#which they both VEHEMENTLY DISAGREE WITH

[willowser]

every single day i think about the influence touya would have had on shouto as an older brother.

he has to take him everywhere he goes, so they're always jamming to the same hardcore music in touya's shitty car. shouto, obviously, develops a taste for the same bands, same songs. shouto is also in the ride-along to buy cigarettes and beer at midnight, and touya threatens his whole entire life if he tells rei, but shouto would never because he likes going too much.

shouto 100% would attempt to kick the ass of anyone that talked shit to his brother. little string bean, doesn't matter, this little boy is throwing HANDS for touya, and touya very much has the attitude of "no one can fuck with my little brother but me". whenever shouto gets in trouble for doing something he shouldn't be doing, touya is always taking the fall for him, no questions asked. shouto lies for touya like it's second nature.

shouto wants an earring because of touya, and touya probably GIVES the piercing to him, which makes enji blow a gasket. touya learns to play the drums and then shouto wants to, too — though he ends up being better than touya and touya promptly quits after that. touya teaches him to drive. shouto gets drunk for the first time with touya BECAUSE touya wants to be there to take care of him. they hate each other, they get into fist fights all the time, rolling around the house as fuyumi screams at both of them. they're best friends. they understand each other more than anyone else ever could.

[anexperimentallife]

Project 2025 would ban anything the far right considers pornography. The far right considers anything queer-positive to be pornography, and they WILL encode that into law if given just a TINY bit more power.

Have queer fanfic (or trad published literature) or pics of your transition, or of two men kissing, saved to your hard drive? If the GOP get their way, you'd be guilty of possession of pornography. Did you share any of it? You'd be guilty of distribution of pornography. Have a sweet coming of age story with a queer protagonist? That'd be child pornography.

Even now, states are trying to make it a crime to be openly queer in public (by, among other things, classifying dressing as the "wrong gender" anyplace kids might see as a sex crime against children). Oh, and Florida tried (and thankfully failed) to impose the death penalty for the above.

This is just one example of the horrors awaiting us if the project comes to fruition.

And the far right is already screaming that any adult who mentions around kids that queer people exist is "grooming" children. Wear your Pride shirt past a playground? You're now a child groomer. Think they won't put that into law if allowed? You're naive.

The GOP currently controls the Supreme Court (which is how they overturned Roe v. Wade) and has a majority in one branch of congress. Imagine what will happen nationwide with the GOP controlling every branch of government, including supermajoroties in both houses of Congress.

Oh, and top GOP officials have also announced their desire to NUKE Gaza, so don't come at me with, "but I can't vote blue because Biden..." Or tell me how you think Gaza would somehow be better off with Trump and the GOP.

In France, the left and center joined together--even though they disagree vehemently on many issues (get two leftists together and they'll have three positions on any issue)--to stop the far right from totally taking over, because the one thing they ALL agree on is that fascists dictatorships are BAD.

Much the same with the UK finally kicking out their own neo-fascist party, the Torries, to install 400 Labour MPs. Not everyone loves Labour's policies, but virtually everyone with a brain cell recognizes that the Torries are fascists, and that FASCISM BAD.

"Every election, they tell us this is the most important election if our lives!" Yeah, because each election over the past several decades has been more important than the one before, until we are now at a tipping point between remaining a fucked up oligarchy with SOME resemblance to freedom, and an outright neo-fascist military dictatorship.

Trump has literally stated publicly his intent to criminalize dissent, use US armed forces against protesters (Kent State, but multiply it by thousands), purge all agencies and stuff them with those personally loyal to him, and use the DOJ to go after anyone he perceives as a threat to his political power, among other things.

And remember the things he did in office, like pulling the teeth of federal workplace protections for queer folks (which Biden reatored).

I don't care if you don't like Biden or Harris. Neither do I. But the alternative is Trump, and anyone telling you not to vote in 2024, or to vote third party, is rooting for Trump, and for Project 2025. Anyone telling you not to vote does not give one single solitary flying fuck about vulnerable populations in the US or anywhere else in the world.

"You're just being an alarmist!" Right. Like I was being alarmist when I predicted the failed Jan 6 coup attempt. Like I was being alarmist when I said the GOP would try to use control over SCOTUS to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Fucking vote.

[glindaselphie]

spoiler alert for act/part 2 for wicked but

I vehemently disagree with the idea that Elphaba just abandons the animals at the end of wicked

for good is not just glinda and elphie singing about their love and friendship, it’s elphaba passing the torch (the grimmerie) on to glinda and trusting her to help the animals and create the oz that elphaba wanted.

elphie knows full well during that song that she is going to “die”. and glinda is literally the person she trusts more than anyone else in the world.

more than fiyero because, as much as I like and understand him, that man becomes a liability the minute he runs off with elphie. his self preservation skills become none and elphaba knows that full well. even if he hadn’t “died” too, she couldn’t have trusted him to do it in a way that wouldn’t endanger himself.

she can trust glinda to do it however because while she has the same love for elphie, she also has both the power and the self preservation skills to help the animals and oz in a way that wouldn’t endanger herself. (glinda is willing by that point to put those skills to the side however and essentially says she doesn’t care about preserving her own reputation any more but elphie begs her and makes her promise to protect her own reputation because she cannot have another fiyero situation)

we don’t see what glinda does in the musical version of the story after the musical but I’m very certain with the wizard gone and morrible in jail - which was the first step in helping the animals - she would have strived to create an oz and help for the animals that honoured elphie’s wishes.

[yanderes-galore]

Yandere Jaehaerys i Targaryen concept.

Sure! Sorry it's gendered, I couldn't figure out how to write this without making darling a lady :(

Additional Thoughts

Yandere! Jaehaerys I Targaryen Concept

Pairing: Romantic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Female Darling, Potential Targcest, Overprotective behavior, Medieval topics, Marriage, Subtle manipulation, Possessive behavior, Pregnancy, Gender roles, Mature themes, Isolation, Imprisonment, Morbid themes, Dubious turned forced relationship.

Well, there's two ways I think this could work.

You replace Alysanne in canon, making you the sister of Jaehaerys whom he's loved since you were both young (Normal for Targaryens).

Or if you don't wish to replace Alysanne, you can be a childhood friend Jaehaerys fell for instead when he was hiding from Maegor.

Regardless, Jaehaerys is a very loyal man and king to his beloved.

You two grew up alongside one another, even surviving Maegor's rule together hidden by the Baratheons..

When Jaehaerys was crowned king, there was only ever one bride he wanted.

You.

He's polite, wise, and caring towards you.

If you chose option one, then you could even bring the dragons into it.

Vermithor and Silverwing are the only canonical dragon pair we know of.

In canon, it's said they loved one another just as much as their riders loved each other.

If you picked option one, you'd have Silverwing as your dragon, which only proves to Jaehaerys you're meant to be when he sees how close your dragons are.

If not, no worries, in option two you are his loyal childhood friend.

He trusts you more than many, in this HC, he'd love you instead of Alysanne.

His yandere behavior is subtle.

Jaehaerys mostly just comes off as a man who is completely loyal and enamored with you, his wife.

Even when his mother and her Baratheon husband tries to betroth him to another...

He clings to you.

Ever since you two were young, many felt you two were as close as can be.

It was no secret Jaehaerys loved you, naturally as king he'd want you as his queen.

He's willing to do anything to get that.

He courts you with many gifts and gives you much affection.

Jaehaerys is a man who'd never force you into anything... at first.

He wants to be your one and only, but he'll wait for you.

He'll wait for you to accept his gifts and his love... Then when he brings up getting married, he marries you in private at Dragonstone when you're ready.

To him, it doesn't matter if his mother is against his affections.

He'd marry you in secret, but not consummate it until you're ready.

He's overly caring, overly protective, yet knows to treat you right.

He's dedicated to the point of telling others off, even The Faith, if they disagree with his decision.

He loves you more than anything.

Nothing could pry you from his grasp.

In a way, you could view his behavior as possessive rather than overly protective.

You mean The Realm to him....

Many think him weak, just like his father.

So he tries to show himself as strong for you and The Realm.

He wants you to love a strong man... one who can protect you from any threat.

However, Jaehaerys is also a man who wants to resolve things peacefully.

He isn't someone who would kill over you, unless your life and happiness were threatened.

Although... Jaehaerys is known to make veiled threats.

He does know how to show he has power.

He wants his voice heard, especially when he's defending his beloved.

Jaehaerys is a gifted rider who would love to ride alongside his beloved.

If you have Silverwing, he makes time to fly beside you.

If you don't ride a dragon, he invites you to ride atop Vermithor with him.

He sees this as bonding.

Jaehaerys trains for you, studies for you, he does nearly everything for you.

He's been attached and fond of you since you were both children.

The only way he'd give you up is if someone pried you from his hands.

Even when word of your secret marriage on Dragonstone would get out, Jaehaerys defends his choice vehemently.

Even when scolded by his mother, Jaehaerys clings to you protectively.

The good thing about Jaehaerys is he's a very doting husband at the start of your marriage.

I can see him as a worship yandere at times, praising you and cooing over you as his darling wife and queen.

He'd choose no one else.

Even if demanded.

You're taken hunting, riding, and with him to discuss diplomatic matters.

He pledges his love for you, showers you in kisses, holds you close...

Even more so once you carry his heirs.

He's smothering and protective, which seems like the worse he'd get.

Although... He does have dragons... and knows how to show others he means business.

If you were ever pregnant with his child, he is adamant on keeping you in the Red Keep.

Jaehaerys is a decent king compared to his uncle, Maegor.

Yet Jaehaerys still has the typical medieval gender views when it comes to women.

Despite that, as his queen, you are given respect.

Jaehaerys was known for fixing the realm after Maegor's rule.

Such a goal he hopes to have you aid him in as queen.

He treats his beloved well and doesn't seem all that bad compared to most Targaryens.

However... There's still glaring issues.

He's a good husband at times... but was evidently poor with his daughters.

That... and Jaehaerys has been shown in canon to have his wife bear... many heirs (In canon he tried for thirteen children, but nine lived until adulthood)

So one could say he'd be demanding of his obsession.

Jaehaerys would be fine towards you until you two start fighting.

He wouldn't show many toxic behaviors until your marriage begins to fail.

In fact, you may have loved him until issues began appearing.

In canon, these issues involved him marrying off his daughters too young or straight up casting them aside.

He was fine with his sons... but not his daughters.

However, in this concept, you two could fight for another reason if you wish.

To keep it dark, maybe he begins showing controlling behavior?

He may be a worship yandere... yet he's also a subtle manipulative one.

He keeps asking you for children... He keeps trying to lock you in the Red Keep...

Essentially, when he becomes too overbearing in this, you begin to no longer be fond of him.

Jaehaerys begins to notice when you pull away from him, turn down intimacy of any kind, and just glare.

Your marriage goes cold with the king and you want an out.

Nothing he does makes you happy anymore.

Jaehaerys actually becomes a bit... worried.

Even as he makes The Realm a better place, you're filled with disdain... He can't seem to fix his marriage.

Despite his actions, Jaehaerys still adores you.

He's still infatuated, even.

So... Seeing you so distant begins to drive the now older man to court you again.

He orders gifts for you, he offers dragon rides, hunting, reading, anything...

You ignore him.

It both frustrates him and makes him worried.

Will you never love him again?

How can he make it up to you?

Jaehaerys may try giving you your space to make you love him again.

Yet if that doesn't work... and he senses you'll try to flee for Dragonstone or somewhere similar to leave him...

He may need to convince you in other ways.

Imagine Jaehaerys imprisoning you for treason.

That or just locking you in your shared chambers.

He can't bear the thought of you leaving him.

Your children grow concerned about their father's behavior.

Unfortunately, Jaehaerys doesn't change his mind.

If you hate him... He'll tolerate it.

Yet he's going to keep you with him for the rest of his days.

He's used to the arguments you give him at this point.

The entire time he thinks back to when you two genuinely loved one another.

Being king is a hard life.

Even harder when your queen no longer loves you.

However... Jaehaerys would be determined to make you love him again.

If that doesn't work?

He'll just be happy dying beside you while your children take the Iron Throne and Dragonstone.

Ever since you two married, you're stuck to him.

It doesn't matter what you do... or if you reciprocate or not...

Jaehaerys will always love you, die beside you, and keep you to himself for the rest of your days. No matter what.

[renthony]

"Rose Quartz was a bad mother" is a really baffling interpretation of Steven Universe, because Rose never got to be a mother in the first place.

Even if you take the stance that Rose was a bad person (which I vehemently disagree with, but you do you I guess), it's still not possible for her to have been a "bad mom" or even a "good mom." We literally have no idea what kind of mother she would have been to Steven, because she died.

She left some messy stuff behind, sure, but who the hell doesn't leave messy stuff behind when they die? A traumatized victim of generational trauma and abuse dying in childbirth doesn't equal "bad mother." Like, what?

And on top of that, if I dropped dead tomorrow and my shitty abusive family members swarmed around my kid, that's...not my fault? I've done everything I can in life to keep my kid away from the shitty abusive parts of our family. I cut them out as thoroughly as I possibly can. I can't control anything else. If they show up after I die to harass my kiddo, that's not my doing. Because I would in fact be dead.

I think way too many people try to make Rose responsible for literally every bad action that other people took, which is asinine both because it takes agency and impact away from every other character, but also because, like. She's not real. She is fictional. You don't have to hold her accountable for crimes, and that was never the point of the story in the first place. She served a narrative purpose, which was to tell a story about generational trauma. I'm less interested in "bad person vs good person" analysis and much more interested in "was this an effective way to tell a story about a very messy victim of cyclical abuse, and how hard it is to break the cycle without there being repercussions. Sometimes the cycle doesn't break cleanly."

I think it was, personally, especially considering the huge amounts of censorship heaped upon the show. I'd love to take a peek into the universe where they got to fully flesh out the story they originally intended, instead of getting cut off at the knees by homophobic studio heads.

[rubra-wav]

[ Entry #9 ] Various Vox headcanons

A/N I've got a post coming up about what I think it'd be like to actually date him coming up, (alongside Snap part 2 ofc, I'm just taking my time w it to try keep things accurate) so here's some points which will lead into that next post + other misc stuff I've been thinking abt.

Cw: SFW above cut, NSFW below cut - 18+ MDNI, reference to manipulative behaviours

SFW

- While drunk, he's both very affectionate and cute but also gets really sad and clingy. If you stop paying attention to him for even a second while he's gonna start bawling like a giant baby. It's also the only time he's truly 100% honest with how he feels about you.

Basically; the mask falls right off, so he doesn't like to get drunk around people. He will deny all that's been said or done during this.

- He doesn't need to sleep but likes to - when he sleeps tho he doesn't really sleep in the traditional sense but instead goes into a preset 'sleep mode' for a specific set of time. He can also be rebooted remotely if you need him up before he's programmed to wake up again. (I discuss more abt this type stuff in entry #4)

- Follow up point: when he dreams while in sleep mode, his dreams play on his screen. He often dreams about becoming essentially king of hell and having people worship him like a god.

If you bring this up, he will be embarrassed as all fucking hell and will also deny it vehemently.

- He ends up getting water damage fairly often because he really loves swimming and aquatic environments ironically.

He's of course got ways of waterproofing himself properly, but usually he will do it badly or just not give a fuck about it and go swimming impulsively.

Will complain like a bitch after getting water damaged as well, holy shit. Blames everything but himself about it.

- Follow up: if you ever take this man to an aquarium on a date, he's going to be so fucking excited about everything he's seeing.

He will be trying to contain himself, but he may end up letting the mask of calmness slip at points and just start randomly talking a million miles an hour about whatever shark, fish, sea creature, etc. He's seeing. He loves sharks so much.

- Somewhat follow-up point: If you 1. don't tell him to shut up about shit when he starts getting excited and talking really fast and loudly AND 2. Actually listen?

He's gonna be so goddamn happy. Holy shit.

He's used to being told to shut up when he starts talking about ideas he has for a new VoxTek project, so if you give him feedback and your thoughts on it once he's done info dumping? He's gonna start internally screaming because he's so happy about it.

- Follow up follow-up: He doesn't take criticism well though. In fact, he's a baby. If you're in a relationship and you've gotten him out of his bs a bit with his ego being fragile as shit about everything, it'll be better but still pretty bad.

He needs reassurance that just because you disagree or think (y) would be a better alternative than what's his (x), that you still think it's a good idea, lmao.

- If you wear blue light glasses he can't hypnotise you, and he absolutely fucking hates it. In an argument or confronting him, you just put on bluelight glasses and cross your arms, and he's so annoyed about it.

You'd need to start wearing blue light glasses, because this asshole will be trying to hypnotise you into forgetting things if you see something of him that he deems 'undesirable' about himself for you to see.

- He's such a colossal attention whore that the second you are doing something thats not to do with him or talking to someone who isn't him, he's gonna be pissy asf about it.

Think glaring at you while pouting and loudly tapping his foot. He's such a little shit 💀

- He's so intensely touch starved it's not even funny. If you're doing anything his hands are gonna be on your hip, your back or your shoulders.

He desperately wants to be physically close to you but he also will never normally instigate cuddle sessions because he thinks it's embarrassing that he wants them so badly. If you instigate them, he will absolutely love it.

Just not in public, though. If you try to be super affectionate or maybe even affectionate with him at all publicly, he'll be pushing you away telling you to wait until later.

And will get mad if you try get a bit defensive about it with him.

NSFW

- He has barely any self-control and ends up getting unintentionally excited really easily - even in situations where he really shouldn't be. If you as his partner are cuddling him, sitting in his lap, touching his neck, or god forbid the ports, he's gonna get hard so quickly it's not even funny.

Him being touch starved is really a double-edged sword because he wants to be near you, but also he gets unintentionally way too physically excited about it and ends up embarrassed asf most of the time.

- Kinda follow up point: I feel as if he's extremely repressed sexually in general. He works extremely long hours to maintain his control over everything single day, and considering his tendency to start zapping things when he gets closer to finishing / overwhelmed, he'd likely not be taking any chances at all with that.

So when he gets physically near his partner alone (and also not even alone), his body just kinda goes 'time to make up for lost time'. 💀

- Most sensitive erogenous zones on him (outside of his dick obviously) are his neck and ports. I'm not sure if him having ports for nipples is canon or not, but if it still is, those are the more sensitive ones. The ones on the back of his head are still an absolute killer, though.

If you kiss his neck even softly, he'll be tensing up, and if you're kissing him or cuddling him and gently brush up against the ports on the back of his head, or your chest brushes against his and brings him nipple stimulation - he's gonna be getting a boner as quick as it gets.

- He doesn't really care too much about his partner's height, but I get the vibe that he'd have a size difference thing and would love a partner who's smaller than him (but not tiny still)

It would trip his ego so much to be able to physically look down on people in general, but with a partner? He'd be going mildly insane about it but in a different way.

Wear his clothes, and they're massive on you? He's gonna be turned on as absolute hell by that. Especially if it's one of his button ups and its neckline is plunging and giving him an eyeful of your chest.

He can easily pick you up and pull you against him in whatever way? Goes absolutely nuts about it.

I love it when I try to go,'this will only be short', then my brainrot takes hold, and my ideas just keep flowing. 💀

Masterlist

[snowglobe-system]

Hi! Feel no pressure to answer, but I have a few questions (regarding DID)

So I'm aware of what an endo system is, but I'm a bit confused on why it would be considered valid since the condition is directly caused by trauma, which is the thing that endos lack. Could you please explain your perspective on it? And maybe your perspective before you became pro-endo?

Hey! I've been sitting on this ask for a few days now. I do want to start out by thanking you for reaching out to me and asking about my perspective. Please note that you are not obligated to agree with me, or to change your mind just from my answer to your questions. I like having you as a mutual, and I will continue to do so regardless of your syscourse stance.

I'm going to grab a term that some of my mutuals in the DID community have used, and say I'm really more pro syscourse conversation than I am pro endo- pro endo is just the easiest way to communicate my basic stances.

I think the most important thing to understand here is that a lot of the time, the "are endos real" debate suffers from both sides fundamentally misunderstanding what the other's stance actually is. While there is a small subsection of the endo community claiming that DID isn't trauma based- which I vehemently disagree with, DID is absolutely trauma based, and that's backed by all of the research- that's not the majority.

Most endogenic systems are not claiming to have DID. They are claiming to experience themselves as more than one. I am by no means an expert on this, but I know that it is a very western-centric view to assume that everyone subscribes to being one singular self. If you want to learn more about non-western views on the self and on plurality, I would recommend looking at @system-of-a-feather's blog. They make great posts on the subject!

And- here's a real kicker- not everyone with a CDD- CDD standing for complex dissociative disorders and including the likes of DID, OSDD, P-DID, UDD, etc- actually identifies as plural. Not everyone with even DID identifies as plural. So if someone with a CDD can identify as one, what's stopping someone who doesn't have a CDD from identifying as more than one? This post puts it pretty well, so I'm just going to link it here! And if you're looking for scientific backing on endo systems? Dr Colin Ross, one of the very well known DID researchers, believes in non-traumagenic self states.

Basically, I'm choosing to believe people when they talk about their subjective personal experiences.

Now you did also ask about my anti-endo days and I will also gladly talk about those. I will admit, I was the worst kind of anti-endo. I was the type of person who would throw even other CDD systems under the bus as fakers because I wanted to seem more legitimate. Everyone who didn't present the "right" way was a faker. And endos, my goodness. They were the worst fakers of them all.

It was an extremely reactive position to take. I was suffering from my plurality, therefore everyone who wasn't had to be faking. They were making a mockery out of me! At least, that's how I perceived it.

And then I started interacting with endos, and pro endos. I realized that they were also real people, not just an abstract concept to make fun of to make myself look more legitimate. And I started reading blogs that had the rawest, realest content about CDDs that I'd come across thus far... and they were pro endo. And the arguments as to why were really good.

Somewhere along the way, I realized that the things that were leading me to being anti endo were the same things that made me into a transmed when in the 2010s. I believed that people had to meet a minimum quota of suffering to be real. In a way, I was defining people by it. And ultimately, if they are lying? It costs me nothing to believe them. I'd rather believe some liars than not believe people who are telling the truth. I've had enough experience with people not believing me. It sucks. I didn't want to keep doing that to others.

That's about the end of this yap session! Seriously, thanks again for asking, I really enjoyed writing this post. I hope I answered in a way that makes sense to you!

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

How do you analyze so good I'm really impressed and honestly wonder if I can learn from you

It's a skill, so the good news is, you can practice and get better at it!

Read A Lot/Gain Context

Analysis often means making comparisons or drawing from external context - one of the best things you can do if you want to be better at analysis is to try to cram your head with as much knowledge as possible. The time period, culture of origin, and where the author slots into those are usually major influences on a work (in Homestuck's case, much of it is a direct commentary on the internet culture it emerged from, and missing that part of it can drastically influence how the story reads).

Also important are the works the author themselves are inspired by. You've likely heard some variation of "nothing is original." We're actually really lucky with Homestuck in that regard, as the work is highly referential, and you can glean a lot by looking at what it references (for example, if you watch Serendipity, one of Karkat's favorite movies, which is titledropped during the troll romance explanation, you will understand Karkat so much better). This applies to things like mythological allusions - you'll hardly know why it matters that Karkat is a Christ figure if you don't know what the general outline of the Christ story is, nor will you pick up on the Rapture elements of Gamzee's religion or the fact that Doc Scratch is The Devil, etc. The key to picking up a lot of symbolism is being aware that the symbols exist.

And last, it helps to read a lot of media and media analysis so you can get a better understanding of how media "works" - how tropes are used, what effect language has, what other entries into the genre/works with similar themes/etc. have already done to explore the same things as the piece being analyzed is doing - and what other people have already gleaned and interpreted. I've mentioned before that many people seem to find Homestuck's storytelling bizarre and unique when it's actually quite standard for postmodernism, the genre it belongs to. But you're not going to know that if you've never read anything postmodern, y'know? I also often prepare for long character essays by reading other peoples' character essays - sometimes people pick up on things I miss, and sometimes people have interpretations I vehemently disagree with; both of these help me to refine my take on the matter.

Try to Discard Biases/Meet the Work Where It Is

Many will carry into reading media an expectation of what they want to get out of it. For example, one generally goes into a standard hetero romance book expecting a female lead, a male love interest, romance (of course), and a happy ending for the happy couple. If the book fails to deliver these things, a reader will often walk away thinking it was a bad book, even if the story told instead is objectively good and interesting. We actually see this a lot with Wuthering Heights, which receives very polarizing reviews because people go into it expecting a gothic romance, when it's really more like a gossip Youtube video spilling the tea on some shitty rich people (and it's really good at being that).

There's nothing necessarily wrong with this when reading for pleasure and personal enjoyment, but it presents a problem when attempting to analyze something. There's a concept called the "Procrustean bed," named after a mythological bandit who used to stretch people or cut off their limbs to fit them to a bed, that describes "an arbitrary standard to which exact conformity is forced." Going into a media reading with expectations and biases often results in a very Procrustean reading - I'm sure we've all seen posts complaining about how fanfic often forces canon characters to fit certain archetypes while discarding their actual character traits, etc.

Therefore, when reading for analysis, it's generally a good idea to try and discard as much bias and expectation as possible (obviously, we are never fully free of bias, but the effort counts) - or, perhaps even better, to compartmentalize those biases for comparison while reading. For example, Hussie talks at length about what they INTENDED Homestuck to be, and, while reading, I like to keep Hussie's words to the side while I try to experience the comic fresh, seeing what choices were made in accordance with Hussie's intentions, or where I think Hussie may have fumbled the messaging. At the same time, I try to let the work stand on its own, set in its proper context.

I'd say this is the number-one problem in fandom analysis. For example, people hear from the fandom that Eridan is an incel or a nice guy, so they interpret everything he says and does to fit that belief, or ignore any contradictory evidence. Or they fall for the character's façade that's meant to be dismantled by the viewer. Some works are fairly shallow and accessible, wearing all their meaning on their sleeve (or are Not That Deep, if you prefer meme-talk), and problems arise when a work is, in fact, That Deep, because someone biased towards the former will discard evidence that a work is the latter. This isn't exclusive to HS - it's happened in basically all of my fandoms - which is a statement to how easy it is to fall into this way of thinking.

Even without knowing that Hussie had coming-of-age themes in mind, for example, characters will talk about being kids and growing up. Knowing that Hussie has explicitly said that that's one of HS's themes serves as extra evidence for that interpretation, but the work itself tells you what it's about - if you're willing to listen to it.

Even If the Curtains are Just Blue, That Still Means Something

This is the next biggest fandom stumbling block - thr insinuation that when things in a work are put into the work without more explicit symbolism, that that means they're a discardable detail. This one is more about making a mindset shift - details aren't discardable, even if they don't appear to have been made with the explicit intention to mean something. Everything kind of means something.

First of all, whether or not the curtains are Just Blue is often highly dependent on the work. For example, in something made in large quantities with little time, staff, and budget - say, for example, one of the entries into the MCU's TV shows - there likely isn't too much meaning behind a choice of blue curtains in a shot (although you'd be surprised how often choices in these constrained environments are still very deliberately made). In a work like Homestuck, however, so terribly dense with symbolism and allegory, chances are, the blue curtains DO hold some special meaning, even if it's not readily apparent.

However, even in cases where a choice is made arbitrarily, it still usually ends up revealing something about the work's creative process. Going back to our MCU example, perhaps the blue curtains were chosen because the shot is cool-toned and they fit the color grading. Perhaps they were chosen because the director really likes blue. Perhaps the shot was filmed at an actual location and the blue curtains were already there. Or, even, perhaps the blue curtains were just what they had on hand, and the show was made too quickly and cheaply to bother sourcing something that would fit the tone or lend extra meaning. These all, to varying degrees, say something about the work - maybe not anything so significant that it would come up in an analysis, but they still contribute to a greater understanding of what the work is, what it's trying to say, and how successful it is at saying it.

And this applies to things with much higher stakes. For example, Hussie being a white US citizen likely had an effect on the B1 kids being mostly US citizens, and there was discourse surrounding how, even though they were ostensibly aracial, references were made to Dave's pale skin. Do I think these were deliberate choices made to push some sort of US superiority; no, obviously not. But they still end up revealing things about the creation of the work - that Hussie had certain biases as a result of being who they were.

Your Brain is Designed to Recognize Patterns, So Put That to Use

So with "establish context" and "discard expectations" out of the way, we can start getting into the nitty-gritty of what should be jumping out at you when attempting to understand a work. One of the most prominent things that you should be looking for is PATTERNS.

Writing is a highly conscious effort, which draws from highly unconscious places. Naturally, whether these patterns are intentional or unintentional is dependent on the author (see again why reading up on a work's context is so important), but you can generally bet that anything that IS a pattern is something that holds significance.

For example, Karkat consistently shows that he's very distraught when any of his friends get hurt, that he misses his friends, even the murderous assholes, that he's willing to sit them down and intervene on their behalf, despite all his grandstanding to the contrary. We are supposed to notice that Karkat actually loves his friends, and that he's lying when he says he doesn't care about them.

Homestuck is very carefully and deliberately crafted; if something comes up more than once, it's a safe bet to assume that you're supposed to notice, or at least feel, it. Don't take my word for it:

Basically, [reusing elements is] about building an extremely dense interior vocabulary to tell a story with, and continue to build and expand that vocabulary by revisiting its components often, combining them, extending them and so on. A vocabulary can be (and usually is) simple, consisting of single words, but in this case it extends to entire sentences and paragraph structures and visual forms and even entire scenes like the one linked above. Sometimes the purpose for reiteration is clear, and sometimes there really is no purpose other than to hit a familiar note, and for me that's all that needs to happen for it to be worthwhile. Triggering recognition is a powerful tool for a storyteller to use. Recognition is a powerful experience for a reader. It promotes alertness, at the very least. And in a lot of cases here, I think it promotes levity (humor! this is mostly a work of comedy, remember.) Controlling a reader's recognition faculty is one way to manipulate the reader's reactions as desired to advance the creative agenda.

But this applies to less deliberately-crafted work, too; for example, if an author consistently writes women as shallow, cruel, and manipulative, then we can glean that the author probably has some sort of issue with women. Villains often being queer-coded suggests that the culture they come from has problems with the gays. Etc. etc.

This is how I reached my conclusion that Pale EriKar is heavily foreshadowed - the two are CONSTANTLY kind to each other, sharing secrets, providing emotional support, etc. etc. It's why that part of my Eridan essay is structured the way that it is - by showing you first how consistently the two interact in suspiciously pale-coded ways, the fact that a crab is shown in both Eridan's first appearance AND his appearance on the moirallegiance "hatched for each other" page becomes the cincher of a PATTERN of the two being set up to shoosh-pap each other.

A work will tell you about itself if you listen. If it tells you something over and over, then it's basically begging you to pay attention.

Contrast is Important, Too

Patterns are also significant when they're broken. For example, say a villain is constantly beating up the protagonist. Here's our pattern: the hero is physically weaker than the villain. In a straight fight, the hero will always lose.

And then, at the mid-season two-parter, the hero WINS. Since we've set up this long pattern of the hero always losing to this villain, the fact that this pattern was disrupted means that this moment is extremely important for the work. Let's say the hero wins using guile - in this case, we walk away with the message that the work is saying that insurmountable obstacles may have workarounds, and adaptability and flexibility are good, heroic traits. Now let's say the hero won using physical strength, after a whole season of training and practicing - in this case, we say that the work says hard work and effort are heroic, and will pay off in the end.

In Homestuck, as an example, we set up a long pattern of Vriska being an awful, manipulative bitch, and a fairly remorseless killer. And then, after killing Tavros, she talks to John and admits that she's freaking out because she feels really bad about it. This vulnerability is hinted at by some of her earlier actions/dialogue, which is itself a pattern to notice, but it's not really explicit until it's set up to be in direct contrast to the ultimate spider8itch move of killing Tavros. This contrast is intended to draw our attention, to point out something significant - hey, Vriska feels bad! She's a product of her terrible society and awful lusus! While it's shitty that she killed Tavros, she's also meant to be tragic and sympathetic herself!

Hussie even talks about how patterns and surprises are used in tandem:

Prior to Eridan's entrance into the room, and even during, the deaths were completely unguessable. After Feferi's death, Kanaya's becomes considerably more so, but still quite uncertain. After her death, all bets are off. Not only do all deaths thereafter become guessable, but in some cases, "predictable". That's because it was the line between a series of shocking events, and the establishment of an actual story pattern. The new pattern serves a purpose, as a sort of announcement that the story is shifting gears, that we're drifting into these mock-survival horror, mock-crime drama segments, driven by suspense more than usual. The suspense has more authority because of all the collateral of unpredictability built up over time, as well as all the typical stuff that helps like long term characterization. But now that the pattern is out in the open, following through with more deaths no longer qualifies as unpredictability. Just the opposite, it would now be playing into expectations, which as I said, can be important too. This gear we've switched to is the new normal, and any unpredictability to arise thereafter will necessarily be a departure from whatever current patterns would indicate.

Patterns are important because they tell you what baselines the work is setting - what's normal, what's standard, what this or that generally "means." Contrast is important because it means something has changed, or some significant point is being made. They work in tandem to provide the reader with points of focus in the story, things to keep in mind as they read, consciously or unconsciously.

Theme

I'm talking about this stuff in pretty broad and open terms because stories are so malleable, and so myriad, and can say so many things. There are stories where horrible cruelties are painted as good things - propoganda is the big one, but consider all the discourse around romance books that paint abusive/toxic relationships as ideal. There are stories where the protagonist is actually the villain, and their actions are not aspirational, and works where everyone sucks and nobody is aspirational, and works where everybody is essentially a good person, if sometimes misguided.

This is, again, why outside context is so important, and biases need to be left at the door. For example, generally speaking, one can assume that the protagonist of a children's cartoon is going to be an aspirational hero, or at least a conflicted character who must learn to do the right thing. However, there are even exceptions to this! Invader Zim, for example, features an outright villain protagonist - a proud servant of a fascist empire - and for a lower-stakes example, the Eds of Ed, Edd, n' Eddy are the neighborhood scammers, constantly causing problems for the other characters with their schemes.

Thus, how do we determine what any particular narrative's stance on a given topic is? It's a difficult question to answer because every narrative is different. If I say something like, "the things that bring the protagonists success in their goals are what the narrative says are good," then we run into the issue of villain/gray morality protagonists. To use moral terms like "hero" and "villain" instead runs into the problem of defining morality within a narrative in the first place. But you have to draw the line somewhere.

So that brings us to themes.

Now, as with a lot of artistic terms, "theme" isn't necessarily well-defined (this isn't helped by the way the word is used colloquially to mean things like aesthetic, moral of the story, or symbolism). Wikipedia says: "In contemporary literary studies, a theme is a central topic, subject, or message within a narrative," but this is still very broad and hard to work with, so I'll give it a shot.

A theme is what a work says, beyond the literal series of events. Sometimes a theme is obvious - the theme of Boy Who Cried Wolf is that if you become famous for lying, you won't be believed when you tell the truth. Sometimes a theme is one of many - for example, Disney's Cinderalla says that kindness and virtue will eventually be recognized and rewarded, and that cruelty is interlinked with ugliness. Sometimes a theme is unintentional - for example, how Disney's body of work tends to villainize queer-coded characters. Sometimes context and the passage of time changes the theme - for example, Snow White originally held a message of hope for wartime families that domestic normalcy would one day return, but is now seen as anti-feminist as it appears to insinuate that a woman's place is in the kitchen, and her happiness is in marriage to a man. And sometimes a theme is not something you agree with.

In any case, a theme is a meaning to be gleaned from the text, more broad and universally applicable than the text itself. After all, we humans have traditionally always used story to impart meaning; our oldest epic, The Epic of Gilgamesh, contains within it several themes, most famously that of accepting one's mortality. It's startling, really, how applicable the story is to this day, even if specific details have become obtuse or unsavory to a modern reader.

This is, again, why it's so important to engage with a text on its own terms, in its own context, with as little bias as possible. A story's themes are not necessarily apparent, and commonly implied rather than stated outright, and approaching the story with expectations can easily lead to a Procrustean twisting of the facts to fit those expectations. A theme should emerge to the analyzer out of the reading, not the other way around.

Identifying theme gets easier with practice, and largely comes down to identifying patterns within the narrative (alongside looking at context and symbolism, of course). What does the narrative consistently touch base on? Are there any references; is there any symbolism? What does the story deem "normal," "good," or "bad"? How are ideas developed, and why? Why did these events happen, and are those motivations echoed anywhere else?

Homestuck is very complex and tackles many topics at once, and explaining why it's a coming-of-age would basically require a whole second essay, so I'll use a simpler and more popular example (like I've been trying to do) - let's say, Shrek.

The most obvious theme of Shrek is that beauty does not equate goodness, that one mustn't judge a book by its cover. The opening sequence is LITERALLY Shrek ripping out pages of a fairy tale book to use as toilet paper, and the movie ends with Fiona finding that her happiest, truest self IS as an ugly ogre. Shrek's main character conflict is that people immediately judge him as cruel and evil because he's ugly, and the characters' lowest points occur because Fiona is similarly insecure about her ogre half, considering it unlovable.

But there's other stuff in there, too. For example, if you know that Dreamworks and Shrek were founded after a falling out with Disney, then the beautiful, sanitized city of Dulac, with its switchback queue and singing animatronics add to this theme of a direct refutation of traditional Disney fairytale values, mocking them as manufactured, inhuman, and even cruel in the way that they marginalize those who don't fit an ideal of beauty. Again we see the opening sequence - defacing a fairytale - as support for this, but also the way that Dulac is displacing fairytale creatures. There's a moment where Gepetto literally sells Pinocchio, which can easily be read as a commentary on the crass commercialization and exploitation of fairy tales Disney likes to do.

And then, of course, there are lesser, supplementary themes. Love being a powerful positive force is one - Donkey is able to rally Shrek after he truly reciprocates Dragon's love for him (which echoes the theme of not equating goodness with beauty, as Dragon is still big and scary), and it's true love's kiss that grants Fiona her happy ending.

And then there's stuff that's unintentional. There's all this work done about how beauty =/= goodness, but then they made the villain incredibly short, which is a traditionally unattractive physical feature. So, does that mean that ugly things can be beautiful unless that ugliness is specifically height?

Sometimes, authorial intent does not match up with result - but in those instances, I think the most is revealed about the author. Modern Disney products tend to be very cowardly about going anti-corporation and pro-weirdness, despite their usual feel-good tones and uplifting themes - and that says a lot about Disney, doesn't it. That's why I think it's still important to keep authorial intent in mind, if possible, even if they fumble what they say they've set out to do.

Obviously, Lord Fuckwad being short doesn't REALLY detract from the overall message - but it's still a weird hitch in the themes, which I think is interesting to talk about, so you can see where personal judgement and biases DO have to be applied. There are two options here, more or less - either one believes that Shrek is making an exception for short people, who are of the Devil, or one believes that the filmmakers did a bit of an oopsie. Barring an outright statement from the filmmakers, there's no way to know for sure.

We can say a work has very complex themes when it intentionally explores multiple ideas very deeply. We can say a work has shallow themes when it doesn't have much intentional meaning, and/or that meaning is explored very lightly. The labyrinthine storytelling of Homestuck, with its forays into mortality, morality, and growing up, chock full of symbolism and pastiche and allusions, is a work with complex themes - especially as compared to the average newspaper comic strip, although they ostensibly share a genre.

We can say a work has very unified themes when these themes serve to compliment each other - the refutation of Disney-esque values, and love as a positive driving force, compliment the main theme in Shrek of not judging books by their covers, of beauty not equating to goodness. Ugly things are worthy of love, and those who push standards of beauty are evil and suck.

Similarly, we can say a work has unfocused or messy themes when the themes it includes - intentionally or not - contradict, distract, and/or detract from each other. Beauty has no correlation to goodness... unless you're short, in which case, you are closer to Hell and therefore of evil blood. To get a little controversial, this is actually why I didn't like Last Wish very much - there are approximately three separate storylines, with three separate thematic arcs, going on in the same movie, none of which particularly compliment each other - so the experience was very messy to me, story-wise, even though it was pretty and the wolf was hot. This is why we feel weird about Disney pushing anti-corporate messages, when they're a big corporate machine, or why it's easy to assume Homestuck was written poorly if you don't like Hussie - we want themes to be coherent, we want context to be unified with output.

Tone

Tone is somehow even harder to define than theme. It's like, the "vibe" of a work. For example, you generally don't expect something lighthearted to deal with the realistic, brutal tragedies of war. Maybe it'll touch on them in light, optimistic ways, but it isn't about to go All Quiet on the Western Front on the reader. By the same token, you don't expect fully happy endings out of the melodrama of opera, or frivolous slice of life from something grimdark.

Tone, too, is something people often wind up Procrusteanizing, which makes discussion difficult if two people disagree. If I read Homestuck as unwaveringly optimistic, with its downer ending the result of an author fumble, I'm pretty much going to irreconcileably disagree with somebody who reads Homestuck as though it's always been a kind of tragedy where things don't work out for the characters. Since it's even more difficult to define than theme, I'm not even really going to bother; I just felt like I had to bring it up because, despite its nebulosity, it's vital to how one reads and interprets a text. Sometimes I don't have a better answer for why I dislike a certain interpretation other than that it doesn't suit the work's tone. I generally try to avoid saying that, though, because it winds up smacking of subjective preference.

In summary... analysis is about keeping everything in mind all the time! But i swear, it gets easier the more you do it. Happy reading!

[carrymelikeimcute]

The izcourse continues...

When did people stop saying 'in my opinion'? because lord above would that simple phrase have stopped me getting so mad this morning.

I have no interest in reblogging the posts and starting drama, but some izzy takes I've seen this morning have made me want to chew through rawhide, and here's my opinion on why these 'factual statements' are wrong.

Izzy fans shouldn't be upset by his death because he's not a main character, he is a plot device to further the story of the main characters.

I'm a professional writer btw and to me a 'plot device' character is the barista who's in one scene. To me, if a named character with backstory and complicated interpersonal history with one or more main characters is just 'a plot device' - that's a waste of a character and shitty writing. I don't think ofmd is shittily written so this annoys me on two levels - disrespecting the show, and the character. Because in my view if Izzy is 'just a plot device' that's someone insulting the show.

2. Izzy was an antagonist and antagonists can only ever be redeemed and then die, or become a villain.

Not even true of ofmd and certainly not of media in general, yet stated as fact with nothing to back it up. This is NOT an opinion btw - you only have to look at Zheng and Jackie to know it's not true within the context of the show.

Jackie dobs Stede in to the British just as much as Izzy does, and she threatens them with vengeance again over the indigo - does she die? Does she become a villain? No, she's a guest at the lupete wedding for fuck sake.

Zheng insults Ed and attempts to kill Stede, two things Izzy was vilified for, gosh it was so sad when she died in the finale wasn't it? Oh no wait, she became their ally and sailed away on The Revenge!

'Have to die or become villains' is just...incomprehensible to me. The only way I can see it working in someone's head is if they think character like Jackie and Zheng did nothing wrong, when Izzy was evil, for doing the same things - albeit for more personally passionate reasons.

3. Izzy telling Ed that the ship's atmosphere was poison because of 'his feelings for Stede' was Izzy 'blaming Ed's actions on love again, just like he did in s1.e10 because Izzy is just one-note evil and only ever has that one thing to say.

To me, s1 Izzy is absolutely thrilled to have managed to bait Ed to anger, to have brought this out of him. He thinks he knows what he's just unleashed, but as we soon discover, he has no idea - because Ed had never cut off one of his extremities before. He poked the bear, but the bear was actually a fucking kraken.

s2 Izzy, in my opinion, looking at his expression above, is sad, resigned, he is saying Stede's name (which it's already established even obliquely mentioning him is a BAD IDEA with the whole 'talk it through' thing, after which Izzy sounds panicked) but he is specifically trying to make Ed see that he is not himself - that what he is doing to the crew is toxic.

Just because he's essentially saying 'This isn't you' in both scenes, doesn't mean the tone or the meaning of those scenes is the same. One scene ends with Izzy gleeful, victorious. One ends with him screaming on the deck, bleeding out.

I am happy for people to have these opinions, and for me to vehemently disagree with them, but they ARE opinions. And Izzy 'fans' or you know, people who see the show differently to you, are not stupid, racist, immature or whatever else you want to call us.

We just have a different opinion. If you're going to share your opinion, great! But it's still just your opinion.

[violetasteracademic]

Hi :)

I know that you believe the Elucien bond is real but it's Cauldron created so it's not a bond of love, rather a bond of matching Fae to create offspring that the Asteri can feed off. (I'm honestly torn because there is so much evidence suggesting this but there's also some evidence to suggest that the Elucien bond is similar to Rowan/Lyria's; all that to say, I constantly go back and forth 😂)

I'm curious what you make of Azriel being able to smell the Elucien bond. It seems odd to me but I don't have your repertoire of ACOTAR knowledge, so I'm interested if you've given it any thought!

Hellooooo my darling! So, I think both are actually true; I think the Cauldron bond is "real" in the sense that the Asteri used their power to actually create new bonds to serve them. I think they are a perversion and corruption of what the bonds were intended to be- but they aren't "fake" in the sense that with ToG Maeve used her power to create an illusion:

Whereas the disruption of Rowan's mating bond was a tug in a psychic thread, using Maeve's abilities to control and manipulate minds and reality, the Cauldron corruption was a base warping of the power at the heart of fate and all creation.

I know some people believe the Valg and Asteri are the same. I vehemently disagree with that. So my perception is that you are right- it is the same thing as what happened in ToG- but there are different powers at play going about it in a different way.

What I do think is interesting is the usage of threads being pulled and tied in different ways, and that language remains consistent. Maeve pulling at psychic threads, and then this "thread tied to a rib" that Elain and L/ucien are experiencing:

What is interesting is L/ucien experiences surprise at actually seeing the real thread between himself and Elain. Whether that's because he was still questioning the validity of the mating bond- wondering how a woman so unlike the woman he loved was thrown at him- or he is just surprised to see a physical bond, I'm not sure:

Now, the thread language also continues when discussing enchantments, spells, and glamours. What is so wild is this is all done in the same book, ACOWAR. Elain and L/ucien's bond which snapped immediately after Elain was poured out of the kettle, which is NOT how Nessian or Feysands bonds formed. Feysand and Nessian also experienced golden threads or unbreakable chains weaving their souls together after accepting their mate, but did not experience any sensations of threads tied to their ribs a moment before then.

And now to explore how I think this story will differ from ToG!

Let's take a look at what L/ucien is able to see with his eye:

Interesting. This is also the book we discover L/ucien is actually Helion Spell Cleavers son, who later describes his powers as such:

Shout out to @elainemg97 for catching that one!

SJM has been swinging a bat in our faces that reads Elain and L/ucien's Bond Is Abnormal.

L/ucien seeing the single thread and Elain experiencing it as something tied to her rib (or perhaps bindings around an individual, as Helion describes) is abnormal.

A woman feeling a bond without any sense of consent or interest in their mate is abnormal.

An immediate snap between two people who have never met has only occurred once before, with Rhysand's parents. Then in ACOSF, Elain and L/ucien are compared to Rhysand's parents again by repeatedly pointing out they willingly live apart and actively choose to stay away from each other, which is abnormal.

Elain and L/ucien:

Rhysand's mother and father:

So- I think where this differs from Rowan and Lyria is that even though there was still some difficulty (Rowan recalls how difficult it was to court Lyria. Again, abnormal) Maeve's power of mind control and psychic illusions would never have been able to be caught by anyone and Rowan overcame the challenges in their mating because in ToG's world, there is no discussion of mates being poorly matched or allowed to reject each other.

It seems to me that E/lucien's bond is being highly alluded to as something that can be physically noticed and hopefully broken by those like L/ucien's father and even L/ucien himself, in conjunction with items like Azriel's blade Truth-Teller that have the power to unmake things:

We are definitely headed in a direction leading up to all the things that can quite literally unravel the threads that the Asteri have forced.

SJM has given herself an incredible amount to work with here. I'll be home excited to see how it all plays out, and I wonder if she'll ever tell us exactly how far along she was when she started writing ACOWAR. Did the Asteri exist yet? Or was she working off Valg ideas like Maeve?

It's all pretty damn badass and interesting. But essentially the main difference I think it boils down to is this: the only way to break free from Maeve's tampering is the mental strength and ability to do so. In that sense, the forced bond wasn't real. The Asteri bonds are going to require a bit more work. In that sense, they are wrong, but they are real.

I think Azriel can smell it because he and Elain are true mates and it is being interfered with. I don't care whether or not they are actually mates, and it'd be cool even if they weren't. I just think that is where the story is headed. Feyre also got major headaches on the Faebane, the same thing Azriel was shot with, that cut off her bond from Rhys. Azriel's headaches start on page at the end of ACOWAR. So hopefully his nose will get some relief soon!

This is where I'm at right now! But what I love about SJM's writing is that even after all these years and rereads, there are still new things to discover. I know a lot of people are ragging on her right now after a highly criticized book release and a long wait, but damn if she didn't do soooo much that we are all still analyzing and assessing her work and dying to see what will happen next. I think that is pretty impressive, and I'm still just as excited as ever for Elriel's book and the incredible literal threads woven for them.

[raine-kai]

How Much Ace Loved Luffy (and so does Sabo, but this is mostly about Ace)

I have been suffering from the worst One Piece brainrot. Seriously, I cannot think about anything else without bring it back to One Piece, which is particularly unfortunate this month when my schedule is completely nuts.

(A few days ago, I was reading a scientific paper and I saw the word "doctrine" and went "omg Dr. Kureha??? Why is this paper mentioning One Piece?"—it's that bad.)

The thing I have been thinking about the most is Luffy's relationship with his brothers.

First off, I would like to say that I vehemently disagree with the take that Sabo is just Ace 2.0. While the relay of their stories can make them feel that way on an emotional level, exacerbated by Sabo succeeding Ace with the flame-flame fruit powers, I think Oda has done an excellent job showing that they are very distinct not only in personality, but in their relationships with Luffy.

Ace was always the first brother.

He's the one who knows Garp just as well as Luffy. He's the one introduced to Luffy through Garp. He's the one Luffy initially attaches himself to. He's the one who was there all through Luffy's childhood and adolescence, who can do a handstand on Luffy's head with no explanation, knowing that Luffy can hold him and knowing that Luffy will understand exactly what he is telling Luffy to do.

Ace was also always the most self-deprecating brother. When he was arrested, his first and only request was that nobody tell Luffy about it. When talking to Jinbei, he tells him that he would have worried Luffy couldn't live without him, but having seen his crew, he knows that Luffy will be okay.

When Luffy hears that Ace is in trouble, his first reaction is that Ace has his own adventures, and that Ace will be angry if he drops everything to chase after Ace. But when he is told that Ace is in Impel Down and his execution day is already scheduled, he drops everything, including reuniting with his crew, to sneak into the highest security prison in the world to try to break out his brother.

Meanwhile, Sabo is the kind brother.

If Ace was aware of how codependent Luffy was with him and tried to utilize tough love to push Luffy away, he's also always been the most inclined to bicker and trade mockery and insults with Luffy. Meanwhile, Sabo has always been more inclined to be concerned for Luffy, and use positive reinforcement to help Luffy improve. When Ace and Luffy were at odds, Sabo was often the mediator.

Sabo and Ace have known each other longer than either of them has known Luffy, but their relationship as brothers exists because of Luffy. As Sabo pointed out in his farewell letter to Ace, they never even defined what kind of brother they were (a thing that has more significance in Japanese, where big brother/younger brother are terms far more common than the neutral "kyoudai", which translates to elder-brother-younger-brother, and can often denote a non-blood relationship).

Luffy is their crybaby weakling baby brother, and they are both willing to throw everything aside if they are worried that Luffy might be in trouble. Not once in the story have Ace or Sabo showed up without stepping in to rescue Luffy somehow.

But today, the rescue that sticks in my brain is the most painful one of all: the death of Portgas D. Ace.

In a world full of people who exposit about the honor and dignity of a death with a back unmarked by scars, Ace dies with his back to Akainu, whose fist goes right through the tattoo proclaiming Ace's loyalty to Whitebeard.

Whitebeard's significance in Ace's life was huge.

With Ace's anger issues rooted in a childhood of being told he should never have existed, his arc is about learning that yes, he deserved to exist—he deserved to live.

And while Luffy's love, Luffy declaring how much he needed Ace, provided something of a salvation, some kind of purpose, it was not enough. Because Ace was trying to teach Luffy to be self-sufficient—was trying to help him to grow up into a man who wouldn't need Ace. Even at the very end, as he thanks Luffy for loving him, he describes himself with self-deprecation.

Being needed wasn't enough. Ace needed Whitebeard, because he needed a parent figure whom he could believe loved him, for whom he was enough. His relationship with Dadan was too utilitarian: he brought her food, and she let him stick around. His relationship with Garp was too marked with the conflict born of Garp's stated wish for Ace and Luffy to become marines. Whitebeard was the first person to embrace Ace exactly as he was and call him his son, and never expect him to be or do anything else.

Ace is genuinely surprised at the war that is waged to save his life.

Not only does he not expect Luffy to show up, he doesn't even expect Whitebeard to show up.

Regarding Whitebeard, Ace sees his actions as his own failure. He did not listen when Whitebeard told him to let Blackbeard go. His own failure to heed his father's cautionary words should not be cause for his father to wage war on the marine headquarters, he thinks.

But when Luffy turns up, Ace shouts at him—exactly as Luffy had predicted. He demands to know what Luffy thinks he's doing, weakling that he is. That Ace has his own adventures and his own pirate crew, and he doesn't need Luffy to come too.

"I'm your little brother," says Luffy in response, and I always start tearing up at that line, in manga or anime.

As far as Luffy is concerned, losing Ace is not an option.

And that one line is all it takes to make Ace back off. To remember that yes—Luffy is still his little brother, though they each have their own crews now.

The Marineford War is so full of moments where Luffy shows himself to be capable of so much more than anybody expected was possible.

But of course we all know how it ends. Luffy is the one to free Ace, but he's also the one who doesn't notice how vulnerable he is to the charging Akainu.

And Ace takes the blow intended for Luffy with his back—right in the tattoo declaring his alliance to Whitebeard.

I can't stop thinking about the significance of this.

All Ace had ever been searching for—family, belonging, purpose, acknowledgement that he was wanted—he got from Whitebeard, who was his parent in a way that nobody ever was, breaking through his insecurities about his parentage in a way that surely only got through to Ace because Whitebeard is someone who personally knew Roger. In a world without Luffy, Whitebeard and his crew would have been Ace's salvation.

But we don't live in that world. We don't know if Ace would have made it long enough to join Whitebeard in a world without Luffy.

What Ace tells us in the way that he shielded Luffy from Akainu was that Luffy was worth more to him than everything he got from Whitebeard and everyone on that crew. That he loved Luffy above and beyond all others.

And he thanked Luffy (and Whitebeard and his crew) for loving him.

I'm sure there has been ample discourse on the significance of these things. I'm pretty sure I've read, if not participated in it. But having circled back here recently, I feel like I'm discovering the significance all anew.

Ace said thank you for loving me and not I love you because he saw more value in being loved than his own love. Surely it would have been more comforting to Luffy to hear that he was loved—but Ace is caught up in the idea that he is demonspawn, not worth existing, much less being loved.

With how much he talks about Luffy to everyone he meets, surely in a world where he did not have cause to question his existence, where he did not grow up knowing that the world wished him dead, he would have been happy to just exist with the brothers he loved. He would not have felt he needed to prove that he deserved to exist.

Meanwhile, though Luffy idealizes pirates from an earlier point in the story, their backstory shows us that Luffy's desire to grow stronger originates in learning how Sabo "died". And Ace supports this narrative that Luffy ought to grow stronger, more self-sufficient.

At Luffy's core is simply love: a desire to hold his loved ones close, to be strong enough to never lose them again.

But he lost Ace anyway.

And Ace just wanted Luffy to be safe—to go on without him. His only regret, he said, was that he wouldn't be around to see the end of Luffy's dream.

Ace, at his core, just wanted to be loved. And he had that, but was not able to accept it, to believe that he deserved it, until the very end.

And isn't that just heartbreaking?

I believe that it was Ace's spirit, realizing Sabo was still alive, who knocked the memory back into him, screaming at him what the hell has he been doing, go protect and support their baby brother.

I believe Ace still lives on in Luffy, who will never stop loving the brother who all but raised him.

But I need to cry about it anyway. Again.

[beifong-brainrot]

Kuvira's unsustainable empire.

Stalin is here too. For some reason

I do often find myself wondering just how sustainable the Earth Empire Kuvira created was. Outside of the whole ethnostate thing, I have seen plenty of people argue that what Kuvira was doing was good for the Earth Kingdom and its people.

Kuvira: Growing up in Zaofu, with Suyin Beifong, I learned that the idea of a royal family passing a title from one generation to the next was archaic, and that technology and innovation should be what drives a nation forward. [...] It's taken me three years to get it back on track, and there is no way I will allow it to slip back into the dark ages. [...]

I find myself both tentaively agreeing with and vehemently against these opinions.

It's true that Kuvira helped stabilise the crime problem of the Earth Kingdom post the death of the Earth Queen. She also seemed to have greatly modernised and industrialised the Kingsom as well.

Of course, this actually makes perfect sense when looking at the real life inspirations behind Kuvira and her empire.

A lot of people compare Kuvira's rule over the Earth Empire to the Nazi party. And there is good reason to. But there are also huge ties between her and the rise and rule of Stalinism over the Eastern Bloc.

I think the main reason people compare Kuvira to the Nazis (other than the comparison seeming easier) is the ethnic clensing, concentration camps, etc.

But the thing is, the USSR also did that. The NKVD targeted many ethnic minorities, often accused for secretly plotting against the country.

Now, we never really are given a good reason for why Kuvira went through with an ethnic clensing in her empire. Which honestly kinda fits because from most testimonies I've read, a lot of people who were detained by the NKVD weren't told what they were being detained for either.

Bolin: So how did a bunch of water and firebenders end up in one of Kuvira's reeducation camps?

Ahnah: [Angrily.] Call it what it is: a prison.

Baraz: Kuvira's been purging states of anyone who's not of Earth Kingdom origin and locking them up.

Now the use of the term 'purging' immediately brings to mind the aptly named Great Purge (also known as the Great Terror.), which was essentially Stalin killing a lot of people in order to consolidate his power and remove influence of his political opponent. (A lot of people is apparently from 700,000 to 1.2 million)

Utilising violence in order to remove political rivals is also a pattern for Kuvira.

Of course tlok is stil a kid's show, so no oke is getting shot in the back of the head, but Kuvira uses implicit threats of violence to bend others to her will.

Kuvira was quite alright allowing the people of the state of Yi to starve and die purely because they refused to completely submit to her. (the idea of starvation is a surprise tool thay will help us later!) She also sends men after Wu, due to him posing no immediate threat to her. This is a very smart tactic of methodically stripping away anything that can question the legitimacy of her rule.

The branding of people who disagree with her, even people who were never allied with her, as traitor is also a very smart tactic.

Kuvira: Bring the citizens of Zaofu to kneel before the Great Uniter! All who pledge their loyalty to me will keep their freedom and will be dealt with fairly as full citizens of the Earth Empire. The rest will be imprisoned as traitors, like Su Beifong and her sons. Now bow!

Whoever is against Kuvira, is against the nation... questioning the leader equals treason... got it.

However, Kuvira's... strong punishments don't exactly extend to the very outlaws she was meant to weed out.

Kuvira: Stop groveling as if this is the worst day of your life. This ... is a good day. I'm going to give you all the opportunity to rehabilitate yourselves, and become productive members of your nation. Right now, you're lost, but pledge your loyalty to me, and I'll give you a new purpose in your lives. Of course, if you don't want to join, you could always stay right here.

As you watch the show, you can clearly see that Kuvira valued her Empire's militaristic power more than anything, including her people's actual well-being.

This actually gives us a little insignt on Kuvira herself. Kuvira, ever since she was a child, has dealt with a lot of pain. And the way she dealt with it was by reacting with violence and by pushing others away, keeping her defences up, so to say. This is most seen in her relationship with the Beifongs, and how she would rather push them away and convince herself they never cared for her, than open up.

We also see that Kuvira projects her trauma onto the Earth Kingdom which is an.... interesting way of coping to be sure.

Kuvira: [...] I was cast aside by my own parents like I meant nothing to them. How could I just stand by and watch the same thing happen to my nation, when it needed someone to guide it?

And that's where we get into the unsustainability of Kuvira's empire. She prioritises what she percives as safety. However, she seems to be pouring an astronomical amount of resources into her military.

I mean, how much money do you think was dumped just into this thing alone:

FUCKING LOOK AT ITS GOOFY ASS

To give Kuvira the benefit of the doubt, we don't really get to see what really goes on in the areas she's conquered. (which kinda sucks like did we really need all those episodes in Republic City)

We do however have Opal's testimony, and while she is biased against Kuvira, I don't really think she has any incentive to lie here.

Opal : They might have been happy when you first arrived, but I've seen what happens after you leave. Citizens are forced to work as slave labor, dissenters are sent off to who-knows-where!

I wouldn't be completely surprised if it were revealed that Kuvira introduced some manner of collectivisation in the Empire. Since this would also mirror the USSR's collectivisation of agriculture in real life. Plus, it would allow Kuvira to handle more respurces she could funnel into the army. This is also kinda supported by Varrick telling Bolin this:

Varrick: Relax, kid, what can they do? Kuvira controls the whole nation now, and Republic City is begging for the metal that we're mining. This train has left the station, and we own the track!

This implies that Kuvira excudes at least some amount of control over all the aspects of the country's economy.

More proof of this lies in Kuvira's words about literally seizing and redistributing Zaofu's resources as she sees fit.

Kuvira: [...] Zaofu cannot continue to rule itself. They have been hoarding their riches and technology too long. I'm here to distribute those resources fairly throughout the nation. This is about equality.

How much do you want to bet that 99% of those riches and technology went to the invention of Avatarverse's equivalent of nuclear warfare?

How much money was spent on Kuvira's military. More important question, how much food would it take to keep this military alive. Especially that you must also count other batalions and forces stationed around the country, so this isn't even all of it.

So we have a country where the citizens are forced into slave labour and most likely are poorly fed, in order to bolster and uphold a military (that probably consists of at least a few criminals). This is... not really good nor sustainable.

But it is in character for Kuvira, someone who prioritises her percieved 'safety' over everything, even her own other needs. Such as her very obvious desire for relationships.

Sadly Kuvira projecting her poor coping mechanisms onto an entire country isn't the best idea lol.

"But, Quill!", I hear you say, "If Kuvira ran the country so poorly, why did she have so many fans and supporters? "

That's where we get into ye ole cult of personality. Propaganda can be a shockingly effective tool, one that was used a lot by Stalin.

Similarly, we see tons of propaganda surrounding Kuvira. Even her title, The Great Uniter reeks of it. There's a lot of spectacle and performance in how Kuvira intracts with her people.

There's many examples of Kuvira twisting the narrative to make herself look better/more reliable, especially to her subordinates. Her lying about Bolin and Varrick still being with her, her portraying herself as a peaceful negotiator at Zaofu, despite threatening the Beifongs with an attack (her ignoring Wei's question of "you call bringing an army to threaten our city peaceful?" also feels very poignat because there really is no good way to answer that question lmao)

Her speech to her men before her fight with Korra is also a good example.

Kuvira: Fine. I want you all to know that I would never ask any of you to do something that I'm not willing to do myself. So, rather than risk your lives, I will fight the Avatar one-on-one.

Yes, perhaps to some extent she wanted to keep her soldiers safe, but this was also calculated. I'm quite sure Kuvira was able to tell Korra was weakened, she comments on it a few times. Kuvira has hostages, Zaofu's forces are diminished by her taking a lot of them with her. She clearly has no care for civilian lives, she attacked Republic City, a place full of civilians earlier than expected, it was guaranteed the place wouldn't be evacuated in time.

Kuvir holds all the cards here, but she still puts on this spectacle, because what better way to convince your followers about your power than kicking the Avatar's ass?

Kuvira's rule is built upon by the cult of personality surrounding her. She is, to some extent the figurehead that brought the army together.

There's fucking merch of her, she signs autographs, like she's a celebrity. This is deliberate. This is what keeps people blind and excusing her shortcomings and cruelty as a leader.

This may also be why Kuvira's right hand man, Baatar Jr seemed to have gotten scott free off for the crimes he also partook in. He may have helped Kuvira commit them, but he wasn't "the face of the empire" , so to speak.

Also no one gives a fuck about him for some reason despite him being a really interating character. I also want to make a longer post about Baatar, Kuvira and the consequences they faced for their actions.

In the end, I think that Kuvira is a very troubled young woman, who gained a good deal of power very quickly. And used that power the only way she knew how. To control and protect by pushing away any percieved threats.

You can see the Earth Empire as an extension of Kuvira herself, in a way. Kuvira has been through pain, and built up very prickly painful walls, while also maintaining a tight grip on her vulnerability.

The cult of personality thing would also be a more self indulgent aspect of Kuvira's trauma bleeding into her rule. Kuvira wants to build relationships, but doesn't want the vulnerability that comes from true relationships (most likely one of the main reasons she distanced herself from the Beifongs). This makes sense, as she did experience the cruelest rejection one can go through, being rejected by one's own parents.

However, facilitating connections where she has all the power would allow her to reap the benefits of relationships, without having the vulnerability she fears so much. (The exception to this rule is Baatar Jr. And I do wanna talk more about him and his relationship to Kuvira one day).

Kuvira is a really complex person, who really shouldn't have been placed in any position of power. But Raiko and Tenzin really needed someone to do the dirty work so they could place Wu on the throne (and probably puppet him) so uh. Yay.

Also I'm really not sure what this rant even is at this point. It was gonna be me complaining about Kuvira running the Earth Empire. Then it became me vomiting the contents of my history textbooks onto you.

Tbh I feel like I've been stating the obvious so uh. Yay. But enjoy my rambles lol

[chaztalk]

Alrighty then, let’s get this essay over with.

Before I start, I’d like to preface the most people will vehemently disagree or not like this opinion I have, both canon shippers and Harmony shippers alike.

The basis of the essay is explaining how me, a Harmony shipper, completely despises the Harry Potter movies, and how other Harmony shippers shouldn’t like it as much either.

I’ve complained about the movies a couple years ago, but now, since I’ve flipped through the original scripts and watched all the deleted scenes, I have a firmer grasp of the movies.

The funny thing about all of this is that the reason I became a Harmony shipper was because of the movies. I became obsessed with the dance scene in the tent in Deathly Hallows Part 1. I’d watch the scene over and over again on YouTube. I’d eventually read comments on the videos which was a mix of different opinions on it, like liking it, disliking it, noting that the scene wasn’t in the books, saying that the canon pairings were more fleshed out in the books, etc. So I picked up the books to confirm my suspicions, and despite reading it all the way up to the epilogue, I still remained a Harmony shippers.

That’s the lore of how I became a Harmony shipper.

Moving on, this is my thesis statement: I despise the Harry Potter movies because of the way they portrayed the canon pairings in a way that made people think the romance in the book was far better than in the movies, the way they portrayed Harry and Hermione’s relationship which clouded people’s judgment, and Harry and Hermione’s relationship wasn’t even that good in the movies.

This is will be the shortest explanation of the 3. The movies don’t do a great job at selling the romance in the series, and this is mostly about Harry and Ginny’s relationship cuz it is bad in the movies. No chemistry, uncomfortable kissing scenes, their scenes felt forced, which is quite on par with canon. But canon will not see that. They will focus on the bad and cringey scenes that weren’t in the books and that they were more fleshed out in the books. Ron/Hermione in the movies is a mixed bag. Some people like it, some people hate because Rupert Grint isn’t attractive enough to match with Emma Watson. Canon shippers are heavy on Ron’s treatment as a character in the movies moreso than Ron and Hermione’s relationship.

“Why do people ship Harry and Hermione together? Because of the movies.” “I ship Harry and Hermione together, but only in the movies.” This is what I see when there is discourse on Harmony. Harmony shippers do not realize that the movies actually did irreparable damage to the ship. 99% of Harry/Hermione scenes in the movies are not canon. Not putting in canon scenes between them is bad because it’s so easy to forget if you are a biased viewer. People will forget their scenes in the books and will just focus on how the movie “had to add non-canon scenes” between them.

And lastly, the most controversial topic to do as a Harmony shipper: shitting on the Harmony scenes in the movies. After reading the books, reading the original scripts, and watching the deleted scenes, I have come to the conclusion that the Harmony in the movies is just not good. There’s always something wrong with a certain scene between them. I’ve seen the movies several times so I can pretty much remember every Harmony scene.

The first and second movie are pretty similar to the books with a few minor changes/things left out, so they can get a pass.

Prisoner of Azkaban is the most Harmony-friendly movie because a good chunk of the movie was Harry and Hermione adventuring together. However, this is where people started thinking Harry was a third wheel cuz Hermione went to cry hug Ron when they thought Buckbeak was getting executed.

Goblet of Fire is the worst movie for Harmony. I would say Hermione hugging Harry before he begins the 1st task a top Harmony scene in the entire series, but once I remember what movie that scene is, it becomes worthless when the same movie has Hermione snapping at Harry twice when that didn’t happen in the books.

Order of the Phoenix is the antis’ 2nd favorite movie because there’s barely any harmony in it at all

I’ve spoken before about the Half-Blood Prince movie, how Harry confirms that he sees Hermione nothing more than a friend when Dumbledore asked him about his relationship with her (out of nowhere) and how Hermione still rejected Harry and decided to go with Cormac to Slughorn’s Christmas party.

The infamous Deathly Hallows Part 1. I like the tent dance scene because it was goofy and the song fit the scenario, but the way it ended is nothing more than a ship tease and a reminder that Hermione still ended up sad. The other ship tease is the “why can’t we stay here, Harry… and grow old” scene. And what how did Harry respond to that. With silence.

There are no explicit Harmony scenes in Deathly Hallows Part 2.

Going over the original scripts and deleted scenes is a dreadful as a Harmony shipper. Rewinding back to the HBP movie, there’s the scene at the end of the movie where Ron’s in the background while Harry and Hermione are talking. It’s a well known scene that pisses off Ron stans and canon shipper. Little do people know that there is an extended scene where both Harry and Hermione joke about “keeping their (Harry/Ginny, Ron/Hermione) snogging to a minimum” when the other (Harry or Hermione) is present. “Movies are Harmony fanfic” my ass

In conclusion, the Harry Potter movies do a disservice to Harry and Hermione’s relationship, distorting people’s perceptions of their relationship and the canon pairing’s relationships.

[literallys-illiteracy]

The Dichotomy of scientists, an Arcane season 2 essay:

This is a relatively short analysis of Viktor’s role, appearance, and symbology of Viktor in Arcane, focusing on his relatively brief appearance within season 2 so far, alongside his dichotomy with Singed.

Singed:

Singed acts as a foil, or ‘Shadow character’ to Viktor, being his teacher, and thus the most influential figure in Viktor’s personal development. This concept of a shadow in one's psyche is anything that is not consciously acknowledged or wanted in the “self”, not necessarily good nor bad. In the first season, Viktor is shown confronting this shadow figure, coming to terms and understanding him, realising that sacrifices must be made for the sake of progress, a sentiment that will recurse later upon Skye’s death, a statement that Viktor acknowledges, and vehemently disagrees with.

From this divergence between the two, comes a better understanding of Viktor as a character, the same way that one could understand one’s self in wholeness through accepting your unconscious mind.

His experiments with Vander, soon to become Warwick I suppose, are only directly shown in the ending of this release.

The chilling lullabye alongside the visceral breaths set the entire scene on edge, the stark contrast in tones, Singed's delirious smile, and the drawn out permutation of his blood, only to once again find focus on the pendant which he now holds tight, and the final shot revealing the chained beast. The most common idea I've seen is that Singed, through these experiments, is aiming to obtain some form of regeneration or biological immortality, in order to save his daughter, often presumed to be Orianna.

Once again, this is something that they are clearly aiming to set up over the following acts, so I will not attempt to theorise with too little information as to his intentions.

However I want to note his thematic connections to Viktor, which will be elaborated conversely and conversationally in his respective section.

Most notably is Singed's parallels to Viktor in this sense.

Both Zaunite scientists who became (presumably self imposed) outcasts from society due to the death of a woman close to them. While Viktor seeks to atone, having wished to die before using the hex core, wanting to use this newfound life to help others selflessly; Singed, instead, seeks his vaunted progress at any cost, shown in the visceral nature of his experiments.

Viktor's final scene mirrors that of the act's ending, each scientist resting, one having restored another's humanity, bathed in the light of the sky, surrounded by his flock, acting as the shepherd of the outcasts, and the other, rather than tending a flock, sits concealed underground, tending to his wolf.

The contrast between this biological and synthetic evolution, through chempunk and hextech, through green, and through blue, is the clearest parallel, one could make thematically, other than the mentioned shepherd and wolf, both attempting to "improve" humanity through their disciplines, yet in direct opposition to each other.

Viktor:

Viktor's journey is syncratically one of the Hero's Journey, a topic I already have a project working on, which centres around the growth (or in another sense, progress) that one undergoes through their life.

This is all but stated through the most impactful scenes that Viktor has undergone throughout the show, his first meeting with, and return to, Singed, his "death" and abyss losing Skye, and his "Apotheosis", or transcendance, beginning his third process, now having moved past his immaturity, symbolised through Viktor's return to Zaun, having naught but his gowns and robe, leaving the life that he formed in Piltover, saying his last goodbyes to Jayce, realising their differences.

In this discussion of archetypal themes (referring to the Jungian archetypes of the autonomous psyche), there are two avenues that I could take, the first being that of a Trans Allegory, the latter being those archetypes that Viktor embodies throughout his arcs.

The most obvious is that of the messiah figure, the shepherd as I named him earlier.

Viktor mirrors that of a biblical messiah, an ethereally disconnected soul, above that of humanity, not showing fear nor hate at those who would harm him, simply remarking the senseless nature of it all.

Viktor’s appearance following his death mirrors that of a shepherd, gowned in his robe, carrying himself alongside his staff, moving through the crows with a weightless grace, guiding those of lesser grace and, in a scene of direct parallel to those of biblical origin, lifts the weight of another, “forgiving their sins” in a sense.

While not my field of expertise, I want to note the relations that I have noticed to Viktor and Geothe’s character of Faust (specifically that of Geothe’s play, as prior tellings, such as Dr Faustus, differ in telling, specifically that of ending).

In the play, Faust is granted powers, knowledge, and any indulgence he desires, on the account that, come time the end of his bargain, the devil will come and claim Faust’s soul.

With this power and influence, Faust seduces and impregnates a young woman, Gretchen, who’s life is destroyed through her contact with Faust, having drowned the illegitimate child and was thus sentenced to death.

In many endings of this story, as mentioned prior, Faust’s bargain (origin of the phrase Faustian bargain) comes to a close, and his soul is corrupted by the power of Mephistopheles (whom takes the role of Faust’s shadow character, alongside acting as the ambassador or extension of the devil), and thus Faust is dragged to hell. In Geothe’s Faust in particular however, through Faust’s strive for improvement, alongside Gretchen’s influence and pleading, Faust’s soul is saved in the final moments of the play, alongside the introduction of the ‘Eternal Feminine’.

Everything transient Is but a symbol; The insufficient Here finds fulfilment; The indescribable Here becomes deed; The eternal-feminine Draws us on high.

This same concept of the Feminine is present, but not explicitly mentioned, in earlier acts of the play, such as the transcendental “Godlike female form” that Faust sees through the clouds, discerning the presence of many mythological women, alongside Gretchen, his lover, and Helen of Troy, who acts as a symbol of ethereal beauty – Helen appears in further scenes of the play, being representative of the long past beauty and knowledge of greek culture from which she hailed. 

This transient visage of women long gone, alongside that which dies within the play, parallels Viktor’s image of Skye as he gases afore the light, the hex core, Viktor’s corrupted dream, having consumed her, alongside his body, her form appearing in his sight, leading him to redeem himself, saving himself and others from the corruption.

[blue-mint-winter]

Daemon and Viserys' relationship and their roles in the family - analysis

Psychoanalyzing characters is a common fun past time in fandom and recently I stumbled on a take how Daemon actually wanted to be Viserys' sister and fulfill the role of the king's wife but it couldn't happen, so he lived it out through marrying Rhaenyra.

I vehemently disagree with this interpretation. The relationship between Viserys and Daemon is complicated, but I don't think it's in that way. There's no indication Daemon wants to be a woman. Desire to be respected, trusted, loved and needed by his family, to serve his monarch isn't exclusive to one gender. Daemon's desired role in the family isn't that of his brother's wife. If that was the case he'd be jealous of Aemma and Alicent, not Otto.

First, let's look at the obvious, the basics of the brothers' family situation. Do they look like they were raised normally? Daemon definitely doesn't act like a well-adjusted individual by their society's standards. We need to look for the reasons for his rogue-like behavior.

His mother, Alyssa died, when Daemon was 3 years old and Viserys was 7 years old. A lot of people assume that their father, Baelon, picked up a slack caused by his wife's death and dedicated himself to raising his sons. It's widely assumed that Daemon's loyalty to Viserys is something he was taught by Baelon. However, there's no evidence to support this assumption and plenty suggesting otherwise.

Fire and Blood explains that Baelon was hit so hard by his wife's death that he never remarried. He refused his younger sister's seduction attempt despite being known as a 'lusty lad'. His reaction to his brother's death was also extreme. He burned thousands of men and even after coming back hours or maybe days later (we don't know how much time it took, but it wasn't a short flight from Tarth back to Kings Landing) he still was so emotional and openly grieving that he publicly cried in his mother's arms.

Losing the love of his life must have affected him even more deeply than losing his brother. Am I supposed to believe this perpetually mourning widower had the faculties to pay close attention to his 2 young sons and their needs? Especially after he became heir and Prince of Dragonstone, taking on all these new duties that undoubtedly took up most of his time?

It's pretty telling that Fire and Blood DOESN'T say anything about Baelon's relationship with his sons despite the fact he is the father of a king and the famous Rogue Prince who both continued the dynasty. There's no mention of them doing anything with their father, nothing about any father-son bonding activities. Even when Daemon received Dark Sister, it was from king Jaehaerys, not Baelon, the previous wielder of the sword. Baelon's relevancy ends with his death which allows Otto to become the Hand and leads to the Great Council in Harrenhal. When Baelon dies, the one who is sitting with him and holding his hand isn't one of his sons, but Jaehaerys, who also lights his funeral pyre. Baelon is never mentioned again in the context of his sons and how he possibly affected them. What's more, both Viserys and Daemon never talk about him in both the book and the show. It's like for them, Baelon might not have existed. They're beings separate from him. Viserys' overdependence on Otto as his Hand can be seen as another sign that Baelon didn't spend much time with his son to teach him about being the king.

All of the above points to one conclusion - Baelon had a minimal role in the raising of his sons. It doesn't mean that they lacked filial piety as both brothers honored their father by naming a child after him (Baelon and Baela), however it seems likely that Baelon was an absent father. Alyssa's death effectively orphaned both sons, taking their father away as well in a functional sense.

In such circumstances it seems natural that Viserys as the older brother became Daemon's parental figure. With Baelon lost in his grief and later occupied with his duties as the heir, the boys only had each other as the closest family. Their extended family lacked any adults willing and capable of properly looking after them. As the result, Viserys was the one raising Daemon.

Viserys being Daemon's father figure explains a lot about them. Daemon being his heir affirms this relationship. He doesn't want to be replaced in Viserys' heart by actual sons but Rhaenyra as a daughter isn't a threat to him in that sense. Viserys on the other hand treats Daemon more like a child than a brother (sending him away to Runestone as a punishment for misbehavior - like a parent sending a misbehaving child to stand in the quiet corner of the room). He doesn't think of Daemon as an equal or someone he can rely on for help. Why? Because from the beginning Viserys was taking care of Daemon, was responsible for him. Daemon's refusal to cut the umbilical cord and start his own family with Rhea Royce, instead choosing to stay dependant on his brother, must have been perplexing to Viserys, because he raised Daemon, but he doesn't actually regard him as his son. And this is the root cause of their conflict with each other - Daemon feels like Viserys is his parent and wants to be treated accordingly as a son, but Viserys sees him only as an irresponsible little brother that he always has to clean up after.

What's more, Viserys wants Daemon to act as an ideal brother to him - be responsible, dutiful, supportive and obedient, but Daemon refusing to do his duties as expected of him makes him unreliable in Viserys' eyes and unfit to be his heir. Which means that Daemon rejecting Rhea and clinging to the title of heir because he wants to fill the role of Viserys' son has the opposite effect - his actions prove that he can't be the heir/brother that Viserys desires (compare with Rhaenyra who complies with the arranged marriage to Laenor which she didn't want and does her duty to birth heirs to the best of her abilities, which satisfies Viserys' requirements for his heir).

Daemon pursues the role of Viserys' son and in this context his marriage to Rhaenyra makes perfect sense. By being Viserys' daughter, she's metaphorically Daemon's sister that he should marry as the 'son' according to the tradition of House Targaryen. She's the heir directly descended from Viserys that Daemon can't be and Daemon is the son she can't be. Thanks to marrying Rhaenyra Daemon becomes Viserys' son in law, the closest he can get to making his role as the 'son' official.

What's more, as the result of his complicated relationship with Viserys, Daemon strived to do better as a father to sons that weren't of his blood. He accepted Rhaenyra's Velaryon sons and raised them as his own, upholding their claim to the throne over his biological sons. He betrothed his daughters to Jace and Luke, who were only their cousins, not Aegon III and Viserys II, their full-blooded brothers. Baela and Rhaena were only 4 years older than Aegon, so the age gap wasn't a big issue. Though it seems Daemon and Rhaenyra planned to have more children to provide sisterwives to their sons (Visenya's conception would suggest that).

The betrothal wasn't just political. It showed that Daemon fully accepted Jace and Luke as his sons by giving them his daughters' hands in marriage - which is something that Viserys refused to do for Daemon. Jace's actions during the war suggest that he was taught by Daemon about politics and strategy. Daemon's reaction to Lucerys' death is to arrange a terrible vengeance on the Greens. Also, the third son, Joffrey, resembles Daemon the most from the Velaryon boys - a spare son who lost one parent at the age of 3 (just like Daemon who might have seen himself in the boy), he wanted to be a knight and prove himself in battle, loved dragons and tried to save them, swore a terrible oath of vengeance for Luke's death, was even sent to the Vale for a time (to Gulltown) and was entered into a political betrothal (with a Manderly girl). All of the above proves that Daemon spent time with all three Velaryon boys, fulfilling the duties of their father and becoming their role model (in the TV show it's only expressed through Jace who is constantly asking after Daemon and emulating him in his dress and bearing).

Viserys as a father is another topic worth looking into in the context of his youth. The first thing that comes to mind about him is that he was a great dad to his daughters, Rhaenyra and Helaena. He made Rhaenyra his heir and always defended her claim and her sons, only once threatening to take the position away from her when she opposed doing the heir's duty by marrying Laenor. Helaena had a custom of visiting Viserys with her children in the evenings for bedtime stories, which proves she had a close relationship with her father (there is only one example of her visiting, before Viserys' death, but she did the same with Alicent, so it had to be a routine for her to bring the children to their grandparents).

On the other hand, Viserys isn't much of a father to his sons. He was raising Daemon while being a child himself and the effects were mixed and rather unsatisfactory to Viserys. Daemon was Viserys' first practice at being a father to a boy. Later, with his actual sons - Aegon II, Aemond and Daeron - Viserys seems absent, neglectful and disinterested in raising them or even interacting with them. It couldn't be just because of his illness, which in the books only got bad in the last few months of his life. Viserys had time for Helaena, but his sons act fatherless and Daeron is even sent away to be raised by his mother's family.

Why is Viserys good with raising girls but not boys? I think once again we need to look at his early years to find the cause. It's very likely Viserys treated his sons similarly to how his own father, Baelon, treated him. Just like there's no mention of Baelon doing any bonding with his sons, the same is true of Viserys. Viserys once made a jibe that Aemond could claim a dragon on Dragonstone "if the lad is bold enough" which stung Aemond and pushed him to claim Vhagar. It's possible similar circumstances led to Viserys claiming Balerion in his youth and so the history (or rather just story) made a full circle.

However, the first girl Viserys raised wasn't Rhaenyra. It was Aemma. Viserys married Aemma when he was 18 and she was 11. It means that a preteen girl, still a child, was put under his care. Aemma was separated from her family and father in Eyrie and became Viserys' sole responsibility as his wife. In addition, it's not stated if this separation occurred at the time of marriage or even earlier. If they had a formal betrothal first, she could have been placed under Viserys' influence at an even younger age. In any case, it's undeniable that logically, for the lack of other capable candidates to fulfill the father's role in Aemma's life, Viserys had to be the one who did it and raised Aemma through her teenage years. His positive relationship with Aemma then influenced his ability and interest in being a father to his real daughters.

As the last point in this longish commentary, it's pretty interesting that it's not just Daemon who uses the son in law route to become a son to his chosen father figure. Doesn't Viserys do the same when he decides to marry Alicent? He then becomes Otto's son in law. Young Viserys' need for guidance of his Hand in his early years as the king makes it possible that he saw Otto as a father figure that he sorely lacked. Even after dismissing him for the insistence to change the succession, Viserys forgave Otto and brought him back, then trusted him to run the kingdom as Viserys' health deteriorated. Maybe I am reading too much into this relationship or maybe it was just very one-sided on Viserys' side. I don't see the same affection for Viserys in Otto who left Viserys' corpse to rot and betrayed his will with the usurpation. It seems Otto simply manipulated Viserys from the start for his own gain, to stay in power.

It looks like Daemon after being rejected by Viserys also sought a replacement father figure and gravitated towards Corlys, eventually becoming his son in law by marrying Laena. Anyway, it's an interesting mechanism for men to marry in order to become sons in law to their father figures. Or Daemon betrothing Jace and Luke to his daughters to make them his sons in law.

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Thanks for reading, I hope this was interesting and clear enough. This was a pretty spur of the moment analysis. Next time I plan a topic related to TWOIAF :)

[dullgecko]

(Look, this was going to be a quick little thought about the aftermath of the goblin situation, but then my angst-loving brain got all excited. Oops?)

Once the whole "oops all goblins" ordeal is over, Riz definitely feels some kind of way about how the rest of the school treated his friends while they were goblins.

Had they all been turned into halflings or other small species, he was pretty sure there wouldn't have been anywhere near as much of a reaction. Sure, some people would have had the reaction of "Oh they're so small now, that's cute" but that would have been it because halflings are still much more respected than goblins are.

Instead, there had been a weird mix of "Oh that's so cute" and "Oh that's so weird" because obviously goblins ~are~ weird, but these little hybrid ones were also pretty adorable and that made it okay. Riz did his best to shield his friends from the worst comments, but he still heard and internalised every single one of them.

Aside from the occasional Helio kid, no one was outright racist towards the bad kids while they were goblins, and even the most racist Helio kids didn't physically hurt or threaten any of them. And that was good, Riz obviously didn't want his friends to get hurt, but he also knew why they were getting a free pass on things that he had been routinely bullied for and that hurt more than he cared to admit.

Him getting overwhelmed by light or sound was disruptive and something that he should just deal with. Adaine getting overwhelmed was met with sympathy and patience.

Him needing to bite things was gross and harmful and dangerous. Fig biting things was funny and cute.

His tail had been a target to step on and cause him pain. Kristen's tail was treated with utmost care, even when she tripped over it herself.

Him eating strange foods was disgusting. Fabian eating strange foods was cool and experimental.

Him being angry made him dangerous and monstrous while also not taken seriously because he was so small. Gorgug's rages were still taken seriously, no matter his height.

Riz knew that he was weird (practically everyone he met reminded him of that), but he had also grown up as one of the only goblins, and he was well-acquainted with the various forms of racism. Seeing his friends get treated so well really really hurt, because maybe it was just him that was the problem after all. (Later, with both of them crying, Fig would vehemently disagree with him about this).

So once it's all over, and Riz has had a chance to recover from the hypervigilance of watching 5 new goblins, he falls into a really bad dysphoria/dysmorphia/self-loathing spiral and he ends up with a whole clue board for all of the ways he has decided that he is Wrong based on the ways people treated his friends compared to how he is treated. He kept it hidden for a week or so, withdrawing more and more until he stopped talking with his friends beyond basic necessities, flinched away from any touch, and by the end of the week just fully stopped spending any time with them or replying to any messages.

That weekend, they all broke into his office where they found him just staring at an alarmingly cluttered clue board, surrounded by piles of even more "evidence", including extracts from old monster manuals describing goblins as dangerous vermin, old research papers that claimed that goblins don't feel emotions but use signals like tears to manipulate "actual people", and a hastily scribbled note saying that dominate monster had been specifically used on him and no one else.

Once the bad kids worked out what the board was, Fig confiscated and destroyed it while Adaine removed all of the other "evidence" Riz had gathered but hadn't yet added. There was then a very tearful and intense conversation about everything (or as much as Riz could put into words, which definitely isn't everything but is still a lot to be dealing with).

He begged them not to tell his mom about the board, and eventually they agreed, on the condition that he talks to Jawbone or some other therapist instead.

Not long after that, a lot of the outdated and harmful information about goblins mysteriously disappears from the school library. In an entirely unrelated event, a huge bonfire party is held at Seacaster Manor :)

(A couple of weeks later, Riz still isn’t doing well exactly, but he is doing a little better and has finally started accepting hugs again even if he has to fight against his brain telling him he shouldn't).

I love getting this kind of stuff its so juicy.

The whole 'his friends get treated well as goblins' thing definitely hits a nerve. Mostly because everyone who saw them at school knew who they were (they've saved the world several times they are lowkey famous except for fig and gorgug who are just famous famous). They're not real monsters they're just cursed/sick so they got a lot of free passes for things that Riz would never be able to do without putting himself in actual danger.

Plus, the whole situation with them being hybrids? Yeah, they were pretty. Riz wouldnt say cute because they were the same size as him and almost adults for fucks sake. It makes him wonder what the fuck is wrong with how he looks if he's constantly being told goblins are disgusting, but only if the goblins look like him apparently.

And hey, maybe he was just manipulating people by pretending to have emotions? More than one research paper was saying it, and right now he wasnt feeling much of anything. Had he ever felt much of anything? Maybe he was just tricking people the entire time.