npdvamp

[npdvamp]

Alt transfem user boxes! ー requested by @delphientropy!

[npdvamp]

[npdvamp]

yeah basically

I need more Hollow pics more Hollow content please please please

#need more hollow knight content #like specifically about the hollow knight

[npdvamp]

stupid au where raava is the spirit of ballet and vaatu is the spirit of contemporary freestyle and they can never agree on the rules of dance

What aggravates me so much about Vaatu and Raava in regard to the canon of season two or Korra is that the show very nearly DID acknowledge that Vaatu and Raava could not be ontologically evil or good. The entire setup leading to that moment, including the entirety of AtLA, does lead us to believe that there are no truly evil spirits. (Long analysis and ideas under the cut)

Avatar the Last Airbender, particularly Book One, establishes some things about spirits, their roles, and their emotions. Very early on in the show, Aang encounters Hei Bai, a spirit that’s been terrorizing a village and capturing people. In that episode, Aang discovers that Hei Bai’s anger comes from a place of grief about the Fire Nation burning down his forest, and when Aang shows him an acorn and gives him hope that the forest will regrow again, Hei Bai becomes far less aggressive and leaves, returning the kidnapped people to the village. This establishes that spirits take a more aggressive or “dark” (as referred to in LoK) form due to their own emotions and imbalances in the world.

The finale of Book One: Water, also deals heavily with spirits. We are introduced to a pair of spirits that could be quite similar to Raava and Vaatu - two spirits that represent opposing forces that work in harmony, Tui and La. Unlike Raava and Vaatu, however, neither of them were intended to be inherently good or evil, and they seemed to rely on each other for balance, circling each other endlessly. When Tui is killed, La becomes distressed and fuses with Aang to become a large, destructive, vengeful being. But even though Aang has to grapple with the destructive force of La and the Avatar State later on, La is still never portrayed as evil - just grieving. This is already a better-written and more insightful version of what Raava and Vaatu could have been. The writers ALREADY HAD WRITTEN IT.

We are also introduced to Koh - who is interesting, because he’s definitely portrayed and perceived to be terrifying and dangerous. But even then, he seems to represent a natural force more than an evil being - let him be or play by his rules and he won’t harm you. Despite being antagonistic, he gives Aang valuable advice and knowledge, revealing that he had already found Tui and La. This further reinforces the idea that no spirit is evil for the sake of evil.

And then there’s Legend of Korra. While arguably not as well-written as AtLA, the beginning of Book Two: Spirits establishes a similar narrative. A dark spirit attacks and Unalaq calms it (albeit, through a style of bending instead of addressing the spirit’s distress itself), and says that there are no dark spirits - all spirits have both light and darkness in them, but when they become unbalanced, darkness takes over. Korra learns explicitly that fighting and punching fire at aggressive spirits will not accomplish anything, and she HAS to approach them calmly. Not only that, but Unalaq establishes the idea that the spirits are distressed because of the spiritual decay that the destruction of the hundred-year-war left on the Southern Water Tribe - this somewhat follows the narrative that Hei Bai’s episode in AtLA established, which is that spirits become distressed when their space has become unbalanced or destroyed. It also ties back to the impact of the Fire Nation.

Even after Beginnings part One and Two, this narrative is still followed to some degree. Korra becomes lost in the Spirit World, and accidentally angers and upsets multiple spirits which attack her. Later on, she meets Iroh, who teaches her that her emotions have an impact on this realm, and if she becomes too distressed, it will cause the spirits around her to become dark and angry. The arc of that episode is about her giving spirits hope, and not making an immediate judgement based on how they look.

But then. There’s Vaatu. Vaatu, who for some reason, none of this applies to. Vaatu, who we’re suddenly expected to believe is evil for the sake of evil, who is ACTUALLY the reason spirits are dark, and who, despite being half of a kind of balance, is meant to be locked away or dead.

Legend of Korra, you were so close. And yet so far.

Why are we supposed to believe that Unalaq was lying about dark spirits? Or that Raava’s the sole Good Spirit, who inherently deserves more power than Vaatu? This contradicts everything that AtLA and LoK previously established, and it contradicts so many ideas that come after.

In Book Four, when Korra asks for the spirits’ help against Kuvira, and when they decline, insisting that they don’t like to be involved in human conflicts, Korra cites Unalaq and Vaatu. And the spirit tells her that “Unalaq misused Vaatu’s power to force us.”

Now we have two conflicting narratives. That Vaatu is ontologically evil, that he was the reason behind the dark spirits, that he used Unalaq to gain power over the mortal realm - or that Unalaq used HIM. That Vaatu was NOT solely responsible, that Unalaq dragged spirits into a human conflict in order to gain power.

But it’s never resolved. We’re still supposed to believe that Vaatu deserves to die, and it’s just a throwaway line that no one is supposed to think too hard about.

So, I’m rotating a few thoughts in my head for AU’s or different ideas that could keep the narrative consistent:

1. Raava is outright an unreliable narrator. Both her and Vaatu are flawed, and Raava believes he’s not maintaining balance “correctly.” In this version of events, Raava and Vaatu still have resentment between them, but neither of them are specifically the “good” or “evil” one. I got this idea from @katkastrofa’s Adumbration and our conversations!

2. Vaatu’s imprisonment was the result of humans believing he was evil, classic “humans meddling in spirit affairs” line of events. Wan’s meddling is still a mistake, and imprisoning Vaatu is another mistake instead of a victory, and Korra has to right this ancient wrong. Vaatu doesn’t die here.

3. I’ve also seen some ideas on here floating around where Wan becomes an avatar to both spirits instead of only Raava, which I think is very cool.

4. Similar to idea 1, the events of Beginnings proceeds as canon, but Vaatu’s rage and destruction at least partially comes from a deep place of grief and a destroyed imbalanced relationship with Raava - his “infecting” spirits comes from the fact that emotions impact the spirit world as established in “A New Spiritual Age”, and the imbalance taking over. Unalaq also is the one who manipulates Vaatu. @npdvamp and I have discussed this one at length!

5. Raava and Vaatu simply work a lot more like Tui and La, where they’re meant to be equal and both exerting a balanced amount of influence on the world - circling each other endlessly. The breaking of this balance (Vaatu being imprisoned) throws everything off and Raava’s lost.

#txt post #moe shut up challenge #stupid posts for the vault

[npdvamp]

snapping my homies out of being corrupted by the curse by firmly gripping their shoulders and telling them to "get real"

[npdvamp]

accidentally indulged in too much ‘me time’, turns out i’ve been reported missing for over six months and presumed dead by most local and national authorities

[npdvamp]

📚 QUEERBOOK 2024 is hereee! We made a book by and for LGBTQ+ youth! 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈

Last year, we asked LGBTQ+ youth: what's your idea of a "queer utopia?"

Not gonna lie - with more than 150 bills introduced in 35 states in 2023 that aimed to restrict student access to inclusive and diverse books and other library materials, the theme felt pretty radical.

And you DELIVERED. With the help of our Youth Voices (amazing queer youth activists from across the country), we compiled your amazing submissions of poetry, short essays and letters, visual art, photography, and more into Queerbook 2024. Like a yearbook, it captures what queer youth are feeling, going through, and hoping for - right here, right now across the U.S.

It's also no accident that it's the perfect small-ish size to stash in your locker or backpack so you can crack it open any time you're looking for some queer connection. :3

Read some more about the book and grab your own limited-run copy of Queerbook 2024 now here.

[npdvamp]

I must not mock Gen Alpha. Mocking Gen Alpha is the mind killer. Mocking Gen Alpha is the little-death that brings total generational solidarity obliteration. I will engage with Gen Alpha lovingly. I will permit them to be cringe. And when they grow up I will turn my eye to their accomplishments. Where mocking has gone there will be nothing. Only generational solidarity remains

[npdvamp]

— HELP SOLEIL PAY ITS ER BILL

— hi everyone! long story short, last month I ended up having to go to the ER in the middle of the night, and holy hell ER bills are expensive.

I am physically disabled & chronically ill (hypermobile EDS, asthma, a back injury, among other things). I'd already been sick for a few weeks, but after experiencing severe unusual pain reminiscent of another kidney infection that left me crying & barely able to move in bed, my boyfriend bit the bullet and drove me to the ER as urgency care wouldn't be open until about 8 hours later.

I was severely dehydrated, so I was given liquids via IV as well as morphine due to the amount of pain I was in. after I was rehydrated, out of the CT scanner, & recovering from the morphine, I was prescribed Cyclobenzaprine and antibiotics for a bad UTI & epiploic appendagitis (which mimics the symptoms of appendacitis, hence the CT scan.)

for additional context, in December of 2023 I suffered a kidney infection, COVID, and a shingles outbreak all within the same month, something that did take a toll on my already disabled body. If you got a dollar or two to spare, I would be EXTREMELY grateful. 🫂

This is not incredibly urgent & I can manage to pay it off, but it definitely stings.

— MY KOFI — BOYFRIEND'S PYPL

[npdvamp]

Great news everyone. There was a kitten wandering in the drive thru at work and my inner warrior cats kid tried to be a hero and capture him.

I have now suffered multiple puncture wounds and have to go to the emergency room.

[npdvamp]

download killing upload pain. instant thousand deaths to brain. motherboard on murder spree. blood computer victory.

[npdvamp]

I hate the “open floor plan” that everyone is obsessed with in houses now. I want nooks and crannies and bizarre floor plans. I don’t need to be able to see what someone is doing on the other side of the house. I want places to hide and lurk and dwell in the shadows. I am the beast who awaits in the labyrinth

[npdvamp]

Mermay!

[npdvamp]

I hate the trope of "I refuse to hit women!! [Gets decked]" cause it's boring but I do like the trope of someone in an RPG going "hey I don't wanna hit a kid that's kinda fucked up" and the kid just obliterates them

[npdvamp]

the thing about carrying tension in your jaw is that once you've started it's really fucking hard to stop

[npdvamp]

crabs are literally being forcefemmed by barnacles every day and no one ever talks about it

[npdvamp]

you have to stay alive. you're going to be such a beautiful middle aged freak. young freaks will see you in the street and know that things can be okay.