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tothedarkdarkseas · 5 years ago

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What do you think is the REAL difference between Stu and Murdoc? Is it upbringing, age, personality, or cocktail of things?

I’ve gotta tell you, of all the kind asks you sent (and what a nice thing that was of you to do, thank you, they were fun to ponder!) this is the one I’m like… jittery to answer because there’s just so much to be said. Put under a cut because it ended up kinda stupid-long.

I mean, what has to be determined first is– are Murdoc and Stu that different? I tend to think they’re not, not as much as they are alike. That’s actually what I like best about them and something I usually play to when I can, how much they both resemble a certain stereotype but with their own twist. Many of their differences are a little superficial, like Stu being a bit more geezery with his football and all, and Murdoc being less uptight with his hobbies (be it involving cheeky GTA or a gimp mask.) I joked the other day that the biggest difference between the two is just that Murdoc does uppers and Stu does downers, and that’s pretty much it. I do think on a “deeper” level, like a more innate behavioral level, they’re a lot more similar than they actually realize.

But with all that being said, of course they’re not identical, and there’s a lot that contributes to where exactly they differ. I think that everything you said is absolutely relevant to that!

Let’s start with age and upbringing. The age difference between Murdoc and Stu is actually fairly stark when you just look at the years, but it never feels quite that bad to me because Murdoc and Stu are both so emotionally stunted and immature. There’s a line in Bojack Horseman than I think is incredibly on-point here, about how “the age you are when you get famous is the age you stop growing.” I think for Stu, it absolutely damned him to become famous at around 20, it locked him mentally into an age where he should’ve been learning everything wouldn’t be given to him, and instead it was just… given to him. In excess. If you follow that reasoning Murdoc’s sort of odd though, in that he never actually achieved fame on any major scale until he was in his 30′s. It seems more like Murdoc’s exaggerated sense of self-importance (probably a response to knowing, very much knowing, that he was not in fact something towering and impressive at all, and there’s like… something absurdist in really choosing to think he is. That’s almost the ultimate form of his Humor As A Shield– what could be a bigger joke than not hating himself?! Ha! It’s funny because it’s sad!) set in way before he actually became famous. It’s more like his maturity is stalled at the time he started trying to be famous. Stu didn’t actually try to pursue music at all before, while Murdoc spent a decade absolutely convinced that it had to work and doggedly not accepting when it wasn’t. It feels like these two approaches enabled (or damaged) them in different ways, but both end up with the result of men who don’t act their age for many years and have hedonistic, stereotypically rockstarish ways of living far beyond that of their bandmates. Stu can barely claim he knows better though and is perhaps more… people are gonna yell at me for being so hard on him haha, but more spoiled and therefore more ignorant because he never actually lived a responsible adult life. (Does that mean Stu hasn’t had difficulty in that life? Absolutely not. The man has at least three counts of massive head trauma and was in a coma for an undetermined period of time, he has a permanent physical impairment that likely impacts his vision, I think he’s earned a few perks.) Murdoc on the other hand is very aware of what it was like to be a failure, to be conventionally unemployable, and to have so little to lose that he’d make incredibly stupid decisions that could’ve ended his free life. His indulgence now is frankly more extreme, but Murdoc has an even greater sense of believing he earned that and he owes nothing (whether that’s completely true or not.)

And that’s just touching on the ends of their “upbringing,” not the actual 18+ years that went into it. It goes without saying that Stu and Murdoc had very different home lives– Rachel and David Pot are suggested to be rather precious with Stu out of some probable guilt for his first head trauma, in complete contrast to Sebastian’s humiliation and neglect– but on top of that, what seems to be glossed over at times is how they grew up in very different regions at very different time periods. I’m far from an authority on this or on anything (as always I really suggest asking @elapsed-spiral if you want better information, don’t let the hiatus thing fool you, Danni’ll still talk about British Shit Innit) but I’m told the British school system Murdoc would’ve endured in the 60s and 70s was unremittingly bleak and damaging to a child’s development. Despite his immaturity and my feelings that their age difference isn’t really so pronounced, Murdoc is older than Stu and unfortunately he experienced a much colder and rougher school environment, and it’s tough to argue that didn’t have an effect. (Though on the flipside, Stu was in school during Section 28, a thing I’m also not an authority on. Go figure a working class and very closeted bisexual man in the 80s might internalize some homophobia! The go-go 80s aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.) It’s not exactly surprising that Murdoc, who grew up on the lowest end of working class, in council housing, in an unglamorous Northern town like Stoke with a neo-fascist brother and a neglectfully-abusive alcoholic father, would come away an emotionally repressed and embittered person. It’s almost a bit bold that Murdoc is as “flamboyant” as he is (even if it comes with a hefty side of toxic masculinity)– he could’ve become hateful in a more stony way, but instead he’s like a giddy-cruel showman out of spite. You can argue that Murdoc’s lack of support system results in him feeling much more unfettered. He has no one to thank for getting him out of that and no one he credits for getting him where is. He very much has the mentality of “I take what I can and do what I want, because the world owes me everything.” And in a way, I can see where that’d come from.

He’s wrong though. Because Stu’s there. And Stu owes Murdoc nothing.

I know I’m really running on here, and I think you probably already have a picture of what I see Stu’s upbringing and childhood as. Rachel Pot is the unsung best character in Gorillaz, Stu was quite coddled by his parents, and Stu admits to being largely unmotivated and rudderless. It’s notable that Stu is in fact also working class but he’s presented like he’s not, I think just as a result of looking a lot better in comparison to Murdoc and us Americans not fully knowing the details of the British class system as compared to ours. (I don’t want to condescend to you anon, you may be British and know all this a lot better than I do. But because I am American, what would be more American than assuming everyone’s American?) I would say Stu’s family places on the higher end of that though (again, council housing for Murdoc, Stu had a garden with what must’ve been a decently big tree for him to fall out of) and isn’t portrayed as struggling in the same way. His job at Norm’s seems more like something he does because he’s not allowed to sit in the house all day, and he likes messing with the keyboards and he likes having spending money because he’s too old for allowance, and girls he’s fooled around with occasionally pop in to his work and bring him a pastry from the Tesco Express she works at and they make out in her car. Stu comes away from Crawley with quite a few “tethers” that disallow him from feeling as “loose” as Murdoc– he has a good relationship with his parents, a handful of mates, probably a handful of girls he wasn’t on bad terms with, at least one who’d end up becoming his girlfriend. So why does he have some of the same “cruel showman” qualities as Murdoc? Why does his entitlement end up looking much the same? That’s all personal interpretation of course, but I’d say it’s because Murdoc drove a car into his face and stole an unspecified amount of time from his life. I’d say because he’s out of his parent’s house for the first time in his life, and he’s going full throttle into being this person now. I’d say that in one night, and many unconscious nights following it, Murdoc smashed that same embittered attitude into the front of Stu’s skull. To be clear, that isn’t writing off Stu’s faults on Murdoc; it isn’t to say Murdoc made him egotistical or promiscuous or immature. But the attitude that you are fucking owed something is really only an attitude they share because Murdoc gave Stu someone to spite where he didn’t have that before.

(I recognize this whole dynamic isn’t for everyone and I do get it, and for what it’s worth I think it’s totally correct to say Murdoc gave Stu all the best things in his life. He just also gave him the worst bits too. The reality is neither would be here without each other, for all the good and bad that implies. It’s true that Stu’s famous because of Murdoc, but it’s also true that Murdoc’s famous because of Stu. What a tangled web!)

I’m sorry, I’m so off the question now, I just love this stuff. So, personality! That’s unquestionably a factor, the answer to the nature vs nurture debate will always be a little bit of both. I think if you tallied up all of Stu and Murdoc’s traits, desires, and behaviors after they’ve been living together a few years, you’d find a longer list in the similarities column than the differences. The environmental influence doesn’t just stop at where you’re raised, I think the environment you live in and the people who inhabit it continue to have an impact on you pretty much throughout life; even if moving to a richer city doesn’t “change” you, it changes the way you look at things, understand things, respond to things. It just inherently does. Still, I recognize that’s my own characterization of them and if you just look at the characters in canon, you’d be hard pressed to say they seem like the same guy. There are things about them that are just innately different, some of it learned through their upbringing and some of it dictated by… the way they’re wired.

Which is a point I’m really hesitant to comment on too much, but– mental health. It probably doesn’t look the same between Stu and Murdoc. There are other blogs who will discuss in more depth their neurodivergent headcanons and I see nothing wrong with that, I don’t really think there is any case that can’t be made, but I’m not especially confident making those cases myself. What I’ll say is that I don’t necessarily read Stu as having any specific learning disorder, because I fear it’s a little… iffy to have so many jokes in canon about him being thick or being slow. I think it really is just that, even prior to the injuries I reckon Stu was “a bit thick.” Head trauma doesn’t help that, though. Lifelong migraines and impaired motor function came about from the brain damage, absolutely, and I do imagine he must’ve suffered some neural response slowing, but his “lower intelligence” I feel a little less comfortable casually ascribing to anything and more to just Stu being Stu. Murdoc is also a case to be careful with, but within phase 3 it seems fair to say Murdoc suffers a psychotic break and is dealing with some delusions. Dangerously, I kind of lean into thinking this isn’t something that “just happened” because of the events of El Mañana and Plastic Beach, and that Murdoc had perhaps needed to be on an anti-psychotic like lithium well before that point. Again, I don’t want to insensitively represent this so I try not to really put such a fine point on things, but… I’m a little inclined to think Murdoc went undiagnosed in his young life and still may be demonstrating some effects of that. So, y’know, make what you will of it, but there’s that.

Sorry I nattered on about this, I do really enjoy examining both characters. Jokes about the drugs and stuff aside, I’ve always felt that the biggest difference between Murdoc and Stu is that Murdoc is adaptable, and Stu is malleable. Where that stems from is probably a combination of all these things. Murdoc knows what he wants and has no loyalties, he’s been without a future, he does what he can to succeed because he’s already done what he can to survive; Stu doesn’t know what he wants and he does have “loyalties,” but he has no sense of purpose, and he’s easily nudged in the direction you need him to go. While he can be stubborn, just like Murdoc, he’s also more sincerely shaped by his experiences even later in life into multiple, sometimes disparate versions of himself– I might even wager that’s why Stu becomes such a contradictory character without any of the contradictions feeling inauthentic. The two of them “being what they need to be” is part of the reason they accomplished as much as they did. But it’s also hard to say that they really “held on” to each other through the years, or if they just melded together in parts.

#Anonymous #sorry i'm late with this but i can't shut up #headcanon posts

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football15-7fics · 5 years ago

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Tu M’appartiens - Chapter 5 Part 1

But still, although Tessa was cursing Mats in the most spiteful of the way, Nicole read through the lines a truth that Tessa herself wasn't aware of. Her loathing against Mats gave the impression that it seemed more of an animal attraction, that she was in need of him, that she wanted to fuck him. Yes, Nicole had the perfect eye combined with the perfect brain in terms of body language, and concerning Tessa, it was an unquestionable topic, her body was craving on Mats.

Mats' presence had a bad impact on Tessa, at the view of him, she came to the saddest reality that her relaxing holiday came to an end. His stupid smile on his stupid face rose her tantrum a little bit more. When Tessa returned to the apartment, Nicole knew something was wrong based on the look on her friend's face expression. This one was amused at Tessa's reaction, laughing uncontrollably each time Tessa was repeating over and over again how Mats raised his hand at her.

Nicole's clumsiness to this situation gave Tessa a feeling that her bestie didn't care about her, especially about the hot point that Mats saw her boobs.

July 7, 2018

The big day finally arrived, Tessa turned 29, a new age for her. Life hasn't always been kind with her, but as the strong woman she was, she always kept her head steady and proved she had enough of maturity to take care of herself. Tessa developed a fierce maturity from a very young age, probably due to the divorce of her parents when she was still a child. She forged herself a strong personality and was never afraid to raise her voice to say what had to be said. Tessa was loved by everyone, first her dad and mom with whom she had a privileged strong bond, her friends, her coworkers and of course the BVB players that absolutely loved her. Never ever a player from the team disrespected her in any way or never proposed a friends with benefits relation, she was considered as their sister. But nevertheless this didn't refrain her from having a personal opinion on them, in fact she did find Sancho and Bürki really cute and attractive.

Nicole had been very evasive about the birthday party that she organized for her best friend. Only two hints were revealed, first Tessa had to be sexy and the second one was to make the most of it. As a smart girl, Tessa knew that everything seemed fishy, she felt something was on it's way and that it would be somehow of nasty. But to please Nicole, she decided to keep that feeling for herself.

"You look fine as hell bitch!" Nicole said as both her and Tessa accessed the elevator.

🔴⚫[Tessa's Outfit]⚫🔴

"You look fine as hell bitch!" Tessa shot back sarcastically.

"So where are we going?" Tessa asked curiously as her fingers typed her phone screen answering to the many birthday wishes via her Instagram.

"You'll see!" Nicole said as she pressed the 20th floor button on the elevator control pad.

"Ehm why is the elevator going up?" Tessa frowned her eyes curiously.

"Surprise!"

"I thought we were going out!"

"Why go out when the best is right in our hand!"

"Alright!" Tessa answered but mumbled [I feel I'm having a lot of fun!] Out of earshot to Nicole.

The elevator doors opened at the 20th floor, both stepped out when Nicole grabbed a red scarf out of her bag.

"Wow wow what are you doing!" Tessa made a step back when Nicole was about to roll the red silk scarf around her eyes.

"It's a surprise baby, do you trust me?"

"Ehm.. I guess so!" Tessa said as she felt a little tensed but nodded approving Nicole's move.

"Now relax, and keep walking, don't worry I'll guide your steps, you are not going to hit nothing!"

"Ok…" Tessa said, feeling a bit more at ease.

Girl, trust me, you'll thank me!" Nicole said as they entered a room.

"Nicole, what is going on?"

"There she is…" An unfamiliar female voice exclaimed.

As the red scarf was detached off Tessa's eyes, this one got speechless at the stunning set of red themed decorations. Masquerade masks, huge red sequins carefully wrapped around a huge table served with a delicious buffet. Fine wine and champagne, petits-fours, luxurious lobster and a wide variety of seafood, it all looked like one of these socialite private parties. Tessa examined each detail, but the gorgeous black and red birthday cake was too catchy to be unnoticeable. Everything was decorated based on Tessa's favorite red color. In the past Tessa always had amazing birthday parties, but this one was just on another level.

"My gosh, Nicole… it' s so perfect and beautiful, how… how did you do that!"

"I got some help in the name of this amazing girl, Amani!"

Tessa looked at the short woman, who looked absolutely stunning. As Tessa looked closer at the woman, her mind sent her flashbacks, enough to recall who she was the same woman with whom Mats was at the swimming pool.

"Oh gosh!" Tessa mumbled. "And who is Amani?" Tessa behaved foolishly.

"Oh, a friend… she's a sweet person!" Nicole said on a reassuring voice tone as she tapped on Tessa's shoulders.

"Happy Birthday sweetie, hope you like the decoration set, Nicole told me you were obsessed with the color red, so we based your little party on that!" Amani exclaimed excitedly.

"It's really beautiful, I can see you put a lot of devotion and of yourself, thank you, it's really perfect!" Tessa said in a sort of approval behavior.

"Don't he shock darling!" Amani said funnily..

"I'm so glad you like it, we know that you're not a big fan of big parties with a hundredth of people, private parties are way funnier and much more intimate, basically anything can happen without having to justify over certain things!" Amani spoke with a suave voice tone while she approached Nicole with a surprising behavior of her having her mouth locked with Nicole exchanging a passionate kiss. Tessa in shock had her mouth opened, in the unknown of how to react to this situation or of what to do or even what to say.

This was a new side of Nicole she found out and in the most of the explicit way.

"I'm… I…" Tessa baffled continuously with her eyes blinking several times.

"Tessa, you know me, I'm straight but sometimes crossing the line feels so good!"

"Nicole, I think I'll go back to our apartment room, you can stay here and have fun in my name!" Tessa spoke out foolishly.

"Yes, probably…" Tess was out of answers

She walked to the table where the food and drinks were displayed and served herself a glass of champagne that she gulped in one sip and filled up the empty glass immediately.

"No, you stay here, the fun hasn't even started yet, grab your glass, sit comfortably and relax!" Nicole guided Tessa to the living sofa.

"Are you girls dating or something similar to?"

"No, no, but from time to time when Nicole comes to Dubai, we get to have the best of the fun, we love to fuck!" Amani answered as she sat next to Tessa.

"Oh okay, I see, but yesterday, I saw you with Mats, at the swimming pool, you guys looked as a couple!" Tessa felt hungry to know further more about this sort of triangle couple or partner.

"Oh Mats, one of the greatest guy I know and probably the best lover ever, fuck with him for the first time and you'll get addicted to him!" Amani admitted with a sigh filled with lust.

"Gosh, why are every woman addicted to Mats!" Tessa said with an annoyed voice.

"She hates Mats, he's the enemy!" Nicole joked.

"What, you hate on him, oh girl, this is the worst mistake of your life, he's one charming man, treats women with the biggest of the respect and will make you go insane on him, and you're totally his type of girl, sexy, gorgeous and smart, and you're definitely my type as well!" Amani said as her eyes examined Tessa from head to toes.

"Oh my gosh, girls, can we just go out, I want to go dancing to a nightclub, I want to meet some handsome boys, I want to have real fun, get drunk and behave naughty." Tessa begged with puppy eyes.

"Why to go out when we have everything here!" Amani spoke with her eyes focussed at another direction, precisely behind Tessa. This one turned wanting to know what caught Amani's focus, for a second she thought she saw Mats Hummels, but it was from being a mirage, Mats was really there, standing beside Tessa.

"Tessa, so nice to see you again!" Mats had one of those charming smile, but Tessa had a different opinion about it. She had the look of a killer in her eyes, following his steps to the bar where he served himself a glass of red wine. Tessa's anger took hold of her entirely, she was literally boiling to a point that it became hard to contain herself. Inside she was yelling, spitting out her venom at Mats.

"Okay, tell me that this is a fucking joke?!" Tessa stood up from the sofa while she stared at Nicole with annoyance.

"Sweetie, calm down please!"

"How the fuck you want me to calm down when this fucker is here, smiling stupidly!" Tessa felt the tension rising so hard.

"Tessa, it's okay, it's your birthday, enjoy this moment please!" Amani tried to gain control of the situation while this one looked at Nicole for support.

"OMG, I can't believe it, you set me up, you set up all of this situation, Mats, the birthday, this place and everything, how could you do this to me!" Tears started to form in Tessa's eyes, not tears of sadness, but tears of rage.

"I didn't set you up darling, it was planned to have your birthday on a luxurious yacht but due to bad weather we had to find an alternative plan, and yes Mats is here because he is my friend and I thought that it was a perfect occasion for you guys to get to know each other!" Nicole shouted loudly enough.

"You know what, I never asked for all of this, I knew I should never have come here, wanna have fun, then just have fun, I'm out of this shit!" A flustered Tessa made her way out to the balcony, not even paying attention to Mats who did feel somehow bad for her.

"She's really mad Nicole, I think you should go and talk to her!" A concerned Mats said as he joined the two other girls.

"No, I have a better idea, she'll have a memorable birthday!" Amani said as she put a tiny white pill in Tessa's glass of champagne.

"Is that what I think it is?" Mats asked with a grin of satisfaction.

"Yes baby you got it, the most erotic natural drug that will make her change her mind radically!"

"Oh gosh, her wide side will take on her because believe me she is a savage!" Nicole laughed.

"Is she?" Mats frowned his eyes with curiosity.

"Oh Mats, you have no idea what you'll deal with!" Nicole winked an eye at him.

"Give me her glass, will bring it to her!" Nicole said.

#mats hummels #mats hummels fanfiction #football fanfiction #mats hummels tu m'appartiens

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winterywitch · 7 years ago

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I just want to say that I really admire the depth you put into your OC's and your confidence in talking about them! I'd like to learn more about them, but I'm on mobile and it isn't letting me search the tags, so... are there any W@tchtower Grotto characters you haven't talked much about that you'd want to talk about?

oh!! ;-; gee thank you.......................

uhhhhhhh gee idk why but it feels like i dont have an actual comprehensive post on who/what nana actually is bc most of my friends know him very well already? so here’s that

hes like... early 30s?? in terms of appearance/maturity, hes the godking of the country in midnight

nana is uh... certainly a rebel at his core thats one way to put it, a lot of core things about him for better or for worse challenge the status quo. he thinks this is a good thing 100% of the time, like he’s some kind of radical rebelling against an oppressive norm on every single norm he challenges. (its not)

he is RIDICULOUSLY people-smart, hes likely an empath and could easily be called a genius when it comes to reading people and understanding how people tend to work.

if he were a dnd character he’d be a sorceror, he casts from charisma not intelligence [though he is certainly NOT lacking in that department]

hes definitely considered the leader of his little commune of kings [involving desiderius, hachi and kyuun], those three tend to defer to him and seek him out for advice [well. they mostly Used to now its just hachi that does that last part]

he sees himself as a teacher and guide to people, which isnt inaccurate necessarily!

hes very good to his people, his country as a whole is doing pretty well financially, there’s a vibe there of everyone taking care of one another! not to mention the fact that its lovely visually

he’s right about most things and he’s comfortably aware of the fact that he’s right about most things. but hes open to being corrected! he cant possibly be right about everything ALL the time!! he just has to consider you an authority on what youre talking about, which is something he very rarely considers other people to be, or he might just ignore your correction. but sometimes he wont, which makes you feel kinda silly for pointing out his tendency for hypocrisy! how confusing. it’s hard to keep up with this one.

he, like all of his colleagues minus desiderius, thinks he is the only Good King while all the others are complete messes who dont know what theyre doing or are just flat out bad people. but like, yknow, its a fucked up dysfunctional family! that’s totally normal, right??1/11

something about him just makes you think “theres a guy who knows his shit,” its probably his sturdy [outward] confidence, his [appearance of] wisdom, his [very real] intelligence and his long list of supporters that make you think that about him

his hair is weird as shit! there are ‘stars’ in it that glow, not BLINDINGLY bright but i mean yknow, they do glow, and where theyre embedded in his hair theres increased physical sensitivity. pulling on this guy’s hair fucking HURTS, even petting it can be uncomfortable if youre not really really careful. not to mention a fucking haircut, good lord (haha)

his parents were kind of like... very emotionally shallow, they were the sorts of people to be like Oh I’m Fine ^_^ at everything, and in subtle and hard-to-detect ways, they would punish nana for showing emotion of any kind (for example, laughing at him when he would cry at sad things as a child). because of this, he is now very open about his emotions and embraces them as something he should listen to and follow rather than only relying on cold logic as his parents tried to have him do. (its a lot more sinister in practice than it sounds, because yeah most of the time it is innocent like this but at the same time, he takes his own feelings VERY seriously and if you hurt them, even if it’s just by having boundaries, he will identify you as someone mistreating him or even abusing him depending on how close you are]

[heres where we get into The Shit, big tw for abuse, csa/pedophilia and “marital” sexual abuse/assault]

his closest friend and advisor arya kurosawa has been his best friend since they were both teenagers. they met when arya was 14 and nana was 17 [in terms of appearance/maturity are what those ages refer to, they were both immortal] and they got along very well.

of course by very well i mean on top of getting along very well, nana has ALWAYS had an inherent, base-level disrespect for arya’s boundaries. it’s been there since they were teens, and it mostly manifested in nana pressuring arya to do [mostly innocent - but the pressure and coercion made them not so innocent] things he was scared to do.

they were inseparable pretty much ever since they met and VERY, very in love with each other

they definitely were a romantic item by the time nana inherited the throne from his mother, and the age gap was definitely concerning but it only grew more concerning as nana’s mental/appearance age rose because he was growing up emotionally and psychologically and arya’s... stagnated.

when nana was in his early 30s so to speak, arya was stuck at 14-15 or so. and like... they didnt really see anything weird about that, they figured “well we both met when we were kids so its not like nana is a pedophile or anything, why question something so good?”

to someone who didnt know better wrt age gaps in romantic relationships and pedophilia, the relationship between those two would have looked completely normal and healthy. there was certainly an appearance of mutual respect, support, love and commitment

nana could only treat a 14-15 year old so much like his equal. to be totally honest, even since they were teenagers, nana treated arya like his inferior, like a student that needed to be taught, and that dynamic only grew/got worse as nana aged mentally.

but at the same time arya also taught nana so many things! see? nana wasn’t some condescending prick! obviously everything is fine. there were a lot of ways sometimes in which ARYA was the adult and nana was the child ^_^ so it’s equal, right?

arya certainly didnt know any better, nana was the love of his life and that was all there was to it. he knew [because of nana] that any discrimination they might face due to their ages in this relationship was simply unfounded, cruel bigotry from a species of essentially cavemen who were afraid of fire. he knew he was progressive for his time, in a couple decades probably everyone else would come to their senses too!

long story short, one day arya very quickly, almost violently realized EXACTLY everything that was wrong. nana’s condescending behavior had come to a head and someone arya considered a playful rival had forced him, very painfully, to face the truth of what this relationship was: abuse from a man who should know better, taking advantage of a boy who didnt.

arya couldnt exactly love nana after realizing this. and it really fucking sucked. he really wanted to go back to the way things used to be, he wanted to “undiscover” what he’d discovered, but there was no way back and he felt so broken and dirty and ungrateful and bratty and selfish for suddenly feeling this way.

nana on the other hand noticed arya very suddenly averse to being touched or held or even looked at. for a while, he was very understanding about this - what that playful rival did was essentially cast a spell and at first he thought arya was just sick or physically not well or something, and that he’d get better soon.

he didn’t.

nana didn’t know what to do. suddenly arya was neglecting him, acting like he was terrified of nana. he’d never been like this before, what happened? it’s incredibly painful and confusing, losing the love of your life like that; one day you’re everything to them, and the next they’re flinching every time you raise your hand around them. nana had never hit him or abused him verbally... in fact, it was nana who HELPED ARYA gain the strength and courage he needed to become independent from his emotionally abusive parents. so why was nana suddenly the bad guy? he had no idea what happened, why, how to fix it, or anything like that.

eventually he snapped, unable to take being deprived of love and attention like this, so he just took whatever he wanted, physically, not caring what arya thought of it.

he knew it was wrong. he knew he’d definitely crossed the line into objectively unforgivable actions. but he was almost too afraid to stop and relinquish this power over arya, because then he had to A.) lose arya, and B.) be held accountable for his actions. both two very terrifying things he saw no personal gain in.

that went on for a long time, until nana sort of... slowly realized he was feeling weaker and weaker, more prone to physical weariness dizziness, severe headaches and nausea, and he didn’t put 2 and 2 together until it was too late.

arya had figured out how to start poisoning him and getting away with it.

by that point, nana realized not just what was happening and why, but also that he unquestionably, factually deserved this pain and much, much more. that realization was too much for him, it sort of broke him psychologically for a very long time, leaving him completely helpless to whatever revenge arya decided to take on him

[it was all physical and psychological torture, but arya was certain NEVER to stoop to his level and sexually abuse nana. he couldnt even think of sleeping with nana “consensually” anyway, it made him horribly sick to even consider]

eventually after a long-ass time of this, arya just got sick of looking at nana and couldn’t even be around him anymore without feeling absolutely god-awful, so he just abandoned nana, leaving him to fester in his broken body and mind

and y’know, stuff happens after that, but thats all there really is to the most prominent phase of nana’s development in THIS story. i also play him in his phase of development after that last bullet point [roughly 200 years later], where he’s fucked up in all kinds of ways and totally deserving it, but also trying to... not really redeem himself or anything like that, he knows that’s not really a thing, but rather to make himself useful to good people who want to do the right thing, in a dnd campaign

nana goes through a SHIT TON of changes, to the point that each phase of his development has his own individual profile on toyhou.se, he’s become a Big Trauma Coping Character for me and somewhat an experiment in redemption arcs, seeing what exactly should happen and how to make “redemption” arcs seem not cheap or forced

here’s the one i talked about in this post though

http://toyhou.se/335049.nana-of-the-stars

#kara's charas #w@tchtower grotto #mind the warnings!#misstooni

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trendingnewsb · 7 years ago

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How The Actual ‘Spoiled Elite’ Try To Silence Helpful Celebs

We’re into Week Two of the “Everyone versus The NFL And Everyone Else” kneeling controversy, and we are truly living in a golden age of stupid attempts to willfully misunderstand a situation in order to have angry takes.

It is a record-breakingly stupid time in America right now, and I wouldn’t dare presume I could actually change the opinion of anyone within the Colin Kaepernick Facebook comment cesspools that’ve globbed together over the past week. Plus, if you can’t tell from my doofy little avatar pic up there, I don’t exactly consider myself America’s preeminent spokesperson on racial issues. (I might not even be in the top five.) However, I do have a lot of experience with people on the internet saying dumb shit, and there’s one specific ultra-stupid criticism that keeps popping up again and again that I want to focus on: The idea that any wealthy celebrity who speaks out is automatically some out-of-touch, ungrateful elitist.

Last week, during Obamacare Repeal 5: Operation Miami Beach, Jimmy Kimmel spoke out against the Graham-Cassidy Healthcare Bill, and got blasted for being a “Hollywood elite” — a catch-all distinction that apparently disqualifies his Ivory Tower delusions of wanting poor children to be kept alive. Days later on Fox, Newt Gingrich attacked Colin Kaepernick and any other protesting athletes, calling them “arrogant young millionaires” who need “therapy” if they think they’re oppressed. Joe Walsh, the former congressman turned guy who’s constantly hate-retweeted into your Twitter feed, also called Stevie Wonder “another ungrateful black multi-millionaire” for protest-kneeling. It’s a similar critique as the Kimmel-bashing, with some hideous racist undertones to boot. Or not “undertones” so much as, y’know, “tones.” Loud, clear tones. It’s basically that jarring noise when everyone’s phones blare an amber alert all at the same time, but racist.

This specific critique — “celebrities and athletes are such spoiled rich ‘elites’ that any opinion they have is automatically nullified” — is so thunderously, nakedly stupid that we need to preemptively delete it from these conversations before the stupid people making these stupid arguments can proceed to their subsequent also-stupid-but-for-different-reasons arguments.

First off, Americans — and conservatives like Gingrich and Walsh in particular — clearly don’t believe that “rich elites” are incapable of exercising judgment. Jimmy Kimmel’s salary is estimated to be in the 12-15 million dollar range. Colin Kaepernick has made $43 million in his six-year career. They’re definitely financially “elite,” there’s no question. But Rex Tillerson, our secretary of State, was an ExxonMobil CEO who received a $180 million severance package. Betsy DeVos, our Education secretary, has a father-in-law worth $5.4 billion, and who is the 88th-richest person in the entire country. These people are orders of magnitude more “elite” than professional athletes and talk show hosts, and we’ve appointed them to positions of far greater influence. Should we all pile on these two anytime they open their mouths to offer any opinion other than “I am so gracious for being wealthy”?

Here’s the real reason this argument is unlockable-level stupid. Of COURSE there are out-of-touch celebrities whose wealth has insulated them from everyday life. We just wrote about five of them here. Celebrities like Robert De Niro and Jim Carrey have championed the “vaccines cause autism” horseshittery. Kylie Jenner tweeted about the dangers of chemtrails. Gwyneth Paltrow has built an entire brand around giving working moms advice and peddling expensive and un-self-consciously vague “wellness” products. That’s out-of-touch millionaire bullshit.

But when celebrities use their platforms to champion a cause for underrepresented people who don’t share their wealth or social standing, to no personal gain (and in Kaepernick’s case, considerable personal loss), that is, by definition, the opposite of elitism. Kimmel has repeatedly emphasized how his wealth and excellent health insurance have spared him the life of crippling debt that his child’s ordeal would have caused a poorer, uninsured family (if they received care at all). Blasting his “elitism” is the opposite of the point. He’s specifically advocating for the non-elite, even if it means he’ll end up contributing a disproportionately high amount of money and diluting his own access to healthcare services to some degree. Classic Hollywood bigwig behavior. Have another PRIME RIB at the BROWN DERBY during a MEETING, ya freakin’ Hollywood Man.

Kaepernick’s outspokenness unquestionably cost him a shot at a backup QB job this offseason. He’s lost out on millions of potential dollars, and his career could be over prematurely at age 29. And all for the selfish, spoiled privilege of being the most death-threatened and racially-slurred human on the face of the Racial Slur Death Threat Factory (aka the internet). A less selfish athlete would’ve just kept quietly earning millions of dollars instead of greedily forfeiting his job to crawl through a shit-pipe of backlash for a cause he believed in.

Again, Kaepernick’s message — raising awareness about police violence toward black people in America — has nothing to do with his own financial standing. He’s not coming out and saying “I believe deeply in two things: justice and not being grateful for having lots of money. Those are my two causes.” There’s not some imaginary financial line after which someone loses their ability to notice and point out things. And there are legions of non-millionaires making the same case for racial justice, and many of them are — shockingly — maligned by the same people who hate Kaepernick. It’s clear on every level that his finances are ideologically irrelevant to the people complaining about them; it’s just a quick and easy way to complain about something else and end the conversation.

Furthermore, that old refrain “You’re rich, what are YOU complaining about” has been hurled at every successful black celebrity who’s ever spoken out about anything, from Louis Armstrong to Jackie Robinson. The same press that championed Robinson’s “gracious” rise said the exact same shit when he started advocating for race-related causes. It’s such broken logic — “You can’t complain because you’re rich.” “What about the people who aren’t rich, who I’m specifically advocating for?” “We ignore them too. But unrelatedly.”

Can we just immediately dispense with this irrelevant “elitist spoiled millionaire” rhetoric whenever a celebrity acts in a demonstrably non-elitist way? It’s so completely beside the point, and even the people using the argument know this. There’s a friggin’ Marvel vs. Capcom select screen’s worth of other dumb, shitty arguments out there. Pick another one.

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