#we all become our parents

[punk-lite]

I went on a trip to the south, and about four days in, I desperately missed eating rice and veggies. Don't get me wrong, southern food is superb. I'm just becoming an Asian grandma who gets cranky if she goes three days without the food of her people.

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 117

Bruce does not enjoy magic. In fact he’s absolutely horrible at it, to the point it’s better that he avoids it in general. Getting thrown into some sort of summoning circle bullshit was not helping him feel any better about it either. 

At least he isn’t dead… probably. He might be surrounded by green and there might be a massive entity sitting on a throne, but he isn’t dead yet. Even if the cult had been rambling about sacrificing ‘the dark knight to the dark king’. 

… His kids are definitely going to kill him, but there are small children peeking out at him from within the being’s cape. Who seem happy enough, while the… king looks exhausted in a familiar way. Well. Maybe it’s his own parental exhaustion talking, but they can’t be too bad if their kids are happy to be there. 

[eyestrain-addict]

Iwtv s2 ep2 spoilers

My thing I'm wondering is that in the promos/trailers claudia screams that Louis "picked another one over me" but in this episode she's encouraging louis to live outside of her and pursue a romance with Armand. I wonder what's going to change in the next few episodes.

[jamesheathridge]

sooo many theories about bensons dad but honestly think the idea of him killing himself when benson was young is really interesting and i've been cycling it around in my brain lately

[fatehbaz]

.

[waitmyturtles]

Your post about your upcoming Bad Buddy meta got me thinking about Bad Buddy (again), and I remembered one particular thing that had an impact. Apologies if this is long and rather incoherent, I wrote this past midnight.

In the final episode, the part where we see Ming and Dissaya turn a blind eye to Pat Pran's shenanigans really struck a chord with me.

[I'm an Indian, born and raised, and queer, but it's well worth mentioning that my experiences are not universal- in fact, they may be the exception rather than the rule; I'm not quite sure.]

What it reminded me of was, that asian parents tend to come around eventually- in particular mothers. We've seen time and time again in series' that deal with difficult/not accepting family members; Bad Buddy, GAP, Wedding Plan, maybe even Double Savage (haven't watched this one but I believe the dad feels bad in the end?), that even if the parental figure(s) doesn't agree with their children's choices, they learn to compromise. Because the difference in opinions isn't worth losing their children over. Obviously, for every parental figure that comes around there's one that the children cut ties with (Wedding Plan remains a good example), but I think it's something worth seeing.

It made me think of how I was never scared of coming out to my mother, because I knew that, despite the difference in views, and her prejudice, she'd accept me, no matter whether she thought it was a phase or not.

Do I know what the point of this ask is? Not really, I was rather nervous sending this ask, especially not on anon, but I'd love to know what you think of this, since I've come to really enjoy reading the thoughts you have on these shows.

Ohhhh, wow. @starryalpacasstuff, come 'ere for a big mom hug! HUGE HUGS!

I'm gonna unwind a little randomly; I hope this is coherent. A ton of what I write about on my blog vis à vis Asian dramas are the unique characteristics of Asian families and an Asian upbringing. Parental conditional love, competitiveness, our unique experiences with intergenerational trauma. I write a lot about how Asians, in our cultural expectations of life, accept pain and suffering as an assumed part of our existences. The reason why I watch Asian dramas exclusively is that, as I'm Asian-American, I just connect far more easily to the Asian cultural experience of growing from a child into an Asian adult, than I do the experience of white Western folks growing into their adulthood. I grew up intimately with Asian cultural practices and expectations; but I also grew up with racism in my external American world, and came to my adulthood in a society that still values white Americans above all other demographics.

But one thing I'm cognizant of, that I don't think I write about enough, is that many of these characteristics of the Asian cultural scopes of life are indeed similar to those that a fully American person (for example) might experience. It's not like intergenerational trauma doesn't exist in the West. It's not like homophobia in families against a child doesn't exist in the West.

However. As an Asian-American, one thing I note about many (not all, of course) Western families and family systems is that very often: Western adults will give up their agency to be loyal to what I might call a "higher power" -- a philosophy, a political preference, a religion. If a queer person wants to come out in a conservative American family, that queer person may very well be risking cutting permanent ties with their family.

That, of course, also happens in our Asian family systems. But I think you're onto something, @starryalpacasstuff. While divorce rates are sky-high in the West -- there is also a paradigm of family systems being and looking different in the West than they do in Asia. Asian family systems still don't accommodate for divorce and blended or chosen families as they do in the West.

The Asian family systems and paradigms that you and I grew up with as Indians absolutely still value a heterosexual two-parent household -- and I'd posit that our past generations, our grandparents and great-grandparents, put HUGE, HUGE pressure on our parents to keep the two-parent family systems together and whole. And to keep the children close. It's a huge value in our Asian cultures to have whole and complete families. The West has become far more accommodating, culturally, on this issue.

And, so. I totally agree with you, @starryalpacasstuff. I think we do see the beginning of a coming-around on the parts of Ming and Dissaya. And that coming-around is certainly something we can relate to. Our parents will likely accept us for our differences. I fucked a lot of shit up with my folks when I decided to live independently of their desires -- and I don't think things really healed (and I still carry tremendous traumatic baggage) until after I had my own kids, and expanded all of our families. Because in the end, the value in our Asian cultures is that keeping the family complete and close still matters more than any one's individual biases or desires.

Ming and Dissaya are remarkably traumatized people. Ming was traumatized by the expectations of his father. He screwed Dissaya over, and literally handed his trauma to Pat on a silver platter, for Pat to embody for most of his life. And Pat flipped that platter over in his father's face and ran away. Ming, at the end of the series, is passive-aggressive with Pat, despite Pat's efforts to try to work with him. And yet -- Ming still sips Pran's scotch.

To your point -- does time heal everything? I'm not so sure in the West, with the Western predilection for Christian/Puritanical/conservative values to supersede reasonable family resolutions. But I think, because of the value that Asian systems put on having complete families, that you are right -- that there may be more room in Asian family systems for eventual acceptance of a child's "differences," despite us living in collectivist societies. This is definitely not an absolute. There are environments in which it's still dangerous to come out. But the value that Asians put on family does indeed give us a tiny bit of comfort that our cultures can move the needle on acceptance in different ways over time.

[shhh-secret-time]

To be honest, stardew valley has me in such a chokehold. It always has, even before the 1.6.

In such a way that my brain wants to smash my hyperfixation into it. So late at night I'll be awake thinking of this stardew/south park mashup.

Call that bad boy Star Park AU.

But no brain! Bad! We already have too much going on! You have a Secret Soulmate AU. Fantasy AU, A Cowboy AU story staring Kenny that's still in the outline phase, and these one shots!

(Look at the tags to watch me descent into madness)

[dreamieparadise]

Can- can I ask about the Somali pirates?

Hi hi, Lili! Yes, of course. Tbh I shouldn't have called them "pirates" they are known as such and treated like villains, but they're more like unofficial naval guard! The official naval guard was disbanded in the 90's due to the civil war that broke out [btw this civil war is why I'm diaspora! My maternal family fled to Djibouti or elsewhere. My dad came to Canada due to it.] Anyway! Other nations took advantage of this as they tended to do and started fishing illegally in the waters! Somali citizens rely on fishing to live [also farming and agriculture bc I also recall there was a drought and famine going on] so they turned to "piracy" to stop these thieves from stealing from them! Of course, these outsiders didn't like it and called it "piracy." they shouldn't be there in the first place!!!

BFJRKRKRKR I TALKED IM THE TAGS AND REACHED THE LIMIT I AM SO SORRY LMAOOOOO

Other than Puntland there is also Jubbaland ok lol I love talking about my people's history too much

[penisbilt]

the bittersweet but absolute flood of relief that comes from admitting defeat at living independently, to have to move back in with parents. we tried! we gave it our best shot for almost 3 years! but living like this (being on our own) is just not possible for us at this time of our lives. we've finally proved it to ourselves that we can't do it. it'll be okay to let ourselves rest now

[autumn-applepie]

University ever pushes you so low you have to go buy a couple of beers? /srs/neg

I'm gonna vent in the tags for a moment humor me for once /gen

[aspenstarflare]

Tales of the Jedi Ahsoka looks so freaking cool and I can’t help drawing Ahsoka because SHE ALWAYS LOOKS SO FREAKING COOL

[guinevereslancelot]

not to be ungrateful but i don't get paid enough at my job lol

[anotherpapercut]

sometimes I feel like there's a narrative on here that like. people who work and live not with their parents in their 20s are somehow privileged and its really annoying as someone with 0 family and 0 built in support system lol

[immortalsins]

self-isolation during times of stress is pretty bad actually shame it took me 2 years of uni to realise this

[sab-teraa]

.

[tracing-lines-in-the-infinite]

Any episode of Person Of Interest can make you cry if you think hard enough about it