#to be fair I don't see these kinds of comments on tumblr very often but I see it on Pinterest allllll the time

[twilight-good-yall-dumb]

a part of me dies every time I see fanart of a book character depicted with the most bland, conventionally attractive, instagram face features possible and there's somebody commenting "wow, this is exactly how I pictured them!"

okay so you have no imagination? so you can't fathom a reality where your favorite characters aren't a perfect mold of contemporary beauty standards? this is simply a mannequin with the same hair and eye color as your character. where is the soul? where is the individuality? your mind is so corrupt by the onslaught of artificial beauty that not even fictional people can escape the standards you've developed.

dumb. boring. lame. unsexy

and these are the same people who will see the most gorgeous, well developed fanart of a character who's been given (oftentimes book accurate) "imperfections" or unconventional features and will comment "why'd you make them ugly?"

grow up!!!!!!!!!!

[genericpuff]

(disclaimer, this is coming from a heartstopper fan! i love heartstopper this is not hate!!)

i think at least part of the annoyance with heartstopper isn't just that isn't a light fluffy ya series, it's also that its another example of how the queer media that gets the most mainstream attention tends to be this kind of light fluffy ya stuff that focuses on two conventially attractive queer boys or men and it also tends to be written by people who aren't queer men on top of that, so not only can it feel very samey but it can feel like other queer people are relegated to side characters in the stories of cis gay men. and as someone who loves heartstopper i get that on some level.

btw by "written by people who aren't queer men" NOT saying that isn't not written by queer people. alice oseman is genderfluid and aroace, becky albertalli is bisexual, etc. and while i think the point is still valid there is a misogyny element in that a lot of the focus is put on things that are written by women or people they perceive as women while tumblr darlings like good omens and ofmd (written by presumably straight men) don't get the same treatment.

nah y'know what, that's fair, I can get how frustrating it can be for a lot of popular queer stories to feel samey, I've definitely gotten BL-fatigue in the past on platforms like WT and Tapas because many of them ARE the same and feel like they're just piggybacking off trends for the sake of clout (and this is a problem in the heterocis romance stories too, don't get me fucking started on how dark romance has turned into torture porn where vulnerable women are constantly being victimized by rich powerful men and we're just supposed to root for that ??), but it's one of those things where like, what might be seen as just more corny shit could very well be the revelation another person needs that they're gay / trans / etc. that the story helped them realize. there's just a point where i see these arguments against cheesy popular queer stories that teeter dangerously close to being queerphobic and, as you said, misogynist, simply because "it was written by someone who i perceive as a woman so that makes it BAD!"

and I didn't mention it in the original post because I didn't want to @ OP in any way but in the comment section they literally said "i dont think heartstopper itself is all that bad but it has pretty much aimed the direction of all mainstream gay comics towards wholesomeness instead of anything more interesting so i want to destroy heartstopper to destroy heartstopper clones" and that gives me massive ick because it implies their sole reasoning for including it was "chill and happy queer stories bad, if a character doesn't suffer enough then they're not interesting"?? why can't LGBTQ+ audiences have more 'vanilla' stories that aren't all sad and angsty all the time? are we not entitled to the same corny romcom vanilla shit that the heterocis are entitled to? why do LGBTQ+ characters - and by extension, people - have to suffer to qualify as being 'interesting'? You're already interesting, you're you! like i'm sorry, are we trying to scare people straight??? 😭 shit, that's even a plot point that's touched on in Heartstopper itself where Nick is questioning his sexuality and he starts googling shit and it's just ALL the terrifying news stories of queer kids being ostracized / bullied / murdered / etc. and as much as it's important to be aware of the ongoing issues so we can keep fighting for our rights, we ALSO need to find balance and remember to celebrate the stories that AREN'T that because we need something to be hopeful for, something we can find peace in. I don't think Heartstopper is some deeply profound piece of work, but it also doesn't seem like it's trying to be? It's a low stakes celebration of the LGBTQ+ experience that's very warm and comforting, especially for those who are the same ages as the main characters who are often being persuaded by the grown-ups around them that it's a death sentence to be gay / trans / etc.

and it's not like we HAVEN'T had popular pieces of queer representative media that explored things outside of cheesy BL, like are we forgetting about Nimona which explored both the gay and genderfluid experience in a very accessible and fun way while still being mature and not pandering to its audience over how society has made monsters out of queer people?

(and even then I'm sure there are folks who would argue "actually, here are the issues with Nimona" , and that's fine tbh, we can like media and appreciate what it brings to the table while also discussing what it lacks in, such as what we're doing now with Heartstopper! progress is a never-ending journey!!)

and also okay, not me trying to be argumentative in the slightest BUT I don't really get the argument that 'other queer people' are being sidelined for the main characters? unless there's something I'm missing here lol (I will apologize for that because it's admittedly been a while since I've re-read Heartstopper so I should probably go do that to refresh myself on it). like i say that in the sense that Heartstopper is clearly meant to be about two gay male teenagers. just like how Nimona is about a shapeshifter who is not a girl or a boy (they're Nimona!) and a gay man who are both trying to change the system that's other'd them for years for the better. that is the story Heartstopper is trying to tell and it achieves that. it also has a trans character plotline that I could see people arguing feels sidelined but I think there's a massive difference between 'sidelining' and just having a B plot ? my honest take with that is not every piece of representative media is going to be able to cover every single topic, it's just not doable for one piece of media to be a monolith for everything, the same as how one person can't be a monolith for an entire community of people. BUT that doesn't mean works like Heartstopper and Nimona can't inspire others to also lend their voices into the medium and create that representation that's needed. That's why we need ✨variety✨ and Heartstopper is part of that variety by offering a more vanilla cutesy story full of good vibes for people who want that sort of thing.

IDK, I think there's just a lot of nuance that's being missed in that poll, and in the difference between Heartstopper inspiring more people to write happy cozy BL stories vs. implying that it's had an actual negative influence on modern art and media in the same way that series like Homestuck and LO have to the point that people think it needs to be destroyed, like wtf LOL Like they're not even comparable IMO and a lot of the arguments I see people making about why it is just feel a little backwards, and those arguments obfuscate the real issue which is just "popular thing is popular and people like to piggyback off popular shit". That's a fact for basically any niche and genre, these trends come and go. Even if the whole cutesy BL trend passes one day (which it will) it'll be replaced by something else that people will also inevitably find samey and boring after a while. This is not a concept that's unique to LGBTQ+ media, it's universal.

Balance is important and I think finding that balance is as much a responsibility on the shoulders of the consumer as it is on the creator. And I don't think Heartstopper deserves to be put into the same camp as stories like LO which literally straightwashes its canonically queer characters and gives those queer identities to nothingburger characters who are easy to shoo out of the plot to make way for the heterocis ones (while still parading itself around like it's actually 'queer rep' which... it really isn't.) Like all three of the comics in that poll are vastly different, serving different audiences, with different goals and intentions. It's comparing apples to oranges to pineapples.

The worst Heartstopper has to offer is just a low stakes plot that might not appeal to everyone or feel 'samey' which yeah, valid, but in the grander sense of whether or not it's had a negative effect on queer media just for being... cheesy? And inspiring other people to write stories like it? I don't get the argument, it feels like it's severely missing the point of what we're fighting for here - to live happy little unbothered lives - but that's just me ╮(￣ω￣;)╭ I'm definitely not trying to be a dick about it in any way and I don't want anyone to think I'm not open to the opposing points here, I do agree with you on the oversaturation of samey BL stories, but it just rose some massive red flags to see Heartstopper next to frigging Homestuck and Lore Olympus LOL

[more-better-words]

fic author interview

Yoinked this from @ladytharen because it looked like fun. Hope that's not presumptuous of me. <.<

Tagging @deadheaddaisy, @phoenixflames12, @butcharondir, and anybody else who'd like to play.

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

60! That's a nice round number.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

Currently 593,580 - though in fairness, nearly a third of that is a single fic.

It was a different time back when I wrote that.

3. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

The four fics of my Built to Last series (though not in order, lol)

What We Build Here

For the Duration

From the Ground Up

The Place We Call Home

And rounding out the top 5, a Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency fic!

Lay Down the Beat 

4. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Absolutely! And because I have very little self-control, I will often do so within minutes of receiving them! 😅

5. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Hmmm. I don't really do angst - I mean, I'll write stories where angst happens, but that's rarely the point of the story. If the plot demands a dash of angst, then, much like a chocolate recipe that needs some salt, it will get its angst. But I don't really set out to write A Series of Sad Events in Which the Characters Are Sad; that's just not my style or my taste.

So I can't really say that ANY of my stories have an angsty ending. Oh well.

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

With the above in mind, happy endings are basically a guarantee, at least up to a point. 😆 I let my darlings be happy, I let them get married and have things work out, because it's fiction, dammit, and I can.

That being said, probably the happiest of all would be just about any of my Trip/T'Pol fic, because I let them get married and have kids and successful careers and be surrounded by friends and family who love and support them because SCREW YOU CANON.

7. Do you write crossovers?

No, I don't think my brain's wired for that. I just...can't seem to.

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Never on AO3 (okay, I once got snippily told I'd mistagged something, but that wasn't hate). I have gotten hate here on Tumblr, though never anything specific, just general "u suck" which...whatever.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

For a long time, I did not.

That answer has since changed.

As for what kind...the sweetest, fluffiest, most loving, happy, vanilla, tooth rotting smut ever.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not to my knowledge, and I seriously doubt I ever would. I'm rather niche.

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Again, niche. Haven't yet, doubt I will.

12. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Years ago, I worked on an AU fic project with a friend that was very cool and a lot of fun. None of it ever got published, though.

13. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Which ever one I'm writing right now. 😁

14. What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

I wouldn't mind finishing my Shadowrun: Dragonfall fic The Haven. Maybe some day.

15. What are your writing strengths?

Dialogue, baby! I can have two characters sit and talk to each other FOREVER.

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

Action and physical description. Even when I can clearly see a room where action is occurring in my mind, I have real trouble describing it on the page.

17. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I used to not have any, then I started making up words and phrases in my own version of Andorian for my Trek fic.

And I still don't really have many thoughts, because I'm sure I'm doing it wrong.

18. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Hmmmm. Pretty sure there's some BtVS fic of mine still existent on LiveJournal. 😅

19. What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to?

I'd love to write Discworld (I adore Carrot/Angua), but Discworld is already so perfect. It would have to be an absolute gem of an idea.

20. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

Whichever one I just finished. 😄

[thatscarletflycatcher]

Tumblr isn't letting me find again @fictionadventurer's and my own posts on epistolary novels, but I have been thinking about it again, because I fell down a Goodreads review rabbit hall and I have thoughts again.

So many people dislike the style, and honestly, I don't blame them, because it's so often done... not well. It is in some aspects, a deceptively easy one, and in others, deceptively hard. And because I'm trying to write a novel with this format myself, I have been thinking about what makes or breaks an epistolary novel.

I talked yesterday about TGLPPS, because it is an interesting case to analyze. I have thought many times about it, and cannot think of a single non-merely-aesthetic reason for it to be told in an epistolary style. A lot of it depends on -British- people who have survived some terrible war conditions willingly opening up to a stranger about their experiences, and that's made... even more difficult if the medium is letters? typically writers will appeal to tropes like making the reserved character drunk, or have them share an extreme experience in isolation with the stranger to create sudden intimacy. None of this is possible in writing; if anything, one is much more self-conscious about the things one writes than the things one says; verba volant, scripta manent.

It seems to me the story would have flowed much more naturally if Juliet had been stranded on Guernsey for some reason -like the first author herself!- suddenly Dawsey commenting that he got a book from her library makes so much more sense! Yes, certainly, if you met a stranger out there, and they introduce themselves and you realize you have a book that once belonged to them, you would tell them so! And it is in this way that the epistolary format does violence to a story that would otherwise sound much less contrived.

Another problem is the large cast of characters and multiple settings. For all I complain about Dracula, Stoker manages this pretty well (of course he has the model of The Woman in White, but TWiW has fewer povs), at least on the first half, because structurally the storylines of the characters are converging, and that does a lot to guide the reader in the understanding of the character's relationships. TGLPPS's relationship structure is more of a multidirectional flow chart, and that becomes confusing really fast.

Another novel I read reviews for recently is one set in WWI, composed of back and forth letters between two lovers torn apart by war, and one common complaint was... that the climactic scenes, the times they meet, etc all happen... off-camera. It is a fair complaint, but also one I cannot really blame the author for, because that's what usually happens with real life compilations of letters of that kind. Sure, usually the editor/compiler will fill in the blanks sometimes and add an epilogue of sorts explaining what happened afterwards, and that is possible if you are writing it fictionally too, but some may think it spoils the effect of immediacy and whatnot, which, fair too.

But it makes me think of how aware Jean Webster was of these difficulties, and how deftly she managed them in both Daddy Long-Legs and Dear Enemy. Both novels have aged badly in terms of content and message, but they are very interesting stylistically.

DLL is a bildungsroman with a dash of romance; through Judy's letters to daddy long-legs we can see how she grows as a person, gaining independence intellectually and economically, and as a writer, as her grammar and vocabulary change and grow. Between making Judy an orphan who hates the orphanage where she has lived her whole life, and one where she lived past the usual age of being thrown into the world, Webster does away with the need for letters between Judy and her friends and family: all her friends and family are her college roommates and her benefactor, who is the person she writes to. The benefactor scheme also makes it so that she doesn't have to write dll's replies, which in turns makes it much more natural and acceptable for the reader when Judy writes him the ending's love letter describing the feelings and impressions of their finally meeting in person and in truth; Judy has become a writer, and she is so used to write to him as another person all the time, that it just makes sense for her to write to him one more letter at the point where her benefactor and her lover become one and the same person. She has written a novel where the core is the correspondence between lovers AND managed to include as well all the moments of their meetings that we would otherwise miss.

Dear Enemy is a similar, but longer and more ambitious story. Instead of one relationship-connection (Judy and Daddy's), we have Sallie as a nod of connections: she's Judy's friend, Jarvis' "employee", the boss of several characters, has a tense colleague-boss relationship with the visiting doctor, a boyfriend of sorts in Washington, and a family we have met before. It is, in that way, a similar setup to TGLPPS: a urban girl of means becomes a fish out of water in a different setting till she ends up assimilating to it, and settling definitely through marriage. But Webster does a few things differently to make it click.

For starters, it is clear to her that this is the story of Sallie's maturation -I have sometimes talked of Dear Enemy as a novel where a Mary Crawford-like character undergoes a transformation arc. The happenings and stories she meets and tells Judy about along the way serve this arc, besides standing on their own as case studies to illustrate the problems, ideology and solutions proposed to the secondary themes of the story (education and social reform). I feel like TGLPPS is much more interested in Guernsey's survival through the war, in which case Juliet's story is already a frame, which, again, makes the epistolary format cumbersome rather than complementary.

Dear Enemy adds more correspondents, but it is very austere/economical with them, and narrows the letters we see to only those Sallie sends. YMMV regarding if it was too much cutting or not, but the undeniable effect is structural soundness; you are never confused by what is happening or who is writing to whom. We can guess the Honorable Cyrus Wykoff probably wrote some indignant letters to Jervis, and those would be funny to read, but... would they be worth the break in the flow of the narrative? I don't think so. To this effect, just having Sallie write a line to the effect of "I expect at this point you have at hand an irate letter from the Hon. Cyrus" is enough to paint a picture for the reader. Perhaps a letter or two from Dr. MacRae would have helped develop his character more -definitely a first read of the story obscures how much misdirection there is in Sallie's narration to Judy, which in turns tends to create an impression of suddenness to the closing letter that doesn't come across well to the reader.

The choice of Sallie mainly writing to Judy is, IMO, a really good one too. It not only establishes a connection with DLL, but it also allows for the intimacy that makes disclosure believable (something TGLPPS struggles with, as I mentioned above). When you add a few letters to the doctor and Gordon and Jervis, you also get a better perspective of Sallie's personality, how she deals not only with a friend, but with acquaintances, romantic partners and coworkers.

From all this it is pretty evident that for Webster the main function of epistolarity as format is aiding in showing psychological and moral development. But that's not the only thing the format can be really good for: perspective is another, and Austen uses it to great effect in both Lady Susan and Lesley Castle.

Both stories deal with mainly static characters, but who have very strong perspectives of the same situation, and it is this singularity of setting and story that anchors the narrative to avoid confusion, while the variety of perspective brings interest. In Lady Susan, we are dealing mainly with the marrying off of Frederica and seduction of Mrs. Vernon's brother, Reginald. There where Lady Susan paints Frederica as an undisciplined, irrational and ungrateful daughter, her sister in law, Mrs. Vernon, paints her as a sweet girl and a victim of her mother's ruthlessness and lack of love. Both agree that Reginald is being seduced, but, of course, with opposite goals: Lady Susan wants him to succumb, Mrs. Vernon, to escape, and this is a delicious struggle for the reader to follow!*

Lesley Castle being an earlier effort, and unfinished, does show some of the defects I have mentioned before (mainly, the relative confusion of having several correspondents in separate storylines), but illustrates well this same perspective effect: Margaret writes to Charlotte about the new Lady Lesley, and the new Lady Lesley writes to Charlotte about about Margaret and her sister... and in these contrasts lies the main interest of the narrative.

Some conclusions to these musings, then:

Not every story is suited to the epistolary format.

The epistolary format seems to work the best when it is used for either A) showcase psychological and moral development B) to play with perspective on people and/or events.

One of the main difficulties of the format is finding a narrative element to anchor and structure the letters around.

It must have a core couple of correspondents, or at most, two. More than that will make it confusing (unless, perhaps, the story is very short and about a single event or two).

A delicate balance must be found so that the secondary correspondence doesn't cut the flow of the main one, and if possible it must feed into it.

*It is interesting how Love and Friendship, being such a delightful -and I sustain one of the best ever- Austen adaptation, is by force of the perspective switch towards a more impersonal third person, more about a love story between Frederica and Reginald than a struggle between Lady Susan and Mrs. Vernon. Which isn't dissimilar to how adaptations of DLL end up being more about the romance between the leads than Judy's coming of age in college; tropes aside, I feel like if the epistolary format is well embedded in the story, it's going to be nearly impossible to reproduce the effect in adaptation.

[vroombeams]

FIC WRITER INTERVIEW

tagged on main by @boonbeenblade i hope you don't mind if i answer over here where i'm more active 💖

How many works do you have on AO3?

21!

What's your total AO3 word count?

72,196

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

like you do (1,011)

delicate topographies (666) (nice)

hot in it (637)

a place to rest your arms (478)

mile why club (408)

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i do! as often as i can i try to respond to comments because i really appreciate them all and it really really really keeps me going. but it's been a bit of a contentious thing lately i think in fandom at large, the way that there've been a few people saying that they straight up won't comment if they see the author doesn't respond etc etc. for me personally i have pretty severe chronic fatigue and just a whole cornucopia of bad brain things that make it difficult sometimes to go through and drop what is essentially a copy-pasted thank you note in the replies to each comment. i'm not at all against responding and especially if there's a question or something to engage with it always makes me really happy to do so, but it does push into burnout territory faster. so usually i'll just write more fic and hope that that's enough!

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

free for all or decathect probably! actually intermediate was pretty bad too in that capacity. forgot about that one. but i mean most of those also are semi-ambiguous i guess, like it's sad and continues to be sad and it may or may not continue to be sad after? but yes those three. if the bloodborne au ever gets finished that will ~snatch the crown~ tho. also i was filling this out before i finished kinktober and probably the cnc fic is pretty up there now

What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending?

like you do? a place to rest your arms? the happy they're-going-to-get-together endings i guess?? for me also i would personally put rear 32 in this category. to me it's like, there's a sweet-warm-good vibe to the end of it and in my head and i guess sometimes on tumblr there is some extremely warm aftercare that follows that makes Me, Personally, very happy

Do you write crossovers?

liiiike. i guess you could qualify a really distinctive au as a crossover if you really wanted to. the crime au could be considered a gta crossover. paleblood is, you know, bloodborne but with landoscar in it. but i guess to me a true crossover would involve characters meeting other characters from that other universe??? and the answer to if i've written those is also yes, but not for f1 (yet)

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

oh yes in the dark days of ffnet there was a great deal of flaming all the time, the etiquette wasn't quite what it is today lmaO. to be fair i deserved a lot of the hate i got. i sucked pretty bad. and then a couple of fandoms ago i got a pretty cruel guest comment on a fic that i ended up deleting, but that's a whole other story lol

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

gestures vaguely at the kinktober archive

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i'm aware of! i don't think i'm big enough to have been stolen from. but one can always hope (jk)

Have you ever had a fic translated?

yes!! someone in a previous video game fandom i was in translated one of my fics to mandarin. very cool!!!

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

yesss a few times! all in previous fandoms. there were a couple of people i used to write with pretty regularly in that way, like popping a bunch of junk in a doc and then letting each other run wild and smoothing out the rough edges at the end. super rewarding and super fun and a really interesting exercise in making different styles flow together

What's your all-time favorite ship?

all-time is a rough one to answer LOL. in f1, currently, probably jondo. as far as ships that i still will actively go back to and enjoy just as much... maybe adam/ronan (raven cycle) or altair/malik (assassin's creed)? zack/cloud from ff7 lives within me also. and will till i die

What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

the water takes it back for sure. between that one and i guess the long-distance relationship landoscar fic. i like them both a lot conceptually but they're both pretty raw to write, like, achy in ways that feel too personal maybe? i'll probably continue to pick at them but i don't know if i could ever finish/post them just because they are a Lot in a Lot Of Ways. then again i'm also in a bit of space rn so. ask me again in a few weeks

What are your writing strengths?

maybe knowing what i want from a piece? like the goal of a thing or the vibe i want to achieve. but also sometimes i do just be flinging myself into a doc and hoping something happens so it's maybe not that specific lmaO. but yeah, i guess the vision is a strength, when i do have a vision it's usually a pretty strong and solid one!

What are your writing weaknesses?

dialogue the beloathed! i hate it i always feel like it comes out clunky and makes the rest of the piece clunky by extension

also getting caught up in like. a lot of minute details and plot threads? this is obviously not an issue in all of the stuff i've been posting for the last month because. duh. but in larger projects i definitely find myself creating too many threads or not tying off threads correctly or not having enough threads, god forbid. this is of course why there's no multichap posted on this account lol. it's something that i'm specifically working on right now! trying to be better at you know... organization and clarity? by the end of november we will know if i've achieved that lol

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

oh interesting question. i don't think it's like... super necessary? to include? like unless a pov character has some familiarity with a second language that they don't actively speak, i don't think there's a ton of reason to write out like idk a whole bit of dialogue in french or italian or whatever. mainly because if you don't speak a language At All you're likely not going to be catching complete sentences/words anyway, so taking the pov character into consideration is important for this?? as far as a bi-or-morelingual character goes, i think doing a dialogue tag in english and saying 'they said, in (language)' after makes more sense from a reading perspective. if that makes sense. that's just my personal take on it!

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

yugioh lol. way back on ffnet. i think my first ao3 fandom was... mmm. we will just say [redacted] bandom i guess

What's a fandom/ship you haven't written for yet but want to?

ohhh. like is it a cop-out to say indycar because i'd love to mess about with some pato ships in the near future??

What's your favorite fic you've written?

rude question to end on THANKS

i don't know man. as it stands everything i've posted isn't like a favourite?? anymore?? my go-to answer has always been free for all or pouffe. but there are a couple of the kinktober fills that i'm really really fond of now like the oscarmark breeding kink? the oscarmark cnc is like also important to me in a lot of ways. i think i'm also in the post kinktober headspace where i want to tear everything i've ever done to absolute pieces and then maybe set it on fire??? anyway yeah those ones 😭 otherwise probably there's stuff in my docs that i've not posted that i prefer but that's neither here nor there atp

i know this one is fuckin huge so extremely no pressure tagging @glasscushion @freeuselandonorris @monacotrophywife @piastriachios @bright-and-burning to at your leisure if at all 💖

[skynight110]

Child Of The Monsters

A monsterverse fic:

You can't remember when it all began. When something changed. Or maybe you could, if you thought deep enough on it. All you knew now though, was that you were alone. Because of them. Because of Him. If only you weren't so young when this all began, perhaps you could have prevented everything; the death of your parents, being one. Being forced to give up your childhood "for the sake of humanity" being another. But alas, nothing could change what has happened, and all you could do now was try and escape this hell that's been built around you, and pray to whatever deity is out there to grace you with luck. Because if they find out, if He finds out.....

The sake of the world, the sake of your life, the sake of every little good thing you've managed to keep, will be at stake.

•••

Hello, hello. I've decided to post my story here on Tumblr just...because lol. You can find it both on ao3 https://archiveofourown.org/works/55869871

Or wattpad https://www.wattpad.com/story/366621677?utm_source=android&utm_medium=link&utm_content=share_reading&wp_page=reading&wp_uname=KnockoutRules

Updates will most likely be posted on these two first, and I'll post when I remember to on here. However, to be up to date I'd suggest reading on either of those platforms.

Like on both of those, here is important information that I insist you glance over before reading:

This story is definitely inspired by Screaming into the Voids "Y/n, Child of the Monsters///Platonic!Yandere!Godzilla/Titans x Child/Teen!Reader" on Quotev, I suggest going and checking it out, however it is incomplete and I'm unsure if the writer is still interested in finishing it. With that out of the way, this will be a "yandere" type story, and will have normal Godzilla movie themes in it such as

- death

- canon-typical violence(cmon, it's godzilla, he's going to end up ripping something in half)

- spoilers for the movies(except gxk, I haven't seen it yet)

and themes I've added in. There will be

- "talking" kaiju, however they don't physically speak to humans, rather its an insight into their thoughts/feelings

- mentions/forms of telepathy

I personally headcanon that mothra can "tap" into others, and while she can't speak fluent, she can send emotions or brief thoughts to others that aren't close to her. Godzilla can do similar things, but it takes more focus for him, and it works better through touch. But it doesn't happen very often.

- some forms of experimentation, both on humans and kaiju

I want to make it clear that there is no romance in this, it's purely platonic.

I've tried to align readers age with how the movies are set in time, so here's a quick guide if any of you get confused:

Reader is born in 2009, they are 5 during the events of 2014.

By the events of Kotm, reader is 10.

Gvk, reader is 12, and this is mostly where the story will take place, and continue onwards.

In GxK, reader is 15.

I also won't be adding in much from the comics because I haven't read them, but there's a chance I'll add in some small things that I've managed to find out.

As for plot family wise, as stated your parents don't appear for too long. They ded. But you will have other family members! For my own sake to make it easier for me I'm gonna make reader related to the Russels; Mark being your uncle and Madison being your cousin, simply because of plot wise it makes it easier for me to use them.

If there are any questions, feel free to comment them, I'll do my best to answer them to best of my ability.

ALSO

Fair warning now, even though I like writing, I lose motivation VERY fast. So if I fall of the face of the earth for a bit, don't be surprised. I have stuff to do in my life too, seeing as I'll be graduating next year and need to get my stuff together. If you're worried that I'll be discontinuing this story, just ask in the comments, I promise I'll answer, later or right away. I'm the kind of writer that will have random spouts of motivation in the middle of the night when I'm tired, or in the middle of the day when I'm busy.

But, I will try my best to commit to this, because I really want to write this to give both myself and everyone who finds this a story with the Big G, because there are so few out there.

[i-arch-my-backula]

hello hello ! been a while since ive requested. could i get og micheal, thomas hewitt, jason, and the sinclaires with a really out-there gothic bf? im talking the whole nine miles, extravagante makeup, very gothic clothes, loud goth music, all of it. i just wanna see what their reactions would be! thank you :]

also shhhhh take the dabloons i gave you, even if it isnt applicable on tumblr. please i have too many dabloons i must share my wealth.

- 🫀

Of course I can heart anon. So I was goth for about a year before I just kind of wasn't interested in it anymore and I've had my fair share of out there looks. I've dyed my hair every color under the rainbow, I've drawn on horrible big eyeliner, etc. But I still hold an interest in goth looks, music, etc.

Slashers with an out there, goth male reader

Includes: Og Michael Myers, Thomas Hewitt, Jason Voorhees, and the Sinclair brothers

Warnings: Slashers being a little mean, mentions of self harm and mental health issues, mentions of stalking, kinda implied Stockholm syndrome

Og Michael Myers

Now Michael first started stalking you because of how out there you looked. He was so curious about your big hair and huge eyeliner.

He'd watch you very often, learning that this is just how you are and not actually a costume. This just drew him in even more.

Now as for when you start dating Michael will be a little jealous because of all the attention you're getting from strangers. He doesn't care how you dress it's the fact that other people feel the need to comment on it and constantly look at you that bothers him.

He's not too confused about why a man is wearing makeup because he doesn't fully understand gender norms but he still wonders why you do it.

I know goth music is a wide set of genres but I feel like he'd like the slow and dark music. He honestly might put on a few of your records if you're out and he's at home.

Overall Michael doesn't care so much how you dress but it is something he likes and thinks you should keep doing.

Thomas Hewitt

I wouldn't say he's scared the first time he sees you but he is kinda freaked out. Thomas is a sheltered Christian man so seeing someone like you is freaky for him. Although if he sees you wearing rosary's he's feeling a little better.

After getting to actually know you he sees that you're not that scary and that he doesn't really mind how you look. Although his family will give you odd looks and rude comments about how men shouldn't wear makeup.

As for the music Thomas is a little sacred. I know that everyone thinks he would listen to metal but if we're being honest he was raised on country music and gospel music. He doesn't mind your music it's just new and a little scary.

He'll also worry about you getting hot in all black clothing. He'll try to get you to wear lighter colors but will give up when he realizes that it's not going to happen anytime soon.

Jason Voorhees

Pamela warned him about people like you. Goth's, who according to her are all depressed and cut themselves. But upon meeting you Jason learns that's not true. You're actually pretty happy and you just enjoy dark music and clothes.

He'll watch every morning that you put on makeup. He loves seeing your process as you create thin sharp eyebrows and big black eyeliner. A little confused about why a man is wearing makeup but he honestly doesn't care too much about it

He doesn't mind the music. I feel like Jason never really listens to music anyway so this isn't too big of a deal for him

He's also glad that you don't really mind being around death. Obviously he's going to keep you away from the people he kills but it at least means that you're not going to hate him for it.

He's a little freaked out by the music. No one he's come across has had this kind of music before so it's new to him. Start off slow with The cure and Siouxsie and the Banshees.

Vincent Sinclair

Out of all of the Sinclair brothers he's the most supportive. His mother would have hated you and he loves that. Especially if you have dyed hair, piercing and or tattoos.

Speaking of dyed hair, if you have it he's obsessed with it. He'll convince Bo to go buy you more when your roots grow out and he'll help you with dying it.

He loves goth music. He loves the instrumental elements and how dramatic it sounds. I have a feeling if you gave him pictures of what some goth musicans look like he'll make some of the wax figures look like them.

He'll steal clothes from victims if he thinks you'll like the clothes and probably makes some accesories for you. He'll kinda treat you like a goth barbie doll with how he want's to constantly dress you up and do your makeup.

If his brothers ever make any kind of rude comments he's quick to shut them down. He loves you so much and he won't let Bo give you shit for wearing makeup.

Bo Sinclair

I'm not gonna lie, he's gonna think it's a sex thing. You quickly shut that down and he realizes you just genuinly like the style and music. But he also never even knew about the music element.

But like Vincent he thinks his mother would hate you and he loves that. Probably one of the reasons he keeps you alive.

He'll think you're a little gay for wearing makeup but point out how he is literally dating a man and he'll quiet down really quick.

Doesn't mind the music and will probably start listening to some of the bands you listen to as well.

He doesn't get the fashion and thinks it's just for attention but over time he won't care as much and understand it's more about self expression.

While he does (lovingly) make fun of you for being goth. If anyone else does it, especially a victim he's not having mercy on them. Sure he thinks you look ridiculous sometimes but only he can say that.

If you have piercings and tattoos he will encourage you to get more. Maybe will drop the idea of getting his named tattooed but if you don't want it then he won't force it.

Lester Sinclair

You scare him a little. But after talking for a little bit and seeing how sweet you actually are, he falls for you very hard.

Again, like his brothers he loves you even more because his mother would hate you.

Thinks your music is scary but he won't tell you that.

Loves watching you get ready and how you turn from some normal dude into a super hot vampire.

He loves to play with your hair if it's big and teased up. He knows it's crunchy form hairspray but please let him touch it Y/n.

Will gift you things made of bones and animal skins that he thinks look gothic. He's glad to have an s/o who's so into death. It makes it easy for him to talk to you about his job.

Will defend you against his brothers. Lester won't put up with Bo calling you freaky or asking if you cut yourself. Honestly I can see him getting physical with Bo if it gets to that point of him being an asshole.

[kquil]

THE SWANS : MY MUTUALS + ANONS

a post where i treasure and love my darling moots, they're the light of my life here ♡

@astonishment / @aastonishment | my honey, my darling! mal is such an incredible person and is a very talented writer! she inspires me to write better but also inspires me to be a better person, she's so sweet and deserves all the love in the world! she writes like an angel with gold ink and i still get giddy and shy whenever i interact with her. she's the type of person who makes you feel warm and you would want to run up to and hug every time you see her. i truly hope she continues receiving all the love and appreciation she deserves and more! she's truly perfect, i wouldn't be surprised if she's hiding wings and a halo

@tiensmamains/@sageskisses444-deactivated20230 / @never-fair | my darling sage, even though she's not on tumblr anymore, i won't forget her - she always made me smile and laugh and happy just by being her. her taste in memes were impeccable and she was so easy to talk to. my friendship with her, although early and brief is one that i will treasure forever! i appreciate her and miss her so much, i hope we cross paths again soon ⏤ quick edit: she's back! hehehe~

@futurecorps3 | lola is the most supportive and sweetest person i have had the pleasure of being friends with. she's also so talented in writing and deserves so so soo much more recognition and love. she makes me feel at ease and appreciated, she truly has a heart of gold and is a friend and fellow writer that i will treat as preciously as she treats me so naturally. true kindness embodied in a person, that's lola!

@loving-and-dreaming | such a sweetheart, i love her so much! her excitement for my writing just rejuvenates me (o´〰`o)♡*✲ﾟ*｡ she's so supportive and kind and so lovely to talk to. she's a great friend and her friendship is precious to me. she is someone i feel like i would do anything for because she's that precious of a person. a cinnamon roll embodied, that's the best description of her, adorable and sweet but also with the biggest heart!

@prongsio | lola! darling! she deserves so much, she supported me from the very beginning and another writer i look up to, though i also look up to her for aesthetic goals - she is the queen of aesthetics! i don't know how often she changes her blog's 'looks' but i anticipate each one without even knowing it's coming. lowkey, she gives me cool older sister vibes even though she's younger than me so i still get shy around her (i've always wanted an older sister ｡(*^▽^*)ゞ)

@its-sappho-biotch | bibi is so supportive, ugh! i'm so grateful, words can't even describe how much i adore her (┳Д┳) every comment, not matter how small means so much to me, coming from her. every writer would be blessed to have a reader like her indulging in their works and i'm one of those lucky writers! i will treasure her always! she's the type of reader i aspire to be because she lets them know how much she likes their writing but i get shy and i over complicate my words! i want to be more like bibi!

@wicked-sprite-66 | another reader that im so lucky to have in my life, at this point, my darling has become a life line to me, without her, i wouldn't be writing! she's so sweet and appreciative of my work that now i'm conditioned to smile every time i see her hearting or commenting on my writing. i adore her so much, such a precious sweetheart that i'm so lucky to have in my life, supporting me! no words can describe how much i adore her (┳Д┳)

@diputy | eryn! my kindred spirit! we are on the same wavelength when it comes to fanfiction tropes and i love it! it makes me so happy every time i get to fangirl in the comments with her, she has me kicking my feet and rolling around in my bed acting like a teenage girl chatting with her bestie about her crush! ahhhh! i love it so much! it makes me so so sooo happy, she makes me happy! ₍₍ (ง ˙ω˙)ว ⁾⁾

@neeezza101 / @cassandra-nerezza-black | my darling that i want to protect from all bad things in the world! she's another sweetheart that has won my heart and won't give it back! she's supportive and sweet and such a lovely person to talk to! she is a very precious person and having her support means the world to me! if anyone hurts her or makes her sad, i will do everything in my power to make them pay! no one hurts her or they will get everything that's coming to them!

@somewereinthegalaxi / @thebestofoneshots | rose! omg...where do i even begin?! ‧º·(˚ ˃̣̣̥⌓˂̣̣̥ )‧º· she's such a friendly person and so easy to talk to, she's incredibly kind and such a sweetheart as well. anybody would be lucky to have a friend like her, she's just so bright and warm and is definitely someone who can get along with anybody. there's something very magnetic about her that i could talk to her forever if i could! she's been so supportive of my writing too! she and her friendship are truly a blessing in my life! i have yet to read her writing but i'm such she writes as beautiful as she is as a person and a friend ٩( ^ᴗ^ )۶

MY ANONS

🌸 : anon

STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION ... MORE MOOTS TO COME + PRAISE FOR BEING A DARLING

[eastgaysian]

I get the food motifs on the show because, you know, same. But I never understood the animal motifs. I get roman/dog m and kendall/water motifs but I see many others floating around tumblr that I just don't get. Maybe I focused on the food too much to notice the rest? 🤔

[guy who only thinks about succession animal death motif] i feel like there's plenty of recurring ideas around animals/nature/hunting if you keep an eye out for them tbh

i honestly feel like the dog motif is a little overemphasized tbh... dial it back for a second, come back later once you've calmed down, and we'll see what connections are actually supported by the text. like these are things that recur periodically and with consistent meanings throughout the show but not everything has to be about dog all the time. also i think it's fair to say roman gets hit with the dog motif more often or memorably than other characters, but people can get myopic about this. the idea of being (treated like) a dog gets brought up with all of the main cast.

[^ i'm literally the doggy suit guy so feel free to think i'm full of shit]

i don't know what specifically you've seen floating around tumblr wrt animal motifs in succession, so i can only comment on the things i've seen or talked about. generally speaking on succession, animal metaphors are employed when characters want to gesture towards a 'natural order' of things, some kind of hierarchy or strong-rule-the-weak theory of the world. comparing someone to an animal can be dehumanizing-demeaning or dehumanizing-mythologizing, suggesting innate (biological) traits and behaviors because that's just how an animal is, as opposed to humans being complicated and capable of change or self-determination. the stronger animal wins, because it's the stronger animal, because it was born with the sharper claws and the stronger jaws compared to the animal doomed to be prey. ofc this is also dependent on a very simplified narrative of animal behavior lol

off the top of my head, scenes/lines i'd point to underscoring this idea (excluding Dog): - lawrence's 'you just invited me into the chicken coop' line to kendall (domesticated, sheltered, helpless animals before a predator) - stewy calling logan a 'brontosaurus' in s1 finale (doomed to extinction, not adapted for the current environment) - boar on the floor ofc - nan pierce 'you've brought me animals' to frank in tern haven abt the roys lmfao - cut logan 'i'm a lamb, i'm a fucking lamb' in the all the bells say confrontation (rolls around my head a lot, lambs as the symbol of purity and innocence)

obviously animal death motif is kind of my baby i love to rotate it in my mind. this rambly post gets at what makes it stick in my brain so much, the idea of their inability to cope with animal death/refusal to engage with unclean or demeaning labor becoming a point of weakness and potential site of resistance. which is ultimately futile. exchange value completely disconnected from use value humans completely disconnected from the 'natural' world. animal death motif ^_^

maybe this sounds a little too obvious but like, if your interest is how food is talked about and used in the show, then in the context of hunting specifically there's a direct connection between killing an animal and eating it. in the episode hunting, the roys/associates are absolute shit hunters (completely removed from the reality of having to exert physical effort or interact with the environment to sustain their livelihoods) and their dinner of the boars they killed turns into a punishment game with their family and colleagues as the boars fighting for sausage. it's easier for them to turn on, hunt, and eat each other than to hunt actual animals. and they can all stomach it.

also in return when caroline warns shiv and roman about eating the pigeon because there's a lot of shot in it. killed for eating in a way that made it inedible. unnourishing queen give us nothing <3

i hope this wasn't a totally incoherent answer...? obviously i do have a fair amount of interest in succession's animal motifs haha so i appreciate the opportunity to talk about my thoughts.

[coraniaid]

It probably shouldn't irritate me quite as much as it does, but I wish fewer people on Tumblr would use the word 'normal' as an all-purpose synonym for 'polite' or 'respectful' or 'kind' the way they frequently seem to do.  

I very often see posts on here urging people to be 'normal' -- about trans people or Jewish people or disabled people or homeless people or whoever else -- in contexts where I simply don't think that that is what the original poster actually intends to suggest. The word 'normal' does not mean any of those things I listed earlier.  In common usage, something is 'normal' if it is typical or expected or commonplace.  There is no reason to assume that ‘typical’ or ‘expected’ or ’commonplace’ behavior is actually virtuous or worthy of praise, or that it is a suitable yardstick by which to judge your own actions. There is nothing inherently good about being normal.  

In fact, very very often the ‘normal’ way to treat other people -- by which I mean the way the majority of people do, unthinkingly and without drawing comment, every day -- is actually pretty terrible.  Rather than asking yourself if something is 'normal' to do, why not ask yourself explicitly whether it's fair or reasonable or courteous?  Why not worry about whether it's nice?

Yes, language changes and evolves over time, and yes, strict linguistic prescriptivism is a ridiculous position to argue for.  Yes, you probably assume that most of your target audience knows exactly what you mean when you say ‘normal’, and you're probably not wrong.  But, at least outside of Tumblr, most speakers of English do not use the word 'normal' the way you are using it, and I think the world would be a somewhat better place if we didn't needlessly confuse the urge to fit in and conform and not attract unwanted attention with the aim of being a good person. Because these two things really aren't the same at all.

Please be normal about the word 'normal'.

[hootfort]

one hit update when??

Hi gamers!

So, if you've interacted with me in any sort of passive way, you'll probably know my life is always some sort of trainwreck. I've had a chapter (well, multiple, given their length) of One Hit ready to go since I last updated, but life has gotten in the way.

For the people who have left comments, sent asks, or messaged me and not received a response, I'm sorry. I see pretty much everything, but mentally, it's hard to find the energy to reply in a manner that feels fair to you. I want to meet you with the same attention and care that you have shown me, but my brain hasn't been up to it.

TL;DR - One Hit will get updated now that it's summer. I can't promise when, but I promise that it will happen. I'm studying at a place that lied to my face and has driven me to my limit, not academically but mentally. Picking up the pieces and creating a future that I can survive is exhausting, but I'm getting there. The lovely messages and comments are often the highlights of my month, and I am utterly grateful for all of your kindness. All of you are wonderful, and this fandom has been one of the driving forces for me to reach the finish line.

In no particular order, I was and still am enduring a lot of harassment/discrimination in my academic life. It's to the point where I'm facing the very real prospect of having to move to another university to continue my education beyond my current degree, but this final year and the state of my department is... a lot. I'm dealing with the aftermath of turning against a nonprofit that got me started with writing; the cornerstone of my identity since 2017 is in shambles, and that organisation was why I went to university to study what I do.

I don't want to out myself too hard here, but I cannot emphasise how crushing the sequence of events has been. Everything that we were promised when enrolling in this place was a lie. When I last updated, I was attempting to get out of a predatory internship that I had to quit THREE SEPARATE TIMES, and this was an internship shared by my university. I was being felt up, for lack of a better explanation, by a former driving instructor who took thousands of pounds from my family and utterly destroyed my self-confidence and my trust in the world. A large part of who I am and who I want to be is gone, and reconciling that has been difficult.

So, yeah. My life has been a mess. For more reasons than this, but those are my biggest feelings.

I'm getting there. I'm not even sure this is all pertinent information, but I logged into Tumblr and saw all of these alerts, and I feel like I owe it to people to tell them why I was gone. Because I love this fandom, I love the people in it. I love your art, your fanfics, and the countless other things that you do for a world that can seem so dark.

The world is lucky to have you guys in it, and I really want to thank you profusely for what you've done for my life, even if it wasn't visible through updates. My little corner of the internet makes me so happy, and it brings me great peace and comfort to know that now I've survived hell, I can enjoy hanging around a little more for now.

Fingers crossed that it won't take me forever to update this time.

- Min :)

[celestial1980slady]

[20 Question Fic Writer Tag]

Tagged by the rad @scottysketches, thanks!!

How many works do you have on AO3? I have two, one on two different accounts to separate the fandoms lol

What is your AO3 word count? One account is: 99,568 The other: 125,471

What fandoms do you write for? I have written for many different fandoms over the course of my time here on tumblr such as the Supernatural fandom (many still up on tumblr) but currently I write for Assassin's Creed Odyssey and the MJ fandom!

What are your top five fics by kudos? The Odyssey That Should Have Been: 71 The Way The Wind Blows: 7 (this one is newer lol)

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? Absolutely!!! After the initial bit where I'm mushy and gushing over said comment, I try to be a bit more constructive in my response LOL

What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? It's not finished yet (maybe never will be lmao) but 'The Odyssey That Should Have Been' is based off the First Blade DLC so it's got it's fair share of super angst but also humor and romance and joy!

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? All of my characters must get a happy ending, NO QUESTIONS ASKED!!!!!!

Do you get hate on fics? I haven't yet and honestly, if you hate on someone's piece that they put a lot of work into - fuck you lol

Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Indeed I do - it is pretty much always romantic smut between two lovers because I am a hopeless romantic at heart lol

Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? I've never really dabbled in crossovers but it could be fun to try one day!

Have you ever had a fic stolen? No and I s2g please don't do it!

Have you ever had a fic translated? No but feel free to reach out to me if you'd like to do that!!

Have you ever cowritten a fic before? No, unless you count roleplaying on roleplayer.me in the early-mid 2000s, then yes LOL

What's your all-time favourite ship? From my blog bio: "Resident Kassandra/Natakas shipper" ;)

What's a WIP you'd like to finish but doubt you ever will? ....All of them.

What are your writing strengths? I'd like to think I'm pretty good at A) dialogues, I just feel like I'm really good at writing what my characters are saying and I find myself often being like "oh that was a good line" LOL and B) historical facts. I pride myself on being somewhat historically accurate and to the time I'm writing in.

What are your writing weaknesses? Probably descriptions of scenery though I do my best. I also overthink when I'm trying to write a very simple scene and people 'nod' or 'chuckle' and 'look' too much lol

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic? I already sort of have Greek and Persian words for certain things in 'The Odyssey That Should Have Been'!

First fandom you wrote for? I couldn't tell you but I believe it may have been an MJ story when I was like 12 or 13, maybe Big Time Rush? IDK LMAAAAO

Favourite fic you've ever written? Probably 'The Odyssey That Should Have Been' simply because it was my first big labor of love in terms of fanfic writing and the first one I published for all to see on AO3!

I'm tagging (with absolutely no pressure as always!!) @aeide @blue-mono @solareias @findusinaweek @wickedwitchofthewesninski @ainulindaelynn and whoever else writes and wants to do it!

[decepti-thots]

re: writing fandom meta and why there might be less of it recently - the fandom spaces I started out in ~15 years ago didn't have any meta, at least not in the way they have now, so the whole thing is comparably new to me. and then the meta I see always posts that seem to take SO MUCH of canon/background knowledge into account, so many things that I haven't even heard of. and there's so many posts criticizing (parts of) fanon and common fannish opinions, which I often understand, but which also feel a bit elitist and doesn't make me wanna try putting my thoughts on a piece of media into words just to get criticized. finally, I also don't know how to - last time I analyzed media was in school, and I was never good at it.

Thank you for this ask anon, first off! All of this is really interesting to hear, and a lot of it lines up with things people said in shorter responses directly on the post, so it looks like there's definitely some overlap in terms of common pain points in terms of this stuff. (And not just "pain" points, to be clear- folks also basically said that they preferred expressing their ideas through fiction, which is fair, and not really a thing that exists as something causing friction, per se, as much as an active enjoyment of fanfic as a way to express ideas.)

I hope you don't mind if I use this response as a launching point to give a few of my personal thoughts on this, because you so happened to bring some stuff up I kind of wanted to give a perspective on anyway. Not necessarily as a direct response in all regards, but it seems as good a place as any to touch on my own feelings? (Under a cut, feel free to skip this, if you do then thanks again for responding!)

The point you make about how meta wasn't much a thing in fandom spaces you were in 15 years ago is interesting, because one of the things I always think when I see the argument there's universally "less meta" now than there used to be is: does at least some of this stem from the folks saying(/bemoaning) this come from them being in different fannish spaces that the ones they're in now and not realising? It's a similar thing to when people confidently assert "people comment less on fics than they used to", where I can't help but wonder how much of that is just that the fandoms they are in today have different ways of engaging with fanwork, or different expectations, or that the fandom spaces they used to be in commented a lot relatively speaking. 15 years ago, I was in fandoms mostly based around LiveJournal communities, which were often assumed to be the obvious "centre" of fandom activity by folks in said communities. (Incorrectly; LJ only looked like the "main hub" of all online fannishness if it was where you and your fandoms mostly clustered, IME.) A lot of those were media fandoms (though not all) and those tended to have a lot of meta, I would argue at least in part because LJ as a "format" encouraged the posting of long, pre-mediated posts that lent itself well to folks wanting to write meta. But some other fandoms (a lot of anglophone animanga fandoms come to mind) tended to not have nearly as much because people were mostly engaging with them in places and communities where those things didn't line up in a way that encouraged it. The move to Tumblr and even Twitter as big fannish platforms where things work differently is then probably also of note, idk!

(Sidenote: the AO3 meta wars when it launched are probably worth mentioning, since the push to allow fannish nonfiction on AO3 was in part a result of Tumblr seeming like a very bad replacement for LJ when it came to posting essays!)

Anyway, a really common thing that seems to be cropping up is the "if I post an opinion as meta, it opens me up to [potentially virulent, potentially bad-faith] criticism, and that sounds unfun" fear. Which on the one hand is not necessarily untrue because I think even now fannish norms around meta are just a little different than other forms of fanworks, yes. Meta is usually seen as, on some level, an invitation to discussion in a way that e.g. fanfic often isn't. What I do think is interesting to think about here is it seems like there's not a lot of faith that there could be productive, even fun disagreement on specifics and readings. I'm not saying that wariness is necessarily wrong, to be clear. (I have been on the receiving end of plenty of virulent, bad faith "criticism" in my fannish life, haha. Or just... like... bad criticism that is tiring and unproductive and unnecessary, lol.) I mention it more because it seems worth explicitly saying that the assumption that being contradicted, corrected and/or argued with is an inherently unpleasant or even disciplinary way to experience fandom is one that seems to be pretty deep-rooted in fandom right now, and it seems worth pointing that underlying principle out.

To bring that back a little to the "platform shapes the fandom engagement" thing, I do think the way Tumblr works contributes to that. Reblogging to add additions has a very different impact that replying to someone else's static blogpost, and reblogging is (as people do keep pointing out on viral posts, haha) the primary encouraged form of interaction on this site. It's different in multiple ways; a person reblogging something often feels like they are talking about your ideas in the abstract and not by talking to you as a person which can encourage a very different tone and approach on their part and make their addition read very differently. And it also means that your post may not just be contradicted, but the contradiction may wind up being exposed to huge numbers of people as the default way of seeing your post and opinions. That makes the idea of being subject to that disagreement higher stakes, I feel, and also the idea of productive back-and-forth functionally impossible a lot of the time. (It also means having a full conversation often requires constantly spamming your followers, let alone multiple convos.)

So I fully get it. But I do also think it's a shame that it can be really hard to imagine fannish communities where disagreeing back and forth on different ideas about a canon or text is... fun? I guess? I sometimes find that stuff fun, is the thing! When done in a good faith way and an environment it works in. You wind up with all these interesting perspectives that may run very contrary to your own but still have interesting ideas in them, and sometimes you wind up with opportunities to expand on ideas you had but hadn't yet found a way to articulate them. I don't think that's going to be fun for EVERYONE but I think it's a shame that it seems so universally... terrifying, for a lot of people? Fandom is a very good place, if nothing else, to practice getting comfortable with low-stakes intellectual disagreement. (Because for most things, it really is low-stakes as hell.)

I do want to touch on the elitism comment though. I find that... a strange perspective tbh? It's true that doing analysis generally holds a baseline expectation of familiarity with the canon, but I can't really see how that can reasonably be called "elitist". Similarly I think there's a sense where someone will sometimes see people strongly dislike a thing they enjoy and feel the need to argue why that person is "wrong", such as when folks defend their fave fanon against folks who find it tiring/uninspired/etc. I think this post really sums my thoughts on that up, tbh. Sometimes what can kneejerk feel like a person passing judgement on you is actually them being a bit bitchy in their own space knowing full well they're talking about their own taste and nothing more. IDK.

[emmathorne]

Just a vent abt a bully

Hello, I’m going to complain!

My better judgement says sit on this quietly and smile the grumpiness away, but frankly I always feel better getting my fed up thoughts written out, and Tumblr is the quiet place we vent to, so here we are.

Anyone who cares enough to pay attention will know who I’m talking about, but for those who don’t (and for the sake of this being pure venting, not some kind of beef starting or mob building), I’m going to refer to the gentleman involved as “John” in lieu of his real name. If you don't know, it doesn't really matter because he is not the only person like this out there, and you may be able to relate.

This week, John, a big figure in the sceptic community, who commands a lot of respect and has a large following gathered over many years, was, in my opinion, quite rude to a friend of mine. He was rude, dismissive and pretty condescending, and this took place publicly. Said friend is also a creator- smaller than I am and much smaller (as we both are) than John. My friend reached out to John for clarification on something, and was overly polite with pleases and thank you’s and consideration. Whether they were just in a super nice mood or they chose to be careful because John has a reputation for getting angry over minor things, I don’t know. All I can say is they were very polite. 

John is like a bear, we admire him and adore him for his incredible skill and power, and when he swipes one of us with his claws we all laugh or apologise and bow down to him because that’s “just how bears are”. What I've learnt is to accept that's how bears are, and that I feel happier and safer staying out of swiping distance, because I don't deserve to get clawed.

John was curt and rude and all the things I mention, and my friend clapped back (something I have always felt is perfectly reasonable. Someone is stinky to you, you shouldn’t be expected to be super kind in return). At this, John flew off the handle, called them several names and blocked them.

A lot of people saw this and had the same reaction I did: ‘wtf did I miss’, because it seemed quite an absurd overreaction. I added onto the conversation, because that’s my friend and I go into defensive mode when I see a bud treated unfairly. I make no apologies for this.

I too was overly polite (something I almost regret in hindsight because of John’s attitude throughout) when I suggested that this was a little over the top, that he was surely fair to be irritated at my friend’s sarcastic comment (again, as a retort to John’s attitude I think it’s fine, but it makes sense for John to be annoyed by it), that twitter often gets the worst of us, and an apology would surely be accepted. I also remarked that if he felt a comment was a waste of his time, it would probably be better to ignore it than fly off the handle.

I admit I’m often out of the loop on mainstream sceptic activists and creators, partly because my content is quite varied outside of that, so I didn’t realise how naive it was to think that polite compassion and understanding would reach John and that would be that. After the fact, I’ve been told by lots of folks: audience; creators and behind the scenes community members alike, that John has been this aggressive and reactive for a number of years now. If I’d known that, I perhaps would have just marked him down as someone I wasn’t interested in talking to and quietly removed him from my various feeds. Alas.

He responded to me in the thread, essentially telling me to go away, take my own advice and ignore him, he didn’t ask for a lecture. Surely yes, nobody asked for a lecture- but someone was stinky to my friend and that’s not the sort of thing I want to ignore. It didn’t completely make sense, it was very ‘heck off i can do what i want’, and I was pretty surprised. 

I started to wonder if there was some context I was missing, that maybe something had happened between John and my friend before that made John particularly sensitive to their questions. A while ago, John added me on another social media app. So I reached out to John privately.

You fool. I know.

I sent John a message essentially (politely, I must add) asking if there was some context I didn’t know about, why he had behaved in such a bullying manner, and hoping that we could come to some more compassionate understanding. 

His response was more or less: Wow!!! You’re going to say I DID A WRONG THING? Prove it!

The entire discussion went like that. It was cyclical and frustrating. There is a type of person (and I’ll say I’ve only experienced this from men, not that it’s a rule, but John fits a certain “type” of older, righteous white man that I find most frequently guilty of this tactic) that turns every conversation, especially if they are criticised, into a debate. Even a private chat about behaviour and feelings, in this case, became an intellectual debate. 

I have experienced this many times, and I find it to be a method pseudo-intellectuals use to belittle and ‘win’ against people that aren’t able to articulate as well as they are. Every infraction was a point that had to be proven with evidence, and if he could counter it with his debate tactics, it meant he had ‘won’ and couldn’t have done anything wrong, ever. 

This was a conversation about how he had been rude to someone on twitter. I explained what was rude, that I was not the only person who considered it rude, and his only retort was to continuously demand proof. John is an excellent debater. I am not, I don't debate, and while I know that there is some value to certain kinds of debate, I often question their value. Being good at debating and being right are entirely separate things, and so I don’t generally allow myself to be bullied by this tactic. I had told him what was rude, and that was that. 

He demanded to know exactly who and where others had called this behaviour out, and I allowed a cheeky retort of my own! Of course in hindsight this is exactly what he needed to satisfy his status as the victim of my evil, deceptive tactics (all in the name of trying to understand why he was mean to my friend. What a sinister agenda I had!). I replied that I could easily ask him to ‘research’ for himself instead of ‘wasting my time’- because this was the complaint he directed at my friend who had asked him for clarification. It was a direct parallel of something he had said, with the intention of pointing out how absurd that was. I added that if he genuinely needed me to screenshot people calling out his behaviour, I would do so.

We went on for a bit in circles with this proof demanding, accusing me of dishonesty (I asked him outright what was dishonest about anything I said, and I still don’t fully understand. I believe it’s the fact that he kept hounding me for ‘proof’ that his behaviour was rude, which is a pretty weird stretch), and ‘name calling’. (The name calling is because I said his behaviour was bullying. I also later called him childish, which I hope you can understand given what i’ve explained so far. I maintain that to be true). 

He continued getting angry and being aggressive about proof, including about me not being the only one to think he was out of order. I reminded him I'd offered him screenshots, and he basically said that I was clearly being sarcastic. I told him I wasn’t, that he’d assumed that out of nowhere- he was angry about that too. I had literally said “if you genuinely need me to-”. I included the word ‘genuinely’ and he still made it my fault that he thought I was being sarcastic. Except because John can’t be wrong, I had been sarcastic, and I guess just hadn’t realised it or was lying about it? Perhaps that’s where the ‘dishonesty’ thing came from. Who knows.

I shared some screenshots of people agreeing this was rude, which is pretty ridiculous I know. It’s bebo era schoolyard stuff. If he hadn’t demanded proof that he was rude and I wasn’t the only person in the world who thought so, I would never have thought to, but it seemed to be necessary. Of course, I was wrong about that too. It was only the case if they had MESSAGED him. That was all that counted. Of course he knew that I wasn’t going to be screenshotting his own inbox, so why he only told me this after the fact remains to be seen. He had demanded who and where, and then told me the who and where I presented didn’t count.

John was like this throughout. Incapable of being wrong in even the tiniest way, but treating me like I was a stupid, dishonest kid who was mistaken and crazy about every single thing I said. Even when it contradicted something he’d said earlier, it turned out I was wrong about that. I should have known psychically that tweets don’t count as people calling him out, that I was definitely being rude and sarcastic when I explained I was being genuine. I was wrong about every single thing.

Along the way, one of John’s gripes was that my friend, after the conclusion of the tweet thread, had joked about this being great publicity. I think it’s a funny way to try and make light of someone with a huge fan base being an ass to you. John decided that this meant my friend was only “in it” (conversation with him? Content creation in general? Unclear) for the publicity and he hates people like that. In my opinion, that’s a ridiculous stretch. To take someone’s jokey ‘getting a positive out of an awkward situation’ and make it into their entire driving force in all they do is absurd, and any reasonable person would see that. John is not reasonable. 

In case you are one of the folks who, like John, thinks that joking about someone being mean being great publicity is actually terrible (as I saw some of his fans agreeing, in that slightly tragic bootlicking way where they agree with everything he says whether it makes sense or not), I’d like to remind you that everyone was fine with me making the same joke out of Kent Hovind giving me publicity. The only reason it’s suddenly bad when it happens as a result of John being an ass, is because they want to have some reason to vindicate him. 

John used the publicity joke my friend made as an excuse as to why he didn’t need to apologise for anything. I considered that fallacious, not just because of the above where he’s viewing something silly in absolutely the most uncharitable way possible, but because that came after the fact anyway and had nothing to do with John’s initial rudeness. The idea that you can’t be cheeky or joke about someone who has already been a complete ass to you is tone policing, at least in my opinion. At the very least it doesn't change anything to do with John’s part in being rude as hell in the first place.

In our private conversation, I attempted to empathise with John- this was also wrong and got me chastised. Something I’ve seen him and his followers explain is that he gets tired of answering the same questions time and again- understandable after so many years of doing the exact same thing. I experience this too, and gosh I’m really grateful to have a varied range of content I engage in, even if it makes me a bit more niche. If I spent 20 years getting angry in debates over the same things, I'd probably go crazy too.

Anyway I attempted to empathise with John on this, telling him I understood how frustrating that could be and so on (again, I have experienced this myself, so I felt it was reasonable to empathise). Because it was a debate and he had to ‘win’ against everything I said, this was also terrible of me for ‘pretending to understand him’ or something, even though he also said that yes it was true. I guess his claim was that it wasn’t relevant to this, which doesn’t make sense and frankly I don’t believe. It doesn’t really matter, I could have said the sky was blue and I’d have gotten a lecture on how wrong I was.

I had mentioned creator size to John, because he was someone with a huge following publicly dissing someone with a relatively very small following. Something that I’ve adopted from a lot of the most conscientious creators I watch is the idea of not ‘punching down’. In general I do not think it’s responsible to do things that might mobilise a large audience to target someone at a much smaller level who doesn’t have the resources or experience to cope with a high level of abuse. The ‘punching down’ discussion has nuances that I’m not going to waste time on here, and it’s something people certainly disagree on, but my personal belief is that you should adopt a level of care when talking negatively about a much smaller creator. John disagreed with this. He called my consideration of creator size a "fallacy". I don’t know if that’s even vaguely correct, but I am not the intellectual that John is, so who knows. I think it’s relevant. He doesn’t.

This led to an awkward part of the conversation that I feel uncomfortable recalling even now. He subsequently asked me if I was a smaller creator. I told him that compared to him, yes certainly, but larger than my friend. He said that in that case, he would leave it there. While I am grateful he took my feelings on audience size into consideration despite disagreeing with it, I find the subtext really uncomfortable. The suggestion is that, if I hadn’t been a smaller creator, he would not have left “it” there. What is it? Putting me on public blast? I didn’t ask. Maybe it was an overreaction, but I found that a little threatening, so I ignored it and moved on. I don’t want to know what he might have said or done if I had identified as a large creator or someone at his level. Forever grateful to be niche, hah.

I was really ready to end this confrontation now, because it was more than clear that John was never going to accept being wrong about anything, that he was going to be as rude as he damn well wanted and if he was called out on it, he’d deny it righteously till he was blue in the face, and I either gave up, or admitted being a terrible person with a nefarious agenda.

I got through a last tirade about me being dishonest and fallacious and so on, all the same things I've mentioned. He concluded with a very brief nice comment about some of the content he’s seen from me. So I responded that it was interesting, because I thought some of his arguments were fallacious too. I said there were things we’d clearly never agree on, but I wished him the best with his work and hoped he continued to do good activism. I had a glimmer of hope that we were actually going to end on neutral, polite terms.

His response was to go back to demanding proof, in the same rude and combative way he had been all along. Eye roll.

At this point, I was 100% done and it is hopefully clear to anyone reading that I could not have done or said anything that would ever change his mind, so I said goodbye and blocked him. End of. Or not?

Cue a very “2010’s internet drama” maturity level post from John about an unnamed ‘dishonest, name-calling whiner’, aka me. I assume the ‘name-calling’ + ‘whiner’ thing was intended as irony? Or perhaps he’s just that lacking in self awareness. Either way, it’s a deeply frustrating and upsetting thing to read from someone you know is so respected in the community, who people idolise. I was sitting there wondering how many of my own followers were liking and retweeting that statement without knowing it was about me, and certainly not knowing how utterly ridiculous the entire interaction was. All of this because John was rude, and unable to acknowledge it. He’s got a critical debate-bro condition.

Despite his anger at this suggestion from me, I really think that John must have some serious sensitivity around being challenged, criticised or asked questions about his words. Many people that live in this angry, debate-centred world for so long do develop ptsd-like reactions, or genuine anger problems. I’m not in a position to diagnose anyone, these are just some of the thoughts I have trying to rationalise and understand John’s behaviour towards me, my friend and anyone who has dared criticise him or even ask him a question on the wrong day.

I heard in hindsight from many people who had been talked down to, belittled, blocked etc for minor things, and even similar cases of John going off the rails at something minor involving people far kinder and more intelligent than me- so at least I don’t feel this is a totally personal slight. I am bugged about it, clearly, but I feel fairly comfortable that I did the best I could to resolve things rationally and compassionately, and that the issues at the heart of this nonsense are problems with John and not me, nor my friend, nor any of the other people who have experienced this. John is a very "no, it's the kids who are wrong" type.

If I had to be in the room with John for a function or to engage with other people, I’d do so and be perfectly polite. But I do not want to work with him. I certainly do not want to speak with him. Right now I prefer not to see him on my timeline- I've hidden one channel that I like because seeing his face on my YouTube screen was making me uncomfortable (that I’m sure will pass quickly though, I just like to give myself comfort wherever I can, especially with what I do bringing confrontation and hate to my attention more than I’d like). 

As much as this has sucked a fat one, I don’t regret anything. My friends come first, and I will always stick up for them. Maybe this loses me access to some of the ‘big names’ in our community. I hope not, but I consider it worth it either way. The ‘angry atheist douchebag’ phase is something that I think a lot of us go through, especially when young or deconverting, after some religious or family trauma etc. It can be a very natural part of the process. Should that be the face of the sceptic community? Hell no. We’re very fortunate to have a lot of smaller, developing channels with more diverse voices and a kinder attitude, alongside the playful snark and ribbing that we love. I’m curious as to how someone attains that kind of idolisation, where their fans can call him their favourite, despite having only had negative interactions with him (real comments I have read in response to this).

People can be kind of assholes and still do great work. Often, I think people like John miss out on important topics and ideas (I’ve certainly seen him do this on shows) because of their quick reactions and jumps to negativity and their swift putting down of anyone who might have a slightly different opinion that him, even if they didn’t know that before they, say, called him on a show. I do genuinely hope that he continues to do good work, and I respect what he’s built. I understand that people love watching him ‘throw down’ and that can often be satisfying. I enjoy seeing people who deserve it get a swift talking to. I don’t enjoy seeing people who are trying to learn, improve themselves or bring a different perspective being treated with equal meanness. I disagree with his methods and attitude, and I personally am not interested in watching him. I can’t imagine watching him on a show after the way he’s spoken to and about me, all because I dared to question his rudeness.

So that’s it. I’m a little hurt and quite frustrated, but I feel I’m frankly in good company with people who have faced the wrath of John. I’m trying not to feel too stupid in the wake of being belittled over all the ‘fallacies’ and general debate bro bollocks that were thrown at me. Emotional intelligence is also a real thing, and not everyone has it. Mine isn’t perfect, but it’s certainly better than John’s and I am grateful for that. I’d rather be willing to make mistakes and learn and treat people with compassion than be able to ‘win’ every argument. I’m also glad not to be the sort of person that gets outraged over minor things every day, continually alienating people in the process.

Long live the silly lil guys.

Thanks for listening to my vent. I feel better already.

[purenguyening]

N A O L I C E + Q T

This one will definitely be long, eheh..

N - Name three things you wish you saw more or in your main fandom (or a fandom of choice).

Bellow mostly applies to Touhou Project:

More character analysis based on how they appear in the games. It doesn't happen often but I think talk centered round how Touhou characters express themselves through spell cards can add a lot of depth that doesn't come through in fanworks.

More fanworks that draw from their historical inspiration (this limits to a small cast of characters but I feel like Historical Touhou is very rare...I also understand why this doesn't happen much mostly due to high barrier of entry and in general requiring more work.)

Also a huge fan and will always welcome Touhou designs that pull from the artist's nationality. It's a fun twist and I'm always impressed when they incorporate design elements from the original outfit into the clothes.

A - Ships that you currently like a lot. (They don’t have to be OTPs because not everyone has OTPs.) Friendships, pairings, threesomes, etc. are allowed.

Sakuro and Cleru during my Summon Knight: Swordcraft Story playthrough made me laugh a lot. Sakuro is a very, very silly Craftlord. They have a very similar dynamic to Steven and Brendan's relationship from Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald (though I feel like Emerlad is probably the better fit to their dynamic).

There's a few others but Giyuu/Tanjirou and Sabito/Tanjirou are on my mind because of [this fanart]

O - Choose a song at random. Which ship or character does it remind you of?

Alright, I had to have Youtube randomly shuffle my Summer Recap but it pulled up Fifty Fifty's Cupid and it just reminds me of Devil Survivor as a whole for the sole reason I read all eight volumes while listening to this song on loop at 1.25x speed. It's really funny of all the songs I put on loop throughout the summer, it happened to pick one I actually have some association with a fandom....

L - Say something genuinely nice about a character who isn’t one of your faves. (Characters you’re neutral about are fair game, as are characters you merely dislike. Characters that you absolutely loathe with the fire of ten thousand suns are exempt, as there is no point in giving yourself an aneurysm over a character that you hate.)

Major spoilers for Swordcraft Story: I really like Ureksa a lot as a character, he's portrayed in a pretty sympathetic manner and I think how he patches things up with Cleru/Pratty is really refreshing. While I don't love the suicide bait and switch, it really does feel clear to me even if he made some pretty bad decisions, I do think he's a kind person at heart. He's a very prickly person, but I think it makes sense from his design (a lot of spear specialists tend to not be very direct, which makes sense for their fighting style, the game specifically sets up spear users to fight at a range).

Now that I think about it, Matsuoka Rin (Free!), is also someone I warmed to eventually because I liked seeing him be a mentor to Aiichirou and Momotaro. I think that's part of his character design though...

As an aside, it is possible to send me this prompt multiple times since there's very few characters I actively hate and I always have something tucked away in the back of my mind. Most of the time is me wanting to comment their role in the story, but I think that can be read as me recognizing their purpose....

I - Has Tumblr caused you to stop liking any fandoms, if so, which and why?

Not tumblr, but on Twitter, I do think it's really easy to lose interest in fandom because it's very easy to fall into negative spirals. There is a general shift in fandom overall that made me feel the need to keep my interests separate with side blogs and I tend to be more active through a very closed off account on Twitter.

Maybe one day I'll be courageous and blog about my interests from my one main blog, but that's still an option off the table for now.

C - A ship you have never liked and probably never will.

Toyosatomimi no Miko/Soga no Tojiko the popular fandom portrayal just gets on my nerves and I find it really annoying when sometimes posts still appear because the ship name is not mentioned anywhere in the tweet. I do have a specific portrayal but I'm hesitant to say if's romantic, but i do think their dynamic is interesting, I just can't bring myself to think of it as romantic.

This might be more closer to me complaining I wish I had post block on Twitter/Tumblr Mobile.

E - Have you added anything cracky/hilarious to your fandom? If so, what?

I think a long time ago I made a joke about how the fanon portrayal of Shinichi drinking coffee is a subtle way for him to drive away people bugging him. (Caffiene is a natural insecticide, hence the word play). Truth be told I'm not 100% sure now if that was the inspiration for this post I made...

I think maybe you can still find it in the KaiShin discord, but I felt like there's a lot of innuendo to be had knowing Toichi and Yuusaku having a back and forth with just a question mark and exclamation point. (The symbol that combines both the question mark and exclamation point is called an interrobang and it looks like this: ‽)

I don't think either of them spawned too much in the fandom, but I realize my sort of humor needs like a short essay just to explain the context and this is probably why I don't really share my more cracky/insane interpretations....

Q - A fandom you’ve abandoned and why.

I think the only true fandom I've completely abandoned is Harry Potter? Aside from the obvious reasons, I've learned I still do really love the concept of magic, but I would rather have it manifest itself in different ways. I love fantasy and magic, but I think I end up preferring it to be a back drop or the setting rather than the primary focus. I guess it's more closer to, I like it more as an aesthetic, but dislike it when it becomes the center focus.

Even more controversial fandoms I never can quite fully bring myself to fully abandon (the one that mainly comes to mind is Hetalia). A lot of other fandoms that are less contentious I tend to just cast aside for a while but after a few years I end up picking it back up again for one reason or another.

T - Do you have any hard and fast headcanons that you will die defending? 

Listen, I know it's basically confirmed now that Futo killed Tojiko as of Strange Creators of Outer World, I still refuse to believe Futo actually did it. The closest thing I'll compromise on is Futo's definition of killing Tojiko is "she was not present to stop the murder." That's about it.

I'm basically a Futo apologist and I'm sorry you had to find out this way.

[olivieblake]

Hi, Olivie! Catching up on your latest “Not Reading” video and I have to say I’m just stunned people tag you in bad reviews??? Like, I realistically know it happens all the time to authors on bookstagram, like I use booksta every day, but I’m still flabbergasted people think it’s okay to tag authors in the most negative posts known the mankind??? Like where is the basic human decency and common sense?

On a side note though: I often tag you in my TBR posts or like, general praise posts on my bookstagram (I’ve been reading your self-published works since early 2021 and just love to show off my indie copies and rave about your work in general, especially because you’re one of my comfort authors. Moreover, I tend not to write super critical thinkpieces on bookstagram for any book because I find Instagram to be a very gimmicky place and not actually conducive to discourse in general). Anyway, are you generally okay with being tagged in positive reviews of your works? I just wanna know what you’re specifically cool with as pertains to booksta and tagging? Thanks, and have a great summer!

I’m into my reread of One For My Enemy (first time reading the newly published version) and it’s like hard drugs in the best way possible.

I think after a certain level of perceived popularity (perceived being the operative word) people stop thinking of me as a human being, much less one who receives notifications. and to be fair, there is a lot that I don't see—instagram loves to hide things in my spam folder and I gave up on even trying to deal with my DMs a long time ago. I don't always read everything I'm tagged in, it just seems like on those days where I'm like "let's see what's on instagram!" it'll backfire cosmically. also, instagram likes to put only the meanest reviews in my notifications, which is like one out of every fifty. I have no idea what the plan is there, engagement via misery? in any case I try to stay out, because you're right—it's not really conducive to conversation. it's not like two active users on instagram at the same time are engaging in a meaningful way, like what can occasionally happen on twitter or tumblr. anyway, to answer your question, yes go ahead and tag me! I can't promise I'll see it and if it's a review I likely won't read it, since even praise isn't necessarily good for the art and any stray comment could have a weird effect on my brain. but I like to share posts when I can so that I can direct people to accounts they might have interest in

so basically don't worry about it. the risk of complaining about social media users who do things like that is that they aren't listening, but the people who behave conscientiously are, so it's kind of a preaching to the choir thing