#to those who ship it but it just. isn’t for me

[phantomrose96]

Aromantically rotating this quote from Jon "The Silt Verses" Ware from the Season 2 Q&A (bold emphasis mine)

Question: I love what Paige and Hayward have going on. How would you describe their dynamic? ​ JON: I saw someone online talk about the, “the paladin and the prophet.” Which I think is a really nice way of looking at it! Whereas I saw them as two people who…both of them have come to the end of the road in their old lives. [...] I think maybe there’s also an implicit question there about whether there’s something romantic going on – maybe I’m reading into it, but that is something that’s on my mind a lot, so I’d love to talk about it more. ​ Because shipping is fantastic and it’s wonderful and it’s cool, but as a writer who’s way too online in a parasocial world, I’m really wary of how I respond to it and how I process it. ​ I personally, I don’t like writing fictional characters where the most important moment in their narrative arcs is when they get together with the person they were always meant to get together with. Generally, it’s just a bugbear of mine in fiction and I’m not sure I agree with the underlying message. ​ But I think if any writer who’s way too online sees, hey, people are getting excited about these two characters hooking up and falling in love and they keep coming back to this idea of them hooking up and falling in love, there’s a real rodent voice in the back of your head whispers, "give the people what they want. Get those likes, get that fanart." ​ Which is the wrong response! Because we don’t understand that maybe people are just having fun exploring these characters or their own interpretations of these characters, we think they must be anticipating a pay-off from us. ​ And again, I think it can send you in the wrong direction, one that ends up being essentially flattening – we don’t think, "if these characters hook up, OK, what new opportunities does that give us to explore them, to understand them in greater depth?" Instead we think we need to perform a climactic moment of love and comfort and happiness to get the audience’s approval. Which can be very much to the detriment of the complexity of the characters, but also, afterwards, where do you go with it? ​ And after we released maybe one episode of The Silt Verses, I saw a couple of folks online going ‘oh, god, I hope this isn’t going to end with Carpenter and Faulkner hooking up,’. And you go, "oh my god, I hadn’t considered that as a possibility for a second, that’s not who they are and that’s not what the relationship is here" - but of course all of us are primed for it, that enemies-to-lovers thread that is so common. ​ [...] ​ So it felt like I could introduce a connection there [with Paige and Hayward] and we could see a different way that they begin to be around each other that hopefully feels like it’s adding new dimensions to both of the characters without me looking over my shoulder going, “Am I in danger of turning this into something a bit stock by turning it into quite a straightforward romantic situation?”

[eugenedebs1920]

You know!? It ticks me off this perception that Donald Trump, J.D. (Jerkin Dicks)Vance, even Musk, is somehow manly. I mean, Trump and Ol Jerkin D wear more makeup than my wife! You can’t say that’s all just for television. Musk looks like if Smeagal had only kept the ring for 250 years as opposed to 500. His Prrreeeccciooouussss. None of those guys project masculinity. It’s the varsity cricket team and their weird gangly friend.

Does anyone remember when Trump tried to act like he knew how to use a shovel 🤣🤣🤣 That sh*t cracked me up!! Like ‘MFer, where have you seen someone attempt to shovel like that!?’

Then J. Dick Vance projects uncertainty in his sexual identity. It cool if your gay, but don’t fight being gay so much that you are viscous to women and marginalize those who’ve figured out who they are and are not overcompensating for it. it’s coo Jerkin D! We’ll still hate you either way.

I’m pretty sure Musk is a supervillain. But like if Dollar General had a comic book action figure series.. He’d be the main villain in that. Corneal Creepy McBillions, somethin like that.

These guys definitely got picked on in grade school and vowed to get revenge by making everyone else miserable. Thanks bullies! 😑

Speaking of. If you haven’t constantly put people down, talk sh*t on people, (I realize the irony as I’m sh*t talking these f*cks but, physically I don’t think any of them could take me, but power wise, what they could have done to me!! They’d ruin my world..) pinpoint and pick on a vulnerable individual or group, pretty much, if you get hard by making people laugh at or join in on teasing or bullying someone, that itself reeks of insecurity. It shows the flaws in yourself, you’re hiding by putting those flaws onto others before someone sees them in you. Trump is the master of that! If he accuses someone of something, he’s definitely guilty of it.

It doesn’t make you any less of a man to be kind. It’s isn’t a feminine to treat women with respect. It doesn’t make you macho to be a prick. Being racist and ostracizing immigrants doesn’t protrude masculine traits.

You know what women find sexy. Confidence. Knowing who you are, what your values are, compassion, knowing the difference between proper and improper, and sticking to those principles regardless what others would say or entice you to do. Being a good person, because that the good thing to do, proud of oneself, but knowing there’s always room to grow and learn.

I certainly don’t see what’s would constitute being attractive when you are borderline in a cult, infatuate with a 80 year old politician who bankrupted casinos, been accused by 23 women and adjudicated for sexual assault, shameless grifter, hateful, cruel, racist, bully f*ck. It’s just, sorry to say it, weird.

I have a heart and care for people, I build houses for a living. I believe in equality and the rights for EVERYONE, I can rebuild an engine. I think women are people (who knew!?) and should be in control of their own destiny, I am pro 2nd amendment and love to go shooting.

I’ve been in bar brawls, climbed mountains, go hunting, chop wood, ride atv’s, snowboard, go 4wheelin, camping, have a big beard, drink beer, and I think everyone is entitled to dignity, despite their sexual preference, race, religion, gender, what their hair looks like, whatever. Why? Because it’s basic human respect.

The last 2 times America actually won a war it was Democratic (BIG D 😉) administrations. The only 2 presidential administrations to not add to the deficit in the last, nearly 60 years, were both big D Democratic administrations. Democrats passed the Civil Rights Act, all the racist Dixiecrats jumped ship and became Republican. Democrats nominated and elected the first African American president. We have TWICE nominated a woman at the top of the ticket.

While Republicans are whining about having to wear a mask LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE DID, Democrats passed legislation to address the problem of unemployment, of vaccinations, of shipping logistics, while they were at it passed a HUGE infrastructure package, invested billions in green energy (our future) and ensured national security by manufacturing the technology materials needed to be the best in the world. Simultaneously creating a ton of well paying, respectable middle class jobs.

The right is too busy talking about Jewish space lasers, and checking out Hunter Biden’s junk, and keeping weed illegal, and worrying about bathrooms and sh*t.

How is that manly at all?! Acting like a bunch of whiny immature kids! They even whine when they win!! It’s stupid! It’s a waste of time, money and energy. Just grow up and do the job you’re elected to do!

So yea… I would say the right isn’t the vision of manhood they pretend they are. It’s overgrown children, spoiled to the core, acting out because they want it their way 😤

What shows manliness is doing your job, and doing it to the best of your ability. Being a kindhearted person and willing to help someone in need. Being true to yourself, and in turn others. Being knowledgeable yet willing to learn. Being brave, but admitting when you’re scared.

[madbard]

I love shipping characters who hate each other in canon.

I love shipping characters who have had exactly one (1) conversation in canon.

I love shipping characters who have never met in canon.

I love shipping characters from different pieces of media.

It starts off silly. The notion of the pairing is so weird, so unexpected and seemingly dumb that it makes me laugh a little, perk up, look into it and see if this is really a thing.

And then it becomes a joke. Haha, look at this ship I’m shipping ironically, isn’t it silly, it would obviously never work out in canon but I’m looking at it and producing content for it anyway because it’s fun.

But as time goes on, it starts filling my feed. I start thinking about it - really thinking about it. Why did someone put these characters together in the first place? How would they really interact? How did they end up together, and why would they stay together?

What started out as a joke becomes a diving-off point, an opportunity to really think about both characters. The dynamic isn’t canon, so it’s yours to shape. The dynamic isn’t canon, so now you must delve into each character on your own, figure out how you perceive and understand both of them, learn to see them in a different light. What started out as a joke encourages you to dig deeper, think harder, fall even more in love with those characters as you consider the potentials which lie outside of canon, but which ultimately trace their roots through the core of the characters themselves.

Because by their very nature, crackships and rarepairs are not based on plot, and they are not based on canon. They are so seemingly random and odd that they disrupt your typical view of these characters, making you think more deeply about them. The non-canon ships you embrace or reject can inform your perception of these characters on a deep level. They can make you cry just as easily as they make you laugh. They add so much flavor.

And they can also be really, really funny.

[dykedvonte]

I find the line "I have to believe our worst moments don't make us monsters." Fascinating because it comes from Anya, and I feel she really proves it the best.

For obvious reasons most people are in the "Anya did nothing wrong" camp and for good reason but there is a single action that I don't think she did well and it was her suicide. Specifically her method.

Realizing that Anya took Curly's painkillers was horrifying to me. As a Nurse I have no doubt that she'd know how terrible dying from overdose is. She had access to a gun which is well known for having a far more instant and far less painful death. And despite everything falling apart around her, knowing how bad Jimmy was, she still left Curly alive.

I don't think I thought about it much like that at first but the longer this game has sat with me the more horrified I am by the action. Curly is man who has been horribly disabled and is completely unable to help himself and he is very much a human being who does not deserve to be anywhere close to that amount of pain. Those painkillers were one that the few things that could give him any amount of relief and Anya took them.

She could have shot herself and left the painkillers for whoever was left to help Curly. She could've shot Curly and then taken the painkillers. She could've shot them both and quickly put an end to their misery, yet she didn't. Anya had a great amount of her agency stripped away from her, to the point that she didn't deem life to be worth it anymore and ended it, right next to a man who couldn't make that choice for himself even if he wanted to.

It is easily her most horrific choice and yet, she's still an angel.

(Please don't take this as Anya slander, I genuinely love her so much. I just find this to be an incredibly interesting thing)

I do subscribe to the idea that Anya realized that Jimmy was hitting Curly when giving him his medicine but didn’t intervene. I also don’t think her taking the pills from Curly as monstrous mainly because (while she knew he suffered worse with out them) she likely also knew they were basically bandaids on a bullet wound.

I have this sort of belief that that statement can only really apply to Jimmy in the inverse. Like some statements in the games aren’t meant to apply to all characters and not in every context of every action they do. It’s the idea that no one should be responsible for Jimmy’s actions but himself but they are forced to by him or the environment. Everyone is experiencing their worst moments but no one is a monster outside of Jimmy due to his inability to take responsibility and how he escalates the severity of the situation through his bad choices. Even then it’s not one moment that makes Jimmy a monster it’s the culmination of every moment that prove his inability to be anything but in this scenario.

With Anya you must remember she did have the code to the gun. Yeah, she could’ve broken it open but who’s to say how easy or how long it would’ve taken. Not to mention, there’s this misconception that she wanted the gun to kill Jimmy which isn’t true. She wanted the gun to defend herself in the case he got aggressive which is an important note of Anya being the only proactive person on the ship vs reactive. Locking the door, knowing there was no way in was likely a duel mercy for them both. A person in his state would die relatively soon without constant care and she has ample time to pass. It’s a hard decision to make for herself and someone else but it was the easiest even if it caused more damage than it was ever meant to cause.

It’s a sort of parallel to how Curly made choices he thought would help Anya and everyone but ultimately doomed them all further. Jimmy got what he wanted in both scenarios of crashing the ship and wanting Anya gone. What happened on the Tulpar will go down as a tragedy if they are ever found, a mystery if not but certainly not in a way that Jimmy wanted. Anya and the pregnancy are effectively gone but he’s still facing the repercussions for it.

There’s this idea that it’s controversial to say that Anya was anything but perfect and while I don’t think she did anything wrong, she certainly didn’t make the best choice in telling Jimmy but that again was because of the situation and environment she was in. We don’t know why she didn’t wait on Curly after their conversation in the cockpit, we know that was the plan and we know Jimmy finding out through her alone was the catalyst to the crash within like the next hour, yet you can’t really blame her. We don’t know why Jimmy came to medical nor what anyone else was doing. It can be considered her one mistake but then again we can’t blame a reasonable action on someone’s unreasonable response.

I think that’s a big aspect a lot of people look over in the characters actions. Most of them are normal, reasonable, human. But the systematic responses to them and Jimmy’s are unreasonably harsh and punishing.

This has gone off in a tangent from what you originally posed but I genuinely think of what might do happened if that confrontation happened with Curly there and away from the cock pit. I assume it’d happen in medical or even utility, hell, an area away from anything sensitive but what if? If the ability to do something awful wasn’t at Jimmy’s finger tips, if there was more than one voice in Curly’s head during that moment, what would’ve changed?

When I look at Anya I see her as having the best responses to anything happening during the events of the game but the environment, systems against her and even the other crew mates to an extent made it so it would inevitably backfire on them and mostly her hard.

[indiestsnake]

sometimes I wonder if my parents are part of the reason I’m so scared of being vulnerable.

uhhhhh ramble. not necessarily a vent, just getting some thoughts out after a revelation I had. but it isn’t exactly my brand of silliness lol. and it’s long. so ye :P

showing people what I like rlly scares me. showing people what I do in my private time even more so. like, i essentially cannot listen or watch anything without headphones, with my screen turned away from the room. same with books. Even if it’s a friend who literally follows me on tumblr, i cannot type out a silly post with them looking over my shoulder. i just can’t.

and I don’t know why I’m like this. but I had a thought in the shower tonight.

my parents never trusted me to be safe online. but at the same time, they left me alone with full internet access at seven years old. obviously I saw shit I wasn’t supposed to! so they would just… ask me to show them the video I was watching. or to take off my headphones. sometimes they did this during family gatherings. and those moments, just nervously watching them judge every word said, every visual, and it was just agonizing. this was never an alone thing, there was always other family members in the room, watching me, judging me. And to add, I was a young child with undiagnosed ADHD, anxiety, and probably some other forms of neurodivergence. so I’d repeat lines under my breath, make motions with my hands. just stimming, Yknow? but if they saw me doing too much of that, they’d ask me to take my headphones off and replay it.

so I started turning my screen away. hiding it. getting more and more anxious any time they asked to check, even when I wasn’t watching anything bad. and for the record, they never found a single bad thing. maybe some swear words when I was like 10. oh, be still my heart. and then they asked me to do it. during thanksgiving.

when 10-12 total people were in the room.

most of which I never spoke too outside of family gatherings.

for a solid three minutes. just�� staring at me. listening. judging.

I remember that feeling vividly.

and it just kept going. they stopped checking as I got older, as I gained their trust, as i got better at hiding. and they probably figured out that around 11-12 years old, they didn’t want to see whatever I was watching anyway. but the anxiety stayed. anytime they called my name, asked me a question, I would get this massive pang of anxiety. that they’d… I dunno, find out. that they’d looked through my tablet and would soon be shipping off my private personhood to some doctor to make me normal. that I’d be scolded, scorned, lose my access to my favorite games and content creators and all that.

that still remains. dulled, somewhat. but when my mom simply says my name to ask a question, I still get that pang.

…

hm.

I love my parents by the way. They’re amazing, far better than most parents, especially in their generation. they’ve improved so much, and they are miles, miles, MILES better than the average for parents of two high schoolers. but I just… had to get this off my chest.

maybe my upbringing… wasn’t as perfect as I claim.

[alitlantern]

#𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐋𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐍 ━━━━━━━━━ ⚖️ ɪɴᴅᴇᴘᴇɴᴅᴇɴᴛ / ᴍᴜᴛᴜᴀʟꜱ ᴏɴʟʏ / ꜱᴇʟᴇᴄᴛɪᴠᴇ ᴄᴀʀʀᴅ , ʀᴜʟᴇꜱ , ᴀʙᴏᴜᴛ , ᴛᴀɢꜱ

ᴛʜᴇ ᴛʜɪɴɢꜱ ʏᴏᴜ ᴘᴇᴏᴘʟᴇ ᴋɴᴏᴡ ᴀʙᴏᴜᴛ ᴊᴜꜱᴛɪᴄᴇ ᴡᴏᴜʟᴅ ꜰɪᴛ ɪɴᴛᴏ ᴀ ᴛʜɪᴍʙʟᴇ.

𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐒 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━⚡ an unfriendly aesop: when a moral lesson conflicts with our understanding of "good."

― Melody, 29, they/she

― Account is 18+, NSFW is for 23+

― Disabled, chronically online, horrendous sleep schedule

― Right off the bat, I am sex positive, kink friendly, and a taboo safe haven. I don’t believe in “pro shipping” or anything of that ilk. As long as you’re an adult and not hurting anyone IRL, I beg you to write what you want. With me, even! I’ll write fucked up shit with you gleefully! Censoring will only aid the corrupt.

― Haven’t been on Tumblr in probably 5 years, but I was here in the advent of RP and have a long, sordid history with it

― Iconless bc I’m not trying to screenshot games like that. It’s fine if you use them though!

― Don’t worry about matching my format, of course! I’m very lazy with it as it is

― Have played all the DA games + DLCs, working through the books now

― Constructive criticism about lore is always accepted!

― Brevity is the soul of art or whatever but I suck at it. Sorry :D

― Plotting >>>>

― I can usually bounce off of anything someone sends me, if plotting isn’t your jam, but I am here for the girls, the gays, and the theys that both want a 12 hour long yap session about every intricate detail and also write it all

― Explicit NSFW can be written on the dash if both parties are chill with it. If you wanna write it but don’t want it on the dash, I will be more than happy to move to Discord or Google docs! Also, I’m obviously just as happy to fade to black if need be.

― Favorite genres: Angst, hurt/comfort NSFW/erotica, fluff. I can roll with anything though

― Dark/Mature/Taboo themes will be mentioned; Anders is canonically a victim in many ways and I do not shy away from representing the fact.

― Please move ask responses to separate threads, linking to the original. Also, it doesn’t matter how much time has passed since I answered the ask; always feel free to turn anything into a thread!

― This is controversial but my biggest pet peeve is dropped threads. I’m disabled and have a very limited attention span, but I will still always go out of my way to not drop threads. It may take me weeks to reply, but no thread is ever dropped unless we’ve talked about it. I really hope for the same level of committment to this hobby from those I share it with

― Another controversial take; I don’t always follow with the intent to write. Yes, of course, I would love to write with absolutely everyone and will make that happen as much as I can, but I don’t think it’s a requirement to stay mutuals, or to even be friends! Sometimes I follow people just because I like the way they write, or I want to read their headcanons, or I mean to write with them in the future. I’m not in a rush here to figure out what to do with every last mutual. If that bothers you, please hard block me. No hard feelings!

― Dupes are welcome! We don’t have to write anything but I would love to be friends with people who love Anders as much as I do!

[yippee-inks]

So many people ship ghoulucy and guess what.

I am not one of them 💀

[megaultrasuperhypergodkiller]

I find it incredibly interesting how the fan response to Mouthwashing perfectly exemplifies the ideas and themes the game itself is trying to get across.

Seeing people completely ignore Anya and any of her struggles and pain that goes past surface level and instead focus on Curly and Jimmy really shows how effective the narrative was. How people can go throughout the whole game and miss arguably the entire point of the story and instead leave the game more worried about shipping the two male protagonists instead of the woman in the center of it all.

[candyheartedchy]

There should be an option for self shippers to let other self shippers know if they are blocked for sharing reasons so the blocked person isn’t wondering if they did something wrong or not when trying to follow.

Like I understand blocking is there for self shippers to have a more pleasant shipping experience without having to see doubles. And that’s okay to do so! It just would be a nice thing to confirm the reason of it being because of doubles instead of the blocked person worrying if they did something bad when they didn’t.

[foxgloveinspace]

People jumping ship cause of the new masks is very ahhhh. Telling. Tbh.

[solazu1]

I’ve seen so much shitty ship content in the marble hornets fandom since I’ve joined that I’m starting to get sick of shipping as a whole, ngl. I’m staring hard at the main contenders here, Jaylex, Brim, and Jam. Brilex is another ship I see frequently fucked up a lot too, but yea whatever. I’m not condemning people who get it wrong because I’m not the goddamn messiah of characterization either but there’s gotta be a line to be drawn, right? like with all the absurd vaguely uncensored abused x abuser content associated with jaylex, the uncomfortable brim content where every instance of hoody fucking up Tim's life on **PURPOSE** is ignored for the sake of a cuddle or for the sake of sexualization, THE HEAVY OVER-SEXUALIZATION OF BRILEX, and the fully fleshed out personalities of Tim and Jay being washed away and sacrificed for mischaracterized, stereotypical, romantic interactions that really isn’t something the character would ever do but rather something the author wants them to act out. <- honestly the last bit can be applied to all other ships too! And it isn’t my only gripe with Jam specifically but I feel like my specific criticism on it deserves another post that will probably never come haha.

[burinazar]

Mmph. It’s been a while and I didn’t realize I would still be excessively annoyed/affected by people with negative things to say about my OTP, but I am, I guess.

If it helps to add context, these comments were on a post where an account had reposted (without permission) some sweet gift art of the ship made especially for me, so I may be inclined to take it more personally for that reason. >__>

[kiwisandpearls]

the statements “platonic relationships should not be undervalued” and “it’s ok to ship wlw ships and mlm ships even if the characters involved have no canonical romantic interest in each other” are not mutual exclusive.

[isuara-ez]

I have had some problems with the overall direction with Campaign 3, I try not to complain about them too loudly because I am still having a ton of fun. I mean all of these characters are amazing, and you can tell it’s some of the most fun the cast has had. I will keep watching, but I do hope the Campaign doesn’t end with the resolution of the Ruidus arc. Because so far that’s been almost the entire game and the party has only known each other for maybe a couple of months. By the time VM fought the Croma Conclave they’d known eachother for a year, Two when they fought Vecna, The M9 had known each other for 11 months when they went into Aeor. This feels like that scale with characters that feel no where near as close to each other. And I’m not trying to compare the quality of Campaigns at all, I like each one for different reasons. Just a little context on why some people might not love the pacing.

Also as far as the Characters themselves, again I do really like all of them, I like almost all of the dynamics, Just moving forward now that some of the tension between characters has been resolved, I do hope relationships outside of the normal sub groups can be expanded upon, because some of these characters going into the campaign knowing each other for years has felt, restrictive? Like you could’ve told the same exact story better with allowing more on screen development.

[quartzskies]

random but is anyone else into yosurise but in a doomed kind of way. like kind of one sided. like a yosuke is into rise in a puppydog kind of way and rise keeps trying to find a relationship but can’t and finally decides to give yosuke a try because at least he’s a friend and she knows he won’t try to take advantage of her being an idol etc. And yosuke is ECSTATIC and wants to give her the world but in an unsustainable kind of way, a desperate “i don’t deserve her but she’s giving me a chance and i need to do anything i can to keep her happy” kind of way. And rise is so flattered and like yosuke is nice but she can’t match that dedication, no one can or should, but it’s all so one sided and she feels so guilty about that but she doesn’t want to break his heart or be “mean”. all while yosuke is becoming almost self destructive by trying to give her “what she deserves” but it’s an unhealthy level of dedication and it’s honestly hurting both of them

[fictional-men-enthusiast]

TophAbe shippers, it is ON SIGHT, I am NOT SORRY-