#understanding it but purposefully ignoring it to suit their own narrative

[sunfyrisms]

sometimes the ultimate form of self care is pretending season two of house of the dragon simply was never made. and that’s okay!

[raxistaicho]

Firstly, we should begin with the definition of the word, Revolution, which has two main meanings but the one we're most interested in is the overthrowing of a government or ruler, as that tends to be the most popular meaning.

You opened this whole post with, "we're going to ignore the definition that doesn't suit my narrative". Why bother going on when you immediately defeated your own point? Popularity has no meaning to the accuracy of something.

Then there's to say nothing of the frequency with which members of the Church of Seiros, most notably Rhea and Seteth, refer to Edelgard or the Adrestians as rebels or traitors.

Edelgard's war is against the social structure established by and upheld by the Church of Seiros. Faerghus, Leicester, and their nobility align with the church's interests in most storylines.

Do you honestly think that the Vietnam War should count as a revolution?

...The roots of the Vietnam War lay in the conflict between the Vietnamese and French colonial interests in the region, so yes, it was, to a certain extent, a revolution against western colonial powers in the area.

The Invasion of Poland by Russia and Nazi Germany in World War II? The Colonization of the American Continent?

Here comes the point where we just hopelessly talk past each other, since you don't acknowledge what Edelgard was trying to do. You see the war as a landgrab, which is why you compared it to those two, while I understand the unification of Fodlan was not the end goal but a step along the path of her reforms. How would you feel if I hit you with, "Dimitri didn't actually give a fuck about anyone?"

Now one could try to argue that I'm arguing semantics or performing some description pedantry,

You absolutely are.

but the truth of the matter is that if you're going to use a word especially with a strong meaning such as revolution, make sure you know what the actual definition is,

You say, having purposefully ignored the definition that didn't fit your narrative. Also, I, too, can grab definitions:

Definition of a Revolution

There's been a recent trend where Edelgard supporters refer to Edelgard's war as a revolution, I don't know if they're purposefully disregarding the definition of revolution or if they're simply ignorant, either way, they're still just wrong.

Firstly, we should begin with the definition of the word, Revolution, which has two main meanings but the one we're most interested in is the overthrowing of a government or ruler, as that tends to be the most popular meaning.

Now last time I checked, neither Faerghus or Leicester are governing Adrestia, which means Edelgard attacking them can't be part of a revolution. As for the Church of Seiros, Adrestia kicked them out 120 years prior to the game's start, and the Church of Seiros isn't in a position of governance over Adrestia either. So then the question is who exactly is Adrestia launching a revolution against?

I'm sure the question on the reader's mind is who exactly is Adrestia launching a revolution against? Many of Edelgard's supports including Edelgard herself believe that her war is a revolt against the social groundwork of Fodlan itself.

Now that seems clever, but falls apart on a closer inspection, because it could be argued that every single war in history could be counted as a revolution which would greatly dilute the meaning of the word. Do you honestly think that the Vietnam War should count as a revolution? The Invasion of Poland by Russia and Nazi Germany in World War II? The Colonization of the American Continent?

For instance the Napoleonic Wars could be argued as a revolution under this logic as one could say that Napoleon was rebelling against the social groundwork of Europe. Now I would think it would be obvious that Napoleon was not launching a revolution, as he was simply intending on conquering Europe.

Now one could try to argue that I'm arguing semantics or performing some description pedantry, but the truth of the matter is that if you're going to use a word especially with a strong meaning such as revolution, make sure you know what the actual definition is, as for those who purposefully disregard the meaning of the word, Congratulations, You're not a Clown, You're the entire Circus.

Regardless of how many people try to claim that it's a rebellion, a revolution, or any other synonym of the word, what will remain true is that Edelgard's war is simply a war of conquest, nothing more and nothing less, and it would be nice if people were honest with themselves and admit that.

[jvzebel-x]

"Sex Sells: Surviving, Hooking, & (intersectional) Feminism" is a personal piece about finding a place to hold dialogue about experiences with both sex work and sex trafficking while constantly having to remind people of the lines between the two, &the frustration of having to be perfect in articulation to avoid being either shunted or tokenized while trying to fight for both workers rights and victims security.

🌹

full piece below the cut. ♡

Sex work has a different veneer, depending on who you ask: there are those who purposefully blur the lines between violent human trafficking and definitively consensual erotic work, and also those who paint sex work as glamorous and wholly empowering while actively ignoring the narratives that don’t suit this ideal, ironically damaging their own cause by refusing to indulge in nuance. It can be difficult to find people who understand that sex work, like all categories of work, is merely a named category of jobs, and like all categories of jobs, contains a broad spectrum of working conditions, the safety (and legality) of which depends largely on the same societal intersections that impact every other job (if not always at exactly the same rate): race, class, health, gender and sexual identity, to name a few.

Sex trafficking, however, is purposefully seen with much less nuance or specifics: vague and heavily dramatic examples are often painted by people with little to no experience talking to or working with trafficking survivors, used to push political agendas that do not center and ultimately will not help survivors or current victims in need of a solid way out. Survivors and victims who, very similarly to many other forms of sexually explicit violence, are often held to impossible standards to be believed or helped. Standards that, if not met, will also land them in jail for breaking laws surrounding exchanging sex for money. The question becomes (and, truly, has always been): when the favoured image of “sex trafficking victims” are largely ones that you’ll be hard-pressed to find examples of in realtime (virginal, cis-gendered white women, literally caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, laced with drugs that otherwise would never be in their systems, taken by shifty and sexually violent men, always of colour), where does that leave the victims who cannot prove their innocence in ways approved by authority figures? Case after case has shown us that it leaves these victims in a legal hole, one that rewards silence and legally punishes speaking out or trying to receive any help. And with no effort to address the different marginalizations that are statistically proven to lead to an increased chance of being trafficked (and given the marginalizations most notable, specifically race and class), one must wonder if this refusal to detail the facts behind the issue is purposeful or not, particularly as legislation is perpetually passed that does nothing to help sex trafficking victims, and actively harms and endangers consensual sex workers.

These two separate issues, often so inappropriately blurred, have shaped my life indescribably, and after all these years, I’m still trying to find my place in socially progressive circles that often do not want the complexities that my experiences involve. Centuries worth of sexualizing Native Hawaiian women, as well as a skyhigh cost of living rate that matches the soaring poverty rate amongst kānaka in our own homeland, put me at a crux that would introduce me to sexual violence and coercion extremely early in my life, and leave me in it for a long time. As most people in my situation have to, I had to find my own way out and away from my abuser, and thanks to laws specifically made with the alleged intention of helping those in exactly my situation, I risked severe repercussions if I went searching for vindication via the law. Highly uncomfortable in a body I had never been given any chance to see as anything other than an object with a price point and with a permanently skewed view of what sex was in every sense of the word, by the time I got away from my abuser, I was still barely out of my teenage years and had spent almost all of my adolescence trying to escape in one way or another. So I was proud: of course I was proud. Life would finally get to start for me the way it had for everyone else around me, and I could leave several forms of darkness in the past. So I got a civie job… then another… then another. Even with bar experience — and a demonstrably unusual amount, for someone barely legally allowed to drink — I was working seven days a week, juggling three turn&burn bar gigs to cover mine and my family’s expenses. As it turns out, I had made a rookie mistake when I’d finally gotten away from my abuser and the years of exploitation, sexual and otherwise, that I had been caught up in: I had let myself get so desperate for freedom that it never occurred to me that nothing else had changed… I was still broke on an island that was increasingly impossible to afford life on. My family and I still needed money, individual shelters, and food. And the thing I still had that was worth the most money, particularly on an island that has been forced to build an entire identity around sexualizing “Hawaiian Hula Girls”… was me.

And that wasn’t all that I had miscalculated: I was different than my peers and coworkers, regardless of age. I couldn’t relate to them, and I realized more and more that I didn’t really want to. The feeling was mutual, as far as I could tell. My humor was too dark, I inexplicably fluctuated between “prudish” behaviour and sexually explicit behaviour, I had a hard time trusting anyone so there were episodes in my life that I simply had no explanation for when questioned. For many reasons, I was simply different, and I missed not feeling that way constantly. It took me an unfortunately long amount of time to realize why people who had gone through so many things so similar to me could also relate to my complicated family relationships, violent domestic history, experiences with drugs and alcohol, lifelong financial hardships, and racial background. I wasn’t ready to let go of my dream of walking the straight edge… but over the course of the years that I tried to, my relationship to the memories from my history changed in many ways, particularly as I realized that the “straight edge” wasn’t much different than the crooked one. People respected me just as little, it felt, working at jobs that still “weren’t real” under scrutiny, regardless of the long nights, stacked schedules, or legitimate pay stubs. I felt increasingly alienated in my experiences and rejected by those around me, despite doing everything (in my mind, at least) correctly. More and more, I felt lied to and bitter.

My introduction to money exchange for sexual interactions, how that had involved explicit sexual exploitation, and the ways that those lines can be purposefully blurred to prey on and manipulate vulnerable people like me, changed my life. Whether I liked it or not, those experiences helped shape me… and I didn’t want them to. But since they had, I wanted community: fortunately for me, social media made that easier to find than it’s ever been in all the history of humanity, and there was group after group, in fact whole political subsections, formed around the experiences of people like me. I thought finding my place would be simple… in a lot of ways, I’m still often shocked at how complicated it has ended up being to find a place to exist, complex feelings and all.

Having been raised Protestant, and with religion playing a huge role in my life exactly parallel to experiences that assured me and most of those I knew a slot in hell, both the pride and disillusionment surrounding escaping my abuser were coupled with a need to repent. This set me up immediately for introduction into social and support circles that peddled “feminism” that looked extremely similar to the religious doctrines I had been raised in, though the people I found again and again denied that observation. Over the years, I have entered countless conversations that end in gridlock: the narrative I have about my experiences is simply not what these people have ever wanted attached to their cause. They want my story, gritty details and all, but they don’t want the parts where I met some of the most caring people I have ever met in my life, or the parts where these skills, forced onto me or not, would go on to help provide for me and keep me from starving, help pay for my medicine and get me out of homelessness multiple times. They don’t want the parts where reclaiming my sexuality meant embracing as work what had once been far darker in nature, or indulging my own explicit sexual preferences without abject shame. They don’t want the stories, and they don’t like that I want to keep the stories. They don’t want me healed and proud of where I’ve been, what I’d gone through: these types always want the story to have beaten me, which means I’ve never wanted a seat at their table. I didn’t and don’t want to be an example of the perils of misogyny and capitalism, don’t wholesale hate every client I have ever had — even when it was not my choice to do the “work”. I don’t agree with the tone of conversations that make some of the strongest people I’ve ever had the blessing of knowing into victims without their consent, especially when there seems to be no interest in helping with things like bail support or jail correspondence, things that would in fact help people who are being actively victimized by the system. These people and the groups they represent want details of my “pimp”, they want horror stories about the violence, they want me to hate men and hate anyone who supports the industry they believe is responsible for so much of my pain. They don’t want me, and ultimately, they’ll never forgive me for who I am on the other side of it all. The types who talk loudly about wanting to help those who are victims of sexual violence and coercion with explicitly bioessentialist language and antiquated views that have been proven consistently to be incorrect and dangerous, who want to help the (explicitly Female) victims of the (explicitly Male) “pimps”, traffickers, and perverts… just not when the victims turn out like me.

Conversely, when I found my way to the online sex worker community, I was enthralled immediately with what I found. I wanted to be one of the Empowered Sex Workers, one of the Girl Bosses who chose to embrace their bodies and reclaim them in a world that would force a pricetag onto anything that it could. I wanted to be apart of the world of glamorous sex work and beautiful sex workers, the one where the girls weren’t afraid to show their faces or have their names permanently attached to their careers, the ones that could take all their entrepreneurial skills and build empires with them: strippers who became professional choreographers and dancers, girls out the bowl with phDs, porn stars who went on to be videographers and traditional artists. I wanted to not be ashamed, and I wanted, for the first time, to be Sexually Empowered™. I didn’t understand, yet, exactly how my experiences had shaped me: I just knew that they had, and I knew that if I had to be a person who knew how to Hook, I wanted to be a Sex Sells Femme Fatale… not a streetwalker with a record. If I needed to have years of experience under my belt barely past childhood, I wanted to be apart of the face of sexual women’s empowerment… I wanted everything that I had gone through to mean something, and in a good way.

We are who we are, however, and we don’t get to choose the ways in which our experiences make us. I realized quickly that monetizing sexuality was not enough, and that my story was not one that fit the narrative of sexual empowerment. I bit my tongue and kept my secrets, even amongst those who I had desperately wanted to believe would accept me, and over and over again, I realized that people with stories like mine were shunted from the conversations surrounding sex work for a very simple reason: no one found our stories or opinions particularly “empowering”. And, in a way, I understand that: what is empowering, sexually speaking, about a person who has faced violence while doing this work, and continues because bills don’t just go away because bad things happen, people who were introduced to the experience through coercion and force, but stayed or returned due to a lack of options, both legally and financially? The hard truth of the matter is, my work is not always empowering — it’s dangerous, it can be violent both physically and emotionally, support systems are purposefully incredibly hard to form, and having been outted against my will has impacted my life in wholly negative ways, which was the goal of the person who did it. This all, in fact, is why I wanted so desperately to find a way to feel empowered by it, if I couldn’t change it. But as these interactions have become more and more frequent, I cannot help but wonder: why are those who face the violence, those who need the social changes to happen not only because of legislative change but also because of explicit interpersonal violence… why are these the people who don’t deserve a spot at the table when fighting for sex worker rights, or demanding justice and respect for sex workers? It’s the streetwalkers who have always made and demanded change, historically. Why is there suddenly the ticket price of “Feeling Empowered” or “Loving Sex Work” to be accepted into the fight for sex workers rights, on the western front? Even among those who support sex work, mention of survivalists, street work, and club extras can often only be found as hushed examples of why legal forms of sex work need extra protection and gatekeeping, with terms like “pimp” and stereotypical (often explicitly racist) descriptions of traffickers being thrown around in the same horrifically damaging and only half-correct manner as those they ironically fight against in terms of politics and legislation, encouraging narratives that blur the lines between consensual work and sexual trafficking without even realizing it and making it harder for contact workers of any kind to build support systems. Tragically, what the two loudest collections of voices surrounding the issues of sex work and sex trafficking in the west often have in common is a desire to use those who need the help the most on both sides of the issue as stepping stones in their movements advancements, as well as a total aversion to memorial, jail, or bail assistance for those who fell prey to systematic failure. Those who, often, have very similar and equally complex relationships to sex work and sex trafficking as I do.

Ultimately, I have found myself trapped between a rock and a hard place indefinitely… though very, very far from alone. The fight for sex workers rights and safety is a global one, and one with a long history. Though groups throughout the western world push the dialogue that the fight for sex worker rights and decriminalization is a “white and privileged” one, sex workers (many of whom are also survivors of sex trafficking) from India to Thailand to Nigeria to Brazil fight tirelessly for changes to legislation that will protect sex workers as well as allow sex trafficking survivors to come forward without fear of persecution due to violent, unfair, and draconian laws. I am extremely fortunate to have finally found my way to movements and communities that both understand and value my input, and have given me the language to understand my experiences, both good and bad.

The hard truth that connects my experiences with sex trafficking and my experiences with sex work is one that can be incredibly difficult to talk about, but not uncommon: the marginalizations that left me vulnerable to my abuser and trafficker also made it almost impossible for me to leave the work itself behind, and the circumstances that surrounded every part of my situation left me with little to no options. It took years to get away completely, and sporadic and random physical contact with my abuser would not stop until I left the island permanently. I wouldn’t be able to truly understand what had happened to me until years later, either, upon returning to sex work the first time… and being forced to accept that what I had endured, for years, was not work. It was forced. It was coerced. It was manipulative and violent and harrowing. It was trafficking. I had been trafficked.

But at the same time, I had also faced police and legal repercussions: the first time a police officer ever told me he’d look the other way in exchange for service, I was 16 years old, and the first time I saw the back of a police car, I was 16. I had faced violence, judgement, and ostracization at the hands of people who allegedly helped sex trafficking victims and hated people like me for “encouraging” sexual violence by participating in it… none of them cared that force was involved. I was a Bad Victim, so I wasn’t a victim at all. I had never been offered help when I’d gone looking for it — in fact, I’d been told to keep my mouth shut if I didn’t want to trade one type of oppression for another. I hadn’t been “free”, and I had known that much. What I didn’t realize until years later, however, was what exactly that meant, and why exactly I always struggled with what had happened to me, despite my wholehearted support of decriminalization and sex workers rights. My decision to return to selling sex was less a decision and more a need of survival, yet the difference (even with less safety availability thanks to the repercussions of FOSTA/SESTA, an excellent realtime example of sex trafficking victims being used to paint violent and vague pictures to push legislation that will not and has not, in any of the years it’s been in effect, helped victims in any way) was jarring and left me furious at a time in my life when I was already profoundly shaken. It forced me to relive memories I had buried long ago, as well as confront truths that have done nothing but further encourage me to fight for space for those like me and our stories.

Even though sex work has only ever been something I have returned to as a means of survival, the distinction between consensual work and trafficked coercion is crystal clear to me despite the complexities of my relationship with them both. I abhor conversation that purposefully blurs the two, in fact actively fight the misconceptions that allow that blurring to happen at the hands of anyone who would use stories like mine as thought experiments to try to push agendas that do not help victims or survivors in any way. Yet I also have more negative experiences with my work than positive experiences, though this is largely systemically enforced and due to the conditions I am forced to operate in, and the nuance necessary to discuss any of this is so often completely trampled on that the conversations are almost impossible to have. So where does that leave us: all the ones with stories that don’t fit neatly into one factions agenda or another?

The only answer I’ve been able to find, after all these years, is simply that it leaves us each other. At the end of the day, this is all we have: the community we’ve built, despite all the efforts in so many different directions to stop us. Through the memorials, the jail correspondence, the bail fundraising, and the twilight-call safety signaling warning of dangerous clients, stings, and raids: we have always taken care of us first, even before anyone else was willing to acknowledge that we deserved it, no matter what we’d done or been through.

[beanenigma]

MAKE THEM FAT, YOU COWARDS!

A small guide to writing fat characters, by @beanenigma​

As a writer and an illustrator simultaneously, I have the incredible privilege of being a spy for both sides and comparing the community of both hobbies/jobs all in the comfort of my blog. And for a while I have been seeing something that makes me very happy: an effort from the artists to include bigger body sizes in their art - me included. But, on the other hand, I don’t see the same effort in the books I read except for tokens who don’t make that much of a difference to the plot and are only there for certain effects. . 

And even then, the only purpose them being fat serves is them being underestimated, weak, bullied or made fun of. So, with 20 years of being fat in my belt and having suffered through a lot of enraging fat representation in fiction, I compiled this list of things I would like you to remember when writing fat characters:

If you’re character is fat, call them fat 

Have other characters refer to them as fat. Have them refer to each other as fat. Fat is not a bad word… Unless you use it as a bad word. Going around the bush makes it feel like it’s something that should be hidden instead of a natural feature of your character, like being tall or blond. 

Getting thin is not the ultimate victory

 Nothing makes a fat reader feel worse about themselves than this narrative. Not everyone can or wants to get thin. And getting thin won’t fix all of their problems. Especially the emotional trauma of being told (and constantly reminded) the way you are naturally is unfit for life.

Also, getting thin shouldn’t be the only thing on their minds all the time. They should have hobbies and friends and other worries. And if losing weight is the only thing they can think about and plan for, they are probably sick and they need professional help. Eating disorders are real even if we don’t talk that much about them anymore. So keep watch on your characters if you didn’t intend them to be sick. 

Society? B*tch, please

Don’t blame SOCIETY. Society is an abstract concept made of people. People tell fat people shitty things and write shitty things in magazines and purposefully don’t hire them for TV and movies, not “society”. Name the enemy. We know who it is. 

FAT ≠ UNHEALTHY or UGLY

Fatness is not all the same. We are not all thin children that got fed McDonalds and somehow ended up like this. Some people have different metabolisms, genetic components, thyroid disorders, etc, but otherwise are perfectly healthy.

When writing AUs, science and historical fiction, remember in other times, fat had different social meanings. In renaissance Italy for example, the giocondas represented the wealth of the emerging bourgeoisie. Our ideas of fat are very conditioned to our place and time - that doesn’t make them the absolute truth.  

You don’t have to have one designated fat character. 

Make more! Make two! A hundred. Make secondary characters. Background characters. They are not points outside the curve, something that is wrong and should be handled like hot potatoes. They’re a large part of the world’s population (in 2013, there was an estimate of 2.1 billion obese people in the world). 

Choose the right bod! 

Like I said before, not all fat bodies are the same. The artists can help you with these and doctors can too, as well as women’s magazines (surprisingly). Choose your prefered body type keeping your universe and backstory in mind. also, personal choice, let’s normalize stretch marks, they’re so pretty and every girl has them, mention those awesome stripes please? 

Finally, fat characters are characters like any other - that also happen to be fat. They can and should have wishes, dreams, hobbies and relationships. The reader should be able to remember something else about them other than “fat”. Make them human. Please. 

Now, with that being said, being fat can be a great plot device as a physical obstacle towards some objectives. So here’s other obstacles for you fat character that would definitely be more interesting than what’s currently out there: 

Self-esteem issues

Not that we haven’t seen this before in media, but it’s normally caused by constant teasing and bullying. But the thing is that just like it happens to a lot of people with noticeable features, we are painfully aware of our weight at all times. There is really no need for someone to come up to us at our face and say “I hate you because you’re fat”, because we feel that constantly in everything that we do in society. Not that everyone lets themselves be taken by these kinds of stuff - I know some kickass models who couldn’t be more happy to have the body they have - but these things tend to collect a price on our self-esteem (big or small). So keeping that in mind might help not clutter your narrative with unnecessary violence. 

Medical negligence

I know fatphobia is a word people have a hard time believing is real (and I know it sounds weird), but it’s a real thing that happens. Just while writing this, I asked two friends and they both said that they had their concerns ignored by doctors that claimed their ailments would all be fixed once they lost weight. Both me and my mother had that happen to us as well. 

Not to say that weight can’t cause sickness (because it does), but people know their bodies and they know when something is wrong. Personally, I would find it hilarious if a fat superhero went to a doctor to try and find out what their powers mean, for example, and got out with the recommendation of a nutritionist. That’s some relatable content right there.  

Exercising is hard

I know. I know, it’s hard for everyone. But there’s a reason people tie weights to their limbs to carry around when exercising. It makes it harder. We’re carrying a lot more weight on our bones. Muscles get tired easily (and hurt after). Backbones are under a lot of pressure; feet are tortured; speed is decreased. So honestly, no need to trip on the way. Your fat character can run just as well as everyone else on the team, they’ll just get tired faster. Which is great potential for showing physical strength on their part, keeping up with them without showing discomfort. 

AGAIN, REMEMBER: Being fat not always equals being unhealthy. Not all fat people will struggle with exercise. You must decide what’s the case of your character. 

There are sports in which broader body types might be ideal - wrestling, for example - but they could also perform others and be good at it. And if you disagree, I’ll eat you. 

Clothes won’t fit/places don’t have their size

We all remember Mean Girls, when Regina gains weight and the lady tells her she should go shopping elsewhere. Sh*t’s funny, right? Not really. 

But this issue can go further than regular frustration during shopping. What if they want to be a cheerleader and there’s no money to get her uniform (despite them making the team and everyone else getting one their size?). Or, what if, as a superhero, they can’t find the right measures for a uniform that suits them? Or the right mold for knight armor? Or the right size of space suit to go out of the ship in a crisis? It makes you feel unwelcome, unfit, too much, even when people are doing their dang best to help. 

It’s a great opportunity for showing the perseverance of your character or introducing that awesome supportive character who understands. Still on the topic of clothes that won’t fit, here’s the places where normally there are issues:

Thighs and butt (mainly) 

Breasts (for inverted triangle girls, it’s common to have tight clothes at the boobs and loose lower). 

Arms (sometimes they fit but you can’t stretch your arms ahead or up without having the shirt going up)

Waist (and not necessarily belly; when things have a very slim waist, it gets crumpled and what’s down is projected by the belly.

Belly (if you really must)

Chairs are not suitable

Chairs don’t have to break to be mortifying to sit in. Personally, stools are terrible because my thighs go bananas over them. Swallow them whole, and I feel unstable. Some chairs simply won’t be comfortable because parts of me are not on top of them. Having to have someone bring you a special chair is humiliating. 

What if the spaceship was built for slender species? How about the conquerer queen who, upon looking at the pathetic small throne of the territory she just took over, splits it in how with her mighty swords while her new subjects watch in horror as she destroys millennia of history? 

So with those tools, I trust you will not be a coward and give us a thought the next time you’re thinking of your cast of characters next time.

Feel free to reblog this with your own aditions and follow me for similar content! 

[humansofhds]

Edwin Alanís-García, MTS ’19

“Ever since I was little I did nothing but read, and I always think, what’s the point of acquiring knowledge if you’re not going to share it and exchange it or try to dissect it with the help of others.”

Edwin is an MTS ‘19 candidate studying philosophy and religion and a writer of poetry and fiction.

Learning to Know

I’m from a small town about an hour-and-a-half outside of Chicago. It’s part of the suburbs, but it is on the edge, so it's very rural. The road leading up to my parents' house is just off the interstate and it's mostly surrounded by cornfields and soybean fields and farm houses. It’s a small and not very diverse town. Population of about 5,000. When we were growing up it was predominately white—about 99 percent white. Our family was part of the other one percent. But we were all working class, that was the one thing in common.

Both of my parents are from rural Mexico. My dad first came to the U.S. as a kid, as a migrant farm worker, and then as a young man living in New York he learned how to weld. In Mexico my mom worked as a receptionist and as a cashier at a grocery store. My dad's training led him to become a union pipe fitter/welder. It was a grueling and dangerous job, but it was extraordinarily well-paying for an immigrant. That's what enabled our family to live very comfortably.

In coming here, I think my family was trying to leave their old world behind. And it wasn't a bad world they were leaving, at least in comparison to small-town Illinois. But one side effect was that it was very isolating to be in America. Our household is like taking a slice out of rural Northern Mexico and dropping it in the middle of small-town Illinois. We couldn't assimilate well, which I'm rather grateful for despite its drawbacks. There's a trope in many immigrant narratives that the first generation kid has trouble learning English. For me it was the opposite.

I started to teach myself how to read when I was around three years old. No one thought there was anything strange about it. It wasn’t until recently that I realized it was unusual. It eventually became one of the many reasons I've always felt like an outsider. One of my most important memories from elementary school was being asked to sit in the corner during recess because I was the only kid who did our first writing assignment correctly. The teacher had to redo the lesson for everyone else. It wasn’t a punishment, but it sure felt like it.

Even the way I speak, when I tell people where I’m from, they say they can’t hear a Chicago accent. I think it has to do with the way I acquired language, which was mostly through an old dictionary and an encyclopedia set my parents got from a grocery store. There was nothing else to do in our town, so I just stayed inside and read. Evidently that did something—for better and for worse.

Leaving Home

As an undergrad I studied philosophy and psychology. I probably would have been better suited for English, which was surprisingly one of my least favorite subjects in school, along with math. I was definitely more interested in the sciences, especially biology and astronomy. It’s kind of painful to say, but coming to literature wasn’t really my dream, but it feels like where I was rightfully placed. I didn't view language as what I was passionate about and loved. I think my success with it was more a product of a weird background and a disordered mind.

After undergrad I did a few years of grad school in philosophy, but after that I didn’t really know where to go. Job opportunities in my hometown were very bleak. They're still bleak. People kept telling me that I should apply to MFA programs in writing, so I applied and got in to a few schools. I was totally shocked. That moment was the beginning of the biggest shift in my life. Where I went to undergrad was a campus literally surrounded by cornfields. Then suddenly I was living in Brooklyn and going to school in Manhattan.

Emerging from the subway for the first time, I had never seen anything like it—so many people. I have bad anxiety in big groups, so it took a while but eventually I got used to it. Culturally, though, the biggest adjustment was class. The cost of living in New York is astronomical. While I was studying there, maybe 150 students passed through our program and out of those students only about 3-4, including myself, came from a working class or low income background. It was the first time ever in my life I met people who said that they had gone to Ivy League schools for undergrad. I always thought that was something that only happened on TV or in books. I had to learn that there was nothing mythical about it.

Cambridge is the quintessential college town, and I feel very at ease here. Growing up, my world was a dictionary and an encyclopedia set, and now I have access to the world’s largest university library system. I can socialize and have a nightlife if I want, and be socially active, or I can keep to myself and camp out in the library if I need to. It feels like I have more options here to go my own way.

Getting to HDS

There are three things that led me here. The first was my general interest in philosophy, especially epistemology of religion. Ever since I was little I never had faith. I went to church but I didn’t understand why we were going to church. It felt like religion was one of the rare domains in which it's explicitly acceptable to believe in something against the evidence. This isn’t to say that reason and argumentation are not used to defend religion, especially with philosophers like Aquinas and especially with contemporary analytic philosophers of religion like Alvin Plantinga. They give well-reasoned arguments for religious belief. Even though I don’t agree with them, it's interesting to hear their approach because I'm more in line with that tradition. But what I am fascinated by are the traditions that don’t follow that path, that say there is something other than just evidence and reason, like experience and faith. Views like pragmatism and fideism. I'm not really on board with these views, but I think they say something important about the nature of belief. Not just religious belief, but belief in general.

What brought me here on a more personal level happened when I was doing research for my MFA thesis. I was researching the city of Monterrey in Northern Mexico, the region where most of my family is from, when I found out that the first European colonial settlers there were conversos, or Sephardic Jews who had converted to Christianity. I knew nothing about this history and no one in my family knew about it, either. I wanted to learn more about this vein of Jewish history because after DNA testing it was confirmed that my family has a significant percentage of Sephardic ancestry. So, part of what I am here to study is this hidden history of people navigating multiple worlds: There’s the Jewish thread that's been partially erased throughout history, and the indigenous thread which has been replaced by the more romanticized Aztec/Mayan civilizations, which don't actually seem to be causally connected to the indigenous tribes that existed along the borders. There's a lost story here, and I'm hoping to find out more about it and hopefully write about it.

The final moment that led me here, that pushed me to studying religion and philosophy, was a craft of fiction class at NYU taught by Zadie Smith. Zadie assigned me to give a presentation on Kafka and Kierkegaard; as soon as I started rereading those authors, I realized that I wanted to return to philosophy, but through the study of religion and literature. Zadie was very supportive and encouraging in my decision to come to HDS, as was Chuck Wachtel, my mentor and advisor at NYU. I wouldn't be here without their support.

Bearing Witness

I didn’t think there was anything ethical about the literary world until I had the opportunity to take a poetry workshop with Jorie Graham last semester. The workshop was amazing, and completely changed my outlook on art and language and really everything. I'm slowly getting over my discomfort in regarding myself as poet. I would've quit writing if not for that workshop. I'm now starting to see writing as a moral activity.

I think my most worthwhile poems aren’t the ones that I purposefully sit down to write; they just sort of come. And often it’s through this emotionally charged rant. My workshop saw it as bearing witness. I was pointing out a classed segment of society—the literary world. There's this willful ignorance that's led to the unfortunate political situation that we’re in now, and the fact that I’m even referring to the situation now is in itself problematic because most of the problems that are being discussed now have always been issues. For example, years ago I wrote a novella that took place in an ICE facility near Brownsville, Texas. In the story, the facility was in a gutted former Walmart that had no walls, only chain link fences, and all the prisoners were children. Then two years later ICE actually built this facility.

I don’t think there’s anything supernatural about this story. To me, it's all just about paying attention and seeing certain patterns and adopting an absurdist sensibility. But this led me to realize that if there's a pattern in society that I'm picking up on, then perhaps writing about it becomes a moral imperative. That’s kind of how I see writing poetry and fiction. I'm fascinated with this element of prophecy in fiction. And apocalypse. Jorie stressed that apocalypse actually means an unveiling. Not just an end to things, but a revealing of truths.

I never did anything with the novella because it was actually really bad. My classmates and instructor were phenomenal, but I was too immature of a writer at the time. Now people keep telling me that if I went back to it, rewrote it, it would get published. But that’s just because it’s timely. I don’t know if I feel comfortable doing that. I don’t want to give this false impression that illusions of representation, and bearing witness to the suffering of others, and simply pointing out injustice—that this all somehow absolves writers and publishers from the evils of society. And I think if the publishing world wasn't interested in this topic back then, in a few years it probably won’t be interested in it anymore. But the problem isn't going anywhere. If that’s the case then maybe we have a moral obligation, especially being in a position of privilege, to always and consistently be critical of ourselves and the powers that be, no matter who they are. The suffering that exists on their watch is ultimately suffering that exists on our behalf. We are all complicit in that.

Returning to Society

I would like to apply to PhD programs and see how that pans out. In any case, I would love to teach. That’s one thing that I discovered at NYU—that I love teaching. It doesn’t matter if it’s at a university or a high school. I'd like to mentor young writers. Shout out to the young artists and translators at Still Waters in a Storm in Bushwick, Brooklyn. They taught me how to be a better listener and to pay better attention to the world. That's probably the most important skill for a writer.  

Ever since I was little I did nothing but read, and I always think, what’s the point of acquiring knowledge if you’re not going to share it and exchange it or try to dissect it with the help of others? It reminds me of the prologue to Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, where Zarathustra says that he's meditated alone for so many years that his mind has grown heavy from his thoughts. He needs to return to society to share them. Can't just hide in the library anymore.

Interview and photos by Anaïs Garvanian

[ren-black-fmp]

Zine research 2

Going Homo - Issues #2-#4

This has probably been my favourite zine to look at so far. the narrative style from the main author makes it feel like a conversation between him and the reader. This really allows the tone to be flexible, skirting from serious topics and obituaries to more jokey interactions poking fun at themselves and the reader. 

What this zine is extremely effective in is it’s collaboration. The zine itself is often 70% collaboration with the main author being used as a linking devices between the different sections. This builds such a strong sense of community and becomes especially valuable as you learn more about how underground the gay scene was in Arizona universities in the 1990′s.

Top surgery Recovery in Community - August 2020

This was quite an odd mix of emotive and informative. The structure of the zine had heavy medical influences especially in describing procedures and recovery. The work was very individually centres with insights into the authors own lived experiences. This might be a detriment to the core message of the zine as it wants a more community driven feel. I think this could be helped with collaborative voices once their personal experience was discussed, this would balance out the voices and make the claims about community feel more substantiated.

New hearts New Bones - December 2010

Found this magazine interesting as a continuation of the style of earlier zines. The entire work is constructed using magazine clippings and images with a few handwritten elements and purposefully printed images. This creates a strong colour story and visual language but it does little to promote the actual messages they are trying to convey. I know from descriptions of the zine that it is meant to be anti-capitalist, this helped me understand certain spreads in the zine and connected a few of the dots but the first 5 or so pages feel a bit random compared to the message.

It’s not the end of the world (But it sure feels that way) - Cameron Tepper - April 2020

Extremely well constructed and provides an intimate slice of life look into early quarantine for the author. The suggestion of music seems key to the piece, he talks about Connie Converse repeatedly, so much so that as soon as I had connie converse playing in the background I felt more connected to the zine and the feelings he was trying to convey.

Really like the visual style of the zine. Combines the collage aesthetics of the 1970s-90s with more modern techniques to create a more polished effect that feels curated and controlled. 

Enjoyed the changes in formats and different sections as it allowed my focus to be shifted and reinvigorated my interest with each page.

Mental Healthy - Jenny Eden

Not completely my cup of tea but I appreciate the use of colours to create a warm and welcoming atmosphere to match the contents of the zine. Also a very clear narrative style and effective use of illustration to build on whats written.

Itchy Legs - Sara Gore - 2019

A more story-book like narrative with more adult themes to do with medical conditions and anxiety. I felt a great empathy for the main character/author and the illustrations served to add humanity to the story being told.

The lack of structure to the design of the pages and the use of handwriting instead of type, make the zine feel more intimate and like a stream of consciousness . This helps put you int he shoes of the author and approaches something you might perceive differently without this insight.

“Straight Ally” is an Oxymoron - March 2020

I’m not so sure how much i agree with the sentiment of this zine.Its vibe is quite hostile and seems off putting for the audience it perhaps is angled towards. As part of the LGBT community, the information was not as relevant for me as it is already known but it would be a useful introduction to ideas around relationships and gender in the queer community.

The title and accusatory the might make some non-lgbtq people turned off of the zine as it feels like they are going to be attacked for something they were unaware of.

Attitude Adjustment

This takes the form of a more traditional comic book layout which suits the dialogue based narrative being showed. It also allows the mind to be more open to ridiculous cartoony images and discussions. This allows the author t escape realism and begin to explore their high stakes emotions in a more free and somewhat overly-literal way.

I really enjoyed reading this zine, I felt like it was familiar in the sense that it brought nostalgia for 1990′s cartoons such as “Daria” and has the same flippant attitude to the main character. They aren’t afraid of making her dramatic or the extreme of one point of view. This allows the viewer to project ideas that they would usually ignore due to their extremity of dramatics.

Felt very seen as an over thinker. Felt very reminiscent of real conversations I have had with professionals who just really don’t understand. Inadvertently fosters a community of people behind the zine with shared experiences.

Let us rejoice for it is spring*

*At this latitude and warmer than usual because of global warming. - Das Ende

This zine is really unique to me. the entire thing is hand drawn in a style that looks like a traditional quill with a digital edges. The more traditional/religious connotations of the text style and narrative voice is interestingly coupled with references to modern urban experiences. The two serve to make the writing seem trustworthy and significant while acknowledging its roots in the authors won life experiences. Love the illustration style, it feels immediate and lively with a lack of control that suggests that it was done in the moment the author thought of the words.

[barbitone]

My Review of THE SHINING

Ok, in case anyone has been on the edge of their seats here, my final verdict on The Shining is as follows:

This movie is trash. OK maybe that’s a little harsh. Maybe it was really cool at the time or something? But watching it now, I gotta say ugh.

As a book adaptation- The Shining is Trash

As a stand-alone movie- The Shining is mediocre at best, incomprehensible and lazy at worst. I mean, the main way the movie created a “spooky” mood is by Jack Nicholson making crazy faces and staring off into space. I guess there’s symbolism in it too? But it’s decontextualized to the point of meaninglessness. The pacing is totally off, and character development as well as plot progression are ignored in favor of frankly useless scenes that add little-to-nothing to the narrative.

But beyond that, the book is just better in every conceivable way? The book is even about 1000% more theatrical and visually impactful. I’m now going to compare the movie to the book, so I’ll put it behind the cut even though- I mean this stuff is really old guys. 

100% READ THE BOOK. If you’re planning on reading the book, don’t read the “read more”

The major story of The Shining is the progression of the Overlook’s influence on Jack Torrence. As a character he is starting out as a real shitty dude who is on the path to redemption - he’s got anger issues, an alcohol problem, and a bad case of victim complex. But at the beginning of the story he is already well on his way to self improvement.

The big tragedy of this whole narrative is how the Overlook (using Jack’s own son’s power) twists Jack into a homicidal maniac bent on the destruction of the only thing he holds dear - his son. Irony.

So we’ve got some interesting things at play here - the Overlook’s dark history, which is what actually turns into into a basically Evil Building and its fight for power and self-preservation.  We’ve got Jack - trying to come through for his family and losing the battle against his demons. We’ve got Wendy, hopeful and cautious, learning to stand up for herself and act on her own agency. We’ve got Danny’s psychic gift (The Shining) as it interacts with the Overlook, and as it gives Danny the chance to control his own destiny and ultimately save himself and his mother. Really cool stuff ok!

The movie fucks it all up. The history of the hotel is completely unexplored - also the hotel is really ugly for the most part. Danny’s “shining” is not really explained for what it is, and is just turned into a creepy kid trope. “Tony” is actually a manifestation of Danny’s power trying to warn and protect Danny and his family. So in other words, Tony is the Good Guy. Jack starts out creepy and then just suddenly gets creepier. Wendy is good. So that’s ok.

But they took the hedge animals and replaced them with the hedge maze. Which, it was sort of cool I guess? But the hedge animals were cooler. They were giant and moved ok. They left out the Presidential Suite. They turned the Dog Man into some kind of gay sex joke. They turned the Woman in 237 into some sexy... corpse lady??? WHY??? They left out the most interesting interactions between Dick Hallorman and Danny (and killed Dick for literally no reason...) And, finally, they left out the BOILER. The Boiler is arguably the most important part?? As Jack’s primary job is to keep an eye on the boiler so that the pressure doesn’t creep up and it doesn’t explode.

So what happens in the movie is that Dick just happens to catch Danny’s accidental psychic distress, shows up at the Overlook only to be immediately killed. Then Danny and Wendy manage to drive away while Jack is lost in the hedge maze and then freezes to death. Super anticlimactic.

What happens in the BOOK is that Danny PURPOSEFULLY sends a message to Dick, which makes Dick rush down to the Overlook. On the way there he’s attacked by the giant fucking hedge animals, and he has to fight them, ultimately setting them on fire with gasoline on the side of a mountain. When he arrives at the Overlook Danny and Wendy had been struggling with Jack for a while. Dick’s arrival is what distracts Jack from killing Wendy (who had, by that point, stabbed him in the back). Jack and Dick struggle for a while before Jack is distracted by Danny.

Jack chases Danny down, finally catching up to him and getting ready to kill him. At this point I’d say that Danny really comes into his power, and understands the meaning of a premonition he’d been having for a while. They were forgetting something. They were forgetting the boiler. He tells Jack/The Overlook this, sparing himself while Jack rushes down to the basement in a last ditch effort to release the pressure on the boiler.

Danny finds his mother and Dick, and tells them they need to leave. Jack is too late to fix the boiler. It explodes, killing him. The hotel burns down, the evil is vanquished once and for all. Danny, Wendy, and Dick escape and make it back into town.

They spend the summer in Florida, and Dick teaches Danny how to catch catfish and use his gift.

I MEAN. What a better ending! What a better story! I can’t believe a movie maker had an explosion right in the text and went like NAH. The bad guy will just freeze to death cuz he gets lost outside. Really?

[obaewankenope]

The Gospel of the Anakin Apologist + The General Rudeness of Unrelated Comments on a Post

So @stonefreeak had an anon show up and whine about Padme. I and @sanerontheinside added our two cents in then *waves hands* SOME ASSHOLE shows up and wants to play ‘Anakin is a victim and Padme is a stupid ho and Obi-Wan is to blame for EVERYTHING EVER’ on the post even though, amusingly enough, it has no bearing on the discussion in the slightest.

Ergo I got vexed.

Actually all of us did bc wow stupid much.

The rest is under a read more because wow this got long and salty.

Also I’m tagging people so they can share the salt: @meabhair, @kyberpunk, @maawi, @markwatnae, @lilyrose225writes, @knight-kennedy, @punsbulletsandpointythings, @deadcatwithaflamethrower, @myurbandream, @jhaernyl :)

You see, we were discussing Padme as a female character and the double-standard around female characters being expected to be perfect and male characters essentially being able to do whatever the fuck they want so long as they’re pretty (pick a fandom, any fandom, you’re guaranteed to see the same dichotomy in treatment of male - female characters).

Apparently we can’t do that shit tho bc ‘oh no you’re blaming my bae!!!’ like wow, really fucking stupid much.

Anyway, to explain why I’m raging (why all of us are raging actually: it’s glorious to behold and I feel so blessed to experience the righteous fury of my spouses and friends) I personally feel like this particular person has literally pulled the embodiment of that “she doesn’t even go here” meme because whoa boy, their reblog does not belong here.

Now, in general I’m usually quite happy to let the morons roll on by like the sad little tumbleweeds of ignorance they are. But not when it’s on a post informing others of the behaviour and perception of gender/sex relations and treatment of characters in fandom. When you show up here and want to blame a single character who is flawed, especially just to venerate and excuse the behaviour of another flawed character... well, then I feel obligated to respond.

It’s not personal it is it’s just in my nature.

Okay so, first paragraph of their reblog (and subsequent stupid dialogue included) sums up the situation on Mustafar as ‘Padme should have been a good wife and sided with her genocidal husband who just helped wipe out thousands of lives (including children) bc she’s his wife’ and that ‘Obi-Wan is responsible bc he tried to do his duty as a Jedi’ and apparently that’s wrong as according to the Gospel of the Anakin Apologist.

Of course, they make a general, sweeping statement about Obi-Wan, describing him as a ‘fantastic space cop but an asshole friend and a person in general’ which, as I’m sure you’re all aware, shows a typical lack of understanding of what the Jedi are in universe, and also the background of Obi-Wan and Anakin’s interaction.

This isn’t unusual and I’m not gonna berate people for not knowing about the EU (Extended Universe) materials, or those damned benighted Junior Apprentice (JA) novels about Obi-Wan’s padawanship (and Anakin’s later on). The thing is though, there is plenty of information available about Obi-Wan, his background and so on on various websites -- Wookieepedia, to name but one -- so I don’t think it’s fair to be so quick to judge a character, any character, without understanding their background.

Even if this blogger is uninitiated into the ranks of SW lore and such, even if they only have the movies to go on, I still consider them to have a shockingly particular mindset and perspective of the relationship between the three protagonist characters.

So, here’s the thing, the below is a direct quote from their post. As you can see it’s... a particular perspective.

Padme should have sided with Anakin or Obi-Wan clearly when Anakin confronted her about Obi-Wan being on the ship, Obi-Wan killed Padme by appearing while they were talking, Padme might’ve been able to talk some sense into Anakin or join him, i guess Obi-Wan was afraid Padme would flip sides and decided to burst out with his “hello there” bullshit, if i was Padme i would have immediately said            “that fucker snuck on my ship i had nothing to do with this, take care of him my love!” or “oh shit, well i didn’t plan this Obi-Wan tag in!”            i know she was shocked and all that jazz but lady think on your feet, you went to meet your fugitive husband who just killed a academy full of space coplings on isolated planet and a space cop popped out of your trunk, use your words and use them quick! Anakin choking his wife in anger is understandable when you think of it from his perspective,           “ok im on the hide from the law(Jedi), ill contact my wife and get her to safety” “hi love i came alone as you asked”            “oh thank god for a moment i thought you might sympathize with the corrupt jedi” *Obi-Wan dumb ass pops out of the shadows* “hello there bitches!~~”            “wtf Padme?! you brought a cop to our meet out?! you do know i am wanted dead right!? You little bitch! i did this all so i could keep you alive and this is how you repay me? i killed younglings to get this power Padme fucking younglings! you ungrateful little bitch ill kill you!” “hey bro let her go you said you wanted to save her right? kind of doing the opposite right now”            “… god damn it i hate it when he is right, lets fight!”

First of all, they’re working on the assumption that Anakin was hiding from the Jedi. Second of all, that he was hiding from the Law(Jedi). Perhaps their memory has failed them, but I’ll provide a little breakdown of how the third movie actually went so they can understand that their initial narrative is... well, to put it plainly, ‘wrong and really wrong’.

1. Separatists vs Republic battle with Obi-Wan and Anakin going after Dooku. Dooku dies by Anakin’s hands after being disarmed (this is murder btw, rules of war mean that if your opponent loses or surrenders, then you don’t kill them -- this is generally considered a war crime). 

2. Obi-Wan and Anakin talk about stuff and then Obi-Wan heads off to chase Grievous alone. This is after Anakin has been put on the Council by Palpatine even though he’s only been a Knight for a while. The Jedi do not approve, Obi-Wan is cautious and advises Anakin to be careful (Anakin ignores him by the way and continues to be friendly with Palpatine).

4. While Obi-Wan is off after Grievous, Anakin has Palpatine’s identity revealed to him. Gets played into saving him from Mace and co in order to keep Padme alive (even though she isn’t dead by the way). Anakin then goes to the Temple with a collection of Clones and helps murder every Jedi there. He purposefully murders the children in the Council chambers. 

5. Obi-Wan is nearly killed after defeating Grievous because of Order 66. He escapes and hides. Meets up with Yoda and Bail. Goes to the Temple. Finds out that Anakin killed Jedi and is heartbroken by this fact. Then he goes to Padme after being tasked by his superior to go and defeat Anakin. He tells her the truth and she refuses to believe him.

6. Padme goes to meet with Anakin who is on Mustafar, drowning in his angst-ridden guilt of now having become an accomplice to genocide. Obi-Wan tags along, knowing that Anakin and Padme love each other so much that both would forsake their duties. He hides and Padme doesn’t know. Anakin doesn’t notice.

7. Padme rejects Anakin BEFORE Obi-Wan shows himself, because she realises he’s literally gone crazy. Then Anakin turns on Padme and chokes her into unconsciousness, even though she’s heavily pregnant and he ‘loves’ her. Obi-Wan gets Anakin to focus on him and they fight.

8. They fight to the point where Obi-Wan has the high-ground and Anakin does a stupid and gets his limbs cut off. Obi-Wan leaves him to burn to death (brutal) and goes to Padme. He takes her for treatment and instead watches one of his oldest friends die while her children are made into orphans.

9. Movie ends with Anakin becoming the giant suit version of Vader and Obi-Wan on Tattooine delivering Luke to his aunt and uncle.

Anakin isn’t evading the law, aka the Jedi, he’s killed them. Obi-Wan is the one evading the law because it wants him dead. Anakin is on Mustafar because Sidious told him to take out the Sep leadership. Padme meets him there after hearing the truth from Obi-Wan and only believes it when Anakin admits it himself. Then she rejects him. Obi-Wan does his duty as a Jedi -- sworn to destroy the Sith -- and the end is that Padme dies because Anakin loses his temper and lashes out at her.

I may be Anakin apologist but considering his situation he didn’t act out of character, id be pissed off too if i contacted my wife when i am in hiding and she brings a cop there (it seemed like that to Anakin since he didn’t know Obi-wan snuck on board) before i can explain myself to my wife

Firstly, you are an Anakin apologist and he did act out of character. His behaviour after discovering Sidious’ identity and stopping Mace from killing a Sith Lord is out of character. Anakin is a bright, kind and friendly child with a temper issue. Anakin is someone who hates injustice and despises the way some people are treated by others for no other reason than because of where they were born or who they were born to. He was a slave and then he became a Jedi; he went from victim to protector. His final character jump sent him from protector to oppressor. That’s not in character, that’s specifically cultivated and justified behaviour because he puts his own needs above absolutely everything else.

He also had the chance to explain to Padme. He didn’t deny what he did and Padme actively rejected him when she realised he wasn’t sorry for what he’d done ‘in the name of love’. You’re justifying abuse and don’t even realise it.

Think of it like this, in a galaxy where there are force powers etc shit you keep seeing horrible nightmares of your wife dying, your mother gets kidnapped by space isis and killed,             you butcher the village in retaliation and tell your wife about it, after which the greatest political figure of your “country” tells you that there is a way to save your wifes life from the faith that seems foretold (like someone offering you a cure for cancer when you think your wife has cancer),            the old dude tells you you have to do something to get the cure (equivalent would probably be extracting stem cells from kids spines or something lethal), well you love your wife and can’t let her die because love,            well you go and do the dirty deed like a loving husband would can’t let your honey bun die, now you’re kind of in hiding waiting for your old dude friend to wipe out the cops (rought shit but it will all be worth it when i save my wife from certain death),            you contact your wife and tell her to meet you in some backwater planet where you two can talk it out, you can tell her why you did it and you can finally save her from her faith, your wife finally arrives the joy we are finally together, listen wife the reason i killed the younglings is “Everybody down on the ground, the Jedi man has arrived!”,            all your efforts to get the cure, all you did in the name of saving your wife and she brings a cop to execute you (that’s what he thought and can’t blame him, how the fuck did she not know Obi-Wan snuck on board?)

Firstly, Shmi Skywalker was kidnapped and tortured by Tusken Raiders on Tattooine, not ‘Space ISIS’. The settlers on Tattooine are the proverbial invaders of a planet where the Tuskens are the natural species. So your metaphor is inaccurate and shows but a lack of understanding and also a clear desire to produce extreme sympathy for Anakin. We don’t know why the Tusken’s took Shmi but it’s generally considered unusual behaviour. We do know that they have attacked farms on Tattooine before and that they have been united by an ex-Jedi at one point when Obi-Wan was in exile. This is all we know. So you’re making an assumption that they’re evil terrorists when you don’t even have the material to back you up. 

Anakin killed an entire village of Tuskens, including women and children. There is no excuse for that. Unless you think it would be acceptable for a US soldier to execute the children in an Iraqi village because some of the inhabitants were part of Al Queda? 

Obi-Wan had already informed Anakin in Attack of the Clones that ‘dreams pass in time’ referring to Anakin’s recurring problems with his dreams about his mother. Anakin didn’t inform Obi-Wan of anything after that and so Obi-Wan has no knowledge. He tried to help, in his own way. Anakin’s behaviour and fear of what he dreamt about Padme drove him to extremes of behaviour -- the love he held for her is what destroyed him because he was so selfish as to refuse to let her go.

The dangers of attachment isn’t of falling in love, it’s in that love turning into obsession which is what happened with Anakin. Palpatine used Anakin’s fears of losing Padme to sway him into his service and with Mace’s death, sealed his fate and that of Padme. 

Do you honestly think Padme would have died had she not been choked into unconsciousness by her ‘loving’ husband on a boiling planet of death, after the revelation that her husband had willingly committed genocide because of his love for her? 

If you do then there’s no hope for you.

The dialogue of the Mustafar scene is below, read it and perhaps recognise that Anakin admits to having become obsessed with power and paranoid. Perhaps also recognise how Padme only rejects him after he says he’s going to overthrow the Chancellor and together they can rule the galaxy.

Padme: Obi-Wan told me terrible things Anakin: What things? Padme: He said, you’d turned to the Dark Side. That you... killed younglings? Anakin: Obi-Wan is trying to turn you against me Padme: He cares about us Anakin: Us? Padme: He knows. He wants to help you... Anakin, all I want is your love Anakin: Love won’t save you Padme, only my new powers can do that Padme: At what cost? You’re a good person, don’t do this! Anakin: I won’t lose you the way I lost my mother. I am becoming more powerful than any Jedi has ever dreamed of. And I’m doing it for you. To protect you Padme: Come away with me. Help me raise our child. Leave everything else behind while we still can! Anakin: Don’t you see? We don’t have to run away anymore. I have brought peace to the Republic. I am more powerful than the Chancellor. I- I can overthrow him. And together you and I can rule the galaxy. Make things the way we want them to be Padme: [backs away, shaking head] I don’t believe what I’m hearing. Obi-Wan was right, you’ve changed Anakin: I don’t want to hear any more about Obi-Wan. The Jedi turned against me, don’t you turn against me Padme: I don’t know you any more. Anakin... you’re breaking my heart. You’re going down a path I can’t follow Anakin: Because of Obi-Wan?  Padme: Because of what you’ve done! What you plan to do! Stop! Stop now! Come back! I love you! Anakin: LIAR! Padme: No! Anakin: You’re with him! You brought him here to kill me! [Starts choking HIS WIFE] Obi-Wan: Let her go Anakin!

The end of this interaction is that Padme rejects Anakin for going power-mad, Anakin admits he’s become a stranger to her and then attacks her over a perceived betrayal -- out of character for someone who at the beginning of the movie thought Padme might have been cheating on him and then APOLOGISED for thinking such things in the first place. 

In conclusion to your post that I’m not going to ever reblog, but will link here so others can read it in full, I have to say that your ending paragraph is... well, a fantastic example of selective thinking and something I daresay several of my friends from my psych classes would have had a field day with the dispositional and situational bias you exhibit.

who nearly killed Anakin and Padme? Obi-wan freaking Kenobi, well done douchebag, be sure to lie to his son that Vader killed Anakin to pit a son against his own father, Obi-wan was a fantastic space cop but an asshole friend and a person in general, dude is the reason Luke’s father is a space cyborg and Padme is a corpse, but that’s not all let’s turn their son into a space cop and tell him to kill daddy cyborg, he’ll never know it was his father, if he did this could really backfire but who gives a shit ill probs be dead by then

[gch1995]

I had to quit watching after S5 because the writing for everyone’s characterization was so unbelievably OOC, infuriating, and mutually toxic, especially for Emma, Rumple, and Belle, who were my faves. They’d even turned Henry into a whiny and selfish little shit with no empathy in the 5B finale of “Only You” with that stupid “destroy magic” PLOT twist. Of course, I couldn’t really blame the characters for behaving in wildly OOC fucked up ways, and/or doing, and/or saying wildly OOC fucked up shit to each other that no one would ever realistically forgive. I could understand if it actually made believable sense why they were all being characterized as such as toxic messes, but on the show at this point, it was blatantly clear that Emma, Hook, Rumple, Belle, Snowing, and Henry were all victims of A&E and these writers external forces of nonsensical PLOT-driven magical fuckery Drama™️ on this show that had devolved into a soap opera, and not really due to anything that had to do with them being inherently unlikable or unsympathetic characters.

Plus, after that unbelievable, wildly OOC, and melodramatically mutually toxic extreme low the writers took CS to in 5A with that character destroying Dark Swan/Dark Hook nonsensical PLOT twist, I knew there was no way that A&E and these writers weren’t going to purposefully fuck up Rumple and Belle in a way that was so wildly OOC, illogical, melodramatically mutually toxic, and cringeworthy that I couldn’t defend or excuse either of them anymore as written in canon sooner or later to prop up Hook/CS again after 5A, and I couldn’t deal with that shit anymore, especially not after S4-S5 being more than bad enough to Rumbelle for Hook/CS’s benefit enough already.

Yeah, I think OUAT was the first show I watched on television that taught me the difference between hating a fictional character and hating the writers/creators behind them.

I used to be one of those people who thought, “Oh, people who ignore canon writing for their favorite problematic fictional characters when they do fucked up things, are just being babies! They signed up for a problematic fave, so they should know better!”

The problem with OUAT wasn’t the characters as originally written, and/or when written in-character and developed organically. I loved Rumple, Belle, Rumbelle, and Emma as originally characterized and developed from S1-S3 in canon on the show, and I love them in canon-divergent/AU fanon scenarios! But A&E and the writers were ultimately lazy, and chose to misuse them as tools in their PLOTs to emotionally manipulate the audience to blindly feel whatever they wanted them to feel, rather than telling an organic story with realistic characters who dealt with realistic relationship problems, development, and/or consistent characterization in favor of cheesy magical soap opera Drama™️ I had to quit watching after S5 to save my sanity.

The big issues, in my opinion, were that:

A) It was only ever a melodramatic big deal “OMG, SO EVOL” when Rumple so much as considered committing crimes and/or abusing magic in ways that violated autonomy or consent that could recklessly hurt/potentially endanger other people for, generally speaking, good reasons. But Emma, Belle, Regina, Snow, David, Zelena, Hook, and Henry could abuse magic for their own ends in ways that could/actually did potentially hurt and/or endanger other people recklessly all the time now too, and no one batted an eye. Rumple wanting to do the same with magic to protect family in narrative shouldn’t have been excused either, but character assassinating him by having him fuck around with bizarre and contrived magical macguffins out of nowhere and framing him as awildly OOC cartoonish mad villain for it, didn’t make the other characters look any better for getting away doing the same whenever it suited them on the show. Just because the writers had Rumple look bad under a magnifying glass of deliberately character assassinating bad writing by having him abusing magic to counterbalance everyone else’s magic abuse on the show, it didn’t automatically make the other characters look morally superior to Rumple or make them better characters. It just made them look hypocritical, self-righteous, petty, narrow-minded, and lacking in self-awareness. I feel like Adam, Eddy, and these writers felt like they could make everyone else on their fucked up and toxic show look better by deliberately tarnishing Rumple as their scapegoat to vilify in an increasingly obvious attempt to emotionally manipulate their audience to side with all of their other also incredibly fucked up and problematic characters by singling out one character as the “worst” on a show where everyone else was/ended up becoming just as much of, if not worse of a toxic mess of bad writing in one way or another anyway. Not surprisingly, they failed.

B). A well-written problematic character is not necessarily redeemable, but your audience still sees and understands the realistic reasons of how and/or why they got there gradually and consistently unfold on screen and/or within their backstories behind the scenes that build up to increasingly problematic behaviors on screen by not taking care of their mental health/sanity, even if they don’t end up liking them in the end.

A badly-written problematic character may suffer from unresolved issues of abuse, mental illness, addiction, trauma, grief, and loss to flesh them out more sympathetically in a narrative, but those realistic issues don’t end up being the issues the writers behind them choose to focus on to drive their increasingly problematic and out-of-character behaviors from point A to point C. On OUAT, they chose to focus on contrived, biased, externalized, hypocritical, and blatantly emotionally manipulative cartoonish “hero vs villain” character destroying Drama™️ by breaking, and bending their own rules of magic with bizarre macguffins and flashy magical PLOT twist fuckery character destroying garbage to force the audience to feel the way they wanted them to feel about the characters. Consistent, realistic normally intelligent, loving, open, kindhearted, devoted, loyal, cautious, and sane characterizations in these characters and their relationships were thrown away out of the blue if and/or whenever the writers stupid PLOTs demanded they suddenly start acting like wildly OOC caricatures who were acting bizarrely cartoonishly evil, exceedingly distrustful, exceedingly deceptive, exceedingly gullible, exceedingly conniving, melodramatically toxic, melodramatically cruel, reckless, and/or unbelievably stupid because the writers wanted for them to be ridiculously oblivious to solutions to conflicts and/or problems with each other thst should have and would have been obvious for them to resolve by taking a fucking chill pill, asking questions and doing research, sitting down to talk to each other and make compromises with each other like two mature adults for no realistically believable reason because they wanted for them to self-destruct to the worst possible rock bottom in their magical Drama™️ soap opera character destroying PLOT fuckery “twists.” (CS in 5A and Rumbelle in 4A-6A).

I could understand if it were a gradual, realistic, slow-burn, and organic build up of insanity in an unhealthy response to a character being constantly abused, rejected, misunderstood, ostracized, emotionally manipulated by false hope, and/or fucked over for trying to be good, anyway. However, on OUAT, especially in later seasons after 3A, you would have Rumple, Regina, Belle, Emma, Snow, David, Henry, and even Hook himself going from being seemingly normal, loving, rational, sane, and/or trying to be good in one moment to very uncharacteristically melodramatically abusive, cruel, criminal, dark, deceptive, distrustful, petty, impatient, insensitive, reckless, triggering, stupid, and/or batshit insane in the next out of nowhere within a timeline that took place over a day or less from the end of 3B-S7 because their asinine PLOT twists or contrived macguffins demanded they do a complete 180 for senseless character destroying Drama™️ for “fun” in the next few episodes of an arc.

Then, they just “went back to normal” after the writers were all done outright destroying their characters credibility and integrity for wildly OOC needless Drama™️ in their magical PLOT fuckery twists by making them do, threaten to do, and/or say horrifically and unbelievably OOC, melodramatically and needlessly cruel, destructive, hurtful, mutually toxic, traumatizing, reckless, violent, and/or stupid shit in regards to each other for a few episodes of an arc that no one would ever realistically forgive, even if they meant well. At least not without a logical explanation for why it happened, and/or or a lot of time to process it to let go of the hurt they caused each other first, which we never got to see on screen in the aftermath as a resolution on screen.

It’s the most infuriatingly lazy type of writing that I have ever seen on a television show and such a total waste of potentially interesting and relatable characters for cheap shock value and Drama™️ in the PLOT.

C) When you kill off a character, especially a redemptive anti-villain/tragic hero type character, kill them off once and then be done with them for good. I’ve seen it work in fan fiction, but on television where you’re expected to stick to rules, it never does.

D) “Foil” does not mean you outright destroy another character to fool the audience into thinking that the other one you want them to root for is any better without them actually doing or saying anything to prove it. That’s just lazy and blatantly emotionally manipulative bad writing.

E). Stop with the “Evil is sexy” in female villains and Rumple, a feminine-coded anti-villain. It honestly was so cringeworthy and unsexy on OUAT.

F). Female “empowerment” and “feminism” does not mean being a control freak with a man, refusing to let them get a word in edgewise, interrupting them, belittling them, walking away, and/or being needlessly cruel, and/or a petty bitch every time they so much as slightly disagrees with you. It does not mean giving men ultimatums for you to be together, or leading them on with borderline emotionally manipulative false hope to get what you want from them, only to drop them right afterwards/if they don’t do exactly what you demand 100% of the time. It does not mean being emotionally, verbally, physically, and/or sexually abusive of men. It does not mean needlessly kicking men when they are already down by using their emotional vulnerability against them to mock them about how “weak” they are for expressing their very real fears to you in a desire for your emotional support and understanding. Being a “strong” woman does not mean treating men in relationships like “projects for you to ‘fix’” just as being a “strong” woman does not mean giving up your own personal convictions and independence to be with them. My god, they really fucked up Emma, Regina, Belle, and Zelena with this Empowerment™️ trope…

G). Male characters should progress and regress with more than just the solely emotionally manipulative force of a female love interest. Female characters should be able to progress and regress with more than just a male love interest’s emotionally manipulative force. I’ll always love Rumbelle, Snowing in the early seasons and in fanon scenarios, and even CS wouldn’t have been that bad, but the writers either destroyed both halves of them with Drama™️ in the PLOT, and/or sidelined them and made them unhealthily codependent. I think killing off Nealfire killed that core theme of family, especially in Rumple and Emma.

But basically, Rumple, Belle, Snow, David, Emma, Neal, and Hook should have all been more developed as individual characters who could grow and regress as more than just love interests.

H). Stop this trope of using female love interests to vilify their male love interests by turning them into OOC emotionally abusive/whiplash PLOT devices to trigger them with on-and-off-again bs or problematic behaviors to drive them insane. They did this with CS in 5A, Rumbelle in 6A, and Phole on Charmed in season five. It’s not fun to watch. It’s actually really misogynistic writing that does not make either halves of your couples feel blameless or likable in anti-heroine/redemptive anti-villain couples. It ruins and limits both of them in a way that feels mutually toxic and gross. Acknowledge that both halves of your anti-heroine/anti-villain couple are imperfect and flawed, or break them up amicably for good. But stop trying so hard to make the audience see the problematic female love interest as the “blameless” victim for consciously pushing the male anti-villain’s every button, and getting away with problematic behavior towards him! Stop doing this trope of having the male anti-villain as a “pure EVOL abuser” driven to insanity by the woman with this trope, and then wonder why fans aren’t rooting for either of them when they are being written this way by you.

J) When you “have” to kill off, sideline, and/or outright destroy other characters/ships to get rid of competition for your favorite character or ship, it doesn’t make you a good writer. It just makes you look like a petty hack with a Gary Stu/Mary Sue or a creator’s pet that’s polarizing the show.

K) You are are a very bad storyteller if you think that “fun” means deliberately destroying/derailing your normally sympathetic and/or intelligent characters characterizations into something inexplicably, melodramatically, unbelievably, and uncharacteristically mutually toxic, stupid, and unsympathetic for contrived, needless, and senseless self-destructing Drama™️ in your PLOTs.

L). If your goal as a creative writer is to mindfuck your audience with “SHOCKING” twists that you pull from your ass with no lead up whenever things seem to be headed in a direction that actually feels interesting, promising, and starts to makes organic sense, then we will lose emotional investment in the stories for these characters you’re not interested in telling, and catch on to a pattern the more often you do it because we’re a lot smarter than you think we are.

M). Accept that character growth and/or regression can’t just happen right away because your PLOT demands it. Take time.

N) Guest characters should be fleshed out, and well-developed. Don’t use them as discardable plot devices

O). Stop going back to the status quo! (Rumple’s the Dark One, Emma’s the Savior, Hook/Neal is her boyfriend, Rumbelle are separated for reasons x, y, and z, Rumple does something stupidly self-sabotaging with magic to try to fix a problem in the wrong ways and only makes it worse, Rumple does something selfless for the “first time,” Belle’s a failure hero, Hook wants to get revenge on someone who wronged him, particularly Rumple, Regina has a hole in her heart she wants to fill by artificially absolving her guilt, Zelena fucks over Rumple, Emma has to learn to open up her heart to love, Snowing keep dark secrets from Emma, etc. This show became such a predictable soap opera by S5 that I had to finally quit to preserve my sanity…)

P). Stop romanticizing rape culture!

Q). Dealing with visible negative symptoms mental illness and trauma is not just something that just “bad guys” deal with. “Good guys” can deal with it too, and it’s not something that makes then “weak” or “evil.”

R). No one is entitled to forgive someone who abuses them.

S). Committing murder in immediate self-defense is common sense, not evil.

T). Do not keep trying to force the audience to sympathize with and forgive a villain who feels no remorse for their crimes, and who does nothing to earn it (Regina in S2, Hook, Zelena). The best they did for writing redemption on this show for a villain that I actually cared about was with Rumple, but they even fucked up their best written character.

U). Commit to a single moral standard that applies to everyone on your show, not just one person on your show.

V). Stick to your own rules of magic consistently, and make sure they apply to everyone. Don’t bend and/or break them.

W). Romantic relationships can still be interesting and entertaining to watch without becoming toxic or unhealthy.

X). There’s a way to write hurt/comfort and relationship break up angst that makes realistic sense with a realistic and satsisfying conclusion. Then there’s OUAT romantic couples who get angst for angst sake that feels forced by becoming on-and-off again, juggling the idiot ball, getting written as wildly OOC, and/or getting character assassinated for “SHOCKING” magical PLOT fuckery bullshit contrivances and twists that make no sense to force them to unbelievably toxic and/or stupid extremes that make no sense.

@0ceanofdarkness

@sarashouldbestudying

@takingbackouat

@sieben9

@bellefrenchroleplays

@worryinglyinnocent

anneelliotscat replied to your post “I’ve said it before and even though I swear it’s been explained to me…”

Well, I put it down to two things: first, fiction requires Plot, which means conflict, and angst makes great conflict for these two. Second, they are both so pretty when they suffer. And the reason we yell at the OUAT writers about the angst is that their angst is Badly Written. Too often it depends on OOC behavior, Reverse Character Development, or the Idiot Ball.

I guess. But doesn’t all angst require one of those three things anyway? 

I mean, the natural state of these two is to be together, so if we want to force them apart, then we have to make them do something stupid in order to do that. 

[gch1995]

I had to quit watching after S5 because the writing for everyone’s characterization was so unbelievably OOC, infuriating, and mutually toxic, especially for Emma, Rumple, and Belle, who were my faves. They’d even turned Henry into a whiny and selfish little shit with no empathy in the 5B finale of “Only You” with that stupid “destroy magic” PLOT twist. Of course, I couldn’t really blame the characters for behaving in wildly OOC fucked up ways, and/or doing, and/or saying wildly OOC fucked up shit to each other that no one would ever realistically forgive. I could understand if it actually made believable sense why they were all being characterized as such as toxic messes, but on the show at this point, it was blatantly clear that Emma, Hook, Rumple, Belle, Snowing, and Henry were all victims of A&E and these writers external forces of nonsensical PLOT-driven magical fuckery Drama™️ on this show that had devolved into a soap opera, and not really due to anything that had to do with them being inherently unlikable or unsympathetic characters.

Plus, after that unbelievable, wildly OOC, and melodramatically mutually toxic extreme low the writers took CS to in 5A with that character destroying Dark Swan/Dark Hook nonsensical PLOT twist, I knew there was no way that A&E and these writers weren’t going to purposefully fuck up Rumple and Belle in a way that was so wildly OOC, illogical, melodramatically mutually toxic, and cringeworthy that I couldn’t defend or excuse either of them anymore as written in canon sooner or later to prop up Hook/CS again after 5A, and I couldn’t deal with that shit anymore, especially not after S4-S5 being more than bad enough to Rumbelle for Hook/CS’s benefit enough already.

Yeah, I think OUAT was the first show I watched on television that taught me the difference between hating a fictional character and hating the writers/creators behind them.

I used to be one of those people who thought, “Oh, people who ignore canon writing for their favorite problematic fictional characters when they do fucked up things, are just being babies! They signed up for a problematic fave, so they should know better!”

The problem with OUAT wasn’t the characters as originally written, and/or when written in-character and developed organically. I loved Rumple, Belle, Rumbelle, and Emma as originally characterized and developed from S1-S3 in canon on the show, and I love them in canon-divergent/AU fanon scenarios! But A&E and the writers were ultimately lazy, and chose to misuse them as tools in their PLOTs to emotionally manipulate the audience to blindly feel whatever they wanted them to feel, rather than telling an organic story with realistic characters who dealt with realistic relationship problems, development, and/or consistent characterization in favor of cheesy magical soap opera Drama™️ I had to quit watching after S5 to save my sanity.

The big issues, in my opinion, were that:

A) It was only ever a melodramatic big deal “OMG, SO EVOL” when Rumple so much as considered committing crimes and/or abusing magic in ways that violated autonomy or consent that could recklessly hurt/potentially endanger other people for, generally speaking, good reasons. But Emma, Belle, Regina, Snow, David, Zelena, Hook, and Henry could abuse magic for their own ends in ways that could/actually did potentially hurt and/or endanger other people recklessly all the time now too, and no one batted an eye. Rumple wanting to do the same with magic to protect family in narrative shouldn’t have been excused either, but character assassinating him by having him fuck around with bizarre and contrived magical macguffins out of nowhere and framing him as awildly OOC cartoonish mad villain for it, didn’t make the other characters look any better for getting away doing the same whenever it suited them on the show. Just because the writers had Rumple look bad under a magnifying glass of deliberately character assassinating bad writing by having him abusing magic to counterbalance everyone else’s magic abuse on the show, it didn’t automatically make the other characters look morally superior to Rumple or make them better characters. It just made them look hypocritical, self-righteous, petty, narrow-minded, and lacking in self-awareness. I feel like Adam, Eddy, and these writers felt like they could make everyone else on their fucked up and toxic show look better by deliberately tarnishing Rumple as their scapegoat to vilify in an increasingly obvious attempt to emotionally manipulate their audience to side with all of their other also incredibly fucked up and problematic characters by singling out one character as the “worst” on a show where everyone else was/ended up becoming just as much of, if not worse of a toxic mess of bad writing in one way or another anyway. Not surprisingly, they failed.

B). A well-written problematic character is not necessarily redeemable, but your audience still sees and understands the realistic reasons of how and/or why they got there gradually and consistently unfold on screen and/or within their backstories behind the scenes that build up to increasingly problematic behaviors on screen by not taking care of their mental health/sanity, even if they don’t end up liking them in the end.

A badly-written problematic character may suffer from unresolved issues of abuse, mental illness, addiction, trauma, grief, and loss to flesh them out more sympathetically in a narrative, but those realistic issues don’t end up being the issues the writers behind them choose to focus on to drive their increasingly problematic and out-of-character behaviors from point A to point C. On OUAT, they chose to focus on contrived, biased, externalized, hypocritical, and blatantly emotionally manipulative cartoonish “hero vs villain” character destroying Drama™️ by breaking, and bending their own rules of magic with bizarre macguffins and flashy magical PLOT twist fuckery character destroying garbage to force the audience to feel the way they wanted them to feel about the characters. Consistent, realistic normally intelligent, loving, open, kindhearted, devoted, loyal, cautious, and sane characterizations in these characters and their relationships were thrown away out of the blue if and/or whenever the writers stupid PLOTs demanded they suddenly start acting like wildly OOC caricatures who were acting bizarrely cartoonishly evil, exceedingly distrustful, exceedingly deceptive, exceedingly gullible, exceedingly conniving, melodramatically toxic, melodramatically cruel, reckless, and/or unbelievably stupid because the writers wanted for them to be ridiculously oblivious to solutions to conflicts and/or problems with each other thst should have and would have been obvious for them to resolve by taking a fucking chill pill, asking questions and doing research, sitting down to talk to each other and make compromises with each other like two mature adults for no realistically believable reason because they wanted for them to self-destruct to the worst possible rock bottom in their magical Drama™️ soap opera character destroying PLOT fuckery “twists.” (CS in 5A and Rumbelle in 4A-6A).

I could understand if it were a gradual, realistic, slow-burn, and organic build up of insanity in a character’s unhealthy response to being constantly abused, rejected, misunderstood, ostracized, emotionally manipulated by false hope, and/or fucked over for trying to be good, anyway. It wouldn’t excuse them for their actions or necessarily make them forgivable, but I would believe that I would do what they would in their shoes in similar circumstances as theirs if I saw the build up happen organically without bizarre twists, contrived magical macguffins, prophecies, and rules of magic being bent and broken to melodramatically and inorganically derail them from being seemingly normal to totally losing their shit and essentially having a completely different characterization/personality in the blink of an eye for whatever PLOT demands. I would see realistic reasons and build ups for why they became the way they did by not taking care of their mental health or getting healthy emotional support, and choosing to give into darkness/insanity instead without any strings of PLOT forcing them there inorganically.

However, on OUAT, especially in later seasons after 3A, you would have Rumple, Regina, Belle, Emma, Snow, David, Hook, and even Henry going from being seemingly normal, loving, rational, sane, and/or trying to be good in one moment to very unbelievable, and uncharacteristically, melodramatically cruel, criminal, dark, deceptive, distrustful, petty, impatient, insensitive, reckless, triggering, stupid, and/or batshit insane in the next out of nowhere within a timeline that took place over a day or less from the end of 3B-S7 because their asinine PLOT twists, magic prophecies, and/or one-season magic macguffins demanded they do a complete 180 for senseless character destroying Drama™️ from one episode or scene to the next.

Then, they just “went back to normal” after the writers were all done outright destroying their characters involved for wildly OOC needless Drama™️ in their magical PLOT fuckery twists by making them do, threaten to do, and/or say horrifically and unbelievably OOC melodramatically and needlessly cruel, destructive, hurtful, mutually toxic, traumatizing, reckless, stupid and/or problematic ugly shit in regards to each other for a few episodes of an arc that no one would ever realistically forgive, even if they meant well. At least not without a logical explanation for why it happened, and/or or a lot of time to process to let go of the hurt they caused each other first, which we never got to see on screen in the aftermath as a resolution on screen.

It’s the most infuriatingly lazy type of writing that I have ever seen on a television show and such a total waste of potentially interesting and relatable characters for cheap shock value and Drama™️ in the PLOT.

C) When you kill off a character, especially a redemptive anti-villain/tragic hero type character, kill them off once and then be done with them for good.

D) “Foil” does not mean you outright destroy another character to fool the audience into thinking that the other one you want them to root for is any better without them actually doing or saying anything to prove it. That’s just lazy and blatantly emotionally manipulative bad writing.

E). Stop with the “Evil is sexy” in female villains and Rumple, a feminine-coded anti-villain. It honestly was so cringeworthy and unsexy on OUAT.

F). Female “empowerment” and “feminism” does not mean being a control freak with a man, refusing to let them get a word in edgewise, interrupting them, belittling them, walking away, and/or being needlessly cruel, and/or a petty bitch every time they so much as slightly disagrees with you. It does not mean giving men ultimatums for you to be together, or leading them on with borderline emotionally manipulative false hope to get what you want from them, only to drop them right afterwards/if they don’t do exactly what you demand 100% of the time. It does not mean being emotionally, verbally, physically, and/or sexually abusive of men. It does not mean needlessly kicking men when they are already down by using their emotional vulnerability against them to mock them about how “weak” they are for expressing their very real fears to you in a desire for your emotional support and understanding. Being a “strong” woman does not mean treating men in relationships like “projects for you to ‘fix’” just as being a “strong” woman does not mean giving up your own personal convictions and independence to be with them. My god, they really fucked up Emma, Regina, Belle, and Zelena with this Empowerment™️ trope...

G). Male characters should progress and regress with more than just the solely emotionally manipulative force of a female love interest. Female characters should be able to progress and regress with more than just a male love interest’s emotionally manipulative force. I’ll always love Rumbelle, Snowing in the early seasons and in fanon scenarios, and even CS wouldn’t have been that bad, but the writers either destroyed both halves of them with Drama™️ in the PLOT, and/or sidelined them and made them unhealthily codependent. I think killing off Nealfire killed that core theme of family, especially in Rumple and Emma.

But basically, Rumple, Belle, Snow, David, Emma, Neal, and Hook should have all been more developed as individual characters who could grow and regress as more than just love interests.

H). Stop this trope of using female love interests to vilify their male love interests by turning them into OOC emotionally abusive/whiplash plot devices to trigger them with on-and-off-again bs or problematic behaviors to drive them insane. They did this with CS in 5A, Rumbelle in 6A, and Phole on Charmed in season five. It’s not fun to watch. It’s actually really misogynistic writing that does not make either halves of your couples feel blameless or likable in anti-heroine/redemptive anti-villain couples. It ruins and limits both of them in a way that feels mutually toxic and gross. Acknowledge that both halves of your anti-heroine/anti-villain couple are imperfect and flawed, or break them up amicably for good. But stop trying so *hard* to make the audience see the problematic female love interest as the “blameless” victim for consciously pushing the male anti-villain’s every button, and stop having the male anti-villain as a “pure EVOL abuser” driven to insanity with this trope. It’s so annoying and disappointing! If you’re going to make it so that *both* halves of this kind of relationship are toxic to each other in an anti-hero/reforming anti villain romance, then stick to being fair, and call them both out to resolve their issues, rather than trying to make the audience take sides! Don’t chicken out halfway through, and go to “evil abuser” versus “blameless victim” mid-way through and/or at the end because you’re too afraid to admit that the “good guy” in the relationship is imperfect and hurtful in regards to the “bad guy” in the relationship! If you can’t be realistic and fair enough to discard your “hero” and “villain” labels, then just break them up amicably after their first fall out. I’m so tired of this on-and-off-again hypocritical character destroying Drama™️ bs, though.

J) When you “have” to kill off, sideline, and/or outright destroy other characters/ships to get rid of competition for your favorite character or ship, it doesn’t make you a good writer. It just makes you look like a petty hack with a Gary Stu/Mary Sue or a creator’s pet that’s polarizing the show.

K) You are are a very bad storyteller if you think that “fun” means deliberately destroying/derailing your normally sympathetic and/or intelligent characters characterizations into something inexplicably, melodramatically, unbelievably, and uncharacteristically mutually toxic, stupid, and unsympathetic for contrived, needless, and senseless self-destructing Drama™️ in your PLOTs.

L). If your goal as a creative writer is to mindfuck your audience with “SHOCKING” twists that you pull from your ass with no lead up whenever things seem to be headed in a direction that actually feels interesting, promising, and starts to makes organic sense, then we will lose emotional investment in the stories for these characters you’re not interested in telling, and catch on to a pattern the more often you do it because we’re a lot smarter than you think we are.

M). Accept that character growth and/or regression can’t just happen right away because the PLOTs you come up demand it. Take time to get them from point to the next in development and/or regression.

N) Guest characters should be fleshed out, and well-developed. Don’t use them as discardable plot devices

O). Stop going back to the status quo! (Rumple’s the Dark One, Emma’s the Savior, Hook/Neal is her boyfriend, Rumbelle are separated for reasons x, y, and z, Rumple does something stupidly self-sabotaging with magic to try to fix a problem in the wrong ways and only makes it worse, Rumple does something selfless for the “first time,” Belle’s a failure hero, Hook wants to get revenge on someone who wronged him, particularly Rumple, Regina has a hole in her heart she wants to fill by artificially absolving her guilt, Zelena fucks over Rumple, Emma has to learn to open up her heart to love, Snowing keep dark secrets from Emma, etc. This show became such a predictable soap opera by S5 that I had to finally quit to preserve my sanity...)

@0ceanofdarkness

@sieben9

@ishtarelisheba

@idkmybffjillyy

@takingbackouat

@tariella

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@done-with-ouat

@anna-williams-wins

@anneelliotscat

Hi! Are you also a fan of Emma Swan?

Hello! Yes, I’m generally a fan of Emma—but with a caveat. I’m not a fan of how she was written in the later part of OUAT, but I love who she was at her core and what she could have been. Sometimes it feels like I’m more of a fan of the pairs that Emma is in—her relationship with Neal, or Regina, or Snow and David, etc—and fanon!Emma… but yeah, I’m a fan. She was a lost little girl who kicked ass fought for what was right and found more family than she could possibly know what to do with. :D