#what is a good kid

[laughingcatwrites]

As a reminder that good exists out there, a coworker recently confessed to me that he found out his child is questioning their identity (kid's gender redacted for this post). The kid is keeping it from him, so he can't say anything to them or show that he knows, but he's doing his best to get mentally prepared and educated so that he'll be ready whenever his kid does feel comfortable enough come to him.

For context, this guy is a big, bulky middle aged dude who loves sports and typical outdoor "manly" activities. As his coworker and friend, I know he's a kind and sweet teddy bear of a person, but his kid probably views him as a stern, authoritarian figure, the way most teenagers view their parents. His family lives in a conservative area, so I'm sure between that, their dad's looks and interests, and the fact that their dad is a Figure of Authority, the kid is worried that they won't be accepted.

But you know what? When he found out about his kid, the first thing he did was reach out to his closest queer friend and ask for resources for parents of questioning children. His biggest fears are that his kid will be bullied or discriminated against and won't feel comfortable enough to be themself. His second action was to find himself a mentor in another parent who went the same situation (kid coming out in a conservative town). The other person is preparing him for some of the struggles his kid may face and the fights he may need to take on as a parent to make sure his kid is safe and treated well.

Something I want to emphasize for people focused on language as the primary method of allyship is that when we spoke, he used some outdated terms and thoughts about gender and sexuality. That does not make him bad. These were the terms and thinking used about questioning teenagers when he was growing up and he never needed to learn more current ones. But now that he does have that need, he's throwing himself in head first because that's his kid and he's darn well going to make sure that his kid feels welcomed and has a safe place to be themselves even if they never come out to him.

[chloesimaginationthings]

The true meaning behind FNAF princess quest

[hinamie]

in spite of everything, I had fun <3

[marzipanandminutiae]

what's with the weird glorification of smoking that's come back lately

like

I've seen so many posts that paint opposing smoking as some impossibly Loser-ish or puritanical stance and I really don't get it

it makes you, your house, and your clothing stink, destroys your teeth, and gives you lung cancer. opposing it is. Correct. obviously addiction is very complicated and quitting can be hard, but just saying "smoking is gross and harmful as a practice (including vaping)" is True and Right actually

some of you have never grown up hearing about how some beloved family member died a slow, agonized, wasting death of smoking-induced cancer, or watching it firsthand for yourself, and it shows

[catmask]

sometimes while i think about that while a lot of adults did not treat me very well as a kid i also get a lot of 'in hindsight this person was so good to me and i didnt even realize it until now' as an adult. today i was thinking about how the first anime convention i ever went to was when i was 10 and i asked the man working the manga cafe what manga was/what a good place to start was (because the con was very overstimulating for me and i had gotten lost) and he asked how old i was before recommending yotsuba and asking if i wanted any water or something to eat. its really simple but theres a lot of bad things that couldve happened or he could've been careless in his recommendation, but instead yotsuba has remained one of my favorite manga for years, and probably a large portion of why i continue to read manga as an adult... i think adults who try to involve kids in the world safely/kindly even in little ways make so much more of a difference than they ever really know.

[funtergeist]

are there still any shadowpeach fans

[botanyshitposts]

public libraries are so crazy man. like you’re telling me I can read this book for free

[inkskinned]

at some point it's just like. do they even fucking like the thing they're asking AI to make? "oh we'll just use AI for all the scripts" "we'll just use AI for art" "no worries AI can write this book" "oh, AI could easily design this"

like... it's so clear they've never stood in the middle of an art museum and felt like crying, looking at a piece that somehow cuts into your marrow even though the artist and you are separated by space and time. they've never looked at a poem - once, twice, three times - just because the words feel like a fired gun, something too-close, clanging behind your eyes. they've never gotten to the end of the movie and had to arrive, blinking, back into their body, laughing a little because they were holding their breath without realizing.

"oh AI can mimic style" "AI can mimic emotion" "AI can mimic you and your job is almost gone, kid."

... how do i explain to you - you can make AI that does a perfect job of imitating me. you could disseminate it through the entire world and make so much money, using my works and my ideas and my everything.

and i'd still keep writing.

i don't know there's a word for it. in high school, we become aware that the way we feel about our artform is a cliche - it's like breathing. over and over, artists all feel the same thing. "i write because i need to" and "my music is how i speak" and "i make art because it's either that or i stop existing." it is such a common experience, the violence and immediacy we mean behind it is like breathing to me - comes out like a useless understatement. it's a cliche because we all feel it, not because the experience isn't actually persistent. so many of us have this ... fluttering urgency behind our ribs.

i'm not doing it for the money. for a star on the ground in some city i've never visited. i am doing it because when i was seven i started taking notebooks with me on walks. i am doing it because in second grade i wrote a poem and stood up in front of my whole class to read it out while i shook with nerves. i am doing it because i spent high school scribbling all my feelings down. i am doing it for the 16 year old me and the 18 year old me and the today-me, how we can never put the pen down. you can take me down to a subatomic layer, eviscerate me - and never find the source of it; it is of me. when i was 19 i named this blog inkskinned because i was dramatic and lonely and it felt like the only thing that was actually permanently-true about me was that this is what is inside of me, that the words come up over everything, coat everything, bloom their little twilight arias into every nook and corner and alley

"we're gonna replace you". that is okay. you think that i am writing to fill a space. that someone said JOB OPENING: Writer Needed, and i wrote to answer. you think one raindrop replaces another, and i think they're both just falling. you think art has a place, that is simply arrives on walls when it is needed, that is only ever on demand, perfect, easily requested. you see "audience spending" and "marketability" and "multi-line merch opportunity"

and i see a kid drowning. i am writing to make her a boat. i am writing because what used to be a river raft has long become a fully-rigged ship. i am writing because you can fucking rip this out of my cold dead clammy hands and i will still come back as a ghost and i will still be penning poems about it.

it isn't even love. the word we use the most i think is "passion". devotion, obsession, necessity. my favorite little fact about the magic of artists - "abracadabra" means i create as i speak. we make because it sluices out of us. because we look down and our hands are somehow already busy. because it was the first thing we knew and it is our backbone and heartbreak and everything. because we have given up well-paying jobs and a "real life" and the approval of our parents. we create because - the cliche again. it's like breathing. we create because we must.

you create because you're greedy.

[pants-lint]

Just had a Thought and now I'm curious. What's you guy's strangest comfort media? It doesn't have to be strange as in like creepy/fucked up/whatever, it can just be smthn a lil odd.

[artist-rat]

some epilogue vibes (an excuse to draw some hugs. and my durge so many times)

[a-most-beloved-fool]

makes me a little sad when star trek ignores IDIC. like. vulcans are logical. that is true. But 'logical', for vulcans, does not amount to 'without compassion,' and it definitely doesn't amount to 'racial superiority.' Belief in 'infinite diversity in infinite combinations' should NOT result in the weird racist/speciest stuff we're getting in some of the newer treks. It does make sense that some vulcans are discriminatory. They're still flawed. But that should not be common or expected, like it seems to be in SNW. If it is, then it's a race of hypocrites, which. doesn't seem very true to Star Trek's message.

I think TOS Spock does a pretty good job of embodying this. Not always, it was the 60s, after all, but mostly. He was often trying to find non-violent routes, and get by without killing - even if they were in danger or had already been attacked. (See: the mugato, and the horta (until Kirk was the one in danger, lmao. t'hy'la > IDIC), the Gorn ship). Kirk, in his eulogy, calls him the most human soul he's ever known, and I've always read that as Kirk calling out Spock's overwhelming compassion.

It's just so much more interesting when Vulcans get to be radically compassionate. I want them to believe that everything and everyone has value. I want them to respect all ways of being. I want them to find ways for even very non-humanoid aliens to exist unfettered in society. I want them to see hybrids and think that it's amazing. Also, like, disability rep. I want Vulcans to have The Most Accessible Planet and available resources because they want everyone to feel accepted and valued. It makes for better characters and more interesting stories.

[chloesimaginationthings]

IDK what William Afton expected to happen in FNAF..

[yardsards]

say what you will about steven universe but it's objectively hilarious that arguably one of the most toxic ships in the series is just. two coworkers at the same shitty minimum wage food service job

[haveihitanerve]

Okay but hear me out- the batkids as actual Vampires. Not bruce, just the kids, and bruce providing for them. Because he just has the tastiest blood.

Little Dick toddling over to Bruce, tears in his eyes because he ate his bloody dinner too fast and hes still hungry and Bruce just sighing and sticking out his hand and Dick lights up and they watch a movie while dick is happily gnawing on Bruce’s thumb and sucking his blood. Big Dick complains very loudly about how hungry he is and Bruce will glower at him before finally giving in and throwing an arm around his eldests shoulders and Dick pecks his cheek with a sweet “thank you dad.” before sinking his teeth into Bruce’s arm. 

Little Jason would very politely come over and tug on his hand and Bruce would pick him up and let him bite his hand and drink, but Big Jason just pounces on Bruce from behind and sinks his teeth into Bruces shoulder/neck for blood. 

Little Tim slipping five dollar bills into Bruce’s hand just before chomping his thigh and Big Tim very casually stabbing a needle into Bruce’s leg, extracting blood and then putting it into his coffee and walking away. Sometimes, if he’s feeling nostalgic, he will curl up with his head on bruce’s lap and actually bite him for blood, for pure blood, but he likes his coffee bruce blood blend better

Little Cass never once asked bruce for blood because she was scared, but Bruce would just scoop her into his arms and offer her his already cut open shoulder until she was comfortable enough scaling him like a tree and drinking from his shoulder. Big Cass still doesn't ask for blood, she just lands on his shoulders and bites his bicep. 

Little Steph was a little vampire gremlin and any time she saw Bruce without clothes (since his children feed off of him Bruce wears very little, just a tank top and shorts and makes sure to shave as much as possible to provide ample biting space, but as Batman he still wears his full suit just easy to slip off certain parts so his kids can feed easily) she would suction onto him like a little affectionate leech and dig her little teeth into his back. Big Steph also likes his back and has much the same habits as little steph did. 

Little Babs wasn't too keen on blood, but sometimes Bruce would offer her his forearm while she was working and she would work and eat. Big Babs has no qualms about taking his blood, but has few chances, so he stops by her Oracle hideout sometimes and just holds out his arm for her to drink

Little Damian thought drinking blood from a human was beneath him. Until he saw Cass doing it and wanted to follow her footsteps, but he cant climb bruce as well as her, so he just sank his teeth into Bruce’s calf. Big Damian will wait until Bruce sits or lays down and props his feet up and will then enjoy his calf blood. 

Bruce Wayne who is covered, littered in bite scars of varying sizes, who was once knocked over by his three eldest sons because they had been on a mission away from him for a week and were hungry and before they even said hello just sank their teeth into his neck, hand and thigh. Bruce Wayne who’s majority of scars come from his children, not villains and who willingly offers up his neck to any one of his children if they seem hungry. 

Bruce Wayne who, as Batman, will peel his protective bat suit arm off because Dick was hungry on a stake out. 

Bruce Wayne who is not a vampire but his children all are and he’ll be damned if he deprives them their nutrients. 

(selina kyle who is also a vampire and also gets her blood from bruce but from his-)

[hinamie]

wanted to practice some more intense angry expressions and what better excuse to further my agenda of giving megumi the emotional catharsis he deserves

[lyculuscaelus]

I will never get over the fact that Athena’s first line in We’ll Be Fine is “I had a friend before, and he was a lot like you” instead of “you are a lot like him”. It’s almost like Athena is treating Odysseus as the “loving father of Telemachus” instead of Telemachus as merely “the son of Odysseus”. I AM NOT OKAY