#yes more people than you think are into this stuff

[metamatar]

how to be in a relationship when you are suicidally depressed but do not want to be manipulative (opinionated, by former suicidal but still depressed idiot). this is no guarantee that you aren't accused of it ofc, but this like. a good faith try at not being it.

wrote this because i feel like. everyone wants you to know that if you're suicidal you don't have like. the right? to be in a relationship which is unfair. and fuck that. but, i feel like there's way to manage? cope? with suicidality that are better than others.

do not use criticism directed at you as an opportunity to inform someone you're suicidal. it should def never be a part of an argument about something else, even if that's how you feel. exit the argument with a "sorry i cant deal with this right now, be back in x hours" if you're feeling suicidal because of an argument then please do coping mechanisms unrelated to your partner. making someone feel like they can't criticise you or you'll kill yourself is like the no. 1 thing you shouldn't do. it makes all relationships pretty false if someone can't be intimate/honest with you and the threat of suicide is so high stakes it stuffs all criticism. you can explain why 48 hours later. i cannot emphasise the value of your cool down even tbh for your suicidal feelings. i will kill myself after 48 hours is an underrated coping mechanism.

if you notice a specific criticism triggering you more than twice, let your partner know its a real trigger. they should ideally notice that you exited from a conversation multiple times for a specific reason. then you should have a conversation about whether that criticism is a deal breaker for you guys and if and how you want to work on it.

ideally, when you do tell your partner about being suicidal. it should be when you're not otherwise having a conflict and be clear about how close you are to making plans and maybe commit to checking in every few hours. the emmengard scale is very useful is communicating what kind of suicidal you are. if you do intend on a killing yourself, making someone feel complicit in it only makes sense if you want to actually blame them for it? like idk think about if you want them to really feel responsible.

be clear about the fact that you don't expect them to fix you and make it clear to them that they can't fix you. mental health is too complicated for that. can your relationship be a positive factor? yes, hugely so imo. can you involve them in setting up better routines and offering affirmations? def. its very valuable. but locating someone as the sole locus of responsibility is something most people really can't cope with, and tbh if that's what you're looking for, you should be upfront. maybe there's someone who wants that, but most people really cannot do it. you can't save me, but I would like your help in my attempt to save myself is imo. a decent attitude?

[icewindandboringhorror]

Pages from trying to keep a little sketchbook-scrapbook type thing going for two weeks lol. I gave myself specific rules in hopes they might all end up more cohesive/consistent seeming, but alas, scribbly chaos reigns, it seems

[lost-in-fandoms]

Winter Warmers Day 31: NYE countdown. Maxiel. About 1.5k words.

"Max, Maxy, Maximum, Maximus Prime!"

Max turns away from his conversation with Alex just in time to catch Daniel around the waist as he stumbles into him, the drink in his cup sloshing over his wrist.

"Hello, Daniel," Max says, unable to stop himself from smiling, readjusting his grip so that he can hold Daniel more comfortably.

From the corner of his eye he catches Alex moving away, probably deciding that their conversation is over now that Daniel has Max's attention. Which is a very fair assumption, given that in all the years they've been friends, Max has always dropped anyone and anything to focus on Daniel.

Some might call it pathetic, to still be in love with his best friend after so long, but Max doesn't really care about what other people think. He just cares about Daniel's warm weight in his arms, and the fact that when all the people at this party will have left their house, Daniel will still be there, probably moving stuff around to pretend he's helping with the clean up.

"Are you having fun, Daniel?" he asks, trying to maneuver them towards the kitchen, both to clean up Daniel's wrist before he complains about the stickiness and to not feel like every single person is staring at them.

Well, every single person other than Charles and Carlos, who seem to be trying to get acquainted with each other's tonsils.

"Yes," Daniel answers, letting himself be dragged away, stumbling unhelpfully on his own feet.

Once they're in the kitchen, occupied only by Logan and Oscar, heads bent over a phone, a half empty bottle of wine next to them, Max hoists Daniel on the counter, right next to the sink, swiping away a few empty paper plates.

"Stay still, please," he tells Daniel, grateful he doesn't have to shout as much over the music anymore. They should probably start lowering that actually, if they don't want the cops called on them again, but it's new year's eve, for sure old Meredith could let it slide this once.

He plucks Daniel's cup from his hand, something of not clear nature inside it, and wets a couple paper towels, gently wiping at his wrist and hand.

"Maxy," Daniel says, dropping his head forward to rest it on Max's shoulder. He's making Max's job harder like this, but Max is not going to complain. He just hums, showing Daniel he's listening.

"I have decided on my resolutions list," Daniel tells him, sounding slightly more sober than he did before.

Max drops the paper towels and grabs an empty cup, filling it with water from the sink and handing it to Daniel, coaxing him to raise his head to drink it.

Daniel had been talking about his resolutions list for more than a week. Max is not sure why he's so set on having new year's resolutions, since in the past eight years he's known him not once Daniel has been the kind of person who follows a plan, but he's been listening anyway every time he brought the topic up.

Max doesn't understand why he's having so much trouble creating the list either. Sure, Daniel does have his moments of perfectionism, but seeing him actually get stressed about this had been puzzling.

"Yeah? Can I know it?" he asks, dropping the now empty cup when Daniel hands it to him before opening his arms, letting Daniel comfortably slump into him again.

Somewhere on his left, Logan and Oscar leave the kitchen, closing the door behind them, cutting off a little more of the noises of the party, making Max feel like he's in his private Daniel bubble for the first time this evening.

He's not ashamed of saying that he's a bit possessive, greedy about having his fair share of Daniel's time, but he's gotten better with the years. The last time Daniel had been in a relationship, Max hadn't even tried to scare them off, but they had gone anyway after a couple of months, leaving a very mopey Daniel behind. Max had keyed their car.

"First thing, I want to learn how to play the banjo," Daniel says, way too loud way too close to Max's ear.

It makes Max smile anyway, knowing this point will be abandoned in a few months at most, just like every other instrument Daniel had tried to learn, getting bored with each one of them.

"Good start," he encourages anyway, because he's nothing but disgustingly soft when it comes to Daniel, even worse when he's tipsy like tonight.

He gets rewarded by Daniel pulling back to beam at him, before going back to Max's shoulder.

Sometimes holding himself back from kissing him takes all of Max's strength.

"Then, I want to improve my handwriting."

Yep, just as Max had thought. Another task that will be abandoned, like all the other times Daniel had tried before.

"I can read your handwriting," Max tells him, because it's true. No matter the kind of drunken chicken scratch he finds on the grocery list, Max has learned to interpret it all. It's not that hard really, when you manage to recognise the subtle differences between the squiggles. Part of the game is actually learning what is supposed to be a word and what is a doodle.

"You can, because you're great," Daniel mumbles against his shirt, as Max tries to pretend he can't feel himself blushing, "but I am so tired of people complaining about it."

"People should just learn how to read," Max tells him, unhappy with someone making Daniel feel like he should change. Which is very stupid, because Daniel is perfect, chicken scratches included.

It makes Daniel laugh, waist moving under Max's hands, his wet bottom lip dragging against the exposed part of Max's shoulder.

"Do you have any more?" he rushes to ask, trying to distract himself from the feeling of it.

In the other room, the music gets lowered, and for a second Max thinks it's the cops again, until he hears someone scream two minutes!

They should probably rejoin their friends, celebrate midnight with them, but Max is quite comfortable where he is, and he doesn't want to see Daniel grab someone to kiss, even if just to laugh about it afterwards.

He had long learned his lesson, after one year he had tried to angle himself in Daniel's line of view, just for him to reach around him and grab Charles instead. Max had gotten way too drunk that night.

"One more," Daniel says, voice even lower now that the music is off and they're so close. He sounds more hesitant suddenly, nervous fingers fidgeting with the hem of Max's shirt.

"Do you want to tell me?" Max asks, just to be sure. Sometimes Daniel needs a little push before he opens up, but it's always a very thin line between getting an answer and being shut out with a joke instead. This time Daniel nods.

"I want to suck your dick."

Max chokes on his spit, trying to push back Daniel to be able to see his face, feeling his eyes go wide.

It wouldn't be the first time they joke about it, but Daniel doesn't sound like he's joking, and if this is a prank Max is going to get very drunk again and probably go cry in the bathroom, but...

But when he manages to push Daniel's head up, he's blushing and he's looking at Max from underneath his lashes, fear and determination mixing on his face.

"You mean it?" Max forces himself to ask, sounding breathless. His heart is beating too fast, so loud he's sure Daniel can hear it too.

Daniel nods, one corner of his mouth turning up in a shadow of his usual smile.

"My last resolution is to stop lying to myself about my feelings for you," he says.

It echoes around his brain, bouncing around and amplifying: feelings for you feelings for you feelings for you feelings for you.

In the other room someone starts the countdown, and Max reaches forward, cupping Daniel's jaw with his hands.

"Are you gonna buy me dinner first?" he asks, just to see Daniel smile properly.

"Can I do it next year?"

Max rolls his eyes, but he still chuckles, weak for Daniel always, even when it's his bad jokes.

Three, two, one...

On the other side of the door sound explodes, their friends cheering and screaming, but Max barely hears it as he presses his lips against Daniel's.

(George screams when he opens the door to come grab the champagne chilling in the fridge and finds them making out against the counter, Max's thigh between Daniel's. The new wave of cheers that follows it is so loud Max starts mentally preparing his apologies for old Meredith and the cops, even as he copies Daniel in flipping them all off.)

[pluralsword]

reminder that Theodore Roosevelt was considered a progressive in his time, the same guy who y'know, did the Square Deal (which megacorps would like us all to not ask the government to use) and gave a speech about the importance of American empire to the Navy. To us the word is politically meaningless. It either is socialists afraid to call themselves socialists because of the brain poison over that word (particularly in the USA) or it's imperialists talking about the 'progress of civilization' or neocolonial development (eugh) and sometimes it's all three! Utilitarian progressivism is the bane of our existence and such a quick ally or propagator to having a police state, to eugenics, to gatekeeping trans people, imperialist bioconservationism that erases indigenous people and their ways of life from cohabitation with nature (just a little reminder btw, plants can communicate with each other via roots and lichens, and even scream when cut but the scream is too high pitched for us humans to hear, so telling people not to eat the meat of animals they live around is also ignorant in this respect too), to reactionary and far right stuff in general, all in the name of the means justify the ends.

Our study of gender has led us to the conclusion that there can be epistemic shifts that come with gender realizations but these are in no way intrinsic guarantees of actually being open minded and compassionate. we don't have the spoons to get into this rn and yes we do write about this more in depth and may eventually try to put forth / release papers about it (we really prefer writing fiction, take bets on what comes out first our original fiction oracle dice-procedural ttrpg board game or the novel or the papers we need to edit that don't cover this in as much detail as our prose does because fkldskjfalsdfjkslkdfkjdlasd and there some indie games out there that we've seen that do try to play around with something similar to this idea) but like we said yeah. nothing inherent. it's kind of like how having autism can mean having more resistance to internalization of some but not necessarily all hierarchic norms and behaviors - which y'know fun fact there's a significant overlap between autistic and trans people and wowee do we have an ongoing phrase at this point of 'is there really such a thing as a trans community,' because we definitely are not all in lockstep politically (which btw even if we all agreed on civil rights and collectivism we still think even then we shouldn't be in lockstep on everything because having multiple cooperating regime types allows us to learn from each other and to preserve/restore and create new historically particular socioeconomic systems. we don't want just one way, but then, we're a cosmopolitanist pluralist so that's not surprising). stares with pity at homonationalists don't get us started on that can you see why we prefer to engage with eternal existential questions and themes of transformation through fiction where we can at least work from a perspective of a long history of a near utopian interstellar multispecies society that has never had near full severance of intergenerational knowledge of collectivism and gender or even when there is there is such a rooted common heritage it defines the conflict - than to write nonfictionally as often solely about how things are now or were (we are working on a thing that isn't solely that, and did finish something last year we're very proud of). so we apologize in advance if this post is not enough of an answer

Contrary to the epistemic practices of 2010s-era Tumblr, I'm afraid there are no identity groups that are intrinsically progressive. Shocking, I know.

[impactrueno]

throwing my 2 cents into the ring here: i liked the maitlands enough that i was legit pissed they only got a throwaway line in beej beej as to why they weren't around. could afford to claymate the goddamn pedophile but couldn't spare a few bucks for like body doubles we only see the backs of for the maitlands? fuck off.

i definitely agree we saw too much of jeffrey jones' face which i've hated even before i even found out what he did (charles is also my least favorite character in the first movie by far) but charles' death is THE reason why the deetz women go back to winter river in the first place, and delia's whole arc is about mourning him and then reuniting with him, so his character (to my chagrin) was a lot more relevant to the plot than the maitlands could've been. this movie is ultimately about the deetz women, not the maitlands.

i mean no offense to you or anyone who feels this way, and i get being disappointed, but being disappointed is one thing and then there's being angry. i'm actually surprised that people are legitimately pissed that the maitlands aren't in the sequel. they couldn't have been, because ghosts don't age and the actors did (and unlike michael keaton, they won't look the same under layers of makeup and wigs.) alec baldwin has also been disgraced ever since the Rust incident, a lot of people seem to forget that.

the maitlands were also allowed to move on in the afterlife, which (unknowingly to lydia and the viewers at this point) introduced the soul train concept. yes, lydia's explanation felt like a weird handwave but the movie is self-aware about this having astrid sarcastically say "how convenient." this interaction also adds to her growing skepticism about her mother's ability to see ghosts, which is an important plot point, so it's not just a weak handwave explanation.

i also thought the cameo in the model was cute (i gasped and pointed at the screen when i saw it in theaters lol)

at the end of the day i think they did the best they could with what they had, without derailing the movie or piling even more stuff onto it (the movie is already PACKED with characters and subplots, all of which have a purpose and are essential)

so like i said, i'm a bit taken aback by people's angry reactions. me, personally. i don't understand the venom for these decisions.

[iandoubt]

scott smajor with number 7 for your spotify asks?

omg anon sorry it took me so long to get to this, but here: Scott smajor with number 7, Ghost of You by My Chemical Romance!

textless and bgless under cut, as well as really long ramble caption vvvvvvv

I hope this is alright! If nothing else, I’m so so proud of drawing hair braiding, that took. So. Long. lol, anyway yeah I also really like how Scott’s hair came out, and I’ve never made a third life Jimmy design before so I came up with this on the fly and I really like how it looks. But yeah, I saw which song it was and thought of them immediately, Scott was so distraught at Jimmy’s death in third life, (prepare for ramble that is mildly unintelligible if you are not really geeky about MCR lore lol. The main stuff you need to understand is that mcr has four albums, I Brought You My Bullets You Brought Me Your Love, Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, The Black Parade, and Danger Days: The True Lives of The Fabulous Killjoys, and all of them have a lot of lore) like they are so demolition lovers coded, especially because of the whole back from the dead thing where Jimmy is alive and well in later seasons but Scott is still grieving him and the memory thing with winners remembering which means Scott remembers third life and Jimmy doesn’t, reminds me of like (from my understanding of the story, which is different from other peoples because MCR lore is very vague) the inner turmoil of the lover from the three cheers lore who went to hell, and his lover is in heaven and on one hand he wants to reunite but on the other he knows his lover doesn’t even know he’s alive (-ish. Not sure how much his situation qualifies as “living”) and feels guilty, thinking that she probably won’t even want to see him again, because he’s killed so many people and he doesn’t want to ruin her paradise (I mean she misses him too and wants to see him again but he doesn’t know that, and also he rightly recognizes that he is an actual sociopath. I’m not saying c!Scott is crazy (well, as not-crazy as you can be in life series death games. Everyone is at least a little bit off their rocker. Woah, parentheses within parentheses, what is this!?), but I am saying the guy demolition lover absolutely is. I am also saying that c!Scott has self worth issues. At least in my headcannons. I also have a similar headcannon for Joel. Maybe that’s why they hate each other, their mad that they can’t sacrifice themselves for each other and then decided a murderous rivalry was the only option/j ) but yeah so the torturing themselves over a lover who is both dead for them and also at the same time alive and well but unreachable and in a better place than them and wanting to be with them but holding back for fear of hurting them which ends up hurting them anyway (which is also a theme in the black parade, so ig you could also kinda compare Scott to The Patient, but patient always felt more Joel or Pearl coded to me. Also yes I know I already made a post about smalletho demo lovers au, but idk I can have both smalletho and flower husbands demo lovers I just like projecting my interests onto,,,,also my interests ig lol) is something Scott and the sinner demolition lover have in common. Also this song makes me cry. So much. Could barely even draw this through the tears lol/silly, and I’m exaggerating but less than you’d think. Unfortunately I am a crier. I also cry at Summertime from danger days, pretty much all of three cheers but especially I never told you what I do for a living, demolition lovers from bullets (btw for non MCR fans these are album and song names. Also the demo lover’s story starts in bullets with the song titled for them, and then is continued in three cheers for sweet revenge) as well as I don’t love you, wttbp, the end, mama, and famous last words from black parade. And those are just the MCR songs, not counting all the other sad songs from other bands. I am a CRIER lol. But yeah, thank you sm for the ask anon I really enjoyed drawing this!

[aceofheartsssss]

❤️ Deadpool 🖤 and 💛 Wolverine🖤 x Reader Scenarios

Yes, I’ve got a thing for them, how did you know? Everybody is in LOVE with Deadpool and Wolverine and I’ve seen some bubs say that they want fics and I want them too, so I made some scenariossss cuz DAMN IT, Wade and Logan are hot~ Go read my older stuff they feel abandoned :( Summary: Scenarios on how they’d act if they had a crush on you, how they’d act if y’all were a thing, yada yada, fluff, slight spiciness, etc. Let’s fucking go! ❤️💛 Warnings: Swearing, slightly spicy, and mentions of violence but y’all gon have to get used to that on my blog-

- Deadpool/Wade (I’ve loved him for years, he’s just so fineeee~)

How you’d act as friends (but you grew on him tho)

Sometimes he accidentally starts acting a little less intense and silly, and more soft around you, then he quickly snaps out of it

He keeps flirting, usual for him, but his flirting is more intense around you

He doesn’t want to admit his feelings because he thinks you’ll reject him because of his scarred body and face (aww ☹️)

He’s always showing off and posing whenever he fights and kills around you~

He keeps trying to hug, touch, kiss and do shit like that (it’s Deadpool, c’mon man)

He literally does not shut up for one second around you

He actually blushes underneath the mask when you actually say something nice to him instead of yelling (he’s so glad you can’t see his face most of the time 👉👈)

You love to watch movies and shit with him because he makes them way more fun than they already are

He finds his own crazy, actually insane ways to spend a lot of time with you (like you don’t wanna know his complicated plots-)

He likes giving you the most random and useless things (aww)

He secretly loves it when you genuinely laugh at his shenanigans

He really knows how to stick to you so he’ll slowly grow on you like mold

How you’d act as partners (he’s stuck on like glue)

Now that he’s got full access to you, he will never stop touching you (cuddling, hand holding, hugging, poking, kissing, getting it on, etc.)

He constantly reminds you how he feels about you~

Constant compliments cuz yeah- 😭❤️

”Sweetheart,” “Babe,” “Baby,” “My love-”

He’s mostly dom but switches cuz he really enjoys being, uhh… (well, you watched the movies…)

He could and probably would kill anyone who tried to hurt you in any way possible (traumatized red man hates evil ppl 🗡️)

You best believe he’s good getting shit on, considering the experience and his super-powered… tools... (He’s really good…)

He’s the kind of guy who would literally never cheat and would quite literally be in love with you… forever (I mean it, he really is like that-)

He’d go broke trying to buy you stuff he thinks you want- 😭

You best believe that he’d do anything in his power to make sure you guys can be together as long as possible (he’d make a deal with the devil if it meant you had an extended lifespan like his)

He likes eating and chatting with you (so fun- 🌮🍔🍕)

He is the best hugger and cuddle-r with that big, strong, textured body~ (imagine omg-)

Beneath all the trauma, the killing, the humor, jokes, he really is just a big, soft, cuddly boi 👏✨

He’s just a playful guy, like you’d never get bored

-

Wolverine/Logan (as feral as an actual wolverine for him~)

How you’d act as friends (he kinda doesn’t know he likes you)

He’s nicer (slightly) to you than to anyone else and he doesn’t know why

He taunts other people (*cough* Wade-) along with you instead of against you (despite what he usually does)

He throws out an accidental compliment here and there (his eyes go wide when he realizes~ 💛)

Out of character for him, he snaps at people who mock, taunt, tease, flirt, or throw insults at you (I wonder why~)

You’ll catch him smirking or smiling before he fixes it and frowns again

He’s so touch starved but can’t say anything because of his own Wolverine-y reasons (tough boi 😔)

He’ll melt if you initiate the touches (hugs, cheek kisses, hand holding, random “friendly” patting, etc.)

He finds himself hanging around you more than anyone else despite apparently hating people

How you’d act as partners (he wants you as much as possible)

He’d spent as much time with you as possible, always holding you tight

He compliments you however he can

He never wants to let you go (he’s scared of losing you because of his extended lifespan)

Get ready for the most overprotective, husband material man, who’d likely beat anyone to a pulp for you~

He’d give the nastiest death glare to anyone that’s being negative towards you (it’s so sexy tho-)

Don’t tease or taunt him… (or do 😰)

He’s always a stiff man, but around you he’s just… different

He melts at your touch, and this kitty definitely has Puss in Boots eyes (🥺)

”Love,” “Doll,” “Bub,” “Darlin’,”

He def dom all the time, y’all seen the movies-

He’s very good btw. Like a loooot- Soft but rough ngl (idk how but he is, trust-)

He’s into pain… *wink* (canon btw)

He’d treat you right like a fucking gentleman

He’s a nice cuddle-r despite the tough exterior (he’s so touchable, he’d squeeze you so tightttt)

He’s just a comforting, big, strong guy, who wouldn’t want that?

There we go, bubs. Had to get it outta my system~

Lemme know if ya liked my writing, I need the compliments/advice.

(Yessss tie them up…)

[simlicious]

I'm really glad Sim File Share exists and we have a place where we can all safely download CC and host CC on! Truly a blessing 💜

There would be so many dead links and lost CC due to random hosters going pay only or removing download links if they are not clicked regularly.

SFS is so much more than just a place to download, it also keeps our files safe and accessible for people around the world. I think we should all be forgiving about a few hiccups every now and then (which basically every site has occasionally).

On the other topic...

I calculated how many people on average press the heart ❤️ button on my TS3 pattern collections and it's...

4.28%

*insert sad trumpet sounds* I really appreciate every one of you heart-clickers! But I also know the other 95,72% can do better.

Yes, I hear some of you say, but what about when you have 100 individual files and creators do not offer a zipped version?

I dread that too, and that is why I always create zipped files. It does make life much easier. Only 4.28% appreciate it though. Let's change that, not just for me, but for the thousands of other creators who would love to see their heart-to-download-ratios improve!

Dear simmers, here is a tutorial on how to download stuff from Sim File Share. (Over 95% of you do it wrong, so please pay attention):

Notice the red button with a white outlined (read: empty) heart.

Next, you click on that red button!

If you did it correctly (you can try again if it doesn't work out the first time, btw!), the heart is now white inside, and the number goes up by one. It means you did well and it worked! Notice there is also a blue button to the left of that red one. Click on the blue button. Wait until it turns green:

Your goodies are downloading a second later. If you are skilled, it will only be a split second between the two button presses. Go ahead and practice clicking the red button FAST on some recent downloads. Congratulations, you did it! Now you are allowed to feel proud for being kind and doing the right thing. If SFS happens to be slow (though 99% of the time it is not), just click the heart button when you can, okay? So many creators appreciate this!

SimsFileShare love:

I see a lot of people posting about SFS when its overwhelmed and slow snd although I don’t have issues with it - I get it BUT

It’s an awesome site and a great FREE resource. I love it and am glad we have it. People act like there aren’t humans behind this that have NO reason to provide us with this AMAZING resource. You can’t sh-t on people and expect them to stay.

Anyway I believe most users love them and I don’t want the loud minority to ruin it for us all so please show #SimsFileshare love every now and then mkay.

AND FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING HOLY PLEASE PRESS THE HEART WHEN YOU DOWNLOAD THINGS AND SAY THANK YOU!!!

[paracosmicessence]

i've contemplated sending u an ask here for like 2 days regarding ur sonadow art and oufhgh i have to say it is so,, so gentle like the intimacy and softness of it all/pos i hardly see artists that explore the intimate cuddly drawings without the sexual coding so finding your art is so nice?? like refreshing nice as an aroace person bc in my perfect world, many little guys are just cat coded and it's so so cool to me to have found ur art out in the wild also for the mpreg stuff youre literally one of the most normal ppl i've seen draw/bring it up lol, i'm aware so many ppl like to meme on it or make it a fetish which tbh is pretty transphobic, so i'm just really glad you steered it away from that direction and displayed it as something normal and gentle given the context of the au/lh

first off thank you this is such a nice message and i love that people also feel the vibes of soft and intimate from my sonadow art that’s my only ever goal whenever i drew them 😭😭

second off FELLOW AROACE PERSON ACQUIRED 🫵‼️like omg you get it i love thinking about ships in a cat coding way if that makes sense but especially sonadow bc they’re animals so i just love thinking about them as little guys i can put in my pocket just like my cat

like idk if this is an aroace thing bc i don’t hear it described in a way that i relate to exactly so this might just be me but basically: i’ve always loved romance and ships in fiction but as i got older i slowly realized that i don’t think i can feel it for myself. which kinda made me sad at first because the idea of having a partner always seemed so nice, that was the main reason i didn’t think i was aroace at first because i thought i had always wanted to be in a relationship. i did some research and looked into different identities on the aroace spectrum, and thought that cupioromantic was probably the most accurate to what i was feeling, but later didn’t feel like it applied to me because i think the “enjoys the idea of being in a relationship” doesn’t fit right? ig?? idk how to describe it other than i like the idea of relationships, but it took me awhile to realize that i didn’t really want to apply myself in one if that makes sense.

most likely there’s a thing or word out there that already exists to describe that and i just haven’t been looking up the right terms, but basically this is just a very very long way of saying that i feel like whenever i get into a ship it sorta..…attaches?? to my very identity or something?? like i know people can be like “this is my OTP i love them forever and think about them literally all the time” and it’s like YES that’s me but also feels like an understatement, like all of my past hyperfixations on ships are literally ingrained into my soul even i’m not that into them anymore. and i know people compare hyperfixations to relationships and tbh that’s probably the most accurate description but again, that feels like an understatement.

okay honestly idk where i’m going with this i think what i’m TRYING to say is that i feel like because i can’t feel romance for myself my appreciation for ships feels so much more…emphasized, and sonadow is like the longest consistent hyperfixation i’ve ever had on a ship and at that point usually when something has been a “hyperfixation” for 2+ plus years i put it on the special interest display case in my brain except that display case has only ever had like hobbies and fandoms themselves, never an actual fictional relationship that i’m obsessed with but here we are. it might be the development of brain has synched up with this specific hyperfixation but sonadow is the first ship that makes me feel genuinely happy to this degree. it doesn’t make me sad to think about them and also go “aw i’m sad because i’ve never felt that way about another person and probably won’t experience that ever” in the exact same way you would go “aw i’m going to be dead someday” when you think about the fact that you’re alive right now and conscious and exist and have a mini existential crisis of the week. like sonadow doesn’t do that to me, i really just love those stupid fucking gay hedgehogs so much they’ve actually changed the entire layout of my brain and all the neurons and shit they’re everything to me.

ANYWAY JESUS CHRIST sorry for the ramble uhhhh lemme know if you or any other aroace people know what the fuck i was trying to say there hope you’re doing well and also happy new year!!!

[icescrabblerjerky]

On Writing

I've been writing in a semi-professional way for more than a decade now. I'm not SUCCESSFUL, per se, not in a way that means I can live from it (and I'm very lucky in that I don't have to) but I do write a lot, some of it gets published, some of it gets acclaimed. I've even earned a teeny bit of money from it.

Two things, over the course of my career, have made me a better writer.

The first? Just writing a lot. This can be anything. Fanfic, journal entries, posts like this! YES THEY COUNT! Diary entries, letters, formal communications, reports at work. TEXT BASED RP. EROTIC ROLE PLAY. YES I WILL INCLUDE THAT.

Every single word you write hones your craft (this is why fucking AI sucks balls, every time you ask it to write your email for you, you're losing valuable writing time, I am NOT fucking joking on this, do your own fucking WRITING). Write more, write what brings you joy, write what comes easily to you (and what comes hard hur hur). Do the thing. DO IT. You can't get better at squats without doing squats! You can't get better at writing without PUTTING THE WORDS ON THE PAGE MEAT SAC.

The other thing that has made me SO MUCH BETTER is peer critique. It's showing my work to other people and saying "hey is this bad?" "hey, what works and doesn't work about this?" "hey DOES THIS SUCK" and actually TAKING the critique when people give it to you.

I have had the extraordinarily rare privilege of a long term ongoing writer's group who have never been afraid to tell me what they think of my stuff.

Yes. Sometimes the critique is gonna be shit. Sometimes they don't get what you write. BUT more often than not what a peer group will tell you is what works and what doesn't. What captured their attention. Whether they like your characters. Whether they think this plot is worth pursuing or actually no, you've set this whole thing up that is WAY MORE INTERESTING TO ME.

You need to expose your work to other eyes. And you need to LISTEN to what they tell you. It will make your writing SO much better.

[glowinlemon]

Headcanon that in any Corazon Lives AU, Law is just, like, terrifyingly clingy. Like, Cora goes for a stroll to stock up on cigs and forgets to tell Law? Law makes the news. There is a massacre during those five minutes where Cora is out buying his death sticks.

What’s this? Cora-San is dating someone? Not for long. Full, in depth, investigation launched by Law to dig up any and all dirt on this loser who’s trying to steal his dad. And if this doesn’t work, Law and the hearts are NOT above slashing tires.

Cora asks to have a day to himself, to just relax alone? Well now Law’s crying into a pillow with a printed photo of Corazon’s face taped to it. He’s staying up all night stressing. He can’t eat because everyone he tried cooking it reminds him of how ass his dad is at making food and now he’s crying again. Real pathetic behavior, you get me?

Like, people will meet Rosinante and hear him talk about his kid and think “poor kid, his dad’s so overprotective and clingy.” Only to meet Law and come to the realization that while, yes, Corazon is a bit of an overprotective soccer mom, it’s nothing compared to Law’s genuinely psychotic levels of clinginess.

Law’s still embarrassed when his dad does cheesy dad things in public and shows pda and stuff, and he sure as hell complains about it. But if anyone besides Law tries to do that, making jokes at Cora’s expense or complaining about his habits like Law does, there’s a bloodbath. Law and Law alone is aloud to be an asshole to his dad because it’s HIS dad. Get too close and he swaps your arms and feet. Have fun trying to climb up the stairs in a handstand bitch.

And what makes this even more of a golden headcanon in my mind, at least, is the fact that for all his silliness, Corazon is a terrifying 9ft tall ex spy why has definitely killed before. He can handle himself and than some if a situation turns sour. And than Law is over here frothing with hatred like an elderly chihuahua if someone so much as touches his dad.

I just can’t get over it. Like, if I read a fanfic and it features this type of dynamic of ‘overprotective and clingy dad and MUCH MORE overprotective and clingy son’ it’s instantly god tier in my mind.

[serperioranimations]

BUCKLE UP KIDS, ITS TATER TED TALK TIME

I can definitely be on board with this. I am a disabled artist myself, (neurodivergent/ADHD), and I have a range of characters with physical and mental disabilities, and this also includes Red leader Tord. As well as Tom. And Matt. I’ll put my thoughts and response down below.

I also agree with the scarring points, how in film, evil characters have scars to look more “scary”. There is three examples off the top of my head that literally have the word “scar” in their name. However, I won’t really be discussing that here.

I wouldn’t say MY version of red leader is a bad guy(at least not to Edd, Matt and Tom), he’s moreso just a guy who went about things the wrong way while trying to get his friends recruited. Whole thing. He made up with them eventually. And while he has the ability to come off as intimidating, it’s moreso about the level of power he holds in a room rather than his “scary” appearance.

My portrayals of disability, at least with with red leader tord, mostly focus on the mental effects of his disability. Sure, the physical stress is a lot, but the mental stress of having to worry about your perception and how you are viewed as a disabled person makes a lot of disabilities ten times worse.

He fears that he could get into another accident and lose more of his body and therefore his humanity. Sometimes he has to take his arm off because he hates that he now has to have machinery as his arm. He has nightmares where he’ll be full robot and it freaks him the hell out.

Obviously, there are things that affect him physically too. In the crash, he lost some of his teeth and his cornea had a piece of glass stuck in it and it was damaged. His depth perception is greatly impacted because he’s now blind in his right eye, and he has to wear dentures. He had to change parts of his lifestyle in order to keep them in tact, such as quitting smoking. He also quit because he was scared of getting robot/synthetic lungs and further losing his humanity.

Not to mention, he has to do a lot of work to make sure he can actually LIFT his arm, as it has a lot of machinery in it and that can get quite heavy. He has a lot of frustration surrounding that as well. My version of tord is a tinkerer and always is trying to find new ways to improve something. So his arm is never quite finished. It’s more of an extension to his character than it is a replacement for his arm.

My portrayal of future Tom also has this concept, in the fact that he is blind. His visor does do a lot of things for him, and Tord spent a very long time even trying to get it to work AT ALL.

In a comic I made, it’s implied he had to go through several versions and tests over multiple months to even get him to see ANYTHING. And that comic also implied that it was only a START.

And even if it allows him to see, he still needs to take care of it, he has a backup incase something happens, he has to charge it, all this stuff. And also, it cannot help him see all the time. Like when he turns into a monster.

It can’t help him see when he turns to the size of a building. In fact, when he feels himself turning, he often tries to get the visor off of him as to avoid breaking it because he knows how hard Tord worked on it. But without it, He’s just a giant blind monster who has no idea what’s going on or where he is. And that is a recipe for disaster, my friends.

I will say my representations of technology are not exactly “realistic” and I’ll fully admit that. However, I think it’s important to take into account that sometimes, people just wanna design cool robot stuff that can do cool things. It’s the whole reason people love the idea of flying cars. Yes it’s unrealistic, and we have so many other vehicles that would be way more efficient, but come on- the idea of a flying car is very entertaining. And most of the time, that is what I focus on. If it’s entertaining or interesting.

Plus I’m just like “you know what, I like you- here’s some cool shit you can do cool things with.” That’s how I see the technology in WTFuture. Or at least that’s how I go about it.

In a more realistic and grounded universe outside of Eddsworld, such as my own original story “The Bad Hunters”, I would obviously go about this differently.

But in a world where people can turn into vampires, superhero’s, giant monsters, and just overall break most rules of physics and real life, I think it’s understandable why people in the fandom often default to “because it looks cool” when it comes to designs. After all, I think Edd Gould himself shared this sentiment. 90% of the decisions or jokes he made in his show, I guarantee he made “because it’s funny” or “because it’s cool”.

Like, for example, I have this joke that Tom during meetings will play minesweeper in his headset, because 1- it’s in character that he wouldn’t pay attention to meetings, and 2- it’s funny as hell. And let’s be real- if you’ve been on a zoom meeting that was boring, you’ve probably pulled up minesweeper or solitaire. Is that something realistically that a blind person would be able to do if they had a headset that allowed them to see? Absolutely not. But is it funny? Yes.

Future Matt also has a pretty big disability- that being he has some memory loss related to a brain injury. He got shot in the head and his eye was replaced with a metal one. He also had to get his jaw fixed. He often struggles with remembering what people just told him, and sometimes he forgets where Edd is and that he left. It also, much like Tom and tord and their disabilities, took some getting used to.

He’s also got a mini super computer in his eye that allows him to calculate bullet trajectory and allow him to dodge bullets matrix style. Because fuck it- future Matt is cool, he deserves cool shit. Also because tord was like “aight bro what if I made sure you never got shot in the face again”. Again- is it realistic? No. But is it cool? Yes.

Overall, as an author with disabilities myself, the portrayals of disability I enjoy the most are the ones that acknowledge “this shit sucks” but also are ones that allow for some levity and lightheartedness. This applies to both mental and physical disabilities.

Like toph from ATLA. Yes, she can’t see through the earth and she’s insanely powerful, but also, girlie can’t swim. Obviously, her drowning is no laughing matter, and they don’t make fun of that. But her confidently putting a poster on a wall the wrong way because she can’t see is hilarious.

Or like in arcane, when sevika gets a sick new arm made by jinx, only for it to turn out to be an unpredictable hunk of junk that will do random shit like blast music or shoot fireworks, and sevika is just like “bro are you fucking kidding me”. That may be the most realistic portrayal of a disability aid/tool I’ve ever seen. Sometimes it works great, but sometimes it’s a fucking piece of shit. It also helps that Sevikas arm links to her gambling addiction, hence the slot machine. Sure, it’s not the most “realistic” portrayal, but it does further her character and I think that is also a valid way to write it.

Overall, what I’d say is that I definitely agree with all of what was said above me! These are all valid points and the portrayal of scarring being used the characterize “evil”, or make them look scary, as well as just treating prosthetics as perfect replacements definitely don’t always sit right.

But also I would say that with portraying disability, don’t go the easy way out and basically get rid of their disability by giving them a perfect replacement with no issues that would realistically go along with this. Not just because it’s harmful and disability erasure, but also because it’s boring as shit.

Challenge yourself. Do some research. And most importantly, HAVE FUN.

-your friendly neighborhood tater

The Problem With the Eddsworld Fandom's Depictions of Red Leader/Future Tord, A Disabled Perspective

Disability is a contentious concept for most of society, with most either treating us with disgust, confusion, refusing to treat us as human, or to see our struggles as what they are. Ableism affects all people in many different ways, but as someone who focuses a lot of my energy in fandom spaces, the pervasiveness of ableism with how media and their fans interpet and react to disabled characters is a very personal situation for me. While many may argue that an ignorance to these topics in fiction has little bearing on real life, the prevalance of these tropes have echoed and led to feelings of othering for many disabled people, and oftentimes support the same notions that lead to the day-to-day ableism in our own personal lives.

In recent years, I have experienced this most often with the prevalance of negative disability tropes perpetrated by fanfiction surrounding the character of Tord, also known under the alias of Red Leader in some fanworks. It is a problem not just common in the Eddsworld fandom. A more recent, and much larger fandom in Mouthwashing also shares a common trend of repeated ableism in fan depictions and interpretarions of disabled characters. Most fan creators are unaware of these tropes and the harm that they cause, but as a disabled person, I am unable to ignore it.

For context on myself, you can call me Fish. Get it? Or"fish"eus? I like to think I'm funny. I am a mentally ill, disabled, and neurodivergent creative who has niche interests in representation in media and the intersection of intersectionality and fandom spaces. I experience chronic pain due to a multitude of conditions, all of which are invisible disabilities. I am NOT an amputee or have a facial difference, like the character I am analyzing. I can only speak based on my own research in my attempts to portray him positively, but I want to mainly focus on the ableist tropes I see and the real life effects they have. That is something I CAN focus on, because I've been dealing with it for years from conditions that came onset later in my life. I will be speaking from that perspective, but will be doing my best to try to educate on what I do know from my research to help authors, artists, and creatives create a better portrayal of him in fanworks.

The most common tropes I see with him are what I will call "The Disabled Villain", "The Innacurate Disability", and "The Ignored Disability". There are a few tropes in each, but for ease of organization (and the sake of your (and my) time), I will be talking about them together in these sections. There are also overlaps in many, but I will define the main issues with them.

The Disabled Villain

James Bond, Wonder Woman, The Witches. You name it. You have most likely seen this trope at work in cinema. A malicious evil-doer is revealed to have a "horrid" face symbolic of the true evil within their soul, while the beautiful, able-bodied hero is meant to stop them. It's a trope as old as time, one that goes back to even Plato. Tropes are tropes, people subvert them, so a few cases down the line may be excusable. But that has not been the case For many years, the most prevalent form of representation for disabled people was in these villains. Imagine if the only representation you had for yourself was narratives surrounding how the way you look or what your disability is and have it only be equated to evil people. It leads to a villainization of disabled people. People react to facial differences with disgust, because they are "shown" that it is "evil", or "ugly", or equal to being a horrible person. As stated by The Nora Project, "According to the book Disabilities: Insights from Across Fields and Around the World, disabled students are two to three times more likely to be bullied in comparison to their nondisabled classmates. The disabled villain trope contributes to this phenomenon in overt and subtle ways. For example, the trope implicitly encourages fear of disability and difference, while validating, and even elevating, those who fight against the evil, Disabled Villain. Bullying based on fear and disdain is almost a natural consequence of the trope when viewed in this light". Another big issue is that disabled characters have not been given space to exist outside of villainy. There are not many complex narratives surrounding them. This leads to our disabilities being downplayed, us being dehumanised, and we are seen more like props in real life, or simply tools to achieve a message in a narrative.

Tord's disability is never explicitly shown in the show. It is something more prevalent in Fanon, specifically in fanworks that focus on the "Future" era of the show's timeline, where the narrative and outside discussions on the show implies a high tech society, potentially dystopian, potentially a consequence of his actions. These ideas have taken a life of their own in the fandom, with many creators fully expressing these ideas. The problem arises when Red Leader falls in line with this trope. In many works, he is the sole disabled character, a figure of pure evil, or given little nuance in the narrative. Artists illustrate his scars as bright red, crimson, or, in TBATF, green. For some reason. In this way, they attempt to highlight the villainy by equating him with common symbols of evil: facial differences and disabilities. Unfortunately, these are not just symbols. These are conditions and scars that real people have, which the fandom tends to ignore in favor of dramatization.

This was a trope I most commonly saw explored in fanfiction when I first joined in 2016/17. The show, unfortunately, subtly and accidentally perpetrated it by having the only character visibly and irreparably "damaged" by the giant robot fight be Tord, despite the fact that Tom, who had a whole missile directed at him and got buried under a house, was fine with at most a leg injury and a cut on his arm. Luckily, we have grown past the need for ableist tropes, and the faults of the show can be left in the past!

... Not.

Disability tropes have simply evolved in how the fandom treats Tord. Even if it is now done with more consciousness and sympathy towards his character, ignorance still prevails. Let's talk about common pitfalls people fall into when writing him.

The Inaccurate Disability

In fanon perception, Red Leader is an amputee with a high tech prosthesis and a facial difference resulting from burn scars. Like many disabled characters, he suffers from a collective fandom lack of research. But never fret! That is what I have subjected myself to for the past four years, so your friendly neighborhood disabled Fish can tell you how to right your fandom wrongs! Just kidding! Take this as a pointer, and do your own research.

As is common with fictional prosthetics, his arm prosthetic is treated as a perfect fix for his amputation. It acts just like, if not better than an actual arm. The issue with this is that is isn't realistic. Yes, I know, I'm criticising Eddsworld fanfiction for not being realistic. STAY WITH ME HERE. Once again, if it was one instance, or a few, that explored prosthetics being incredibly functional in science-fiction, then it could be a cool concept. But when every sci-fi work has it, then that is no longer a concept. That is a misconception. And I have interacted with people who believed that prosthetics were 100% functional! The thing is, like all disability aids, it does not suddenly make us able-bodied. For example, I have ear defenders that I wear when I experience pain within my ears. But that does not mean my hearing will now become normal, and I will no longer experience pain from the sound I'm hearing. What WILL happen is that I will straight up not hear you. Like, literally. Can you repeat that? I had my ear defenders on. Oh, you're saying that my ear defenders aren't prosthetics and are not a fair comparison? Well, that's fair, but take this as an illustration of a disability aid and how they differ from able-bodied experiences. Also, many prosthetic users do many things without their prostheses, and some even prefer NOT to wear them. Blogs that explicitly cover disabled representation, such as @/cripplecharacters, have posts that cover WHY many amputees are not fans of this trope. The problem comes with that it erases disability, and yet also treats us like we are given a space at the table of representation. It's just another way that authors avoid actually doing research.

Other things that people tend to ignore are how burn scars, or any scars, would not only appear on a character, but also affect them. I have seen, aside from skin tones that looked like they were picked out of a crayon box instead of what would appear on a person, teeth exposed, wounds that look as if they are fresh from the explosion YEARS after they occurred, and what I like to call "paper shredder" scars. Because instead of them looking like burn or shrapnel scars, it appears as if his skin was put through a shredder. Once again, another consequence of the show's at most-30 second scene with questionable decisions that made massive ripples in the fandom. With the injuries Tord received, it is most likely that he would have two kinds of injuries: a burn on 18% of his body (minimum, based on rule of 9s), and/or shrapnel scars from debris. While shrapnel scars would manifest as darker scars, the burn scar would likely be a hypertrophic scar, as "70% of patients develop hypertrophic scars following burns" (Finnerty et. al). The scars, when healed, are warm toned on the boundaries of their areas and cool in between. When on a pale skintone, they are not too dissimilar, and would therefore not have such a drastic color difference as seen on skin. They would also not go down to the bone or skin, as that would be a completely different kind of injury, and are also commonly done to make him look "scarier", which then aids the Disabled Villain trope. It also treats these scars and injuries more like a work of fiction, rather than something that many real people have experienced, adding to continuous misinterpretations of real life disabilities and facial differences.

For writers wanting to include consequences of burns, what would be more likely to be affected are his hearing, vision, and nerves on the right side of his face, as burn scars can go as deep as nerve endings. Also, burn scars, especially third degree burns, require treatments, such as burn-specific skincare. Scars, especially burn scars, can affect you and become disabling. For artists, the main thing I don't see artists do is draw him with damaged hair follicles. Burn scars damage the scalp and eyebrows, preventing hair growth. I am sorry, but he would not still have fluffy, luscious hair. Do not kill me. He just wouldn't. And if you are saying that he had it in the show, I can't hear you because my ear defenders are on, but I hope you heard me, as we've gone over that the show is inaccurate and we should do our own research.

Even well intentioned authors and artists ignore many aspects of the disabilities he would likely have!

Which brings us to the last trope...

The Ignored Disability

Many well meaning people intend to give him nuance by trying to avoid the Disabled Villain trope. Accidentally, however, they end up completely ignoring his disabilities instead.

Just like the high-tech prosthetic, the real disabling aspects of having a disability are at best rarely mentioned. I have seen, in some fanworks, that he goes straight from amputation to having a prosthetic. And that is where his disability ends. Because the prosthetic ends up being a fix-all situation. Authors refuse, or forget, to include aspects of amputation, such as the healing process, stump or phantom pain. Artists will cover up his scars with a helmet or a mask, another trope that undermines his disabilities and attempts to brush it under the rug. I understand that there is a discomfort for able-bodied authors in thoroughly exploring how a character feels about their disability. That is something I think we should. Avoid. If you're not familiar with the experience of being that minority, you do not need to add commentary on it. And if you do, and it just falls into more negative tropes, I will send a salmon cannon at you (/j). However, I do not agree with brushing every disabling aspect of his life under the rug.

People can assume it's not a problem, like it isn't something blatantly apparent. But, if you assume that disability and being disabled is not a "big thing", you end up where your medication is denied because your insurance refuses to see your common procedure as not a necessary medical intervention because you're "too young". And that is not fiction. That is what inspired me to write this essay, because the day that I got that news was the same day I sat down and told myself that I needed to share my perspective on the perception of disabled characters by honing in on one of my favorite characters and how the fandom treated him.

Disabled characters deserve to be included in media, disability and all, with care given to how their life would operate as a result and what they would experience with their specific disability. That's why many people recommend sensitivity readers who can give proper insight upon that disability and can advise people to properly portray it.

But if you cannot afford or access that resource, what can you do?

Fish's Non-Cohesive List of Ways I Tried to Write Tord as a Non-Amputee Without a Facial Difference

Do research!! The more you are to try to understand what you are writing about, the less you are to misinterpret or misrepresent it.

Look into resources that focus on portraying disabled characters, especially with those you wish to write about. Read blogs, research tropes that are common in disabled characters, and hell, read medical journals. They can provide great insight (<< nerd who likes reading medical journals)

Include more disabled characters. Make the other boys be disabled! Want to be canon compliant? Create OCs who have disabilities! I have a bunch! It's 2024! Be cringe and be free! The character's disability would go against the traditional narrative form of "usefulness"? I'm an animator who can't wear headphones and a theatre performer who can't physically handle the volume of a band. And yet, we find ways to persist, to exist. We will always find our way to live in the way we want to, in whatever way we can.

Look into disability activism. Learn the difference between the Medical Model and Social Model of disability. Know what an invisible disability is. Listen to us when we say that we don't want to be treated as special or an inspiration for simply living (inspiration porn). The more you are aware of what we struggle in real life, the more aware you will be to not repeat those mistakes in your fiction.

Write what you can. Highlight little talked about aspects of having a burn scar or being an amputee, such as the recovery, or treatment for the chronic pain, or how different he would be in battle due to decreased depth perception. As a disabled author, I have personally touched on the experience of gaining a disability later in life, and how he copes with it. Now, not all of y'all can do that. But that is a personal experience I do have, and it is something I have highlighted in my own work. So, while I couldn't tell you the ins and outs of having a burn scar or a prosthetic arm, I could describe the shock and frustration that comes with suddenly experiencing difficulties, or even being unable to do what you had done before.

I ask that, if you are willing to do better, or to start on the right foot, you take what I have written, reflect on it, and treat disabled characters, and in turn, disabled people, better from here on out.

Fiction is not reality, but the way we deal with it is reflective of who we are and what we believe. The boundary for our own personal being does not suddenly stop within fiction. When we interact and interpret it and create for it, it is integral that we remain conscious that bigotry runs rampant, albeit often as an unseen force, within fandom spaces, and do our best to counteract that.

I have doubts that the new eddisode will treat this topic with the same respect. I hope you can all go forward with what you have read in this WAY LONGER than I expected essay, and do what those grown British men cannot. Even if they erase it, retconn it, or do not treat it with respect, let's all go forward and do better!

As for always, you can discuss more in the tags or my inbox!

I hope you have a wonderful life,

Fish

[cozymochi]

Can i... can i yume with your oc.. nyoka??🥹🥹

Last time discussion about this topic was brought to my stoop I got my personality beat up. So, I’ll tread carefully.

*Yes you may. IN FACT, I’LL ASSUME THIS IS HIGH PRAISE FOR ANYONE TO WANT TO DO THAT. He must feel real enough for it, so im kinda flattered lol😭💖💚 Then again, that surprise x reader fic a friend wrote to bamboozle me has more notes than some Nyoka art I’ve posted, so maybe there’s more interest in that than I thought. 😩 BUT!!!

*ONE CONDITION: Absolutely none of that “non-sharing” stuff with him. I’m literally right here, and I would not feel comfortable with anyone doing that.

I don’t expect anyone to get too serious about this to that degree since it’s not even a canon character. In fact, I don’t believe it will happen at all. But, I figure I should establish that now. The canon dudes are one thing, but it’s different when the person who made him is literally one message away.

…

That’s honestly my only major condition, I think. I have enough good faith in people that anything else I could think of probably won’t happen, so I don’t see the need to spell out anything else. Besides, I have car payments.

OTHERWISE, HAVE FUN 👍 he’ll feel more real lmfao THIS IS JUST FOR INTERNET FUN LETS KEEP IT THAT WAY BYE

[ckret2]

I love how Bill has somehow upgraded his friendgroup from just Mabel to a couple of different pairings with randoming amounts of friendship and hostility.

You got:

Girlz Roolze (Grenda, Candy, and Mabel)

Frenemies (Stan)

The Icebreaker? (Wendy)

Disaster Squad (Wendy's Squad)

The Stan and Gideon equivalent (Dipper)

I'm not sure yet about the "Lovely Couple" but I really like how you write Ford's conflicting feelings about how to treat Bill.

I'm hoping if he tries to find romantic love he finds it in someone besides Bill, but maybe if things go well he finds friendship or a some neutral ground with Bill. Ford just deserves that kind of peace you know?

Anyways I hope you don't mind this dorky fangirling and stuff!!!

I think it's a bit of a stretch to call Dipper part of his social circle lmao, if dipper disappeared tomorrow Bill might forget about him entirely until Mabel asks for his help putting up "missing brother" fliers. The thing about Stan & Gideon's rivalry is that it's mutual, each views the other as a threat. Bill views Dipper as the prepartum snack Mabel failed to eat. I don't think Bill's thoughts on Dipper have changed at all since the start of the fic.

The others though? Pretty accurate.

And sorry to burst your bubble anon, but billford has been in the plans since the start of the fic.

I write Ford as somewhere on the ace/aro spectrum, won't settle on exactly where until it becomes relevant, so he may or may not be able to feel "romantic love"—but if not, however exactly I write his ultimate relationship with Bill ("obsessive special interest with benefits"?? idk) is gonna look similar enough that very few people who aren't on the aro spectrum will care about the minute distinction lmfao. But wherever I put him, I can say two things for sure:

He's not going to TRY TO FIND romantic love. (Can you imagine? Ford???) If love doesn't come hunt him down, it's not happening.

If he doesn't feel it for Bill, he's sure not gonna feel it for anyone else.

At any rate, Bill's the one who screwed up their relationship and Ford won't feel any interest until Bill starts un-screwing it.

Ford absolutely deserves better than Bill, but "does he deserve to endure Bill?" is an entirely separate question from "yes, but under what circumstances would he be happy to endure Bill?" and I'm far more interested in the second question.

[alpaca-clouds]

Why do people struggle so much with understanding pacing?

Okay, let me talk about my pet peeve when it comes to writing in any medium. Pacing.

People, who know me for long, will know that this has been the thing I have been complaining about since I was like 12. And there is a good reason for it.

See, when I learned to write, there was this guy who I greatly admired as an author. And after bugging him for a while (look folks, the internet was a very different place from what it is now) he did give me some recommendations on books on writing. And a lot of them went deeply into his pet peeve, which - you guessed it - was pacing as well.

And thus, I learned early on about story structure, and pacing, and how to pace out a story in a way grips the audience. This material I read went onto different techniques for different mediums, into how different cultures had a different ways of dealing with this, and so on, and so forth.

Some of my main take aways were, that a lot of very long stories struggled massively with pacing, and that a ton of people also very miscalculated their ability to handle characters in terms of pacing - because characters and pacing are two things that are very, very heavily connected.

I also learned something else, though: That a lot of western writing advice did not understand anything about pacing outside of the idea that stories were supposed to have three acts - or maybe five - and ideally from a certain fateful day in the early 2000s on, would follow the "save the cat" formular. (Mind you, I do not hate "Save the Cat", however, this formular has been created for movies. It works at times somewhat well for books, too. But it definitely does not for for pretty much anything serialized, because that is not what it was developed for.)

And I also learned another thing: Most people do not understand pacing either, because pacing is not a thing that is ever taught in normal school (like most things that are about creative writing are not). So, while some people might have a gut feeling that the pacing of something might be off, they rarely can actually say why. And this is only worsened by the fact that today's tiktok addicted society is so used to consuming ultra condensed media, that they will perceive anything less condenses than 1 minute tiktok videos as "too slow and boring".

So, please allow me - the guy who kinda hyperfixated on this specific writing skill - to talk about pacing. And this will be in the following points:

What is pacing actually?

How do characters relate to pacing?

Pacing, Streaming and the supposed "filler episode".

Pacing and Fantasy

Pacing in Action vs anything else

Pacing in books vs visual media

What Is Pacing actually?

Okay, I think one of the main issues when it comes to understanding pacing is, that a lot of people see pacing on a on a spectrum that goes from "I am bored" to "I can't follow the plot anymore". But that actually does not always have to do with the pacing - obviously.

Technically pacing is the speed in which the plot moves. Or, to make it more quantifiable: "How many plot points (beats) are covered per either time (in any timed medium) or per page (in anything you read)". Which makes sense at the first glance - but does actually often not line up with the subjective perception of this. Becau se here is the thing: No, fight scenes are not automatically fast paces. A lot of modern action movies have super slow paced - in terms of story pacing - action scenes. Because yes, during those action sequences a lot of STUFF happens, but nothing of it actually is in any way related to the plot.

Look, I freaking adore the Fast & Furious movies. But you could literally edit those movies down to like 45 minutes each and not lose a single plot beat. But of course, nobody would watch those movies - because yes, me and everyone else who adored those movies, is there to watch them lunch cars into space and see stuff blow up. I don't much care about the characters or the plot.

This is by the way also the kinda point that me and other people talk about, when we are unimpressed by "oh, but sex scenes don't add anything to the plot", while the same people would often not make the same argument about action scenes - even though there is a ton of movies and shows where the action scenes really do not add anything to the plot. A lot of people just do not perceive action sequences as slow pacing, because even if nothing that happens on the screen actually adds anything to the plot or moves it forward, it is undeniable, that STUFF is happening. So basically monkey brain will go: "Hehe, things go boom!"

Don't get me wrong: there absolutely are stories in which the action is moving the plot. Mad Max Fury Road is a great example. The movie is also about 60% action - but the action scenes actually add to the plot.

Meanwhile nothing tells you as much about how unimportant some of the MCU action scenes are, than the fact, that they are often done by a completely different team and will be done apart from the rest of the movie.

But yes, traditionally the idea was, that towards the "finale" of a piece of media, a lot more plot beats would happen over a shorter amount of time. You will see that also in a lot of beat sheets. There are more beats that need to happen in the third act of a story - if we go by three act structure. And often there is actually even more plot developments, as usually in a finale all the "plotlines" will kinda finish up in the end. So even plotlines where not a lot has happened to this point - this shows especially in serialized works both in TV shows and stuff like manga or comics - the important plot points will then often happen close to the finale, because it feels more "right".

In older serialized media - especially TV shows prior to streaming - you also had the same thing hold true towards the finale of a "story arc". In a lot of older shows, you would usually see a structure that looked like this.

The "rise" here technically has less to do with more stuff happening in later arcs or seasons - and more with the threat-level rising, and the convulutedness of a story. lol

But yeah, the take-away from this part should be: No, action does not equal fast pacing. There can be action-heavy shows with super slow narrative pacing - but it will to many not feel this way, because at least action is interesting to watch. Which also might be an explanation to why people are a lot worse in seeing the issue with action-scenes that are not adding anything in visual media, but might actually notice it in written stories. Because in books action scenes do not feel "fast paced" in the same way they feel in movies, where the often faster editing and the amount of motion on screen will create this effect.

Oh, and on the other side: Of course there can be slow paced plots that will leave you having problems following. At times, because they are badly written (aka: the media does not give you all the information you need) - and at times, because a piece of media might expect you to know a certain bit of information that you do not know. I can definitely think of a variety of scifi media, that just expects you to know stuff about computer stuff or space, and will not explain it to you. Which might make you need longer time to take plot developments in, and then leaves you reeling.

Another thing however that is also important is: If the pacing stays actually the same throughout a piece of media - rather than accelarating towards the finale (or finales if there are multiple) - it actually will feel wrong in some way. Often people (even I, who hyperfixates on this specific thing) struggle to point at it at first. But yes, this very much is an issue that also can happen. You want the pacing to accelerate towards certain points in the plot - and then slow down. If you had an important point, you want a few slower scenes/episodes/chapters afterwards, to allow the audience to somewhat absorb all the new things you presented them with.

How do characters relate to pacing?

Alright, now we come to the dicey part - specifically, because a lot of people (which includes narratologists, creative writing professors, and people professionally writing) actually kinda do not fully agree on this. So, fair warning: This is how I think.

A character arc in many cases absolutely is a part of the plot. Most media we consume these days are character driven, so the characters are absolutely centrally connected to the plot and the plot mainly exists to have the character move from point A to point B. Or, to make it more basic: To have a character realize that their WANT is not their NEED.

Sure, those characters will usually also accomplish something plot-related. But them accomplishing them is more often than not heavily connected to them fulfilling their character arc. (Please note: characters having a want but having to realize a need is something that is core of western storytelling. However, given that it makes for interesting character arcs, a lot of Asian media these days also will use this as a central driver for character development.)

In some pieces of media, the character arcs are way more heavily tied into the beats of the main plot, than in other. In adventure, action, and related a lot of fantasy and scifi, there is most of the time a character arc happening parallel to the main plot beats. Meanwhile often enough in more down to earth drama and romance, plot beats and character development beats are heavily interwoven. This is not a hard and fast rule - there absolutely is fantasy where the character arc is the plot arc, just as there is romance where the development does not play as heavily into the main plot - but you can generally observe it.

However, no matter how strongly the character development beats line up with plot beats, you cannot deny one thing: character beats are beats that also add to the pacing - even if they technically do not move the main plot forward. So, for example, if you have an episode in a show or a chapter in a book, where important beats happens in terms of a characters development (for example: they realize something important about themselves), this does not necessarily slow the pacing down - even if no actual plot beats happen.

What the fuck is a plot beat? What is a character beat?

This part of the essay was originally not included, but the people reading over it said I should include this.

If we say, that Pacing is basically the description of "Plot Beats per Time" or rather "Plot Beats and/or Character Beats per Time", then we also need to say, what exactly a Plot Beat is. I will fully admit, that this is one of those things in which I forget that this is not a thing taught in school.

I mentioned "Save the Cat" before. "Save the Cat" is a book about writing movies and specifically about pacing out a movie in a way that it is captivating. It mainly focuses on action, but you can absolutely use it for most other genres. And this comes with a so called "beat sheet", a collection of the main story beats that happen, showing when they are going to happen. It looks like this:

Basically a Beat is a scene, in which the plot (or a character arc) is moved forward by a bit. Basically anything that reveals something to the main characters, anything where the basic assumptions about the plot change, anything like that.

Examples for Plot Beats would be:

Character learns about something going on

Characters find out something important about the plot

Someone (either protagonist or antagonist) gets killed or injured

Characters get a new power or item that is important to the plot

Romance goes forward or a reason for the romance to happen is found

Characters find a hint for something they want to reach

And examples of Character Beats would be:

Character learns something about themselves

Character makes a decision for themselves

Characters realizes feelings about something or someone

Character overcomes trauma

And mind you, because I cannot fit this anywhere else: If you read these you might realize, why Musicals are basically a cheat for very fast pacing. Because you can put an entire character arc into a 4 minute song. This is why musical animated shows like Steven Universe or My Little Pony managed to pull some insanely paced episodes, like the Empire City episodes for SU, and the episode in which the Cutie Mark Crusaders finally got their Cutie Marks. Musicals are insane when it comes to this.

And something that you have to realize: While for movies and books certain Beat Sheets (Save the Cat is not the only one) work rather well, those Beat Sheets usually do not work well for Shows. And currently we are living in a time, where this becomes very noticable - because a lot of modern shows are written and aired as basically 4-8 hour movies, using often just the "Save the Cat" beat sheet (if you have read Save the Cat, you will see it EVERYWHERE, because it is so frequently used in western media), but... obviously, Save the Cat is made for something that has 2 hours, and as such a lot of modern media feels strangely slow and stretched out.

Pacing, Streaming, and the supposed "filler episode"

(Yes, this needed to be the gif for this. Because no filler episode has lodged itself quite as strong into my brain as this one.)

So, let me talk about the issue in modern media. Because oh boy.

As I said: I hyperfixated on this specific writing skill forever - and as such I was annoyed by "filler episodes" in TV shows. To explain for the youngest people (not that I am assuming a lot of those are on this hellsite lol): "Filler" was the name given to material that did not move the plot forward at all. So a "filler episode" was an episode, that was just there to fill the episode slot for the week, while no plot was happening. I am not fully sure whether the term originated with anime - but at least back in the early 2000s, before Shonen-Anime were done as 12-26 seasons that then allowed the manga to get ahead in between, "filler" was also the name used for those story arcs that the anime people made up for shows like Naruto, One Piece or Dragonball, that were not in the manga - and hence obviously also never added to any overarching narrative.

And what can I say: We did not appreciate the filler episode enough. Because this related very much to the last part: While filler episodes did indeed not add to the plot and usually by definition did not the character development, they actually still added something often enough.

They allowed the audience to get to know the characters a bit better and get a better feeling for the character relationships - and those episodes take out a bit of speed, which is actually important.

As said before: The pacing should not be even throughout an entire piece of media. In a TV series after an episode that was especially tense and pushed the plot or characters forward a lot, there should be ideally at least one or two episodes that move forward slower or even not at all. This allows the viewer to sit with the new developments for a bit - and of course the characters to have a moment to breathe and process whatever happened to them.

There is also the fact that those episodes usually give the audience a better understanding for the characters - and if you have an audience who at this point ideally care about some the characters, this will even be more successful.

And as I said. Back in ye olden days, a lot of people - me included - complained so much about Filler. But we were wrong. Fillers are amazing, as long as they do not overtake the whole show.

Pacing and Fantasy

Okay, let's talk about a thing, that is somewhat funny. A lot of fantasy - specifically written fantasy media - often has a pacing problem. And this problem comes from the Worldbuilding. Others forms of fantasy media (other than games - though pacing in games is whole different matter) have this too at times, but it tends to be worst in books.

Basically, when you are a fantasy worldbuilder, you have this whole world. And this leaves you with two problems.

a) You are afraid that people will not be able to follow the plot if you not give them a lot of information about this world and how it differs from ours.

b) Well, you build this entire world. And the people should KNOW.

So, a lot of fantasy media basically regularly will stop to explain to the reader or audience, whatever is happening right now. Some writers manage somewhat naturally put this in. Maybe they have a character that does not know a lot about for example magic or dragons, and they can ask questions and act as an audience stand-in. But even in cases, where the worldbuilding is somewhat brought in naturally (which by far is not all of them - because people usually do not naturally talk about stuff they both know, or think a lot about something they find naturally) those "explanation" pieces will make the plot come to a screeching halt.

So, the more worldbuilding you explain, the slower your pacing is.

And of course, pacing is not a reliable thing to keep people reading, and pacing will not always turn people off. But you know how people complain about how slow Lord of the Rings is? This is because of course, every time that Tolkien describes a piece of landscape over multiple pages, there is no plot happening on those pages. And while I personally think some of those descriptions are darn stunning, it is one of those things many people will not like.

However, this makes it a bit complicated. Because yes, worldbuilding explanations will slow down the pacing to a degree that can be problematic. But if you explain too little worldbuilding, people might struggle to follow the story. Which again is the most common problem if the pacing is "too fast" as well. Basically, people do not properly follow the plot and will struggle to understand what is happening and why.

But the opposite is true as well. I have read way too many fantasy books, where after the first 100 pages, I know a lot about the city the plot is set in, or about the magic system, but sadly have so far not been privy to any information what the plot is about, what the characters try to archive, or even who actually the characters are. And that, yeah... Is probably the most common reason why I put aside a variety of fantasy books in the past.

Pacing in Action-media vs anything else

Okay, let me talk about one other thing. See, the word "pacing" is at times used in some other context: In visual media, pacing will be used for the editing of what we see. Basically the amount of cuts that happen within a scene. Or, in a comic, the distribution of panels is also seen as a pacing element.

And anyone who heard people complain about how at times confusing the editing in action movies is, you know that this at times can get too much.

Still, in visual media action scenes feel usually fast - because the characters are moving around rather fast. In a visual piece of media, action scenes are often thrilling, because the characters are in constant danger of dying, and because a lot of stuff is happening. This often works better in visual media, than in written pieces. While it absolutely is possible to write thrilling action scenes, a lot of writers struggle with this, because they tend to overdescribe and that takes the speed out of the prose. But generally speaking, a couple of punches thrown - something that in a movie takes about 10 seconds - will in book easily end up in 200-500 words, which you will not read quite as fast. A bit more about that later.

And then there is the issue with the action scenes, that even is true for visual medial, is that they often really do not have any important plotbeats. Sure, if the characters have their final battle, that is a plot point. But in a lot of action media - especially TV shows - there are a lot of scenes included that really do not add anything, but just are there because folks love watching action scenes.

This goes so far, that people will think a show or movie with a lot of action scene will just be seen as "good fast pacing", even though if the actual pacing in terms of plot beats being spaced out is rather bad. As a good example I will once more nod at the Fast & Furious and the Mission Impossible movies, that often have horrid pacing and very confusing plots - but they do not feel really like it, because the movies are like 60% action scenes, and hence they do not feel like it when you watch them.

It can work at times. I spoke about my love of the F&F movies. Can I tell you a lot of the characters? Nope, but the action scenes are fun to watch!

But this also tends to mean, that in a badly paced movie or show, that is badly paced because the action scenes not adding any plot beats, everything tends to fall apart when the action scenes do not work. And often enough action scenes will still be prioritized over everything else in many of those pieces of media, making things fall apart easily.

Pacing in books vs visual media

I have hinted at this now multiple times: Written media is generally a bit harder to pace than visual media, because of the things you can and cannot control. While a writer in a book has full control over the scenario, a director of a show or movie had actually influence the timeflow of the things happening on screen. As a writer meanwhile you absolutely have no influence on the speed in which your reader will read.

Sure, you can somewhat influence it. Shorter sentences are easier read. An general lower reading level will allow people to read quicker. So simpler words, shorter words, shorter sentences will make parts appear quicker. You can use this for example in action scenes to have a bit more of this breathless feeling that an action scene on screen might have. Use short sentences. Do not link sentences up. Quick hits. Quick impressions. It can work - but it needs some training. Not to say it is fucking hard.

Generally speaking to my experience when you write a single novel, the "Save the Cat" Beat Sheet actually works rather well, if you are the kind of writer who is fairly good at planning things out. If I actually try, I will usually manage to plan out a story and predict fairly well how many words a chapter will have. So yes, for books I can very much use "Save the Cat" and it will work.

However, some things simply work a lot better when you have visual parts going on - but there are other things you can do better when you do not have the visual stuff. For example: A writer can do much more when it comes to motivation and introspection of characters. Yes, this slows down the pacing - but it is something that writing has basically over any form of media that is not a musical. (In a Musical you can characters do introspection through songs. Musicals are the ultimate way of cheating. I love them!)

Something I feel so many writers struggle with in terms of books is actually putting in a clear goal for the character from the beginning. Again: I have put too many books aside where I reached page 100 and did not yet have any goal for the main character.

That goal you give them does not necessarily need to be their final goal. Again: A lot of western storytelling deals with the incongruent nature of a characters "needs" (aka something that would actually help them) with the character's "wants" (aka what they think they would need). But at the very least the plot needs something that it can head towards from the very beginning - a hook to capture the reader.

There might be readers that are absolutely fine with just reading an exercise in worldbuilding - but you cannot expect them to be.

[sacred-coffin]

@missemrose @disappleasure @ficandkaboodle (in order of appearance) Thank you guys for leaving some super cool tags on this post :3 I hope you don't mind that I'm gonna dissect them a little, but I just love talking. A lot.

Personally, I'm not sure Sister Imperator even thinks she's being a villain. It feels like she's just doing what she thinks is best for the Church...and whatever Satan tells her to do lol. It does seem like she talks to him? at least. The Dark One(?) called her at the hospital lol.

She has a job, and she's doing it. It's an objectively evil job, running a cult that wants to take over the world, but like. I don't think she sees herself as a villain. I think a major point in Ghost is that everyone is kind of evil and an asshole, Sister included, and that's fucking awesome.

It is canon that Sister Imperator made the decision to kill Papas 1-3. And fully agree she's trying to do whats best, but uh, well. It's an evil cult. There's only so much "good" anyone can do there lol. I don't think the church is meant to be a good entity by any means. It's been stated before that Ghost is meant to be more like a parody of the Catholic church, rather than the opposite.

I'd argue that Tobias is against the corruption of the church, and Ghost is just an art project to display that corruption by doing a lot of things Chirstianity preaches and just calling it Satanism to point out how bad it is; if your beliefs can have their labels sanded off and called "evil" without anyone blinking an eye... your beliefs might not be great LOL.

I'm not touching on DeFroque. He is nothing to me. Sorry. It's weird to me that everyone is foaming at the mouth for him. 🤨 I think he sucks and I don't care for people fawning over him at all.

YES!!! YES!!! She is evil and it's awesome and it's interesting and she is complex and she's NOT the only evil asshole. Primo did and said fucked up stuff, Secondo is a dick, Terzo is a cunt, and Copia is. well. Also a cunt. THEY'RE ALL ASSHOLES.... AND THAT'S SO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IDK what I think about her interacting with siblings, but I do agree that I think she was like... generally polite and nice to people? She did some cocomelon shit to the Meliora ghouls but like that's because she thought they needed to try harder. She's a bit of a bitch but like. god forbid women do anything.

so what if she killed the papas so they could sell VIP tickets. it fucking worked didn't it?

I forgot my meds yesterday and my brain isnt fully screwed on. But I have something I have to say and ask.

I feel like the ghost fandom is incredibly caught up in the idea that Sister Imperator is evil, and like, she is! But like... everyone who works with her made that choice. The papas made the choice to work with her. To some extent, they HAD to agree with her and her vision. And she agreed with theirs, to an extent.

Like, it feels REALLY unfair to say that the only woman character is an evil bitch that everyone hated. But they worked for her anyways? Because...?

It's a religious cult. Everyone who is there, to some degree, believes in the cause. And if Sister Imperator is one of the leaders, then... well... why WOULDN'T they agree with and like her?

Why do people hate the only woman character and want her to be the only evil one? Why do people want her to be the one to pin all the bad stuff onto? Why are these grown ass men being portrayed as pure innocent souls who could do nothing wrong and were just manipulated by some cruel mean Woman and they had no idea she was evil. Like. Please. Explain yourself to me. I want to know where you are all coming from.