#tokenizing people of color for their own agenda

[everything-is-crab]

I have watched the video and read about the later interview with CNN and not once did she say that "well I was the only woman in the park" ever. During the incident, however, she did say was being attacked by a man and her life was in danger to the police. But she would have never been taken seriously if she had never added that he was an African American man. Without the term "African American" the police wouldn't gaf. Cops literally shoot kids and poc while they're doing the most basic daily activities in their lives but will refuse to take a stalker seriously because "he hasn't done anything yet".

Might as well bring up a case of false accusers to portray your anti-feminist point. There are few women who exploit feminist talking points for their individual benefit (regardless of whether it was racist or bigoted in any way).

There are people who will always exploit the points of a civil rights movement for their individual benefit or other motive.

Conservatives use the "protect women and/or kids" rhetoric a lot for their own propaganda don't they? Does that mean that they actually care about women and kids or does that mean now talking about protecting women and/or kids should now be considered a taboo because people manipulate things all the time?

Amazing how you threw white "cis" women under the bus (as if white trans women could never perpetrate racism the same way). What about women of color? Especially queer women of color? Are their words going to lead to the death of men of color or trans people too? Is me saying "kill all men" as an Indian girl going to kill a man living in the USA? Okay.

It's really funny how this shit is always directed at women btw (but add the words of "white" and "cis" to dismiss it), but never about men.

There are no discussions on here about how white gay men exploit the bodies of woc in the global south under the disguise of "gay rights".

There are no discussions on here about how black men are against black women getting into interracial relationships or they are "betraying their race".

And whenever people talk about white people feigning fear to threaten black or Latino people it is always always the "white woman and black man" example.

There are multiple incidences you can find online where white men are doing the same shit with black men or even black women. Yk what's the difference I saw in the reaction of both cases from white leftists? They sympathized with the black men whereas the black women "deserved" it because she was being "aggressive" (not misogynoir at all).

And idk how to tell you but a woman saying or getting away after saying "kill all men" does not happen irl. Ever. Do you think a society that hates outspoken and confident women in general will tolerate that sentence from them? Lmaooo

This is an online phenomenon where women say this after they see a man (who is WHITE most of the time) being misogynistic.

They say that because whether you like hearing it or not a minority of men are actually respectful towards women. Yes women are allowed to express anger about this situation the way they want. Even if you don't approve of it her words aren't leading to fucking violence irl.

sorry im listening to a recording of that woman who threatened to call the cops on a black man because he told her to put her dog on a leash. and she literally said "well I was a woman alone in a park" as her excuse for verbally out loud on camera telling him that she would call the cops and tell them a black man was threatening her life. this is what i mean when i say fear isn't apolitical or neutral white & cis women actively use their fear, whether its put-on or genuine, to kill men of color and trans people. "its okay to say kill all men because im a woman im just coping with my trauma!" cool could you find a way to cope that doesn't lead to murder because a white cis woman felt like her life was in danger because a black/trans person existed near her.

[hobohobgoblim]

An open letter to JD Vance from MarkedMelungeon

JD,

Openly, in front of the world, you have tried to understand yourself and your hillbilly roots in the American context. You bore that very painful journey in front of the mainstream, and they largely propped you up as whatever kind of token benefited their agenda.

You tried to quantify and understand the cultural differences between yourself and your grandparents, and between post-hillbilly transplants and the rooted hillbillies still on their ancestral turf.

I am related to you through several lines, including the Vance line that goes back to Bad Jim. Also the Bunch and Bowman and Sizemore lines. That ain’t even all.

You have McCoy in your tree, though— which might be what’s wrong with you. You are a walking feud at war with yourself.

Just kidding.

I mean, you do have McCoy, but so did most Hatfields. Your internal feud is something else.

You got closer to getting it than you realized. Let me help you get a little further.

In the coal camps, our story isn’t anything like the rest of American history. You can’t understand that if you think you’re Scots-Irish. You think that because you don’t realize how much the Yarvin-Musk-Posibiec-Theil (et al.) mentality has been the status quo since at least the Middle Ages.

One needn’t look any further than Herbert Spencer’s social Darwinism to find that the “Unhumans” book you blurbed is essentially a serf and turf war playbook lifted straight from Spencer’s dystopic fever dreams.

I’m Melungeon, and so are you. I’ve done hundreds of Melungeon family trees, including yours, for people from the coal camps. You are all the way Melungeon and not very Scots-Irish. That’s important to remember.

In fact, you and Barack Obama and I descend from Virginia’s first enslaved African family, the Bunch family. If I did more cross comparisons, I would maybe find other direct ancestors you share with Obama.

But, across the border into WV (same hollers your Vance family came from), there were some political differences that changed our trajectories and circumstances by our grandparents’ generation. You need to understand those.

WV state was formed as a result of class and racial warfare. People who aren’t from here never get it quite right because they try to understand it through an American lens, or a Southern lens, and without the context necessary.

Most regions are not made up of an underclass who lived for centuries in isolation as a closed culture resisting assimilation.

West Virginia became a state because Virginia had as much as 20% of its population being “free people of color,” and there were a lot of mixed ethnic Melungeons, Romani, and Natives who were being recorded as “white” on the census but who didn’t see themselves that way.

With Virginia’s resources depleted during the Civil War, the “mongrels” and “amalgamists” and “miscegenists” (as my and your ancestors are regularly recorded in historical texts) essentially staged a coup and were given the mountainous region of Virginia as their own state.

Of course, that’s not the whole story, but it’s the part that matters regarding our cultural differences in central Appalachia’s coal camps. We were the “hillbillies.”

We hated the North and the South. We called ourselves mountaineers because we didn’t want to be the North or the South. We just wanted to govern ourselves.

While slavery was abolished on paper, though, it was not abolished effectively as far as our lives were concerned.

But before the coal camps, and before the Civil War, “Free people of color” didn’t usually fare well and enjoy the rights they had on paper. With the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act, we were at risk of being captured and enslaved at any time, and since we weren’t allowed to defend ourselves in court, we had no way to contend with that.

Our ancestors couldn’t always have businesses, couldn’t legally start families, they had to compete for work against the unpaid labor of slavery, couldn’t pass on an inheritance to build generational wealth, and had no way of achieving the “American dream.”

So, we went into the deep woods, set up militias, built cabins by hand, formed our own communities, fed ourselves by hunting and foraging, mined our own coal, made our own booze for use as currency, and had plenty of blacksmiths and tradespeople in our ranks.

Horses couldn’t tackle the dense and steep mountains. We as a people were semi-nomadic, very skilled at animal husbandry and horse training and riding. We knew our hills and trails and had them signposted in ways only we could read so that only we could navigate our terrain. Outsiders didn’t see it as worth it to “try that in a small town.”

Soldiers couldn’t get past our militias. We even had our own internal government. A lot of our infamous feuds were a result of our own people selling out and using the broader American systems for profit or against insiders.

Your mamaw was what I call Old Ways Melungeon, and you tried hard to reconcile the differences between her generation and your own.

You got close a few times.

“I recognized that though many of my peers lacked the traditional American family, mine was more nontraditional than most. And we were poor, a status Mamaw wore like a badge of honor but one I’d hardly come to grips with.” (From Hillbilly Elegy)

You tried to keep your Mamaw from being seen when she would pick you up and drop you off and lied to your friends about her, claiming you lived with your mom and were mamaw’s caregivers.

You can’t get in the headspace of a person from a culture with a history that’s fabricated.

First, there is the difference between being Poor and being broke, which is an extreme divide you missed, even though you managed to document and illustrate the differences in some nuanced ways.

As the Ohio-born generations you and other post-hillbilly transplants in your town represented, you write:

“This was my world: a world of truly irrational behavior. We spend our way into the poorhouse. We buy giant TVs and iPads. Our children wear nice clothes thanks to high-interest credit cards and payday loans. We purchase homes we don’t need, refinance them for more spending money, and declare bankruptcy, often leaving them full of garbage in our wake. Thrift is inimical to our being. We spend to pretend that we’re upper-class.”

In another section, of your grandmother:

“When Mamaw picked me up from school, I’d ask her not to get out of the car lest my friends see her—wearing her uniform of baggy jeans and a men’s T-shirt—with a giant menthol cigarette hanging from her lip.“

At least she didn’t pull a gret ol’ big hawkin’ chaw of tobaccy from a buckskin pouch she kept in her bra, JD, right? As I write this, I’m wearing an oversized men’s WV t-shirt with a mine hat, shovel, and pickaxe on it. It’s been worshed so many times, the threads are unraveling at the base.

I bet your mamaw used to cut all the unraveling threads off the rags and towels and clothes as soon as she saw them, right?

Yes, we may wear the same raggedy clothes for a long time, may continue to keep a rusted vehicle on life support for a decade past its prime, and we aren’t trying look like or act like we are anything but Poor.

You said, “I recognized that though many of my peers lacked the traditional American family, mine was more nontraditional than most. And we were poor, a status Mamaw wore like a badge of honor but one I’d hardly come to grips with.“

Yes, being Poor is a badge of honor because we refused to participate in the myth of the American Dream or run on that treadmill expecting to get anywhere. We instead turned solidified a culture into what is like an amalgam of a tribe and a labor union.

We knew way before Ronald Reagan that no crumbs of trickle-down economics were going to reach us, and we weren’t trying to sit beneath the bottom rung of the class hierarchies and beg.

Being Poor was better than being delusional. We didn’t need to look like success. Our success was measured in how free we were from caring about what others thought about us.

You were broke, JD, and so were your parents. Your grandparents were Poor. That’s the aching difference.

Thanks to “dewokeification” (to use your word) efforts, our schools erased all our true history from history books because it made the states “look bad” and might lend to future uprisings if people knew what their ancestors fought for so we could all have it better.

And now you’re trying to do even more of that. You want to take from our children the truths they deserve to offer some sanitized version of history that excludes dissenters— and dissent is rooted in our culture because without it we are giving away our free will.

I mean… you have a book with over 3 million sales about white Scots-Irish poors, and no one even countered it. You look white enough. You blamed ignorance and poor education on hill people’s problems and cited a cable news report about “mountain dew mouth.”

In the same chapter, you wrote about Mamaw’s first time almost killing someone. “When she was around twelve, Mamaw walked outside to see two men loading the family’s cow—a prized possession in a world without running water—into the back of a truck.”

That’s right. That cow was necessary for survival. We didn’t have water or electricity for 50+ years compared to the rest of the country, even though we mined the coal that powered everyone else’s homes. We also made the glass for sodie pops, a royal crown treat discounted and for sale at the company store. We could buy it with scrip.

They still don’t have water, JD. The mines have ruined it, and you want to deregulate the mines even further so billionaires can cut corners.

You said of mamaw, “She loathed disloyalty, and there was no greater disloyalty than class betrayal. […] She’d tell me, like a general giving his troops marching orders, “There is nothing lower than the poor stealing from the poor. It’s hard enough as it is. We sure as hell don’t need to make it even harder on each other.”

That’s right. That’s the Melungeon honor code. That’s another core difference between the Poor and the broke.

Most white Americans are broke, not Poor.

You almost caught that, too.

You mentioned two books you read as a teen: William Julius Wilson’s book, The Truly Disadvantaged, and Charles Murray’s Losing Ground. You wrote, “Wilson’s book spoke to me. I wanted to write him a letter and tell him that he had described my home perfectly. That it resonated so personally is odd, however, because he wasn’t writing about the hillbilly transplants from Appalachia—he was writing about black people in the inner cities.”

Murray was also writing about the Black American experience. You find those so relatable for the same reason I’ve spent my life outside of the coal camps primarily in community with Black folks— because Melungeons have a similar history and we culturally co-existed until Jim Crow as mixed people until we were Black or White. Native wasn’t even on the census.

I couldn’t relate to a white American experience, either.

You were close, JD. You mention the disdain, distrust, and disconnect from politics and police, too.

We were a closed culture, JD.

It was us against the slave owners, us against machines, us against Indian Removal, us against corporate mine oligarchs, us against day schools and residential schools— and we fought hard.

You almost got there.

You said, “Not all of the white working class struggles. I knew even as a child that there were two separate sets of mores and social pressures. My grandparents embodied one type: old-fashioned, quietly faithful, self-reliant, hardworking. My mother and, increasingly, the entire neighborhood embodied another: consumerist, isolated, angry, distrustful.”

You said these conspiracy-theory-believing lunatic white post-hillbilly people were no longer capable of participating meaningfully in society, and now you are pumping them full of the same drugs you identified in your book— the “social heroin” you accused Donald Trump of being.

But here’s what I really want to address.

In an article you wrote about your conversion to Catholicism as conceived by neoreactionaries, you said this: “And I realized, eventually, that I had already been exposed to that worldview: it was my Mamaw’s Christianity. And the name it gave for the behaviors I had seen destroy lives and communities was ‘sin.’”

Boy…

Your Uncle Pet would’ve gotten out the electric saw on you for that. You better warsh your own mouth out with soap.

Your ancestors hated rules and law and order. You made them seem like patriotic, police-championing Southern white nationalists at your RNC speech.

We went to war because it was far safer than the mines where we had a 50% chance of survival, not because of some idealistic sense of duty to protecting the myth of the American dream.

We had guns because we had to defend ourselves.

And now, here you are, shucking corn for billionaires and being the utterly dishonest hype man managing PR for exactly the kind of men who have always tried to buy people like you to infiltrate your ancestors.

You’re a scab.

You just endorsed a book that divides people into “haves” and “have nots” and that claims the “have nots” are communists who will rape and kill the innocent, virtuous “haves” if they’re not reigned in and neutralized. “Crushed.”

You are trying to manipulate people into thinking they have a messiah in Trump and Musk.

Your Mamaw would be disgusted that you made her legacy into everything she stood against, priming people to support a police surveillance state that sees forced assimilation and dehumanization as the best way to empower billionaire oligarchs.

You tell people the way forward is to follow a book that says this:

“So mock the unhumans. Humiliate the unhumans. Ridicule the unhumans. Disgrace, debase, and deride the unhumans. Put the unhumans to shame. Tease and taunt and parody the unhumans. Scorn, scoff, and sneer.”

And despite this despotic approach to “have nots,” it also reads:

“One more thing: Never apologize. Ever. You will not express remorse. You will not explain yourself. You will not ‘add context.’ This is your life; the unhumans come to destroy it. Imagine saying you’re sorry to them. Couldn’t be us.”

You are promising poor white people a seat at the company table with “Great Men” like Elon Musk if they do the dirty work of “crushing” “have nots.”

You told that RNC story about your mamaw joining the ancestors and there being 19 guns in her house. You know why?

Let’s talk about another Harris. Mary Harris, also known as Mother Jones— the kind of “communist” revolutionary that “Unhumans” book claims wants to “rape and murder” and “kill, steal, and destroy.”

Mother Jones is a saint in the coal camps, like John Brown and Bill Blizzard and John Henry. Here’s what she said of the hillbillies:

[quote]Here the miners had been peons for years, kept in slavery by the guns of the coal company, and by the system of paying in scrip so that a miner never had any money should he wish to leave the district.

He was cheated of his wages when his coal was weighed, cheated in the company store where he was forced to purchase his food, charged an exorbitant rent for his kennel in which he lived and bred, docked for school tax and burial tax and physician and for "protection," which meant the gunmen who shot him back into the mines if he rebelled or so much as murmured against his outrageous exploitation.

No one was allowed in the Cabin Creek district without explaining his reason for being there to the gunmen who patrolled the roads, all of which belonged to the coal company. The miners finally struck – it was a strike of desperation.

I then spoke to the crowd and in conclusion said, "Go home now. Keep away from the saloons. Save your money. You're going to need it."

"What will we need it for, Mother?" some one shouted.

"For guns," said I. "Go home and read the immortal Washington's words to the colonists."

He told those who were struggling for liberty against those who would not heed or hear "to buy guns."[end quote]

You waited until your Mamaw was with the ancestors and you tokenized her just like you tokenized yourself to do the work of the “haves” and demonize the “have nots.”

Yes, you are an “oppressor class,” and you are perfectly entitled to lick boots of company men all the way to the top— but you are erasing the ancestors and their struggles all the way to a future that your and my ancestors would have and did fight to their last breath to prevent.

Shame on you. You advocate against even apologizing for dehumanizing people who don’t want to live under authoritarian rule.

You’re not a hillbilly. You are a Pinkerton.

And no matter how hard you try, and no matter how destructive the black hole of your ambition and arrogance is, real Vances aren’t bending a knee to billionaires and disrespecting our ancestors.

Not yesterday, not today, and not in a technofuturist hellscape where some California edgelord gets to play god at their expense.

If you knew who you were and how badass your ancestors were, would you still have sold them out? If you had an identity, would you have tried to discover your worth in IQ points or billionaire endorsements? Would you have waged a war against have-nots who organize against authoritarianism and exploitation?

Would you still be driven by shame? Would you still be hiding your mamaw because she looked too low class?

You’re the performative identitarian you scapegoat, putting on costumes and exploiting identities to be someone else.

And you won’t even apologize for it.

You’re never going to fall for your own garbage, and no self-respecting Melungeon would, either.

[none-gender-left-man]

Some folks would rather spend their energy intellectualizing in unrealistic, immaterial ideals while looking for reasons to be holier-than-thou. They're too busy power tripping on keyboards to see shit that is right in front of them when it comes to what trans men and trans mascs live with.

How can you witch hunt people in your own community like this and not question for even a second who might have put it in your head to divide us? (the answer is cis people, radfems, and bioessentialists in general). You're helping them, you're holding hands with and playing into the agendas of radfems and conservatives, which is to make us self-cannibalize so we can't actually make any fucking progress bc were too busy biting one another's heads off over semantics.

How do you cope with the fact that this attitude can and WILL inflate the issue of trans masc suicide, because if we can't even turn to other trans people then what the fuck do we have.

Stop alienating us and deciding the only good trans masc is one willing to self-destruct and self-deprecate! You all are GASLIGHTING an entire branch of the community. The amount of trans mascs I see folding and tokenizing themselves in this argument bc if they don't they'd be immediately cancelled is ridiculous. You are tone policing people on their own god damn trauma and oppressive experiences, INCLUDING and ESPECIALLY the trans mascs of color being harassed and accused of racefaking over this discourse.

Meanwhile half of the "transandrophobia truther exclu/proud transmisandrist" crowd claim that "only white trans mascs are talking about this lolol y'all wanna be oppressed so bad" For fucks sake would you listen to yourselves? Actually no- please STOP listening to yourselves for a moment and listen to the trans mascs and trans men of color, intersex trans mascs and men, and multigender trans men and mascs you are belligerently harassing for speaking about THEIR INTERSECTIONS OF OPPRESSION.

Y'all talk about intersectionality, but where is it though???

Even when we don't mention trans fems at ALL we are crucified and accused of transmisogyny over the mere word "transandrophobia" existing. Even when we explicitly explain how and why this is needed and how it can be used in cooperation with transmisogyny. Even when we are actively working to advocate for ALL trans people, it's not enough unless we minimize ourselves.

This is dogma. This is political cult mentality, and it is directly sourced from radfem ideology. Trans communities are not immune. Trans people can be radfems, and you might want to ask yourself if you're surrounded by them.

Saying transandrophobia exists is not equal to saying transmisogyny isn't real, it's not saying we have it worse, nor is it saying trans women and fems "oppress" us. That's absurd. No trans people can oppress one another, but we All are susceptible to rhetoric and propaganda, and we ALL can be bigoted, including to Ourselves and One Another. Period. No trans person has "systemic male privilege". Not a single one. Yes this includes "passing" trans men, who are still denied healthcare and oppressed by any and all cisnorm authorities that know they're trans men.

If trans men and mascs can be transmisogynistic, then I hate to inform y'all that trans women and fems can be transandrophobic.

And for that matter, trans mascs can be transandrophobic and trans fems can be transmisogynistic. Nobody is immune. Ever.

[angelcasendgame]

Sorry for this ramble, but seriously. It’s largely people being upset about *their own anticipation* of racism. (Doesn’t make the prequel inherently racist! Feelings are valid, but they aren’t fact!) Yet they still blog about spn, which was racist at many times and in many ways. They still enjoy the content with white men in the same breath they use to condemn the writing of *main characters* who are Latino/Black/South Asian and mostly female, and the hiring of diverse writers and crew. All of which were not common on spn prime!!! I hate the finale too. I didn’t like some creators on the old show. I want more Destiel as much as the next person. But enough to go “well then any attempt at progress or rep will be meaningless and these marginalized actors/crew — under new, actually progressive showrunners and producers — should suffer for it”? Does that make sense?

I won’t speak against other poc, people who are being appropriately critical, or people who just don’t wanna watch. That’s fine. But race-centric call outs I see largely keep coming from white bloggers and it’s just ??? are you serious. I’m a woc btw, hi! And I’d love it if white fans would stop speaking over us and stop using other fans of color who are anti prequel to further their own agenda. We are not a monolith. We are not here to tokenize as fuel for their rage-posting about a cw show lmao. They can watch the show and see for themselves if they care about this so much, or listen to *all* fans of color, not just the few whose beliefs align with theirs. I already see how many of them are perceiving these characters through a white lens and assigning stereotypes. Their anti-racism is about their vendetta against a network that wouldn’t give them Destiel, and a white guy from Texas who isn’t the only creative behind this. And they’re yelling racism without even paying attention to the show or analyzing the content to judge it rationally or having conversations with poc actually viewing the show. Which means they are centering their own feelings, not ours. Vile.

Ohmygosh hello anon!! I absolutely love your rambling, thank you so much for it!! And yes I 100% agree with you!! Like so many of the criticisms I've seen as reasons to not watch the prequel have been completely excused for a show they're continuing to engage in. I don't mean to be harsh but people turning up their noses at supporting actual real poc in favour of hating white Texas man just makes no sense. It feels so performative.

Esp considering the poc in the show, they're all new!! This is their beginning!! Nida and Jojo and Demetria are real life actual poc that we're supporting by watching this show!! You would think this would be a time to support them to have more actual poc in the industry but instead their hatred outweighs it all

And you said this perfectly, we are not a monolith, and to only seek out voices that match their own is frustrating!!! For us to be labelled as racists for being excited at characters that we see ourselves in simply because they hate white Texas man so much is so unjust and frustrating

[rf-times]

*Black woman here* Only after reading a masterpiece post about how transgerism/queer tokenize racial politics in an attempt to hide their own racism(while accusing other white people of being racist), I was able to fully understand one of the core issues regarding to race in feminism and the other social movements.

White ppl have been disputing the anti racist agenda for so long and often use accusations of racism against white ppl they disagree, not bc they care about being actively anti racist but rather to protect their own privileges, to buy our sympathy and loyalty to their projects and still being seen as the good white ally.

It's not exclusive to a particular group: I have been seeing this behavior from TRAs, queers, liberals, communists, feminists(which includes liberal, radical, socialist, marxist, materialist etc). I think it's important to highlight this because the tokenization of racial politics disguised as anti racist hurt woc and destroy feminism and other revolutionary groups bc instead of us being seen as comrades/building a powerful sisterhood we're seeing as mere tools in the white supremacy game, where different types of white ppl, unable to fully embrace radicalism (something incompatible to racism) prefer to save their image as "good white allies" at the expense of people of color and on doing so, they also prevent any kind of change, since they care more about themselves than revolution. It's an individualistic mindset.

Absolutely. With a very specific liberal, depolitcised, tokenised racial politics being popular for the last few years in every vageuly progressive majority white space, true anti-racism takes a backseat for optics.

[uh-velkommen]

The White Lotus, HBOMax

Alright four episodes in and things are finally starting to ramp up. My face throughout the whole episode was stuck on discomfort. This show packs so much tension in every 45 minutes that I'm constantly waiting for somebody to pop off or something crazy to happen but instead we get teased with the smallest little plot pusher. Which is working. I'm officially intrigued. I do wish I knew the overall point of the show because that's what would've helped me decide if I wanted to keep up with but now my determination to find out how this all ends is doing just that...

Character breakdown + Spoilers/Predictions

Armond: The manager of the White Lotus resort. I love him in all his poor choices. He's just constant chaos simply because he has the power to create it. He's also the biggest driver of drama. He lies a lot, almost pathologically, and he will carry those lies to the grave for no real reason.

Nicole Mossbacher: Resort guest, Mark's wife, and Olivia and Quinn's mom. She's a pretty basic character who is teased about possibly having OCD and working during vacation. She was pretty chill in the first 2 episodes but every once in a while she says things that gives off I'm a centrist but my views lean a little more conservative.

Mark Mossbacher: In the beginning he's stressing about possibly having testicular cancer because his father died of cancer... Turns out his father had AIDs. He has a depressive episode over his dad being gay and then, while drunk, he inadvertently comes onto the Armond. The next day Armond tests the waters with Sober Mark and we get uncomfortably funny scenes of Armond coming onto Mark in front of the whole family. Mark's a very passive dude who doesn't do anything exciting in the show but we just find out that he has, in the past, repeatedly cheated on his wife and didn't tell her (he told his son that he did tell Nicole but I don't believe it) I think his theme is just being genuinely unhappy with his life at the moment.

Olivia Mossbacher: She's a college sophmore and has many moments where she calls out her parents questionable statements. She carries herself with a weird nonchalance where you'd think she's a mean girl but she's only ever expectedly mean to her brother. However, she brought along her friend Paula and we start to see that their friendship is built on some unspoken competition. The girls do tons of drugs on vacay until Armond gets his hands on them and breaks his 5 year sobriety. This is when and why shit starts to hit the fan. They know he stole the drugs but because everyone avoids admitting to having illegal drugs, no one is ever outright accused.

Paula: Olivia's poc friend, possible hypochondriac, and supplier of drugs, has secret rendezvous with one of the Hawaiian native resort workers. She refuses to say anything when asked about her nightly disappearances but Olivia knows why or for whom Paula keeps sneaking off. We learn that Paula doesn't want Olivia to know about her and her beau because Olivia always wants what she has. My theory is that this wouldn't be the first time Olivia has stolen a partner of hers and I think now because Paula isn't admitting to hooking up with this guy, Olivia is gonna steal him and use Paula's secrecy as a way of blame.

Quinn Mossbacher: Involuntary loner in my opinion. He comes off as a classic video game nerd, obsessed with the internet, cant live without his Switch and Fortnite. He doesn't have any friends and he takes all the teasing from Olivia and Paula without a fuss. But he starts sleeping on the beach alone and keeps running into these amazing sights to see. This is where we start to see him blossom and speak up. Its ever so slow but in episode 4 he actually walks up to a group of guys and introduces himself, interested in their boat related sport[?] (Or maybe even the guys themselves🤞) He's also the only one who knows about the Dad's affair and stupidly hints at it at the family dinner (he's just genuinely stupid).

Shane Patton: Also a resort guest and the funniest character to me. He's your run of the mill self-centered male Karen (Kevin if you will) and he arrives at the resort with his wife Rachel. They're on their honeymoon but so many moments make you question why in the hell did these two get married? He is in an unnecessarily one sided battle with Armond. First the resort accidentally downgrades his room. Armond gaslights Shane into thinking that he never purchased the bigger room. Shane gets a receipt. Armond tells him there's a German couple staying in the receipted room longer than Shane and his wife are there so the room will not be ready for them in time. Shane finds out the Germans are actually leaving wayy earlier. Armond apologizes and books them a romantic sunset dinner on a boat. The boat is actually a funeral where a strange grieving woman, named Tanya, fails to spread her mothers ashes in the sea. Shane confronts Armond and asks for Corperate's number. Armond creates a fake business card and when Shane realizes the number is fake, he bursts into Armond's office to find him rimming a coworker while high on Ketamine. Prediction: Armond's gonna get blackmailed for abuse of power in a classic Monicagate manner.

Rachel: Shane's wife. Rachel's a journalist who actually looked up to Nicole (her job as CEO of god knows what puts her in the public eye) but when she finally got to sit with Nicole over lunch, Nicole calls her out for writing an incredibly slut shamey article, claiming that Nicole used her femininity to get her where she is now. This is the first smack in the face that maybe journalism isn't for Rachel. Well that on top of the constant teasing from Shane about her career choices. Shane's family is much more wealthy than Rachel's and he always finds subtle ways to make it known. Shane also pays her no mind, flirting with Olivia and Paula and battling Armond. Even during their arguments (which happens too many times for newlyweds) Shane doesn't look at Rachel and just gives periodic "mhmm"s and "okay"s. Also Rachel hates the Mossbacher family simply because they all seem to be doing better than her.

Now for the boring ones

Tanya McQuoid: An eccentric resort guest (which is a polite way of saying, a weird ass person who is over polite and basically pushes herself into every other character's drama in the most unintentional way, she's also bad at reading the room) She comes off as calm and quiet but we find out that her mother recently passed and she's in Hawaii to spread her mothers ashes. She becomes creepily obsessed with the resort's massage parlor manager, Belinda, after a complimentary massage and suggests becoming a beneficiary so Belinda can open up her own massage parlor. Her "obsession" could possibly just stem from Belinda showing her an act of kindness during a hard time but I know I questioned Tanya's intentions for at least the first two episodes... In episode 4, some random dude, Greg, shows up and invites Tanya to dinner after "accidentally" mistaking her room door for his own. Tanya postpones a business meeting with Belinda so she and Greg can hook up that night. The presence of these characters feel a little out of place. Unlike the Newly Weds and the Mossbacher family, there is not a lot of plot overlap. Tanya will often pop up to converse with the others and brag about Balinda's skills but she doesn't cause any trouble. Tanya's also very wealthy so I definitely thing this "Greg" has some secret plot to take down Tanya or plant something or steal her cash and unfortunately I do not think Belinda will see anything bright in her future. Her plans will be left on the backburner which I say is unfortunate because she's a kind woc who is just trying to do her job and is clearly very skeptical about going into business with this strange, rich white, resort guest.

Honorable Mention

Lani: A Hawaiian native, trainee at the White Lotus. She shows up in episode one as her first day on the job. Later we find out she's also pregnant and goes into a premature labor on the job. She has her baby and disappears for the next three episode. Come back Lani, Armond has just started getting your name right!

Show Themes

The show does touch on conversations of race and class but I would not consider this a political show or one with an agenda (it's satire). I point out the characters of color here because their race becomes a device used to create tension but not in a Token POC kind of way. All the characters are rich and they are shamed for it by the show writers. By this I mean nobody is spitting in their faces and calling them Climate Killers but the choices the characters make, the things they say, and the way they act gives the viewer something to laugh at. Their ignorant entitlement juxtaposing with the beautiful Hawaiian beaches and tragic Hawaiian history creates an underlying experience of, look at these rich people not having a good time and they can't even realize why! As for the characters, there is plenty of time to sit back and question, is this character a good person, who's the real antagonist, how do these stories intertwine, who do we root for What story is attempting to be told here? What is the message!?

[ms-demeanor]

Hi, can I get some clarification? At one point does lusting for a person/feeling lust for someone become objectification?

Objectification is treating a person like an object, like a *thing* instead of a person.

(for the purposes of this post I am primarily going to be talking about sexual objectification though parents treating their children like objects is DEFINITELY a thing)

I would argue that objectification happens when you disregard a person’s autonomy (not that you overrule or deny he fact that they HAVE autonomy, but like it doesn’t even occur to you that your choices should be considered because they’re not real enough to you in that moment for it to matter).

Having a crush on your friend or thinking that the cashier at a store is sexy isn’t objectifying them. Resenting your friend for not returning your crush or taking a photo of a sexy cashier to share on social media is objectifying them. Arguably just thinking about someone while masturbating is, to an extent, objectifying them. But imagining the sexy cashier taking you out on a nice picnic date and showering you with presents and buying you a pony is objectifying them too.

I’ve got a hot take here: Objectification isn’t inherently bad.

There’s a person at my gym who has some fucking THIGHS. Every time they’re at the gym they’re on the stair machine for a minimum of thirty minutes. I’m pretty sure they can’t wear jeans because I can’t *imagine* the kinds of jeans that would fit over this person’s quads. Every time I’m at my gym and this person is working out their thighs it’s a little bonus perk for my gym visit. In fact it’s kind of an incentive: if I go to the gym maybe I’m gonna get to see THIGHS and that’ll be cool.

This person is an object to me. At a conscious level I know that they are a real person with their own thoughts and desires and agenda and whatever but that’s not what they are to me. What they are to me is Damn! Thighs!

And that’s not a problem.

However if I *follow* them around the gym to look at their thighs, or if I stare obviously and move so that I’m working out behind them, or if I follow them out so I know what their car looks like so I can make sure to go into the gym if I see them in the lot THAT is a problem. And if they introduce themselves to me and I don’t remember their name or their interests and all I ever want to talk about is how hot their thighs are then THAT is a BIG problem. And if they were my coworker and I ignored their achievements and didn’t listen to their requests because their needs were less important to me than hot thighs and anyway if you spend so much time looking good you’re probably an idiot who doesn’t really work but just gets a paycheck because the boss likes looking at you and your work doesn’t matter THEN that is a VERY VERY BIG problem.

You are allowed to lust after and objectify people so long as it doesn’t impact the actual real world and that actual real person.

Chris Evans is an object to me. He’s pretty. I like looking at him. He doesn’t have any idea that I exist so me seeing him as just a pretty dude and ignoring everything else about him doesn’t matter. And I cannot tell you how much I DO NOT want to personally humanize Chris Evans as a celebrity and form a parasocial relationship with him where I know about his dog and his siblings and look at pictures of his family at the holidays. I’m much more comfortable experiencing Chris Evans as an object than as a person, thanks, and I’m pretty sure that for most celebrities that’s how they want most of the world to interact with them. But if I were to meet him and objectify him by presenting him with sexual fanart of him or if I were to have an interview with him about his political website and only asked him questions about his workout routine THEN it would be a problem for me to objectify him and I would be doing so in a way that was directly harmful to him.

Also. In terms of nonsexual objectification:

I keep hearing random liberals say that Biden needs to nominate a woman of color as his running mate.

I hear it over and over but I’m not hearing names, just “Joe Biden needs to nominate a Latina” “Joe Biden won’t win if he doesn’t run with a Woman of Color on the ticket.”

Over and over. But no names. No policy. Almost as if people are seeing this possible running mate like some kind of talisman or token or object or fetish (in the original “magical object’ sense, not the sexual sense) instead of a theoretical politician with experience and ideas of her own.

Hm. Gross.

And yes it is COMPLETELY possible to objectify men and we as a society do it A LOT and I kind of have the objectification of men as commodities in the popular music industry as a special interest that I’ve done a lot of reading and research and writing about.

Objectification is a thing that people do. It is arguably a *necessary* thing that we do in our society, where we’re aware of so many hundreds or thousands of people that we can’t actually individually treat them like humans (and we can’t even meaningfully conceive of MILLIONS or BILLIONS of people).

So let’s look at George of the Jungle (because that’s what we’ve been talking about today)

The ladies looking wistfully at George as he plays with the horses: these characters are objectifying the character of George but it is likely harmless because he doesn’t even seem to notice that they’re ogling him.

Ursula’s roommate/friend staring at George naked: this character is objectifying George and it *could* be harmful to his character because it will change their interactions and the way she views him and the dynamic between him.

The advertising for the film focusing on a shirtless character slammed into a tree: Not objectifying George.

Tumblr focusing on gifs of George/Brendan Fraser without his shirt: Objectifying the character/actor, harmless (though if you approached the actor on the street and said “Oh my god, I am so hot for your ass in that one scene where you’re wearing the bowl” that would be harmful)

People focusing on Brendan Fraser’s weight gain and lamenting that he’s no longer sexy: Objectifying the actor, potentially harmful to the actor (because people frequently tag the actors in criticism like this) and definitely bodyshaming in a way that can be harmful to the people who encounter the criticisms.

Fans expecting actors to maintain a particular level of fitness outside of a film: objectifying the actor, harmful.

Studios expecting actors to perform complicated stunts without adequate preparation or safety precautions: Objectifying the actor, harmful.

Studios and audiences expecting actors to be dangerously dehydrated so that they appear extremely muscular or extremely fit when filming; Objectifying the actor, harmful.

A film executive expecting an actor to perform sexual acts for them or to tolerate sexual touching because they’ve cast the actor for a part: Objectifying the actor, harmful. 

So it’s interesting that while the actor Brendan Fraser was likely objectified in the process of making this film (especially considering that, yeah, there was probably some unhealthy dieting and some dehydration to look as lean and muscular as he did in some scenes) the film as a whole does not objectify the character of George.

Anyway.

Shit’s complicated and there’s not a clear dividing line but it’s okay to think of people as objects sometimes because that’s honestly a thing that we have to do to get through the day without keeling over from overextended empathy but it’s not cool to *treat* people like objects and media that treats people like objects frequently models behavior that people normalize even if they don’t intentionally emulate it so it’s worthwhile to have discussions about the objectification of characters in media.

There we go.

Easy, right?

[wisteria-lodge]

badger primary + lion secondary (bird model)

Hi! I am so hyped to find your blog - I have been following SHC for a while now and this is one of my hyperfixations lmao. Anyway, I am wondering if you are able to take the time to help me figure out my primary and secondary. I have a hard time trusting my instincts and experiences because of PTSD.

I’ll keep in mind that you’ve probably dealt with/are currently dealing with some burning. 

Even though I have an idea of what I could be, it will be nice to get some external validation. (I’m bad at explaining my internal thoughts sometimes).

That is something that Lion primaries struggle with… but it might also be a burnt secondary thing. 

My morals are largely based on social justice oriented structures of oppression. I have always felt this even growing up but after I finally learned the actual language for the power structures that uphold oppression in school (like capitalism), I realized that I’ve always intuitively used some kind of structure like that to assess morality but it was nice to learn the language and be able to talk about it and explain it to others. 

Definitely leaning Lion primary for you. 

An example would be as a child when I found out that Nike was using child laborers to make their sneakers, I just boycotted Nike and told my family I was boycotting Nike. 

I’d be really interested in knowing what the thought process behind this decision was. Was it “child labors are people too” (Badger) “This is Wrong!” (Lion) or “this piece of information makes me re-think my model of how the world works” (Bird.)

Currently, I am struggling to be a good “Daughter” (i’m nonbinary but my family expects me to be a nice afab daughter) who performs family duties well, and living who I am authentically. It makes me super miserable.

You’ve got Lion somewhere in your system. Either primary, secondary, or both.

The thing that keeps me stuck between lion and badger primary is while I do find things right and wrong and sometimes, a lot of what I find right and wrong is based on people. For example, I get annoyed at a lot of activist communities because they like to play this I’m the Next Top Activist game, and start shaming people who are not able to give their 100% to the cause, and I think that just… super ableist. I often struggle with being in activist groups for that reason because I find myself disagreeing with the ways they may intentionally and unintentionally exclude people with disabilities, or people in other marginalized groups. And the minute that someone is joining a cause to advance their own agenda and profile or ease their own guilt…they’re no longer supporting the cause in my opinion. I can’t just be nice to a politician without really trying to suppress my desire to call them out. It’s really uncomfortable to - like for example, asking a politician for money even though that money was our tax money in the first place. 

This is interesting. And this part actually got me thinking Badger because - it’s just so focused on groups, organizations, and communities. What really makes you get up in the morning is this feeling that all people matter. So you’re  tuned into issues of accessibility, and what’s happening with our tax dollars. But then, you are also crossing out categories of people yourself. Like, if they’re not a True Believer, you don’t want to deal with them. If they’re a politician, you don’t want to deal with them. It’s a very Badger impulse, but be careful there. 

My secondary is tough because while I try to plan, I always forget about my plan. I end up improvising on the spot, and I like shortcuts, but I also cannot pretend to be someone I’m not. It’s hard for me to deal with workplace professionalism and act respectable as I always have to think about what I can’t say or else I will get in trouble. I’ve gotten in trouble in the past for my mouth.

The badger side of me shows when I am noticed for showing up at things I support. I tend to take on supportive roles in the causes I’m involved in because of my lack of energy (I deal with a lot of mental health stuff that limits my energy) and I’m also dealing a lot with my neurodivergence which makes communicating and public speaking sometimes difficult for me. 

I don’t tend to take on leadership roles willingly, but I notice people always coming up to me and asking for my lead on things because they notice what I’m doing. I got my current job because my supervisor approached me at the company holiday party and asked if I would be interested in applying because she noticed the work I did in my previous role. 

Everything about this is very Lion secondary, *especially* the bit about easily falling into leadership positions. Lion secondaries are inspirational, and they tend to gather armies around them. 

I grew up super shy and things overstimulated me a lot so thats why the lion secondary sometimes feels like it doesn’t fit me. 

Probably your Lion secondary was somewhat burnt when you were younger, but it seems REALLY fiery now. 

Ok I realized I rambled a LOT (lmao hyperfixation). Please let me know if you need more info from me if this isn’t enough! Also, if you are out of capacity and don’t get to this, that’s ok too. Thank you so much for reading and for your time!!

I’m sorry about another ask! I submitted a post yesterday (frantasticlyfran) and I realized I forgot to include why the quiz would sometimes put me as snake primary! So a lot of the choices in my life I made because of my mom. My mom is a cancer survivor. I originally went to study film and biology because I thought that making health info accessible would have saved my mom a lot of trouble with chemo and its awful side effects. Now, I am doing more policy work and studying mental health because I realized that I enjoy working on the ground with people more than doing work that seems removed from why I’m doing it (which film sometimes feel that way). The film world was also really awful to me on principle and the way that it doesn’t pay its workers, or the way it tokenizes communities of color. Now, I still think about my mom a lot as I study mental health and how I want to make mental health accessible for low income, queer, and trans communities of color. 

Sometimes it can be really hard to see your own primary, because you only live inside your own head. It’s hard to see the forces that dominate your life as things that don’t dominate the lives of everyone else. 

Anyway, here is a list of communities you are specifically concerned with and motivated by:

Chemo patients

The film industry (derogatory) 

Underpaid workers

Low income people of color

Queer people of color

Trans people of color

You’re a Badger. 

As a kid, because I struggled with social cues (yay autism lol), I also tended to stick to a few friends and tried to model their behaviors and expressions. That is why sometimes the test would put me as snake primary.

Yeah, that’s an Actor Bird model. I’ve got one too, for the same reason. 

The other thing I forgot to mention was the fact that I sometimes come off as a bird secondary because I like to be prepared when it comes to bringing a ton of stuff when I’m traveling. I end up overpacking and bringing maybe way too many things and sometimes it’s like super not practical. But I do tend to come off as prepared because I’ve also gotten in trouble with others for not preparing enough in the past lol because people would get upset at me for not providing them guidelines or preparations when I usually just, jump in and learn on the spot and forget that others need me to provide guidance and prep work.

Lion secondary, Bird model.

[astraeagreengrass]

The Queen's Husband [3/?]

When her reign is threatened, the Queen of Ergona must find a husband to secure her throne.

Word Count: 2.096

Warnings: None! English is not my first language so I apologize in advance for any mistakes.

A/N: No one is free from apprehension - not even queens! Luckily for our queen, she has found herself a pretty nice fiancé! This chapter is a little short and not exactly what I wanted it to be, but I decided to post it right away instead of keeping on battling my writer's block. I hope you like it! And, as always, thank you to the lovely, kind, generous people that take the time to read, comment and reblog. I appreciate you ♡

Series Masterlist

My Masterlist

Marble archways and red-orange torches were the only witnesses to yours and Steve’s late night conversations.

Your hand was in his as you ambled. It was fairly inappropriate, even if you were engaged, but you couldn’t help it in the darkness of the hallway. The touch of Steve’s skin was thrilling and your palm was sweating from the adrenaline coursing through your veins. The feeling was brand new and fantastic.

This tradition was something you both committed to once Steve moved to the palace, three weeks after your betrothal: he’d escort you to your chambers at dusk, the only moment you could talk in private, even if it sometimes meant you had to whisper. Every other hour of the day you were surrounded by your handmaids, advisors and political allies and you weren’t keen on them listening to your conversations with the Captain; not when the butterflies you first felt in the rose courtyard were still there, brewing a storm in your stomach whenever you gaze met his.

Growing up as the heir to the throne of the Ergona, you’d been extensively schooled since your earliest days. Politics, mathematics, geography, english and other languages, diplomacy… You excelled in many topics, having been taught by the most brilliant minds in the world. Love, however, had never been in your syllabus.

Queens weren’t taught the ways of love and, as such, it was never your priority. Knowing you’d most likely marry for duty, with a suitor chosen by others, you focused on becoming a good ruler - a fair and honorable sovereign, born to love Ergona rather than a spouse. 

Steve’s confession had terrified you - not because you didn’t believe him but because you did. You weren’t lying when you said you thought he was a good man and maybe that was why his love for you was so mystifying. Steve was handsome, loyal and kind-hearted. He could have any woman he wanted and yet he chose to love the one who built walls around her heart higher than those surrounding the Dragon Keep in Albeon. 

Wariness was a hard lesson to learn but a necessary one: trusting the wrong person could cost you your kingdom, your crown and your life. No one told you how hard it would be – the loneliness and the doubt – but a Queen’s life was full of sacrifices. Yet now, every night after you bid your goodbyes to the Captain and laid to rest on soft feather pillows, your past decisions and insecurities kept you awake, taunting your mind with “what ifs” and lost possibilities. 

What if you’d smiled more? 

What you’d been less cold?

What if you’d been more talkative?

Maybe then you’d know what to do with the snake coiling around your lungs, crushing your breath while it screamed you were not good enough. Not for Steve and not for Ergona. 

After every sleepless night, you’d watch the sun rise. The golden glow would slowly but surely spread across the inky sky, making way for dawn. It made you think of Steve and the way the blonde strands of his hair reflected that same light: your fiancé, blessed by Helios himself.

Amidst the anxiety, his presence was soothing. It confused you how the cause of your worries could also be their healing balm. Your days, as busy and hectic as they were, now suddenly revolved around the prospect of these slow walks to your chambers, the dark shadows of the castle’s walls mere bystanders to the way Steve was carefully, day-by-day, breaching through the queen’s careful armor until he found the woman.

It was scary but exhilarating.

Your conversations were easygoing and light-hearted. He’d ask about your childhood, your life in Foghar, your favorite color and favorite foods. In turn you’d question him about growing up in West Ergona, his days in the military and his travels.

You learned Steve was a sickly child who dreamed of being a soldier. His best friend was named Bucky Barnes - “he’s a punk”. He loved visiting Asgard because it reminded him of his mother and was very grateful to Abraham Erskine, the doctor who healed him.

Steve never inquired about your political agenda or demanded to be part of small council meetings. Much to Lord Fury’s chagrin, while you sat in stuffy rooms negotiating tax administration, the Captain could likely be found training archery with Master Barton. 

He was tanned from his moments spent outside in the summer air. His already impressive muscles were bulging and his smiles were relaxed and frequent, as if joy itself had made a home in him. You’d never seen him so carefree.

Outside the fortress domains, Ergona thrived with the news of your nuptials. Apparently, there was nothing like a royal wedding to lift the nation’s spirits after a war and - unsurprisingly - the prospect of Steve becoming the new King was very exciting.

For the first time in your reign, you welcomed Western emissaries to the royal palace, including Steve’s father, the Duke of Arvenia, who was absolutely delighted with his son’s good fortune. A short, balding man who resembled Steve very little, the Duke arrived with an entourage of musicians, dancers and even his personal painter. His golden cape could rival a lion’s mane and his necklace was encrusted with the finest emeralds. A feathered beret completed his look, making him look every inch an exotic peacock. 

Despite the obvious luxury he surrounded himself with, the Duke wasted no time asking how profitable the engagement would be to his duchy. Steve was flabbergasted with his father’s audacity, his face turning a shade of red that could rival his stepmother’s rubies - a girl even younger than you were. In an attempt to soothe him, you placed your hand over your fiancé’s, delicately saying that if the Duke of Arvenia had any questions regarding the marriage, he should take them to Lady Natasha. 

She would sort him out.

You'd gripped Steve’s hand on instinct, your body’s automatic response to his discontent. It was organic, as if your own senses were attuned to his - perfectly synchronized.

When you felt him relax you let it go, even if the loss of his skin left an unpleasant tingling sensation. You weren’t expecting for him to grip you hand again a few hours later, under the dinner table, as Lord Pierce - an obnoxious marquess from West Ergona - made you uncomfortable by suggesting Steve’s virility would surely grant him many sons.

His answer to Pierce, in the same commanding tone he spoke to his soldiers with - made the older man wither like a flower in a snowstorm.

“I hope our first child is a girl, so that she may follow her mother’s footsteps and become a great Queen".

He then proceeded to toast to his words, his wishes dying in a smirk of wine-stained lips.

It was how you ended here, wooden soles clicking on the stone slabs of the corridor. After the second course you excused yourself from the dining hall. You thought Steve would chose to stay with his relatives - according to Natasha, he hadn’t seen his father in three or so years - but he rose from the table as you did, not even biding his farewells.

You missed the way Lord Stark pulled his squire from his belt, preventing poor Peter Parker from escorting you and Steve. No one else dared to follow you and, as soon as you left the room, Steve's hand reached for yours again - bolder this times, fingers entwining in a move so similar to the way his own soul was twisting and wrapping around yours. 

You walked in silence for the first time. No conversation to appease the tension or divert your mind from the heat shared between your palm and his?

As usual, once they saw you approaching, the two guards that kept watch outside your chamber’s door exited to grant you privacy. They’d return once Steve left.

The Captain cleared his throat and spoke:

“In Asgard, where my mother was from, it is customary for a man to give a ring to the woman he is betrothed to. It is a promise of his commitment to her until the wedding day.” 

From his jacket pocket Steve removed a navy blue velvet pouch. Long fingers loosened the cord that held the pouch closed - dexterous with a sword but delicate to the touch - and a ring fell on his palm.

The oval stone was the same shade as the velvet cloth - midnight indigo, dark as the depths of the ocean that crashed in Ergona’s shore. Dozens of tiny diamonds surrounded it, twinkling lazily in the warm firelight glow. Even more diamonds made up the ring band - and opulent jewel, made of the finest gems dig up from western mines and handcrafted by the greatest jewelers at the Duke of Arvenia’s disposal.

Too opulent for you and Steve knew that.

“I know it’s too much” he said apologetically. “My father is known for his grand gestures. But I miss my mother dearly. This ring is the only heirloom of hers I have left. I know it’s not your style, but it I would if you accepted it as a token of my affections.”

There he was, breaking down your walls again. Every carefully placed defense crumbled in the presence of his words, scattering to ashes when you couldn’t find dishonesty in them. You found yourself divided: one Y/N was rational, overzealous and logical, screaming at the top of her lungs to halt the other - wide-eyed and ingenue, desperate to break-free and be loved. It was the second one who said:

“Doesn’t Asgardian tradition say that the groom should place the ring on the bride’s finger?”

Steve beamed - a beautiful stretch of lips and cheeks and eye crinkles. He smiled with his whole face, making you wish for broad daylight so that you could better commit to the loveliness of it.

He slid the ring on the fourth finger of your left hand. The jewel was even heavier than it looked, engulfing your digit in blue lavishness. Delicately, Steve traced a line from the base of your finger towards your wrist.

“This is the vena amoris. It runs from your left ring finger straight to your heart. I hope you can see this ring and remember that my own heart belongs to you.”

He continued.

“And, if you allow me, I will cherish your heart as you have cherished mine.”

“How could I have cherished you heart if I didn’t know of your… feelings?” you replied. 

 He laughed - a short, breath-like laugh that tickled your nose.

“You did so by being you. That is enough for me.”

“I don’t know how to do this” you whispered, mentioning to the space between you, yet meaning it as more than the inches separating you. 

“Neither do I” he took your other hand in his - limbs and worries and dreams laced together in the  dark. “But I’m willing to try if you are.”

Wordlessly, you nodded, cracking a small smile as you swallowed your tears. You didn’t cry easily,  but you found yourself getting more and more emotional the longer you shared Steve’s presence.

With his thumb he caressed the outside of your eye, temple, nose, then slid it downwards and traced your lips. Gently, as if touching a cloud, he took you chin in his grip.

When Steve's lips touched yours, the butterflies in your stomach broke free from their prison,  spreading their crazy fluttering to your heart, your skin, your mouth. It was quick - the briefest of pecks - but it still left you breathless and wide-eyed.

“I'm sorry” he muttered, mistaking your awe for consternation. “That was too bold. Your Grace, …”

Raising your hand, you interrupted him.

“Don’t apologize, I beg of you. I’m just… overwhelmed. I’ve never kissed anyone before.”

Now it was his turn to be surprised.

“Our acquaintanceship is changing me. Being in your company is bringing to life so many things I never wondered about or deemed important. In so many aspects I feel like a new person. And it's disconcerting but rewarding. You make me feel happy.”

“And I don’t know what this means or where this will take us but I hope you’re not afraid of going there with me. Because I’d hate to be alone again.”

“Your Grace…” Steve started but you interrupted him again.

“And I order you to stop calling me Your Grace. At least when we're alone”

Then, in a move that astonished both Steve and yourself, you rose to your tiptoes and kissed him again.

[lesslymelissa]

New Castlevania season surpassed the worst expectations and turned out to be so horrible, badly written and useless, that it makes you wonder how they even released this shit. First of all, it was a meaningless filler in a length of the whole season. The main plotline which they started since the first season didn’t move an inch. Then again, there was nothing to continue since Dracula has been killed. They could have adapted other Castlevania games about Alucard or Hector instead, but they chose to create a series original plot with Carmilla. And that was terrible decision, because without the game story Netflix writers could suggest only fanfiction tier development, and I mean fanfiction of the worst kind. There are absolutely nonsensical and disgusting pairings out of nowhere, that were made only for the sake of smut. They were tormenting characters, because that’s what many sadistic bitches like. And there was literally zero progression of the actual plot, since the writers obviously can’t make up anything interesting or original themselves. That was an awful pandering to brainless fangirls who only like smut fanfiction and don’t give a shit about personalities of characters or story. It’s very noticeable that the main screen-writer made comics before. He filled this season with typical and retarded cliches that teenagers consider to be ‘cool’, but they are pure cringe in reality. Needless nudity with random filler characters, accentuation on gore and constant dirty (and modern) cursing even from supposed to be nobles. All these things are just edgy banalities which can impress only kids and retarded adults who think that violence and sex make story ‘deep’ and serious. But they don’t. It’s a cheap way to catch attention for the lowest common denominator.

The most prominent example of useless filler shit was Isaac's storyline. Isaac is a token character for sjw to begin with. He is black and muslie (thanks for the reason to dislike this shitty character even more). It was absolutely needless information about his religion which they added only in the adaptation, because it’s trendy among sjw to defend muslies. Obviously there was nothing of sorts in the game and it added nothing to the plot. Like a token black character he was saved from everything first by Dracula himself, and in this season he turned into disgusting mary sue. He is absolutely evil - he literally wanted the destruction of all mankind and is a practicing satanist. How does it combine with him being a muslie and isn’t it offensive in itself I wonder? It seems the authors are braindead. A black muslie satanist, who is also presented as some kind of hero despite killing almost every passerby whom he doesn’t like. Is it a parody or something? But they were totally serious with this shit. Why the fuck does Isaac get away from everything even though he is turning people into hell monsters left and right only because they are ‘rude’ to him. He was acting like a touchy hysterical bitch. This scumbag already deserved to be killed, instead they are implying he could become some sort of a new messiah. What a load of bullshit. He had absolutely meaningless plotline with several long talks about nothing and fighting some random magician in the last moment only to get to a new magic mirror. Isaac is the most cringeworthy and disgusting character that an sjw screenwriter could possibly come up with. All about him is idiotic and pointless. It seems dumb writers went crazy from their Isaac wankfest.

Other characters didn’t get any important development too. Belmont and Sypha spent the whole season in random village which also added nothing to their story or the main plot, which is supposed to be a confrontation against Carmilla now. They just killed another completely generic hell monster in the end which was hiding in the church and that’s it. They were literally walking in circles around that church for several episodes doing nothing more. Very impressive progression and writing /sarcasm. That monster was only one of Dracula’s remaining servants, just realize how much the whole scale of the story degraded when the writers didn’t have game plot to rely on anymore. Reminds me of the Game of Thrones horrible ending after the writers run out of the books material. Belmont was completely overshadowed by Sypha, who became a pushy ooc mary sue in this season. Ridiculous considering that he is actually the main character.

But what I think was the most disgusting and nauseating are those horrible pairings the writers created for their revolting smut scenes. Of course all of it is completely made up filler, nothing like this was in the games. It was quite literally a writing on the level of horny teenage fangirls. The writers seem to think that if they are sadistic pieces of shit who like to torture characters that means everyone would enjoy it too. But most viewers are not sadists and always want a good resolve for their favorite characters. So, instead of giving Hector some kind of salvation and rescuing him from the captivity, which everyone wanted after the last season, those scum of a writers continued to make him suffer. They even turned it into some fetish it seems, alluding on making him ‘pet’ of new slut Lenore. That’s some shit straight out of garbage ‘kinky’ fanfiction. I can’t believe they actually showed this trash on screen. Hector is a main character of his own Castlevania game by the way. But here they constantly humiliate him and made him into a slave again, also forcing him into absolutely meaningless dirty pairing made only to show nudity. I don’t know who could like this shit except for brainless wankers and bitches who don’t care about characters themselves.

Another terrible bed scene involved Alucard with a pair of Japanese literally who characters. Again, random filler nobodies created only for a dirty scene with one of the main characters - that’s a textual definition of smut fanfiction writing. And they are showing it in a series, how much lower could they get? Needless to say, Alucard didn’t have any reason to suddenly get into bed with two suspicious strangers. All ‘development’ of their relationship consisted of them becoming his students. To which he also agreed unnaturally fast without a second thought. Why would he sleep with his students who he barely even knew? Just because he felt lonely? That motivation may seem alright only to retarded teenage fangirls and the writers on their level of intellect. Besides, Alucard isn’t even a full-fledged adult. He mentioned in the first season that his body matured very fast while he still was a child mentally. So they showed a sex scene with a child in a body of adult. That’s another level of low trash, it isn’t just morally wrong, it’s practically criminal. And why would Alucard even want something like this when he isn’t mature enough? He needed friends, not an orgy with some strangers. Absolutely horrible and revolting what they did with him, it’s also a disgusting OOC and complete lack of consistency and understanding of his personality. And of course it ended in the most stupid and edgy way possible, turning straight from obscenity into some retarded drama. What was their reason again for wanting to kill Alucard? Because he didn’t tell them how to move a castle? Why did they even need to move it? Also even if they wanted to make a trap for him, they could have locked those magical bracelets on his hands when they were lying on a grass together, for example. That disgusting scene was absolutely unnecessary. Filthy whores from Netflix writers team are making people feel disgust towards Japanese people after this nasty season.

Besides repulsive and smutty het pairings the authors also didn’t do any good with the only lesbian pairing they had. They could have left it to the viewers imagination whom they prefer to ship among the vampire girls. But instead they pushed for hypocritical tolerance again and forced their token white/black ship with Striga and Morana. Striga certainly has some lesbian vibes about her. But she could have make up a nice couple with Lenore. It would have influenced the whole plot positively, because then there wouldn’t be any disgusting humiliation for Hector. A pair with a strong warrior girl and a gentle cunning girl would have been very interesting and cute. They could even schemed against Carmilla together, they are smarter than her anyway. But instead we got another aggressive propaganda of tolerance with b/w pairing. Morana wasn’t interesting or nice, her only purpose was be a forced representation of the person of color in the group. Apparently even LGBT pairings can’t be free from this racial agenda.

Smut in this season was so obviously shown intertwined with boring and unimaginative battle to make a ‘cool’ edgy episode with violence and sex. Literally the level of what underage morons would consider impressive and exiting. That’s the most trashy, cheap and tasteless series I’ve seen. The writers deserve a slow and gory death on the stakes.

[thegreatscribe]

Language and Media: Ways on How to evaluate Language use in the Media by: Van Naputo

Media is a term which covers all the means of communication which have functions such as informing, raising awareness, education, socialization, entertainment and agenda setting, including all kinds of oral, written and visual images. (“What is Media”, n.d.) Upon the dawn of technology, many types of Media came into existence; media people tried to made use of technology to still give the people the pieces of information they want to have and as time passed, people came up with different modes to provide news to the public. Based on the type of medium, their role may be different, but they all exist to communicate to the audience and affect their perceptions. Today, people do not have to travel oceans or wait for a pigeon to get the latest news, they just have to look for the different forms and types of media to find what they are looking for. (Gooseberry, n.d.) However, the media must know who their audiences are, and they must know what proper language approach to use for them to serve the best to the people.

Moreover, people must also know how to critically evaluate the media content and information since not all contents served in those different types of Media are valid.

Definition of Terms

Media linguistics is composed of two words which are “media” and “linguistics” which means it investigates the relationship between language use and public discourse conveyed through the media. (Wyss, 2019) In other words, Luginbühl (2015) stated in Media Linguistics: On Mediality and Culturality, “Media linguistics studies how language is used in the media”

Language Register 

In linguistics it is defined as the way a speaker uses language differently in different circumstances. Think about the words you choose, your tone of voice, even your body language. You probably behave very differently chatting with a friend than you would at a formal dinner party or during a job interview. These variations in formality, also called stylistic variation, are known as registers in linguistics. They are determined by such factors as social occasion, context, purpose, and audience. (Nordquist, 2019) Language register is the level of formality with which you speak. Different situations and people call for different registers. (Eaton, 2018) According to Montano (n.d.), there are five language registers or styles: Frozen, Formal, Consultative, Casual and Intimate

Stylistics 

Stylistics is a branch of applied linguistics concerned with the study of style in texts, especially, but not exclusively, in literary works. Also called literary linguistics, stylistics focuses on the figures, tropes, and other rhetorical devices used to provide variety and a distinctness to someone's writing. It is linguistic analysis plus literary criticism. (Nordquist, 2019) In addition, Stylistics is the study of the devices in languages (such as rhetorical figures and syntactical patterns) that are considered to produce expressive or literary style. (Britannica, 2016)

Grammar 

The grammar of a language includes basic axioms such as verb tenses, articles and adjectives (and their proper order), how questions are phrased, and much more. Language cannot function without grammar. It would simply make no sense—people require grammar to communicate effectively.

Speakers and listeners, authors and their audiences must function in like systems in order to understand one another. In other words, a language without grammar is like a pile of bricks without mortar to hold them together. While the basic components are present, they are, for all intents and purposes, useless. (Nordquist, 2020)

Semiotics

Semiotics is the study of sign systems. It explores how words and other signs make meaning. In semiotics, a sign is anything that stands in for something other than itself. This lesson focuses primarily on linguistic signs.

The word 'semiotics' dates back to ancient Greece, but its use in modern linguistics was propelled in the 19th century with the research of Ferdinand de Saussure. Saussure was a Swiss linguist who contributed greatly to the study of semiotics, also sometimes referred to as semiology. (Taylor, n.d.)

Pragmatics 

Pragmatics deals with utterances, by which we will mean specific events, the intentional acts of speakers at times and places, typically involving language. Logic and semantics traditionally deal with properties of types of expressions, and not with properties that differ from token to token, or use to use, or, as we shall say, from utterance to utterance, and vary with the particular properties that differentiate them. Pragmatics is sometimes characterized as dealing with the effects of context. This is equivalent to saying it deals with utterances, if one collectively refers to all the facts that can vary from utterance to utterance as ‘context.’ One must be careful, however, for the term is often used with more limited meanings. (Pragmatics, 2006)

PRINT MEDIA

Print media refers to paper publications circulated in the form of physical editions of books, magazines, journals and newsletters. (What is the meaning of Print Media?, n.d.)

In addition, Millenger, (2018) said that, print media is the printed version of telling the news, primarily through newspapers and magazines. Before the invention and widespread use of printing presses, printed materials had to be written by hand. It was a painstaking process that made mass distribution impossible.

The following are the ways on how to evaluate Print Media in terms of:

Register

Usually, print media uses Formal Register because it is a one-way process that does not demand any quick response from the audience.

Stylistics

Print Media uses formal type of writing. Also, it gives the readers the taste of excitement for the readers to be carried unto the important part of the topic or the article. The information of the author is detailed for an easy access if the author committed some mistakes or problems in his/her published content. The articles, statements, news or etc. that are in Print Media usually have evidences that supports every claim.

Grammar

Print Media uses correct grammar: it uses formal register and formal type of writing; hence, it must contain correct grammar and of course with correct spelling. If authors will use incorrect spelling and grammar, it might affect the credibility of the news.

Semiotics

For a powerful media design, print media must use effective font styles and font sizes to capture the attention of the readers: bold and formal font style must be used. For an eye-grabber, print media must use graphics that could highlight certain parts: it should not create disastrous graphics and should relate to the topic presented.

Pragmatics

Readers are more focused on the headline before reading the entire article or news; headline is already speaking to the audience. They imply either literal meaning or sarcasm. Hence, headline sets the mood of the reader towards the media; it must create an effect to the audiences’ minds. Putting metaphorical statements, questions, quotes, full-of-feeling words will help the media have a powerful effect to the readers.

VISUAL MEDIA

Visual Media is a colloquial expression used to designate things like TV, movies, photography, painting and so on. (What are the types of effective Visual Media?, 2020) Visual media are sources of information in the form of visual representations. These can be abstractions, analogues, rough illustrations, or digital reproductions of the objects. There should be an interpretation of data, and sources may be hosted on the internet, printed in publications, displayed through broadcast media, or otherwise disseminated. (What is Visual Media and Information?, n.d.)

The following are the ways on how to evaluate Visual Media content in terms of:

Register

This type of media uses different kinds of register basing on the content. In news, it uses formal type of language register. On the other hand, movies use different types of language registers: consultative, to casual, to intimate depending on the content and the characters.

Stylistics

Visual Media is using different styles and that this type of media is exciting because it uses comparison between things: light versus dark, good versus evil, life and death, especially in movies. Though this media is using various styles, it will not be detached from its way of interpreting things and its meaning. As Weber (n.d.) said, “Images have an effect on communication. They initiate and control communication. And they change communication.”

Grammar

Visual Media uses a non-standard grammar. This type of media uses informal grammar: slang words, contractions, and new words that are not seen in the dictionary especially in movies depending on the theme or setting of the movie. Moreover, images have their own language and that sometimes they use informal grammar and sometimes, unidentified --- abstract images or paintings.

Semiotics 

In movies, signs that are shown are not that emphasized because the focus of the audience are the main characters in the movie. However, these signs: road sign, signage in malls, traffic signs and etc. are there to imply that it should be followed. Moreover, in images: photographs or paintings, there are certain signs that connotes meaning to the public audience. This type of media is more on symbolization to interpret certain things.  For example, in colors, black is a representation of mourn or sad, white for purity and peace, red for love and blue for loyalty and wisdom. However, these interpretations vary depending on your sense of geography – culture. These signs are shown in this type of media because they let the image, colors, shapes and etc. speak for itself.

Pragmatics

Images such as photographs and paintings cannot utter words because its way of communicating to the audience is by speaking through every single detail of the photograph or the painting. On the other hand, movies’ way of conveying its message is by the use of body language, gestures and how characters use stress and intonation in throwing their lines; how will they convey the message without literally implying the point.

ELECTRONIC BROADCAST MEDIA

Historically, broadcast media has been a public service, as with public radio which is funded by the government. This includes the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in Canada and National Public Radio (NPR) in the United States. Broadcast media can also be private and includes advertising. Global TV and CTV are examples of commercial television. The term 'broadcast media' covers a wide range of different communication methods that include television, radio, podcasts, blogs, advertising, websites, online streaming and digital journalism. Broadcast media provides valuable information that can inform and educate and includes public service announcements, daily news, weather forecasts, interviews, and documentaries. Broadcast media is also recreational and includes reality television, situation and sketch comedies, movies, sports and advertising. (What is Broadcast Media?, n.d.) Broadcast media describes the traditional forms of media that include television and radio. Technically, the term ‘broadcast media’ can include the internet as well… (Broadcast Media Definition, 2004)

The following are the ways on how to evaluate Electronic Broadcast Media content in terms of:

Register

Electronic Broadcast Media is using formal register: not a full-blown formal register since they are not expecting feedbacks from the audience, but less formal. Sometimes, they use consultative register in asking people or experts about a certain matter.

Stylistics

Electronic Broadcasting Media uses electromechanical or electronic devices to access the content given. Moreover, they are not practicing excessive foul words and language because they are more of a family-friendly media form. Main resources of electronic media are CD-ROM, online content, slide presentations, audio recordings, video recordings and multimedia presentations. Emotional appeal and repetition are highly observed.

Grammar 

This type of media often uses correct grammar in relaying news to the audience and sometimes, their choice of words used are those surface words not the highfalutin words for the better understanding of the audience listening, watching or reading the content.

Semiotics

Electronic Broadcast Media is mainly using TV and Radio. Televisions uses two types of media: Visual (moving images, videos, clips, images) and Audio Media (sound: voice, music and etc.) On the other hand, Radio uses Audio Media, but in present times, Radio is accessing Social Media and broadcasting their news at a live setting. However, traditionally, Radio is mainly using Audio Media. This type of media --- Electronic Broadcast Media --- is presenting their news content in a hierarchical manner: from the very important (politics, economy, and the most trending topic/s) and to the least important (entertainment, sports and etc.)

Pragmatics

TV newscasters or anchors uses scripts in relaying news to the public, but some of what they are uttering in the news are in their own opinion. Some of them are speaking sarcastically to make it not so direct to point as to who or what the anchor is referring to. However, in radio, some anchormen are not sticking to the scripts given to them; they prefer speaking on whatever they want to speak: some might be biased, and some might be abstain. Sometimes, anchormen are uttering things in manners depending as to who is he/she talking to.

OUTDOOR MEDIA

It typically consists of any advertising seen outside of the home, and is primarily grouped into a few specific categories: Billboards, posters and transit etc.

The following are the ways on how to evaluate Outdoor Media in terms of:

Register

Outdoor Media sometimes uses consultative type of register. Overtime, they use casual register for them to be able grab their client or their audience for a better advertising. They use this type of register to somehow create a chill and friendly environment.

Stylistics

This type of media is mostly using figurative languages: personification, hyperbole and metaphor as it grabs the attention of the audience. Also, they make use of interrogative sentences to make the audience think about what the billboard or poster suggests.

Grammar

Billboards and posters is using limited words for it to be catchy to the audience. Hence, this type of media mostly uses informal grammar: using of contractions, slang words and they even use new morphemes --- those that are not seen in the dictionary. They have to use these informalities of the grammar because they address all types of audience; may it be from high class audience or from the lay audience.

Semiotics 

In this type of media, they use signs to give out meaning; the sign could mean its literal meaning, sometimes they use it as symbolism. Moreover, outdoor media mostly uses visuals to give an impact to what they are advertising and to give additional effect to what they want to convey.

Pragmatics

Outdoor media is using limited use of words for it to be catchy and easy to read. With that, they use different styles in conveying what they really want to convey and some of their sentence structures are different. They also use some lay terms such as new-word expressions that could attract to the audience. Also, outdoor media uses images and words with big letters for it to be readable especially in billboards.

TRANSIT MEDIA

Transit media refers to advertising placed in, on, or around modes of public transportation: buses, subways, and taxis, as well as at bus, train, and subway stations. Transit media can be a great way to reach a really diverse audience: families traveling to day cares, professionals heading to work, tourists navigating a new town, or even students making their way to a local coffee shop. (Hendricks, n.d.) 

Transit media advertising is a mass media marketing tool which mainly use public transport to display an advertisement such as displays on buses, autos, cabs, trains, or any transportation mode that consumers use to travel during the course of a day. The idea of transit advertising is not only promoting a product or service outside the vehicle but also consist of displays placed inside the vehicles. Transit is an important medium for reaching an audience of all ages and backgrounds. In the last few years Transit media advertising has become more popular than ever. (Transit Media Advertising, 2020)

The following are the ways on how to evaluate Transit Media in terms of:

Register

Transit media can use different kinds of language register, it can be formal, casual, consultative or static, depending on their target audience.

Stylistics

This type of media uses limited choice of words. Sometimes they could use either formal or informal style of writing given that is should be limited depending on what they want to convey.

Grammar

Transit Media uses informal grammar, and at times, they break some rules of grammar to make it very catchy to the audience. Since they have limited use space, they usually use contractions, slang words more often, and using new words -- expressions to exact -- for it to be easy to read; they use limited words such as 3 – 5 words.

Semiotics

This type of media would not try to overdo things since they are just posted mostly in vehicles. Hence, they do not use symbolism for the audience to not consume that much time thinking of what the content means.

Pragmatics

Transit media tend to just present what is literal than letting the audience think. However, this matter is depending on their target audience and what are they advertising.

DIGITAL MEDIA

Digital media is any form of media that uses electronic devices for distribution. This form of media can be created, viewed, modified and distributed via electronic devices. Digital media is commonly used software, video games, videos, websites, social media, and online advertising. Even though digital media is part of our everyday culture, business owners still find themselves uncomfortable with replacing their paper advertising with digital marketing services.

However, with the constant shifts in technology, one cannot deny the influence that digital media has over our way of life. It changes the way we educate, entertain, publish and interact with one another on a daily basis. And, as a result of this influence, digital media pushes the business world out of the industrial age and into the information age. We’re no longer writing things with pens on paper, but instead communicating through digital devices. (Preston, n.d.)

The following are the ways on how to evaluate Digital Media in terms of:

Register

Digital Media uses more of informal register: casual and consultative, than formal register. However, this is just depending on the content and target audience. Social Media like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and etc. uses casual register and consultative, at times, even intimate register. They just use formal register when their content is for academic and professional purpose.

Stylistics

This type of media mostly uses new style of writing. For instance, in Facebook or Twitter, they tend to use more punctuation marks: commas, periods, exclamation points and question marks, to emphasize their feelings and what they want to mean; mostly, they put more emotions in posting feeds. Moreover, styles of writing in digital media would depend on the content they want to portray.

Grammar

In digital media, usage of correct grammar is not that required because most digital media users are lay people especially in Social Media. However, this will just depend on the purpose of the author or might depend on how will a person relay his/her message to the public. Digital media might use correct or incorrect grammar, but its purpose will not change but could somehow affect the perspective of the reader.

Semiotics

This type of media uses a lot of details to capture the audiences’ attention. They use graphics that are pleasing to the eye and use icons that symbolizes something in the content. Visuals are usually used in digital media to better explain the statements -- if any -- with the help of images. Moreover, with the use of texts in digital media, certain things like example if a post is encoded in all capital letters, it might mean disappointment, anger or shouting.

Pragmatics

Language use here might not be literally implied; some might use words like “HAHAHA” but does not mean that someone is happy. In this type of media, you cannot tell when someone really means what he/she want to mean, especially in text messages, posts or chats. People might mean literal; some might mean something. Hence, you should be careful in understanding and be aware in pragmatic functions to be able to communicate well.

CONCLUSION

As time passed, people came up with different modes to provide news to the public; people use different types of media to find out news, learn new things, communicate, and entertain themselves. Based on the type of medium, their role may be different, but they all exist to communicate to the audience and affect their perceptions. With the advance in technology, people can choose the type of media they want to use, no matter the time or place. Moreover, they can hear the radio while driving to work, can watch their favorite show on their phones, and they can find out any information and news on their laptops or mobile devices. Media and language can really prosper by the use of internet and by the use of technology. We just have to use those properly and religiously for it to prosper and serve its purpose. Today, people do not have to travel oceans or wait for a pigeon to get information, they just have to look for the different forms and types of media to find what they are looking for.

REFERENCES

Bean-Millenger, B. (2018, August 08). Introduction of Print Media. Retrieved from BizFluent: https://bizfluent.com/facts-6852659-introduction-print-media.html

Britannica, T. E. (2016, April 14). Stylistics. Retrieved from Encyclopaedia Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/science/stylistics

Broadcast Media Definition. (2004). Retrieved from OpenPR Worldwide Public Relations: https://www.openpr.com/wiki/broadcast-media

Hendricks, B. (n.d.). What is Transit Media? - Definition, Advantages & Disadvantages. Retrieved from Study.com: https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-transit-media-definition-advantages-disadvantages.html

Hobbs, L. (2020, January 2). What is outdoor media? Retrieved from Effortless Outdoor Media: https://www.effortlessoutdoormedia.com/what-is-outdoor-media/

Luginbühl, M. (2015). What does Media Linguistics Study? Retrieved from Media Linguistics: On Mediality and Culturality: http://10plus1journal.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/00_OPENER_Luginbuehl.pdf

Nordquist, R. (2019, July 16). Stylistics and Elements of Style in Literature. Retrieved from ThoughtCo.: https://www.thoughtco.com/stylistics-language-studies-1692000

Nordquist, R. (2020, January 27). English Grammar: Discussions, Definitions, and Examples. Retrieved from ThoughtCo.: https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-grammar-1690909

Pragmatics. (2006, November 28). Retrieved from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pragmatics/

Preston, L. (n.d.). What is Digital Media? Retrieved from DigitaLogic: https://www.digitallogic.co/blog/what-is-digital-media/#:~:text=Digital%20media%20is%20any%20form,social%20media%2C%20and%20online%20advertising.

Taylor, D. (n.d.). What is Semiotics? - Definition & Examples. Retrieved from Study.com: https://study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-semiotics-definition-examples.html

Transit Media Advertising. (2020). Retrieved from Excellent Publicity: https://www.excellentpublicity.com/media/transit/default/transit-media-advertising

Weber, W. (n.d.). In brief: Media Linguistics with a Focus on Visual Communication. Retrieved from Zhaw: https://www.zhaw.ch/en/linguistics/research/media-linguistics/

What are the types of effective visual media? (2020). Retrieved from Purple Cow: https://purplecowagency.com/what-are-the-types-of-effective-visual-media/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CVisual%20Media%E2%80%9D%20is%20a%20colloquial,photography%2C%20painting%20and%20so%20on%20.&text=All%20the%20so%20called%20visual,(especially%20touch%20and%20hearin

What is Broadcast Media? (n.d.). Retrieved from Introduction to Accessible Design in Media: http://www.humber.ca/makingaccessiblemedia/modules/01/02.html

What is the meaning of Print Media? (n.d.). Retrieved from SoyangGroup: http://www.soyang.net/blog/what-is-the-meaning-of-print-media-2/

What is Visual Media and Information? (n.d.). Retrieved from Media and Information Literacy e-portfolio: https://ewikstar.wixsite.com/mil-eportfolio/visual-media-and-information

Wyss, V. (2019). Media Linguistics. Retrieved from Zhaw: https://www.zhaw.ch/en/linguistics/research/media-linguistics/

[smokeybrand]

Venomous Visibility

As a creator, I always find the subject of representation kind of dubious. With the f*cked up Last of Us II leaks, the continuous misandrist poison leaking into the Star Wars canon from that Kennedy-led Lucasfilm, and the incredibly amazing portrayal of Jill Valentine in the Remake, this sh*t has been on my mind lately. Like, how do you write strong, female, protagonist without falling into that Mary Sue trap? How do you code black without being offensive? How do you write gay without resorting to stereotypes? I don't know how to distinguish a trans or deaf or autistic or native person through text without outright stating these things. Where's the nuance in portraying someone queer without it coming across as pandering? I don’t know if it’s because of my limited experience as a straight black dude who kind of thinks the current trend of eighty-eight genders and personal identifications is kind of ridiculous but i find the attempts studios make to cater to these groups to be adequate as f*ck. Like, Sarah Connor and Ellen Ripley kind of defined feminine bad-ass and they both did it way back in the 80s. Why is there this irreverent need to portray this misandrist energy in modern cinema? Birds of Prey was a fun time but it was way heavy-handed on that “Girl boss” energy and it didn’t have to e. Harley Quinn is already a boss and the Birds kick ass in their own right. Why does that have to be the focus of your narrative instead of actual character development and plot? Especially when you have that Ellen Ripley template? It’s weird to say but it feels like certain groups want those aspects to define the entirety of a character instead of it just being a part of them. I think that mindset is both toxic and does a disservice to the given narrative, unless the narrative, itself, is defined by those aspects.

I'm of the mind that, if you wrote dope characters, that should he enough. Take, for examples, Disney’s newest attempt to represent a queer character in Onward. I’ve never seen the movie, i have severe daddy issues so this hilariously outside of my wheelhouse, but i hear that one of the characters makes a passing reference to their same sex spouse. How is that not good enough? Isn’t that how it is in real life? I don’t see gays running around, shouting about their homo love from the balconies and rooftops. Unless it’s Pride. To add that little tidbit in the middle of a Pixar film, aimed at the notoriously conservative middle America, and not have them trying to burn down city hall is kind of amazing and, in my opinion, very tastefully done. At least it’s better executed than the way Beauty and the Beast did with the LeFou reveal. Like, holy sh*t. Talk about blue-balls. This fervent obsession with representation for representation sake or to push an agenda is absolutely repugnant. You think the character of Rey Skywalker would be enough of a lesson on that poisonous nonsense for everyone, not just Disney. Be it female lead, bisexual heroine, gay protagonist, whatever; If you're character is strong enough to be more than whatever social label cats want to code them with, then the representation is inconsequential. Don’t force something that doesn’t need to be forced.

I’ve seen representation executed beautifully. Euphoria is one of the best shows i’ve seen on television and it deals with a ton of sh*t that most SJWs want to fight about. Zendaya is excellent in this show and so is her trans partner, Hunter Schafer. The way that show is written, you can tell that there is an understanding about that culture, a personal connection to their world. That level of representation is outstanding and i commend the creators for giving us such a rich vision for those characters. That said, the strength of Euphoria is in the characters. Rue makes that show. It’s about her journey and everything after that, is a part of who she is as a character, not the defining aspect of it. That subtlety is how you represent an uniquely ignored demographic. That’s how you handle representation in media for adults. For kids, i think this is a little much. Not many nine-year-olds out there are recovering drug addicts.

I think the best piece of media i’ve ever seen in terms of representation actually came out of Disney years ago and gets criminally slept on to this day. Atlantis: The Lost Empire i easily the most diverse, accessible, and palatable piece of “woke” media, Disney has ever made, and it was never created to be so. Atlantis is a story with a female co-lead of color, who has her own agency, doesn’t really fall into the trap of being “damseled” and ends up being a Queen by the rend of this story. The male co-lead is an anxious, neurotic, nerd with a distinct lack of brawn, who beguiles the antagonists with his intellect. The supporting cast is a mixture of people of color, both of which are dope as sh*t, and various nationalities. I’ve spoken at length about my love for Kidagakash Nedakh, she’d be my favorite Disney Princess if she wasn’t a motherf*cking Queen, but i’d be lying if i didn’t admit Audrey had a near equal place in my heart for her sheer dopenesss. Doc is cool, too. Seriously, how is there no Atlantis world in Kingdom Hearts yet? F*cking Disney, man... For the record, my actual favorite Princess is Rapunzel with Jasmine coming in a close second.

Personally, when I create a character, I describe the way I imagine how they physically appear and let the reader assign whatever else afterwords. If I say a character is female with caramel color skin and lavender hair, it's up to the reader to define the minute details in their mind's eye. Is the Lavender a natural hair color? Is she black? Maybe Hispanic? Could she be native or Indian or something completely different? A lot of people have caramel color skin. Hell, she might just have a tan, I don't know because the way I see the character, is different than whoever reads it. I think that's one of the joys unique to literature, that ability to essentially "customize" a narrative to taste, which only amplifies my inability to reconcile this trend of "representation." A lot of people in the fandom attribute Ahsoka Tano as an LGBTQ character and i think that’s fine. It’s never implicitly stated but i don’t think it really has to be. Ahsoka is a bad ass and she displays all of that effortlessly. If you ant to ascribe a queer connotation to her, fine, but that’s not the part of the character that matters to the overall narrative. It shouldn’t be the one aspect which is harped upon officially. I actually really, really, love Ahsoka so i have a dog in this fight. Not so much about the gay coding, that’s a thing that doesn’t really matter to me, more the fact that she needs deserves more shine in the franchise. Thank you Mando II. Also, Dr. Aphra. I hope they actually give her a show. She’s f*cking awesome and, i think, a legit LGBTQ character. I could be wrong about that though.

If a character can be whatever you want them to be, why does it have to be implicitly stated? How is all of this forced representation and social agenda pushing not disingenuous at that point? How is it not more a hindrance than a strength? Why is it acceptable to have your token marginalized appearance, if it’s forced and detracts from the overall story trying to be told? Is it really okay to just accept such pedestrian pandering for the sake of pandering? Like, i’m not gay. How am i supposed to write a gay character without being an ass about it? The only way i know how is to be direct with it. Direct but subtle about everything. “Strong Female Character” should not be the one aspect of your character driving their development. You don’t need to create a Mary Sue in order to have a compelling female lead. Tifa Lockhart and Norah Price prove that. Your protagonist doesn’t need to be “the big gay” in order to be a bad ass. Ian Ghallagher and Willow Rosenberg prove that. Also, they’re both gingers so, you know, double the suffrage points i guess? You don’t have to write a potato who can do physics in their head, to represent an autistic person. Sherlock Holmes and  Amelie Poulain prove that. I would definitely do what Disney did with Onward in order to represent a character of that type of minority because, to me, as a minority, i don’t believe any singular aspect determine the whole of a character. Race, gender, orientation, religion, and other social identifiers; All of those are just qualifiers to the core of the character you’re creating. They are parts, never a whole. These things are just additions to embellish and enrich, not the definition of who they are, as much as everyone wants it to be. I mean, at the end of the day, how lame is your character if all they are is gay or stronk female? How much of a boner is our story going to be with a protagonist as deep as a puddle because you feel some kind of way about visibility?

[simonjadis]

I’ll say that I don’t entirely agree with your first assessment -- sometimes, well-meaning content that has lots of positive representation gets viewed under a hypercritical lens

(the motives for that can be varied, from people getting sick of seeing it on their timelines to people hoping that it will be their absolute ideal and then not being able to handle it falling slightly short, even if it’s still better than 99% of everything out there)

but yes, there are reactionaries out there who reflexively reject anything that they think has “political” or “SJW” content -- which sometimes just means women, POC, or queer folks in prominent roles. this does not happen organically

it is so important to recognize that these people have been deliberately radicalized. from youtube’s algorithms recommending toxic red pill/incel/nazi videos that get more and more extreme with every recommendation to certain cesspits in reddit to what 4chan has been for the bulk of the past decade to things like fucking Prager U

this segment may be helpful in seeing how official, well-funded groups target white boys

there is also that famous article talking about how they are radicalized organically

Step 1: 12 year old boy hears a joke. maybe it’s racist and he doesn’t even realize it. maybe it’s a funny voice from a cartoon. to him, it doesn’t seem malicious, it’s just funny

Step 2: this 12 year old white boy repeats the racist (or misogynistic or transphobic, etc) joke, in real life or online, and gets immediate backlash. not only does the joke that brought him joy fall flat, but now people think that he’s bad AND a bigot. he’s neither of these things!

Step 3: the 12-year-old boy is at a crossroads, but considerably less likely to take the “I’ll change my ways” approach after facing such a hostile response, so instead he finds an online space where his jokes are appreciated

Step 4: whether he has an Evil Online Mentor or just youtube’s algorithm sending him more and more of what he clicks on and likes, he becomes exposed to a bizarroworld where marginalized people being represented in positive ways is a conspiracy to ruin HIS life and where “PC culture” is ruining the humor that he appreciates

(this can also happen through Outrage Headlines on topics like video games, which is why I do NOT click on those “CompanyName RUINED GameSeries” or “THIS is where GameSeries Died/Went Wrong” videos on youtube; I’m not susceptible to their duderage I’ll just never reward them with a click)

either way, they pick up on things that they decide are “political” or “SJW,” including any of the following:

-pronouns in your bio

-using language like “marginalized community”

-trans people existing

-sometimes the word “gender” on its own

-requests for any kind of content warning

-people of color with more than token representation

-women whose clothing, hairstyles, or personalities do not fit into a few very specific categories of male-catered hotness

those of us who are good people have our own version of this

when people unironically say “pc culture” or “SJW” or “get woke go broke” or post that hateful “it’s ma’am” gif or say “cultural marxism” or “no safe spaces” etc, they are what I call malice signaling -- letting you know that they’re awful people. the “cultural marxism” line in particular is used almost exclusively by nazis

in any case, when these, well, awful people see what registers in their mind as “SJW political agenda” being “inserted” into media, they turn on a dime and attack it

[animentality]

Anyone else think Darkest Minds is the movie equivalent of Pepsi trying to cash off of gen z's perceived desire to rebel and be special?

I mean jesus, some movies are just dripping with corporate sleaze but that one just looks so awful.

Ooh special teenagers with the original super powers of being able to move things with their minds must fight the evil adults who use them like tools.

Plus we have a black female lead and a romantic subplot and teenagers dancing in the woods and being free spirited.

A group of old white shareholding white men got together and said well let's appeal to the tween audience. How do you do that?

Make a plot about rebellion. Maybe a cute little dystopian scenario that's along the lines of hunger games. Throw in a minority or two.

Oh and super powers, cuz teenagers love super heroes and are lonely and desperately want to be special.

God.

Every time I see that trailer I cringe so hard.

I hate these vanilla flavored dystopias that are so clearly attempting to be edgy, but have no real social commentary or anything really twisted about them.

I have no ill will towards hunger games but god I wish it didn't start the hollywood trend of sexy teenagers are fighting adults who do the bad things and use them for political agenda.

It's a ham fisted allegory intended only to exploit the sjw culture we've got going on, where people who like to feel special attempt to out do other people with how many boxes of unprivileged they can tick off.

It's a fantasy for middle class teenagers with diversity sprinkled in like token sprinkles.

Just terrible.

A true product of our time.

The only way the movie could not suck is if it's a subversion of the genre, the main male lead dies, and the protagonist realizes she's a lesbian, and also in the end, the government wins because the government and its evil corporate shadow masters always win.

Edit: I didn't know this was based off a book series.

Ok, seriously, I don't know every movie based on a book, and it didn't say it was based on a book so I thought it was just a corporate written type thing.

Jeez. You people saying I should've done research don't get that I really just type out posts on the toilet and leave them on my blog.

I didn't @ the author, I didn't know there was an author, plus I didn't even know she had a Tumblr.

The rude reblogs are expected, but the bitching in my inbox is getting irritating.

It was a misunderstanding on my part, and I already apologized so either let it go.

Or die mad about it. But on your own blogs.

Not mine.

Extra edit: lmao, white people tell people of color what good representation looks like, the post.

fantastic.

this post became something beautiful, because my friend dragon snake and I, both people of color, just got told by white people what good representation looks like.

Additionally.

We got called racists.

By white liberals who care so much about representation that they'll tell off people of color what it should look like.

God I love Tumblr. Only on Tumblr.

Super edit:

Well, well.

[ominous-chanting]

@godshaped if she is canonically a tory, though, i do question whether the fandom will continue portraying her as a queer nonbinary woman of color considering the tories' agenda is antithesis to someone fitting that description having rights

i actually think it’s more satisfying that way. one of the big parts of the show is the incongruence of being a person and an avatar, and showing how the Fears control and terrify their own avatars. the distortion is all about second guessing a someone’s true motives towards you, and what better place for that than in politics? a queer woc in a space like that (and the world of real estate) would likely be constantly on guard for superficial, two-faced people. the idea that helen might have considered herself “one of the good ones” (a la blaire white) or been a token poc for tories is actually really interesting to me and explains how she was able to not only survive but thrive in the distortion- she was already acquainted with its influence.

“omg i can’t believe helen was a Tory”

you fools that’s the whole point of the distortion

friends who are nice to your face but vote against your rights? family that hates everything you stand for but still gets you nice birthday gifts? coworkers who accept you as “one of the good ones” but think others like you are immoral and disgusting? finding out someone you admire is a bigot?

it’s called the distortion bc it distorts your worldview around these types of people. ever catch yourself making excuses for people you know, even if you condemn the same behavior in strangers? That’s Distortion Baby

[smokeybrandreviews]

Venomous Visibility

As a creator, I always find the subject of representation kind of dubious. With the f*cked up Last of Us II leaks, the continuous misandrist poison leaking into the Star Wars canon from that Kennedy-led Lucasfilm, and the incredibly amazing portrayal of Jill Valentine in the Remake, this sh*t has been on my mind lately. Like, how do you write strong, female, protagonist without falling into that Mary Sue trap? How do you code black without being offensive? How do you write gay without resorting to stereotypes? I don't know how to distinguish a trans or deaf or autistic or native person through text without outright stating these things. Where's the nuance in portraying someone queer without it coming across as pandering? I don’t know if it’s because of my limited experience as a straight black dude who kind of thinks the current trend of eighty-eight genders and personal identifications is kind of ridiculous but i find the attempts studios make to cater to these groups to be adequate as f*ck. Like, Sarah Connor and Ellen Ripley kind of defined feminine bad-ass and they both did it way back in the 80s. Why is there this irreverent need to portray this misandrist energy in modern cinema? Birds of Prey was a fun time but it was way heavy-handed on that “Girl boss” energy and it didn’t have to e. Harley Quinn is already a boss and the Birds kick ass in their own right. Why does that have to be the focus of your narrative instead of actual character development and plot? Especially when you have that Ellen Ripley template? It’s weird to say but it feels like certain groups want those aspects to define the entirety of a character instead of it just being a part of them. I think that mindset is both toxic and does a disservice to the given narrative, unless the narrative, itself, is defined by those aspects.

I'm of the mind that, if you wrote dope characters, that should he enough. Take, for examples, Disney’s newest attempt to represent a queer character in Onward. I’ve never seen the movie, i have severe daddy issues so this hilariously outside of my wheelhouse, but i hear that one of the characters makes a passing reference to their same sex spouse. How is that not good enough? Isn’t that how it is in real life? I don’t see gays running around, shouting about their homo love from the balconies and rooftops. Unless it’s Pride. To add that little tidbit in the middle of a Pixar film, aimed at the notoriously conservative middle America, and not have them trying to burn down city hall is kind of amazing and, in my opinion, very tastefully done. At least it’s better executed than the way Beauty and the Beast did with the LeFou reveal. Like, holy sh*t. Talk about blue-balls. This fervent obsession with representation for representation sake or to push an agenda is absolutely repugnant. You think the character of Rey Skywalker would be enough of a lesson on that poisonous nonsense for everyone, not just Disney. Be it female lead, bisexual heroine, gay protagonist, whatever; If you're character is strong enough to be more than whatever social label cats want to code them with, then the representation is inconsequential. Don’t force something that doesn’t need to be forced.

I’ve seen representation executed beautifully. Euphoria is one of the best shows i’ve seen on television and it deals with a ton of sh*t that most SJWs want to fight about. Zendaya is excellent in this show and so is her trans partner, Hunter Schafer. The way that show is written, you can tell that there is an understanding about that culture, a personal connection to their world. That level of representation is outstanding and i commend the creators for giving us such a rich vision for those characters. That said, the strength of Euphoria is in the characters. Rue makes that show. It’s about her journey and everything after that, is a part of who she is as a character, not the defining aspect of it. That subtlety is how you represent an uniquely ignored demographic. That’s how you handle representation in media for adults. For kids, i think this is a little much. Not many nine-year-olds out there are recovering drug addicts.

I think the best piece of media i’ve ever seen in terms of representation actually came out of Disney years ago and gets criminally slept on to this day. Atlantis: The Lost Empire i easily the most diverse, accessible, and palatable piece of “woke” media, Disney has ever made, and it was never created to be so. Atlantis is a story with a female co-lead of color, who has her own agency, doesn’t really fall into the trap of being “damseled” and ends up being a Queen by the rend of this story. The male co-lead is an anxious, neurotic, nerd with a distinct lack of brawn, who beguiles the antagonists with his intellect. The supporting cast is a mixture of people of color, both of which are dope as sh*t, and various nationalities. I’ve spoken at length about my love for Kidagakash Nedakh, she’d be my favorite Disney Princess if she wasn’t a motherf*cking Queen, but i’d be lying if i didn’t admit Audrey had a near equal place in my heart for her sheer dopenesss. Doc is cool, too. Seriously, how is there no Atlantis world in Kingdom Hearts yet? F*cking Disney, man... For the record, my actual favorite Princess is Rapunzel with Jasmine coming in a close second.

Personally, when I create a character, I describe the way I imagine how they physically appear and let the reader assign whatever else afterwords. If I say a character is female with caramel color skin and lavender hair, it's up to the reader to define the minute details in their mind's eye. Is the Lavender a natural hair color? Is she black? Maybe Hispanic? Could she be native or Indian or something completely different? A lot of people have caramel color skin. Hell, she might just have a tan, I don't know because the way I see the character, is different than whoever reads it. I think that's one of the joys unique to literature, that ability to essentially "customize" a narrative to taste, which only amplifies my inability to reconcile this trend of "representation." A lot of people in the fandom attribute Ahsoka Tano as an LGBTQ character and i think that’s fine. It’s never implicitly stated but i don’t think it really has to be. Ahsoka is a bad ass and she displays all of that effortlessly. If you ant to ascribe a queer connotation to her, fine, but that’s not the part of the character that matters to the overall narrative. It shouldn’t be the one aspect which is harped upon officially. I actually really, really, love Ahsoka so i have a dog in this fight. Not so much about the gay coding, that’s a thing that doesn’t really matter to me, more the fact that she needs deserves more shine in the franchise. Thank you Mando II. Also, Dr. Aphra. I hope they actually give her a show. She’s f*cking awesome and, i think, a legit LGBTQ character. I could be wrong about that though.

If a character can be whatever you want them to be, why does it have to be implicitly stated? How is all of this forced representation and social agenda pushing not disingenuous at that point? How is it not more a hindrance than a strength? Why is it acceptable to have your token marginalized appearance, if it’s forced and detracts from the overall story trying to be told? Is it really okay to just accept such pedestrian pandering for the sake of pandering? Like, i’m not gay. How am i supposed to write a gay character without being an ass about it? The only way i know how is to be direct with it. Direct but subtle about everything. “Strong Female Character” should not be the one aspect of your character driving their development. You don’t need to create a Mary Sue in order to have a compelling female lead. Tifa Lockhart and Norah Price prove that. Your protagonist doesn’t need to be “the big gay” in order to be a bad ass. Ian Ghallagher and Willow Rosenberg prove that. Also, they’re both gingers so, you know, double the suffrage points i guess? You don’t have to write a potato who can do physics in their head, to represent an autistic person. Sherlock Holmes and Amelie Poulain prove that. I would definitely do what Disney did with Onward in order to represent a character of that type of minority because, to me, as a minority, i don’t believe any singular aspect determine the whole of a character. Race, gender, orientation, religion, and other social identifiers; All of those are just qualifiers to the core of the character you’re creating. They are parts, never a whole. These things are just additions to embellish and enrich, not the definition of who they are, as much as everyone wants it to be. I mean, at the end of the day, how lame is your character if all they are is gay or stronk female? How much of a boner is our story going to be with a protagonist as deep as a puddle because you feel some kind of way about visibility?