#this is my opinion and I like to talk about this stuff

[dcxdpdabbles]

I found and read this cute story on AO3, about Frostbite being Danny's legal parental guardian. In the story Bruce Wayne runs into Frostbite (in his full yeti glory no disguise) who is setting up for school bake sale. Got me thinking about what if Danny's past rogues took turns filling in and doing parental stuff especially at school functions. Like Frostbite does the bake sale, Pandora shows up for his games, Ghostwriter goes to all of the PTA meetings, Clockwork goes to teacher meetings, so on and so forth.

The 43rd Annual Gotham Academy Bake Sale by Faeriekit

Ohhh, that sounds good! I'll get it a read when I have some time. Thank you for the rec!

Danny Fenton is one of the lucky few who have a very involved household. His various family members would always sign up for any school event the boy needed support in. It didn't mean that the boy won everything, but as a teacher for nine years, Emily has come to learn how much it mattered to just have someone show up.

She had seen students whose entire faces light up after spotting someone in the crowd in the same amount she saw a student's hope crumble after they scanned the room.

Danny was a polite young man, a bit on the shyer side, but kind and not a troublemaker, his previous school had her believe. If anything, he seemed to struggle with fitting in, but no students blatantly disliked him.

The general opinion of Danny matched, as her students would say, "I know him from class, but I don't really talk to him. He seems cool though".

Maybe that's why so many people were supposed by his family to march into the auditorium during Danny's talent show. Seeing him wave at the row before starting his gymnastic act had been such a surprise.

Now, Gotham wasn't a close-knit community, not with the size of their city and the millions of people living within it, but everyone would have noticed that Danny was adopted.

After all, he was the only one that wasn't glowing or a large humanoid animal. They cheered the loudest among the crowd; uncaring Danny got bronze- having lost to Joey's tapping dancing for second and Damian's spectacular multi-instrumental cover of a meme song for first place- and Danny beamed back at them.

Gotham was known for not being meta-friendly, but that was only due to a few mean people who shouted the loudest on media outlets. Many of Emily's students were meta, had family that were meta, or knew someone meta. It wasn't a common enough trait one would encounter a meta on every outing, but you would see them in Gotham well enough.

Everyone knew, but no one said it out loud. In the same way, she knew which students' parents were in the country illegally but worked harder than anyone else. Saying anything would help the cops, or worse, the rich running Gotham.

Even the most prejudiced Gothamite would rather be spat on then give them aid. And those who were so prejudiced to help the poor man's enemies, well, Emily has lived here long enough to know they vanished rather quickly. The smart ones kept their mouths shut.

No one could forget what happened to that guy who accidentally insulted Penguin. His grandmother had been an illegal immigrant on his mother's side.

No one messed with that side of the family.

"Hello, Mrs. Jackson." Danny's adoptive father, Dr. Frostbite said, ducking down to avoid banging his head on the door. On one of his shoulders was a box of hotdog wieners; on the other were multiple bags of bread. "I'm here for my snack bar shift."

Emily tilts her head back to look the Yeti in the eye. He had been shocked the first time they met, but she could admit that Dr. Frostbite was a relatively gentle and wise soul. "Welcome aboard. The girls are just about to take the field. You can put that down by the crock pot over there."

The mountain of white fur brushes by her with the grace of a king as Dr. Frostbite does as she says. There were no customers at the window, so she leaned on the counter and offered him a smile. "Did you enjoy the game?"

"Yes. I was saddened our team did not win, but Danny hit a home run." Dr. Frostbite's sharp smile could have been frightening if he wasn't oozing parental pride. "I caught it all on video."

Emily opens her mouth to respond when a hand lands loudly on the counter with a loud crack. Her heart leaps, and she looks into Danny's Ember. She isn't one of Emily's students, though she does appear to be a teenager in appearance.

You know. If it wasn't for her hair made of fire. Or her blue skin. Or her glow.

"I set a boy on fire," She announces with a cackle.

"That's so?" Dr. Frostbite gently rips open the box, taking out the hotdog packages. With one large claw, he rips a hole into it and lets the few weiners slide into the crockpot with a gentle splash. "What did he do?"

"Tried to slap me on the butt." She huffs, rolling her eyes, but her smirk doesn't lose an edge of smugness.

"Well done." Dr. Frostbite praises placing the lid back on. It always surprised Emily to see such careful actions from the large creature. "I assume you did so out of Pandora's line of sight?"

"Naturally. I don't want her lecturing me in front of the whole community." Ember scoffs, crossing her arms. Behind her, the top of Pandora's head can be seen swinging side to side over the dugout, keeping an eye on the ball.

She was the best volunteer referee because even the parents knew not to shout insulting things when she was present. Emily doesn't think she has had such peaceful games in a long while. Hopefully, Danny will try out again for baseball next year so the woman can return.

"Oh hey, you're Danny's English teacher, right? Mrs. Johnson?" Ember asks, leaning on the counter to give Emily a curious look.

When the blond nods, holding out her hand for a shake. "That's right. It's nice to see you again, Ember."

The girl's hair flairs a little as a grin grows on her face. Her hand is ice cold to the touch, but she's got a firm grip that her husband would appreciate. "Likewise. I got a message for you from Ghostwriter. He sent the notes for the last PTA meeting to you and the revision playwright for the musical you two were working on."

Emily's mood brightens up. "That's wonderful. Could you tell him I'll check it out when I get home and get to my laptop since my phone broke in the last Two-Face attack?"

Ember's hair flickers in the wind when she nods, but Danny bounces right up behind her just as she opens her mouth to speak. He's wearing his Gotham Acadamy Baseball uniform with pride despite them losing. "Hey, Frostbite, can I go with Tim and Duke to get Peoeria Pizza? We'll be back before the girl's game ends."

"Only if you take Ember with you," Dr.Frostbite says, nodding to his daughter, who looks alarmed to be included. "She needs more friends."

"Hey!"

"Sure. Come on, Ember, you'll get along with Duke. He likes old-school rock."

"It's not old-school!"

Emily laughs, watching the two siblings bicker as they stride away, blending into the crowd with no one batting an eye at the glowing girl anymore. How blessed that boy was.

"I'm glad Danny has gotten comfortable here. I always worried he never was going to have a normal childhood." Dr. Frostbite confesses to swirling the hotdogs around in the water to ensure each one is cooked.

"I think you and the rest are doing a wonderful job. You're a great father." She assures him, thinking wistfully of her William. He's been on deployment for a few months now and will likely miss the holidays again, but his contract is almost up. They may try for a child when he gets in the reserves. "How are things at the clinic?"

"Oh, wonderful. I'm grateful that Mr. Wayne has allowed the expansion of Thomas Wayne Memorial Clinic. Dr. Thompkins will be covering the east side of Gotham while I help those on the west. It's much more fulfilling than working in some hospital that demands funds for the silliest things. Back home, that would have been illegal. The people would have burned me at the stake if I had allowed anyone to pass away due to greed."

"My kind of people." She laughs. A sharp crack sounds from the field as the bat makes contact with the ball, and the crowd goes wild. It's a wonderful day.

[voidingintotheshout]

You know, with the rise of Trump, and all of these other shitheels I’m just gonna say it I don’t actually get it. If you don’t wanna read if you think reading is stupid and not worth your time then don’t take fucking English classes. Just wait for the fucking movie. You’re just a waste of my fucking time. Don’t trick me into respecting your opinion about a book that you don’t respect enough to actually read. One of the things about Tumblr that I’m really starting to hate is this if you can’t do anything it’s totally OK. There is a difference between people who seek out accommodations to make up for their own struggles, and people who loudly talk about how they’re not going to read the book and they don’t want to bother. It’s a difference between someone who’s struggling with alcoholism and someone who wants accommodations for their alcoholism at work. Like, if you don’t value reading, then don’t darken our door in reading-focus spaces if you’re not gonna actually bother to read the books. 

For what it’s worth, I’m really struggling with a lot of stuff right now and so I might regret this really harsh tone tomorrow, but right now, it just feels like the right thing to say. I really love and cherish the work that writers do to create stories, and the people in the publishing industry that work to edit and get those things into the hands of readers. If you don’t respect all of that labor of love, and just want some machine to summarize it and you feel like that’s good enough? That’s an insult to all of those people and their lifetimes devoted to the written word. Like no offense, but fuck you. 

what is HAPPENING

[valdevia]

Very funny that tumblr is having discourse about whether my art is misinformation or not, after I've been posting it all over the internet for years without any controversy. So let's talk about it!

I know people arguing are a vocal minority, but I'm not going to dismiss anyone's concerns. It's an actually interesting topic that I really consider, and it touches some important issues in society. So here's my (rambly) two cents.

My art is meant to misdirect, in some way. Photomanipulation and the tone I typically use are meant to briefly confuse the person reading it into thinking they're hearing a real story, at least for a few seconds.

The Intended Experience™

In this sense, I feel like my art can be misinformation! And it's not only people who don't think critically about things like "how come I never heard about mermaids being real before?".

So, no disrespect to anyone that fell for one of my pieces! My work plays with reality, so if you fell for it for more than a minute, it just means my tone and style worked a little too well for you! And there are legitimate reasons to be confused when you see something online, too. For example, there are people who can have trouble telling real and fictional things apart. When you post something that goes out to a million people, you'll get one million different reactions.

That's why I always take care to make it really clear, outside the main piece and snippet of text, that my art is no more than fiction. There are tags, the tone of my account, even my profile picture is meant to reinforce this. I also have a website which, in part, is meant to capture the clicks of people to wonder if my stuff is real and google it, so they can find a real source that's clearly an art website. You can try googling "mycelium infection 1806" or "pupillosarcoma" to see how my website tends to appear first.

If I get this comment I know I've done something believable!

But let's say, for the sake of argument, that my art wholly constitutes misinformation. What we need to understand is that misinformation is not the same as disinformation. Misinformation is just incorrect information. It's your grandma seeing a little bit of a found footage movie on TV and thinking it really happened. She might be spooked, but nobody is harmed. Disinformation is false information that's purposefully crafted and spread in order to cause harm, division, or further a political view.

Now I ask you: what real world harm does my art create? The worst that can happen is that a tiny percentage of those that see it get a little scared thinking a weird bug is real, or that mushrooms really grow on faces, or that scientists have released millions of trilobites into the oceans. Is that really that bad?

Anyway, that's my take on the topic! I'm obviously biased, but this being my style, I do put a lot of thought into it and I'm always open to people's opinions! (Just don't scream at random people on the replies or you'll get blocked!)

[gothicfied]

more for 124 :(((((((

Hand in Hand - Nam-gyu / Player 124

Pairing: Nam-gyu / Player 124 x Reader

Summary: The fight in the men's bathroom and the rising tension between players gave you much to worry about, but Nam-gyu gave you to comfort you needed

Warnings: Mentions of death/dying, blood, killing (typical squid game stuff), other than that it's just fluff, not proof read (english isn't my first language)

Word count: 721 words

A/N: Tihihihi, I love this man fr. I hope this isn't too cringe🧍‍♀️

You couldn't sleep, actually, no one was able to sleep. Sitting on the bed under you was Nam-gyu, who didn't want to talk to you - talk to anybody - after the fight was broken up. You immediately understood what was up when he yelled out that the men who voted 'X' had attacked them, killing some of the players. Thanos didn't return. Yeah, it was pretty obvious why he seemed so pissed off, so shell-shocked. Quietly, you sat up, carefully leaning down to see what he was doing. Nam-gyu was biting his fingernails, eyeing Thanos' cross necklace that he was holding in his slightly shaky hands. Seeing you leaning down from the corner of his eye, he frowned.

"What?"

"I can't sleep."

"Why?"

"I'm scared.."

Nam-gyu's face immediately softened upon hearing your words. He swallowed hard and hastily tucked the necklace into his pocket, gesturing for you to come down and sit next to him. As gently as possible to not catch anyone elses attention, you dropped down from your bed and leaned against the headboard of Nam-gyu's bed, your shoulder pressed against his. "Are you sad?" you asked quietly, just looking down at your lap as you spoke. You heard his breath hitching for a moment, but he still asked you what you meant by that. "Sad about- well you know." Silence.

Nam-gyu wasn't quite sure how to answer that question. He has witnessed so many deaths in this place by now and none of them have affected him in the slightest. He didn't know them well, so why should he care about a random player? "Because, I'm not sure if I should be." your voice interrupted his thoughts. Slowly, he turned his head your way, taking in your side profile in the dim light. "Nah," Nam-gyu chuckled, "he was an asshole. Had it coming, in my opinion." Despite his words, he sounded bitter. It's not like he didn't mean them, because that's exactly how Thanos was, but they still had some kind of.. friendship.

You met his gaze, your eyes wandering over his face covered in splatters of blood. That was worrying by itself, but you didn't have any interest in asking about what role he played in that fight. "And why are you scared?" You looked at him like he asked you the most stupid question in the world.

"Come on, you know everyone will try to kill each other now."

"And you know that I won't let anything happen to you."

Ever since he defended you from a group of men, who were making more than weird comments about you, immediately on the first day you woke up in this hellhole, you've just stuck with him. On multiple occasions now, Nam-gyu has proven that he actually won't let anything or anyone harm you. Why? He doesn't know it, either. He just likes you and you didn't take that for granted. Nam-gyu made you feel safe, you trusted him, even if that's hard to believe. Usually, he'd be compliant with what Thanos would say or tell him to do, just not when he was giving you a hard time — That's partially why he just couldn't feel sorry for that man.

Slowly, Nam-gyu wrapped his arm around your neck, making you lean your head against his. The silence between you two was never awkward and more comforting than anything. You were able to hear faint whispers of other players, feet tapping the ground and the occasional cough from that old guy, Player 100. Nam-gyu's hair tickled the side of your face as he pressed a soft kiss to your forehead.

"Whatever happens tonight, I promise I'll keep you safe."

[olderthannetfic]

Hi OTNF and everyone,

I am finding that it's harder and harder and harder to get into anything - book, show, movie... most things seem, you know, to just not be doing it for me, be it fanfic or original stuff.

In part, I think, it's a general restlessness and that it's become harder to give anything enough time to get into the stories, the characters, the settings, the narrative voices... I guess you can call it attention deficit on my part, just a need for stories to deliver those sweet, sweet hits quickly, but they're not.

I'm not currently ficcing but I did for years (might again in the future, who knows), and it's made reading, specifically, harder. It's like I've become more aware of what goes on behind the scene, I guess? I feel like I can see the writer giving up on a sentence, skipping a scene because fuck this, trying hard to not repeat a word although it's the only one that fits, etc.

Or maybe it's just the *everything* around us in the world that is weighing on me too much? I could say it's adult life, but then again I have more free time than most (and boy do I need hours of doing nothing to survive the other hours), and no family/partner (all that would put even more pressure on me): what is wrong, to make everything so UGHHH?

I feel like I'm stuck in a rut with a brain moaning feed me, feeeed me, and whatever I try to give it, it spits everything out. (Yes, I've tried hobbies, and nothing sticks there either. I've never really found rewards or satisfaction there, so...)

Decades ago as a kid, I was a voracious reader, although studying literature took the pleasure of it away from me. It took time and discovering fanfic that brought me back to reading, but at the time the internet was starting to be a thing, too, and it can't have helped the attention thing. AFAIK I'm not ADHD but then again, I couldn't get a proper diagnosis (the therapists I saw were either dismissive or just about The Talking, which was pointless for me).

I just wonder how it all disappeared, you know? Sometimes I find something that catches my attention for a while - a book (but I read quite quickly when motivated), a fandom... but it's been a while now, and it's just so frustrating! When is it going to come back? Will it ever? *gulp*

I know that books were escapism when I was a child, and then fandom was escapism, but at the moment I find myself grabbing at air and my empty hands are mocking me. Give me my escapism baaaaack!

So, uh. Anyone here with me?

--

Yes.

I felt like that during part of lockdown. Anhedonia is common in those kinds of circumstances.

Getting your mojo back is certainly possible, but you may need to go see a professional about depression and have some chemical assistance (yes, even if you don't feel sad per se), or you may need to change your lifestyle to one that doesn't have the thing causing you to need eleventy billion hours of downtime.

Aside from serious interventions like that, you can consider a social media detox. Remove every source of doomscrolling and time wasting of that type. When the attention span is zero and nothing brings joy, the tiny and useless hits from finishing a game of solitaire or seeing one more instagram post become very attractive. This is a trap. It will suck what little energy and joy you have and make your muscles flabby for the work of getting into an in-depth book/hobby/experience.

I know the feeling of being able to see how the sausage is made, but... well... first, being in a better mental state will make that matter less, and second, reading prose that is more competent will make that less of an issue. A lot of mainstream tradpub genre fiction is not, in my opinion, very well written these days. Obviously, people are still enjoying it, and that's fine, but if you're noticing writers fumbling around, it might be time to check out some literary fiction or some other category known more for prose quality than anything else.

It's also important to have some structure and some things to look forward to. Even if you feel tired, overwhelmed, and busy, sometimes, the answer is to do more... But it must be things that are distinct and significant and that get you off of the couch, like going to one museum every weekend.

I saw some advice once about this kind of thing that phrased it as "One big adventure; one small adventure."

Every week, you should have those two things to look forward to that matter. Check out a new coffee shop. That could be the small one. Go to an event: a gallery opening, a concert, whatever.

Physical exercise and doing some things that aren't as verbal and conscious thought-involving is important too. Painting is a better hobby for zoning out than writing is. Taking long walks in nature is good for most people.

--

The kind of intense, obsessive love I had for reading as a child and that I sometimes have for fandom requires a lot of attention and some time. It's escapist, but that masks how much work it actually was. It didn't feel like work only because we were in training.

If you've filled your brain and your day up with a thousand petty annoyances or minor and useless attempts to feel something, you won't have the capacity for those deeper things.

Because you are already at a point that's equivalent to a bad sprained ankle, trying to get back to running right now won't work. You have to stay off of the ankle for a bit, then build your strength and stamina back up.

[nostalgebraist]

Thanks for this thoughtful review!

(BTW, for others – this is probably obvious but there are spoilers below the readmore, don't click unless you've read the book)

I'm going to use this as an opportunity to talk about one specific thing that bugs me about some reader reactions to my stuff. Therefore, most of what I say below will be negative (about your review), but I want to emphasize first that that's not a reflection of what I thought of it overall.

----

What I'm here now to talk about is this kind of thing:

There are parts of all his books, where I really think that the explanation for why they are the way they are is that they are "bad on purpose", and all the bullshit [note: in context "bullshit" seems to be meant as a neutral term for non-realist elements -nost] is a way of turning these shortcomings into strengths. The self-effacing voice which whispers that the characters aren't sufficiently well-drawn, are too cartoonish—well, what if that was the point? What if there was a reason for that, in the story?

And like... okay, there is sort of a sense in which this is true, sometimes, kinda. There is a grain of truth to this; it is getting at something real.

But it pains me to say that, because I don't want to encourage this kind of reading. Interpretations like this are occasionally correct but IMO they're much more common than they should be. IMO the right intuition is that this is a galaxy-brained, contrarian sort of take, a last resort you land on when you've ruled out everything else.

And not just with my work, with everything – I'm simply more aware of the problem when it comes to my work, because I wrote it and I'm aware of why I actually did things the way I did.

I've said this before, but watching the way that people react to my own fiction has been an eye-opening experience, one that has taught me things about reader (and viewer, etc.) reactions in general. Specifically, what I've learned was:

People's tastes are way more diverse than I had realized (before I started writing and sharing fiction). And they are diverse in a very fine-grained way; even if two readers have the same preferences about 90% of stuff, or 95%, they'll still diverge on some things. While it's not literally true that "every reader is a unique snowflake with a preference set that no one else shares," that is a very good first approximation of how things are.

Readers (including me!) have been trained by a lifetime of reading book/movie/etc. reviews to frame their preferences/reactions in a pseudo-objective "this is just how it is" way, like their own tastes have some special viewpoint-independent priority, a quality of "reality" or "accuracy" lacking in everyone else's tastes (which are all different, cf. 1). And this is not just a stylistic quirk of the way people write about fiction, it actually (IMO) feeds back into the underlying opinions behind the written commentary. It degrades people's ability to understand what it is they're looking at and their ability to make accurate inferences about the process of its creation.

----

Here's a sort of cartoonish schematic of the type of experience that led me to draw these conclusions. (And I suspect this is not just a thing that happens to me, I imagine it happens with any sort of work that "contains a lot of different types of stuff" the way mine does.)

Writer makes something that has X and Y and Z in it. Writer thinks X/Y/Z are "great tastes that taste great together." Writer is very pleased with the result.

Reader 1 has similar tastes to writer, says something brief about how they loved the book and it's a new favorite for them.

Reader 2 loves X, is OK with Y, hates Z. They write a lengthy review saying that the book was a mixed bag and could have been great if the writer had stuck to X and not messed things up by doing so much Z.

Reader 3 is the reverse of their predecessor: they hate X, are OK with Y, love Z. They write a lengthy review saying that the book was a mixed bag and could have been great if the writer had stuck to Z and not messed things up by doing so much X.

Reader 4 loves X and Z – but they hate Y. They write a lengthy… you can fill in the rest. Imagine a whole bunch of these guys (readers 5, 6, etc).

Reader 17 has the same tastes as Reader 2: loves X, is OK with Y, hates Z. But their lengthy review takes a different, in some sense "more charitable" angle, speculating that the inclusion of Z was a load-bearing pillar in the overall structure, a thing that unfortunately had to be included to "unlock" all that sweet sweet X.

Reader 18 has the same tastes as Reader 3: hates X, is OK with Y, loves Z. But, they explain, X was a load-bearing pillar in the overall structure, a thing that unfortunately had to be included to "unlock" all that sweet sweet Z.

Writer reads all these reviews and feels strange, dizzy. The "nicer" reviews like 17 and 18 are actually more uncomfortable to read than the "meaner" ones like 2 and 3.

"I don't know how to convince you guys," Writer thinks, "but I... I just liked all of it? I thought it was good? That was why I wrote it? (Why else would I have written it?)"

----

Or, as I wrote in that previously linked post from 2021, w/r/t TNC specifically (and making a slightly different but closely related point):

Some people say X was the worst part of TNC, some people say X was the best part. The story was a celebration of Y; the story was about how Y is laughably futile. It’s a letdown that we were never told more about Z; the reason TNC is good is that it leaves stuff like Z to the imagination. It was obvious we were meant to believe P; it is obvious we were meant to believe not-P; the ambiguity about whether P is tiresome literary masturbation; at least the story didn’t jump the shark by spelling out whether P! The reason people like TNC is, of course, that it has A, although nostalgebraist insisted on putting B in there too because he hasn’t fully perfected his formula yet / he somehow thinks B is good even though it isn’t / he thinks it’s funny how bad B is (but the joke tires). …and then someone else has same take, but with A and B flipped.

This exact sort of thing is of course happening again before our eyes with reactions to TAoHS.

I've encountered multiple readers who disliked most of the story but felt the ending (sort of) "redeemed it," and I've also encountered multiple readers who liked the story up until the ending but disliked the ending (or at least thought it was worse than the rest) – to say nothing of the many readers who liked (or disliked) the whole thing all the way through.

And this ending-related stuff is just one particularly obvious facet of a broader diversity in the overall reader response.

By now I know not to be surprised by this stuff, and even to find it kind of fun to watch... but I have to admit, it is still a dizzying and uncomfortable experience.

----

Now, as I said, it is sometimes true that things really are "bad on purpose."

But I think the interpreter's default hypothesis – which should be maintained by default unless convincing evidence against it can be brought forth – should be:

The writer thinks that the thing they wrote is good. They think the ideas are good and they think they executed them well. And they think this more-or-less homogeneously for everything in the work – there are no "bad but unfortunately necessary" parts from the writer's POV.

(At least, this should be the default with works that aren't making the writer much/any money. Obviously things are different with lucrative commercial fiction; there are plenty of well-paid hacks who know they're hacks and do it for the money, etc.)

Why should this be the default? Multiple reasons.

First: it takes a lot of effort to produce any sort of creative work. The writer thought that effort was worthwhile, for some reason – why?

The most straightforward explanation (and a very common one IMO) is that the writer simply believed in the thing that they were making. They believed the effort was worthwhile because it would yield a good product.

Second: as a writer you have an immense amount of freedom. It's difficult to overstate the extent of it. You are playing God, you decide the way that literally everything will be.

Obviously there are some constraints, cases where one part of a story will imply the existence of another or whatever.

But it's very rare that you actually get forced into "doing a thing you know you are bad at, badly." After all: why do that? No one's forcing you! Just do something else! You're God, you control everything!

(Note that this applies also to the very act of writing anything. No one is forcing you to write at all. If you can't come up with good ideas, nothing prevents you from just not writing your bad ones.)

Third: at least in my experience, "playing God" in this way requires a certain state of mind, a certain boldness and self-assurance, which is incompatible with thinking "yeah this is gonna suck but I have to do it" – but is very compatible with thinking "I am making something excellent and every part of it is excellent, hell yes."

Fourth: because of the previously noted diversity of reader preferences, it should not be surprising to any given reader that they find some parts of the work much better than others, even if the writer thought it was all excellent.

This outcome is predictable from the X/Y/Z stuff I talked about above. No clever interpretive work is required to explain it; it arrives pre-explained; it's simply what happens by default.

And finally: because, as I noted above, I think all of us are infected with "reviewer brainworms" and we need to be mindful of this fact.

(Just to be clear, I am not accusing OP of being more infected with said brainworms than anyone else; I'm still on my soapbox, giving a generic rant about a general issue, with OP as merely a jumping-off point.)

We've grown accustomed to the casual conflation between our own tastes and some (usually hazily imagined and under-theorized) sort of "objective, ideal artistic standards."

Outside of a few edge-case eccentrics who can be ignored for my present purposes, we do not do this because we've become intellectually convinced that

(a) such objective standards make sense and really "exist" or at least really matter and

(b) they just so happen to match our own preferences.

Rather, we've fallen into this habit because it's what the pros do: there's a standard style that professional critics and reviewers write in these days, and that style implies these stances. And if one writes (and thinks, in one's inner monologue) in this style, one can easily fall over backwards into uncritically believing (a) and (b) for no better reason than "I seem to already be talking as though I believe these things, hence it would be simple and convenient if I really did believe them."

But – even if we bracket the philosophical questions of whether (a) is in fact true, and (if it is) whose tastes in particular ought to be elevated in the way (b) presumes – even if we table all that for another day, still we ought to keep in mind how weird and audacious a move this is, this simultaneous assertion-without-explanation of the (a)+(b) pair.

We've gotten used to it by exposure, because "the pros" have normalized it. But in actual fact it is a pretty wild thing to just go and assume, given the X/Y/Z/etc. diversity of actual opinion!

If (b) is true for you (general "you" not OP), then it can't be true for me, because we're both unique snowflakes to a first approximation; indeed if (b) is true for you then (to a first approx.) it is only true for you. No one else's tastes have this magical relation to reality, just yours.

Holding the belief (b) about a given reviewer is conceivable-but-wild if we're only considering them in isolation. But once we bring a 2nd reviewer (with non-identical tastes) into the picture, who also believes (b), it's literally impossible to maintain that both of these people are fully right.

And then of course in real life there are not 2 but many, many readers out there, all of them unique snowflakes. And, while it is socially normal in our social context for each one of them to write like they're the chosen one blessed with that special (b)-magic, if you read enough such writing and actually think about what you're reading, it can't help but feel like a sort of game, like playing make-believe. As with most games, it can be very entertaining (for all parties involved), but we shouldn't confuse its amusing conceits for properties of the real world.

In the real world, the writer has their tastes, and you have yours. These tastes are probably not identical. The writer may be aware of the diversity of readerly tastes, and may thus be aware that tastes like yours are out there, but they have no special reason to consider you in particular, elevating you above all the other readers who are non-identical with them (and with you). The writer is dimly and abstractly aware of you, at best, as just another one of the people who will come along later, dislike some of their choices, assume that these choices were wrong in some "objective" way the writer knew about at the time, and then speculate as to why the writer would do something they know is wrong. For every choice, and every way of making every choice, one can imagine a reviewer who responds to it in this way, and quite often these reviewers actually materialize once the work is available for consumption. If you try to reason about these guys in advance, as a writer, it'll stop you in your tracks (if nothing else because there are 2+ of them whose takes are mutually incompatible). You've gotta have some other standard of value to rely on.

So, as a reviewer, if you ask "why would someone ever make a choice I don't like?" and try to pick at this question, you are quite likely heading toward a dead end. The writer wasn't thinking about you (or people like you). They were applying their own, distinct standard of value.

Better to ask: "suppose there was a person who actually liked all of this. What would they be like? How would they be similar to me / different from me? And what, if anything, can I conclude from that?"

The Apocalypse of Herschel Schoen

My fourth novel, The Apocalypse of Herschel Schoen, is now available in full.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

[pricegouge]

Okay I have something to say about anons/comments like this...

When I get stuff like this I usually delete it, or maybe respond depending on how desperate I am for approval that day, but when my friends get demands comments like this? 😤

Look, I understand that it's implied you like the writer's content, given you're asking for more, but I think we all need to take a step back and recognize how you're talking to strangers when you do shit like this. This is the equivalent of just walking up to someone on the street and asking if they ever plan to make that thing you want. And it kinda sucks. Even vending machines get quarters, man.

I know I'm not the first to say that engagement is down, or that writers are being treated like content creators, but when you do this it's almost worst, in my opinion. You like our stuff enough to take time out of your day to drop by our inbox, but not enough to even spend five words telling us what you liked? Or even that you liked it at all? Just "more content?" No fucking 'please'? Even if I give you the benefit of the doubt - because again, I realize what's implied/that it's probably said lightheartedly - it's still rude!

Idk. No one likes asking for approval, but no one likes getting shit like this either. Put good in, get good out. You want your favorite writers to spend more time on something you loved, then actually show it/them some love.

[bonesashesglass]

God, I’m just so mad and upset and I need to rant for a minute:

I live in Wisconsin, where the last several years winters here have been scarily mild. It’s not uncommon for us to have a mild winter every few years or so, but we’ve been having milder and milder winters for the past several years in a row. Winters here are supposed to be long and snowy. It’s supposed to start snowing in November, sometimes October, and the snow doesn’t melt all the way till April, sometimes early May.

Last year, I felt like we barely even had a winter. There was snow on the ground for maybe two months total, it kept melting and then coming back, which isn’t supposed to happen. The snow will maybe melt after the first couple times, but once you get to December, it’s supposed to stay on the ground until Spring.

Same thing is happening this year. It’ll snow for like two days, stick for maybe one day, and melt. It’ll stay that way for a couple of weeks. It’s January now. The fact that there’s no snow on the ground, in fucking Wisconsin, is alarming. The fact that this has been happening several years in a row now is alarming. I’m seeing it happen right in front of me. We’re all seeing the effects of climate change now, and we’re seeing how it’s directly destroying and harming the planet. We can see it with our own eyes.

I’m thinking about the fires in LA right now. I saw someone talk about how they were alarmed they were getting these kinds of winds in January. (I’m not familiar with LA climate but this person talked about how abnormal it is).

Everything the scientists have been saying about climate change is coming true. It’s happening right in front of us, for the whole world to see. And still, the people responsible, the right-wing politicians and businesspeople that profit off of this just deny deny deny. How can you deny what’s happening right in front of everyone? They are destroying our planet, and they still think they can deny it happening. It just makes me so angry. That a handful of people have the power to destroy our planet and refuse to even acknowledge it. They act like the words “climate change” is liberal propaganda. As if it’s not something we can see happening right before our eyes. They pretend it’s political, they pretend it’s a conspiracy, because they have no other way to justify being against protecting the planet.

One thing that angers me most is that the only thing people seem to do about this is complain on social media. (I know, that’s exactly what I’m doing, but hear me out). LA is burning to the ground because of climate change, and what’s anybody going to do about it? Make a post on Twitter? Maybe write an article about it?

That doesn’t change anything. We need change. We need direct action. It’s only going to get worse if we keep letting companies and governments continue as they are. They cannot continue as they are.

If you haven’t heard of the book How to Blow Up a Pipeline, go look it up. The author talks about a lot of the stuff I want to get at here, but he puts it a lot better.

My hope is that these LA fires will start a movement for stopping climate change. Not just a general shift of opinion like we’ve seen the past few years, but a real movement where people show up in person to do something. We exist in a time where Luigi Mangione is seen as a hero for his actions, I hope people will get inspired to take more direct action in regards to climate change. (That doesn’t mean shooting more people, I’m not advocating for murder, but we need to start taking action beyond just complaining on social media).

I’m going to start researching resources to help myself and others to get more involved with preventing climate change. I hope one day, we’ll have an actual winter in Wisconsin again. To everyone in LA, please please stay safe❤️

[kiryoutann]

i wanted to rant about simon.

what do you think so far like what are your actual headcanons for the canon simon vs this simon from this series?

my feelings about the actual simon is quite vague. i've read far more fanfictions than bothering with the actual material so my picture of his is not really...constant? idk

but with this simon, he scares me. just to think about people that can engage in such romantic and sensual acts with little to no feeling involved.

or the mc's father. her dad makes me feel such an anger and injustice that i don't know how to express it and i know we probably won't get a satisfying update on him.

you don't like your wife fine i could understand the distance between them, but how can somebody forget their child no matter if they share the same blood or not, after all the time he raised her

leaving all that behind just to start a whole new life. how can that not eat somebody alive

OHH this is actually a good question. honestly for me, simon is probably one of the hardest character to write about because he doesn't give away too much. too calm. too know-it-all.

we're just gonna talk about the romance aspects!

but based on my head-canon of the canon simon, he has those younger years where he avoids romance, but not this actively and aggressively. it's more because he has too much on his plate (anger management issues, PTSD, depression) than because he think he's not good enough for some happiness (but he also doesn't expect/hope for it.)

canon younger (probably 6-7 years after he killed Roba) Simon lives his life without the need for things to turn out in certain ways. as he gets older (yes, the 2022/2023 ghost) and better mentally, he's become a little more open to the idea, though.

he's still not actively seeking romance, settling on one-nightstands and things that don't require any strings attached. however, he's not completely closed off to the idea too. if he has someone he likes AND TRUST (this is already a high wall to get over), he might act on it. but again, not really actively pursuing it and knows he doesn't need it.

and this might come as a surprise, but he's actually the biggest flirt out there—well, at least when it's only the two of you. when in front of his taskforce, he goes back to acting like he's the calm, collected, cool, stoic, scary lieutenant that everyone knows. can't have you ruin his reputation, right?

"it's private but not secret," with him. though it's not loud PDA, sometimes he lets his hands linger in places like your waist, your hips, shoulders. his love language is act of service, gift giving, physical touch—he makes sure to always appreciate you with compliments and love affirmations, but he's never really a man who's big on words.

WHILE THIS SIMON, hmmm.. he's a bit more complicated. and a mess. at some point, you can think of him as the younger version of canon simon we just talked about to simplify it, but even that's not really accurate considering the different ways they handle "all that sappy stuff" (as simon would say). this one actively and AGGRESIVELY avoids romance.

and while they both (my ver. of canon simon and this simon) sort to flings and one-nightstands, the canon simon is more careful and actually follows the boundaries he draws himself. while this simon outlines the boundaries, follows his rules until an interesting bird enters his orbit, violates them, and destroys them himself before he goes around saying "you read that wrong, darling."

NOW, ABOUT THE FATHER. . .

RIGHT! in my opinion, it's better for them to get a divorce actually and Dad still plays a role in MC's life rather than just leaving her. like, i know it'll still hurt the MC but, at least she can still have both of her parents even though in different houses! at least she doesn't have to feel neglected in her childhood.

okay, you hate someone you thought you would love forever, but abandoning your child? whose very existence was created because of you? talk about the Dad will come up in the sequel. hell, he'll even make an appearance with his two ballet loving new daughters. imagine how MC will feel.

sadly, this happens a lot in real life. fathers leaving and starting a new life without thinking about his "old" family. how people shame single mothers but never the absent fathers. people shame many women who have "daddy issues" or call them "fatherless" yet never call out men's incapability of being a real, PRESENT father.

[tech-luver]

It's exam season and to help me cope I've been writing fun stuff between study sessions. Maybe my opinions could be appreciated and debated on the interwebs.

Ranking (some of) the LL crew based on who would let you take a nap on them and how comfy that nap would be:

Rodimus: 6/10 He would be so down with you taking a nap on him but he's very sharp and very distractable. His neck flare plate(?) would prevent you from sliding off but you better hope when something get his attention you don't get crushed in his neck cabling. I think he would try to remember you are there, maybe poke at you when he's bored, but if he's active, try is the key word there. Bonus points for running warm though… hopefully not too warm.

Megatron: 8/10 A solid nap to be had. Good flat shoulder plating and he would never forget you were up there. Loss of points over the fact he would only let it happen if he really liked you and, lets be real here, there would always be that prickle at the back of your neck over how low your defences are and how many organics this mech has crushed.

Ultra Magnus: 10/10 The holy grail of naps, plenty of flat surfaces to rest on, no one can bother you cuz almost no one is as tall as him, he would willingly be your alarm clock, always knows you're there, incredible nap spot. Only issue would be convincing him, but you could make up something about how humans need to nap in high places or whatever and he would fold in concern for your fragile human health.

Ratchet: 5/10 Half of the battle is getting him to agree and the other half is trying to fall asleep whilst he grumbles, he also moves around a lot cuz he never rests and is always helping bots in the medbay. I don't know if you can fall asleep to the sound of metal being welded together or someone getting yelled at for injuring themselves doing something stupid but… all the power to ya.

Drift: 9/10 Respects the need of the nap, it's basically like meditation so he gets it. His calm energy really helps when drifting off. I think he likes the idea of protecting a little human as they snooze which gives him guard dog energy when you're out, no ones messing with you and ruining your beauty sleep. Lose a point cuz he is sleek in design so fully resting on him comes at a risk.

Rung: 4/10 Doesn't mind if you ask but, I'm sorry, he's too rounded, not good for lying down. Although, he would be very careful and gentle with you so it just might work out. He works in a quiet environment which is nice but if he is having/about to have a therapy session he will ask you to leave, patient confidentiality is important to him. You would have to schedule your naps with him which is not the point of naps.

Cyclonus: 1/10 Zero flat surfaces so you would need to strap in. I don't think he would want you napping on him, he would constantly need to check you haven't fallen to your death and would find it awkward talking to people with something hanging on his shoulder. Would tell you to just go back to your berth or find a non-moving flat area, why do you want to nap on a Cybertronian anyway? A single point for at least being nice about it when he denies you.

Tailgate: 7/10 Absolute sweetheart about it but there's nowhere to really lay down on him. He would offer to hold you as a solution, which, if you don't mind being cradled like a baby (or having other people see you being cradled like a baby, tanking your reputation), seems alright. Since you are right in front of him at all times that way, there's no chance of him forgetting you're there. Will shush other people if they're being too loud around you. High chance of inducing cuteness aggression in him when you're asleep and softly snoring, will go for the cheeks.

Swerve: 3/10 This mech spends all his time loudly blabbering in a bar, noise needs to not be an issue for you. Similar issue with Tailgate where laying down is difficult. Unfortunately, does know what a human baby is so will coddle and humiliate you if you agree to being held. Another issue, the prankster Swerve is, you can't trust this guy to not draw on you or not steal something from you and hide it in an unreachable spot or not put you on a floatie in the middle of the oil reservoir. Gets some points cuz only HE can mess with you, anyone else tries to wake you up and they're out the bar.

Whirl: 0/10 …I mean there is literally nowhere to lay down, he's too damn skinny. You…could take a chance with his giant chassis but you'll probably slide off or look like you're in a baby holder if you strap yourself down. IF you are successful at staying in place (somehow), he would just bother you the whole time or not give a shit you're there and start running around. Worst case, he tries to use you as a meat shield to get away with annoying bots cuz "If you try to punch me, you'll punch the squishy human as well!"

Brainstorm: 3/10 Mech hangs from the ceiling sometimes. Sure, he has some alright shoulder plating to work with but his spontenaiety could literally throw you off. Would allow a nap but wouldn't check on you, too absorbed in his work. If he was bored and didn't have any ideas coming to him, you could suggest a sleeping bag that attaches you to mechs you want to sleep on.

I know I've missed some bots, maybe my stress will produce a part 2.

[universalzones]

Twist would keep his opinion on Lanolin's comment about G.U.N to himself as there were more important things. "My contact ain't that high up, though they should be high enough to convince letting us move out civilians. That said, they might ask your crew to help out with that so they may let some more in, though that's a guess." The lemur wasn't sure what policy's had changed since he was honorably discharged from his service due to his injury.

"Though they may want to talk to the head doctor to confirm the number of injured as well as being short of staff. As long as they don't mind being drawn away from their work for a minute or two." Twist knew it wasn't as simple as that as if someone was heavily injured then stopping for even a moment could be dangerous. Still, there is a possibility they'll want to talk to the head doctor.

===========================================================

Tumble was a bit surprised when Jewel just, gave up and let herself fall. The skunk was quick to catch her and it was clear she wasn't looking so hot. "I think she has a point bro. She clearly isn't looking so hot." He was holding the beetle has gently as he could, not wanting to make things worse if he could help it.

"Then we just have to be careful and find a med kit somewhere! I'm doing the best I can!" Rough shouted as he finished busting the hole open and made it into the sewer line. "Sorry for shouting, though we're already back in trouble. I swear, we try to go straight like Ms. Vanilla said, though Clutch just kept asking more and more," the skunk said as she slipped into the hole.

"I guess that's true," Tumble said as he walked over to the hole and gentle lower Jewel in first for Rough to carefully grab before jumping down himself. The two skunk brothers starting to walk down. "Yeah, Ms. Vanilla was very strict about that, though we did try. Clutch just wouldn't stop asking us for stuff." They tried to stay on the straight and narrow, though so much for that.

"Stupid opossum getting us into more trouble. Just when we were about to talk to start talking Mamá again and work things out." Rough would beat up Clutch if he could, though a guy like that was too well connected and had way too much security so what choice did they have. "All we did was sign up to be the mascots, not all of this."

Lanolin was rather focused on trying to get a signal to call back to the command center when she was approached from behind. She didn't really acknowledge them as she had far bigger issues to deal with. Like dealing with this gun incursion, and finding Jewel. She thought if she called her maybe she could reach her phone? Though she guessed Clutch took her phone away. She just needed to know if she was ok but, she also couldn't waste anymore time and had to get back to the Command Center. Yet Twist's voice finally got her attention and she turned around to face him directly.

" Yes, I'm Acting Director of Restoration. With so many people off base... i was put in command. "

she explained without saying to much more then that.

" I'll be honest... I don't right trust GUN right now further then i can throw the lot of them. But... If you can get these people to safety, or even some more of our staff allowed in. I'd be grateful... tell me what you need "

=============================================

Jewel was still quite dazed from her injury, and her carapace was cracked on her head slightly from the impact to it. She was shocked to see the two ruffin's but then she recalled she did come here to let them out. She recalled Clutch saying they'd been caught and were just expendable and thus he had no intention of saving them. But then the cave in, her head--- had Charm been there? oh chaos where was he!

She didn't have time to think about it as the Skunks dove for her and she tried to fly away but, between her throbbing head and blurred vision she didn't get very far. With one of the boys grabbing her leg and dragging her down! She was held fast, but shockingly didn't fight back. She was tired, hurting, and her head was spinning. The less she moved the better she felt and where did she even have to go? she just went limp in there arms and looked rather dejected and defeated.

But there was always more then one way to win a battle

" ... you two haven't thought this through have you? "

She said in a soft tone as speaking caused her head to throb more

" ... Or rather i doubt you know the situation. How about... you set me down so my head stops spinning and--- we just talk this out? i won't run i promise... both because i can't do to my injury, and because isn't anywhere to go... plus i'm no fighter, so you have nothing to worry about... "

[thewalrusespublicist]

"Tbh I was starting to feel a bit down about my blog and what I was putting out ( the eternal crisis on how to give full answers and opinions without being stupid, boring and annoying lol)"

OMG no way! Your blog is one of the best here! What i love the most is reading the analysis and meta from the users, there's always more information and good takes, and yours are always quite deep and insightful.

I would love if you share your opinions about Stuart as well. I feel like he is obviously more sanctified that he should be since he died young (like that insane quote from his mom saying that Brian told her that Stuart could have been the Beatles' manager, no way lol) and i feel his memory has been used to attack Paul, sometimes in a very unfair way. Like, i don't deny the teenage drama and jealousy that Paul felt about him but he *was* a shitty bass player and the band was Paul's future, he was allowed to criticized him not only for being John's new bestie. I also think John played with them both but i lack of your eloquence so i will love to read your take about it.

Hi anon! And the other anons!

Thank you again and to all the other messages I got, they were extremely sweet and really made my day. :)

From my inbox, it's clear you guys want to know about Stu and his role in the Beatles legacy. Well you asked for it and a novel you shall have. Be warned this might be the longest post I've done so grab like a drink or something.

A few disclaimers: I wish and had intended for this to be more of a deep dive into Stu as a whole person rather than just his relationship with John and Paul. Unfortunately I just didn't have the space to do it. If you want to know more about Stu I would highly recommend @eppysboys' blog which is the source for all things Stu Sutcliffe and where I got a lot of this info. Please check their stuff out. Also, I'm going to be a bit blunter on this than maybe I usually am because this topic has been irritating me for some time. Oh also I’m trying my best to answer a lot of asks in one post so please forgive if I don’t fully answer your specific ask about this!

Stu in a perfect world should be a fandom darling: an exciting cipher, a handsome artistic talent that died way too soon who had a major influence in the early Beatles style. It's like there’s this secret other James Dean looking mf Beatle hidden away to uncover, that's cool and he is cool! The problem is that he’s sort of becomes radioactive to talk about in a normal way due to how he's been portrayed and utilised in some biographies and fandom spaces, particularly those that have been infected by John Lennon aspirational boy bestie syndrome. As those types of spaces cannot seem to exist without tearing down Paul to prop John up as their special lil guy, Stu as John's other best friend has become the ideal heavy object to hit Paul McCartney over the head with. It's like a corrosive element, the minute Stu hits a Beatles bio, the biographer suddenly loses all training in objectivity and source work and starts waxing lyrical about 100 percent reliable never biased or wrong Saint Stu of Hamburg who died for our condom arson sins and that Paul McCartney should feel bad about every day of his life for not worshipping Stu and not accepting his own ‘place’ in life as John's just-some-guy placeholder best friend. I’ve personally seen so many posts and forums where Stu being mentioned leads to a legion of comments about how Paul could never have been Stu (correct both ways) and how John would never have even glanced at Paul for much longer if Stu had been alive. Sidenote: If you seriously think that the musical savant from down the road whom John went on to produce the most prolific song writing partnership in history with couldnt have kept his attention for long then I'm begging you on hands and knees to get your head out of the arse of your John Lennon body pillow and be serious. But anyway…

This boy bestie battle royale approach has in turn lead to a reflex reaction where Stu gets studiously ignored by other sections of the fandom as a precedent has been set that shining a light on him diminishes Paul and John's relationship with Paul. It's frustrating because if people weren't so keen to cut Paul out of his own story then we would get a much better nuanced view of every single person involved.

So let's put aside all of our defenses, cut the John Lennon loved one ranking system bullshit and lets look at the actual question here which is what was John and Stu's relationship really like and what did he mean to John?

John and Stu met at art college a year or so after Paul and John met. Up to that point John and Paul had their fun little codependant thing going on but Stu quickly became a huge fixture in John's life. Stu had things that Paul couldn't really offer at that point in time. John was at his heart a musician who aspired to be seen as an artist (he would later express surprise that he didn't become an artist). Stu was the passionate artist who knew tons about the art of the period that could teach and inspire John. Their creative leanings meant they could work on projects together and share art notebooks and poetry. (Including yes the one with anti-semitic story which I mention again as I believe it's an important thing to remember when it comes to both John and Stu and the culture of the time.) Stuart by the sounds of it was even writing a novel about John at the time of his death. They were fascinated and inspired by each other.

So, creatively they fired each other up but more importantly perhaps, Stu and John were peers. It's funny to think about when you see the Beatles later but at the time Paul and George were the kids in their school uniform coming to see their cool older friend at art school. That's an important divide. When Paul and George's parents insisted their kids do their homework and go to bed, John and Stu could stay up and talk all hours of the night, which they did. They also could rent a place together and spend long hours chatting (despite John moving out later after realising electricity cost money lol.) There's a different dynamic that the age similarity offered as well. Whilst Paul would later somewhat grow into this role, Stu could act as an authority figure to John as well as open up to John in a way you can really only do with your peers. Stu was the person John opened up to throughout Stu's life:

How long can one go on writing and writing like you. I now don’t really know who I’m writing to or why it’s quiet peculiar. I usually write like this and forget about it but if I put it in a little part of my [almost?] secret self in the hands of someone miles away who will wonder what the hell is going on or just pass it off as toilet paper. Anyway I don’t care really what happens because when I think about it, it’s so bloody unimportant – but what is important who has the right to say that this letter is not important and this is a something any way – anyway – anyway – yeah! I wonder what it would be like to be a cretin or something. I bet it’s gear. & how are you keepin Stuart old chap are you as ok – is life as good – bad shite, great – wonderful as it was or is it just a thousand years of nothing and coolness on and on and on. I think this is it Goodbye Stu don’t write out of – er what is it? well not because you think you ought to write when you feel like So goodbye (from John you know the one with glasses) ANYWAY BYE BYE see you soon I don’t know why I said that I remember a time when everyone I loved hated me because I hated them so what so what so fucking what I remember a time when belly buttons were knee high when only shitting was dirty and everything else clean + beautiful I can’t remember anything without a sadness So deep that it hardly becomes known to me so deep that its tears leave me a spectator of my own STUPIDITY + so I go rambling on with a hey nonny nonny nonny no

Extract from a letter to Stuart Sutcliffe from John Lennon, 1961

By lots of accounts Stu was gentle but firm when it came to telling John he'd gone too far. John references this aspect of Stu to Hunter Davies:

"I looked up to Stu. I depended on him to tell me the truth. Stu would tell me if something was good and I'd believe him."

The Beatles: The Authorised Biography (Hunter Davies)

In this way I kind of see Stu as a proto-Yoko. John was so insecure and uncertain about his grip on the world and reality that he relied on Stu to be his point of reference and guide. Paul did this too later and I think in Hunter Davies John mentions this, but not at this time period and not as much due to their competitiveness. This may be why some people saw Stu as the person that really understood John at this time period:

"During the turbulent adolescence that prefaced a turbulent manhood, hardly anyone knew Lennon as intimately as Stuart Sutcliffe. If they weren't exactly David and Jonathan, June Furlong, one of the life models at Liverpool's Regional College of Art, had "never seen two teenagers as close as those two."

The Gospel According To Lennon by Alan Clayson

Now this person likely never met John and Paul together but this is only one of many similar quotes and even Julia captain of John and Paul's friendship boat seems to agree there was a period where Stu dominated and Paul 'kept his distance' from the John-Cyn-Stu 'menage-a-trois'. But the friendship wasn't perfect and his position as John's ultimate best friend was never iron clad. This is best outlined by the shit they pulled when John convinced him to join on Bass for the Beatles.

Despite being John's best friend, Stu was teased and bullied:

"They argued as usual amongst themselves, but most of all they picked on Stu, the newest member of the group. John, George and Paul had been with each other long enough to know that rows and arguments and criticism didn't mean much. If it did, you just argued back. "We were terrible," says John. "We'd tell Stu he couldn't sit with us, or eat with us. We'd tell him to go away, and he did." At one hotel they stayed at, a variety show had just left. There had been a dwarf in the show and they found out which bed he had slept in and said that would have to be Stu's. They certainly weren't going to sleep in it. So Stu had to. "That was how he learned to be with us," says John. "It was all stupid, but that was what we were like."

The Beatles: The Authorised Biography (Hunter Davies)

Why John encouraged this I have no idea, maybe jealousy over Stu's looks and wanting to play people off each other? Things were tense in both Scotland and Hamburg, especially between Stu and Paul. As I said in my last post, the girls were fighting and it was mutual. Paul was mad for both fair and immature teenage-boy reasons. Stu could not be bothered with the bass most of the time and couldn't really play well and was only there as he was '(John's) best friend' (ouch for Paul). Paul conversely had given up higher education to be there and was sending lots of money back home. He also was dating the girl Paul fancied. Stu was popular with the new group and also did mean things like help John steal Paul's money when money was really tight for him. Paul in turn was a passive aggressive, jealous and mean. It all came to ahead in the punch up onstage which according to Spitz came about from Paul wanting money back and saying that Stu could borrow some from Astrid. Stu goes for him and reports vary from full-on bust up to embarrassing scuffle. Stu then goes to where Astrid and Paul's gf Dot are, demands Dot leaves and goes on a rant about Paul. Now all of this must be framed in the context of Stu receiving increasing brain damage from his condition that seemingly lead to mood swings and anger. Nevertheless, the mutual needling and anger, as well as John's refusal to do/say fuck all about it, especially given how protective John was of Stu, suggests that it wasn’t straightforward and/or John may have been playing some games to make both feel threatened. This would also make sense as to why we hear conflicting accounts of John and Stu being the centre of everything and everyone else in orbit AND John and Paul being the centre and everyone else playing catch-up, as well as John giving Paul the lead to take him round the Reeperbahn when John got dressed in the gorilla costume. (I know Paul may have just been the closest there but that always gave off bestie behaviour to me.)

(I did get an ask about how John and Paul's friendship survived it, I think it was damaged by Hamburg. When Paul got back home he got a job at a construction site and there's just a vibe of everything being a bit on tenterhooks. John also acts a bit weird at the period, not talking to anyone for a few weeks then making a lot of weird demands from Paul. I'm really not sure what to make of it.)

Even when he's back in Liverpool, John still writes long letters to Stu and vice-versa. I can't find it at all but I’ve read a really sad interview with John saying he missed his best mate and it's a shame that he's not with them. He had no idea at that point that Stu had already died of a brain hemorrhage at 21.

John is said to have gone into hysterics when he found out Stu had died. A lot of people who've spoken about this time (Aunt Mimi, his sister Julia, the Exsis) concur that at this point Stu was his best friend and the death shattered him. He even told Astrid he wished he could give his life for Stu’s. This is backed up by the fact that John never forgot Stu and his shadow lingered for the rest of John's life:

Stu was recalled in In My Life

Years later, after John composed the first of his truly poignant and heartfelt Beatles songs, "In My Life"—with its lines about "friends I still can recall/some are dead and some are living"—he revealed to me that the two people he had had uppermost in mind were myself and Stuart Sutcliffe. And then he stunned me with a statement that I'd never heard him address to anyone—least of all to another man. "You know, Pete," he said softly, "I do love you. But," he quickly added, "I loved Stuart as well."

Weird that Paul isn't mentioned surely you think that he would be mentioned if Pete was there too okay, okay my tin hat is going away this isn't the time

Pete Shotton, Nicholas Schaffner, John Lennon: In My Life

In 1965 John drew Stu on a postcard

He apparently said this about Stu prior to sending the postcard, prompted by an article about Stuart.

The card had been sent from Genoa mid-way through the Beatles' Italian tour. [...] But the conversation had become maudlin when I reminded him that he was going to talk to me for an article about Stuart. [...] In that sad telephone conversation before they set off for Milan, I asked him if he was happy: 'I'd be a lot happier if Stuart was still part of us,' he said, 'The Beatles would be complete.' And before he rang off he said 'Ill send you something.'

He also appears on the cover of Sgt Pepper

As mentioned, Stu gets mentioned in Hunter Davies in terms of wistfulness and guilt AND he gets a mention in John's insane 'if I were a homosexual' ramblings in early 70s. According to Yoko, John also wanted Yoko to write letters to him and didn't think it would be strange because Stu wrote letters to him.

I have a pet theory that as with a lot of things for John, his unresolved grief over Stu really came to the fore in the late 60s now that he had actually had a chance to sit down and think about things. I believe it was partially why he wanted Yoko to write letters and why he gets mentioned in the early 70s as a collaborator/best friend and not in 1980 where John only gives that credit to Paul and Yoko. I think with the cracks with Paul, John had started to think back on his old friend and guide and what advice he would give.

Stuarts presence is still felt throughout the seventies:

“He told me everything. He loved to talk about Hamburg. There were no secrets. It was the kind of life I never knew…. It meant total freedom. At his side always was Stuart, sweet Stuart. There wasn’t a time in John’s life when he didn’t think about Stuart. He spoke always of his love and respect for Stuart.”

Yoko discussing Stu in When They Were Boys: The True Story of the Beatles’ Rise to the Top by Larry Kane

Coming to grips with his death is also present in Skywriting

SEAN O’HAIRE: What happened to Stuart Cliff? DR. FISCHY: What happened was a full exchange of energy where it was not needed within the expression of your own self or in the energies involved around and about you. We cannot call it a happening. We’ll say it is an awakening, for in that way it has served an expression from the past to the present and to the future to where there shall be more of that incomplete vibration expressed to you in a more fuller understanding.

Skywriting by Word of Mouth, John Lennon

This isn't exhaustive but I think from all this it's pretty clear that John adored Stu, John grieved Stu and kept grieving Stu. Stu had a specific place in his life as a confidant that he tried to recreate with Yoko. At the time of Stu's death, he was John's best friend, probably slightly over Paul. Stuart had been able to be both a friend and paternal presence, a confidant and an artistic collaborator. His presence and loss was one of the foundational points in John's life.

But as we've been asked to play this stupid game and so many bios like to make a hoopla about it, were they at their closest ever as close as John and Paul were at their height?

No.

How do we know? Because John told us so:

" He [Paul] still is the closest friend I've ever had, except for Yoko, so I'm still close to him whatever goes on."

John Lennon to an interviewer, 1971

But Walrus! John just says shit! How do we know he isn't leaving out Stu because the press don't know Stu. Well true John does just say shit but this is at a time where John isn't the most glowing about Paul and he's had no problem mentioning Stu in this time period ('one of my best friends ever' would have made a similar point).

But Walrus again! If John picked Stu over Paul when they were young why wouldn't he be the boy bestie of all time, and why would John say that he was closer to Paul? Well, because of the environment and timings. Stu's death happened near the beginning of John and Paul's major bonding moments. If you look at their personal timeline, Paris, the Nerk twins, and getting signed happened just before Stu died. That's missing the major years of Beatlemania, Key West, LSD, Paul growing more into being John's peer and a load of other huge moments in their lives. It's like how John writes to Cyn in 1962 about wanting the house to themselves and not have Paul around all the time. Would you say because he feels closer to Cyn then that John in his overall lifetime loved Cyn more than Paul? No, because relationships change over time and theirs were no exception. (One thing to consider as well is that we don't yet have many letters between John and Paul during their Beatles years and earlier, probably because they were spending so much time with each other. We know a couple exist that Paul considers too personal for publication but I'm sure there are others. It's easy to understand what John felt for Stu as we have the letters, I think we would also have an easier time understanding what John felt for Paul if we had the equivalent of those.)

At the end of the day Paul was the man he believed he had a psychic bond with, the man he couldn’t shut up about, the man whom he’d conquered the world with with their endless collaboration, the man with a twin personality to him and according to John spent more time with throughout the 60s than he had with Yoko ever. To be frank if Paul had died in 67' I don't think this would have been a conversation.

As mentioned early, in early 1970s John elevates his partnership with Stu to his collaborations with Paul and Yoko but by 1980 he’s pretty clear that Paul and Yoko are their own category.

"I was saying to somebody the other day, “There’s only two artists I’ve ever worked with for more than a one night stand, as it were. That’s Paul McCartney, and Yoko Ono.” And I think that’s a pretty damned good choice!!"

John Lennon interview with DJ Dave Sholin, 1980

There are of course the what ifs. Would Stu still being alive mean that John was not as close with Paul? Maybe, highly doubtful though as the Beatles experience was so intense. If Stu remained a Beatle would John be as close with Paul? If Stu remained a Beatle he wouldn't be Stu so no. At the same time who knows what it would have been like if Paul and John were peers from the off? I said this to @the62ndbugsfan when it comes to Stu vs Paul (hi girl sorry i've made our chat a whole ass post lol) but to go a bit Wuthering Heights, soulmates are made as much from the earth as they are of the stars. What binds us is our experiences just as much as our personalities. There may be a universe where Stu and John took on the art world together or became inseparable bffs again after the Beatles disbanded, but it is not our universe. In this universe Stu tragically died and John and Paul chose to become Lennon/McCartney and artistically unite themselves forever.

Even going back to Stu's lifetime, I've said it before and I'll say it again I find it interesting that not only did John choose to go to Paris with Paul rather than pay to meet up with Stu somewhere but that they arranged to meet up with Juergen and nobody told Stu until they'd already gone. Stu was shocked and didn't know if it meant the end of the Beatles which is a pretty big thing for him not to know about. Why didn't John tell him if they're apparently still writing long letters? Was it because he really wanted to do this with Paul and didn't want to hurt Stu's feelings? And that's really the point I want to make here. Due to his trauma John was preoccupied with reinforcing ranking of relationships within his life. But the thing is friendship rankings are made up guidelines and the reality is far more complicated. You can have a designated best friend but feel closer to another friend at times, you can want to do one thing specifically with one friend and not the other for various reasons. You can (as I do) have more than one equal best friend. Friendship as with most relationships are in a constant state of flux and each friendship you have will give and mean a different thing, even if they are of similar value to you.

Paul may have ended up closer to John than Stu had been, but that doesen't make John's relationship with Stu any less special. Nor does Stu negate the significance of Paul. Whilst both fit into John's pattern of intense relationships and demands related to that, both had unique positions and meaning to him. Considering what I've gone into about John's closeness to Stu, it actually says something deeply, borderline unnervingly, intense about John and Paul that Paul pipped Stu to the post. Maybe it's time Beatles bios accept the fact that John Lennon just wouldn't be into them like that, stop using a tragically prematurely deceased young man as a prop in their jealous psychological warfare against Paul McCartney, stop perpetuating one of the most damaging games that John did to his loved ones and allow both relationships the space to shine and showcase the amazing talent that was the Beatles and those that surrounded them.

[howlsofbloodhounds]

ok hello, i was just wondering your opinion about some stuff, since you are the all wise chroma crew expert. (some are colorkiller since they are my favourite beans)

color's sweaters are stained with killers eye goopy stuff (determination??????)

killer does a lot of cat-like things, like mashing his head into people he likes

anyway i forgot the rest haha

I remember hearing a hc around like a year ago that Color would carry around stuff to clean up Killer’s face and eyes, make it easier for him.

But knowing Mr-Dirt-Freak over here, if he didn’t have any wipes on him (ran out, forgot, what have you), he’d definitely be willing to dirty his clothes if Killer’s leaking eyes are bothering or hindering him more than normal.

Color’s the type of guy who doesn’t give a shit if his friends are in the worse physical state possible in terms of cleanliness—dirt, blood, sweat, vomit, what have you—so long as touching or hugging them won’t hurt them and they want a hug, then he’s gladly doing it. I don’t know, i just think this guy can see beauty in just about everything and everyone—you’ll never hear him calling something or someone “ugly” in terms of appearance.

(The only exception was probably his own body/appearance, which im sure a part of him found horrendous and disgusting, but over time he gradually started realizing that, hey, there’s others in this skull and this body.

It may not be theirs, but they see it when they look through his eye, too. They’re listening, they’re watching. It’s wrong to talk or think about people that way, especially when they have no control over it.)

[scintillyyy]

Hi. I love every second of your blog going "Fuck Chuck Dixon. All my homies hate Chuck Dixon." concurrent with "Dixon could often be remarkably competent as a writer with legit interesting ideas." Please never stop writing metas.

listennnnnn i hate dixon he's awful. he's also written stuff i really enjoy despite the many glaring faults.

the thing with dixon that i'm always trying to suss out tho. like, i think because current day dixon has been radicalized in a truly awful and horrendous way, there's a lot of desire to place his current day radical beliefs onto every aspect of his past works and blame everything on him and him alone as this one terrible writer who ruined all characters for ever and ever just because he's a conservative. but like. i think that because he's an awful person it's easy to place blame on him retroactively for some things that weren't necessarily solely a product of his conservatism or his fault alone.

and mmm. i never ever deny the conservatism present in his works. it's present in his robin book with tim, it's present in his nightwing book with dick, and it's present in his batman books with bruce. but people sometimes act as if he was working in a batoffice that had the current day issues it does where writers are given a carte blance to do whatever they want with all characters with little regards to continuity or character growth. that did not happen during his tim under denny in the 90s--denny o'neil was known for running a fairly tight ship (i can't find the interview but there's an interesting retrospective interview he does wrt jason where he talks about his failures as an editor and how he was too hands off and not firm enough allowing writers to do what they pleased which led him to become a much stricter and firm editor following jason's death because he learned from the experience). dixon in that interview i posted made it clear that o'neil wouldn't even let dixon touch the joker until dixon had demonstrated to o'neil he had a grasp on the character that o'neil approved of. dixon would not have been allowed to do whatever he wanted with characters like robin/tim. without o'neil putting a stop to it if he had gone too far. and for the record, o'neil was a big old bleeding heart liberal that, at the time at least, dixon is noted to have gotten along with very well despite their political opinion differences even at that time. dixon says he was an avid read of grant's work on batman. he's awful now, but at one point he was probably younger and a bit more willing to entertain ideas that weren't his own too.

so when i look back on his work as a historical work, i'm always trying to tease out the following - is this representive of dixon's brand of conservative views in particular or is it representative of a different, overall more conservative time era. and there's a lot of things that fall under the second umbrella that get attributed to the first tbh. listen i love no man's land and understand that despite my love it is full of copaganda and downright conservative ideals by today's standards. but NML wasn't written solely by dixon to push a uniquely conservative pro-cop view--o'neil approved of the story and was the editor of the office at the time. rucka was a huge player in helping tell this super pro-cop story (he even wrote the novelization!!) and nobody ever really puts blame on him for these things the way they do dixon afaik. NML being written in a 'democrats trying to be tough on crime' era absolutely means it's not solely the fault of dixon and his evil conservatism, but he often gets the flack as if it were despite the fact that he was getting these stories okayed by people on different ends of the political spectrum than him + these stories were not his evil conservative brainchild alone.

so these are the things i'm thinking when i read through his works. and maybe that gives me a rosier view than it should, but a lot of my thoughts come from "what can reasonably actually be attributed to showcasing what dixon's views actually are" vs "what might actually not be his fault and his fault alone".

and when i say that tim generally isn't the one who showcases his personal views, i'm not trying to minimize the fact that there is inherent conservatism baked in to his character along with everyone else written by dixon, i'm saying that we need to be realistic and realize that dixon did not have as much freedom to do with tim what he had freedom to do with tim's side characters. tim, after all, had to ultimately fit in o'neil's batbible framework of what he was supposed to be because tim was ultimately an IP character who was part of a batman and robin mythos that o'neil was very, very protective of in the 90s given his previous failures to maintain control of the ship. so when you consider dixon's particular conservatism in tim's books you need to consider that the vast majority of it came from the characters surrounding tim (such as his dad, dana, steph, etc) because dixon had more freedom with those sorts of characters, rather than tim himself who often doesn't have any particular opionion of his own--he's just reacting to all the different opinions being presented to him. and that's not to say that those character should be evil conservatives forever and ever--in fact, i personally think they shouldn't. but take the racist and classist inner city kids are bringing guns to school storyline in robin #25-26. as a whole it's a conservative story. o'neil allowed dixon to do the story in the first place when he could have said no. in the story tim wanders around not knowing what to do about karl bringing a gun to school--which is why he has to go to his dad and dana, who represent "go to the cops/don't be a narc options"--his dad is the one who tries to talk to karl's dad--karl is the conservative one who thinks that they need to protect themselves from inner city kids compared to tim who thinks that guns shouldn't be in school. but tim also thinks that they shouldn't go to the cops and wants his dad to handle it by himself, but eventually comes to the realization that he should have gone to school administration to begin with. in these issues, steph is also the one who dixon uses to link karl's shooting to the inner city kids who are getting bused in to the suburban schools--we talk about that panel of steph declaring herself the protector of the suburbs, but also that panel in context is within the confines of the story--steph is essentially saying "maybe the suburbs need a spoiler (to protect themselves from the inner city people coming to bring crime out to them)" which absolutely is a conservative dixonism that you can pinpoint to his particular kind politics in comparison to the milquetoast of tim's "i don't know what to do/talk to a trusted adult to get help before tragedy happens PSA/overall conservativeness" that happens. that the story itself that exists in tim's book is conservative, yes, and i won't deny that tim also has a few conservative dialogue here but to me the difference is that o'neil would not let dixon use tim drake to go on any overtly political rants or represent any specific ideology *himself* that could make him controversial with readers of the time given how protective o'neil was of not repeating his previous mistakes. you're generally going to find the more egregious dixonisms outside of tim. like "robin 1993 is a conservative book that has a pro-life storyline" (true) =/= "tim goes on an anti-abortion rant" (not true, literally never happened). tim shares blame because ultimately it is his book that presents a conservative worldview but tim as a character tends to exist as a more moderate (not completely, but more) character to have other characters present options and opinions to him rather than he himself saying he has those opinions. robin cannot take sides like that. o'neil wouldn't have let that happen.

and like. when discussing dixon my goal is never to completely absolve tim of dixon's writing. i just don't often see a need to completely rehash the tim-conservatism points because it's been discussed already over and over again to the point there's a pretty widespread misconception that tim is the ultimate dixon conservative mouthpiece who is solely at fault for all of robin 93's conservatism when actually there's a lot of other interesting places dixon's conservatism presents that are almost never discussed in comparison. my goal is not to be "tim's not at fault" or anything but it is to seriously consider and think about where i see dixon's personal opinions shining through more overtly based on what i know of the conservative mindset (as much as i don't agree with it). dissecting dixon and how he writes in consideration of his beliefs is fascinating and fun to me.

anyways he's awful.

[poorlittleyaoyao]

OH NO I MISSED THIS POLL? I MISSED THIS POLL ENGINEERED TO MY INTERESTS?

In terms of enjoying the play, I think he'd have next-level Histories brainrot. I know they were not options because they are not tragedies, but!! He would!! All eight of the plays examine political power from different angles. Who has the right to rule? Is usurpation ever justified? Is divine right of kings even real, and if it's not, what are we doing here? What makes a "good" ruler? What happens when the good ruler isn't the rightful ruler? What happens when being a good ruler is incompatible with being a good man? Can one's identity as a human coexist with one's identity as a ruler, or must one subsume the other? It's great stuff, all explored through wonderfully human characters (who regrettably all share the same three first names , but that's what family tree reference sheets are for!), and I think JGY would really enjoy mulling them over!

In terms of I'm In This Picture And I Don't Like It, I have talked at length already on this blog about JGY and Macbeth, but he'd have some opinions on Caesar, too. My hot take on Julius Caesar is that it's foremost a character-driven story (@ classical theater companies: please stop staging Caesar as a political drama! it isn't one! if you want a political drama, Richard II is literally right there!!) about a bunch of people who are all doing what they genuinely believe is the best thing under the circumstances; the tragedy ensues because the characters' values cannot coexist with each other, and the protagonists' attempts to make things better end up making it worse.

Meanwhile, I agree that he'd like King Lear, but I don't think JGY would like Edmund at ALL. Gloucester might not be willing to let Edmund inherit over his legitimate half-brother Edgar, but he officially recognizes Edmund and speaks highly of him (albeit with a microaggression about his parentage). Edmund's entire usurpation scheme hinges on the fact that Edgar and Gloucester both love and trust him. Edmund has a banger of a speech that justifiably gets used in JGY gifsets, but JGY would look at Edmund and be like... literally WHAT do you have to complain about? No, I think the thing JGY would enjoy about this play isnt the theme of children usurping their dads, because the work itself does not approve of the children sabotaging their dads, even when that dad is an absolute shithead like Lear. The part JGY would be into is how Lear casts out Cordelia and spends the remainder of the play suffering about it. A horrible dad realizes that the child he cruelly rejected was actually the best child ever and he repents of ever mistreating them? To the point where he dies of sadness after that child's death? Now THAT is some wish fulfillment.

He would not like Hamlet at all because Hamlet is so goddamn mean and slut-shamey to his mother and JGY would not stand for that.

PLEASE explain your reasoning in the notes, i am very stupid

[minniesmutt]

     I know I’m a few days late to talk about this, but I still want to. I also want other’s opinions on this, and I do have a poll going for the week to see what others say, but regarding Stray Kids Offical Fan Club, as an international stay, it is not worth it in my personal opinion.

     I have seen other stays on social media talk about this as well and why they won’t be getting the fan club this year. I have only been a stay since January of 2023. So, I can only speak about the fan club from last year and not the year before. But I did want to share this in case I’m weirdly the only person you ever see talk about this or value my opinion in some way (please don’t; that’s a lot of responsibility on me, and most of my opinions come off as asshole-y)

     Most of what I have gathered as to why I-Stays are upset or not getting the fan club is as follows: pricing, lack of benefits, and difficulties with yes24.

     Starting with yes24, it is a little hard to navigate, especially if your device is translating it to your native language since not every language can share the same words/phrases when translating from one to another. Sometimes, I have to fill in the blanks in my head when translating from Korean to English on the site, so it makes sense in my head. But that’s not the main reason I’m seeing issues.

     Many I-stays are having payment issues. When they enter their card information, they get a lot of error pop-ups saying something is wrong—yes24 also will not let you use PayPal or any other payment site to pay—and I will admit I remember having this problem last year with the 4th-gen fan club, Stay Hideout. Along with the payment issues, overseas shipping for the kit is 2-3x as much as the kit. Now, the kit is a small box with photo cards, a photo book, ID badges, and lots of other little goodies that (at least for me) kinda just sit on our shrines/displays. The box is about $25 USD, and from what I remember, I paid about $80 last year.

     Some people may think, “$80 isn’t too bad. I’d pay that for all that stuff!”. And if you have the money to spend that, I applaud you for having your finances sorted out like that. Not everyone can afford that.  But Stays are also promised other perks within Fan Club. Part of that is Exclusive FANS content and concert perks—from what I have read, presale codes, fan club ticket prices, and stay zone. From my personal experience, I only got full FAN access— community posts, commenting, interacting with the boys, etc.— and the kit. I did not have presale codes for the tour— my stop is in May— and from what other stays have said on SM, there is nothing for those of us with the membership at the concerts like there is for K-stays. Paying way more in just shipping to receive fewer benefits because we live farther.

     FANS are a whole other thing. If you don’t know and are wondering why I said “full FANS access,” that is because last year when FANS first launched, everyone, fan club or not, could comment on the community. This had led to —I did not see this happening, but I did see the message JYPE decided to put out regarding this— hate being directed towards the boys on the public forum. JYPE then changed everything and made it so that you could only really do anything on there if you had a fan club membership. This did upset a few baby stays, from what I saw, who did want to interact but had joined the fandom after the recruitment period. The “exclusive content” they told us we would get was BTS photos and photos for their birthdays. Then, they would get shared by other stays not long after they were posted.

     Yes, you could sign up for events, but most of them are live, and not everyone can drop everything and get on a plane to Korea to participate in these events. Looking back, there were a few streaming events for their albums last year, and that was it. But those were then posted on the x/twitter account. So it wasn’t “exclusive”

     And with FANS, the only ones actively engaging with stay are Hyunjin, Seungmin, and I.N. Chan and Changbin for a day, Felix and Lee Know are very rarely there. Han posted one thing, and he was never heard from again on FANS. I (personally) would rather pay for their bubble subscriptions than have FANS access.

     Now, if you are okay with all this as an I-Stay, go ahead and buy that membership, babes! If you read this and go, “What the fuck?” I’m with you. I-stays are in the background as they cater to k-stays and j-stays, which I understand. Stray Kids is a Korean boy group first, and they do have Japanese albums and debuts (I do how that all works; I just see J-stays getting better perks than other i-stays, i.e., dome tour), so the company does focus on them more. But a lot of us I-stays are there for the streaming events. We are a very large part of their fan base, and we all know if they could do more for us, they would. Skz does not know us, but they do love us. If you just like having all their merch and stuff, it might be worth it in that aspect, but it's up to you. I just wanted to share what I saw and what I felt.

TLDR: Pay too much for two things and skz are barely active on the community app so it’s not worth it in my opinion.