#we have so many children

[felucians]

Nex Benedict's death wasn't just for being transgender, it was for being native too. 2 Spirits are revered in many native cultures and it is a native-specific identity. This wasn't just a hate crime against trans & NB individuals, this was also a hate crime against Natives of Turtle Island.

You cannot separate Nex's trans identity from their native identity - this is a case of MMIWG2S (Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and 2 Spirits).

Native children being killed at school is nothing new, so it's equally important to talk about Nex's native identity and being intersectional, this is a devastating tragedy for indigenous people, the queer community & especially those of us who are both indigenous and queer.

May Nex rest in peace 🪶

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Council of lovefools.

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[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 277

Danny would be pouting, but this? This is actually kind of hilarious. He’d be laughing his ass off if he could, but allows himself to shriek excitedly around the binky in his mouth. Jordan on the other hand has no such thing stopping him, letting out his own toddler cackle as something bursts into flames. 

Their current caretaker- Clockwork’s nephew apparently, who is on babysitting duty for the next couple of decades- coos, and then they’re off again. Someone had apparently wanted their sort-of-Fraid-member to go to a meeting despite him informing them he’d be unavailable.

So of course he- and the three of them and Ms. Teekl the cat- just had to set the whole place on fire. You honestly can’t be that rude! It’s like, not exactly maternity leave, but something similar- don’t make fun of him he’s stuck with a toddler-brain right now! 

(All three of them would’ve had completely toddler minds if not for the fact that they were partially made from ectoplasm) 

Really, it was perfectly normal for them to set the building aflame and disappear into another dimension, even if maybe not for humans. Everyone knew you didn’t try to mess with a nesting Realms being! Especially if they weren’t fully Fraid yet. Honestly it’s all the idiots’ fault. 

[redbean-nom]

Cadets

(aka trash children, chaos children, and children who understand 98 is getting graded on this)

Inspired by @thefoundationproject! Closeups under the cut:

jesse got this pic from jangotat:

[gingermintpepper]

In my Zeus bag today so I'm just gonna put it out there that exactly none of the great Ancient Greek warrior-heroes stayed loyal and faithful and completely monogamous and yet none of them have their greatness questioned nor do we question why they had the cultural prominence that they did and still do.

Jason, the brilliant leader of the Argo, got cold feet when it came to Medea - already put off by some of her magic and then exiled from his birthland because of her political ploys, he took Creusa to bed and fully intended on marrying her despite not properly dissolving things with Medea.

Theseus was a fierce warrior and an incredibly talented king but he had a horrible temper and was almost fatally weak to women. This is the man who got imprisoned in the Underworld for trying to get a friend laid, the man who started the whole Attic War because he couldn't keep his legs closed.

And we cannot at all forget Heracles for whom a not inconsiderable amount of his joy in life was loving people then losing the people around him that he loved. Wives, children, serving boys, mentors, Heracles had a list of lovers - male and female - long enough to rival some gods and even after completing his labours and coming down to the end of his life, he did not have one wife but three.

And y'know what, just because he's a cultural darling, I'll put Achilles up here too because that man was a Theseus type where he was fantastic at the thing he was born to do (that is, fight whereas Theseus' was to rule) but that was not enough to eclipse his horrid temper and his weakness to young pretty things. This is the man that killed two of Apollo's sons because they wouldn't let him hit - Tenes because he refused to let Achilles have his sister and Troilus who refused Achilles so vehemently that he ran into Apollo's temple to avoid him and still couldn't escape.

All four of these men are still celebrated as great heroes and men. All four of these men are given the dignity of nuance, of having their flaws treated as just that, flaws which enrich their character and can be used to discuss the wider cultural point of what truly makes a hero heroic. All four of these men still have their legacies respected.

Why can that same mindset not be applied to Zeus? Zeus, who was a warrior-king raised in seclusion apart from his family. Zeus who must have learned to embrace the violence of thunder for every time he cried as a babe, the Corybantes would bang their shields to hide the sound. Zeus learned to be great because being good would not see the universe's affairs in its order.

The wonderful thing about sympathy is that we never run out of it. There's no rule stopping us from being sympathetic to multiple plights at once, there's no law that necessitate things always exist on the good-evil binary. Yes, Zeus sentenced Prometheus to sufferation in Tartarus for what (to us) seems like a cruel reason. Prometheus only wanted to help humans! But when you think about Prometheus' actions from a king's perspective, the narrative is completely different: Prometheus stole divine knowledge and gifted it to humans after Zeus explicitly told him not to. And this was after Prometheus cheated all the gods out of a huge portion of wealth by having humans keep the best part of a sacrifice's meat while the gods must delight themselves with bones, fat and skin. Yes, Zeus gave Persephone away to Hades without consulting Demeter but what king consults a woman who is not his wife about the arrangement of his daughter's marriage to another king? Yes, Zeus breaks the marriage vows he set with Hera despite his love of her but what is the Master of Fate if not its staunchest slave?

The nuance is there. Even in his most bizarre actions, the nuance and logic and reason is there. The Ancient Greeks weren't a daft people, they worshipped Zeus as their primary god for a reason and they did not associate him with half the vices modern audiences take issue with. Zeus was a father, a visitor, a protector, a fair judge of character, a guide for the lost, the arbiter of revenge for those that had been wronged, a pillar of strength for those who needed it and a shield to protect those who made their home among the biting snakes. His children were reflections of him, extensions of his will who acted both as his mercy and as his retribution, his brothers and sisters deferred to him because he was wise as well as powerful. Zeus didn't become king by accident and it is a damn shame he does not get more respect.

[crippledanarchy]

If you're in the US and you're concerned about Palestine, leave US Jews alone, and start asking your local evangelist how much money their christian church sends annually to support the genocide being committed by the state of israel.

[eddis-not-eeddis]

My tolerance for rom-coms has hit an all time low. Every time these idiots are like, "Let's move in together, it's the most romantic thing a couple can do to show they love each other!" I just feel that smoker meme in my soul.

Marriage, folks, the thing you're actually thinking of is marriage.

There's nothing more romantic than swearing to spend your life together. But admit it, you're too cowardly to commit to any ACTUAL romance in your life. :/

[captainkirkk]

I'm now on season 2 of my Natsume Yujinchou rewatch, and I love seeing the marked difference in the way Natsume is treated.

In season 1, we get a very withdrawn, very fake Natsume - quiet, smiling pleasantly but clearly looking right through people, apologising for taking up space. People like him right away but don't know how to breach that distance. But towards the end of season 1/ into season 2, we see people understanding Natsume more and more and deciding to close that distance by reaching out to him with affection. We see them teaching Natsume how to be loved.

We also get more people recognising and seeing straight through Natsume's bullshit, ESPECIALLY Nyanko-sensei.

Natsume: "My temperature is a little over 37 degrees."

Nyanko-sensei: "You should rest then."

Natsume: "I took some medicine. I should be fine if I don't do much. I don't want to worry Touko-san."

Nyanko-sensei: "Geez, how long will it take you to realise?"

Natsume, entirely oblivious to just how much he's loved and wanted: "...Realise what?"

[uncanny-tranny]

I won't rest until we start dispensing PrEP in every vending machine and people all over regardless of if they're in a straight relationship or a normal one or are single or whatever else are taking it. It shouldn't be seen as "the drug the queers take" because (spoilers!) Everyone Can Get HIV and It Does Not Discriminate.

[utilitycaster]

I enjoy a friends-to-lovers story but when it comes to a lot of ships I don't like that are argued to fit that model the problem is usually one of two:

they were never that convincing or interesting as friends either

they work well as friends, but. have you ever been friends with someone and then worked with them or become their roommate and it didn't go well? Sometimes people are great friends because they do not need to make major life choices together and can agree to disagree on significant philosophical choices in a way that couples do not

[tavina-writes]

I started writing yet another tag essay in the notes of a different post where OP posited that the reason established relationships that are rock solid or functional are hard to write and find in fiction because there's missing tension due to the lack of will they won't they, and how one way to solve this in a story is to make the characters insane about each other. (The post is here.)

And don't get me wrong! I like when characters are a little or a lot unhinged about each other! and I also like relationships that self destruct, tragedies that end badly, and all that jazz I enjoy these things a lot! They're good things!

But I'm thinking about relationship tension again and how like, okay yes sometimes we want our characters confess they're in love with each other and get together and sail off into a soft epilogue, etc. This too is love!

But I think fundamentally to deny the fact that two (or more) people can love each other deeply, be totally committed to each other, and yet still have difficulties and life problems to tackle together is an underexplored facet of romance. The mundane of this is where the real romance lies on our day to day as people, and I find this so...rarely? tackled in fiction?

Maybe this is because I'm ace, but I feel that there's a distinct? vibe to these sorts of mature and enduring romances where like, the love is there, the commitment is there, but we still have moments we need to work for it because that's life and we work for it because we find each other worth it.

What is more romantic than compromise with someone you care for deeply? What is more romantic than tackling problems together and trying to come to an agreement and sometimes not being able to but still having done your best and accepted the outcome anyway?

What is a long lasting relationship that isn't about give and take and growing together or coming apart? Aren't those stories interesting? How could any long lasting relationship where people are deeply in love with each other be boring when like, to BE in a relationship with someone for ten, twenty, thirty, sixty years and come out the other side of that saying 'you're the one, you're still the one, you've always been the one' is one of the most wild and rare type of relationships to have?

What sort of sacrifice and compromise and work it takes to build that sort of relationship, isn't that interesting? To persist despite moments of doubt and periods of despair and all the work it takes in mundanity? all the trials a relationship like that has to survive and has survived, isn't that still tension? isn't that still interesting?

Maybe it's just me that I find this more interesting than "will they? won't they?" Either they will or they won't but when I'm reading a romance they mostly will! But do they have what it takes to stay there? And if they do isn't that one of the most interesting things in the world to look at?

Isn't that also love?

[icewindandboringhorror]

Little bright colored outfit with a fun vest ~

(shoes from ebay like 10 years ago. everything else is thrifted)

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 209

Now Jason was planning on, well, a lot of things, when he came back to Gotham. He had a lot of plans, several of which had to do with the old man and even more that had to do with cleaning up Crime Alley, making it safer and all that. 

What he was not planning on was to find some sort of lab in the basement of where he was planning on setting up a safehouse. Nor was he planning on finding several literal children in cages inside said lab. Oh and Lazarus Waters- but children! With muzzles! Being experimented on!

Now he’d like to say he had a plan in what happened next, but if he’s honest everything had gone Green and he didn’t remember what happened next, only that he’s back home with said children and covered in blood. Oh and everything smells of smoke. 

… And apparently there’s more of these things dotted around Crime Alley with the rest of these kids, er, siblings? Family? Fright does mean family? Okay kids, he’s not turning into Bruce but you can stay here while he deals with this… however long that takes. 

He better not be turning into Bruce he swears-

[erynalasse]

I wonder when the Noldor looked around at their dwindling numbers and realized that they were dying faster than they could ever keep up with.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Culinary appreciation

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[wonder-worker]

Thinking about Elizabeth Woodville as a gothic heroine is making me go insane. She entered the story by overturning existing social structures, provoking both ire and fascination. She married into a dynasty doomed to eat itself alive. She was repeatedly associated with the supernatural, both in terms of love and death. Her life was shaped entirely by uncanny repetitions - two marriages, two widowhoods, two depositions, two flights to sanctuary, two ultimate reclamations - all paralleling and ricocheting off each other. Her plight after 1483 exposed the true rot at the heart of the monarchy - the trappings of royalty pulled away to reveal nothing, a never-ending cycle of betrayal and war, the price of power being the (literal) blood of children. She lived past the end of her family name, she lived past the end of her myth. She ended her life in a deeply anomalous position, half-in and half-out of royal society. She was both a haunting tragedy and the ultimate survivor who was finally free.