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#wrong. literally always wrong
penumbralwoods · 7 months
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btw one day an awkward 13 year old will read what you’ve written or see what you’ve made and it’ll make them want to create something of their own and that is the best thing that will ever happen to them
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burquillos · 6 months
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Post-war shenanigans. It's all the same to him
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cthulhum · 2 months
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i lied theres no sex. were gonna sit down and watch supernatural while we analyze the way almost every character is queer coded especially dean
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aftg4rd · 3 months
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🧼: “D’ya think I cuid take my gear off first, Si?”
💀: “Negative.”
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giantkillerjack · 1 year
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Today my therapist introduced me to a concept surrounding disability that she called "hLep".
Which is when you - in this case, you are a disabled person - ask someone for help ("I can't drink almond milk so can you get me some whole milk?", or "Please call Donna and ask her to pick up the car for me."), and they say yes, and then they do something that is not what you asked for but is what they think you should have asked for ("I know you said you wanted whole, but I got you skim milk because it's better for you!", "I didn't want to ruin Donna's day by asking her that, so I spent your money on an expensive towing service!") And then if you get annoyed at them for ignoring what you actually asked for - and often it has already happened repeatedly - they get angry because they "were just helping you! You should be grateful!!"
And my therapist pointed out that this is not "help", it's "hLep".
Sure, it looks like help; it kind of sounds like help too; and if it was adjusted just a little bit, it could be help. But it's not help. It's hLep.
At its best, it is patronizing and makes a person feel unvalued and un-listened-to. Always, it reinforces the false idea that disabled people can't be trusted with our own care. And at its worst, it results in disabled people losing our freedom and control over our lives, and also being unable to actually access what we need to survive.
So please, when a disabled person asks you for help on something, don't be a hLeper, be a helper! In other words: they know better than you what they need, and the best way you can honor the trust they've put in you is to believe that!
Also, I want to be very clear that the "getting angry at a disabled person's attempts to point out harmful behavior" part of this makes the whole thing WAY worse. Like it'd be one thing if my roommate bought me some passive-aggressive skim milk, but then they heard what I had to say, and they apologized and did better in the future - our relationship could bounce back from that. But it is very much another thing to have a crying shouting match with someone who is furious at you for saying something they did was ableist. Like, Christ, Jessica, remind me to never ask for your support ever again! You make me feel like if I asked you to call 911, you'd order a pizza because you know I'll feel better once I eat something!!
Edit: crediting my therapist by name with her permission - this term was coined by Nahime Aguirre Mtanous!
Edit again: I made an optional follow-up to this post after seeing the responses. Might help somebody. CW for me frankly talking about how dangerous hLep really is.
#hlep#original#mental health#my sympathies and empathies to anyone who has to rely on this kind of hlep to get what they need.#the people in my life who most need to see this post are my family but even if they did I sincerely doubt they would internalize it#i've tried to break thru to them so many times it makes my head hurt. so i am focusing on boundaries and on finding other forms of support#and this thing i learned today helps me validate those boundaries. the example with the milk was from my therapist.#the example with the towing company was a real thing that happened with my parents a few months ago while I was age 28. 28!#a full adult age! it is so infantilizing as a disabled adult to seek assistance and support from ableist parents.#they were real mad i was mad tho. and the spoons i spent trying to explain it were only the latest in a long line of#huge family-related spoon expenditures. distance and the ability to enforce boundaries helps. haven't talked to sisters for literally the#longest period of my whole life. people really believe that if they love you and try to help you they can do no wrong.#and those people are NOT great allies to the chronically sick folks in their lives.#you can adore someone and still fuck up and hurt them so bad. will your pride refuse to accept what you've done and lash out instead?#or will you have courage and be kind? will you learn and grow? all of us have prejudices and practices we are not yet aware of.#no one is pure. but will you be kind? will you be a good friend? will you grow? i hope i grow. i hope i always make the choice to grow.#i hope with every year i age i get better and better at making people feel the opposite of how my family's ableism has made me feel#i will see them seen and hear them heard and smile at their smiles. make them feel smart and held and strong.#just like i do now but even better! i am always learning better ways to be kind so i don't see why i would stop
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certifiablyinsanez · 10 months
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It’s so cute when people think Crowley is suave and sexy and cool. Like, only under the threat of destruction by Satan himself can make this demon say ‘fuck’ apparently. He has a corny ass voicemail. Don’t give him access to a crystal ball and a fez if you don’t want him to start acting goofy. 20% of his personality is being a Plant Mom. The other 80% is being a Wine Aunt. She cosplays Mary Poppins just cuz. She manages to stay “up to style” and is very bad at it somehow. 90% of his existence can be summarized as “Silly Simp”.
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thevioletcaptain · 1 year
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i genuinely don't care how good a piece of ai generated art or writing looks on the surface. i don't care if it emulates brush strokes and metaphor in a way indistinguishable from those created by a person.
it is not the product of thoughtful creation. it offers no insights into the creator's life or viewpoint. it has no connection to a moment in time or a place or an attitude. it has no perspective. it has no value.
it's empty, it's hollow, and it exists only to generate clicks (and by extension, ad revenue.)
it's just another revolting symptom of the disease that is late stage capitalism, and it fucking sucks.
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trans-androgyne · 22 days
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Feeling upset at people believing Julia Serano over trans men and mascs about how people respond to our manhood/masculinity. Our expressions of it are never ridiculed? You're certain? I guess all those caricatures of us I've seen as fat and balding with patchy facial and body hair and T needles sticking out of our bodies weren't real. Definitely not intended to imply our masculinity is fake and ugly.
Yes, there is a difference between how trans femininity and masculinity is treated. When people mock trans femininity, they are mocking femininity in general. When they mock trans masculinity, they are not mocking masculinity in general. But they do mock trans masculinity, because it is seen as artificial, disgusting, and offensive on our bodies. Masculinity is inherently gender non-conformity on us, and our masculine expressions themselves are in fact used as a joke. Do not ever try to tell me transmascs don't get made fun of for their masc clothing when that literally happened to me last fucking week.
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poorly-drawn-mdzs · 9 months
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Turtle Takedown Teamwork.
[First] Prev <–-> Next
#poorly drawn mdzs#mdzs#wei wuxian#lan wangji#tulu xuanwu#Something about changing the action sequence to something gentle is hilarious to me.#The lesson here is “Be nice to turtles. They are gentle creatures. And many are very endangered.”#don't get me wrong here; I love this scene a lot. LWJ's string technique is one of my favoyrite things.#We do get a fair amount of LWJ fighting but I always loved how the theme of strings comes into play.#There is actually a lot to unpack with LWJ being associate with 'strings'.#The musicianship: Of dedication and rigor in one's practice.#The tension between following along a path or composing your own way forwards (playing what has been written vs composing)#A string is a tightly coiled/taunt entity; The same tension that makes it sing so beautifully can be it's downfall if pushed too hard.#And as a non-musical string - something that binds. Be it to his sect and family or how he binds his fate to WWX -#LWJ cannot exist without his binds. It is not something which ties him down though. It keeps him together.#And he himself *is* a bind. He 'ties wwx down' in ways that are initially negatively viewed ('come to gusu' - feels like: come be trapped)#But later it is shown how (despite being introduced as a free spirit) WWX truly wants to be bound to something and someone.#Marriage is a bind he wants. He wants to be tied and grounded by LWJ.#It's starting to sound like innuendo. Let's call his fondness for being literally tied up smart thematic writing.#Finally. Sex scenes that are important to the plot and characters
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idyllcy · 3 months
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cherry red pies, pretty pink skies
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word count: 1.5k || pt2 of sparkling green eyes, dazzling green lines
summary: Damian's sweet baby has her first ballet recital
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"Dami, can you—"
"Don't worry." He hums, showing you the pamphlet he had picked up earlier. 
You never thought you'd be worried over ballet lessons. His sweet daughter was having her first recital, and he had cancelled a whole day's worth of plans in order to make sure that everything would go smoothly. You found it cute, though you were no less worried than he was. You could just never quite know what would go wrong in Gotham. The possibilities were endless... even with private security around the vicinity of the theatre.
You wonder if it's possible to be even more anxious than Damian.
"We'll be safe." He hums, hand reaching for yours as he runs his thumb over your knuckles, and you exhale.
"We'll be fine." You mumble. "We'll be fine."
"And if not then I get to shoot at Drake once."
"WHAT." 
Damian doesn't elaborate more on it, but when you catch a blur of orange in the dark, you get the general idea.
Well, at the very least, you feel a little more at peace knowing that someone is taking care of security. You wonder if Tim's out on the roof only to hack the cameras, though.
"Is he?" 
"No." Damian shakes his head, showing security the ticket. "Not this time."
You wonder just how worried Damian is over this entire situation, then.
"Are you worried that she'll mess up on stage at all?" You follow him to the center seats in the middle row, sitting down as he helps you down first.
"She's our blood. She's perfect even if she somehow does mess up. In that case, it would be improv, which we both know is something only the most talented can dream of doing."
You hold back at laugh at Damian's words. 
"Besides. We've both seen her practicing. She'll be alright." His hand covers yours, tapping gently at your fingers.
"I think she'll be fine." Cass hums as she slides next to the two of you, small bouquet in her arms, Bruce following shortly after.
"She's going to do the best out of all her peers." Damian rolls his eyes. 
You can only laugh.
In a way, Damian isn't wrong. Out of all those in her age group on stage, only your daughter somehow manages to remember the routine from start to finish, and when it's the end, you can barely contain your excitement to greet her. Damian follows after you with the flowers he had put in the trunk, small bouquet of congratulatory flowers in his arms as you pick up your precious baby girl and spin her around.
"You were great, baby." You grin, bouncing her in your arms.
"Thank you, mama." She mumbles. "Hi daddy."
"Hi, princess." Damian imitates a light curtsey, offering her the flowers. "Well done on your performance."
"Thank you, baba." She mumbles, cheeks flushed as she takes the flowers from her dad. "I didn't mess up."
"I know." He hums, holding her hand. "We're proud of you."
Your moment is interrupted when she spots Cass, eyes lighting up as she reaches from your arms for her. You hand her over with a gentle roll of your eyes, and Damian watches as she babbles nonsensical things that Cass entertains, flowers handed to her as she continues, thanking her in the same breath, going back to speaking.
"She takes after me for all that talking." You grin, patting Damian's hand as he rests it on your elbow.
"She's much more formal than her peers." Damian scrunches his nose. "Perhaps due to my influence."
"It isn't a bad thing." You wave as you watch Tim and Jason walk in. "You guys missed the whole thing."
"Oh, no we didn't" Tim shakes the camera in his hand, popping out the SD card and tossing it to Damian. "All on video with photos."
"Much appreciated." Damian nods. 
You wonder if Damian's family adores your little girl a little too much. She greets the rest of her uncles with a grin, excitement that only a child can experience making her little body shake with excitement. At one point, Dick calls to let you all know that dinner was ready at the mansion, and you offer to take your little girl from Cass.
"I wanna stay with aunt Cass." She pouts.
"What if she's tired?"
"Baba will carry you." Damian opens his arms for her, and she leaves Cass' embrace reluctantly. "Good girl." 
"Sorry about that." You laugh. "She was excited that you watched her perform."
"Thank you for inviting me." Cass hums. "She'll be great."
"I'm sure it's because she saw that photo of you doing ballet that one time while visiting Bruce. She's been enamored with the idea ever since." 
Cass only hums, glancing to the side as she waves at your daughter — who's still looking at her.
"I'll take her off your hands tonight after dinner." Cass laughs. "I'll bring her back tomorrow."
"Well, it is her summer vacation." You sigh. "Baby, you wanna stay with Aunt Cass for the night?"
"Can I?" She blinks up at you expectantly, and you look up to Damian.
"Do you want to?"
"It would be nice..."
"Then yes." He hums. "Don't trouble her too much, alright?"
She nods, grinning at Cass as she smiles back.
You have dinner with the rest of the family, their soulmates all present, handing your daughter small gifts of celebration as she thanks everyone with a polite nod. She reminds you very much of Damian, and from what Talia had told you when he was a baby, your daughter seems to be the exact image. At the very least, you hope that she'll grow up without the trauma that Damian had to experience because of his blood. He does a great job at keeping her separate from his life in the streets of Gotham. 
You wave goodbye to the family as your daughter gives you both a small kiss goodbye, promising she'll be good for Cass for the night. You have a feeling that means she's going to stay up past her bedtime practicing ballet with Cass again, but as long as she doesn't stay up too late, she'll be fine.
"How late do you think she'll be up until?" You mumble to Damian as he holds your door open for you.
"I'd argue anywhere around 11 to midnight." He nods as he closes the door for you.
"I hope she has fun, then." You chuckle, watching as the manor's doors close once more.
"We'll have our fair share of fun."
"Ugh, I can't wait to get a glass at home."
"Would you like to look through what just arrived? Drake dropped it off before patrol to me."
"You know, for someone who claims to just tolerate him, you sure do rely on him for a lot." You turn your head to glance at him, and he sighs. 
"Siblings."
You found that Damian was highly sentimental after marriage. From the wedding invites to the clothes he wore first when he met you, he knows every moment and minor detail of you. In your room, other than the shelves of mangas he collected as a teen, he also keeps photobooks of the two of you through each year, and all six failed engagement ring attempts are framed on the wall in the living room. You are lucky, you think. Your hopelessness had paid off... or rubbed off. You hadn't known it was possible to be so enamored with someone. Maybe his brothers rubbed off on him.
"Do you want a snack with the wine?" Damian hands you a glass, lips curled upwards gently as you grin at the package.
"I'll be fine. You kept it in the delivery box?"
"You like opening boxes." He hums, settling next to you on the couch as you open the box to find a booklet.
"Oh, from our wedding?"
"These were the behind-the-scenes that Drake got." He hums. "I did not enjoy that he got to see you first on the day of the wedding, but he did give this to us... even if it is years late."
You smile, patting Damian's shoulder gently as you flip through it with him, humming as you point at certain photos, watching as Damian texts Tim to send him the digitals later. You raise brows at certain people, and he tells you each one's name, lips quirking up in amusement when you roll your eyes at some of your friends. You wonder if the development would have happened had you not taken the risk and asked him to be your plus one to the wedding so long ago.
You yawn at one point, and Damian's hand rubs circles on your back.
"Bedtime, habibti?"
You yawn more in response, nodding slowly as you cover your mouth. "Bedtime. Are you going to frame any photos from it?"
"Most likely the one in the back. We should get a family portrait sometime as well."
"Yeah?" You start getting up, pausing mid-way to yawn. Instead, Damian picks you up with ease, waiting for you to wrap your arms around his neck, pressing a kiss to your forehead. "Thank you, Dami."
"Anytime. Rest well, habibti."
"Mm... you too, beloved."
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la-pheacienne · 5 months
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George Martin, 2013: "In a very basic level winter is coming for all of us. I think that’s one of the things that art is concerned with: the awareness of our own mortality. “Valar morghulis” – “All men must die”. That shadow lies over our world and will until medical science gives us all immortality… but I don’t think it makes it necessarily a pessimistic world. Not any more pessimistic than the real world we live in. We’re here for a short time and we should be conscious of our own mortality, but the important thing is that love, compassion and empathy with other human beings is still possible. Laughter is still possible! Even laughter in the face of death… The struggle to make the world a better place… We have things like war, murder and rape… horrible things that still exist, but we don’t have to accept them, we can fight the good fight. The fight to eliminate those things.There is darkness in the world, but I don’t think we necessarily need to give way to despair. One of the great things that Tolkien says in Lord of The Rings is “despair is the ultimate crime”. That’s the ultimate failing of Denethor, the Steward of Gondor, that he despairs of ever being able to defeat Sauron. We should not despair. We should not go gentle into that good night".
JRR Tolkien, 1962 : "One reviewer once said, this is a jolly jolly book, all the right boys come home [...]- this isn't true of course, he can't have read the story. [...] Human stories are practically always about one thing, really, aren't they? Death. The inevitability of death. . . . . . (He quotes Simone de Beauvoir) 'There is no such thing as a natural death. Nothing that ever happens to man is natural, since his presence calls the whole world into question. All men must die, but for every man his death is an accident, and even if he knows it he would sense to it an unjustifiable violation.' Well, you may agree with the words or not, but those are the key spring of The Lord Of The Rings".
"Lotr is all rainbows and unicorns and Asoiaf is nihilistic and grimdark". Wrong, and wrong. In all its hope and radiance, lotr often gets very dark, and despite all the death and suffering, the hopeful moments in asoiaf shine bright. The meeting point of these two is this: having hope while in despair, and even better, refusing to give up because you have to go on despite not having any hope left.
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mel-loly · 1 year
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-It's not your impression, he really did it.
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s0fter-sin · 5 months
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i need ghoap frantically making out against a door finally taking the leap on their feelings. need ghost grinding against soap, expecting to find him just as hard as him, only to feel nothing
and in all his wisdom and experience, he concludes soap was tortured and never told him
he’s trying to think of a delicate way to say he understands, that he’s been through it and it doesn’t change anything about how he feels (and who the fuck touched him so he can hunt them down and rend them limb from limb)
meanwhile trans!soap’s just trying to find the best angle to grind his cunt on ghost’s thigh
just it never even entering ghost’s head bc he’s never known a trans person but he has met plenty of people who’ve been tortured - himself included - so of course that’s his logical leap
soap takes off his shirt and he sees his top surgery scars and ghost asks if he wants him to kill the one who did it and soap just hums like, “actually, man did pretty good, they healed real well,” and ghost’s just teary-eyes with awe at how well he’s coping, “looking on the bright side, that’s my johnny.”
imagine he thinks johnny was fully castrated but sees he’s determined to still have a sex life with him so he buys packers and straps to help him bc hell yeah healing and soap’s just like, “holy shit i’ve never had such a thoughtful partner before, such a sweet man, lt.”
#he a little confused but he got the spirit#its so good bc it can be super angsty of ghost really dreading whats been done to his sergeant and trying to make it right#or just go full crack treated seriously and have fun with it#i love just completely oblivious ghost#in any military context hes the smartest guy in the room#he always knows the play and has more experience than anyone#but stick him in the normal world? man is Lost#ghost just thinks hes had some kind of reconstruction surgery after being tortured and accepts thats what johnny looks like#bc hes never seen a pussy before#it takes years for soap to actually come out to him bc he just never thought to#hes seen him naked theyve literally slept together what else is there for him to say#then he shows him like a family album or something and ghosts just like ‘why arent you in any of these i only see girls’#and he just goes ‘hang on a second’#soap gets one of his sporadic periods one night and panics a little thinking it would weird ghost out or remind him that hes not cis#but ghost just thinks its a normal part of such a thorough reconstruction that hed bleed sometimes#and doesnt question it when soap grabs a pad out of his drawer bc ‘thats such a good way of handling the discharge my johnnys so smart’#just really supportive ghost for the wrong reasons#coming out of my cage and ive been doing just fine.txt#we’re a team. ghost team#soapghost#ghostsoap#simon ghost riley#ghost cod#john soap mactavish#soap cod#save post
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starcurtain · 17 days
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Hey! I apologize if this question has been asked before since it seems like a pretty obvious one, but where do you think the idea of Aventurine being a sex slave came from? Other than the obvious factor of it being something fun for the fandom to mess around with, I mean.
It's something I kind of took for granted as being true before playing his quest, but after finishing it I realized there wasn't really any indication. The only thing I can really think of is his master's comments about him having a good body. Is there anything in his behavior you can think of that would lead to this conclusion if it wasn't a popular fan interpretation already/kind of just an easy conclusion to reach with a slave character?
(also kind of related but what do you think of the idea that he sleeps around/with his clients to make deals? he's obviously willing to sexualize himself with the boob window, but that doesn't necessarily mean he goes further.)
As far as I can tell, the idea that Aventurine was involved in sexual slavery comes from three (maybe four) places:
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First, the comment from the master about Aventurine's appearance. People were holding this comment up as refutable proof that Aventurine was used in sexual slavery on top of being tossed into the Hunger Games; however, the response from other players on this interpretation, especially the Chinese side of the fandom, was very mixed, with a lot of people pointing out that the context in the game probably meant the slave master was talking about Aventurine's ability to attract attention from fans watching the literal Sigonian Hunger Games, rather than having a direct sexual-slavery connotation.
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Second, the comment from Sparkle about stripping naked and getting on his knees for Sunday. This one has way more implication in English than I think it might for an Eastern audience, actually. In English, this pretty much sounds like Sparkle saying Aventurine trades sexual favors for success in his gambles. However, I suspect the original intention in Chinese was more about humiliation. Western audiences don't have as much history with honor-based prostration, i.e. accepting corporal humiliation as a form of reconciliation that Eastern audiences might be more familiar with. And in any case, Sparkle is Sparkle. She probably just went for the lowest blow she could think of here.
Third, the general assumption that if Sigonian slaves were being chained, branded, beaten, sent to death matches, etc., it seems logical that they would also be taken advantage of in other ways. I honestly think this is probably the fairest take--many, many real slaves around the world faced (and still face!) sexual abuse, so if slaves from Sigonia were treated so poorly you could make them fight to the death for entertainment, it stands to reason they were probably also not safe from other forms of assault. We also have no idea what happened to Kakavasha in any of the years between his being a tiny child fleeing the massacre and then being purchased as a slave as a late-teens-early-twenties person. That's a very long time for a child to have to survive on their own on an extremely hostile planet and not face risks of all kinds or end up needing to do unspeakable things to survive. So I think this is at least not that far-fetched, although it's important to say there's nothing in the game that directly confirms this.
And fourth: I read a tweet semi-recently that stated that one of the Chinese (or maybe it was Japanese) names for a quest Aventurine was involved in was actually a reference to a book about a teenage sexual assault survivor. However, when I tried to verify this myself, I couldn't find any quest Aventurine was in that was based on a book about sexual assault in either English, Chinese, or Japanese. It's possible I just missed something, but I'm taking this one with a bit of a grain of salt currently, since I can't confirm it personally.
Regarding your other question, about whether I think Aventurine sleeps around to make deals...
I definitely think he does not, for one major reason.
First, I will admit that Aventurine is definitely willing to use his appearance to his advantage. This is pretty obvious. He wears incredibly flashy clothes, baths himself in cologne, overloads on glittering golden jewels, and absolutely calls attention to his appearance when working with clients.
We see him actively doing this in his Moment Among the Stars video, where he is clearly using his looks as an equal tool (to his wealth), to daze his target.
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It's not an accident that he says things like "Use me as you wish," with all the explicit connotations preserved. The implication is there. However, unless he was absolutely backed into a corner, I think that implication is all it will ever be.
The reason I think this is that the devs go out of their way to give Aventurine three fairly noticeable physical behaviors in his in-game scenes:
For one, he has some of the most closed off body language of any character in the game.
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Aventurine's default conversation pose is arms crossed directly and tightly in front of himself. This is like "Defensive Body Language 101." By crossing your arms, you put a symbolic barrier between yourself and the person you're speaking to, and also ensure that your hands are up and available in case you actually need to physically defend yourself.
Virtually all of Aventurine's conversations take place from this stance, no matter who he is speaking to (from the Trailblazer all the way to Topaz). He deliberately closes his pose off and tightens up his silhouette, which just sends a glaring "Don't touch me" message.
This closing off is also blatantly apparent when you compare it to the deliberately open poses he strikes while trying to make himself seem accessible to others (like tempting clients) or seem powerful (to intimidate):
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Complementing this habit of closing himself off is a second noticeable aspect of his body language: He frequently avoids eye contact to the point that he even holds conversations while entirely facing away from the person he's speaking to.
I might be a bit lenient and say maybe he's doing this to on purpose to be mysterious, whoo~~ But... in all honestly, he just does this with everyone, even with Ratio while trying to talk about an actual important issue (wanting to look into Acheron's real identity). Hell, even the fake Aventurine does it to himself!
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We can even say that wearing the rose-tinted glasses in the first place is another intentional barrier, one Aventurine deliberately removes in specific moments to give people the (false) impression that he's "letting them in" to his circle:
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Now, this might be a bit more complicated in Aventurine's case, because eye contact has a whole extra meaning when eyes are the defining trait of your species and come with particularly challenging racial stereotypes. So it may be that Aventurine is simply used to conducting conversation while looking away to minimize racial prejudice against his eyes' unique appearance.
However, I'd also argue that the devs deliberately turned his entire model away in cutscene after cutscene to create a clear sense of being inaccessible, unapproachable, and unwilling to engage in the physical intimacy of standing closely, directly facing, and staring at his conversation partners.
While he faces away, he controls both the figurative and the literal direction of conversation, forcing people to keep their eyes on him while he is free to move as he pleases. Over and over again, it just says "I want to be the one in control. I'm not afraid to show my back to you, but you are not welcome to come near me."
And, in fact, that's a third aspect of his character's body language that I am sure the devs did not include accidentally: More so than other characters, many of Aventurine's conversations are conducted from weirdly far distances. Like, half the time he's talking, he's standing all the way on the opposite side of the room!
This habit of speaking from a-larger-than-normal distance is apparent in the first scene with Himeko...
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And then in just about every other conversation too:
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The bubble is twenty feet in every direction.
Like yes, he does approach and have conversations like a normal person... sometimes... But it is significantly more noticeable with Aventurine than with other characters that he often conducts whole conversations--even with his allies--from a distance. Just genuinely weirdly far apart.
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Leaving space for Gaiathra, I guess.
And it's because these significant decisions were made with Aventurine's in-game body language that, when he deliberately alters his own behavior, it is instantaneously noticeable.
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In 2.0, he closes the distance, the glasses come off, and he gets directly up in the Trailblazer's face.
It's uncomfortable not just because the player is suddenly being loomed over, but because this behavior has already been subconsciously established for the player as out of character for Aventurine.
The barriers the character himself was putting up are deliberately stripped away so that he can use physicality and demanding eye contact to intimidate his target. He has to reverse his own normal body language in order to come across as domineering (and, I guess if you're into that, appealing in a domineering manner).
And ummmm, just a tiny aside here because I can't resist:
This does mean that when the game goes out of its way to demonstrate Aventurine altering his own normal habit of distant and defensive body language, it is absolutely intentional.
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Yes, this is a Ratiorine post in disguise. There literally isn't any other character in the game that Aventurine is shown being comfortable standing so close to and interacting with in this manner. This doesn't occur in every one of their scenes, but Ratio is the only character that this happens with repeatedly. It's not an accident that the devs literally added "They were walking side-by-side" as flavor text.
But look, I'll be fair: There's a great example of this in Aventurine's scene with Acheron too, where he closes the distance and attempts to make eye contact with her--seeking her guidance and closeness--and she is actually the one stepping away, speaking with her back turned, demonstrating her power and control (and issues with connection!) in that scene.
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Anyway, this was a whole longggg tangent into analyzing Aventurine's body language, but my point is that, overall, the devs deliberately adjusted his model's actions in-game to give the impression of a person who clearly wants to be in control of every interaction he has with other people, who insists on distance over intimacy, and whose stances and habits suggest that he is significantly less accessible and open than his "Use me as you wish" motto might suggest.
Long story longer, I think that there is almost zero chance Aventurine is willingly ceding control over himself or the actions expected of him to anyone he isn't 100% comfortable with, and I think that using physical intimacy of any kind would be an absolute last resort for him. Frankly, he comes across as more likely to shoot himself in the foot than let someone he doesn't trust lay hands on him.
To me, he reads very much as "You may look, but you may not touch."
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demeterdefence · 7 months
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even ignoring everything else wrong with lore olympus (which in itself feels impossible) there is just something really egregious and insulting at the way a "modern retelling" over an ancient greek myth just full-heartedly whitewashes the entire culture and mythos.
and it's not like rachel is the first to do it - greek myths and legends have been whitewashed for centuries, depictions of the gods have been categorically stripped of their ethnicity and origins long before rachel got a hold of them. it's the fact that rachel goes out of her way to insult the original myths whenever she can, that she emphasizes and pushes a western-centric mindset and viewpoint over and over and over and not only reinforces the whitewashing, but continues it down the line.
like, this is the first episode.
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rachel goes out of her way to mock the original styles and wardrobes of the ancient greek world, and i get her attempt was to make persephone feel "out of place" with the more "modern" clothing that the other gods wear, but it really just does more to a) demonize demeter, who is almost always in traditional clothing, b) sexualize persephone.
go even broader with it, move away from the clothing itself, and rachel doesn't even bother to use any of the ancient traditions that are core to the myths. like for the love of god, she uses a christian wedding for persephone and hades!
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greece is the birthplace of modern democracy and had a powerful judicial system, and rachel instead uses the modern / western iteration of court because ... why not
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(completely unrelated but the inserts of everyone except eros and aphrodite come from the stupid zoom session zeus had back when he first charged persephone with treason, meaning we have proof yet again that rachel isn't drawing the characters into the scene, she's making pngs and sticking them into pre-arranged backgrounds downloaded from stock images)
and there are ten thousand more examples i could pull, because this is just the whole entire comic. you can look at a lot of modern adaptions and see where things have been modernized respectfully, and where they are done with disdain for the source material - no one is claiming percy jackson, for example, is perfect, but the author took a great deal of care in his research, and the love for the original myths and culture shine through. lore olympus has zero respect for the original stories, exemplified in how rachel demonizes demeter - the actual crux of the myth. it's bad writing and bad research and further attempts to whitewash a rich and storied culture that had people from so many walks of life, who existed in full spectrum of lgbt identity, who did not conform or even know of the world that exists today. you can modernize without erasing it, and rachel's refusal to do so is one of the many issues tacked to lore olympus.
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luna-lovegreat · 6 months
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I want. Four to get appreciation. Because
Four gave a ton of unnoticed help when Twilight was injured
The fight with Wild was difficult, and I know we're all concerned about his negative view of the shadow crystal
But Four did something that no one else really thought of to help- He took care of Twi's stuff
From the beginning he told Twilight to not worry about them
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So Four took care of pretty much everything but the others (that Sky and Wars handled)
He took care of Epona
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Which is so very important- he took care of Twilight's horse. After her arrival at the stable Four followed up on her
And for Epona, a horse so attached to her human, having some company can help so much for reassurance
He took care of Twilight's stuff
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He got Twi's shield- his bags and equipment, and organized it into one place
And he was worried. He obviously found the shadow crystal while handling Twi's stuff, but his negative reactions to it were out of concern.
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Also- because of his placement in this scene
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I'm fairly convinced Four was ready to start cooking before Wild showed up (since he's beside the counter with food supplies). At the very least he had the basket of fruit out for everyone -but he was literally standing with food behind him- he thought of everything
And he did housekeeping!
Wars payed for the inn, so Four took care of the inn
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Realistically these boys were probably not too concerned with tidyness. Four got all of Twi's things on one table, and took care of the room they stayed in
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Organizing tables and Twi's things, having food supplies ready, and opening the curtains- overall he was the one tidying up the inn
Four helped in a huge way! He took care of Twi's horse (Epona is so important), his equipment and shield and bag, as well as the other rooms in the inn
Four filled in all the little tasks that others didn't think of. He helped in ways that were needed, but not obvious
There's a lot of problems with the shadow crystal and with Wild, and I don't know what's gonna happen in the future
But don't forget this- don't forget that Four was one who stepped up in an almost unnoticeable way
Don't forget that when everyone was barely holding it together, Four visited Twilight's horse and took care of his things
No matter what develops in the future- this amount of care shown is important ya know?
.
Art and comic from Jojo @linkeduniverse au :)))
#epona is so important#Lu four#linkeduniverse#linked universe#I work with horses and#Epona is INCREDIBLE- she's extremely attuned to humans and emotions. she doesn't scare easily and can keep her cool in a fight#but it's still super stressful to suddenly be in a fairly large and populated town- separated from her person#and for such an empathetic horse? Four going and TALKING to her- gently petting her nose and just being near her#means so so much! that literally matters so much to a horses mental state in a foreign situation- just having company#he checked on Epona and gave her company like !!!!!! it's so considerate and means so much for Epona! Four I love you !!!!!#uhhhh yeah!#with the food- I don't think the innkeeper would have free/complimentary food out- but wars wallet def had it covered#then wild showed up with potions in a cooking frenzy- but four was still shown with food behind him- he thought of everything#I don't know what's gonna happen with the shadow crystal and stuff. but no matter what happens in the future- this matters.#he did a ton of small things no one else thought of it matters he cares so much didjdkdksjfjj#I have a lot of posts I'm making/editing and trying to get to. I'm just a little gal trying my best :/#so many ideas and so little time... I love you guys and this fandom so much :))#(if I said anything off or offensive let me know... I'm always nervous about that but I want to hear from you if I'm wrong)#(also you are so so cool and valuable don't forget that ok? I love you and you are important)#:)
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