#which is an additional form of racism lmao)

[yuri-for-businesswomen]

why is it so controversial among feminists to aknowledge that men who come from countries where women have no rights do not like it that we actually do have rights in the west? I'm a social worker in a part of town with a huge arab, turk and romanian-roma population, as immigrants they're more likely to require social services so I mostly have to deal with them. It's grimm what the men have to say about their wifes, daughters and sisters. despite living in a liberal western country the women are not allowed to go outside alone, the girls aren't allowed to join clubs where boys are present (tbh I'm ok with this bc the boys are incredibly sexist and all they do is sexually harass girls when one tries to befriend them, so sex seggregetation IS safer for the girls) they're forced to wear hijab and abaya (if muslim), men proudly proclaim they would divorce their wife and disown their daughter if they stopped wearing hijab. Like, this isn't racism it's reality if you don't preach from your isolated ivory tower but actually work with these people. They come here to reap the spoils of the social care system but want to opress the very people who provide it, since most social workers are women. the entitlement of these men knows no limits, we're all just whores supposed to service them and kiss their feet as feminists we need to stop being tolerant of ideologies and "cultures" that actually want to destroy our autonomy and see us as cattle, it doesn't matter if it's gender ideologues or immigrant men, they aren't poor little victims, they hate western women for stepping out of line and rising above their designated role as servants for men and they hate their daughters whenever they turn out too "western" raised here just as much

right. and white (western) men love women having rights thats why there is no pushback whatsoever. do you know how many white men love andrew tate? ��ivory tower“ girl i used to volunteer at a refugee home and homeless shelter. nobody said these men are not misogynistic i dont know what you think you are proving here by listing all the forms their misogyny takes? i know! and this whole „they only come here to smooch of the social security“ is rightwing rhetoric. all i said is that race is no indicator of misogyny. all men are misogynistic and are as blatant about it as they can be without repercussions. also yall seem to heavily confuse race, nationality, culture, and ethnicity. please point me to where i called them poor little victims? racists are so annoying lmao

[genderkoolaid]

https://thenewinquiry.com/on-hating-men-and-becoming-one-anyway/

found this beautiful article written in 2019 which sums up so so much about transmisandry and the dilemma of trans men, where they’re grouped with the perpetrator class even though they’re equally vulnerable

OHHH kissing you this article is so fucking good. 100% gonna post some quotes from it. I love how this is written & its a really good explanation of how "trans-inclusive" radical feminism & radical feminist ideas fuck over transmascs in a unique & painful way. Like!!:

But trans men’s manhood is inseparable from our transness, and the relationship between trans men and cis womanhood can’t be accurately understood by separating trans status from gender in order to claim we’re oppressed by one but not the other. The day-to-day operations of gendered power in our lives make no such distinction, and while theories of intersectionality are often invoked to defend such claims, the idea that these “axes” can be neatly separated relies on the exact additive conception of oppressive power relations that intersectionality was invented to disprove. In the critique where she coined the term, Kimberlé Crenshaw argues that Black women are frequently excluded from antidiscrimination case law, feminist theory, and anti-racist politics precisely because their experiences cannot be reduced to the sum of racism and sexism. She references the case of DeGraffenreid v. General Motors, in which five Black women plaintiffs were denied consideration of their Title VII claims because the discrimination they experienced was particular to Black women rather than all Black people or women of all races. Because each form of discrimination was treated as a “discrete set of experiences” in this case rather than part of a multidimensional whole, “the boundaries of sex and race discrimination doctrine [were] defined respectively by white women’s and Black men’s experiences.” In reality, however, Black women relate to power differently from either group, and their experiences cannot be understood by combining the experiences of oppression each have. Similarly, trans men’s relationship to gender cannot be understood by adding the privilege of maleness to the oppression of transness; the interaction between these axes substantively transforms both such that it generates an experience qualitatively different from either alone.

He even discusses black trans men&mascs experience with gendered racism & how exorsexism play a part in this. Read this article.

(Although it is fun how he talks about Tumblr in the past tense, like its a ghosttown. My friend we are still doing "do trans men experience misogyny" discourse here lmao)

[macabremads]

rp rules/wants

꒰ ͜͡➸ Hello there! I appreciate your time in checking out my updated rules and preferences for starting an RP with me. Below, you'll find all the essential information you need before sending a DM.

Press HERE to go to the request/character list form!

𓆩*𓆪 wants 𓆩*𓆪 - literate replies (doesn't need to be ungodly long, but I feel as though most substance falls in a medium reply length. ie. one phone sized discord reply) -I am not too keen on writing ships depending on the character chosen. Mainly because I prefer oc x character, but am willing to discuss different plots if you have something in mind! -I prefer to not do one reply a week, I am quite active on my page and am looking for someone that likes to do multiples throughout the week. -I will only do doubles! this is because I feel like there is always a part of the group that feels like they're not having a good experience because their ideas don't always align with the other party. -I totally understand if life gets in the way and you're unable to reply! However, if we have established a normal routine or made plans to write and you're not free, please do just let me know (: communication is key! -smut is not always essential, but I am not too keen on doing ftb plots unless they're really interesting, mainly because I feel like the physicality aspect of relationships builds things in a more nuanced way, and because I just like to write smut lmao -I am in BST time, which usually means that I am the one further ahead with timezones, because of this, I tend to be the one staying up late for the other (im looking at u, usa peeps hehe), so it is really important to have good communication if you're not free so that I am not staying up late for ya if we made plans (: -communication, communication, communication. if you feel as though something in your rp isn't going the way you want, communicate! if you feel like you want something changed? communicate! I love coming up with new ideas and exploring new stuff, I will never be offended and am keen on switching to new plots if you feel like you're bored of the current one! -I love using visuals and usually include a visual section in my discord servers! so, if you like it too, do let me know!

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𓆩*𓆪 rules 𓆩*𓆪 -18+ only! (please do not message or interact if you have an age-less blog) - 3rd person replies, I don't write in 1st! - I do not tolerate any racism, homophobia, etc. - most of the things that I am not okay with writing are quite obvious and standard for most people, however; we can chat more about this in dm's! - in saying this ^^ I will add that my only hard-limit is writing substance abuse issues. by this, I don't like writing someone using hard drugs (m*th, c*caine), stuff of that nature. (I don't mind alcohol, smoking, w*ed). I don't mind it being in the prompt, or mentioned, I just don't wish to act out the action of doing it. This includes writing OD's, I don't mind if it's included, I just won't write it in detail. -I only rp on discord and use 'tupper' to keep everything put together! if you haven't used it, no problem at all! it's really simple (:

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thank you so much for taking time to read! if you have any additional questions, please feel free to send them to me!

xx sao

[ganondoodle]

(your addition is very welcome, you often know much more about general fandom stuff than i do and are pretty good with words!)

i personally wasnt in fandom when botw was new (obsession with it started way later xD) and didnt play it on release either bc i didnt have any money so i dont know what early reactions to zelda was- but i have heard of people being very weird about zelda being what, a little mean to link? like, once? for good reason too? tbh its kind of sad how this zelda is one of ones with most character development (in botw that is, totk zelda barely has a character lmao) when she just doesnt like link (for good reason) from the very start- like it'd be so interesting to have a zelda and link that dont get ever get along tbh

anyway, the fact that a female character cant even be a little mean once without getting hated or labeled as abusive is in itself pretty sexist, like god forbid women are .. people

im still confused as to how anything i or the other person in the og reblog chain said translated to thinking of her as a 'whore' though xD (also since when is my thought bubble the 'general fandom', isnt it exactly the other way around O.o)

i havent played a link between worlds but knew the basics of it- yeah, its really 'interesting' how for hilda its good but when you think of ganondorf like this its annoying and bad, i wonder what the difference is there :)) (no no, dont you see, its da cuuuuuuurse)

it really annoys me how when you ask for even the bare minimum of at least awareness or care in like, big media stuff its now labeled as unreasonable modern 'progressive' demands, its really just their way of dismissing anything they dont want to think about (which is often some form of racism) like our end goal is to have perfectly puritanical(?) paste of nothingness (i certainly didnt have the same view as you, being white and having been a rather sheltered child, but i too thought that he probably wasnt as bad as we were told and wondered why we were just believing everything we were told by the boat (windwaker beign my first zelda game ... set myself up for disappointment from the start huh xD), ganondorf was my favorite character in the entire game and in the end im pretty sure i cried running away from him bc i didnt want to hurt him- which probably stemmed more from the fact i am not neurotypical and hated my questions of "why" being ignored/not explained and villains like him being often 'othered', just like i felt 'other' from everyone else- which is yet another problem point in how villains are often depicted while also 'working as intentend'- but you see, i was an annoying sjw child who cant take a simple fairytale as it is!!!!)

i didnt mention the whole harem thing bc i didnt plan on going on about this stupid comment as much, but yeah, thats another thing (i dont think that person was aware that makes it worse)- as someone who wasnt aware of all the subtle and not so subtle ways of how demonized middle eastern people are and have been for a long time its pretty scary to realize just how normalized it is, even in the little ways (there is no shame in growing and admitting you were living in ignorance for a good portion of your life btw)

i really love when people get worked up about 'wanting hyrule to be SECTRETLY evil' bc ...... they are? not secretely so? the text just justifies it with 'these people are good, so anythign they do is either fine or not important' like its honeslty fascinating how dissmissed it all is, like the shiekah persecution thing is just outright said to you but it doesnt matter? its mentioned just like and offhand comment of no importance, and the yiga are just irredeemable villains or treated as a joke? huh?? like you dont even have to read into it, they just tell and it doesnt matter- do they need zelda to turn to the camera and say "this action my family did was bad" for it to be considered 'bad' ?? do they think we just want the roles reversed? with gan being the unquestioned by the text good guy and hyrule that goes 'harr harr im evil obsessed tm'?? which would be kinda boring again if it wasnt the other way around so many tiems that even that would be refreshing :U

in the end i just wonder why people get so offended when you criticize it, you can still like it? demanding better is a benefit to everyone really? and better doesnt mean more 'pure' or 'non problematic', just like, better written or nuanced characters?? interesting stories?? theres so much interesting stuff you could do (in part bc it IS the way it is) with tloz that it hurts to see it not being capitalized on and people defending it anyway just as much

(anyway, you could talk about everything for so long but i want to do other things as well xD good addition, thank you!)

got this reblog on one of my posts were i talked about being anxious about the future of the zelda series after totk and-

i even went back and unblocked them just to check my own post and check twice what they meant exactly- but i still dont know how they got to these conclusions

i never said i 'want a good uwu ganondorf' (bc that would mean hes aligned with hyrule bc thats how goodness works!!!!11!1!!!), i also dont think of any of the zeldas as 'whores' (seriously, where did that come from?? neither me nor the addition of someone agreeing with me said anything like that??? did they think bc the addition called tloz misogynistic means we think zelda is a whore????? huh???)

its also funny how they say they want zelda to stay a simple fairytale rather than have 'people like me' bc .. one point i talked about in the og post was how the evil arab thing VS good white people media likes to do so much is so normalized here that its simply seen as a simple harmless fairytale trope instead of a big underlying issue in general media and the writers might not even realize it (which is worse) bc the most 'generic' appeal is to people who dont think of it as a problem in the first place, because it is so normalized

(huh, i wonder about what kind of person that part was about .. hmmmm)

(ALSO funny they mention princess hilda as nuanced villain ... like ... wow they are so nuanced about purple haired people!!- like guess why we want a nuanced/less badly/less flat written ganondorf and what he, in particular, has not in common with other villains! its not his hair color! .... or was that point supposed to mean .. look we have one female character that is a villain, its not misogynistic! idk honestly)

(and the classic, "you just call it this/dont like it bc its not what you wanted !!!!!!!2!"1!112!!")

also funny how its 'never gonna be progressive enough' like asking for the franchise to maybe put a little more thought and nuance into their white divine right vs evil desert man simulator instead of making it worse is already asking too much

(i dont know what the last point has to do with anything??)

(also yes totk is racist, like most if not all of the franchise and a alot of other media as well, shocker- you can still like it though, i and plenty of other people are still fans of it, we just wish they did a little more with their stuff and maybe not make the racism problem WORSE)

(also yes the hyrule monarchy is also evil :))) )

(and also not so secretly so either :)) )

[autisticcassandracain]

I have many thoughts on the weird phenomena in the DC fandom and the Batfam fandom specifically where probably the majority of people just straight up. haven’t interacted with the source material. and almost all of those thoughts can be summarized as ‘lmao that’s weird and mildly concerning’.

and because I’m annoying I will list them all here right now <3

1. To preface this post, I mean, obviously, comics are inaccessible as all hell, both in the disability kind of way and the ‘you need to understand the concept of hypertime to fully comprehend the DC timeline’ kind of way. Because of this, even if you don’t have a disability that prevents you from reading comics, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to look at the amount of comics you need to read to have even a base understanding of a character and go ‘no thanks <3′ and just enjoy fanart and fanfic in a vacuum. Ultimately, this is fandom, this is supposed to be fun, it doesn’t really matter.

2. That said, it’s VERY weird to me that the majority of this fandom just straight up hasn’t interacted with the source material, and moreover, that it’s considered rude to tell people that they should do so. It’s especially weird considering the amount of fanon-only fans I’ve seen who straight up have a superiority complex over canon. The idea that it’s gatekeeping to tell fans of something to actually interact with canon is just. so weird, and a fundamental misunderstanding of what ‘gatekeeping’ actually entails. 

3. But honestly I’m less interested in discussing the ways in which canon and fanon fans should interact with each other (personally, I think it would be helpful to create separate tags of some kind, but that’d require quite a big overhaul of the current fandom state) than in figuring out how this actually happened in the first place. On the one hand, it’s obvious; long-running superhero comics the way DC writes them have made themselves so thoroughly inaccessible that most people are simply too daunted to even try. Most media has a cohesive beginning and end (or at least, a planned end somewhere). Comics just... don’t.

But I do think it says something that, even among people who are clearly interested in the characters (since they have, you know, entire blogs about them), the effort to get into comics just seems to be too much to even bother. This really doesn’t bode well for the future of DC Comics. Obviously, I am no expert on anything at all ever, but I’d personally be surprised if DC survives beyond the few decades, at least in its current form/without a big overhaul.

4. But on the other hand, I don’t think the confusing state of DC Comics is the only thing to blame here. Fandom has a well-known problem with reducing any character down to archetypes to more easily ship and write fic/make content with. This problem is particularly prominent in fanfic, which, if you read enough of it, you’ll eventually start seeing not just the same tropes and trends, but essentially the same fics over and over again. And not just within the same fandom; everywhere, or every large fandom, at least. 

Fanon Batfam is entirely built on a bunch of those tropes; insecure/depressed sadboy Tim, team mom with optional hidden trauma/emotional problems Dick, bad boy with a heart of gold + sadboy combo Jason, abused sadboy Damian/angry easily-villified-for-fic-reasons monster Damian, good dad Bruce for found family fic and bad dad Bruce for angst fic, etc. This all culminates in a found family dynamic that’s generic and malleable to whatever fic the writer wants to write.

(This isn’t getting into the ship fic, which I avoid like the plague because the vast majority of it is incest, but I’d bet real actual money that the tropes in those fics fall under what is often preferred by the Migratory Slash Fandom.)

By having a decent excuse not to get into canon (the inaccessibility of comics) and a, by now, well-established fanon fandom, many fans feel free to use the batfam fandom as essentially an excuse to write whatever fic with reduced archetypes and tropes they personally feel the itch to write, without having to bother with even consuming a canon. This is compounded by the fact that canon itself is often contradictory and frankly bad, meaning that whatever interpretation of a character you want/need to go for your fic is at least theoretically backed up by canon (for example, you can just as easily cast Bruce as an abusive shithole dad who his kids need to get away from as a loving father figure who cares deeply for his children), which you can always use as a defense if people question your characterization.

5. This focus on fandom trends and tropes over actual creativity or care for the characters is also visible in the way bigotry manifests in this fandom; namely, in literally the exact way you’d expect. The female characters and characters of colour are shuffled to the side, non-existent, vilified, and/or reduced to harmful stereotypes. 

Barbara is probably the one I saw the most often in fanfic, but usually just as ‘Dick’s girlfriend’, and even then, she was often vilified for Dick angst (especially in fics about examining Dick’s trauma from his canon sexual assault; Kori also often gets the short end of the stick in those). After that, probably Stephanie, who fanon fans don’t really seem to know what to do with, so she’s basically just there as comic relief waffle girl, most of the time, though sometimes she can be used to either further Tim angst or further vilify Tim, whatever the fic calls for. Cass has gotten included more in batfam fics as of late, likely in response to critiques of fandom racism for leaving her out, but again, it’s clear people don’t actually know what to do with her. She’s often reduced to a racist stereotype of a quite, stoic therapist for whatever guy du jour needs it. That, or she’s in Hong Kong and just not there. Duke especially gets left in the dust in fandom, usually just being non-existent, but when he’s there, he’s almost always nothing more than the straight man for the actual fun characters to play off of. Talia probably has it the worst, though, and almost universally gets vilified by fanon stans in order to write sadboy Damian.

All of this is extremely predictable behaviour and falls entirely in line with general fandom misogyny and racism; ignoring or vilifying women and characters of colour, or using them as very minor characters at best. The only two characters of colour who aren’t regularly left out of fic are Dick and Damian, who are both also conveniently the two characters most often drawn and written in a whitewashed manner. In addition, there’s a real trend of demonizing Damian in fanon fics where he isn’t written as an abused sadboy, which I’d argue is in no small part due to fandom racism, considering Damian’s behaviour is in no way as bad as Jason’s, who doesn’t get anywhere close to the same demonization and gets woobiefied instead. I also find it convenient that Damian is probably the batboy who receives the most vilification in fic, when he’s the most obviously non-white of the batboys they’re willing to acknowledge.

Fandom often cries for more diversity in canon, only to ignore the diversity already there and focus on the same generic white guys. The batfam fandom is a brilliant example of this.

Which is not to say that fandom racism and misogyny isn’t present in the canon parts of the fandom (and canon itself); it absolutely 100% is. But I’ve found that canon fans are also more likely to like and care about at least one of the characters I’ve listed as ignored/vilified, and are willing to create and consume content for them, whereas fanon fans... aren’t, really. I’ve never seen a fan of fanon Cass the way I’ve seen fans of fanon Dick, for example. Obviously, this could just be by coincidence, or I’ve just surrounded myself with people like that, but it’s been a trend I noticed. Racism and misogyny is present in every part of this fandom and should be addressed as such, but I feel like it manifests the most blatantly in the fanon parts of this fandom. 

(I’d also recommend the articles Migratory Slash Fandom’s Focus and Beige Blank Slates, which expand more on the type of fandom racism I think is especially prominent in the batfam fandom, as well as literally every article in the What Fandom Racism Looks Like series.)

6. All this leads me to conclude that the majority of fanon fans don’t actually like the characters all that much; they’re convenient excuses for them to participate in fandom. Which I also think is, in no small part, a reason why so many of them react so negatively to being told to pick up a comic; they came to this fandom specifically to consume it as a fandom, because they wanted the fandom experience without having to consume a canon. 

This is not a phenomena unique to the batfam fandom (again, see the Migratory Slash Fandom), but it does fascinate me. While fandom is often said to be an experience focusing on transformative art, I think it’s also safe to say that, especially as fandom has become more mainstream, an increasing amount of people are looking to it less as a way to engage with their favourite pieces of media, and more as a type of media in and of itself. I think the reasons for this are similar to the reasons mass media entertainment like the MCU are so popular; you gain a lot of enjoyment out of it with very little risk involved. 

By consuming the same fics of the same characters (or the same archetypes) over and over again, you are rarely at risk of being challenged or even disappointed. It’s often very clear right from the start whether or not a fic will appeal to you, and if it isn’t, it’s easy to just look for another one. It requires less emotional investment than most other types of media, even ‘popcorn media’ like the MCU - or, yes, DC Comics. It’s safe, it’s enjoyable, it’s comforting, like McDonalds, but just like McDonalds, it’s ultimately bland and unsubstantial. 

7, TL;DR. Ultimately, I don’t think it’s like, wrong to enjoy the fanon version of the batfam without wanting to engage with canon, and I certainly don’t think it’s okay to harrass people over it. But I do think it’s in large part based on a desire to interact with fandom rather than other pieces of media because people are scared of being let down by those pieces of media (or worse, just uninterested in actually thinking), which is mildly concerning. 

[ouyangzizhensdad]

Hey, feel free to ignore this, but I'd love to hear your grievances against Bridgerton? I saw some of the fashion posts you rbed, but I'm especially intrigued by the "fails on all aspects" parts? Thanks!

Hi there,

There is honestly so much that could be said and analysed in finer points but the short version of it is just that it is a bad story wrapped in the glitz of high production value but surprisingly little good technical execution despite all the money shoveled at it. Bridgerton is the type of show where the petty, mean side of me would delight in a detailed and cutthroat list of all of its flaws but for which I do not care enough to be actually invested in hating it. It’s just a thing to be puzzled and petty about: people think Bridgerton is good. Wild.

Now let me first say that I have no inherent problems with anachronistic creative choices, or the idea of a contemporary take on period dramas. After all, all period dramas are inevitably told through a contemporary lens, to different degrees. It’s also not like they were the first big production to do it either: has everyone just forgot about The Great Gatsby? or tumblr’s favourite Hamilton? I honestly think this kind of mixing already has so many cool outcomes when it comes to music (like this, this or this and this), I do believe we could get something really interesting out of creative anachronism in mainstream visual media. I’m also more forgiving with newer forms of experimentation, because sometimes new ideas need to be worked out before they reach their full potential. But the way Bridgerton does it.... so clearly lacks a clear creative vision and dedication to the concept imo that it makes it harder to excuse the ways it fails since the failures seem to originate from that lack of vision and dedication to storytelling. For instance, there is seemingly no logic as to when the diegetic music will be an instrumental cover of a contemporary song or not--which does not even broach the topic of how bad those ‘classical music’ arrangements for modern songs were? Honestly embarrassing how lazy those arrangements were: hire a good composer (or any at all), you cowards. And then the costumes... once again, a lack of internal logic seems to permeate the choices presented in addition to a lack of care in its execution: so many of the dresses are ill-fitted, the characterisation through the outfits were all over the place (like the mom who wore a silhouette that no one else wore and had no basis in any fashion of the era) and so many of the fabrics/jewellery looked the opposite of expensive (kind of looked like a lot of it was polyester and plastic tbh), which is sort of a problem when you are trying to sell the fantasy of "The lives of the rich and famous but make it regency” imo although I suppose a portion of the audience just doesn’t notice lmao. Honestly I find that a lot of ‘costume historians’ who made video essays on Bridgerton were too nice with the show, perhaps in order not to come off as seeming to hate the costumes on the basis of them not being historically accurate, and as a result were way too forgiving imo. And this lack of real creative vision is also something we see in the cinematography and direction which.... seems often confused about the way it wants to make things feel fantastical and ends up dropping the ball on the execution of these meant-to-be extravagant or over-the-top shots.

But, again, the cinematography is just... middling at best, made only worse by the editing which is just plain bad. I guess you’ll have to just take me on my word on this because I am not willing to do an autopsy of all I find off about it, but lord jesus mary and joseph it was painful to watch at certain moments.

Bridgerton is not the first show to do colourblind casting, although I’d say it deserves recognition for fucking it up for no reason at all. Like, sure there are criticisms to be had about how it remains still a very white story that falls into certain tropes wrt darker skin characters or the glaring lack of south asian representation considering what the contemporary UK looks like, etc. but what I’m gesturing at is the totally unnecessary but mind-boggling “royal love solved racism” twist we get in the, what, fourth episode? (Broey Deschannel covered the topic quite well imo) The audience would have accepted that there were no in-world explanation for the colourblind version of the already-made fantastical regency that had them dancing to Ariana Grande songs. The colourblindness, racism-free society would have just been another aspirational aspect. They literally did not need to do this.

Honestly I don’t feel like I need to get into why the story itself is not very good or well-executed since it feels very obvious. I won’t begrudge on principle the show for using well-worn tropes and common-to-the-point-of-farce character archetypes, but I have to object to the way it uses them and in the service of what story. And not to make myself in a plot-hole-ding kind of person-who-has-thoughts-about-media, but this is not a story that holds up well to scrutiny or logic, let’s say. And any type of social or political commentary it tried to include was dumb to the point of farce: the Feminist Character Who Wants to Read not Go Dance was just.... a masterclass in bad, embarrassing writing. I am surprised at how unlikeable and boring the vast majority of the characters were, but perhaps less surprised at how a series that planned on having multiple seasons already sold the twist of Lady Whistleblow’s identity at the end of the first season, for what seemed to be no narrative reason at all. That being said, I have to give credit where it’s due and acknowledge that there is a skill in being able to produce stories that get extremely popular and well-loved.

(Do I need to mention the performances? So many underwhelming or embarrassing performances. It’s hard to tell sometimes whether it’s the actors themselves or the directing that’s the issue, or a mixture of both, but.... oof).

I guess in the end Bridgerton’s biggest transgression is it sits for me in the uncomfortable middle where it is neither trashy or campy fun nor is it an interesting work of fiction. Differently put, it is simply neither good nor fun.

[bigskydreaming]

That post about "I'll keep reading a fic that mischaracterizes Dick even if it angers me because the plot is interesting" but with Scott McCall. I'll come across genuinely interesting concepts and plots and power through for that even when Scott is portrayed negatively in the story, he's there at least and it's either that or wading through 99% of fic which centers Stiles/Sterek and the most common Scott tag being "Scott's a bad friend" ya know?

Honestly, what is it about Scott McCall and Dick Grayson that gets them (mis)treated so similarly by their respective fandoms?

Oh yeah, definitely. Tbh, part of why I’m so loud and obnoxious in Batfandom is because in TW fandom it eventually got to the point where I just had to stop reading fic completely, because I wasn’t finding anything that was Scott-friendly outside of the handful of writers I was already friends with and I just got fed up. And I’m too stubborn to do the same thing twice in two separate fandoms so I just....refuse to give up on DG fic by way of a rousing morning “Not today Satan” pep talk. fhslakhfkal

But honestly, the parallels, there are more than a few:

1) Obviously I do think the racism element has plenty to do with it. Especially in the way “is Scott really even Latino on the show though, I mean did they ever actually SAY it” arguments could be swapped out almost word for word with the “is Dick really even Romani in the comics though, I mean it was just a retcon” arguments. With the primary aim of arguments against this being a factor focusing on just invalidating the idea that either are characters of color in the first place, rather than examining the way people engage with these characters for signs of racism. Instead of trying to refute that there’s anything wrong with certain ways people interact with these characters, people jump right into “well there can’t be racism if the character in question isn’t even REALLY a character of color, y’know not like, a board-certified one with proper accreditation and everything.”

But its definitely interesting when you look at how Dick Grayson’s been perceived by fandom overall, like, in terms of looking back over the years. As someone who’s been in and out of DC fandoms to various degrees since the late 90s, as in before Dick was retconned as being Romani in the first place, and as I’ve said before, he used to be a LOT more popular and forgiven for stuff in the past in fandom.....like, I maintain that if you look back at the early 2000s-2010, aka when that retcon was not just written, but gradually and more fully spread into the fandom’s overall awareness and perception of the character....you can almost like, SEE the empathy gap suddenly click into place once he was more fully solidified as a character of color in a lot of fans’ minds. Even if they won’t admit it because that would require admitting to the racism that then began to seep into how they interacted with this character now, compared to how they’d interacted with this character in the past.

And I think the empathy gap - and the complete refusal to admit that’s even a thing, because its not like these are REALLY characters of color so why would it even apply - like, I think that goes a long way to explaining the way both Scott and Dick consistently have their traumas invalidated and ignored by large parts of their fandoms, with the focus always being shifted to how bad things that happen to them are really MORE bad for how they affect the people around them, etc.

2) It also I think has a lot to do with their personalities and the archetypes they both embody as empathetic caregiver types. I think I described it pretty well here in my BUABS fic:

“What do you know about Impostor Syndrome?"

"It's a term sometimes used to describe over-achievers who have trouble internalizing their accomplishments. Perfectionists who think they're frauds because they don't know how to take credit for their own achievements and say its because of luck or timing or something other people did," Dick frowned, puzzling through both the question and the aim of it. He raised an eyebrow. "Doesn't sound like something that applies to someone as arrogant as me."

"Don't be a little shit, Dick," Dinah said with small smirk. "And you're right, I don't think any of that applies to you. However, it's also used in another capacity, to describe trauma survivors who are unable to internalize their own trauma. Who deflect from it, or mitigate it, treat it as less than it is on the basis that it wasn't as bad as what's happened to someone else. It's especially common in trauma survivors who are noted for being especially empathetic or who have caregiver personality types. People who are so used to self-identifying as someone whose role or purpose is in helping others, that they find themselves unable to identify as traumatized because it might shift the focus to themselves instead of people they feel need it more. Does that behavior sound a little more familiar?"

(For the record, that fic is set in the YJ universe, not the comics, and I go with the approach that Dick and Bruce have a much better relationship there than they do in the comics, and thus overall Dick’s mental health and self-esteem are better than in the comics, generally speaking. I only mention this as a tangent, but like....I think Impostor Syndrome as an issue for perfectionists and over-achievers with low self-esteem DOES pertain to comic book Dick Grayson as well as its trauma interpretation. But anyway).

But point is, I think that describes both Dick and Scott, and their respective approaches to dealing (or not dealing) with their personal traumas. This isn’t a problem in and of itself, as its a valid survivor reaction and issue plenty of people deal with....the problem lies in the willingness of fans to capitalize on the OPPORTUNITIES this presents, as fans of other characters, to keep the focus trained on the characters around these two, and THEIR issues, even at the expense of these two.

Basically, its not in either of their natures to ASK for help and forcefully DRAG focus and awareness to themselves and their issues, for a number of reasons including the fact that I don’t think either character feels they ‘deserve’ that focus or need that help more than other people need theirs. 

And because these characters are the empathetic caregiver archetypes in their respective ensembles, ie the ones who usually take the lead in reaching out to even characters who don’t normally ask for help themselves....there’s often no one else immediately popping up in reader awareness as like, a likely candidate to extend that same awareness and offer of aid to Dick and Scott even without them actually asking for it.

(Which, is a large part of my commitment to the theme “Stop assembling your ensembles with just ONE of each archetype, mix and match more, or like....use more hybrid archetypes so you don’t HAVE this problem, and also, stop limiting characters to JUST their archetypes, three-dimensional people aren’t confined to only acting upon a limited menu of actions and impulses, and neither should three-dimensional characters be.”)

And then of course there’s the additional component, linked to point #1, that a lot of people refuse to write other characters seeing their need for help or support or offering it even when they do see it, simply because like....they don’t WANT these characters to HAVE help or support.

3) The Intelligence Factor - as in, do they really have it? Both Scott McCall and Dick Grayson are repeatedly and consistently established in their respective canons as being extremely intelligent, and no, not JUST in emotional intelligence. I don’t like sounding like I’m undervaluing that particular form of intelligence, I’m just really irritated by the way people go about saying “oh I do admit they have very high emotional intelligence” like they’re throwing them some kind of a bone. LMAO. No. They both have high emotional intelligence, true, but they’re also extremely intelligent across the board in all other ways. Both are excellent strategists, quick-thinking and repeatedly out-maneuvering even other noted strategists, both display a quick grasp of new information and an ability to see how and where and when to PUT that information to use in practical applications, etc. These are not dumb characters, at ALL.

But fandoms have this weird committment to the idea that only the Smartest Person In The Room REALLY matters, and like, there can only be one of those per room, or like, at most two, so that they can be a matched pair and make kissing noises and then very smart babies, or like, they can be the doting (smart) father and his adored (smartest) son, all others can go home now.

Like, no, that’s not how that works. A room full of geniuses does not suddenly become a room full of ONE genius and a bunch of random and irrelevant cuz they’re dumb non-geniuses the second someone deemed King of the Smarties enters the room. That’s not a thing. Stop acting like that’s a thing, fandoms. Nobody’s intelligence is actually threatened by the presence of more than one character with notable intelligence. Also fuck off with the adoration of notable intelligence like people have more value the more decimal points of pi they can recite off the top of their head. That’s not a more evolved human being, that’s just a nerd. Nerds have value but no more than people who like, chose other life pursuits aside from nerddom.

(Not actually intended as a slight against nerds, just for the record. I say that as both a self-described nerd and also a self-loathing nerd and also lol I’m not a nerd. Look, I’m a very nuanced person okay. I put the complex in complex organism).

But the point here is not just that people are weird about there only being one true genius allowed per ensemble, its that people are WEIRD about how in order to ACTUALLY be smart, you need to like.....accurately match the factory specs for “this is how a smart person looks and behaves.”

And Scott and Dick do not look and behave that way. The sheer number of times - and similar ways - people try to completely discredit the idea they have more than one brain cell by pointing to times they’re being INTENTIONALLY goofy and being like “oh yeah, would a smart person do THAT, hmmmm”.....

Its like...yes? LOL. There is no law that says that a smart person can not be a goofball, or that they are no longer smart if they fulfill a certain quota of actions deemed ‘dopey’ by the official arbiters of smartness.

Similarly the way people like to point at stuff like “my mom buys the groceries” when the writers BEHIND the characters were intentionally trying to play up a comedic moment rather than make a sealed declaration of IQ, and be like, “see, would a smart person be THAT dumb, hmmm?”

First of all, yes, even going off the same canon people try and cite as proof Scott and Dick are too dumb to actually be smart.....you can literally find similarly ‘dumb’ moments for every other TW character....the Sheriff expressed incredulity that Stiles didn’t know what a pendant was, and Lydia was like wtf how are you this dumb at Stiles when he asked if she read the movie the Little Mermaid because he didn’t know there was also a book.....Allison made the same mistake about bestiary as Scott did because the writers were so impressed by that joke they literally had to do it twice....and do not get me STARTED on the number of moments I can point to in comics AND movies AND cartoons where everyone from Bruce to Tim to Jason to Damian and more, like, make utter bonehead moves or utter completely bonehead sentences.

Despite what rumors of my being an ancient eldritch being might have some believe, I did not actually know Albert Einstein personally, but I can still with complete confidence say I GUARANTEE that at more than one point in his life, even he did things that might have been pointed at by time-travelers on vacay as evidence that geez, old-timey smart people were really dumb, huh.

And I think we would all agree that Albert Einstein was actually a very smart man.

But yeah, point is, both Scott and Dick are very smart characters who for a lot of reasons - including personal choice, as in, they don’t really see the appeal in conforming to standards of what a smart person is SUPPOSED to be like (especially when those standards have a weird amount in common with tendencies often described as elitist or condescending or like, having or pertaining to the qualities of an asshole) - like, they just don’t typically behave or conduct themselves in ways that match up with a lot of the assumptions people have for what ‘makes’ a genius or what that’s supposed to look or sound like.

And because they don’t SEEM like they’re that smart, a lot of effort then gets put into insisting that they’re definitely not, and they can’t be, because see look how dumb here and here and here.....which then leeches over into other aspects of the characters and their stories and dynamics, and then combines with the issues resulting from Point 1 and Point 2 and probably two more I’m not thinking of at the moment but are definitely there so that by their powers combined.....fandom summons Captain Dumbass to take over most interactions with these particular characters. And thus repeatedly and insistently engages with these two and their stories only in very dumb, very limited, and VERY annoying ways.

[communistkenobi-archive]

Listen listen maybe I'm just dumb but I want to get an understanding of your take on the writing of TCW, specifically the mando arcs cus I'm genuinely curious.

Gonna put this under a cut because it’s kinda long, lmao.

For starters I think the most glaring issue with the Mandalorian arcs in tCW (especially apparent in S2) are their racism, right. Like the fact that they “ex-communicated” Jango Fett, the most prominent non-white Mandalorian in the canon prior to tCW, and all the New Mandalorians (who are ostensibly way more peaceful and “civilised”) are cookie-cutter blond-hair blue-eyed white people is unambiguously racist. They’re also all humans, which is really weird? Because to my understanding, before tCW Mandalorians recruited basically any species that could wear some form of beskar and were not super concerned with bloodlines - their politics were clan-based, and their definition of family leaned more on voluntary association rather than biological heredity.

Now, I don’t actually think this is supposed to be a part of Satine’s textual politics in the show - I think it’s part of a broader trend within SW content itself (and western media in general) to go with white-as-default. And more troublingly, reproducing an aesthetic of high society that is peaceful and intellectual as entirely white.

To use one other example out of many in the show, in the episode Assassin (3x07), Padmé is attending a conference on the refugee crisis that has been caused by the war, and aside from Bail, the entire audience is white (many of them in that same extreme blond-hair blue-eyed category). And like, optically, a bunch of white people convening to talk about the issue of “what to do with all these refugees” is fucking heinous, but it’s incidental to the actual politics being discussed in the episode itself - ie, the show isn’t framing it AS this big racism convention, but is rather reproducing the (racist) aesthetics of the “dignified politician”, and does this entirely uncritically by making all the diplomats in the audience white.

So in the same way that this doesn’t prove that Padmé is some hard-right protectionist weirdo, OR some insidious white-savior liberal type, I don’t think the political crisis on Mandalore means Satine is actually advocating for the removal of all non-white Mandalorians from society (which the show seems to side-step a little anyway by making all the Mandos in Death Watch also white - I think basically all the Mandos that appear in tCW are white, lmao). The show is just using these racist design choices that incidentally make the actual political conflicts buttressed by these designs way more sinister than they are intended to be.

Now like, if someone’s response to all of this is to throw the baby out with the bath water because the bath water is so fucking gross to begin with, I’m not going to argue about that because it’s an entirely fair thing to do. I still like Satine’s character in spite of this, because I think the heart of the conflict the showrunners very clumsily and poorly tried to explore (ie how to peacefully govern a society that is literally destroying its own planet through constant warfare without also destroying their way of life in the process) is still a valid and interesting thing conceptually. I think The Mandalorian show is (probably, hopefully) going to give that conflict a lot more nuance, especially because Din was saved and likely raised by Death Watch itself. Even Rebels handled this with more care by introducing black and east asian Mandalorians into the show and exploring the tensions between family and duty, the use of violence to achieve your political goals, etc.

SO, in addition to all of that, my other big issue is with the arc in S5 and its pacing problems. I think Maul’s takeover of Mandalore should’ve spanned at least half the season, if not the entirety of S5 (probably not reasonable for an anthology show, but it’s too complex for a three-episode arc). Satine’s death was a textbook example of fridging, and you don’t even get the “reward” of Obi-Wan exploring his grief about the event afterwards. That entire arc is executed very sloppily, and all the interesting conflict between Satine and Bo-Katan (respective figureheads for their vision for the future of Mandalore, in addition to being sisters) gets shelved so the show can linger on Maul and Obi-Wan’s personal beef with one another. Which I don’t have a problem exploring, but the consequence of that is that Bo-Katan is largely an irrelevant character, reduced to a few lines about her being upset about her sister dying that make no goddamn sense to begin with, given that she helped to create the circumstances for her death to occur in the first place.

And like I do realise this is a children’s show and expecting in-depth, sensitive political commentary from Star Wars of all things is an asinine thing to do, but given its popularity and impact on other western media, I think these discussions are still important. SW has a long history of racism and misogyny and homophobia and a bunch of other very troubling things, and tCW is a good microcosm to pick apart and discuss those bigotries because all of those things are present in the show in various ways.

[inmyarmswrappedin]

DRUCK reactions - s4 ep1

Ages ago I said I wanted to write meta about Cris’ and Matteo’s seasons, so of course, when I finally sit down to write reactions to a Skam remake, it’s about Amira instead.

A few weeks back I was composing tumblr posts in bed before falling asleep (my number 1 hobby lol) when it struck me that the writing for Amira’s season was really… indefensibly bad. So let’s stroll down through memory lane and revisit Druck s4, or how to throw away your potential because you have to put out this season before summer is over!

CLIP 1: Dark clouds over Winterberg

Obviously I’m writing these with the benefit of hindsight, but I will try and incorporate what my initial reaction to a clip was whenever I can remember.

Sometime between the Abiball episode and episode 32, I argued (on twitter) that the Abiball special was the Abiball episode instead, the first episode of Amira’s season. It would thus introduce us to the conflicts and characters that would take place during Amira’s season. I thought that in addition to the obvious Amira/Mohammed, Carlos/Kiki/Essam would be important, Kiki’s family life would be important, Stefan would be important, and David/Matteo would probably not be important as they seemed to be doing just fine in their scenes.

I didn’t think Mia/Alex would be important because I didn’t actually watch their clip lol. The Winterberg stans on my twitter orbit thought the clip was cute and nothing to worry about. That should’ve been my first clue that the (twitter) stan habit of repeating the “we never lose” mantra doesn’t make for great viewing comprehension, because watching the clip, it’s so obvious that shit is gonna go down lol.

Mia moves from one of the flat share’s bathrooms to the other because they never really recreated Mia’s room in the s3 flat share.

I still haven’t watched Mia’s episode, so I don’t know how all this stuff is going to get resolved, but it seems like Mia doesn’t think they can handle a LDR, and Alex is picking up on those vibes hard. I guess I don’t really get why Mia is so pessimistic about it because at that age I kinda thought a few months break weren’t really an obstacle. (Not sure if it would help me to watch Mia’s season, because this seems like a wholly new conflict.)

Anyway, Alex acts sweet/reassuring (I really like how soft spoken everyone is in this episode), so Mia puts it out of her mind for now. But Idk, they haven’t really spoken about the elephant in the room.

CLIP 2: Don’t call them the chastest evak ever again

Tbh this clip comes across as a direct rebuttal to all the s3 commentary about David and Matteo seeming like they’re not into each other, or like they aren’t ~passionate~ like the other evaks.

It’s like, “these gremlins are horny on main, now shut up.”

But I like that they’re fully dressed, like yes, you can show physical intimacy without undressing your teen actors (shade fully intended).

I love Lukas von Horbatschewsky’s hair and I’m very jealous of Matteo in this sequence, lmao.

Luis Sepúlveda died of coronavirus this year, in Spain. You’re welcome for that bit of 2020 misery dripping onto this cute clip.

I do think David feels guilty that he may have caused Matteo to fail his Spanish exam because of David’s own issues, which I think is very on brand for David. Obviously it wasn’t his fault.

I really like how soft spoken everyone is in this episode, 2X.

And this has been said a million times by now, but David and Matteo are the one evak version where they’re the same age (Joana is in the same year as Cris, but is a year older, so she must’ve gotten held back at some point). So it’s funny, and possibly a reference to Isak and Even, to see David talking about what it’d be like if they had that age difference. Like, maybe David would be more like Even in behavior! And, going by Matteo’s reaction, he wouldn’t be into that.

This clip really feels like the ending to Matteo and David. They’ll go on a road trip, they’ll work on David’s movie, they’ll be around, but this clip is their conclusion. They both feel secure and content in their relationship, and ready for everything that’s to come.

Like I said on the post about Cris and Joana, I like that David and Matteo don’t have further issues. And while I have tons of issues with Druck s4, which I will be talking about forever in the following posts, I never had an issue with how they deployed Matteo or David. (Okay, self. Now say that again without crying about David’s season that should have been.)

Fucking David cutting their make out short only to then say such a highkey flirty, romantic thing to Matteo though. No wonder Matteo’s like, “STOP, I’M SUPPOSED TO STUDY.”

CLIP 3: A challenger appears!

I like the fanon that David is a healthy eater (or at least in comparison to Matteo), because all we ever see David eat of his own volition (i.e. not food that was made for him) is candy.

God, I love Kiki snatching David’s fruity gummies out of his hands. It makes me laugh every time, particularly how she demands to know if the candy is vegan.  

Hanna looks beautiful. ;_;

There’s a split second when Jonas is about to give Hanna that box where David looks alarmed in the background. In my mind he’s all, “Bro, no. Not a public proposal. Reel it back in, bro!”

And then, to the surprise of Jonas and all the viewers, we find out that not only are Jonas and Hanna not together, but Hanna is dating German Arthur. Again, in “fandom refuses to acknowledge storyline conflict until it’s staring right at them” news, Stefan had actually been introduced via an audio to Hanna the day before, but people were convinced it was Hanna’s dad. Whose actor they called just to record an audio. Clearly.

My belief at this point was that Stefan would be relevant to Amira’s storyline, but instead it was just a way to give Hanna her own episode. 🤡

Matteo’s transformation into Michi is complete by donning his grandpa hat.

He also makes to trip David for no real reason. Throwback to Unter Wasser.

Matteo saying Inshallalalah in a sing song voice is cute, but so annoying.

Matteo Florenzi: He’s a pain in the ass, but we love him.

CLIP 4: I guess Abdi and Axel picked up his grades at another point

I love the way Matteo grabs David’s head to pull him along. They’re so cute and I’m gonna enjoy every second.

Jonas also grabs Hanna along, because fans needed to be further confused as to what was happening with Hanna and Stefan and Jonas.

Thank you, Druck, for telling me Kiki’s and Amira’s grades, but as you can understand, that’s nowhere near enough to satisfy my curiosity and I will be needing to know everyone’s GPA because that is the kind of thing that’s important to me. What about it!!!

I think, going by how impressed Mia is, that Mia’s grade isn’t as good as Amira’s. Which I think is a neat detail, since the Nooras are kind of supposed to be the perfect girls. I like that Amira is even better than Mia at school.

I thought the concept of Carlos failing his final exam and maybe realizing school wasn’t his thing would’ve been an interesting storyline to explore, but I’m not mad that it didn’t happen. Hopefully Druck will touch on it with the next kids.

And we’re now treated to three reveals about Kiki. Kiki has a sister (now she has two), she likes the idea of moving out and living with Carlos, and her mom isn’t doing well.

The remakes trying to develop their Vildes past s4 make sense to me. By the end of Skam, Vilde clearly was the character who’d been the most robbed of a season, there were several potential storylines to do with her. Financial instability, alcoholic mom, eating disorders, plus it seemed obvious that any season taking place during the girls’ russetide should go to her. And that’s without getting into Vilde’s strong denial that she was a lesbian.

So the remakes are sitting on all these potential storylines, but as we now know, they can’t make their own Vilde season.

And from a European TV exec’s point of view, Vilde (who in every version is a white, skinny, ostensibly straight girl) is a very safe main after the gay and Muslim seasons.

Cue the LITTLE SISTER.  

I get why people are fed up with the Vildes’ prominence in the remakes that are in their latter stages, but at the same time we got 8 versions of Noora’s season, most of which are a limpdicked enemies to lovers story with a misguided sexual assault storyline tacked at the end. (And I say misguided because after a strong start, it’s mostly about what William will think, how William will react, I can’t tell William about this, etc.) So in my case, I’ve had quite enough Noora to last me a lifetime, but my Vilde thirst has only begun to be quenched.

Tangent over, Kiki lies that she’s not going to the lake because she’s going to check on Carlos. Bad form, Kiki.

CLIP 5: Graduation (Friends Forever).mp3

In clown news, I predicted there’d be a clip between the Kiki stuff and the actual dance (maybe a Sam clip), as it seemed to me there wasn’t much of a connection between Kiki looking sad on that ping pong table and PARTY TIME. Lol at me.

And speaking of clowning, while I thought the Abiball episode was part of s4, I also thought that was fine because it was just doing the multi POV episode in the beginning of the season rather than at the end, right? Wrong.

As much as it would’ve been great if Sam and Abdi had storylines pertaining to racism and islamophobia (whether Abdi is or isn’t a Muslim, people would probably assume he is), I also have to admit… This conversation is hilarious.

“I want to have intercourse with you.” [glass breaks in the background]

Abdi closing his speech with a wide smile gvvhvh.

The first hundred times I watched this scene, I thought Alex seemed a bit alarmed at the conversation taking place, but really… We’re back to stone-faced Alex lol.

Don’t kill me, but I feel a little bad for Abdi in this moment. He really put himself out there and Sam just leaves without giving him an answer, yikes. I actually got tired of Abdi’s sad sackiness during the season, but right now I feel for him. L

There’s this smile Jonas sometimes directs at dudes (like Alex here) that makes me think… Bi. He also directs it at Matteo in s3.

Ugh.

There’s a parallel universe where Stefan was the villain of Amira’s season, and it would’ve been a much more interesting season than the one we got.

Because Stefan is a bit of a Darth Jonas. He works for Greenpeace, but, at least in this scene, seems a bit full of himself, and like… twisting the knife in a way that feels like it has to be intentional. And it would’ve been so interesting if Druck had tackled the white dudes who seem like they’re not going to be assholes about Muslims, but then turn around and say some shocking garbage. I’m sure we’ve all met a guy like that before.

In my mind, Stefan would’ve driven a wedge between Hanna and Amira, which would’ve been way more compelling than what we got, but on the other hand, it probably would’ve made fandom people hate Hanna, and people outside of fandom hate Amira.

Anyway, tag teaming gays! I love how David and Matteo share a look and immediately take care of both Jonas and Stefan.

I also love it when David looks murderous. It looks good on him.

But I feel like this didn’t go anywhere? Like, Matteo always hated Stefan and continued hating Stefan until the finale. In this scene, David seems to dislike Stefan just as much, but it’s not a thread they bother following. It’s too bad because I think Matteo and David together sabotaging Stefan is a lot funnier than just Matteo doing it.

I love how soft spoken Amira is when telling Essam not to show up at her graduation party. I would’ve been a lot less polite lmao.

You know, I actually thought Kiki was genuine here when she said she wasn’t a fan of competitions. Obviously that’s not the Kiki we’ve known until this point, but like, I thought it was meant to show character development on her part, But we’ll talk about THAT more in the following episodes.

Matteo fully blames their win on David being so hot, mysterious and new, and it’s hilarious because that’s also what initially drew him to David. Like, “fuck you for being so hot!”

I thought it was such a nice detail that they brought back the girl from the refugee classes in s1. We’re saying goodbye to all these school people who are going on their own post high school journeys without us!

In my mind, Abdi and Alex are talking about something completely serious, like, I don’t know, Abdi’s dad wanting him to study business and Alex advising Abdi on the best business schools in Berlin or something.

I feel like Hanna is the one girl in the squad who really doesn’t feel ready for post high school life and I HATE the writers so much for how they wrapped her character up, but we’ll save that for later.

I could watch Matteo passing the tiara (=the main) to Amira forever. The way he tips his hat and looks like even he’s a little surprised that he (a character like him!) was ever the lead on a teen show, David’s voice asking Matteo if he’s coming, Matteo leaving with David to live happily ever after, the initial notes of Just Got Paid as Amira looks at nighttime Berlin. This meme is overdone by now, but THE POETIC CINEMA.

Jonas glaring at romantic rivals at end of year dances is iconic at this point.

Amira being tagteamed by an annoying little brother AND a well-meaning, embarrasing older brother. Choose your own nightmare.

I really love the set up for the Essam/Kiki/Carlos conflict. The emotional potential is SO good because on one hand you have Kiki, who wants to have a good time for once instead of parenting her own parent, then Carlos whose self-esteem is on the floor after having failed his final exam, and Essam, whose own sense of self-worth hinges upon whether white German girls find him attractive. Like, obviously Essam is never going to come between Kiki and Carlos who have been through some shit together, but with Carlos out of commission and Essam eager to please, you can see how the situation could so easily turn into a mess.

Amira and Mohammed have the most sexual tension out of any Yousana pair, period. They literally just said hi to each other and I already feel like I’m intruding gvhvhv.      

Social media

David saying of Matteo: “Er bekommt Auslauf.” (Something like, “he gets walkies” because he’s been good with revising) is the cutest shit ever.

Remember when Stefan sent Jonas a whole ass message and signed it “with sunny greetings”? Stefan was much more fun when we were supposed to find him unbearable.

Kiki creating a new Whatsapp group for every single thing is so true to life.

I’d forgotten that Amira also hated Stefan almost right away. The season that could’ve been, I tell you.

All the Abi Chaker Clan content reminds me of how I thought Jonas looked like, well, such a child, compared to Stefan, and I thought that was intentional. Like, here is Stefan with a Greenpeace job whereas Jonas doesn’t know what to do with his life, and he’s like, spray-painting abi chaker clan onto walls and posting pics to the abi chaker clan account. It’s not that I thought Jonas should’ve acted like a whole ass adult, of course he’s having fun with his high school friends, but I thought Jonas might feel inadequate in comparison to where Stefan is at this point of his life.

I can’t remember who revealed it, but Sara was supposed to end up with Toilet Sam and that was supposed to come out during the s3 finale (on that week, Sara posted a story with a guy whose face was obscured iirc). Since that was part of the clip where Hanna and Jonas also got back together, which they cut to make way for Hanna/Jonas/Stefan drama, Sara takes some other dude to the Abiball. And I think we’re supposed to think that’s the same dude she went on that date with.

[dear-wormwoods]

i know that eddie's first encounter with It and the way It manifests itself as his fear is very telling of him being gay, but what do you think the encounters It had with the other members of the loser's club (like mike with the bird, stan with the dead boys, etc) are indicative of?

Okay Let’s Talk About the Losers’ Fears!

The interesting thing about IT is that, for most kids, the fears IT manifests as are pretty basic. Movie monsters, comic book monsters, vampires, mummies, etc. So not all the Losers have super deep meanings behind their fears, the way Eddie and Beverly do, and I think it definitely reflects the level of contentment they experience in their every day life. Obviously Eddie’s IT experiences are symbolic of his fear of his sexuality and the self-loathing that comes along with that, disguised as a ‘diseases are gross!’ sort of thing because that’s easier to process for a little kid (and because IT needs something physical to take the shape of). We don’t need to rehash that. But as for the others…

Beverly is not afraid of blood, her fear is much deeper than that, blood is just the easiest physical representation for what she really does fear, which is her own womanhood. In one of MANY parallels between Eddie and Bev, both of their fears are based on gender and sexuality, and both fears exist, at least in part, because of their abusive home lives. Bev’s fear takes on the disguise of ‘blood is gross!’ but really it’s about puberty and menstruation, and what that change will mean for her sexually - because her dad never stops talking about how boys look at her, and what her role will be as a woman re: having sex with boys. And this isn’t the first time King has used blood symbolism for a girl’s fear of the sexual unknown - he did it in Carrie too (and lbr if Eddie and Beverly were fused together into one character, it would be Carrie and if Sonia and Alvin were fused into one character, it would be Carrie’s crazy fucking mother).

Next we have Bill, whose fear is pretty self-explanatory. IT always manifests as something Georgie-related for him, but what Bill fears most is not literally Georgie’s corpse, it’s Georgie BLAMING him for his death. Bill feels incredible guilt for what happened to Georgie, and feels responsible because he helped make the paper boat and because he was too sick to go out with Georgie that day and therefore could not protect him (this comes up again and again re: his insistence that Eddie not leave his line of sight like, ever, because he’s projecting his Georgie guilt). Bill actually comes the closest to ‘losing’ to IT because his fear is the most emotional - he almost gives in to the apparition of Georgie basically accusing him of murder, and would have, were it not for the other Losers (particularly Eddie) screeching that it isn’t really Georgie.

Richie’s fears are all based around movie monsters, but they’re a little more symbolic than that because of one small addition: Richie’s name being used repeatedly as a label FOR IT’s manifestations. IT also seems to talk to Richie more, because taunting him is more effective than just existing as a visual. On top of that, IT takes multiple forms for Richie, which is unusual. So we have three (unless I’m forgetting one) - the Crawling Eye, the Werewolf, and Paul Bunyan. The Crawling Eye is a movie monster that really freaked Richie out as a kid to the point where he’d have nightmares about it and wet the bed, and he has a lot of eye-related body horror dreams and it’s pretty gross… dreaming about eyes can symbolize needing to (or refusing to) look inward, and dreaming about something being in/hurting your eyes can symbolize being unable to (or refusing to) confront certain truths, or avoiding emotional intimacy. All of this can easily be applied to Richie, the King of Avoidance, and it’s particularly interesting that the Eddie is the one who injures the Eye, and encourages Richie to fight it too, and that Eddie is mentioned by IT later on in relation to the Eye (the SHOES THING also ties into the Eye whenever it comes up!). So there’s THAT. The Crawling Eye, imo, stands for Richie’s denial and emotional stagnation. 

The Werewolf is also a movie monster, and Richie was very effected by the plight of the teenage werewolf when he watched that movie - so it’s telling that when IT manifests as the werewolf, it is wearing a jacket with Richie’s name stitched into it. I know this has been said over and over, but Richie relates to the werewolf on some level because the werewolf is seen by its peers as a horrible monster, but it’s something it cannot help, and while it presents as ‘normal’ most of the time, when the ‘monster comes out’, it’s instantly ostracized from society. Richie sees himself as a ‘monster’ because he’s consistently treated as annoying, or ‘too much’, or borderline-suicidal to the point where he scares a lot of people off from wanting to get to know him. He feels guilty about being a burden on his parents, he hates that he constantly gets himself into trouble for things he can’t seem to control (undiagnosed and untreated ADHD, most likely), and on top of all that, he’s also hyper-aware of the dangers of ‘looking queer’ in public if he’s caught being affectionate with his male friends. There is a lot going on in Richie’s head that all point to him being very aware that he’s not ‘like everyone else’, but he can’t help it, so Richie sees himself reflected in the Teenage Werewolf… and IT knows that, and tries to use that to ITs advantage. 

FINALLY, there’s the Paul Bunyan statue, which involves a little more reaching to figure out, so bear with me if this sounds insane… Paul Bunyan, in a way, represents Richie as well. Richie is well aware that the statue is an attention-grabber, but it’s also kitschy and stupid looking - he himself describes it as having a ‘cheerful vulgarity’. It’s big and loud, but people hate it and think it’s lame. Richie wants attention, but he’s afraid of being Paul Bunyan - he wants to be GOOD at something, and get attention because of his skill and his humor, not just because he’s loud and ridiculous. He doesn’t want to be talked about as “horrible, garish, and unbelievably gauche”, the way Derry townsfolk talk about Paul. As an adult, Paul turns into the clown and has a literal, casual conversation with Richie, and then eventually turns into Buddy Holly - a musician Richie admired and related to, who died tragically young - only Buddy’s glasses weren’t his usual glasses - they were Richie’s glasses, mended with adhesive tape. So even then, he’s sort of seeing parts of HIMSELF in what IT appears as. SOOO LONG STORY SHORT, Richie is his own worst fear. 

Stan’s encounter with IT, I think, was meant to push the boundaries of what his  mind would accept as ‘real’. Stan’s whole worldview was based on order and a certain expectation of reality being… reality. So IT created a visual as ridiculous as possible, while still maintaining some level of offensive realism (by using corpses of real kids who drowned in the Standpipe) and creating a multi-sensory onslaught that Stan couldn’t deny - music, smells, visuals, etc. ITs goal wasn’t to scare Stan so much as break him, but Stan was able to ground himself in reality with his bird book well enough to escape. But what he takes away from the experience in the end is being offended by what happened. He doesn’t give a shit about being scared, he’s just plain OFFENDED by what he saw. So I think Stan’s kids-in-the-Standpipe experience was meant to just…. totally insult the way he sees the world around him. It’s also one of the coolest visuals in the novel and I will be forever angry that the movie changed his IT experience so completely. 

Ben’s IT encounters are SUPER typical… movie monsters, Halloween costume type of shit, like most of the other Derry kids who became ITs victims. The clown with the balloons floating against the wind, the mummy, the vampire… but unlike Richie, I don’t think there is much deeper meaning to it than just being your run of the mill scary shit, because unlike Richie, Ben doesn’t hate himself. Ben is pretty damn content with his life. He loves his mom, they have a close relationship, he doesn’t have any friends before the Losers but he wasn’t bent out of shape about it… he was fine with being alone, and just being a good student, a quiet bookish kid, and he liked buying candy and eating it in front of the TV with his little bathrobe on. Like, Ben was chill. He was confident in what he liked and what he knew how to do, he was a real ‘you do you’ kid. He wasn’t even THAT upset about being fat until other kids made fun of him for it. So Ben’s just going through life, more comfortable than the other Losers. He’s content with his gender and sexuality, he’s content with his skill set and his interests, he doesn’t care about how others perceive him, he’s adaptable, and he’s not plagued with guilt. So IT doesn’t really have a TON to work with, lmao. Movie monsters are all IT has at ITs disposal when it comes to Ben, and that’s all there is to it. And in general, Ben is one of the least affected by IT… he really doesn’t even seem that afraid of IT, on the whole, but he reacts most strongly to the things that sort of go against the laws of physics (the balloons moving against the wind, the Neibolt House seeming to change shape and size)… but even then, the only real symbolism there is that Ben loves physics and architecture. 

Lastly, Mike’s experience with IT is… interesting. I’ve talked about this a lot with @mikehanlonstan and we can’t really come up with good symbolism for the bird aside from the simple ‘he was attacked by a bird as a baby’ explanation from the novel. Which would be fine, if it weren’t for the fact that Mike’s dad… saw the same bird?? Like, what is it with the Hanlons and this weird bird? Who knows, I sure don’t. I was looking for racism symbolism but like… I feel like ‘It’s a bird… like a crow, get it?? Like Jim Crow??” is too lazy even for Stephen King. Also it wasn’t a crow, anyway… it was something that doesn’t exist in the real world, otherwise Stan wouldn’t have been able to get it to go away with his bird facts later on. If anything it just establishes a stronger connection between him and his father, and the long-term connection they both have to IT.

[sominbiased]

hi, did jennie wear a bindi in the dddd mv? i heard it was just decorative crystals, but i'm not desi so i wanted to make sure

Hi love! Thank you for this question, since I have a feeling it’s a confusion a lot of non desi people have regarding Jennie’s styling. I’m assuming by making a distinction between “decorative/ fashion crystal” and “bindi” there’s some confusion as to a) what a bindi looks like and b) how the bindi is used by desi people (e.g, its only used for religious ceremonies or marriages versus being used as a fashion accessory). I’m not an expert on this subject by any means, but with the academic reading I’ve done and my own experiences growing up in India, I’d like to explain, best I can, how imo this distinction really isn’t as valid or important as the manner in which its worn.  Also that being said, I want to state upfront that this is nowhere the most offensive/racist thing done to desi people, and that people who want to cancel her over it are just trying to seem woke themselves. 

 First things first, there’s no particular style or shape that seperates a “real” bindi from just a fashion sticker. Forehead markings of all styles and shapes exist across a variety of Asian cultures. They do, however, descend from India, so I’m sure some right wing orthodox assholes will immediately jump on this by arguing because it’s from one particular Hindu tradition therefore a single red dot makes a “real bindi” (Here’s an example of the original bindi which wikipedia explains pretty well) and that therefore what we see on Jennie isn’t a true bindi, but this ignores the actual reality in India.

One, actual scholars are very clear that the historical origins of a tradition actually have very little bearing on what the cultural significance of a tradition will eventually become*, and secondly because unlike the tilaka, kumkum bindi (which are the markings used exclusively by Hindu women during marraige) and the sindoor, the bindi was never intended to be used exclusively for a particular formal occasion, nor denote a particular social class. Instead, it’s everyday wear for Hindu women, and like some some Indian accessories its also partially migrated to other communities (e.g, wearing the maang tikka is now a must for Muslim weddings as well), though that is notably less common. And because ethnic fashion is a huge industry making everyday wear for millions of Indian women, bindis are everywhere in India: on magazine covers, bollywood stars, in movies, as part of traditional dances, etc, and they are sold in a HUGE variety of styles, often very cheaply, in packs of twenty, so that you can match them to your clothes and accessories (which by the way, used to be the It Thing during primary school for me. My classmates and I all used to go to the store together and compete to get the best looking bindis askfhks). Below is Jennie’s promotional image, and a very popular style of crystal bindis; as you can see, they’re similiar and could have been bought from the same company. The only reason they’re referred to as fashion stickers now is because retailers don’t want to get into trouble after prominent Hindu groups raised objections

The issue desi people have with the popularity of the bindi overseas is not that it is worn but how it’s worn in the west versus in India and what the implications of that are. India is literally one of the most diverse countries in the world, with probably countless number of traditions and styles, so what’s remarkable that all these years the bindi, like (mehendi/henna) has remained a symbol of traditional womanhood, by which I mean its still attached to piety, respect for tradition, conventional/traditional marraige and so on. Spirituality and religion are very very important for many Hindu women, and to many of us, our fashion doesn’t mean compromising our faith (and often, values like social conservatism); another example would be the conservative but fashionable forward outfit styles many Indian Muslim women wear.

On the other hand, the bindi first became popular in the West thanks to “an exotic look” by Madonna, who among other things, is famous for being provocative and pushing the boundaries of sexuality. Now, its associated with wild, often skimpy fashions like Kendall Jenner’s “teeny tiny bra and shorts during Coachella” or “edgier, exotic” images such as G(IDLE) and Blackpink (more on that later). The issue with how these women have chosen to wear and accessorize these bindis is not that there’s anything wrong with presenting yourself in a more sexual way, but because while they might claim to be “celebrating Indian culture” if pressed, its clear from their actions that they genuinely have no idea what bindis actually represent. Foreign celebrities will ONLY make bindis integral to their  edgy/exotic looks, like Jennie wearing a bindi for a “girl crush/edgy” hip hop inspired song, and then immediately discarding it for a “classy/lady like” look while modelling for chanel. This is the opposite of how bindis are actually worn lmao (similiarly, in my post on G(IDLE), I touched on how their usage of mehendi made zero sense and was probably inspired my misconceptions about traditional desi styles). 

A similiar anology to this kind of attitude would be if I only wore round framed glasses with skimpy partying wear and then called it “an exotic look celebrating Korean culture and Korean women” while its obvious from a simple google search that glasses are not exotic accessories, are exclusively worn with casual outfits in Korea and I have no idea what the fuck I’m talking about**.  

It’s difficult to fit a variety of racist beliefs/actions into a single paragraph, but the way I choose to explain it, on a global scale the majority of the world knows nothing about what India’s actually like and tends to buy into one of two stereotypes about the country: desi people, especially women, are either dirty (e.g, we eat with our hands and have more body hair, which apparently makes us gross), backward, hypersexual (e.g, the popularity of the kama sutra and “tantric sex” which is by the way, not a real thing) and even violent, which alot of East Asian countries like Korea tend to buy into because of their colourist beliefs regarding darker skin, or b) we’re simple minded, incredibly backward people overly obessed with our traditions who might speak English but will never assimilate because of our background (e/g racist caricatures such as that one Indian guy on the Big Bang Theory). One of the weirdest aspects of the second attitude is that its now acceptable to just assume Indian traditions live in a vacuum, and we don’t have complex practices and beliefs built on a coherent set of values like everyone else in the world; the attitude that alot of foreigners have when they adopt the bindi or selectively talk about hinduism, if applied to Korea would be things like “Koreans lay out food for their deceased relatives every Chausok because they’re too simple minded and cultural to realise that dead people don’t need food” while happily ignoring the massive economy and high levels of education among the Korean population.

I think its pretty fair to say Jennie’s styling does sort of buy a little bit into both sterotypes, and it’s also fair to say that she’s in no way shown to be actively racist, and this at most is passive ignorance. Desi women have been reclaiming the bindi for years, and they deserve the same love and support foreign celebrities get. Right now though,  Indians have bigger problems to worry about than the popularity of “fashion stickers”, which is why I side eye people who make a huge fuss about this but do nothing to help desi people.  The purpose of this post is not to give people ammunition to “cancel her” which only serves to make yourself look good, but rather to say that when a situation like this occurs our first instinct should be to educate ourselves, because the more extreme forms of these attitudes allow for racism and harm towards people of colour; for instance, most Westerners have woobified Hinduism so much as a religion of peace and mystical spirituality and demonised Islam so much that the proto-fascist radical Hindu government now feels free to allow lynchings and attacks on the Muslim minorities knowing that the Western world won’t raise serious objections. It’s only when we go out to learn with what resources we have (which can be as simple as Wikipedia, like most the links in this post are) that we end up becoming more aware of the world around us, and the different ways we celebrate that as people.

Also on that note, if anyone has any money to spare, both Nagaland and Kerala, two states in India that often get ignored by the Central govt since it doesn’t benefit their Hindu extremism agenda, have experienced natural disasters this year. Feel free to donate here and here (additional info is attached) if you have any spare money.

[sibyl-of-space]

this is very much a working-through-white-tears vent post so i encourage most of you with better things to do & who dont wanna read that shit to just keep scrolling

I’ve been having a lot of fun experimenting with editing cosplay photos recently. I don’t think this is much of a secret lmao. It stemmed from a combination of a few things - an obsession with a shitty camcorder from 2004 that reminded me of how differently older technology captures and interprets light, a desire to frame my own work in a way that appeals to me rather than the “norms” of the massive cosplay “community”, and an interest in pursuing photography as an additional artistic hobby that will help broaden my understanding of composition, colors, lighting etc. that will hopefully also inform my other artistic outlets.

I’m also very much aware that there is an important, ongoing discussion about editing and photographing Black cosplayers. I’ve seen a lot of fantastic resources on the subject and have wanted to try my hand at this as well, because while I’m having the time of my life editing my own photos, and my girlfriend also gave me some of hers to edit (and I’ve had a blast with all of this), I’m very much aware that me and my girlfriend are both white. My only experience editing folks with even slightly darker skin than mine is some older photos with my roommate back when we cosplayed together. I want to go back and re-edit some of those too, but that’s getting somewhat unrelated to the point I wanted to talk about.

One of my (Black) twitter mutuals recently posted selfies/at-home photos of a cosplay she did recently, and I decided to try my hand at editing one of them taking into account what I had learned from various resources about skin tones etc. but also experimenting with the kind of very extra shit I do with my own photos. (I toned it down a lot because someone else was the subject, lol.)

So, here’s where I fucked up, and I totally acknowledge I fucked up, but I wouldn’t be writing this treatise if I wasn’t still feeling bothered by it because I don’t know how to healthily accept criticism and that is a lifelong issue I still haven’t really managed to tackle...

I sent it to her in DM’s (was definitely not about to post a photo of someone else without their permission, even my ass knows better than THAT) and said that I have been practicing photo editing but only of white subjects and I liked her selfies so I tried my hand at editing one of them. I also said something along the lines of “I’m sorry if this makes you uncomfortable and if this crosses a boundary please let me know I won’t do it again” - and see, that right there is the problem, I clearly had some inkling this could be taken as inappropriate and yet instead of asking her permission FIRST I elected to ask potential forgiveness LATER. Anyway, her response was essentially “hey, I appreciate this and like what you did, but please ask first next time. I would have said yes but it’s always good to ask.”

And I think the reason my reaction to that was so negative, even though she has every right to draw that boundary and I know she has every right to draw that boundary, was because I had considered it almost the same way I would consider drawing fanart of something a friend likes, in the sense of “hey I was practicing my art but I made this one with you in mind”; and so my intentions were to do something thoughtful for someone while also practicing my art. So there is a non-insignificant part of me that was a little hurt that it wasn’t entirely received that way on the other end, that it was perceived as something a little more invasive, because that wasn’t what my intentions were at all; but it was received that way at least in part and for that I definitely felt guilty.

But, and again I acknowledge this RATIONALLY (I’m just posting this here because feelings are not rational), someone else taking a photo of you and re-interpreting it to their own liking, especially on a topic that is racially charged when that other person is white and will never know what racism feels like, is a lot different than just “here is some fanart I drew for you lol.”

And also - I am absolutely calling myself out on my bullshit here - when I edited those photos for Sabrina, I asked her first. So I KNEW that consent was important because I offered that to Sabrina, but didn’t for this Black cosplayer. Part of me defends this decision to myself, in the sense of “I edited the latter a lot more respectfully and kind of went wilder with Sabrina’s,” and “I am infinitely closer to Sabrina so that project was a lot more personal and the other was more of an exercise”, and while these are both true I think it says a lot that I interpreted one of these as an exercise. It makes it clear as day my intentions probably WEREN’T entirely just “doing something nice for someone” and were a lot more about being perceived as a Good And Woke Ally or something. I saw a post about editing Black people and instead of putting that into action via respectful dialogue I just jumped in and did something under my own direction with absolutely no collaboration with the subject.

There is another part of me that doesn’t understand how someone else editing your photos could feel invasive, like “hey I took this thing you made and gave my own spin on it but you don’t have to accept it if you don’t want to” (I’ve had some photos I posted edited by a friend spontaneously, some I liked some I didn’t but it always was cool that they spent the time to do that), but again - there is a racial element here I must acknowledge that I cannot pretend to fully understand what it’s like being on the other end. And my own personal boundaries are not universal.

The good news is I am enough of a reasonable adult to have responded to her with just “of course, I’m sorry for not asking before this time” and nothing else, and taking my big long tantrum Feelings TM elsewhere (here). But I did need to work out all my big long Feelings TM because I needed to really scrutinize where my negative response came from, which elements do have some validity and which - most - are a purely defensive response to real criticism that I can learn from.

This is a big reason I came back to tumblr - being one of the only social media outlets where long form venting works, it’s a healthier outlet to work through messy Emotions than a twitter thread for the world to see that can easily be taken out of context and be seen as performative etc. I also have a journal but typing is a lot faster than writing, so.

A N Y W A Y. . . I will say I’m pretty happy with how the edit came out, and I look forward to photographing and editing more Black subjects in the future but only with their full and informed consent.

Edit to give her boundaries the last say here -- her stance was completely reasonable, in fact she was nicer than she needed to be, and I hope she genuinely did appreciate it despite wishing I had asked her first, and wasn’t just saying that to make me Feel Better because she definitely doesn’t owe me that.

[ecritetmort]

answer, add, tag

The Rules: answer these ten questions, create ten of you own, then tag ten people.

Tagged by @plsfeedthewriter​ ! By some miracle I logged back in just in time to see this.

1. What are your ideal writing conditions? Ie. weather, noise, time of day, etc.

Between 10:30 pm and 2 am (basically when no one is around and my inhibitions have all been used up for the day). Mid to late afternoon also, although then I am more prone to becoming distracted; either way I mostly just sit at my desk, either with my feet up on the couch arm with my computer in my lap or just normal.

2. Is there anything that prevents you from being able to write?

[gestures wildly at homework, Tumblr, and Pinterest]

3. Do any of your characters have nicknames?

Not really in canon. Their names are short so I just use them.

4. What mythical creature would you want to own as a pet?

@iguanamouth’s jade dog. Alternatively, a Chinese water dragon. A long, protective, patron friend.

5. What holidays, if any, do your characters celebrate? (Don’t have to be real world holidays, if you’ve made up your own I’d love to hear about them!)

(I actually meant to release something for Valentine’s, whoops.) Karyn celebrates Christmas and both the 1/1 and lunar new year (happy year of the dog btw). Not sure about the others, although probably not many except out of habit, although Bella probably celebrates the lunar new year and gets Del and Zeta gifts (usually with Betelgeuse’s help in going to Earth).

6. Your current read/the last book you read?

Currently reading Kazuo Ishiguio’s An Artist of the Floating World. Very interesting, follows a Japanese artist and father in post-WWII Furukawa.

7. Are any of your characters living out a dream of yours? If so, who and what?

lol no, maybe Akdai in her original D&D bard form but even then not really because fantastical racism sure does exist and also no girlfriend (yet)

8. If invited to an open themed dress-up party, what would your characters dress as?

Diana’s been waiting for a chance to dress up as Wonder Woman ever since the movie came out. There’s no way she’s not going to go as her. Less sure about the others.

9. Are any of your characters religious? (Again, made up religions welcome!)

Not particularly; Tijuana, Hester, and André are pretty spiritual (of course), but the closest that anyone comes to organized religion would be the sort of pseudo-religiousness in the Karyn’s world, in how most characters (Diana, Oscar, Anne, etc) follow the order outlined by Life and Death. I wouldn’t call it the same as worship per se however, outside of Zeta who sort-of-lowkey-highkey sees Life as a reverend figure (although this changes through her apprenticeship lmao).

10. Which of your characters would write their own book, and what would it be about?

Triste probably deserves a memoir. I don’t think he’d write one, but it’d sure be a read.

Oscar has written enough poetry to warrant a chapbook but would be too uncomfortable with making it public.

11. What are your characters’ favorite foods?

Karyn, in her own words, is a noodle soup girl (la mian kind, wide rice noodles and anything). Oscar being the sweet tooth he is loves toffee. Diana particularly likes honeydew milk/boba tea. I’ll just let you skim this interview of Triste.

Less sure about the others, although Akdai is definitely a cherry-everything kind of lady (pomegranates are #2).

12. What smell/taste/texture has really negative associations for your character, and why?

Karyn and fire/smoke. Triste and gunpowder. (Also Death and open fire, but he’s getting over it.)

13. Which of your characters has traveled the least far from home? How far?

(pre-canon) Karyn, Delta, and Zeta.

14. Weirdest trick that helps you write?

Not really any, although for some reason listening to Alan Cumming actually keeps me from, changing music every ten minutes,

15. What does your character most dislike about who they were when they were younger?

unsure.

Ten additional questions:

Which characters have changed the most from their original design?

Are there any characters you removed from the story? Why?

When did you first know you wanted to write?

What book/author inspired you to start writing?

Have your characters been adapted from another medium, like an RPG?

How do you name your characters?

Have you had to change a character’s name/title? Why?

How do you write? (full chapters, individual scenes, etc?)

Do you plan to publish in the future?

Would your characters read your book? Why/why not?

Tagging @fanart-pandemic, @thegreatphantasm (most of these can flip into art/drawing I think)

[groundramon]

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

:O!!!

I’ll take this as asking for five facts about five characters bc im currently waiting for all/most of the items to unlock on my current zoo tycoon game and idk what to do to kill the time besides this sO:

Character 1: Skift (bc I dont talk about him enough)

1. Skift is a very ambitious person.  One of the main reasons he enlists in the army in Majjikku is in hopes of some day becoming a war hero.  He’s also easily influenced by other peoples’ approval or disapproval, despite how adamantly he would insist otherwise if you ask him.  Hence why he wants the validation of being a household name and a hero in the history books.

2. The other main reason he enlisted in the army is because he absolutely despises his family.  I’m still working on the kinks of his backstory but the jist of it is that he comes from an extremely large family with a neglectful mother and an absent father.  He and his other siblings around his age were raised by their elder siblings, but Skift had the misfortune of having a personality that completely clashed with theirs and often got in fights with them, that sometimes even turned physical.  As soon as he was old enough to enlist in the army, he left home and headed to the nearest enlisting center (which unfortunately was several days away since they lived in the middle of goddamn nowhere, but he makes at least)

3. Skift has no real education, living in the middle of nowhere and not having anyone to teach him skills.  When he was younger he got along with his siblings better and was able to learn basic math, and of course he can speak fine, but he probably can’t read very well and anything besides basic addition and subtraction is a mystery to him.  Having said that, illiteracy and a general lack of scholarly knowledge, isn’t uncommon on the Parity side, as they have the very minimal requirement of laws and government required to run a government.  (Literally you can kidnap someone and as long as you give them adequate shelter, food, and water, and you dont abuse them or anything, the “police” wont do anything about it)

4. Skift gets a strong rush while in the middle of combat.  Adrenaline does good things to his psyche and as long as he doesn’t suddenly realize that those were real people dying on the battlefield, he’ll be in a good mood for the rest of the day after a Parity victory.  He’s not bloodthirsty, but he does get uncomfortably into it when in the heat of battle, even if he has to watch the person he’s killing die in front of him.

5. Skift in a way is supposed to be a sort of clueless libertarian/anti-ally who isnt a bigot.  Like, think a white person who doesnt believe in systemic racism but wouldn’t discriminate against a person of color because the whole reason they dont believe in systemic racism is because its bad for the economy.  (Which, it is, they’re right about that lmao).  I dont know entirely what I’m planning to do with that concept because I dont know if I, as a very dumb white person, have the ability to play with racism/the concept of colorblindness like that, but I hope I can do SOMETHING with them.  Either I’ll need to educate myself or I’ll just change that trait to being dumb about politics in general, I dunno.  (Because he doesnt really care about the politics of Parity vs Halcyon, he just agrees with the Parity because thats all hes ever known.)

Bonus fact bc I had too many: Skift is pretty heavily inspired by the design of an old warrior cats OC I had named Falconstar/Falcon.  He’s not exactly a dead character (I dont do anything with Warrior Cats anymore but if I did, he’d be on my list of potential characters to reboot, altho i dont know if id have the heart to take him out of the universe/AU he’s from…) but I feel like their personalities are different enough that they wont be mistaken for one another.  Also Skift has a stupid scarf.

Character 2: Phillip (or is it Lenny? Idk I think I changed it to Phillip)

1. Phillip is also from Majjikku, I should mention, but he’s a part of the Halcyon side.  The first thing I should mention is that he’s a prince, and 3rd in line to the Crayking throne - he has an elder brother who joins the army with him, and an elder sister who stays behind to keep the kingdom safe with their aging parents.  I believe they also have a younger sibling or two, but they’re too young to be politically important.  Anyways, its worth mentioning that the only reason Phillip was sent over her sister is because he’s an inadept spoiled brat, and the Halcyon side was asking for at least two members of royalty to join their ranks to form an alliance, so Phillip was sent alongside their actually combatually adept elder son.  The Halcyon sent Phillip to the “less useful” soldier training camps, while his brother was able to ascend straight up in the ranks of the army.  Since arriving in Halcyon territory, Phillip hasn’t seen his brother once.  (It’s worth mentioning as a side note, the Craykings only allied themselves with the Halcyon side to protect their own necks.  They believe the Halcyons have the upper hand in the war, and want to be on the right side of history when the war concludes.  And they dont have the strength to stand up to both sides; the Halcyons have promised to protect their underwater empire from the Parities due to their allyship.

2. As I mentioned, Phillip is an inadept spoiled brat.  Years of coddling in his palace have turned him into a demanding asshole who makes jokes at the expense of others and has overly high expectations from others, despite thinking he himself deserves to sit on his ass all day.  There’s a deep reason for it, as there is for all my characters, but there are so many layers that caused him to act like this that at this point it’s just become his personality.

3. Having said that, Phillip grew up in an environment where acting nice was more important than being nice.  Who cared what you did behind closed doors, so long as you put on a presentable front?  He’s extremely charming and sociable in big social events, often making on-point jokes and contributing in a seemingly meaningful way.  In fact, he’s arguably even better at it than his two older siblings, since they have opinions of their own and aren’t just a mindless robot for their parents to interject their thoughts and opinions to.  Phillip is very good at regurgitating what he’s been told, and has a very flawed and honestly nonexistent sense of self because he has never had the freedom to make his own opinions.  Or rather, he was told how to act and feel, and he never had the strength that his siblings had to make his own opinions on what was being taught to him.

4. Phillip wears a fancy bowtie and he refuses to take it off for unexplained reasons.  There’s no deep reason to it, I just like bowties.

5. Phillip believes that both of his elder siblings are more adept and intelligent in every aspect.  He respects his parents authority over the kingdom and part of why he acts like a jerk is because he legitimately has no idea what he’s doing and would rather die than inherit the throne.  He knows nothing about politics, despite his entire life being politics (in more ways than one).  The good news is that it seems like if something happened to both his elder siblings and his parents, it would probably go to the next sibling below him, even if they were still under 10 at the time.

Character 3: Glitch

1. Glitch REALLY needs a new name but I’m currently trying to come up with an idea of how Glitch could mean something different in their world (Majjikku, I should clarify), but right now im empty-handed and please help me.

2. Glitch is blind, or at least has significant sight problems.  I think.  I dont know, I really need to develop Glitch more.  Maybe he just needs glasses like I do and without them everything is hella blurry but at least he can get around.

3. Glitch’s species is often used as horses in the Halcyon army due to their obedient nature and high intelligence for a species that generally isnt considered “sentient”/having human intelligence (I know sentient isnt the right word, hence why I clarified).  Glitch’s species does have human-like intelligence and capabilities, having the capability for empathy and compassion and self-realization just as much if not more as other Majjikku species, but they generally lack in vocal and academic intelligence.  Glitch is unusually vocal for his species, a mutation that comes up in packs of the sauropod-like species every now and then.  Because of this and his sight problems, he was put in the same “lesser” squadron as Phillip, instead of the same training the other young from his herd were given.

4. Having said that, “unusually vocal” for his species is still very quiet most of the time.  He has a strong understanding of the words of those around him, stronger than most of the rest of his species (although they can comprehend language, just not as quickly) and can articulate full sentences in a reasonable amount of time, he just prefers not to.  He also can’t go on half-an-hour-long rants about things because he would run out of words and brainpower very quickly, which god I wish that were me because I will talk until my mouth falls off and its 3 am i s2g im not even exaggerating.

5. Glitch has no understanding of the war but as his herd is encouraged to help the war effort, as opposed to being forcibly taken (which was outlawed and deemed unethical when more and more offspring like Glitch started popping up), he supports his side and would gladly die for it.  Also he loves his friends, even Phillip.

Character 4: Aquarius

1. I love Aquarius!!!  Somehow she became my favorite Majjikku character and idk why.  She’s got cool pants, thats probably part of the reason.  Anyways Aquarius is Marble’s best friend in the series; they become fast friends on the train to their squadron when they begin talking about their similar experiences in being dragged away from their families and forcibly enlisted in the army.  (Is it horrible to enlist 13 and 14 year old kids in the army by force?  It absolutely is, that’s the point; I dont take my characters being young teens like most stories abt young teens do, I’m well aware they’re going to be fucked up as fuck and I’m exploiting that for all its worth.)  Aquarius came from a big family of 5 with an absent mother and a nonexistent father, where her elder sister raised herself and then raised her.  Unlike Skift, Aquarius became very close with her eldest sister, although they both share a resentment for their parents because of their shit awful parenting.  Aquarius was forced to join the army because her three younger siblings were too young for the army, and her eldest sister had to stay behind and work a job and care for the younger kids, something Aquarius knew she wouldn’t be able to do.

2. Unlike all the other characters I’ve mentioned so far, and hell probably all the characters in Majjikku in general lol, Aquarius actually supports the Halcyon for what they stand for.  Obviously with her absent mother and father, Aquarius and her siblings needed a lot of financial help.  Thankfully that’s what the Halcyon system was built around, and the government was able to get Aquarius’s eldest sister a stable well-paying job and the entire family enough money to get a decent place and pay for food for a while.  The government still monitors their family regularly to make sure they arent squandering the money and that everything is going okay, but they did far, far more good than harm.  Aquarius believes that this is the best form of government; a form of government that on a very personal level cares for its members and helps them through hardships, and forces them on the right path.  In our world, she’d be a socialist through and through, if not a straight-up communist.  (Having said that, I do believe Aquarius would have different political opinions if she grew up in our world.  The difference between our world governments and the Halcyon government is that the Halcyon government…actually gives a shit about people.  Most of the people who work for the government are volunteers, who at best get a small place to stay and some food.  Like, the Halcyon actually help 99% of the poor population in the Halcyon city.  The amount of financial aid given outside of the city significantly drops, but in their city, being homeless and poor is illegal but instead of throwing you in jail for it they’ll help you get out of it.  If you squander it then you’ll end up in jail, but still.  Idk what Aquarius would believe in differently if she grew up here, but I dont think she’d be a straight-up communist because we have too many failed communist governments in our history.)

3. Aquarius and her family’s coloring is very odd for her species.  The bear-like species that her family is made up of is generally brown, red, yellow, orange, tan, white, gray, black, ect - normal-ish fur colors.  Blue, at least to the extent that Aquarius and her family have is nonexistent.  It is likely that she and her family have a small percentage of an aquatic species’ DNA, such as a crayking, in them.

4. Aquarius loves being supportive of other people and listening to and relating to their struggles.  She’s actually a pretty good motivational speaker and is a pretty great friend.  She’s great and I love her.  Also the pants.

5. Aquarius clashes a lot with Shade, another character in her squadron.  I’m not giving Shade his own section but the reason is that he’s an overly negative character, constantly throwing shade at the Halcyon side and complaining about training.  However, once she realizes the reasons for his dissatisfaction with his current situation, she stops calling him out when he says stuff against the Halcyon side.  She does start to debate her own opinions a bit after that, and has a lot of long conversations with Marble about it in their shared bedroom.  (If anyone’s interested in Shade feel free to send me another star asking about him, or reply to this post or w/e! otherwise ill just keep it a secret lol)

Character 5: Grace

1. Thank god, a character that isn’t Majjikku-related lol.  Anyways Grace is the embodiment of a rebellious teenager.  She doesn’t listen to any authority, goes out of her way to do bad things, and will purposely disobey what you say even if she doesnt want to do the thing she’d have to do by disobeying you.  The whole reason she gets involved in Spirits’ plot is because she knows taking money from a stranger to play with the laws of science and reality would be firmly in her dad’s list of things she can’t do.

2. Speaking of her dad, he’s a little bit of a dick.  He’s the reason she’s so disrespectful towards authority.  He’s basically just a stereotypical religious nut; anti-gay, anti-transgender, anti-atheist, anti-anyone who isnt christian, anti-drugs, and he even enforces some form of gender roles.  And he’s very vocal about these things.  He tries to be a huge helicopter parent, but Grace can and will avoid him, ignore his punishments, and stay out so late that her parents cant yell at her for disobeying them.  Her father is very vocal about his displeasure and downright hatred of Grace sometimes, and ever since she started questioning his words when she was a young girl, he’d yell at her for it.  Her older brother isn’t too great either, but he’s more of an annoying slouch who plays video games all day instead of working than a legitimately bad guy.

3. Grace believes she’s straight because she has no interest in being sexual with a woman, but she’d be totally down with kissing and cuddling and being romantic with a woman, hence why I identify her as a biromantic heterosexual.  She’s also the most sexually active of all my characters, which no I will not elaborate on that, not because I dont feel comfortable with it but because I dont know how the fuck that works.  (Also side note, I headcanon things in my own stories so I like to headcanon that at some point Grace and Shawn get together and they can be all romantic and mushy n stuff together but Shawn’s totally okay with Grace going out for one night stands with guys so long as she stays safe.  Obviously they talk everything out to make sure everyone is safe and okay with the relationship, but Shawn’s pretty okay with it; she’s pretty used to Grace having sex with no romantic attraction involved, and ofc Shawn isn’t into sex so she doesn’t feel like it’s a problem.)

4. Grace is closer with her mother than her father, but although her mother is very much a mediator and acts very kind and forgiving to Grace, Grace still kind of despises her.  Just because Grace’s dad is a dick doesn’t mean she isn’t too.

5. Grace’s spirit form is a bloodthirsty wyvern with major anger problems.  Each of the kids’ spirit forms have a slight personality outside of the kids themselves, and Grace’s is bloodthirsty and destructive - not intelligently so, but still.  Most fo the kids’ spirit forms are pretty mindless and just mindlessly destructive, except two.

[an-actual-real-live-eevee]

overlywhirly replied to your post “why do people still think signing a petition is gonna boycott a movie...”

https://youtu.be/Fnij3MHfl6k

friend

buddy

pal

chum

I am already of the opinion that your video here is disrespectful to the mentally ill as it uses ‘triggering’ in a sarcastic manner and triggers are a legitimate thing and should not be joked about or taken lightly, signed, a person with PTSD....but that’s a discussion for another time. just know that I already have an extremely low opinion of your video. it’s not coming from a place of caring about the mentally ill or understanding the stigma around our disorders, and therefore, it really can’t make any valid points.

but that doesn’t mean I won’t do my best to rip the “points” apart anyway, so here we fuckin’ go!

two-face? first happened in 1942. there was so little understanding for the disorder then, first off. there wasn’t even a community to rally against bad portrayals of it. on top of that, I wasn’t alive. I’m twenty. you, uh, see the problem there, right?

in addition....do you have any idea how hard it is to change media that already exists? do you realize how difficult it is to try and get people to retcon shit that’s been canon in a media world for any period of time that is over a month? the reason we’re rallying against Split is because it’s brand-new and it’s barely out. there’s still time with this one. on top of that, it’s been incredibly hyped, and it’s in a popular genre--horror films. something like Criminal Minds? not quite as big a following as a horror film. so not only does it make more sense to oppose a new thing than all the old shit that’s existed for ages and would be much harder to even try and get rid of or point out as a problem, it’s also a much more hyped thing than past media portraying DID as scary and bad.

why don’t I talk about films demonizing things like bipolar? simple: I don’t have bipolar, and therefore, I know nothing about the stigma around it....so I’m not equipped to speak on it, just like the person in your video isn’t equipped to speak on this subject here!

“does the fact that the antagonists are scary or mean or evil make it okay?” wow, somehow both you and this guy managed to completely miss the point of everything we’ve been saying! no. that’s exactly the fucking problem: the antagonists have our disorder and they are scary and mean and evil. that’s the issue we’re talking about here, that’s the problem, please try to keep up. (also, Psycho came out in 1960, I was again not alive and there still wasn’t much of a DID community....are you getting the problems here yet?)

and yeah, sure, there’s shit that hits way closer to the mark in terms of general mental illness....but nothing that hits anywhere near the mark for DID. funny thing I can’t help noticing here? this dude in this video keeps using ‘DID’ and ‘mental illness’ like they’re interchangeable. news flash, buddy: they’re not. and this is an issue specific to DID, that affects only people with DID, not the general ‘mental illness’ community.

“people need to be victimized.” ....you know, I’m suddenly getting the feeling this is one of those guys who doesn’t think sexism is still a thing.

no, people don’t “need” to be victimized. sure, there are probably people who enjoy feeling that way, but they’re not the majority and don’t try to pretend that they are. “people need to feel victimized” is an extremely typical response to actual fucking problems like racism, sexism, ableism, transphobia, and so on. and dismissal of actual problems is what leads to shit like Trump’s presidency! but you keep on toting that “people are making shit up because they want to feel victimized!” flag if it helps you sleep better at night for being so self-centered.

oh wow, we managed to hit on something I actually think is a problem! people fabricating mental illnesses while I, a person with the actual disorder, wonder why anyone would ever want it for themselves. yes, there are lots of people who fake DID or similar on Tumblr, and no, I don’t really get why they would; DID sucks ass, if I’m being honest. it’s just too bad that you and this fellow here can’t put two and two together to realize “people with the actual disorder are upset over people faking it inaccurately and causing problems for those with the actual disorder who need to be taken seriously” is also applicable to “horror movie blows disorder out of proportion, calls it the by the disorder’s name, and uses it as a cheap horror scare while making people with the disorder seem dangerous.”

almost every antagonist in a horror film suffers from some kind of mental condition, you claim? mmm...maybe. I’m sure, if we looked at every antagonist ever in a horror film, we could probably diagnose the undiagnosed ones with some form of a psychiatric problem, based on what was close to what the antagonist seemed to display. 

however! 

this movie, Split? it’s a DID-based movie. it uses the disorder’s goddamn name. it talks about multiple personalities. it makes it VERY fucking clear that this is DISSOCIATIVE IDENTITY DISORDER and nothing else. I can think of, off the top of my head, three horror films I really liked that didn’t label a mental illness for the antagonist to have the way Split does. that right there’s a big part of the problem. in addition, Split’s gone after a very distinctive mental illness--even if they hadn’t labeled it, it would be very clear what they were talking about. also a problem! on top of that....no, this claim is absolutely false; not every antagonist in a horror film is given a mental illness the way Split has given one to their antagonist. I can think of two off the top of my head that I’ve seen and enjoyed that didn’t use mental illness for horror factor at all. I can think of a third that used an extreme version of an existing autoimmune disorder as part of the horror factor. so no, this claim is very false. but even then--you’re not wrong. mental illness is often used as a scare factor in horror films. especially the “scary and dangerous” ones, like psychosis. it may shock you to find I also have a problem with that! but surprisingly, I have a limited amount of energy to devote to online stuff and opposing things, and so I’m trying to take this whole ‘trying to get better portrayals of the mentally ill’ thing one fight at a time. Split caught my eye because it’s been so hyped, and I went from there.

and hey, guess what? part of the whole fucking problem here is that Split is super inaccurately representing DID....in exactly the same way it’s been misrepresented many times before: as a scary disorder that makes you a murderer. like....again, this is part of the problem. (really starting to wonder if you read any of my posts at all, dude.)

why no outcry against the PTSD portrayal of the pink stuffed bear in Toy Story 3? I can posit three guesses: one, it’s a movie targeted for kids, who are rarely in a position to recognize or speak out against PTSD and portrayals of mental illness. kinda an obvious fact there, I’d think? anyway. two, PTSD absolutely can make someone overreactive, easily upset, easily triggered, and sometimes downright cruel or dangerous. that’s not an incorrect portrayal on the whole, and so I wouldn’t actually be upset by it. three, there are decently positive portrayals of PTSD in existence--something DID doesn’t have. PTSD affects many people and is relatively well known about and talked about and not horribly demonized as “having this makes you scary and terrifying”. which isn’t to say it’s totally accepted, but it’s doing better than DID! DID, on the other hand, partly because of its media history and partly because of how few people it affects, is rarely discussed, often demonized, and sometimes even viewed as fake....all of which makes it very hard for actual sufferers of DID LIKE ME to talk about their disorder, discuss it with anyone, be open about it with friends, family, or even therapists--which are PROBLEMS. problems that movies like Split definitely contribute to, but movies like Toy Story 3 really don’t, for aforementioned reasons.

oh boy, here we go with twisting the facts and ignoring the actual truth of how PTSD is handled in most media versus how DID is handled in most media! no, idiot, Toy Story 3 is not teaching kids to ‘fear people with PTSD’. for one thing, by the time a kid learns what PTSD actually is and puts it together that the bear has it, they’ll probably have seen a positive portrayal of it, or they’ll know someone who has it, or at worst, they will have it, and they’ll have to accept it and learn that people with PTSD aren’t scary. on the other hand, DID doesn’t get positive media, people rarely know someone who has it, and it’s even rarer that someone will have it themselves. in addition, this is media directed at adults, who will be able to process that Split is about a real disorder since they NAME IT IN THE MOVIE (the disorder of the bear in Toy Story 3 is UNNAMED), and will already know about mental illness and mental disorders, and will probably take away that DID is a scary disorder at the bottom line.

re: isn’t it teaching kids that if they had a traumatic experience, they’ll probably become evil? ahahahaha. wow. it’s almost like that’s not a rhetoric tossed out to abuse survivors with PTSD all the time, that they’ll grow up to replicate their abuse....OH WAIT IT IS WOW WHAT A COINCIDENCE

.....I don’t think my DID makes me a better type of person, lmao, so I’m not sure where we got THAT from

anyway....in conclusion, I think you and this guy are both idiots who didn’t do their research, and I think you didn’t read my posts at all, and I hope you’ve appreciated this picking apart of this dumbass video! assuming you’re still with me, that is, which I assume you’re not--people like you tend to be giant narcissists who don’t care about others and just want to enjoy things without those damn whiny babies it’s harming speaking up.