#with big egos and dont like to be wrong so they assume they're not- and being like that? is suuuper fucking easy to manipulate.

[snekdood]

another aspect of this that I forgot to address is that it's not just that we need to give the world more time to come out of religious beliefs to make a conclusive answer on if its "bad", we also have to consider the fact that a lot of the reason countries are "less peaceful" has to do with the fact that they were colonized by christianity specifically and christianities values- at least the kind that likes to colonize other lands and make them christian- are very authoritarianistic while a lot of other religions aren't. so even if we do wait until more countries are athiestic, it's still not a fair comparision bc what you're really comparing it against is christianity rather than religion as a whole. also, a lot of the countries that aren't christian problems' can be attributed to the fact that they were colonized by christians. maybe if we had both a good chunk of atheistic countries at the same time period as other religions that Aren't christian then we could make a fair comparison, but tbh the problem I think you have with religion really boils down to christinaity, which explains why when western anti theists argue about religion they come from the perspective of growing up culturally christian and all their arguments are attacks on christianity that dont exactly apply to other religions.....

anti theists will really be like "psh, religion is the problem. look at this map of earth where basically all the countries on it are religious. this is surely the best metric to judge this by" idk bud maybe we should wait until more countries are more athiestic and then you can make your sick dunk if its true. we've only just recently started diverging from religious thought, dontcha think you're a lil too eager there? give it a couple decades or maybe even centuries and then we can have a more conclusive answer

[snailstrees]

some v5/site spoilers. just my general thoughts LOL

holy shit the new site absolutely FUCKS it feels so. Alive. also the new volume so far kicks butt i love that uni actually got her gamer speech back 🫡 🫡 not to mention the art in the epilogue like. Got damn ! that shading makes my brain itch. AND A NEW CHARACTER HELLO????? actuslly holy ahit thinking of it i think that's like. reboot bonez. like barry's original love interest

i saw the site on mobile and honestly its SO much more accessible now and refreshing. i will probably check it out on pc later though

im so glad we got pretty much Every Single Character in the cast page now even the minor ones because I've been ao curious about them and we knew jack shit of them unless you check tumblr every fucking day. so thats one hell of a good change. the animations and icons also help bring the characters more to life and DOES kc animate well. seriously I can't emphasize enough how much i loved the cast pages they were so fun to read and skim through !!!!

im also glad kc explained the backstory of hemera and barry so the fandom doesn't shit on them for no reason. in this economy we live in we get barely any characters who react to trauma in ways that are considered bad or harmful/through anger 💔

the content warning thingamajigs and saturation bar is also rly handy so i dont get a content warning every 2 seconds

OK gushing over let me talk about some neutral/negative things imo. these are not just related to the relaunch but just. the comic in general

alright so this is basically just nitpicking but there are So Many Fucking Lesbians. nothing wrong with being lesbian i am one myself LOL but literally more than half of the frmale-aligned cast is a lesbian which kinda sucks a bit because. yknow. wheres the representation for other identities

also yeah. all the other crit blogs u were right unis definitely getting really fucking babified. girl has no fuckin flaws or anger or anything of the sort shes just an innocent uwu cinammon roll . head in hands

and my biggest nitpick of all. Cuddles. yeah he's the big bad villain but. he's so cartoonishly evil man. like in his bio it basically states every single bad thing a human (anthry?) person can do and it's just so hard to take it seriously im sorry. like it blatsntly states something along the lines of "there's no trauma or anything of the sort that led to him being like this" and im like. girlypop. thats not how people work. people just don't wake up one day and go "o fuck yea im gonna start hurting animals and torturing people and driving them to suicide and feel good doing it because i want to!!!!!!!!!!" like. No. Not At All. It's just not how shit works yknow. someone HAS to have reason to do shit like this and enjoy it, and not because they're big villain of the narrative and/or because the creator said so. hell BOWSER has more depth than cuddles. bowser is a hopeless romant. he's power hungry and constsntly soing risky, dangerous, or just over the top shit because he wants peach to love him and because he wants to earn respect amongst his people. and he also has a soft a side, being a father and even sometimes helping his arch nemesis whenever someone stronger than him appears and he doesn't want to lose respect, and evn though he does this to feed his ego, he ends up accidentally helping others in the process

.......okay sorry i did not mean to go into that bowser rant i just really like him Oksy. but my point is that just bowser is a character from fucking nintendo and is really cartoonish and yet has more depth and reasoning than the main villain from a webcomic about medical malpractice and trauma. the way cuddles is written overall just gives off vibes of a kid who doesn't actually know how to write stories and assumes the villain has to be the Big Bad for no rhyme or reason

but. overall. i can tell kc and the z//cp staff worked their asses off to get this volume and site done and did they hit the nail right in the head. excited for whats to come

thank u for listening to my thoughts gamers

ps. sTOP LOOKING AT ME WITH THAT SHIT EATING GRIN DORITO HEAD

[sparklinpixiedust]

Basic Training

This post has been sitting in my drafts for months now, during which I've come up with a few ways I wanted to write this post. This is what I've come up with.

Basic Training is the episode which made me hate Ben the most. The whole episode consisted him of being a stuck up brat only to be rewarded for it in the end.

This episode was the perfect opportunity to have Kevin in the spotlight and show how skilled and smart he is.

Gwen's presence in this episode was actually fine, there's no change needed for that.

Look, I know the shows named Ben 10 but we have seen Ben be the hero tons of times already.

And Ben being egoistic about his heroism is not something new in the franchise.

There have been episodes on the OS where Ben got a big head, yet I dont ever see anyone complaining about that.

Was is it because he was 10 that we excuse this behaviour? Nope.

15 - 16 is still pretty young and his attitude can be excused at this age as well.

My opinion? It was handled better in the OS.

There were times when Ben wasn't always the main focus.

In Lucky Girl, Ben has his ' who's your hero?' Moment.

They showed Gwen feeling jealous and hurt by the fact she wasn't noticed much.

It was realistic.

Then the epsiode proceeded to focus on Gwen , having Ben being kind of like a sub plot to the story.

Towards the end Ben compliments her.

So yeah Ben got big head, but at the same time they shifted focus so that the audience wouldn't find it annoying.

Gwen was in the spotlight for a bit, giving people a break from Ben.

Secondly  , in Be Afraid Of The Dark, Ben again is shown to be slightly stuck up, but towards the end of that episode he learns and acknowledges Gwen and Grandpa for help and understands his crime fighting is more of a team effort.

In Galactic Enforcers, we are shown there are other heros besides Ben as well.

Ben wasn't the sole focus of that episode. Yes it was about him but also about the Galactic Enforcers.

I don't think he was shown to be over confident here , but it was nice to see some other heros in the scene.

The Ben 10,000 episode focuses on how Ben was too focused on his job and the lesson at that was Ben needed to relax and have them Galactic Enforcers take the lead instead.

Again , his attitude towards everything was brought in focus but towards the end he learnt something.

I recently started watching Generator Rex and I can't help but compare Rex's character to Ben's.

Rex is also proud , rushes into things and considers himself to be a hotshot. But they also show him being down ,having trouble with his nanites and actually voice out his insecurities.

He's still the hero, still has things go his way most times but it's not annoying like Ben.

( I've only seen like 7 episodes so far so I don't know if this going to go down hil or not but so far so good)

The issue with the sequels after the OS was that Ben was the focus a bit too much.

We as the audience were rarely ever given a break from him.

Other than a few conversations here and there about his attitude,  nothing really was done about it.

Gwen should've been appreciated more for saving Kevin and Kevin should've been appreciated for stopping Aggregor.

But they weren't.

If it had been Ben , they would've made sure to show him getting some sort of recognition or trophy.

Back to the Basic Training episode.

We know he's the legendary Ben Tennyson, we know he's a hero. We didn't need another episode on it.

Instead the plot should've focused on Kevin. His skills, his abilities.

Ben would act the same but Magsiter Hulka should've put some sort of cover so Ben couldn't use the omnitrix.

Ben goes on breaking rules,  and having a hard time being a hero without the watch.

Towards the end, it should've been Kevin who cracks the case and saves Hulka. Ben is mad he can't use the omnitrix but instead uses the guns and other weapons he's learnt to use at the academy

He's not amazing at them , but it makes him realise that he is hero , watch or not, something that has been emphasised in the show. Its not impossible for him to function without the watch.

Towards the end, Ben getting a 95 was a stretch. I'm sorry , but the guy wasn't great with using weapons and without the watch I dont think he would've been able to complete that hostage excercise.

I'm thinking more like 89%.

Gwen gets 98, that's fine and Kevin gets a 100.

Hulka comes in and awards the medal (?) to Kevin, suggesting he's becoming more like his father.

( im ignoring the ret con, plus the retcon I'm assuming wasnt thought off at this point by the writers)

Ben is shown to take one of the guns back to earth, because he thinks they're cool and he wants to practice and get better at them.

The whole hostage situation makes him want to get better at making strategies.

Yes he's good at improv, but he needs to learn to properly plan as well.

It doesn't matter if he's never shown to use the gun ever again, and he's back to relying on the omnitrix.

Or maybe some time down the line, he could use the weapon, even if it for a second, to show that he is improving and getting better.

Before you say 'he's already a hero, he doesn't need to learn anything ' sorry but no.

He's 16. He may have saved the world but he still has growing up to do. Different battles are going to arise all the time.

Saying he is perfect at 16 is dumb. Saying he's perfect when he's ben 10k , it'll make some sense. He's been around for a while and is pretty experienced.

The watch is a part of him, but seeing him try to explore other options would've been a fresher idea.

Another scene that made me mad was the court (?) scene in Vreedle, Vreedle.

Ben being a hero shouldn't make him above the law.

Domstol ruling in favor of Ben just because he's the legendry Ben Tennyson was stupid.

After Ben's little monologue , and destroying Domstols desk, the judge should've just informed him that being a hero does not excuse him from following the law.

Kevin could've had his little moment doing some negotiation ( would've been nice to see how he works as con artist) and Ben could've jumped in and helped while making some good points for the argument, showing us he's not stupid.

Then having Domstol rule in their favor would've made sense.

On the way back to earth there could've been a joke about how Ben watches Judge Judy too much which is where he learnt about trials and stuff. Or maybe Gwens dad taught him a thing or two at some point.

All this doesn't mess with Ben's character all that much, he's still the hero of the show, he still has his ego but it makes him more likeable, shifts focus from his attitude, and shows us he's pretty smart and is growing into a good hero.

Ben's not a bad guy. I mean he is the hero of the show. There are tons of scenes which show he's good , like the whole sacrificing thing so the ultimates could live and all.

But little scenes here and there tend to be enough for someone , especially for someone who isn't a super hard-core Ben lover to form negative opinions on him.

Although calling him a psychopath / narc is out of line because I don't find him to be like that. His attitude was magnified by him being in the spotlight too much and writers not having a good balance in writing situations.

Ben being the main character of the show is at risk of becoming hated or less appreciated just because he's the font runner of the show.

Admit it, side characters tend to get more love most times than the main agonist of shows.

I've been watching videos on YouTube on this topic as to why this happens , and what I've come up with is that writers of shows tend to focus too much on main character. Things seem to go their way most times and this tends to get on peoples nerves, consciously or subconsciously because it's not exactly realistic.

Having shows where everything focuses on one person most times tend to backfire.

I don't mind Ben having a big head, I dont mind him making jokes and being so casual.

It's his defense mechanism to protect himself from drowning into the struggles and pressures of being a hero. But always having him be that way isn't good.

The writers should've executed it properly.

( okay this post got really long,  more than I thought it would. If you're read the whole things , congratulations on making it here lol.

I'm not going to stop anyone from replying to this because everyone has different opinions and we all have the freedom to express them.

Although I believe I've made my point and I've made sure to keep in mind all the arguments about why bashing Ben is wrong when he's not a bad guy while typing this out.

I don't think I've directed any major hate towards him , its mostly towards the writers for making the situations like that,but if you think I have you can reply to it.

I'm not gonna reply back though , because again I feel I've made my point.

Any agreements / disagreements you have with the post feel free to share because it is your right.

Any disagreements you have with other members,  as long as its related to the post you can share it.

Any issues you have personally with other members,  please keep them to your selves.

I will not tolerate bullying , harassing,  name calling and petty arguments on my post and blog page.

If this happens I will simply delete this post and re-upload it.)