#writing: inroads

[skykittywhatchamahcallit]

Never reaching this exact goal ever again in my whole life

[lucky-clover-gazette]

kings rising highlights & annotations

chapter 3

indented text is from the book. some quotes have commentary, some do not. some comments are serious, and some are definitely not. most of them will only make sense to people who have read the series. and, like, there are spoilers. so please read the books first if you're interested!

also: part of the reason i'm doing such a close reading is to study cs pacat's style, especially in terms of how she does romance and erotica. there are "craft notes" that might seem weird, like i'm being redundant or restating something rather than analyzing, but those are more things that i want to remember/take away from the writing!

i'm going to tag these longer posts with "sam reads capri" in case anyone wants to read them all at once.

this is a google doc i wrote with overall content warnings for the captive prince series. it's not perfect, but i do think it's important to include.

The Regent’s forces were rivers of darker red, driving inroads into their lines, mingling their armies together, like a stream of blood hitting water, then diffusing.

He killed, and it was simply that men got out of his way, or were dead.

He had grown used to something that had been temporary, like the flash of exhilaration in a pair of blue eyes for a moment catching his own. All of that tangled together inside him, and tightened, through the killing, into a single hard knot.

something about the way this is written just hits me in the abandonment issues

‘If the Prince of Vere shows himself, I will kill him.’ Nikandros half spat the words.

nik private twitter venting moment #2

The ground was wet, his legs were mud-spattered above his knees—mud in dry summer, because the ground was blood.

i don’t know man i feel like after a point you have to just be like. hey. why are we doing this again? like yeah i get that fighting in a military force can be for A Cause but unless you’re directly involved in enacting ideological change, aren’t you basically just cannon fodder

On the far side of the field, he saw the flash of embroidered red. That is how Akielons win wars, isn’t it? Why fight the whole army, when you can just—

i’m guessing the part in italics in a previous laurent line, about damen killing auguste at marlas?

He used the little name that Damen had been called as a boy; the childhood name, reserved for intimates.

the fact that is was kastor specifically asking the veretians to call him that…

Damen realised that he was on his knees, his own chest heaving like the chest of his horse.

laurent’s horse will be glad to know that damen’s horse lived. because, as we all know, they’re in love

‘Over?’ The word grated out of him. All he could think was that if the Regent still lived, nothing was over.

it is interesting how, even when he thinks laurent screwed him over (see previous chapter), damen has this uncontrollable rage towards the regent rather than laurent. i think this has more to do with the regent killing his men and trying invade his country, though. and maybe just that it’s easier to hate him than laurent. “regent = bad” is something that’s easy for damen to comprehend right now, while laurent’s whole thing is a lot more confusing and intimate

And with returning awareness, he saw as if for the first time the bodies of the men that he had killed to get to the Regent’s decoy, and beyond that, the evidence of what he had done. The field was a rutted earthworks strewn with the dead. The ground was a churned mess of flesh, ineffective armour and riderless horses. Killing ceaselessly, for hours, he had not been aware of the scale of it, of what he had caused to happen here. He saw flashes behind his eyelids, faces of the men he’d killed. Those left standing were all Akielon; and they stared at Damen as at something impossible.

damen holy shit… i guess that’s one way to reclaim your authority. and he didn’t even mean it as a sign of intimidation, he just wanted to get to the “regent.” who by the way was just some random guy RIP

‘Find the highest-ranked Veretian still living and tell them they have leave to bury their dead,’ said Damen. There was a fallen Akielon banner on the ground beside him. ‘Charcy is claimed for Akielos.’ As he rose, Damen wrapped his hand around its wooden pole and planted it in the earth.

not sure if calling it an akielion victory despite the combined forces is just customary, or intentionally out of spite. i’m leaning on the former, since it’s damen and not laurent we're talking about

The herald came cantering across the devastated landscape on a white, glossy mare with a curved neck and a high, flying tail. Beautiful and untouched, he made a mockery of the sacrifice of the brave men on the field. His banner streamed out behind him, and its blazon was Laurent’s starburst, in blue and shining gold.

here is an excerpt from a post i made while reading king’s rising for the first time:

“damen when he realizes he’s not in a slow burn romance with problematic beginnings, but a complex psychological thriller in which the smartest fictional character i have ever personally encountered has decided to make his life a living hell and also they’re in love with each other but the psychological thriller stuff is way more important to his bitchy blonde nightmare malewife and he is SO down bad and just has to deal with laurent’s mean girls 4d chess petty nonsense bc it’s enrichment for him and damen will kill anyone who gets in laurent’s way and he can’t even pick up the very very VERY clear implications of laurent’s trauma that would probably allow them to reach some kind of vulnerability equilibrium in their relationship”

on a re-read, i think this is a great time to dig into that a little more ;)

SO what i love about so much of laurent’s choices in the next few chapters is the fact that much of what he says and does is entirely petty. like, yes there’s always strategy and trauma and depth as usual, but i think it’s not denying him depth to say that he is 20 years old, this is his first love in the midst of an extremely stressful and messy situation, and despite his own wishes he cannot prevent his emotions from affecting his actions. laurent has had control over so much of the situation with damen thus far, both with the power dynamics between them as master and “slave” and the fact that damen didn’t know that laurent knew who he was. but now laurent knows that damen knows, so all of his previous and future actions are going to be under damen’s scrutiny in that context. they’re equals now, and the secrets reinforcing laurent’s prior cognitive dissonance have dissolved. that leaves laurent vulnerable (especially after being tortured and genuinely letting damen down even if by accident) and emotional compromised (he has no choice but to see damen as damianos, and with that comes all of the auguste baggage and the fact that they’ve already fallen in love and had sex under different circumstances).

all that is to say, the next few chapters are laurent’s mean girls era. he is, again, still being smart and strategic (4d chess), and his feelings are valid and his trauma is real. however, he is also just being MEAN, for the same reasons classic high school movie mean girls tend to be: he feels insecure and vulnerable about his romantic attachment to damen, stressed out by the insane amount of power he definitely should not have, and self-righteous about all the ways the world has conspired against him. regina george might have been the villain of the movie, but she was the hero of her own story. janis and cady methodically dismantled her life as a popular, powerful, and confident person. that’s why she got revenge with the burn book instead of looking inward and acknowledging her own issues, of which there were many. she had a machiavellian view of life, in which mean people always won, and so being mean in retaliation was how she could protect herself from being a victim.

that is laurent’s perspective too, for a lot of this series. we don’t know anything about regina’s backstory, or heather chandler’s (another great example), but we do know exactly why laurent has the worldview he does. he used to be sweet and it made him a victim. so he is mean to protect himself, even if that robs him of his sweetness. damen’s integrity and honor have challenged laurent’s worldview, though, and that has been the source of a lot of laurent’s slow reconsideration. but now that laurent can’t just pretend that damen isn't damianos, now that he has to accept this situation in its full interpersonal and political messiness, he isn’t nearly as inspired. laurent assumes, now that laurent has gone “mask off,” that damen will realize that laurent doesn’t deserve the love he has shown him in the past. because laurent has been mean to damen, by lying about his awareness even at the times damen thought he was being earnest and sweet. that makes damen a victim and fool—two things laurent deeply fears being, and therefore assumes everyone else also fears in themselves. two things the regent had wanted laurent to consider himself, by placing damen in his life in the first place.

therefore, in his insecurity and vulnerability and anger, as a 20 year old just experiencing his first love, as someone with a lot of power and stress who cannot waste time or energy on genuinely confronting his own flaws in good faith, laurent is gearing up to be sososososo mean to damen specifically in the next few chapters. like comedically mean. aimlessly mean. pathetically mean. on purpose. ultimately, if he must be alone (which he obviously must, says laurent's brain), laurent would rather be the villain of someone else’s story than a victim in his own. that, at least, is similar to book 1 laurent—but while he was a cat playing with a mouse in book 1, in a position to do serious damage to his opponent, now he’s more like…. a cat, slapping another cat. evenly matched, but still throwing hands. transparently insecure and pathetic, only effective in doing emotional damage in ways he doesn’t intend. damen isn’t hurt by the petty things laurent says and does, because he sees through them for what they are. he’s hurt because laurent sees them as necessary to protect himself and keep his distance, when all damen wants is to make things okay between them. which laurent would never expect, because he assumes that damen wants nothing to do with him, and would be happier and better off if they stayed apart.

basically: unstoppable force (damen's persistent caring) meets unmovable object (laurent's refusal to be genuinely cared for). the only way for this cycle to end is for damen to choose to stop, or for laurent to choose to yield. laurent will eventually make that choice, but he still has to be a huge bitch about it first. he's going to lash out at damen and challenge him to stop caring, but ultimately fail—both because damen is just built different, and because he's lowkey written as a fantasy partner for emotionally volatile people with attachment and abandonment issues.

rest assured, laurent’s genre is still psychological thriller, but it’s also now a high school drama movie. and damen is about to get a bitter taste of that, with pretty much no choice in the matter. this poor man will have to deal with laurent’s bitchy theatrics as they try to co-parent an army, and he’s already too emotionally invested and aware of laurent’s habit of lashing out when he’s in pain to genuinely fight back.

this could also be called laurent’s s1 catra era, but i’m not sure what the venn diagram of capri and she ra enjoyers looks like. to those who get it—laurent is doing what catra did at princess prom for the next several chapters, down to the “hey adora” = “hello lover.” this dynamic is very fun to read because it doesn’t overstay its welcome. it’s different from laurent in book 1, or catra in general, because it’s so clearly pathetic, damen and laurent are on the same side of the war, and damen could technically make it stop at any point. so i think it’s very very fun, while it lasts >:)

The herald reined in in front of him. Damen looked at the mare’s shiny coat, not dirt-covered, not heaving or darkened with sweat, and then at the herald’s livery, in immaculate condition, unflecked by the dust of the road. He felt it rising at the back of his throat. ‘Where is he?’

damen showed up to the prom laurent planned with him to unite their rival high schools, only to find himself dateless and laurent’s promised fancy party decorations missing. this is the moment where damen checks snapchat (i was in high school from 2013-2017) and sees everyone from vere high at their own immaculately-decorated prom, where laurent is being crowned king. little does damen know, laurent was blindsided by the vere-only prom and forced via social pressure to be there since everyone elected him prom king. they’re mad at each other for a high school drama pacing-typical period of time, and then make up when they realize the misunderstanding and reassert their dedication to each other.

laurent did still murder someone with a chair, though. but like a metal folding chair from the band room

The herald’s back hit the ground. Damen had dragged him bodily from his horse into the dirt, where he lay dazed and winded, with Damen’s knee in his stomach. Damen’s hand was around his neck.

His grip tightened before it opened enough to allow the herald to speak. The herald rolled onto his side and coughed as Damen released him. He pulled something from inside his jacket. Parchment, with two lines on it. You have Charcy. I have Fortaine. He stared at the words, written in familiar, unmistakable handwriting. I’ll receive you at my fort.

lamen hr complaint #5 (unnamed herald): ragdolling this guy over what should be impersonal, professional correspondence

also, because i can't help myself:

Fortaine eclipsed even Ravenel, powerful and beautiful, its towers high-flung, its jutting crenelles biting the sky. It rose to a sheer, impossible height and, from every vantage, it was flying Laurent’s banners. The pennants seemed to float on the air effortlessly, patterned silk in blue and gold.

WELCOME HOME, BROTHER KILLER

Rows upon rows of peaked, coloured tents were pitched on the field outside Fortaine’s walls, the sun lighting the pavilions, the banners, and the silks of a graceful encampment. It was a city of tents, and it camped a fresh, intact force of Laurent’s men, who had not fought and died through the morning. The constructed arrogance of the display was intentional. It said, exquisitely: Did you exert yourself at Charcy? I have been here examining my nails.

this is funny and i wouldn’t put it past laurent, but also i’m not sure if he like. really meant this part of it specifically to piss damen off. he was just tortured idk he probably just wanted things nice. a good part of the fun of lamen divorce era is remembering that damen’s interpretation of events isn’t necessarily accurate, and that it’s hilarious how he interprets things as petty personal slights even when they might not be. they’re both so obsessed with each other and it’s great

Nikandros reined in alongside him. ‘Uncle and nephew are alike. They send other men to do their fighting for them.’

nik tweets this verbatim on priv (#3)

Damen was silent. What he felt in his chest was a hardness like anger. He looked at the elegant silken city and thought about men dying on the field at Charcy.

but not exactly anger—betrayal? heartache? self-consciousness?

Some kind of herald’s greeting party was riding towards them. He gripped the Regent’s bloody, torn banner in his hand.

the phrase “greeting party” just made me imagine them rolling up with like confetti and a speaker blasting the celebration song. while damen holds the bloody torn banner

‘Just me,’ said Damen, and put his heels into his horse. About halfway across the field, he was met by the herald, who arrived with an anxious party of four attendants saying something urgent about protocol. Damen listened to four words of it. ‘Don’t worry,’ said Damen. ‘He’s expecting me.’

lamen hr complaint #6 (more unnamed heralds): disregarding protocol

(also “he’s expecting me” girlllll)

Without even pulling off his gauntlets, he strode to the tent. He knew its high scalloped folds; he knew the starburst pennant. No one stopped him. Not even when he reached the tent and dismissed the soldier at the entrance with a single order: ‘Go.’ He didn’t bother to see if his order was obeyed. The soldier let him through: of course he did; this had all been planned. Laurent was ready for him whether he came docilely behind the herald or, as he did now, the dirt and the sweat of the battle still on him, blood dried in the places where a cursory swipe with a cloth had not reached it. He swept the tent flap back with an arm, and stepped inside.

again i do have to question, beyond the drama, how much of this is as intentional and petty as damen thinks it is. like, the heralds literally cite protocol, damen knows this is the correct way for a camp to be run. i think he is assuming a lot here, although it’s reasonable to do so. we have seen in the past that damen assumes things of laurent that laurent is just like, “uh. not everything i do is on purpose” about, or damen is just WRONG about. i just wonder if damen’s approach here confirms things laurent was worried about (damen thinking poorly of him now that they’re on even ground), further fueling the fire of his rejection-sensitive bitchiness. not that it’s an excuse, or even undeserved, but it’s good to remember that there are two sides to the story.

like to damen, this is an angry post-battle rush of a moment to confront laurent and speak his truth (he doesn’t know laurent knows who he is), but to laurent this is like. post-torture and escape, and basically being thrown into the deep end of vulnerability with damianos and what this all implies to auguste’s memory. we’re not getting the best or most rational version of either of them right now, which is great for the drama but also makes the narration less reliable

This was the place Laurent had chosen.

right. damen thinks laurent chose this place to hear the truth about him, because the “you have charcy” note implies that at some point laurent probably figured out that damen is damianos. therefore laurent chose this occasion for them to meet each other, as they truly are by birth, for the first time. damen just doesn’t know the twist that laurent has always known who he’s been, and has chosen everything else before now with that knowledge too

There were a few furnishings, low seats, cushions, and in the background a trestle table hung with its own coverings, and set with shallow bowls of sugared pears and oranges. As though they were going to nibble at sweetmeats.

the same guy who ordered the “sorry you were given a severed head and discovered a suicide” fruit basket in prince’s gambit had to order a “sorry i gaslighted you for 2 books but not really because you also technically gaslighted me” fruit basket in kings rising

He lifted his gaze from the table to the exquisitely attired figure leaned with a single shoulder against the tent pole, watching him.

lucky number laurent lean #13!

Laurent said, ‘Hello, lover.’

It was not going to be simple.

this being the follow-up line to “hello lover” is such a good combination of funny and tension-building. like laurent’s cunty tableau immediately put out damen’s fiery righteous indignation and now he’s just like “oh this is going to suck.”

He made himself breathe through that. ‘Your men think you’re a coward. Nikandros thinks that you deceived us. That you sent us to Charcy, and left us there to die by your uncle’s sword.’ ‘And is that what you think?’ said Laurent. ‘No.’ Damen said, ‘Nikandros doesn’t know you.’

this is really a testament to pacat’s cleverness, how in chapter 1 there are a lot of moments where it’s almost like damen is directly saying he thinks laurent screwed him over—nikandros and the herald saying it and him not disagreeing, him accepting the reality that laurent is not going to show up—but he never does truly say that he thinks the abandonment was on purpose. because he didn’t, and he doesn’t, which makes sense. but he’s still angry and confused and also just concerned about how laurent is taking the “news” that he’s damianos. how much of damen’s anger about laurent’s composed appearance is projection of his anxiety about laurent seeing him as he truly is, a powerful authority figure in his own right who just won a battle against insane odds?

it’s so ambiguously written that it’s almost like pacat WANTS us to spiral. which i did, and will probably continue to do, so well-played. these books are like evil catnip to anxious overthinking theater people with attachment issues and an interest in understanding complex fictional situations to cope with the fact that real life never makes enough sense. also kinky gays but let's be real that's just a trojan horse for the other stuff

‘And you do.’ Damen looked at the arrangement of Laurent’s weight, the careful way he was holding his body. Laurent’s left hand was still casually resting against the tent pole. Deliberately, he stepped forward, and clasped Laurent’s right shoulder. Nothing, for a moment. Damen tightened his grip, and ground in with his thumb. Harder. He watched Laurent turn ashen. Finally, Laurent said, ‘Stop.’

proving that he knows laurent well enough to pick up from his posture alone exactly where he’s been injured. also they’re both so messy, like let’s put pressure on each other’s literal and figurative wounds instead of just talking about our misconceptions and feelings, awesome

He let go. Laurent had wrenched back and was clutching his shoulder, where the blue of his doublet had darkened. Blood, welling up from some newly bandaged, subterranean place, and Laurent was staring at him, his eyes oddly wide. ‘You wouldn’t break an oath,’ said Damen, past the feeling in his chest. ‘Even to me.’

damen proving to himself, and proving to laurent, that he knows that laurent didn’t screw him over, and instead was injured and failed to show up. laurent is shocked by how quickly damen picked up on this. also ow

He had to force himself back.

he doesn’t want to see laurent in pain, or know that he’s causing it :( which is especially unfortunate given the conversation they’re about to have about damen murdering laurent’s brother

Laurent didn’t answer. He still had a hand clutched to his shoulder, his fingers sticky with blood. Laurent said, ‘Even to you?’

“you wouldn’t break an oath, even to me” (“even to me” being a sort of freudian slip, meaning “i killed your brother, and i’ve known that this whole time and i haven’t told you, and you have a good reason to hate me for that”) “even to you?” (to damen’s incomplete understanding: “well i know who you are now, and if i’d known before i would have broken every oath to you i’ve ever made”)

He made himself look at Laurent. The truth was an awful presence in his chest.

babygirl it’s about to get so much awfuller

He thought of the single night they had spent together. He thought of Laurent, giving himself, dark-eyed and vulnerable, and of the Regent, who knew how to break a man.

damen totally sees laurent as his “victim” right now, set up well by him re-opening laurent’s physical wound. damen fucked this man while knowing that he (damen) killed his (laurent’s) brother, and put trust in him. if they were normal, or this was a normal story, that’s where the confrontation would end. it would be that simple—damen didn’t mean to hurt laurent but still did, and laurent has to forgive him for that, and forgive himself for being fooled—and then it would get tearfully resolved because they love each other so much that it doesn't matter. but they are not normal, and this is not a normal story, so…

Outside, two armies were poised to fight. The moment was here, and there was nothing he could do to stop it. He remembered the Regent’s constant suggestion: Bed my nephew. He had done that, wooed him, won him. Charcy, he saw, hadn’t mattered to the Regent. It hadn’t meant anything. The Regent’s real weapon against Laurent had always been Damen himself.

damen thinks the regent’s plan had been to weaken laurent by putting him in circumstances where he’d unknowingly make himself vulnerable with his brother’s killer, triggering him emotionally and destroying his judgment. i'm pretty sure that this was basically his intention, but had also made sure that it would also torture laurent even if he did recognize damen on the spot.

personally i think the regent knew that laurent knew in book 1 through observing his reaction, but had planned for both possibilities in advance. what he hadn't expected, though, was for laurent and damen to start genuinely working together instead of against each other. this happens early as the thing with patras, and really pops off during the botched assassination attempt.

charcy was meant to drive a wedge between them, to correct the regent's previous miscalculation. and given the inevitable truth damen must now reveal, there's nothing he can really do to stop laurent from being upset.

‘I’ve come to tell you who I am.’ Laurent was so keenly familiar, the shade of his hair, the strapped down clothing, the full lips that he held tense or cruelly repressed, the ruthless asceticism, the unbearable blue eyes. ‘I know who you are, Damianos,’ said Laurent. Damen heard it, as the interior of the tent seemed to change, so that all of the objects in it took on a different shape. ‘Did you think,’ said Laurent, ‘I wouldn’t recognise the man who killed my brother?’

the way i YELLED during my first read. i remember even like posting something before, like “oh my god damen just tell him put this poor man out of his misery,” and then after i got to this part i immediately went and deleted that post

Each word was an ice chip. Painful, sharp; a shard. Laurent’s voice was perfectly steady.

do you think he practiced this?

‘I knew in the palace, when they dragged you in front of me,’ said Laurent. The words continued, steady, relentless. ‘I knew in the baths when I ordered you flayed. I knew—’

he definitely practiced this

‘At Ravenel?’ said Damen.

“you knew when you kissed me and let me fuck you????”

‘If you knew,’ said Damen, ‘how could you—’ ‘Let you fuck me?’ His own chest hurt, so that he almost didn’t notice the signs of it in Laurent, the control, the face, pale at any time, now white.

he almost didn’t notice the signs, which means he still totally did. because even now, damen is attentive and caring towards laurent

‘I needed a victory at Charcy. You provided it. It was worth enduring,’ Laurent spoke the terrible, lucid words, ‘your fumbling attentions for that.’

LIARRRRRRR

It hurt so much it took the breath from his throat. ‘You’re lying.’ Damen’s heart was pounding. ‘You’re lying.’ The words were too loud. ‘You thought I was leaving. You practically threw me out.’ He said it, as the realisation blossomed inside him. ‘You knew who I was. You knew who I was the night we made love.’

tbh i think this kind of realization would make me have a panic attack on the spot. also do you think this is the kind of betrayal he’s been trying so hard to avoiding confronting, coming from kastor and jokaste? but here he has no choice to confront it, because laurent is forcing him to understand the depths of the deception. no avoiding it now

He thought of Laurent surrendering, not the first time, but the second, the slower, sweeter time, the tension in him, the way he had— ‘You weren’t making love to a slave, you were making love to me.’

very true, but laurent isn’t ready to deal with it. he can’t keep up the cognitive dissonance in the present, but that doesn’t mean he’s about to accept that it was real in the past. instead he’ll just lash out.

And he couldn’t think that through clearly but he could catch a glimmer of it, a glimmer of the edge of it. ‘I thought you wouldn’t, I thought you’d never—’

OF COURSE damen suspected, at some points, that laurent knew. but this tells us that he’d ultimately dismissed the notion because it would have been insane for laurent to kiss and fuck him, while knowing his real identity. “i thought you wouldn’t, i thought you’d never—“

this is similar to how i thought about it during my first read—i suspected for all of book 1, and some of book 2, but then figured that the story was taking a different direction because how the hell could the plot points of “laurent knows who damen is” and “laurent makes himself vulnerable to damen and does a romance/sex about it” possibly be compatible? laurent, a deeply traumatized and self-protective person, wouldn’t and would never. except i underestimated laurent’s capacity for self-delusion, and overestimated the amount of control he truly has over his emotions and impulses, beneath all the posturing. damen, here, is recognizing that he’s made similar miscalculations, and now he’s seeing laurent as he truly is. they’re both seeing each other, truly, for the first time.

‘Laurent, six years ago, when I fought Auguste, I—’ ‘Don’t you say his name.’ The words were forced out of Laurent. ‘Don’t you ever say his name, you killed my brother.’

i like the simplicity of this. just the plainness of “you killed my brother.” laurent’s language is so often clever and cagey and embellished, but that last sentiment is raw and informal, and what we the reader are probably screaming in our heads. because yeah, holy shit, damen killed laurent’s brother. it’s a pretty hard thing to argue against, or ignore. “you lied to me” “you killed my brother” “you flogged me” “you killed my brother” “you forgot to do the dishes” “you killed my brother”

Laurent was breathing shallowly, almost panting as he spoke, his hands rigid on the edge of the table behind him.

his practiced words are saying one thing, but his body is very obviously having a panic attack. this scene isn’t nearly as much of a laurent mean girl moment as it seemed during a rushed first read. that’s actually kind of a relief to me, bc it made me sad to interpret him as so heartless and unfazed the first time around. even if “hello lover” is an iconic moment, it’s a performance more than anything else. and pacat shows us this sooner than i recalled or first perceived. she’s not torturing us, the reader, as much as she’s torturing both damen and laurent. and it’s not even like a lazy misunderstanding kind of torture, this is genuinely complicated and they’re both in the wrong and they both are justified in this pain and hurt. i just couldn’t see that as well the first time, having binged like all of book 2 already and having no idea what would happen next and honestly just being shocked and betrayed and compelled by the massive mislead with laurent’s awareness of the situation

‘Is that what you want to hear, that I knew who you were and I still let you fuck me, my brother’s killer, who cut him down like an animal on the field?’

you know he doesn’t, laurent, that’s just what you’re telling yourself now that you’re forced to confront it. you started this scene with “hello lover” and your prepared speech, hoping to destroy damen emotionally, but once again you’ve just kinda played yourself. maybe just cool it with the emotional gambits for now, when it comes to damen, bc they only really seem to come back and hurt you (oh fuck he can’t hear me)

‘Shall I ask you how you did it? What he looked like when your sword went in?’ ‘No,’ said Damen.

laurent, shaking, pale, looks like he’s about to pass out: “you bastard, tell me about how you murdered my brother as i think about the fact that i let you fuck me in a similar way, go ahead just make it hurt more”

damen, not a therapist but still emotionally intelligent enough to know this isn’t really about punishing him: no, i don’t think i will. can you like sit down

‘Or shall I tell you about the illusion of the man who gave me good counsel. Who stood by me. Who never lied to me.’ ‘I never lied to you.’

that italicized “i” is interesting. is it an accusation of laurent’s own lying and hypocrisy, or a specification that damen never directly told laurent he wasn’t damianos? given damen’s well-established integrity, i’m guessing it’s the first option. again with the mutual moral arbitration. and damen wouldn’t want to take such a weak a cop-out as “well i never technically said it,” it’s just not typical of his character.

The words were awful in the silence that followed them. ‘“Laurent, I am your slave”?’ said Laurent. He felt the breath forced out from his lungs.

of course laurent takes it as the second option, though, and implies that by swearing himself to laurent and then bedding him damen was directly lying about his identity. because to laurent, damen =/= damianos. a slave can’t be a prince. so damianos, the prince, must have been intentionally lying about being damen, the slave. and that’s actually easier, and less painful, and less complicated to accept than any kind of nuanced alternative.

‘Don’t,’ he said, ‘talk about it like—’ ‘Like?’ ‘Like it was cold-blooded; like I controlled it. Like we didn’t both close our eyes and pretend I was a slave.’ He made himself say the exposing words. ‘I was your slave.’

he’s right. nothing much to add here. damen wasn't just literally laurent's slave, he had devoted himself emotionally as well, and he's admitting it here despite the fact that it makes him vulnerable—something laurent is too much of a (traumatized, understandable) coward to do himself. i love damen's characterization so much

‘There was no slave,’ said Laurent. ‘He never existed. I don’t know what manner of man stands before me now. All I know is that I am facing him for the first time.’ ‘He is here.’ His flesh ached as if he had been prised open. ‘We are the same.’

this gives us some insight to laurent’s actions in book 1—not necessarily excusing them, but making them fit better into what we’ve since learned about his moral code. it ties things together, which isn’t the same as making them simpler or easier to like. pacat is very very VERY good at establishing continuous moral ambiguity in her characters, and does not rush the slow burn of making ends meet. so when she does eventually begin to connect things, it’s satisfying, because it hasn’t been all been spelled out the whole time so readers don’t have to think for themselves. this, in reference to a lot of the series’s more problematic themes, is exactly why i think people end up seeing capri as apologism or glamorization. but by claiming that, i also think they’re exposing themselves as impatient, shallow, and (sorry) simply lazy.

but i don't just want to be reductive and uncharitable, because that would be shallow and lazy too. to be perfectly clear, i honestly can't blame people for disliking this series, and not being willing or able to have patience and understanding for its more problematic elements. this series is marketed as romance/erotica. it started as indulgent kink fic. it ended up evolving into its current state during its development—and i'm really glad it did, but that doesn't change the fact that so much of its marketing and premise imply certain things that it doesn't quite deliver. and if you look up the series today, as it's still being published years after its completion, it's still marketed in a way i find somewhat misleading. to the extent that when i picked it up, it was in an intentional attempt to expand my own horizons—i wanted to challenge myself with indulgent shameless problematic porn/romance, as opposed to the weak-ass "enemies" to lovers running rival bakeries gay romance novels with canva covers that haven't worked for me in the past. the logic was basically, "well, if i don't like romance on that side of the scale, maybe i'll like the opposite extreme, or at least learn more about what i don't like." and i did feel pretty challenged during book 1, to the point that for a while i only kept reading out of morbid curiosity and vague horniness rather than any genuine expectation of depth or satisfying storytelling. it was only around the assassination scene in book 1 that i started to see the book as something capable of more depth and intrigue than just like kinky debauchery, and it pretty much just snowballed from there. and as someone who frequently reads about these dark topics in other genres and contexts, i was familiar enough with the things happening on the page to at least stomach them and push foward.

however, if i was coming at the series from a different place—like if i loved cozy romance and had very little familiarity with reading about these topics—i can see the first book especially being very blindsiding and distressing, and not wanting to engage with it further. that's not laziness, it just means that the book wasn't for me.

and the nuance doesn't end there. one of the things i love most about this series is that, even if i was just looking for shameless slavekink porn and decidedly did not want to rise to the occasion of depth or thematic exploration, i would also walk away unsatisfied. because the truly problematic shit in these books is not shameless at all, and indulgence never comes without a cost. there are a few distasteful moments that make me roll my eyes, and the garden scene definitely prompts a Conversation—but as a whole, i think pacat is very aware of the moral implications of these themes. and i also think she's perfectly aware of the fact that many people get off on them.

this series almost feels like an accidental study of, like, the psychological implications of being a person compelled by dub-con and problematic kink, finding a sort of gratification in situations where those things ar kind of inevitable (like they are for damen in book 1). AND this is made even more complicated and brave by the fact that laurent is, very relevantly, a victim of serious sexual assault. like, as hot as some of the scenes in this book are, i really don't think it makes itself easy for people to just uncritically get themselves off to. it doesn't encourage shame, but it does encourage introspection. and a lot of people simply don't read erotica and romance to introspect. (couldn't be me though. if it isn't clear, i love the laurent of vere "having insane mindfucking sex fully clothed across the room" approach to eroticism).

i feel like it's actually kind of funny that i specifically got here, as a person who almost always reads books that force dark introspection, and assumed that this erotica/romance book would be mindless, but ended up with gestures vaguely instead. for me, coming across this series and realizing what it truly is was an incredibly happy accident. but for others, i completely understand how it could be the exact opposite, and it's not lazy or shallow to realize that you misunderstood what you were getting yourself into and step away.

what is lazy and shallow, though, is to either DNF and review based on those misconceptions, or keep reading simply to fuel your own disdain and discomfort. ultimately, i think that the true error of people who walk into capri wanting shameless porn or untroubling romance is the fact that they keep reading, even when it becomes clear that the book isn't doing that. and then they decide to evaluate the book based on expectations and standards that aren't the ones the author or fans have for the work itself. people seem to take out their anger towards the SUBJECTS of slavery or rape in fiction themselves on capri, rather then the way capri specifically portrays them. either because they fucking stopped reading the book and just wanted to go on a tangent on the topics in general, or hate-read to confirm their own pre-existing bias.

my point is, nobody has to read things that trigger or upset them, and it's okay to just pass on fictional stuff that makes you feel bad or frustrated. aspects of this series made me feel bad and frustrated, even on re-read, but i enjoy the intellectual and emotional exercise of exploring those feelings and better understanding the true meaning and purpose of the art. but there are certain topics in other works of fiction that i'm unwilling to explore, which would cause me to simply stop reading, and if asked for a review i'd just say that i'm not the right person to say. and there have been many times where i've continued reading a book, hoping it would change directions, and ended up just being like, "yeah, that wasn't for me," and moving on.

the exchange "there was no slave, he never existed" "here is here, we are the same" is almost a meta-commentary on the reception of the series as a whole. it would be dishonest to deny how this series started, and some of the themes and subjects it intentionally confronts. you can't say "there was no slave [kink], [it] never existed" because the narrative proceeded to be more of a commentary on kink rather than an uncritical display of it. kink, and dark topics in fiction in general, do all have depth, and while they might not be for everyone, they are for someone. exploring that depth is entirely optional, and i understand why people with certain experiences don't want anything to do with that exploration. but our personal tastes don't change the fact that subjects like slavery and rape exist, and that reality is inseparable from the stories that come from it. ultimately, the choice is whether we're willing to take that specific reality thoughtfully on, or else just walk away.

the people i have the hardest time with are the ones who choose neither of those options. like, what do you even get out of continuing to read something that you're unwilling to explore in good faith, or that you straight-up hate? just read something else. we only have so much time in the day. stop wasting yours, and stop wasting the time of people who actually enjoy the thing with your useless bad-faith criticism. sorry this tangent has totally departed from the chapter itself, but that really is what pisses me off so much about current-day online book culture. like, i'm thinking about all of those smug-looking booktubers making 2 hour videos called "i read [name of book that doesn't appeal to the lowest common denominator of people] so you don't have to." i know how long it takes to read books thoughtfully, and then to write, film, and edit videos. maybe stop wasting your own time and dig into something you love instead, or even try to make your own thing, and just hope that some smug asshole on the internet doesn't decide to do to your work what you've done to other people's work. but no, lazy cynicism and appealing to the easy gimmick of cringe is way more profitable, i guess. and it makes you less vulnerable to people criticizing work that came from your soul, because the work you're creating is completely soulless.

anyway. i wonder what kind of totally normal things damen and laurent are up to in the chapter i'm annotating

‘Kneel then,’ said Laurent. ‘Kiss my boot.’

"if you really are still a slave, even though we both know you’re a king, then do a demeaning slave thing right now"

He looked into Laurent’s excoriating blue eyes. The impossibility of it was like a sharp pain. He couldn’t do it. He could only gaze at Laurent across the distance between them. The words hurt. ‘You’re right. I’m not a slave,’ he said.

can’t indulge in the kink anymore by circumstantial necessity, but i’m sure they’ll find something even weirder to do instead on purpose

‘I am the King.’ He said, ‘I killed your brother. And now I hold your fort.’ As he spoke, Damen drew out a knife. He felt rather than saw all of Laurent’s attention swing to it. The physical signs were small: Laurent’s lips parted, his body tensed. Laurent didn’t look at the knife. He kept his eyes on Damen, who looked right back at him. ‘So you will parley with me as with a king, and you will tell me why you called me here.’ Deliberately, Damen tossed the knife onto the floor of the tent.

okay this is just extra of him, but i mean laurent got to do “hello lover” so damen deserves to be dramatic too as a treat. i also like what this symbolizes, as opposed to their previous knife moments. as defined by their stations, they don’t have a power imbalance anymore, and they don’t have a reason to be enemies. they are a prince and a king, not a master and a slave. they are military allies, teaming up against the regent. any power imbalance and beef they have now is emotional, complicated, and abstract, nothing clear-cut (haha) enough to be represented by an instrument of simple violence like a knife. and damen summarizes this perfectly, in the context of their previous knife moments, by viscerally reminding laurent of those encounters and then just tossing the thing across the room.

honestly, i bet laurent feels jealous of the clever performative gesture. and maybe a little turned on, too, despite the horrors. that’s a fun reversal.

‘Didn’t you know?’ said Laurent. ‘My uncle is in Akielos.’

yeah, he got a really good all-inclusive deal at the akielion sandals resort and needed a vacation after all of the murder and [redacted]

[drdemonprince]

I’ve been kind of mindblown since reading your “no vanilla” post. I have some particular kinks that essentially take the place of sex in my mind in terms of turning me on/getting me off, and sex itself is just not very interesting to me. But it took me a long time to realize that. (I was like “Well I must want to have sex because I’m horny about [kinky acts] all the time!” And I didn’t think of myself as asexual because I did feel sexual attraction, but only in… very specific contexts.) Recently I’ve taken some steps to incorporate my kinks into my sex life and that has been an improvement. But it literally never occurred to me that it can JUST be the kink stuff and sex isn’t, like, an obligatory part of the equation. I feel so free haha

Right?????

As an asexual-spectrum hypnosis fetishist, I often fell back onto sex because in most hypno-kinky scenarios that people create in writing or porn, sex is the reward for having conquered a submissive's mind. Hypnosis is frequently presented as a tool that's being used to take control over a person, and unrestricted access to sex with that person is the true expression of that control. And I do get horny from hypnosis and everything to do with control, and so I often populated my own fantasies with sexual scenes. But that's really just one fun activity that can occur. I'd just as much love being left locked up in a closet with my mind wiped for hours, or serving as a hypnotist's footstool while in a trance.

And with bondage I feel that even moreso. Being locked up just fucking FEELS GOOD to me. It puts my mind at ease and slows my breathing like I'm a dog in a thunder vest. Sometimes the sex can kind of ruin it, because once I've orgasmed I'm overstimulated and squirrelly, which makes me thrash and want to escape. But if I just stay all primed and horny, I can stay locked up for hours and love every minute of it. I'm so happy now that I have found play partners who enjoy kink for kink's own sake, not merely as an inroad to sex.

[harrypottermovieproblems]

Hello, all!

We find ourselves at a funny little crossroads today. There is officially an HBO television adaptation of Harry Potter in the works, one with a clearly stated commitment to open casting that could create an inroad to character representations aligning with a great many fans' longtime hopes and dreams for Harry and Hermione especially. Ten years ago, this would have been everything we could have ever hoped for in this fandom. Today, news of this new television show cannot bring joy.

The movie adaptation has brought many book fans a great deal of frustration over the years (hence the creation of this blog); while being greatly beloved by an entire generation, it simultaneously dropped the ball in many areas focusing on characterization and worldbuilding. And yet the faces of that film franchise - the actors of the main trio especially - have been invaluable voices in the public struggle to push back the flood of anti-trans rhetoric free flowing from JK Rowling's social media accounts.

On the other hand, we finally have a long-form adaptation of the series on the horizon, but it comes less than fifteen years after the end of the original movie series and therefore inevitably falls into the exhausting position of being yet another franchise remade too soon. And most importantly, of course, the main and inescapable effect of its creation will be lining the pockets of a woman who has been actively and enthusiastically supporting bigotry against women - both trans and cis - in society and in politics.

There have been rumors that Warner Brothers is trying to buy the rights to the entirety of Harry Potter from JK Rowling, and if true, it has to be admitted - ironically, given the nature of this blog - that I hope they succeed. If the choice is between lack of artistic fulfillment in the portrayal of a fictional world or real-life financial support of a woman actively making the world a more dangerous place for vulnerable populations, there is only one choice to support.

A few years ago, I started writing a detailed post that was a general post-mortem on our collective fanship of JK Rowling, and never completed it due to general feelings of exhaustion, disgust, and feelings that it was redundant. But briefly:

Many years ago, JK Rowling made a post on her personal website about her portrayal of Aunt Marge's bulldogs. She was dissatisfied with how she had written them, because she hadn't known a lot about bulldogs at the time and hadn't taken the care to portray them in a way that did them any justice. While she meant no harm, she's since learned better and wishes, in retrospect, that she had portrayed them differently.

When I think about JK Rowling, I think about that post a lot.

Even before her newest and most outspoken TERF era, even prior to all of the issues involved in the Fantastic Beasts spinoff series, JK Rowling wrote a beloved children's series that was seen as highly progressive upon publication but also contained a number of elements that have aged, shall we say, very poorly. Some of these were markers of the time when Harry Potter was originally written - many things from the 90's have aged badly - and some of them are down to the personal ignorance of the author, whether or not you assume that ignorance came hand-in-hand with malicious intent.

She could have spoken out about this if she wished - you know, like she did with the fucking bulldogs, to say that she had no ill-intent at the time but that would write these elements differently today if she had the chance - but as far as I'm aware, she has not. In fact, despite having endless wealth and resources at her disposal now, as opposed to the original start of her writing journey as a single mother scribbling ideas on cafe napkins, her portrayal of delicate issues of things like race, gender, and sexuality in her writing has only gotten worse.

The 'JK Rowling was always a secret conservative' rhetoric is strong, especially on Tumblr, and while I understand it, I genuinely think that it is misguided. The woman spent most of her life voting in favor of and speaking out for leftist and progressive politics. We (progressives) are not immune from propaganda, radicalization, or being raging fucking bigots. However she votes now, whatever idiots she is friends with now, the call very much started from inside the house on this one.

So, to circle back to the original point of this post:

This new HBO television series, in a best-case scenario, could take all of the tone-deaf sociopolitical issues with the original novels and fix them. It could take all of the creative issues with the movie franchise and fix those too. It could give us a diverse cast and tell an emotional story that does credit to what so many people held dear about the book series while growing up.

(I doubt it will, but it could.)

And yet this would still be a thing that on some level brought me no joy, because at the end of the day, it would also be putting pallets and pallets of cash into JK Rowling's pocket as she continues to dig her way down the conservative rabbit hole instead of fixing any of the mistakes of her early writing career.

Gross.

xoxo

[ladyeyrewrites]

8x06 Speculation

I'm gonna stray outside of my little fanfic writing corner into some speculation for a bit because I don't know if anyone's mentioned anything along the lines of what I've been thinking about, but I haven't seen it said yet.

So first off, I don't think the BuckTommy storyline for next episode has anything to do with Tommy being divorced. The mention of divorce and old wounds fits what they've been setting up for Eddie and it'd be redundant and too similar to the Carlos storyline in Lone Star if they did something like that for the thing from Tommy's past that Buck's going to have to grapple with.

So what have they been setting up for Tommy?

There have been repeated times when Tommy has commented on how tight-knit the 118 is. In 7x04, he admitted to being jealous of how it's become like a family. Then in this episode, when they're all in the hospital waiting room and everyone gets the group chat message from Hen, he says, "It’s a beautiful thing, isn’t it? Having a crew like this behind you, even when things go wrong."

And maybe I'm reading too much into things, but he gets this kind of far off look in his eyes like he's thinking about something from his past. Like he had a crew that didn't support him when things went wrong (which definitely fits with what we know about Gerrard's 118, but I think there's more to it that what we say in the Begins episodes). Knowing that Tommy recoginises his past mistakes, I also wonder if maybe Tommy was part of a group that turned their backs on a friend in need and he regrets that.

Earlier in the episode, there's another moment when Buck is info dumping that I missed the first time I watched because it's very quick. Buck is telling Tommy about Billy Boils and says "His own posse hogtied him. Turned him into the sheriff for the reward." We get Tommy's reaction to seeing that. His eyes kind of widen like it's triggered a memory. Or I could be reading way too much into things. If I'm not reading too much into things, that could support the idea of Tommy being betrayed people he thought were his friends (which would fit with how closed off he was in Chimney Begins) or was part of a group betrayal, either passively or actively, that he regrets.

Later, when Buck's delivering his eulogy, there are three lines that I think could foreshadow whatever hurdle we're going to see in the relationship coming up:

"Your posse abandoned you when you needed them most. I can't imagine how scary that must have been for you."

"Your days of bouncing around, unknown and forgotten are over" (the camera focuses on Tommy when Buck says this and he has another distant look on his face)

"'Cause I'm in your posse now." (Tommy looks at Buck with an expression I interpret as hopeful yearning, in addition to looking completely enamored)

There's been this consistent focus on Tommy and his connections to other people/groups. He wants to belong to a family. He's jealous of the 118's tight-knit dynamic. He's not quite part of the family yet (he and Eddie are friends, but he's not part of the group chat and Eddie needed to clarify that Athena was Bobby's wife) but he's making inroads through his friendship with Eddie and his relationship with Buck.

The writers could have chosen a different backstory for Billy Boils or they could have chosen to have Buck infodump about him to other characters. They very deliberately placed Tommy in those scenes where Buck uncovers Billy's history and show Tommy's reactions to this information. They didn't have to do that.

All this to say that I think Buck's going to learn something about Tommy's past that has to do with group dynamics gone bad and the part Tommy played in those dynamics whether as a perpetrator or victim. Maybe it'll be from Tommy's army days or from when he first joined the 118, maybe it'll be from earlier than either of those. I don't think it'll be about how he treated Chim and Hen in the begins episodes because that would be rehashing story the audience already knows.

I also don't think that anything points to there being a break up next episode because despite believing Billy cursed him, Buck still had his body buried, paid for a marker (did he also pay for the burial plot, cuz that's a lot of money for a 100+ year old corpse), dressed up in a suit, and gave a eulogy essentially saying he'd be on Billy's side. And Tommy was there the whole time.

If Buck can find forgiveness and empathy for a corpse he believed cursed him, he can definitely do so for his boyfriend if it's the case that he learns about something not-so-great that Tommy did.

Anyway, I have no idea if this makes any sense. I just needed to get out of my head so I can finish the next chapter of my fic.

[ibedressin]

Fantasy OC time! A small write up for this character I made. Photos by Julie_Floro on Instagram! Styling by me!

Cassian is half human and half dark elf, a shadow that follows them throughout their life in their mostly human court. Although they've held the contempt and suspicion of many for most of their life, Cassian has made many inroads with esteemed members in the court. This life of persecution has only sharpened their ambitions. They long for power so that they may never feel powerless again.

They've gained the trust of the court through what some highborn members would consider a rather unsavory but necessary set of skills. They thwart threats, engage in gender fuckery, should an assignment call for it and will go as far as bloodying their blade against anyone who would do harm to members of the Court. Cassian is truly the Shadow of the Court, a title they now proudly carry after previously living a long life in desperate isolation. They are respected, admired, and feared by many within the walls of the castle. While they may be held under suspicion by outsiders, Cassian's loyalty to many generations of their mostly human court remains untarnished.

Their proficiency with their tongue is equal to their combat skills, both of which would be deadly things to find yourself on the other side of should you be their next target.

[enbycrip]

I was just viscerally reminded of the number of fucking doctors who were writing long op-eps in late 2020 and early 2021 about how shitty, inadequate and exhausting it was to deal with the NHS over treatment for Long COVID when they

a) didn’t have to deal with structural “oh this Trust doesn’t have a treatment for your disorder because the consultant who had an interest in it retired and we decided we’re just Not Treating it anymore”;

b) didn’t have to deal with their colleagues disbelieving they were actually ill, or that their illness existed because “apparently it’s trendy now”;

c) had contacts and colleagues who would go the extra mile for them in a way they wouldn’t for random patients;

drove me to nearly throwing my phone out of the window more than once.

I do genuinely hope all of them have recovered and have their lives back now because I wouldn’t wish chronic illness on anyone.

However, I can testify that they haven’t made any structural inroads with their colleagues because I spoke to my GP last week about the possibility of trying a treatment for POTS that I’ve heard good things about and was told “well the British Faculty of Cardiologists doesn’t actually recognise POTS as a disorder so I’m afraid we can’t actually refer you to a cardiologist, and you’d need them to sign off on treatment like that.”

“…but it’s a neurological disorder of the autonomic nervous system, and I *was* diagnosed with it by my former GP in the same Trust I still live in.”

“…well, yes, but it mostly *affects* the heart so that’s who we would refer you to if they accepted referrals for it…”

I was genuinely just so gobsmacked I just put the phone down then and there. I had waited three weeks for this phone appointment.

And I do absolutely know this is because the Tories are literally dismantling the NHS, but…I would honestly rather be told “we won’t refer you because this probably won’t kill you and we’re literally putting all our cash into cancer patients because they show up highlighted in our statistics than this labyrinthine Kafkaesque gaslighting I’ve been dealing with for over a decade now.

[transfloridaresources]

Palestine Global Strike Jan 21-28, 2024

Infographics / toolkit created by queerandtranswealth and the_operating_system on IG.

[Photo ID: Blue to yellow gradient background. A photo of Bisan in a Press vest smiling at the camera while standing outside in the daylight. Text reads: 'Bisan called for a global strike next week from January 21-28. @ queerandtranswealth.' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Blue to yellow gradient background. Text reads: 'What is a general strike? A general strike is a stoppage of work and economic activity across all industries to force leaders to change their actions. Bisan called for a global general strike from January 21 to 28. The purpose of the strike is to disrupt economic systems supporting the ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. Bisan wrote in a post yesterday, "Strike as much as you can and protest...for a whole week or until this madness ends!" @ queerandtranswealth' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Blue to yellow gradient background. Text reads: 'Are general strikes in the United States protected by the National Labor Relations Board? No, they are not. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) protects the rights of employees to engage in "concerted activity," which is when two or more employees take action for their mutual aid or protection regarding terms and conditions of employment (NLRB.gov). If your workplace or union does not support the general strike, your employer may discharge, discipline, or threaten you for participating. @ queerandtranswealth.' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Blue to yellow gradient background. Text reads: 'You have the privilege (underlined) to strike if you have: A workplace that supports the global strike for Palestinian people. A union that is organizing a general strike in solidarity with Palestinian people. Unused sick days or PTO. A fully funded emergency savings fund to use in case you get fired, disciplined, or threatened. Your own business or private practice. Here are other ways you can support the global strike. @ queerandtranswealth.' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Dark background with text in colors of pink, yellow, white, red, and light blue. Text reads: 'The many meanings of "shut it down" - how many can you commit to tomorrow? This brief toolkit offers ways to STRIKE if you can't physically be at an action: With your money (boycott / divest / support). With your attention (read / watch / listen). With your platform (share / archive). With your voice as a voter (write / call / fax). With your personal networks (gather / build). With your calendar (plan / commit). With your bodymind (wrestle / strategize).' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Dark background with text in colors of pink, yellow, white, red, and light blue. Text reads: 'An access oriented strike framework: As we call for a GENERAL STRIKE, how can we do so sensitively to the ways that certain forms of resistance are a privilege? And create inroads for those for whom a work stoppage or arrest involves risks such as homelessness or deportation. So too must we name the inherent ableism in valuing physical presence most highly, and leave room for that for whom violence is a palpable threat. If physically "striking" isn't accessible, this guide invites you to consider how a strike day can be a call to COMMITMENT - to holding yourself accountable for changing where your attention and resources go.' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Dark background with text in colors of pink, yellow, white, and light blue. Text reads: 'Strike with your money. Commit to boycotting + spreading awareness about BDS / consumption. Commit to moving your money out of corporate banks and harmful investments. Be concrete: start the process of setting up new accounts. Put a list of brands to avoid on your phone or in your wallet. Demand accountability and transparency at business + schools.' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Dark background with text in colors of pink, yellow, white, and light blue. Text reads: 'Strike with your calendar. Commit to weekly and monthly blocks of time, either on your own or with others. We owe Palestine, and each other, endurance -- this work is the work of our lives. It deserves our dedicated time. Identify and plan on upcoming events to attend, online or off. Make a list, a note on your phone, a story highlight, a saved post folder on your phone of organizations and people whose work you want to follow. Recognize the value of this feeling manageable. Be strategic. Samidoun has a great events calendar!' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Dark background with text in colors of pink, yellow, white, and light blue. Text reads: 'Strike with your platform. Commit to the global call to visibly stand in solidarity with Gaza + Palestine, for ceasefire, and against genocide: Film a 10 second selfie video. Say "My name is (first name only), I am from (country) and "I stand with Palestine." Send your clip by email to palestine@gazanewslive.com and upload it to your personal platform with the hashtag #IStandWithPalestine. Commit to fighting the algorithm by sharing and archiving counternarratives.' /End ID]

[Photo ID: Dark background with text in colors of pink, yellow, white, and light blue. Text reads: 'Strike with your attention. Commit to re/orienting your time on this day away from passive consumption of media and leisure activities, towards educating yourself, getting involved in virtual actions, contacting your reps, etc. Quiet strike re/orient "workday" hours. Watch / listen / read: Today, dedicate blocks of time to strategically informing yourself, with film, audio, articles, or other media. Share what you've learned.' /End ID]

[unclevladscorner]

On sock puppets, pen names and Freydis Moon

First, lets talk about the difference between a pen name and a sock puppet becauese lots of authors use pen names. This includes me.

I use two names- Uncle Vlad is for my games and erotic short stories on itch. I do not intend to take this name off of itch or Tumblr. I will publish Sword of the Voivode under T.G. Joye. This is mostly because my legal name is used by several entities to publish other work already, and I don't want to be mixed up with unrelated works that are not my own.

Sock puppets are almost exclusively online handles used to harass and manipulate people. Freydis used both- sock puppet accounts often tended to also be pen names for other styles of writing.

While neither of these things is a crime per se, some of those alternate personas engaged in digital brown face. While also not a crime per se, it is in very poor taste.

Here's where things get absolutely FUCKED-

Freydis is an award winning latinex author who is; by all accounts, not a latinex person. Freydis also engaged heavily in multiple forms of bullying, which I have been on the recieving end myself. This bullying largely targeted minorities who are underrepresented in fiction- allowing Freydis to boost themselves as a supposedly marginalized author as they harrassed many trans, non binary, and people of color out of publishing own ownvoices work.

I've seen the effects of Freydis's predatory behavior first hand on transmasculine writers- many were afraid to leave their sphere of influence after becoming attached to Freydis, in spite of the bad behavior. Many more were harrassed off of various platforms- like Discord and Twitter- cutting them off from a small but tight knit community.

I am one of those people who was harassed off of Twitter, and have not made any inroads into the digital writing community b/c I feared backlash from Freydis. I've spent the last two years trying to figure out what I was going to do once I released Sword of the Voivode. While not erotica, I still felt fear to publish on Amazon due to Freydis's past harassment. It is a miracle the book has come this far in the process and I will be publishing it later this year.

Many, many more people were manipulated into believing Freydis with an unwavering, cult-like fervor, making it impossible to even have a conversation about years of abuse and manipulation going on behind the scenes.

The Takeaway-

We need to be better to one another, both by being more supportive of those within our own communities and by questioning our loyalty to any one person. We talk about believing victims, but never in the context of bullying and I think that has to change here and now.

We also need to boost each other like there's no tomorrow. Many ownvoices works have been left languishing in obscurity because Freydis took up so much space in multiple minority communties. Boost those books you felt unsafe to do so before. Boost your own. We need to lift each other up and engage with one another more readily to really undo the hurt done to us.

Be safe, and be kind to one another,

-Your Uncle Vlad.

[cyarskj1899]

These Bitxches love an excuse to put on costumes and march for 💩they practically caused. All I see is a “Look at me”, parade. I bet they’ll be wearing Handmaid’s costumes too!

Black voters need to make a list of everybody who argued for the last 10 years we need to punish Democrats knowing that Black lives would be affected the most if that happened. Folks that are determined to punish us need to feel our wrath. And that includes other Black folks.

We need to show up to Free Palestine rallies and ask what are they doing for Black folks.

We need to show up at Jill Stein's house and ask her what is she doing for Black folks.

We need to go to FBA, ADOS and B1 meetings, rallies and candidates house's and ask they how much progress have they made with reparations and why haven't they made any inroads with Trump and Republicans.

We need to go to Latino Republican meetings and ask what are they doing for their Black constituents.

We need to go to the offices of The Intercept and ask their staff and editors why aren't they writing stories about the anti-Blackness in white progressive anti-Democrat circles.

We need to go to mosques and ask them why aren't they speaking out about anti-Blackness in their communities.

We need to ask pro-Trump Black celebrities like 50 Cent why he expect us to buy his products while he pals around with someone who hates us.

We need to confront Black conservatives like Candace Owens about how she monetizes her anti-Blackness and ask her why she raises money for Neo-Nazis and racists but not Black businesses.

We need to go to every third party meeting and rally and demand to speak about how callous they are about Black suffering.

We need to go to DSA meetings and ask them why are their chapters so white and how that impacts their view of politics particularly harm reduction and they way Black people view politics.

We need to ask #BlackLivesMatter activists why they were preaching anti-Democrat messages when we specifically asked them to advocate for Black lives. Particularly knowing how much agency Black women have in the party. And the fact they profited off of our pain.

We need to call into progressive podcasts and jump in the mentions and chats to ask them if they were paid by Russia to be anti-Democrat and to develop a plan for Black America if the Democratic Party is destroyed. Where exactly do we weld influence in politics if they're gone?

We need to bumrush speeches given by anti-Democrat pro-union leaders who advocated voting for Trump but dismissed the Biden-Harris administration saving their pensions. And we need to ask does the next Democratic President have the right to ignore them because of this.

We need to gather student loan forgiveness advocates who argued the Biden administration refused to act when we now know the SCOTUS and the federal judiciary Trump nominated was never going to allow that to happen. Do they feel any guilt for lying about it?

We need to go to the houses of Justice Democrats and protest about their plan to weaken the Democratic Party. We need to specifically ask how this plan benefits Black voters as a whole and not the few they chose to run as candidates

We need to yell at the legacy media as much as possible. Email them. Crash their interviews. And talk about how they mainstreamed and sanewashed Trump and his voters but never Black Democratic voters unless they were thinking of voting for Trump.

We need to bombard progressive media activists and writers to answer why Black Democratic voters should pay for a "genocide" that is taking place thousands of miles away in a war the US didn't start. How does our pain create a solution to Palestinian oppression?

We need to attack activists who say we shouldn't fundraise for Democrats but abortion clinics. Because if you don't vote for Democrats and Republicans pass a national abortion law how does it fucking matter? What is their plan if that happens?

We need to confront contrarians in our community. Are you pro-Trump or just anti-Black women? Are you pro-Black or just anti-Black men? You can't be both. Either you're down for us AND I DO MEAN ALL OF US or you're not like us. Are you here to build or destroy? Speak up. Be clear

We need to go after so-called Black publications like The Grio with white owners and how they talk about Black politicians and especially Democrats. Is your takes beneficial to Black voters? Or are you preaching apathy? How does that help our community? Blow up their mentions.

We need to question Black influencers like Boyce Watkins and the Black Millionaires Twitter account why do they preach Black wealth while humanizing Trump and advocating to not vote. Aren't poor and financially unstable Black people the most vulnerable in our community?

If we're tired of playing with folks, let's do that.

Folks wanna threaten us and the party we have agency in.

Get right back in their shit.

What the fuck do we have to lose?

Votes?

These mufuckas ALREADY said they not voting for us.

Let them feel the heat.

During the beginning of the Obama administration, white conservatives began protesting about shit that really didn't matter. Housing initiatives. Taxes that hadn't happened yet. It was bullshit but the media paid attention. That blossomed into the Tea Party. We need to take note.

We need to be in front of every camera and in every reporter's mentions talking about Black voters. They're going to try and memoryhole us but we need to let everybody know we're not fucking happy about this shit or with anybody that's responsible for it.

We need to identify the people who argued "the Supreme Court didn't matter" in 2016 and remind mufuckas every single day it did and it does. And it specifically mattered to Black voters. Especially since the right-wing SCOTUS gutted the Voting Rights Act and Affirmative Action.

[chaotic-archaeologist]

Hi! I'm currently doing my MA in archaeology (European Prehistory specialization) and I love it. I always thought I'd get my Masters and dip, but lately I've been seriously contemplating getting a PhD. I love learning and studying my topic and I'm having so much fun at my uni and suddenly starting my working career at 22 doesn't sound very appealing anymore. However, the idea of applying to a PhD program is very overwhelming (luckily where I want to apply has a pretty cohesive sign up step by step), still the idea of funding (especially) and having to write a proposal and possibly getting rejected from the place I've spend the last three and half years walking around is very overwhelming. How can I have that be not so overwhelming to the point of giving up bc if sounds like too much? Do I need to worry about funding that much? Is it expensive?

(I tried to find your advice masterpost before sending this ask to check if you'd already talked abt it, but I couldn't find a working link, sorry)

Thanks in advance :D

Hi dirtling,

First, here's a link to my advice master list—sorry that wasn't working for you. Our blue hellsite is fickle like that.

From what you say, it sounds like you have a great attitude for starting the journey to a PhD. Ultimately, the love of learning and a dedication to the field are the most important parts. The application and the proposal and the funding are daunting for everyone, but they are doable. I find that breaking things down into bite sized pieces and establishing your sense of self worth outside of academia are critical.

Now I feel the need to point out that my experience and advice come from a uniquely American viewpoint, and may not be applicable to European schools at all. Europeans please feel free to chime in with your own advice!

The very first thing you should do is talk to your advisor. Please send them an email right now if you have not already done so! Your (potential) advisor is going to be your champion in any sort of application process going forward. If you want to continue at the same university you're already at, your advisor is the single best person to help walk you through that process. Even if you wind up going somewhere else, you're going to need to make inroads with another advisor at a new program.

Finally: grad school is expensive (at least in the United Stated). However, many programs will have tuition waivers and assistantships that they offer their grad students because if everybody had to pay for it, nobody except the very rich would be able to afford to go to grad school. Exactly how affordable it is depends on the cost of living in your area and how much the school pays you (and whether you're able to work outside to supplement that income if need be).

Honestly, I think you've already done the hard part by getting into (and nearly completing) a Master's program. That's a great step towards proving to PhD programs that you have what it takes, and it should give you a decent idea about finances. What are yours like right now? How about your peers? I would imagine there isn't going to be a vast amount of difference from a MA to a PhD, and in the US a PhD is sometimes cheaper because they're funded while MAs often are not.

There will be differences from a MA to a PhD. Doctoral students are going to be expected to take on larger magnitudes of their own research and function more independently, but a good advisor and program should help you through that process. Again, the key is to take things piece by piece. Start with talking to your advisor and maybe the graduate program director. Take a look at that step by step guide with them and break it into separate tasks you need to do.

Don't psych yourself out about this too much. One thing at a time.

-Reid

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Zack Beauchamp at Vox:

The Republican party is going in two directions on race at the same time. Electorally speaking, the modern GOP has never been so diverse. Each of the past two elections, and most available 2024 polling, reveals the GOP making real inroads with Black and (especially) Latino voters. These gains shouldn’t be overstated — Democrats still dominate among non-whites as a whole — but they are real. But at the elite level, conservative intellectuals and operatives are developing a new doctrine of white identity politics. And it’s already shaping the Trump administration’s plans for a second term. A new book on “anti-white racism” — The Unprotected Class, by Claremont Institute fellow Jeremy Carl — illustrates this trend clearly.

Its April release went unheralded outside conservative circles, but it received laudatory attention inside them. Tucker Carlson praised it as “outstanding”; leading activist Chris Rufo described it as a “must-read.” Nate Hochman, a former speechwriter for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, called it “the most important thing you read this year.” Carl got friendly interviews on Donald Trump Jr.’s web show and on Fox News during primetime. Carl’s book centers on the claim that “anti-white racism is the most predominant and politically powerful form of racism in America today.” What mainstream scholars of race call “white privilege” is, in his view, a series of “informal evanescent cultural legacies.” By contrast, anti-white discrimination “is increasingly legal and formal.” This discrimination is, for Carl, primarily the product of a pernicious ideology popular among elites (nonwhite and white alike). “Anti-white racism is the all-but-official ideology of our ruling regime,” he writes — and they have acted in such a way as to ensure that whites are increasingly shunted to the bottom of America’s social hierarchy.

Carl’s arguments for this view resemble a funhouse mirror version of American racial history: roughly the same series of events, but with the roles of victim and perpetrator reversed.

[...]

Carl’s version of white identity politics is hardly isolated on the intellectual right. He cites two other prominent book, by New York Times contributor Christopher Caldwell and think tanker Richard Hanania, to argue that the legal roots of anti-white racism were created by the legislative victories of the civil rights movement. Their accounts align on the idea that the basic structure of anti-discrimination protections — including the Civil Rights Act of 1965 — needs to be overhauled or repealed entirely. Of course, conservatives have complained about “reverse racism” for decades. What’s new is not just the aggressiveness of Carl’s claims and others like them, but their direct connection to radical policy proposals — and the fact that people in positions of power appear to be listening.

The MAGA movement is based on White victimhood and entitlement that plays up the “anti-White racism” while ignoring other forms of racism that have historically dominated American society (anti-Black, anti-Latino, anti-Asian, etc.).

[goldkirk]

My five happy things for yesterday

• seeing the lava lamp glowing in the window while coming back from the last dog walk after dark

• the veggie pot pies that the grocery store is now stocking!!!! So tasty, I missed this

• making progress with therapy work and processing-writing again bit by bit. It WAS the right choice to stop pushing that and bring it back in slowly. Hopefully this time I won’t blow out my whole writing ability again for everything besides technical documents and basic lists. fingers crossed I ride the line successfully this time instead of tipping over again. im not going to keep getting repeatedly terrified to write, I'm done with this. fixing it for good if it kills me lmao

• Got so. many. merge commits resolved from multiple commiters mixing. got frustrated, took a break, walked aroujd, did a productive physical task, came back, ploughed trhough. booyah

• productive tiny inroad conversations that keep slowly shifting the needle

[grapehyasynth]

Wille and Simon are good friends and housemates, living together after studying together in university. Simon is making inroads in musical instruction; Wille aspires to be a poet but is struggling to make ends meet now that his parents have cut him off.

One day Simon is taking out the recycling when he notices scraps of paper with snippets of handwritten text on them, like abandoned lines from a poem. He always loves reading Wille's work, so he tugs it out. It's all heavily romantic, some of it bordering on cheesy and sappy - things like "you're under my skin but I like the itch" and "I thank the stars every day for you". He pockets it, not quite sure what he's feeling, and it's only later that evening when he unfolds it in his room that he can admit he's jealous. Wille is writing overdrawn romantic poetry for someone - someone who is not Simon.

He tries to casually ask Wille what he's been working on lately, and Wille is extremely cagey, all but confirming Simon's suspicions: Wille has a crush.

Several days later, Wille comes bouncing through the front door, tossing his things aside and grabbing Simon's hands for a poorly-executed waltz. Wille is wearing a suit and Simon's stomach sinks. Is this it? Has Wille just been on a date with his mysterious crush? Does Simon have to slowly descend into madness as he watches Wille fall h love?

Then Wille announces he's finally gotten a job - with a greeting card agency. "It's not ideal, but it'll pay the bills while I work on my - why are you laughing?"

Simon pulls out the scrap of paper. "I saw this the other day and thought-"

Wille hides his face in embarrassment. "Oh no. You probably were trying to think of a nice way to tell me it's all awful."

"No, I just assumed you were writing it for someone specific," he laughs, trying to tug Wille's hands away from his face. "That you had a secret lover."

Wille somehow manages to go very pale and blush at the same time. "Unlikely."

"Why is that unlikely?"

"Because - nevermind," he says hastily, and he snatches the paper from Simon and hurries away to his room.

Several weeks later, there is a card in Simon's mailbox. A card from Wille. Who shares the mailbox. Who in fact shares their apartment and could have just hand-delivered the card to Simon. He opens the card in the lobby of the building. It's from Wille's company, and inside it says you're the subject of all my best poems and that's no secret, lover. Wille has handwritten below that, I know it's bad. I hope you'll still go on a date with me.

He texts Wille, should I respond by post as well?

[bharv]

i think you have such a rich and interesting past and sometimes i can feel the weight of your experiences in your writing

Ahhhh thank you! You know what’s funny? I spent my whole twenties worrying I wasn’t making enough inroads, I didn’t have a solid career, I was too flighty and non-committal… but it meant I have experienced so many weird and wonderful things that I wouldn’t have if I didn’t try things out, go to parties, say hi to people, date around etc.

Say yes to things that’s what I will say!

[mega-aulover]

Week 14 of 2024

Hi all and welcome to April. This year is going so fast. For those participating in Camp Nano, or if you are participating in any of the writing prompts that are up coming up, I'll be posting more writing sprints.

In all of this whirlwind I want to remind people that it's okay if you miss a week or several. It's okay if you only wrote 4 words. (That was my reality a few weeks ago)

Writing is a JOB, people write for a living (ie for a paycheck).

We - use it as a fun activity, and yet we berate ourselves when we can't write. I've been there, this year has been super difficult for me to make inroads on the stories, and I beat my self up when I can't, because of time or illness. My life like many of yours is a literal circus. There are days we are exhausted and the last thing we want to do is write. And that is my point. It's okay to feel tired. It's okay to feel fatigue. It's okay to say you know what not today.

I want you to all know that I love seeing when you have an update whether you do it every week or are able to do it once a month or whenever you can. It's an honor when you do post.

The Dead Wip's Society is meant as an encouraging safe space for all writers efforts to be celebrated. To celebrate their accomplishment. It doesn't matter what fandom you're from or if it's for a personal project. Writing is a JOB, yet we write (I know we are insane lol...and gladly so), because we love to write.

So come on and tell us how you did - I did....

For An Everlarked Ever After I wrote : 3996

For Bitter Rivals I wrote:  1491

Gelly Story : 2,735