#you can tell this post is super old

[perilegs]

i know astrology is fake but i'm not too keen on how a lot of people on this website seem to be clowning on it as a hobby a bit too hard. i swear the woman who thinks it's neat how she and her friends with the same sun sign are all similar isn't trying to say that you are who you are born as and there is nothing you can do to change it. it's a hobby. an interest. what happened to finding meaning and joy in the small things. does it affect you if someone enjoys tarot reading or crystals. does it make you upset someone has interests that they enjoy.

[sirenium]

'If you're doom scrolling this tag-' shut up. Get out of the tag that you, yourself detest, block it, and move on. You're helping nobody with these corny ass posts; if anything you're exposing yourself to the very thing you hate. You're triggering yourself. And if you doom scroll, get out of the tag and block it. It's that simple.

[doux-amer]

One thing that has deeply annoyed me about the response from Americans/Westerners about this week's events in Korea is that a lot of them, including people I like and respect, are like, "The protesting civilians and lawmakers who barged into the National Assembly would've been shot if this were the U.S./this would've never happened in the U.S. because people are too afraid of being shot." There's some truth to that, at least with regard to state violence, but I'm fed up because it doesn't account for how frightening this could have turned out to be had it not been for how much of an inept flop dunce Yoon Sukyeol is. It minimizes the courage of those who showed up.

Sure, it was likely that the military and riot police wouldn't have done much (again, YSY's self-coup wasn't thought out well, and there's more evidence of that as military officials and soldiers are speaking up about the lack of information they received, but I'll refrain from talking about that to avoid making this even longer than it inevitably will be, knowing myself), but let's not pretend there haven't been issues with them in recent years. They pepper sprayed and used water cannons during an anniversary rally for the Sewol ferry victims (x) (x) (if you don't understand how unbelievably cruel that is, look into the horrific Sewol ferry sinking). They tear gassed crowds (Korea has a gruesome history of this) and sprayed water cannons, and citizens have been injured and killed during the 2015 protests and 2016-17 Park Geunhye impeachment protests, notably Baek Namgi, an elderly activist whose death caused global outrage (x) (x). Park Geunhye was going to enforce martial law during those protests according to a leaked document, with hundreds of tanks, thousands of soldiers and special force troops! (x)

Not to mention, there are decades of extreme state violence that have scarred an entire country and are still super fresh for a huge percentage of the population. Again, check out that tear gas history piece. Look up the April Revolution, Gwangju massacre, and June uprising and see just how bloody they were. Thousands of civilians were tortured and killed. Look at how many protests were going on year after year during the 1980s. That isn't that long ago! All those older people who ran to the National Assembly to stop the coup? You bet a lot of them were college students who protested during that time or knew people who did. All the younger people? They may not have experienced what it was like living under martial law, but as I said, state violence still occurs, however much it's dwindled over the years, and you have to account for generational trauma. I don't think I'll ever forget the way I felt when I saw the breaking news alert about the martial law declaration on December 3. I've never experienced that, at least to that degree.

Instead of viewing the response from civilians and elected officials through the framework of police brutality in the U.S., it should be contextualized using Korea's own history. Thankfully most of the serious discussions are doing this, but like I said, even people who are smart about reading up on things have reflected on how this wouldn't fly in the U.S., not because of the difference in protest history, civil movements, and public engagement with both in the two countries but because of the military/police response. There's an insinuation there that Koreans would be more reluctant to do what they did if they knew what it's like to live in fear of violence instead of living in such a safe country like Korea...and I want to yell.

It was monumentally brave of everyone to do what they did to stop the coup. We're all laughing at how stupid the coup was and there's a reason why people were more furious than scared because of the political history of Korea and the laws set in place to protect the democracy and neutralize coup attempts, but this could have easily become a disaster. It's not alarmist of me to say so because there was no way for anyone to be 100% sure of how the military would react—especially when no one knew what the hell was going on.

[1tsjusty0u]

man. totk couldve been so good

[bumblingbabooshka]

Workforce Tuvok is my cringefail babygirl

[demo-ness]

i've already seen people call Messmer a twink, but imo he so CLEARLY has the stereotypical bad yaoi anatomy build:

acknowledge his yaoi hands NOW

[wild-at-mind]

Today's events and the past few months of bullshit have made me feel so rejected from my local LGBTQ community.

[eemoo1o-potteroo]

I think it should get to the point where they should genuinely just stop printing Harry Potter. Not just because of Rowling as a whole, but because it’s also going to get to a point where the books – which are a time capsule in and of itself at this point, a staple of a specific love and nostalgia – will just lose their magic. Like there’s a lot of copies online, either kept rather untouched or battered to hell but still legible, just buy them. Pass the second-third-fourth hand books around as much as we can until the corners are curled and the covers are white from the crackly fold damage. Beautiful.

[no1ryomafan]

In my constant brain rotations of “why are people in the west so hard on mecha aside from the fandom can be a bit unfriendly” I think one thing I realized as much as I hate to say is how mecha is sometimes treated remind me of the constant hatred superhero stuff gets.

It’s such a weird comparison because with mecha I do not know what the root of it was-and I’d love to know why but I feel there’s either no clear answer or there is one and it’s stupid-where as for superheroes in the west while there’s still a dedicated community the mainstream audiences have become tired of them due to over-saturation, which I understand, but it’s caused such a massive dismal to the entire genre of it much like mecha.

People think superhero stories can’t have any substance because it’s all about fighting and not about the characters- yet forget the SIGNIFICANT impact they had to so much pop culture. How superhero stories were rooted within comic popularity, how superheroes inspired countless of stories, even so far as reaching japan since so much early anime was taken off of western media which birthed its own genre of superheroes. It’s no different to how mecha help started up the anime industry making it one of the most important genres to japans history, yet most people don’t know it and belittle it.

Yet in superhero story cases it’s even WORSE when people are against it yet then go to see one superhero movie because it’s animated and put it on a pedestal and don’t bother to try other superhero content even though they consumed is no different from the norm. It’s the exact same shit when people watch eva and then think all other mechas don’t compare to it, when the genre always had darker, mature and emotional elements, just only a select few decide to canter to a audience who doesn’t even accept what genre it’s from which makes it all the more frustrating to deal with.

I’m someone who’s hardly into superhero stuff even if some of it catches my eye but it sucks to see that the situation is pretty identical to how mecha is seen, that I can’t help to feel sympathetic whenever I see some comic book fans upset at the mainstream audience even if they too can be a little hostile.

[fortes-fortuna-iogurtum]

unpopular opinion maybe, but personally I think it is WAY past time for the Super Tight Butt Jeans thing to fade into obscurity.

[oddtripps]

E g g: Pondered

@peigay

[samuraisharkie]

due to Life Shit I kind of stopped drawing much about a year or two after I graduated high school bc I just kind of didn’t have the time or mental/emotional/physical capacity to fit it in, despite art being something I really want to be a part of my career. It kind of makes me sick to realize how much muscle memory I lost just from that time (I had only about a year and a half total of absolutely no art but that was enough. doesn’t help that during that time I seriously injured my hands) considering I’ve been drawing my entire life. I really wish things had not gone that way and that I could have kept going, but expectations were on me to do something else and any time I sat down to draw was treated as wasting time. There’s also something weird about recovering from severe trauma that kind of adjusts how you engage with a hobby you used as a coping mechanism, which Art very much was. I almost never drew vent art, but I used it to focus on something and make myself happy and proud of work I actually could do, and once I was out of the environments that funneled me into drawing (being forced to go to church, school, anything involving sitting down for a long period of time) I found less time to actually have an excuse. Someone bought me a single college course of art classes right out of high school, and I think that was where I COULD have had the opportunity to really get started if I had actually had the money to continue and the college hadn’t been so far away. After that course ended I didn’t have that excuse anymore. I used to draw in DeviantArt and Discord art groups, but those began to fall apart and soon I didn’t have that option either. After that I doodled but didn’t really create Full Pieces unless some friend asked it of me, and it was never a commission bc I’d never trained myself to get that sort of shit done without taking too long, so I’d always do it for free. So even that wasn’t a big motivator eventually. Now that I’m struggling for work after becoming more physically disabled after COVID, all that time I could have spent honing my art skills so I could do SOMETHING with my art really is weighting down on me. I have the option to do freelance work, illustrations, pet commissions, even things like cards and cookies. I’ve seen these avenues open up for me gradually, but I’ve lost the skills I built up that I need to actually make something I’m proud of. I’ve taken to tracing old art to try and remember my thought process and my “style”… but my memory was bad BEFORE the covid, and it’s worse now, and my brain fog makes it hard to focus even if I could get back on the train of thought. I don’t remember the construction that would be in my mind’s eye. I barely can keep a clear vision in my mind’s eye anymore, worryingly. I never had a crystal clear imagination, it was always sort of abstract, but I could see the lines, I could construct a scene. Now I have to focus hard to get any sort of detail clear in my head. It’s like if you tried to look directly into someone’s face in a dream, or put in a prompt in neural blender. So I have to adjust to performing the entire thought process physically, slowly and tediously trying to figure out what I’m imagining before I can really get started. Those old art tutorials for constructing shapes and bodies and such just aren’t coming naturally anymore so I have to dredge deep into my mind to remember which advice helped “click” the best and knowing it might not do it this second time around. It’s like if you forgot how to ride a bike. It was something natural to you, you could even get started haphazardly and distracted and still be able to tell where you were going and not fall over or trip on yourself, but now it’s like you have to focus on each step and it constantly feels like it’s taking everything you have to not crash. I’m glad I can start drawing again, but it hurts that something so huge in my life has been turned into this. I’ve ranted about it before it’s just easier to notice when you’re not sketching out people’s pets or doing super stylized doodles.

[persephonaae]

Hrm

[wizardlyghost]

always good to find out which of your coworkers, upon you saying that you are getting sick of your manager's bullshit, will immediately report to your manager that you said you were getting sick of his bullshit. henceforth you are lower than a customer to me. motherfucker.

[deus-ex-mona]

little brothers and their will to #slay, man </3

[finch1pinch]

gotta say I really do enjoy the beginning of Across the Spider-Verse and Gwen’s monologue while she’s pounding on the drums (beware spoilers ahead obviously!)

on the first viewing(yes I saw it in theaters twice) its mostly just a recap of the first movie to get everyone who hasnt watched it over 15 times and knows the plot and a lot of the lines by heart. But as I enjoyed it for the second time in theaters and now when im listening to the soundtrack, Gwen’s monologue is her coping with the aftermath of ITSV. She’s gone through a lot of shit, her mother died, she accidentally caused her best and only friend’s death, shes having tension with her dad due to her double life, and she finally got the courage to make her first friend in a long while, and now she can’t interact with that friend at all. She just got a taste of being able to depend on other people to have her back and BOOM! now shes back to total isolation. and she doesn’t know how to cope. No spider-person ever really does. all of them are bouncing from one responsibility to another than none of them ever have any time to truly process the shit they go through on a daily basis.

That is why Gwen keeps repeating that “He’s[Miles] not the only one.” as she bashes her drums. She’s using him as a vessel to process her feelings. She knows she isn’t the only one, but its a little hard to believe when there is not physical proof of it. So Gwen monologues about how Miles and her are similar.

And while she is dealing with her sudden isolation, she joins a band.

“I didn’t join a band so I could talk about my feelings, I joined so I could hit my feelings with sticks.” (apologies if I misquoted)

She wanted to have friends again. But she can’t connect with any of her peers because they don’t get it. None of them can hope to understand her position as a spider-person who has people around her dropping dead left and right.

And Gwen also doesn’t really give them a chance to be her friend.

because she wasn’t really searching for new friends, its presumably been a month or two since she went through the collider, she’s desperate for connection with her peers. The problem is that none of the kids her age are her peers. Miles is her peer. Hobie and Pavitr end up being her peers and her friends. the bajillion Peters her age are her peers.

Her joining the spider society is both bad and good for her because of this. She’s finally got peers that she can connect with, despite the lack of Miles’ presence, but she also has really shitty role models now. said shitty role models are doing exactly the opposite thing that you’re meant to do with parenting teenagers. They are clipping her wings rather than Miles and his dad “You gotta let him spread his wings man.” Jess and Miguel (and sorta Peter?) won’t let her visit Miles based on rules that are theoretical AT BEST, and she’s effectively trapped in the spider society due to her dependence on the watch so that she can avoid her dad. (side note: WHY DID NOBODY HELP HER PROCESS AND FIX HER DAD SITUATION???) does anybody else think this is a classic setup for an abusive situation? Though she does have Hobie and Pavitr, she is still being isolated from Miles because he’s a “bad influence.”(read: anomaly) I will ask you all again, does anybody else think this is a classic setup for an abusive/culty situation??

I’m sorry but the idea of canon events feel like grade-A bullshit meant to corral the spider people into a single template. They are straight up scaremongering that forces the spider people to endure trauma that they wouldn’t have to go through if they all just flipped Miguel off and helped each other! (can you tell I despise Miguel, i’m aroace i’m immune to the hotness) Miguel 👏 is 👏 making 👏 a 👏 fucking 👏 cult! 👏

All in all, the isolation that Gwen faces after ITSV made her very susceptible to the kinda culty thing that the spider society led by Miguel has got going on rn. All spider people deal with heavy isolation and loneliness, so the thought that maybe all that sacrifice and isolation did actually need to or was meant to happen, is comforting to them. they went through all that pain because they had to, rather than all the deaths could’ve been avoided. The other spider people have never been in Miles’ shoes, in terms of having the ability to actually change so-called fate. So they don’t get it. But now, with Gwen’s father quitting the police force, Gwen is once again Miles’ peer. They both know that they can avoid their dad’s deaths. And you bet they’re going to try.