#hes just this old man who thinks he has the right to dictate who lives and dies and he FULLY BELIEVES THIS

[fullsaw]

Say it with me now,

YOU DONT HAVE TO JUSTIFY A CHARACTERS ACTIONS TO LIKE THEM

#i hate this strain of fandom purity culture #people are so fast to come up with a tragic backstory for an antagonist so they can claim theyre “just as innocent as the protagonist” #let characters be assholes!! #i think people should still blorbofy and babygirlify characters but embrace the fact they are low key evil #the saw fandom accepts that john kramer is an ego maniac and doesnt try to justify his actions and its SO FUN #hes just this old man who thinks he has the right to dictate who lives and dies and he FULLY BELIEVES THIS #and people love him

[dyketubbo]

tbh for me the thing about cbeeduo is that its so like. how am i supposed to look at this dynamic and not feel insane for the rest of my life. like going along w the crushing during nlm hc ranboo fell in love w tubbo at his WORST. they saw some child president who was probably on illegal substances like half of the time with a tired face and forced grin as he got through politics he didnt understand and got insults hurled at him, comparing him to an abusive dictator as he tried to solve a trolley problem (his best friend was on one line and his country was on the other and of course he chooses majority rule but the trolley loops back around anyways and all he did was delay the inevitable) and ranboo saw some 16yr old on his last leg going on about how he felt like he was going to die soon (and hes too too close to the cliffs edge but hes grinning and its like hes really hoping death is a happy ending) and everyone was leaving him and he didnt want all this and ranboo goes follow my voice i wont leave im sorry and they fall in love with whatever virtues there are left in tubbo and decide that they would keep trying to do right by him

and then, inevitably, ranboo messes up and betrays tubbo and tubbos voice shudders and ranboo never wants to see that broken expression of disbelief again so he fights for a country even though hes been disenchanted with it for a while and hes never liked picking sides anyways (but this is tubbo, and if hes choosing tubbo its okay because he cant hurt tubbo again) and of course it falls anyways and tubbo makes a new home and tubbo makes nukes and tubbo makes a plan and then tubbo is on his knees and an axe is held to his neck and ranboo barely gets a glimpse before things are moving forward and tubbo is pressed to her side calling them minutes man again

the marriage starts out as a joke, tubbos never been rich and ranboo only gets richer and tubbo pretends its for tax benefits, hes just a golddigger, because right now its a joke and thats all hes letting it be. but then hes laughing like normal but it feels different and hes looking at the family portrait of the two and michael and hes thinking about bunk beds and he gets a mansion because hes in love at this point because ranboo was there during his worst moments and even as tubbos getting (relatively) better ranboos still there and of course tubbo forgives him because when he met ranboo they reminded him painfully of himself and tubbo cant let ranboo be like him so he falls in love with them instead and if ranboos going to stick by him tubbos going to try and be someone good to stick by

but of course ranboo finds bad influences anyways and tommy is back but different and everythings different and ranboo wont move in so every few days its just him and michael (and god, he shouldnt be a parent at 17, what is he doing with his life? he should have been dead by now) and he tries so so hard to be good for michael and good for ranboo and better for tommy and he isnt really good to himself but thats fine and ranboo is so much better than he'll ever be and michael adores him and tubbo adores him and its fine that the mansion is collecting dust and its fine that ranboo lives by tubbos executioner and the people who helped destroy his country and its fine that he doesnt really know who ranboo is at all outside of his kind husband that was there for him at his worse and its fine that ranboo doesnt really know who tubbo is outside of someone who has been through a lot and needs a good break and its fine that theyre keeping secrets its fine that they never really talk about their problems (its fine that its been months and ranboo still hasnt moved in)

and then they have their first disagreement and tubbo tries to make up for it and it works until they have their first argument and ranboo tries to make up for it but he has to make a point too and they hardly get to talk about it before suddenly time has passed and

and ranboos dead and tubbos a widow and single father at 18 and his (their) son got kidnapped and hes making friends with murderers and hes not sure how to feel about his husbands ghost (and ranboo is so so happy to be dead and ranboo is in limbo alone and tubbo doesnt know how any of this works) so he moves on and his anger gets the best of him and he pushes someone off a bridge and he moves on and he isnt getting better and he moves on and nothings getting better and he moves on and because the dream smp is at its core not that great pretty often theres no closure to any of this ever tubbo dies and loses all his memories ranboos forever a ghost and takes his son elsewhere and thats it the end youre just meant to be normal about all this now. they never learned how to truly trust each other and they were so so in love and wanted to be good for each other but never talked about their problems and now they just Dont Get To. The End !

#mask mews #not to go insane but im going insane rn #beeduo #dsmp #tubbo #ranboo

[tessa-liam]

Turning the Page  

A Step Back in Time, chapter 11

Choices, The Royal Romance, AU 

Series Premise: As Riley Brooks journeys through life as a single parent in New York City, an epiphany strikes as she contemplates the future for herself and her two-year-old son. 

Turning the Page Series Masterlist 

Main Pairing: Liam Rys x F!OC Riley Brooks 

All characters belong to Pixelberry Studios, except William Brooks (Rys) and Matteo Magro, who belongs to this series. 

Category: On-going series, contains angst/fluff/depression. Cross-over fic with Choices, Perfect Match. 

Rating: M🔞 - Warnings - Series will contain crude language, weapons, NSFW material – not Beta’d - please excuse all errors. 

Words: 3268

A Step Back in Time, Chapter 11

Chapter Summary: Liam, Riley and William arrive for a weeklong retreat in Lythikos. Olivia takes Riley ‘under her wing’ to mentor and to offer advice for her return to court. Olivia was determined to get her friend into the right frame of mind and to ultimately get the sparkle back in her eyes. 

Music Inspiration: What Was I Made for? Billie Eilish ; Lose Control, Teddy Swims 

A/N1: In this alternate universe, after King Constantine orchestrates two individual scandals to humiliate and entrap Riley Brooks and Olivia Nevrakis in shame, Madeleine Amaranth secures her position as the Queen of Cordonia. Riley, as the King’s mistress and Olivia, in self-imposed exile. Tariq is never found.  

A/N2: Damien Nazario has been assigned as William’s personal bodyguard. (Series cross-over with ‘Perfect Match’) 

‘Cause I, ‘cause I 

I don’t know how to feel 

But I wanna try 

I don’t know how to feel 

But someday I might 

Someday I might 

Think I forgot how to be happy 

Something I’m not, but something I can be 

Something I wait for 

Something I’m made for 

Something I’m made for’ 

Cordonian Royal Palace, Capital 

If you told Riley Brooks that she would be living in Cordonia, in the Royal palace, with the King of Cordonia just last summer ... she would not believe you. She would tell you that ‘once upon a time’, she fell in love with that King and competed for his hand in marriage in his social season. By reason of the cruelty of fate, and the callousness of the Royal court, that dream would be ripped away from her by a world that was foreign to her. Where outsiders, or commoners, were frowned upon and/or deemed lesser than the noble class. She would be relegated to be the other woman, the mistress to that immensely powerful man whose duty to his country dictated that he must marry a ‘chosen’ woman, even though he did not love her. 

...and she had to watch that man she loved, marry another. 

...because she loved him, she remained. Confiding to him, ‘I’ve made my decision ... I want to be with you. I don’t care what it looks like.’ 

...and it broke her. 

In the Royal east wing, inside William’s bedroom, Riley meticulously packed his clothing into a large suitcase. Carefully selecting each item with love and care for their winter vacation in the Alps of Lythikos, she folded his small woolen sweaters with matching pants and jeans. Soft mittens and a woolen cap were nestled next to his favorite plushie, Scooby; ready to go with him on his snowy adventures. 

"Li Li, sweetheart, come here please," Riley called out, her voice echoing through the spacious room. William bounded towards her; his eyes wide as he watched his mother pack his belongings. 

"We go away, Mama?" William asked, his voice filled with wonder. 

"Yes, my sweet boy," Riley replied with a smile, scooping him up into her arms and placing him down on his bed. "We're going to the mountains with your father to visit a good friend of ours. It's going to be so much fun." 

William's eyes sparkled with delight at the mention of his father. In the five short months since he met his father for the first time, the bond between father and son had grown stronger exponentially. William adored Liam, who always had time for his son's playful antics in New York and now, here in Cordonia, as well. Despite his Royal duties, Liam made the point to spend as much time with William as possible. Riley was not surprised. Liam often spoke about what kind of father he wanted himself to be. The exact opposite of his own father. She could tell that Liam was trying his best to make up for all the time they had lost. And she could not be happier. 

Riley continued to pack, tucking away William's favorite books and toys to keep him entertained during their trip in Lythikos. She had already arranged for snacks with the kitchens, ensuring they would have everything they needed for the long drive to the northern chateau.  

Riley looked up, catching Liam's gaze.  

Liam stood and silently watched, leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded. A gentle smile played on his lips as he watched Riley packing their son's belongings for their trip, while William happily tried to help his mother. 

"Come, my King," Riley softly spoke and smiled with a playful glint in her eyes. "Help me double-check if we have everything for our little adventurer." 

Liam pushed himself away from the doorframe and strolled over to Riley; he crouched down beside William, who was wide-eyed with anticipation. 

“Daddy, look.” William pointed to the large suitcase, smiling happily at his father. 

"Hello, my little prince," Liam greeted, ruffling William's hair. "Are you ready for an adventure?" 

William giggled and nodded his head vigorously, his eyes reflecting the admiration and adoration he held for his father. Liam chuckled, “I see you have lots of toys packed.” 

William climbed over to the suitcase and plucked his favorite plush to show his father. 

“Ah, I see you packed your little dog. Is he your special friend?”  

“Yes, Daddy. I love puppies.” William grinned, squeezing his toy. 

“You do? That is good to know,” Liam winked at Riley as William returned his toy to be packed. 

“I will meet you two in an hour. All right, love?” Liam asked Riley. 

“Okay, Daddy,” William answered as Liam and Riley chuckled together at his response. 

As Liam left to go to his study, Damien entered, bowing to Liam, “Your Majesty”. 

Liam smiled and nodded 'hello' in response as he walked towards his assistant waiting in the hall followed by his security detail. 

Nevrakis Chateau, Lythikos, Cordonia 

Driving through the majestic mountains, Riley stared at the vista overlooking the Nevrakis chateau. Memories flooded her mind as they passed the frozen lake below. The lake where she, along with the other suitors skated on, with Liam during his social season years ago.  

Riley shivered. Was it from seeing the beautiful winter landscape or from those memories of past competitions for the man she loved? Riley’s thoughts were interrupted by the happy sound of her son’s voice. 

William giggled; totally enthralled by Liam’s storytelling of his past adventures in the snow. The sight of father and son was precious to Riley, as she softly smiled at the two of them. William was sitting on Liam’s lap as he pointed to the large chateau coming into view ahead. 

The escalade stopped at the grand entrance of the Nevrakis chateau as members of the royal guard went into formation and opened the vehicle doors. 

As they made their way toward the entrance, a flurry of snowflakes fell from the sky, adding a layer of white powder to the ground. 

"Wow, this is beautiful.” Riley raised her arms to the sky. “I remember my first visit here during your social season.”  

"It is. If I remember correctly, it was just as cold." Liam quipped adjusting William’s scarf. 

Members of Olivia’s waitstaff greeted the party as they entered the lavish and grand estate. Standing at the base of the grand staircase, Olivia grinned as William squealed at the pair of Alaskan malamutes sitting inside the foyer. 

“King Liam, Lady Riley and Prince William ... welcome to my quaint northern lodge. I am delighted to host the three of you.”  

Liam approached Olivia and kissed her cheek, then gestured to Riley and William to join them. 

"Olivia, it's been far too long since I last visited. The grounds are magnificent.” 

"Indeed, thank you, Liam.” Olivia beamed with pride. 

"Thank you for hosting us. Your hospitality is greatly appreciated.” Riley added. 

"Anything for my dear friends." 

Olivia's attention was drawn to William, who was petting the dogs and giggling. 

"Well, hello again, prince William." Olivia walked over and knelt beside and offered treats to her two canine companions. 

William looked up at her and smiled. 

"Hewwo." 

"He's even cuter than I remember," Olivia grinned. “This one,” she motioned to the brown tipped dog, is ‘Mischa’. And this big guy is ‘Zeus’, "she cooed. 

"Now, Riley." Olivia stood and walked forward slowly, looping her arm through Riley's arm and leading her inside. "We have lots to catch up on. Liam, make yourself at home. Your Royal suite is ready for you. Gustav will be your personal attendant for your stay." 

"Thank you, Liv. That is much appreciated." 

"You are quite welcome. Now, Riley, let us get started on our girl time.” Liam winked at Riley, his shoulders shaking as he chuckled at Riley’s faux scared expression. 

"Okay, sounds good." Riley shook her head grinning as she walked by Liam. 

Olivia and Riley climbed the grand staircase and disappeared around a corner while William sat on the floor playing with the dogs. 

"William, let's get you changed and settled." Liam extended his hand down for his son to take. 

"Okay, Daddy." 

“Bye bye puppies.” William exuberantly spoke to the large dogs. 

***

 Riley and Olivia sat on a plush sofa in front of a large window overlooking the mountains. The sun was beginning to set, casting a golden glow over the snowy landscape. 

"It's so beautiful here." Riley marveled at the picturesque view. 

"I'm glad you like it.” Olivia proudly acknowledged as she handed a large glass filled with chardonnay to Riley. 

Olivia sat back and watched Riley; her expression turning serious. 

"Riley, I know that things have been difficult for you since you've come back, but you have to remember, you're a force of nature. You are stronger than you think.” Olivia was continuing the conversation of their last visit at the palace.

Riley looked down at her hands, which held onto the wine glass with a death grip. She knew the invitation to spend the week in Olivia's duchy was not just a holiday for her, Liam and William. Her once adversarial friend, and now, her good friend, wanted to assist her with reuniting with Liam.

"I can see the pain and sadness in your eyes." Olivia continued. 

"Oh... "  

"How is it really going? Riley, how is everything between you and Liam?" 

Riley sighed and set her wine glass on the table. 

"I'm...I'm not sure." 

"Do you still love him?" 

"Yes, of course. I have never stopped loving him.” 

"Do you think he loves you?" 

"Yes.” There was a small smile followed by biting her top lip. 

"Then what's the problem?" 

"I'm not sure."

Olivia shook her head and sighed. 

"You have to trust him, Riley. He loves you. And I can see how happy William makes him.” 

"I know that.” 

"But there's something else, isn't there?" Olivia eyed her friend for clues.

"It's just that... we've spent so much time apart. And now that we are back together, things feel different.” 

"I think I understand. That is quite normal, all things considered." 

"And I'm worried that he'll eventually resent me for leaving him while I was pregnant with William." 

"He could never resent you, Riley. You are the mother of his child. It'# not in his DNA.” 

“I keep thinking that that there will be another scandal around the corner. That something or someone will tear us apart.” 

"What happened to that confident and free spirited American girl? The one who turned the court on its' head. Where did she go?"

"I know what you are asking. I feel scared; waiting for the other shoe to drop.” 

"Scared of what? And why?" 

"That he won't forgive me." 

"Riley, listen to me. That is your guilt talking.” 

Olivia reached over and grabbed Riley's hands, looking her in the eye. 

"Liam loves you. He will always love you. You and William are his world. And I know that he wants nothing more than to make you happy.” 

"But..." 

"But, nothing. There is no 'but'.” 

"Okay." Riley was not convinced. "But, Madeleine ..."

"Is out of the picture; where Liam is concerned. You have the power of position now, make Madeleine feel it." 

Riley looked at her friend and took a staggered breath.

"Most importantly, you hold the King’s heart...show the world, show Cordonia, show Madeleine what that means...you will bring her to her knees." Olivia sneered. 

"This is why I wanted you to come for a visit. To remind you of who you are and what you are capable of.” 

“Olivia ...” Riley sighed, shaking her head, ‘no’. 

"Now. Come with me." 

Olivia stood and motioned for Riley to follow. 

Olivia took her down to an armory in the bowels of the chateau. 

"Here we are." Olivia turned and motioned to a wall of weapons. 

"What are we doing down here?" Riley asked, eyeing the collection of weapons displayed on the wall.

"We're going to do some training.” 

"Training? For what?" Riley questioned, perplexed. 

"For the press." 

"Why do I need training for the press? With weapons?" 

"Because they're vultures. They will try to get a rise out of you. They will ask rude and invasive questions. They will try to trip you up.” 

"But why do you think I need training? I know you haven’t forgotten that I was subjected to them during Liam’s social season." 

"Because they're relentless idiots.” Olivia sneered. 

"Okay, but ...” 

“Now that you are back in Cordonia, the mother of the crown prince, no less ...they want to find out your intentions with their king.” 

Riley took a deep breath, closing her eyes. 

"Don't worry. I'm going to teach you how to handle them.” Olivia confidently proclaimed with a smirk. 

"Thank you, Olivia.” Riley sighed as she eyed the collection of pointy weaponry again. 

"Of course. Now, let us get started.” 

Riley was grateful for Olivia's help and advice. She knew that she was right about the press, having dealt with them through the engagement tour, after the scandal was brought to light. 

Riley didn't have to know that. At least, not yet. 

And she knew that she needed to be prepared. Riley understood the extent to which the press would dig and manipulate information to get a juicy soundbite. But she was not aware that Madeleine would have her own agenda to discredit and sabotage her at every chance she got, all the way from Morocco. However, Olivia was well aware of Madeleine’s spite and her bitterness over losing the crown. 

"First off. I want you to choose a weapon." Olivia pointed to her collection of weaponry mounted on the wall. 

"A weapon?" Riley’s eyes were wide looking at the selection before her.

"Yes. You cannot fight the press with words alone.” 

"Um...okay." Riley answered sceptically. 

Riley looked at each weapon closely. There were swords, halberds, axes and daggers, among others. 

She picked up a sword. 

"Hmm...a sword? Interesting choice." 

"It's light and I can move fast.” 

"Good. Particularly good.” Olivia nodded approvingly. “That would be a weapon that Liam would choose.” 

“Really?” Riley admonished. 

"Now, we'll practice some moves.” 

"Moves?" 

"Yes. Maneuvers. Stances. Blocking and parrying.” 

"Wow. This is serious.” 

"Indeed. I'll start slow, but don't let your guard down.” 

"I won't.” Riley responded warily. 

"Good. Now, attack me." 

"What?" Riley looked aghast.

"Attack me." 

"Oh, um ... okay." 

Riley raised the sword and ran at Olivia, who easily dodged the blow. 

"Is that the best you've got?" 

"No.” 

Riley lunged at her again, and again, Olivia sidestepped each attack. 

"You're leaving yourself open.” Olivia challenged.

"I am?" 

"Yes. If this was a real fight, I would have cut you down by now." Olivia chirped. 

"Oh.” Riley let out a large breath, wondering to herself how this lesson was going to end. 

"Here. Let me show you." 

Olivia demonstrated a series of moves, her sword flashing and swooshing in the air. 

"Now, you try.” 

Riley imitated the movements, her sword swishing through the air. 

"Better.” Olivia critiqued. 

"Thanks." Riley answered questionably. 

"Again.” Olivia commanded with Riley going on the defensive. 

They continued to spar, their swords clashing together. Riley was impressed with Olivia's skills and ability to read her opponent and react accordingly. 

As they continued to fight, Riley became more comfortable with the sword, her moves becoming more fluid and graceful. Liam slipped into the back of the room, quietly watching the sparring.

"Excellent.” Olivia praised.

"Thanks.” Riley smiled at the compliment, picking up a bottle of water.

"Now we need a target." Olivia led her to a stuffed, practice dummy.  

Riley chuckled as she watched her friend attach a large face photo of Madeleine onto the head with a dagger.  

"Here, let me help you." Olivia handed her an assortment of knives, before she expertly threw her dagger.

Riley's first few throws landed wide, but she quickly found her mark, sinking several blades into the center of the picture. 

"Nicely done.” 

"Thanks." 

"Feel better?" Olivia snickered as Riley laughed. 

“Yes! Yes, actually I do. But I don't understand. How is this going to help me?” 

 "When the press asks you questions, you need to stay calm and confident. If they try to rattle you, throw them off balance. Focus on your target.” Olivia pointed to the picture. 

"Let's practice."

"All right."

"Imagine I'm a member of the press. And I ask you, 'Lady Riley, where have you been all these years?'"

Riley cleared her throat and straightened her posture. 

"I've been raising my son in New York. It's where he was born and raised.” 

"Why did you leave Cordonia?"

"I left to protect my child. And because I knew that King Liam had an obligation to the Queen.” 

"What are your intentions now that you've returned?” 

"I'm here to support my son and to be a part of his life.” 

"Do you still love the King?” 

"Yes, of course." 

“No! STOP!!!” 

Olivia moved assertively towards Riley. "This is where you say, 'that's all the questions for today’ and then you walk away from the microphones. Show confidence. Show determination. Show stoicism. Control the narrative.” 

Riley raised her eyebrow. "How did you get so good at this, Olivia?" 

Olivia shrugged, her shoulders rising slightly. "I'm the duchess of Lythikos. People talk. And sometimes they don't realize I'm listening." 

Riley nodded, a new respect for Olivia blossoming in her heart with a renewed sense of determination in her step. 

Feeling his arms, Riley giggled and leaned back against him with a content smile. 

Liam sauntered up to Riley from behind, wrapping his arms around Riley’s waist. 

Riley turned around to look at Liam, her eyes filled with love. 

“The Royal guard will then lead you away from the gathering,” Liam interjected. “You will never be left without protection.” 

"Thank you, Liam.” Riley tearfully smiled.

"I want you to know that while I am alive, you will always have a home in Cordonia. And I will never let anyone threaten that ... or you ... ever again.” 

Riley felt a warm feeling in her chest and a sense of calm.

Maybe everything was going to be all right, after all. As long as she had Liam and William, she knew she could face anything.

"Liam, I love you."

"I love you, too, Riley."

Liam pressed his lips to hers, and Riley melted into his embrace. They kissed for a long moment, savoring the feel of each other's bodies.

"Come, let's go get some sleep. We have a busy day ahead of us tomorrow."

"I'm ready.*

"Pleasant dreams you two. Good night."

"Olivia, thank you for your expertise. It is much appreciated.

"Your welcome, Liam. It's my pleasure."

Good night." Riley called out.

Riley followed Liam out of the room, her hand firmly grasped in his.

And for the first time since she had come back to Cordonia, she truly felt like she was home.

"Thank you, Olivia," she whispered as she lay in Liam's arms, his steady heartbeat lulling her to sleep.

Thanks for reading; please let me know if you would like to be added or removed from this series.

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Perma tags: @ao719 @queenmiarys @sfb123 @twinkleallnight @alj4890 @differenttyphoonwerewolf @harleybeaumont @busywoman @karahalloway @kingliam2019 @imjusthereforliam @lovingchoices14 @kyra75 @tinkie1973 @emkay512 @malblk21 @kristinamae093 @charlotteg234

TRR Liam & Riley TTP: @emersyn-in-cordonia @mainstreetreader @belencha77 @walkerdrakewalker @iluaaa @mysticalfangirl @queenwalton @bascmve01 @umccall71 @choicesfrog @amandablink @ownworldresident

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#tessa liam writes #the royal romance #liam rys #trr #riley brooks #trr fanfic #choices fic writers creations #king liam #king liam rys #choices liam x oc #turning the page

[lupins-hehim-pussy]

I wanna know ur Fontaine msq criticisms 👁️👁️👂I’m all ears

I'm not sure if you wanted me to talk about this secretly or publicly but! Here I go!

The TLDR: Fontaine MSQ aestheticised prison, poverty, child abuse, the justice system/court and didn't properly address any of it.

More:

Focalors/Furina has way too much of a sympathetic angle for a dictator who's lets people drown with her inaction.

Neuvillette feels Bad for sentencing some people to death/prison, but that's it. He's one of the most powerful people in Fontaine. If he felt like there are systemic injustices, I.E sending an abused Child to prison, he should be the first person to DO something about it, not just cry and be sad so the audience can be like aw, that's complex character writing isn't it? No it's not! And guilt doesn't absolve you!!!!!!! (These are stuff we deal with in OTCOJ read my fic now /j)

Meropide has children in it, both Sentenced there (Wriothesley) and BORN THERE (Lanoire), and this is just a quirk of the place. Not only that, Meropide accepts prisoners of all genders and crimes. There are abusers and abuse victims in one place. Do you know how bad that is? How much potential for crimes to happen in a place like that— oh wait, Meropide isn't under Fontaine's jurisdiction. If you are assaulted as an inmate it literally means nothing to the court.

Wriothesley had no qualifications when he took over. Depending on how long he lived on the streets, how old he was when he killed his parents, how old he was when he was first taken in by the orphanage, etc, the man might never have more than 4–5 years of formal education. Sigewinne probably had to teach him how to write reports. And do Meropide's spreadsheets. Edit because I forgot to elaborate on this one: This isn't a point brought up anywhere, which is bad, because when poverty and incarceration robs you of a proper education (and the rights to vote in many places too, too, by the way), it reduces your prospects for jobs, reduces many people's ability to get a home etc etc. Wriothesley was just, narratively, Given his position.

Meropide is an industrialized prison, and they portray this as a good thing. Prisoners are paid in coupons for their labour, and this is also portrayed as a good thing.

The One-Meal-A-Day reform was something Paimon gushed about being so great of a perk, that people might want to go to jail for food (could be interesting and reflective of systemic poverty if MHY had brains, but they don't, so I was just Pissed because essentially all Paimon wanted to say was "Prison isn't so bad, but still don't go to prison guys! Prison labour is really hard!"). By the way, in most real-world prisons they are obligated to feed you three meals a day. Because that's how much food a human needs. MHY went with one meal just so they can say "if you want to eat more, you have to work." And then the welfare meal is a goddamn gacha. So imagine you're a starving child who's too weak to work in the fucking robot assembly line, and you wander up for your first meal in 24 hours, only to luck in with a shit one. I'd kill myself.

They wrote Wriothesley, who's a victim of the system, into a guy who's say shit like "I'm the Duke I can do whatever I want" for a cool moment where he choke-slams an inmate (I know he was a bad guy. But also, in copaganda when cops are violent/disregarding protocols, they are always only portrayed to do that against bad guys, so what does our critical thinking tells us about this one?) They wrote Wriothesley, who was an inmate of a prison so bad, so notorious that it is the literal boogeyman of Fontaine, that has a legal (???) fighting pit, with an administrator who abuses his position to be unreasonable, to willingly stay in the place and become an Administrator who would choke-slam an inmate while saying a cool line about how he has the power to do whatever he wants. They wrote him, the guy who had to be fed on the streets by melusines, to think one-meal-a-day was a good enough reform (while he spends god-knows how much on his boat). This wasn't a victim-turns-into-abuser narrative either, they want all this to be seen as positive character growth.

And then, the final kicker is, they gloss over his entire abuse. You can only read about these shit in his profile, which most people don't because they don't Have Him or doesn't care to unlock it/read it online, and they jammed his entire backstory into a flaccid info-dump at the end of his character story quest. This man isn't Allowed to feel abused and neglected and show any reaction to it within the narrative of Fontaine itself, because if they actually Gave Weight to what happened to him, they'd have to confront THE FUCKING JUSTICE SYSTEM they had NO PLANS on criticising. I don't think they ever explicitly said the fucking Crime-Theatre nonsense was Bad either.

I could go on, but this is already so long. But yeah, I hope this gave you an idea.

#and then. and im putting my most controversial opinion in the tags bc im scared lmao. but like... then... you have the fans..... doing...... #the same fucking thing. #the amount of times I have seen Wriothesley used as just a side prop for Neuvillette to feel bad about shit. While Wriothesley is just..... #portrayed as having the inner peace and acceptance of a fucking monk. I was shocked when I read some fics I swear #they really said this man has no trauma at all! the stuff in his past? he's over it! #i hate that passivity when writing victims. like ok if One is written like that #sure. but MHY write all their victims like this #I mean look at fucking Lanoire #and Neuvillette sentenced him to prison after he killed his parents who were never confronted by the law. That's canon. #that's more canon than WRLT itself. #why weren't they confronted? did wriothesley try to talk to someone about it? why did he feel like killing them is his only option ????? #at least have there be some sort of conflict and friction there. How does Wriothesley feel about the court and Neuvillette when #this is the literal system that allowed all that shit to happen to him in the first place??? #are you Sure he won't be at least a little wary? the fact that some people think he's Grateful to Neuvillette or even idolises him is crazy #because the man literally subjected him to prison. and if you want to portray his prison life as easy breezy and trauma free #you undermine his entire shitty little 'prison reform' narrative #and if you think he'd be completely 100% accepting of the justice system. Then why the fuck would he kill his parents himself #don't you see that the whole 'I'll accept whatever sentence in order to kill my parents' thing in itself is an act of defying the system #and I Hate #this idea. about being some of the most powerful men in the nation. and yet they can't fucking TRY to set up a better system or smth #i can't believe I read a fic where leaving starving street kids croissants is the most they (the characters and the writer) want to do #like. what the fuck. the whole point of that scene is just to make neuvillette feel bad and be like aw......... poor people exist.... OK??? #this is literally how MHY would portray him though.... tbf..... This is what ppl would argue as 'in character' #I just think the character they're in is bad. #I will say I'm giving the fic a lot of grief. there's more to the scene than that. and. ultimately..... #fanfic is (saying this through gritted teeth) ........ recreational....................and free........... in the end................. #i dont think this is reflective of the writer. I do think it is reflective of the way the canon material (genshin impact) #presents in the audience who consumes it. most fans only want these guys to fuck anyway. not think about systemic injustices #canon doesn't make it about the systemic injustices either so why should we. the aesthetic of slums and prisons are just there for fun guys #IM JUST CRAZY OK. I SHOULDNT EVEN BE HERE THIS IS NOT FOR ME . I DONT CARE THAT MUCH FOR PEOPLE FUCKING AND I CARE TOO MUCH

[snaxle]

just saw someone say the reason bi lesbians are problematic is because they're inclusive of radfems, and that bi lesbians spew terf rhetoric. i dont know what kinda secret alternate universe you're living in where terfs are supportive of mspec identities but im begging you to turn on your brain cells for longer than 5 seconds at a time and then go outside instead of wallowing in queer twitter discourse made by 15 year olds 10 hours every day you fucking idiots.

terfs dont fucking like bi lesbians. terfs would rather watch us either kill ourselves than ever support our identities.

"i hate mspec lesbians because they tell people who hate men that they're sharing terf beliefs, which is exactly what terfs want!!" have you literally never seen a terf's account before in your life? they fucking hate men and want everyone in the world to know that every single man in the world no matter how old they are that they're gross ugly creatures who all hate women and want nothing more than to prey on the downfall of all women. yea, even those 6 and 12 year old boys that live next door to you. so yea, while you're posting your quirky little "i hate all men they're disgusting 🙄" posts every three days for your 400 twitter followers, you're 100% spewing terf rhetoric!! no that doesnt mean you're a fucking terf but you're sharing into their beliefs and spreading their agenda every time you do this shit which is what they want!!!!

"the term lesbian is already inclusive of trans and nonbinary people, so using the term bi/mspec lesbian is problematic because you dont think trans people can be lesbians!" look me in the eyes. do you genuinely, honest to god think that terfs care about that. do you genuinely think terfs are okay with trans people calling themselves a lesbian. terfs dont fucking care, they still want you to either detransition and realize how "evil" being trans is and follow in their beliefs, or they want you dead. a nonbinary trans man who uses he/him pronouns calling himself a bi lesbian is literally the least of your fucking worries.

i am trans and bigender. even if i just called myself solely a lesbian without the extra labels, terfs still wont fucking accept me because i am not a pure innocent 100% woman. they will not accept me even when i tell them i feel more like a woman most days than i do a man because i am not their definition of what a woman should be. "it doesnt matter what terfs say, lesbian is still inclusive of trans people!" no, it's only inclusive of trans people that you deem are good and women enough to use the label.

people love going around talking about how they're so so supportive of any and all identities and then immediately turn around and be like "hmmm but not Yours." i could be the most perfect woman in the world, but the second i so much as mention i think a man looks attractive, then i am not being a lesbian the Right way.

so who the fuck cares anymore. who cares if i use the term bisexual lesbian to identify myself? im already doing it all wrong supposedly, so who cares if im more of a problem than i already am? the queer people im supposed to share a community with would rather side on the side of terfs because im not being a lesbian in the supposedly Correct way, and no matter what i say to try defending myself I'll never be seen as a true and proper lesbian because random strangers on the internet i will never meet ever in my life has already dictated that I'm not good enough. that my existence is problematic and harmful to everyone else, completely ignorant of the fact that they're unwillingly sharing in the beliefs of transphobes, homophobes and conservatives who would like nothing more than to wipe us all out instead of standing together as a community.

but you know, putting bi lesbians on your dni or whatever is more important.

#og #txt

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

Hey. To the thought of suicide being 'inevitable', I'd like to share my story to show why I can disagree...if I may.

So my mother, she hurt my father. Abused him. Hit him. Manipulated him. Badly. Stalked him. Then she took her own life. As a result, mentioning her in our household was all but forbidden because it reminds my father of her. He'd NEVER talk about her. He'd tense up and become curt when I tried to mention her. And he broke contact with all her family. This happened before I was able to remember anything. So all my life, I felt doomed to repeat what she did. Because if you're not allowed to remind your father of your own mother, else risking anger, punishment and exclusion, that's pretty hard to do when you're her spitting image. So I wasn't allowed to exist. Not move, not speak, not be. Because I am like her. I look like her, speak like her, move like her. Maybe I even like stuff that she liked. So basically my life became about avoiding triggering my father. How can I do that best? By believing that I shouldn't exist. Because my whole DNA seems evil. Remember, he removed her entire family tree from his life, which is not far from effectively "killing" them. So I grew up thinking that my Mom deserved to be dead, because she was Bad™ to her core, and because I love my father and my father is a good man and I believe his pain to be true. And so I thought that I deserved to be dead too, because all I could ever do was hurt my father just as she has done. Until I took action and found that family of hers.

I found wonderful women who look like my mother, who look like me, and they are GOOD. They have problems too, yes, but they are kind and they are HUMAN. And they made it in life. They did not die because there was no other way. They lived. They still live. And for the first time in my entire life I understood that my mother made a choice. For herself. That she HAD a choice, and that I have the power to choose differently. I found women on different paths of life, and I discovered that I have the capacity for good. If anything, I'm allowed.

It's my father who never moved on. It's my father who is triggered. It's my father who avoids facing up to his past and to feel through the pain and the emotions of what my mother did to him. It's not my problem. It's not me. It's not my fault. It's him, never having dealt with an old and terrible wound. That doesn't make his own pain less true. But he made it about me, as if I was the problem. He cannot stand the sight of me.

And so... I don't know your story, but I know that every family entertains a certain solid narrative that frames their entire history and reinforces their current behavior. And it will continue to do so until it is challenged. So I will go out on a limb here and dare assume that you can't stop self-harming because you are punishing yourself and that deep down, you somehow believe that it is right for you to deserve it. You deserve to die because it's tied to your identity, to who you are, and not to a specific behavior of yours. You cannot help being you, so it's a fault to be as you are.

Because someone else saw or sees it as a fault, and they have influence and authority over your life, likely because they're family (NEVER underestimate blood, but I don't have to tell YOU that), and they have - whether they intended to or not - let you know this all your life. If it's tied to being autistic, you may have been told you're "too much". You're "a freak" (for me it was "drama queen" for wanting to express myself). You're "exhausting", "why can't you be normal". Your poor Mom can't handle you, or whatever (take this with a grain of salt, only you know what it is). Why are you being such a burden.

Darling, pursue self-respect. You do not have to suck up to anyone's trouble with who you are as a person. That's on them, not you.

Don't let them take you. Don't let society, or your surroundings, dictate your permission to exist. You have permission to be. You are loved, and wanted, and known by the Most High.

And I believe that people love you too. But I get that it's hard when you aren't akin to their standards. You are allowed though. It's not your fault. I'm glad if the autism diagnosis helps to set a frame for other people and yourself to understand you better. Congratulations.

Wishing you peace.

;-; thankyou

[herowithbadpublicity]

Who is Hal, really?

Like, we see so many different versions of him. We’re introduced to this awkward, neurotic, definitely not Mitchell, vampire in season 4. Oh cool, he has these friends he’s been with for years, that’s great!

Hal literally kept Leo chained up with the sole purpose to watch him kill people (and make money, as he mentions betting on the fight). This was actually in a prequel clip, not in the show - if you saw the clip, Hal and Leo’s relationship dynamic completely changes when we see them on screen together for the first time.

Throughout the show, Hal implores people to be his keeper, to watch him and make sure he doesn’t commit anymore sins. First Leo. In some ways, this is extremely cowardly - Hal puts the responsibility on others. If his inhibitions drop and he’s placed in just the right situation, he does awful things and can say “oh they didn’t watch me close enough”. I’m surprised Leo kept his promise - if I got free, the guy who initially kidnapped me would be getting these hands.

I really really like Hal and Annie’s dynamic. She is so opposite of him, and from the very beginning you see his discomfort. Then, when Kirby shows up, we get a scene where Hal wants to confess his sins. Part of it is because he would rather she hear it from him, but another part is something Hal does frequently - burden others with keeping him clean.

Who is Hal though? There are 3 parts of Hal. Of course there’s the awful part, that killed Cutler’s wife and who is 100% capable of becoming a genocidal dictator. Then there’s the part we see most of the time. Seemingly harmless vampire with obsessive compulsive tendencies, endearing in some way and obviously trying his best to stay out of trouble. But there’s this other part, that we only see a few times. It’s when the two overlap. There’s some glimpse of it with his prequel - he’s a “slavemaster” but he’s hesitant and ashamed, and wants to be someone else. We also know that this is the in between, as he references the cycles of bad and good Hal.

I think, living for over 500 years, Hal has had to develop a way to cope with everything he has done. There are old ones like Mr Snow who seem chill and totally fine with being menaces to society. But we SEE Hal is capable of acting without malice, of choosing to do things to keep others safe.

I propose then, that Hal, upon becoming a vampire and murdering people left and right, had at one point realized his psyche could not manage and be okay with it all. So, what better way to cope then to organize who you are. Hal is neurotic. He creates a line - bad Hal and kind Hal. It becomes black and white for him - he either goes full villain, or he is safe. He treats the bad part as another being, trying to separate his sins from who he is as a person. I suppose we can also see it as vampire Hal and Vampire Hal.

I struggle at times when trying to figure out who Hal is for real. Is this the true him, proper, neurotic, judgemental. How do these traits present in Vampire Hal. He dresses classy, he manipulates, and he harms. The judgement in this case leads to murder. Try to imagine Hal, the one awkwardly holding Eve, and when he turns Cutler. How can one man behave so contrastingly? The blood eases the anxiety and the pressure. Hal can let go, fall into habits. Without blood, he has to always be mindful.

So, other than being a story telling device; I see the Jekyll and Hyde aspect of him being a coping mechanism. He either fights the urges and the habits, vampire Hal who keeps a schedule, or, he goes full Vampire.

#just me rambling about Hal #Hal meta #that’s all over the place #he’s such a fantastic character #hal yorke #being human #being human uk

[ruinedbylanadelrey]

King of Your Heart

Chapter 11 "You're done"

summary: All that Frankie has ever wanted to be was your everything. After years of being best friends one phone call changes everything between the two of you.

inspired by The King by Sarah Kinsley

warnings: 18+, MINORS DNI, age gap (reader is 28-29, Frankie 38-39), friends with benefits -> situationship, Frankie isn't a dad, jealously, best friends with benefits, reader is toxic, reader wears makeup, reader has long hair, princess is out for blood, self-hate (both characters), princess and fish love to argue, what is the name for having a military man kink??, oral (m.rec. not frankie yikes sorry), sex in the jeep, squirting, angst, oh yeah and a lot of angst, no y/n, pet names, possessiveness, triple frontier boys, Tom is dead, reader is a flirt

an: made a halloween playlist for Benny's upcoming halloween bash. T-Minus 12 days!! ALSO check out Princess's new instagram page (yk the mood board above)

inside the world of king of your heart

playlist

series mainlist | main masterlist

taglist: @hiroikegawa

"Benny, please! I'm begging you, just set me up with someone." You bat your eyes at him, he groans and facepalm. You were having lunch with Mari and Ben the weekend after the party. You haven't spoken to Frankie when he put you to bed. 

"Princess, I can't-"

"Why?"

"I-I" He looks to Mari, not knowing what to say because the second he mentions Frankie, his name will trigger your fury. "I was joking, maybe Daniel?"

Daniel was old news, with no true shock value. You've been there and done that. Frankie would think you are too predictable. "No Daniel. I'm thinking military." You smirk, like you are going through a catalog named Benny's Buddies. 

Mari was biting back a smile. She knew what game you were playing. The silent game of jealousy chess. You had the right moves to counter Frankie's move with Vanessa. Ben said he'll text you a number and name later in the day, you could live with that. 

Not seeing Frankie was making your days long and lonely. You wouldn't go out with the guys for a few days. You would sit at home and think about how sweet revenge but knowing it wouldn't work on Frankie. He always knows how to detach himself from any situation, shut down, and control it all.

Isolation was not a friend of yours.

Pope dragging you out of bed and making you go to the bar. He was rambling about that you should never let a man dictate how you feel and what you do even if that man is Frankie.

"Princess, you know you're better than this," He throws a random dress at you, then leaves to let you get dressed. Walking to the car packed with Benny and Mari in the backseat and Pope in the drivers seat. You didn't say a word when you got in the car hearing Benny in mid-sentence.

"-he said he's busy with that chick," Benny was reading his text messages, Mari ebolws Ben in the rib when you groaned in frustration hearing about Frankie.

"Sorry. Just reading what he said." Benny winces and mutters 'sorry Princess'.

Too busy for his buddies? Too busy to even answer a single text from you but not too busy to answer Benny? Too busy getting his dick wet with a woman who wasn't even as hot as you?

This was Frankie being in control. He will keep his distance and strike at you when he knows you're at your weakest.

It was test drive day, rescheduled and the hefty garage fee to be paid. Usually, Frankie and you would split it but well he hasn't been to the garage at all for a month, and you've been doing the same.

"Afternoon, Princess. No Catfish again?" Stef, the garage and track owner greets you. He was a good-looking man, tall, with dark features, and a permanent 5 o'clock shadow, you liked how he had that boyish charm in his mature face. He was ex-military and knew Frankie from when they first enlisted in the Army. Close enough to Frankie but not exactly crossing a line. 

"Just little ole me, Stef," You pouted, jutting out your bottom lip and then curling your lips into a devious smile. Your eyes scanned up and down his frame, admiring how his arms were still toned, with a soft stomach, and his legs forever muscled. His dark brown hair had always been the same, short on the sides and long on top. His brown eyes are big and almond-shaped. There are bits of Frankie in him. 

Stef tilts his head and smiles at you, he can see the lust clouding your eyes. 

"Could you look over the Jeep for me?" You widen your eyes to play the doe-eyed card, innocent, and calling out for a man to help you. He's on your heels while you book it to the garage, the smell of gasoline, motor oil, and grease fills your nostrils, breathing heavily with Stef's hand over your throat. His hot wet tongue slid next to yours, his other hand sliding under your skirt and met with no underwear. 

"I always thought you were filthy," Stef mumbles as he nips at your neck. The surprise was for Frankie when you sent him a text about working on the car by yourself, hoping he would walk in here and fuck you since he won't speak to you  

You gave a girlish giggle and nodded. He laid you out on the hood of the Jeep. Your hands quickly undo his belt and unzip his jeans, without any hesitation, you drop down to your knees, his cock was hard, and a red tip is right at your lips, not as thick as Frankie's but the same length. You smile up at the older man opening your mouth, and taking him down the throat. You moaned with a mouth full of cock you shouldn't be sucking. 

"Shit- you're so fucking hot," Stef fists your hair and thrusts deeper down your throat. Your eyes were stinging and the whines leaving your mouth had the man shooting his load and overspilling at the corners of your mouth.

His softened cock pulled from the hot wet cum filled mouth. You held your mouth open for a minute letting him see how much of his cum is on your tongue then swallowing it all. You wipe the corners of your lips and suck the remaining spent off your fingers.

"You're..." Stef was at a loss for words, and you mentally rolled your eyes at the man. It was just a blowjob. "Amazing, wow!" 

You were about to say it was fine when Frankie knocked on the back of the Jeep, you jumped and turned around to see him. Frankie looks at the mascara smudge under your eyes, how your lips were swollen and painted with a deep shade of pink almost red. He breathes out and comes around to the front. Stef's clothes frump and your hair slightly voluminous. 

"And what are you so amazing for, Princess?" Frankie's voice drops an octave, his eyes shaded by the cap, he towers over you and rests his hand on the base of your neck. Eyes flutter shut when you feel his warm calloused hand on your skin. Setting ablaze going straight to your core.

"You already know how good my mouth feels." You smile smugly, Stef excuses himself and Frankie shoots you daggers with his brown eyes. He's at a loss for words, even emotion. He didn't understand why you giving a man head would bother him so much. You don't give head to just anyone. He knows this. 

"I'm going for a test drive. You're more than welcome to join me if you're not busy fucking Vanessa." You changed the subject and added the jab at him. You grab the keys from the holder on the wall. Frankie shuffles himself into the passenger seat, and the jeep rolls out the track. 

"You're just so predictable, Princess," Frankie yells over the purr of the engine. You scoffed and took a tight turn on the curve of the drive. Adding more gas when you straightened out. The vibrations jiggling your thighs, Frankie grips the flesh and squeezes hard knowing they bruise so easily. You choose to ignore him touching you, making a hard stop when you get back to the garage. 

Frankie takes your chin into his fingers forcing you to look at him. His mind was thinking about how should he stake his claim over you once again. 

"Open your mouth, Princess." He squeezes your cheeks, making them part. You sit there with your pink tongue sticking out. Frankie swishes whatever saliva is in his mouth, his lips purse, and spits a long dribble of his saliva onto your tongue. You whimpered when his warm spit coated your tongue. 

"Swallow." He commands, and you quickly follow orders, the undying desire to please Frankie is still there. Frankie hauls you to his lap having you straddle him. Your hands dive to take off the belt and shove his pants and underwear to his thighs. 

Frankie pumps his length and helps you slide down on his cock. You throw your head back at the feeling of him stretching your slick walls, Frankie thrusts up into you when your body would bounce down on his dick. 

"Anyone can cum in your mouth but I am the only one to cum in this tight fucking pussy," Frankie pulls your hair to have you look at him. You loved how his eyes were almost black and the dominance oozing from him. A pitiful whine escapes from your lips when Frankie reaches between your thighs, basking in the feeling of his thick fingers and rough skin against your clit. 

"Only yours, Frankiee" You moan out of breath, he continues rolling his fingers on your clit, biting your chest, and sucking soothing the throbbing pain with his tongue. Your moans were spurring him on, having Frankie bite harder. 

"Yes! Yes! Mark me, I'm all yours," You cried out when the coil in your stomach snapped with pressure from Frankie fucking up into you, juices spraying from you and onto Frankie's lap. He whimpers and loves your sensitivity to his touch.

You were bouncing fast and hard when Frankie bites your collarbone, "My princess," moaning out your name, claiming you. His seed filling your cunt and you hummed at the sensation of his cock stuffed into you along with his searing cum. 

"You're done fucking around with other guys." Frankie lifts you off his lap, shoving himself back into his underwear and soaked jeans. "And you're done with that Vanessa." You brush his hair when you take his cap to sit on your head. 

"Frankie, do you think we can start again?" You collected yourself from the orgasmic haze, he looks at you with a smile on his face. His hat still on your head and fucked out, his new favorite look on you. 

"Yes, Princess. Sometimes you have to fall apart to start again." Frankie was ready for this. For you to be his girl and you were ready to be his. Frankie kisses up your arm to your shoulder and revels in the electricity sparking between you and him. 

Your heart skipping a beat when Frankie gazes at you with his puppy eyes. Don't run. You're done running. You are staying where you belong. Allowing yourself to be in love and explore your emotions was going to be a challenge the fact that Frankie still wanted you as his partner after everything made you become conscious of his raw passion for his princess. 

"I'm ready." You breathe out. "You're all I want, Frankie." 

#frankie morales #frankie morales x you #frankie morales x reader #frankie morales fluff #triple frontier #triple frontier fic #frankie morales smut #frankie morales x f!reader #pedro pascal #frankie morales angst

[melishade]

Okay people, let's do this one last time. My name is Mariam Yohannes. I was bitten by a radioactive spider, and for the past four years, I've been the one and only ሸረሪት (shu-re-rit). It does mean spider, her name is just spider. Lol.

So yes, I've updated the design of my spidersona and have even given her a name: Mariam Yohannes, which is a play on 'Mary Jane'.

Backstory:

She lives in modern day Addis Ababa, still plagued by wars and conflicts of both modern times and the past. Even though the dictator (Mengistu Haile Mariam) that overthrew King Haile Selassie had faked his death and fled the country, Ethiopia is still plagued by corruption, and conflict on both a tribal and religious scale. In an attempt to modernize the country and advance Ethiopia's place in the world, the Ethiopian government (which is still extremely corrupt) made an economic deal with classic Spider-man villains like Osborne and KingPen, to build an Alchemex in the capital. Mariam is taken there on a college tour and that's where she's bitten. Mariam herself is fairly well off all things considered.

Her father, Yohannes, worked for the government, while her mother, Desta, works as a waitress. Her grandfather on her mother's side, is a priest of the Orthodox faith, and is extremely devout to his faith. Mariam has an older sister who left the family due to years of charged conflicts between her and her father. Meanwhile, her younger brother, is still in high school, and is slowly getting drawn into the wrong crowd. Mariam is tired of the way that the older generation is running things. Some may have good intentions, but others do not, and many are stuck in their old ways thinking that it will work to make the country better. Mariam uses her powers to become a symbol to the nation and a change to the younger generation.

Her canon event is the death of Yohannes. Mariam was always smart, and after her older sister left, her father doubled his expectations and demands on her. When Mariam calls him out of the corrupt government and how he was a coward bending to the will of the others. It took a lot of courage for her to do that, cause she had no clue if she would be physically punished for it (getting whipped with a belt is a common practice in Ethiopia). She even brought up the fact that his refusal to change is why her sister left. When Yohannes begins to have a change of heart, and even supports the civil protests that happened in Addis, the government quickly turned on him, and the police fired into the crowd (with machine guns. The police in Ethiopia openly carry machine guns, I know that. I've seen it.) Mariam watches in horror as her father is gunned down and he dies in her arms, using his last breath to apologize and telling her and her other siblings that he loved them.

She's initially despised as ሸረሪት. The church saw her as a demon because of her powers. Her grandfather has made efforts to slander her name during service. Men were quite misogynistic at the idea of a female superhero. The government hated her because she was actively undoing a lot of their corrupt shit. The only group that loved her were the kids. Despite the fact that the parents told them to stay away from her, they would actively try to run after her and keep up with her as she ran around the city. It makes Mariam feel pride that she's doing something right. Especially her brother, who at the sight of her superhero persona, starts to turn his life around.

(There's some other stuff about her gaining the respect of the Ethiopian people and her joining the Spider Society and ultimately betraying it, but that'll probably be another post or something.)

#into the spiderverse #across the spiderverse #atsv #itsv #original character #oc #black oc #spidersona #spiderwoman #ethiopia #ethiopian oc #female oc #female original character #krita #artist #black artist #krita drawing #atsv spidersona #itsv spidersona #..I could've done something better with the writing but that's okay #I'm really happy with the redesign #redesign #oc redesign #oc art

[ahintofblue]

To New Beginnings

Ship: Antares/Sung Jin-Woo Rating: T Chapter: 3/? Summary: Jin-Woo is thrown into a timeline where he is bound to the Monarch of Destruction as his husband and an army of dragons are now his to care for. Antares has no memories of their previous fights, the desire to destroy and ruin is entirely gone, so a new challenge awaits for Jin-Woo instead.

It is not what Jin-Woo expects his new life to be.

Perhaps a change of heart is required?

Tags: Alternate Timeline, Fluff, Romance, Family, Bond, Interspecies Relationship, No Beta We Die Like Antares Notes: Chapter 3 is up with only 3 short parts for today! AO3!

Bellion is the first to ask Jin-Woo what he plans on doing next. He suggests he should leave Antares’ side and find a way to communicate to the Rulers, to which Jin-Woo takes a minute to consider his options but he’s certain Antares isn’t so easily tricked especially by the unfamiliarity of this timeline. As much as Jin-Woo finds it oddly pleasant to spend time with Antares on some domestic level, he knows some part of this isn’t real. 

Antares must know this as well. Husband or not. If so, then what is the old man waiting for? “Should you choose to battle him or not, we will abide by your orders.” Then again, Jin-Woo wishes it doesn’t have to come to that and looks at Bellion with a defeated sigh, the mere thought of fighting Antares again is a tiring notion. He’s done enough to protect those he cares about. Deep inside, he thinks it’s time to give himself a decent rest and this world offers it. Just not in the case he expects.

“I will think about this.” Then, Jin-Woo waves his hand dismissing Bellion. With a bow, Bellion disappears into the pool of shadows, and Beru watches with almost teary eyes, worrying about his liege’s turmoil he faces. 

“Don’t cry.” Jin-Woo looks at the radiant sea of stars. “At least the view is beautiful here.”  

/

Jin-Woo knows the castle is a home to the dragons, no longer a haven for humans who built it originally. Sections of the fortification already toppled over, giving new paths for the youngins to venture in and play a game of hide and seek. The larger drakes rest inside in the upper parts of the ruins and others enjoy the outside walls, even one sleeps on top of a pointed tower, wings covering its body and a long tail sways back and forth. 

The building is bigger than he realizes when Antares lets him ride on top of him in his full form, revealing a larger scale of the territory that goes beyond the human’s creation. Compared to the cottage Jin-Woo lives in, it is but a small dot on the map and with this discovery of a lake behind their home, he asks Antares to tell him a story about this land as he enjoys the wind in his hair.

/

The smallest of the dragonets is by the name of Rukie. Her white scales remind Jin-Woo of a pristine winter while her underside is the color of ashen gray. She greets her master with a tittering of screes, her wings taking her atop of Antares’ right shoulder. Jin-Woo discovers it is her favorite place and finds Antares’ hair is a chew toy for her to nibble on. It seems Antares doesn’t mind and with a gentlest of touches, his fingers rub Rukie’s head in circles and down her neck.

“She was the weakest out of her brothers and sisters,” Antares says, watching her like a proud father. “Even the mother did not hope for her survival but she came out strong. Refusing to let fate dictate her end.” Antares speaks in a foreign language to her next. 

Jin-Woo doesn’t recognize it but it sparks an instant joy in Rukie’s amber eyes as she lets go of her treat and takes flight towards Jin-Woo at an unexpected speed.

“I will give her to you,” Antares states.

“Huh—Whoa! Oh you’re a fast one.” Jin-Woo catches the bullet in his arms. Rukie is the size of a pigeon but a fiery one wrapped up in scales. She is adorable, no doubt melting his heart in seconds and one can tell Beru is already captivated in his head. Certainly, Jin-Woo can’t say no when she starts making her way on top of his left shoulder and proudly stays in her spot, looking at Antares with a good huff through her nostrils. “Do I take it that she accepts?” Repeating what Antares did prior, Jin-Woo strokes her head and receives a lick over his thumb. Distracted by Rukie’s happiness, Jin-Woo misses Antares closing the distance and stealing a kiss from him, giving him a firm acknowledgement and his turn for Jin-Woo’s attention, something Jin-Woo also learns, while Rukie watches them with curiosity before a soft growl comes out. 

Antares pulls away first, while Jin-Woo hides his face in Antares’ shirt. “Little one, you must learn to be patient.”

#solo leveling #solo leveling fanfic #story: to new beginnings #antares #sung jin woo #more like drabbles now

[noirandchocolate]

Round 3 super fun happy comments post time!

Match 1, Vimes vs. Rob

Vimes I love you buddy but there is no way you can handle a Feegle going down your drawers.

--@purpledemoncat

Vimes would probably get adopted by the clan. He has a similar distaste for lawyers. All they need to do is get rid of his penchant for following the law.

--@missnotlob

Feegles are superstitious Rob would see the following dark and bugger off.

--@shiftyfly

But also this poll missed a golden opportunity for Rob v Adora Belle. Because there's plenty of people Rob could beat who could also beat Adora. But I firmly believe no male feegle could ever beat her. You really think that someone afraid of the pursin' o' the lips and the tappin' o' the feets could beat Spike??? I do think after the fact all the rest would be terrified of her but Rob would actually become great friends with her. (Much to Moist's terror.)

--@myidealhousehaschickenfeet (This is so funny, yes I definitely want these two to meet.)

Match 2, Granny vs. the Librarian

Granny would just Borrow him and we'd have a "stop hitting yourself!!' situation.

--@purpledemoncat

Granny turns the Librarian back into a human, or headologies him into doing it himself. He spends the next week crying and trying to grab things with his feet.

--@missnotlob

I once again point out that Granny Weatherwax is somewhat unclear on the concept of a friendly fight and very unclear on the subject of Granny Weatherwax losing anything. The Librarian ain't no fool. He's either pulling a Rincewind or backing away very slowly.

--@the-damn-things-overlap

The Librarian is a clever ape. He takes the bag of peanuts Gytha Ogg brought, thoughtfully eats one, shakes his head and points to Granny. He isn't gonna fight her.

--@msmeiriona

I feel like the fact that the Librarian is an inherently silly figure is what could lead to an upset here. Granny can rise above any serious threat and will herself look silly sometimes in handling minor ones like say raindrops or her broomstick. But I don't know how well she'd tangle with an inherently silly threat. And I think the Librarian could actually snag this one.

--@omicheese

Match 3, Vetinari vs. Nanny

@pourablecat did fanart of this match's outcome!

I can't articulate why I voted Nanny but I looked into her smiling face and it just felt right.

--@hazelnootle

There's a reason why Nanny lives in Lancre and it's to stop her from pile driving this man.

--@purpledemoncat

It's sheer narrative logic. What looks like a friendly old lady goes up against a trained assassin. The only way this could look more million to one was if she were blindfolded on one leg.

--@katistrophe

Vetinari plays Thud, Nanny Ogg plays Twister.

--@modstin

Would Nanny winning be fucking hilarious? Yes. But they had to invent a cursed gun and an entirely new system of poisoning to get a scratch on Vetinari so. And he couldn't be convinced to drink her scumble anyway. Vetinari got one-shotted by a magic user exactly once and is not about to let that happen again.

--@twofoursixohjuan

Vetinari may be a dictator but Nanny Ogg has to plan family game night for 100 people every weekend. I think that makes her far more powerful a foe. His ass is not ready for the Ogg.

--@spunchthegoblin

The only person Vetinari has ever feared is his Aunt. Nanny is the primordial matter from which all Aunties are formed.

--@thisblogisboundforglory-blog

Match 4, Carrot vs. Angua

@thestuffedalligator and @oorpe made this one sexy in a silly kind of way, and I am here for it.

Carrot, being ever the chivalrous gentleman, tries to LET Angua win. She realizes what he's up to & losers her whole entire temper. Carrot ends up having to pin her to stop her thrashing him in a fit of rage. he wins by accident for the pin & is DREADFULLY embarrassed about it.

--@javaelemental

This is a IDW Sonic Issue #57 moment, here.

--@cipher-of-the-round-table (I don't know what his means but I laughed.)

SO MUCH good commentary on the fights this time, I really enjoyed reading everyone's thoughts. Everybody go check out the notes on all the fights, they're full of more funny and well-reasoned rationales for voting!

#terry pratchett #discworld #discworld fight club 2023

[thelonesomequeen]

Here is a master post of some of your asks. A lot of you had commentary to add after the newest DM podcast and I did get to some asks, but I wanted to make a space to post all opinions that we received. Below are anon submissions, not the commentary from moderators of this blog.

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I have a hard time believing the narrative of his family not liking her but inviting her to all the family events, parties and more./ Anon is forgetting is that in some of those events, Chris was probably the one paying the bill. So she will go and they will say nothing.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

How is Chris rushing to get married? They've been together long enough that I wouldn't call this rushing. I hope it all works out for him. My husband and I had people we were close to doubt our marriage, and it sucked. Every time we've hit a rough patch, I've wondered about the "I told you so's" we would get if it all fell apart. But we're still together almost two decades later, and counseling has been really helpful for both of us and the marriage. So, I say good luck to Chris and Alba. I wish them the best. I wouldn't want them to have to go through the pain of a divorce.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

Man I don’t get this. Even if he is rushing to get married, why are y’all acting like he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s a 40 year old man, i’m sure he’s not forcing himself to get married just to be a husband. And i’m sure he’ll get a pre-nup because he hasn’t been in the industry for 20+ years and built up a career by being an idiot. They way some of y’all infantilize him is just insane. I don’t even care for Alba but y’all are acting like she hasn’t had multiple opportunities to use him for money. She could’ve easily gotten pregnant and gotten child support if she wanted instead of living in bumfuck Massachusetts for a year and going through a whole possible marriage. You know how much hate she would get if she divorced him and took his money. Even the five Chris fans who like her now are gonna hate her even more. There are valid reasons to dislike her, but this one just doesn’t stick.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

Ok so if some people in this fandom are gonna believe that his family doesn’t like her, they will have believe that they’re engaged to be married right? Or are they gonna pick and choose the info to believe that best fits their theories.

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I don’t know I just find it hard to believe what dm said about his family. Some of them might not love her but maybe to tolerate her instead of outright dislike. But still I have doubts because he’s so close with his family especially his mother. Plus his best friend of several years seems to like her too. I just don’t think he’ll marry someone when his family doesn’t like her. This also reminds me a lot of what someone said during the Jenny days that his mom didn’t like her either.

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Who in this fandom is happy about the current state of things? Literally no one.// please don’t speak so broadly for everyone! I for one am okay with the relationship (I don’t think Alba is problematic at all- her friends are a different matter), I am very happy he found love and wish them both the best. The only current “state of things” I am unhappy about is the way some parts of the fandom is behaving: the hateful nicknames, the internalized misogyny, the hate based lies, the xenophobia.😞😒

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

So why is he marrying her if his family don’t approve?/// My apologies for the light snark but: are you kidding?! You have to be joking?! Irrelevant of his reasons, so what if his family MAYBE doesn’t approve, it’s his life not theirs! Do you live your life based on your family approval over any decisions? College? Career? Love interest?- if you do I feel deeply sad for you. You live your life for you; family advice can be taken into consideration but not dictating it. & He’s online that’s why!

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

cause she was 21/22 when he followed her, right? 😬 yikes)// she was 23, and he followed a bunch of other actresses all working for Netflix too, so it’s clear as day the follow wasn’t romantic but likely work related, and likely and unintentionally it eventually turned romantic. Sometimes the heart wants what the heart wants 🤷‍♀️ we don’t have control over who we fall in love with, they’re both legal, she was in her mid 20 she’s old enough. Plenty of high age difference marriage in Hollywood.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

Okay so it seems as though (to me) he’s rushing to get married // rushing? How is dating someone for over a year and being engaged for nearly a year, getting married after being together for over 2 years is a “rushing”?! That’s the standard timeline for many couples I have ever met. They say you know within the first 6 months it you’re in love and if this is the person for you.. sounds to me he knew and acted upon it. Rushing would be if they eloped within a week or even 5 months, that’s rushing

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

I think it could be the rushing into it, but he very obviously wants kids and it's always risky to have kids with a partner that potentially will live overseas if the marriage ends. I hope he is at least thinking about that. I mean Chris has money she doesn't, but custody could turn ugly. I would definitely be worried about that if I was a family member.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

For what we know he was seeing/hooking up with other girls before Alba so if that Taxi cab theory was the case why Alba and not the rest?

Also someone that desperate wouldn’t wait 2 years to get married and have kids I don’t know just my two cents 🤷🏼‍♀️

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

I don't think there may be issues if she decides to stay home and put her career on hold to have children or just follow him around, like she seems to be doing now. The age difference, expectations in life, cultural difference will enter sooner or later. I don't see this lasting.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

But…I give it a handful of years maybe? I think it’ll get to a point where the age difference isn’t an issue now, but I think it will be eventually

I think he very much wants kids so I can absolutely see them having one or two, staying together to try and make stuff work for them but eventually divorcing. That’s not really saying much considering divorce isn’t exactly uncommon these days.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

Real or not, I agree that it is likely his family is a bit disappointed in his choice. Maybe not Scott, but his mom and sisters seem pretty down to earth and grounded. I doubt they would approve of the age gap or the character of who he chose. After waiting for so long, it is sad to see who he finally picked.

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

That man loves his family and I don’t think he will marry anyone that they don’t approve of imo

🍎🍎🍎🍎🍎

Watching them fixating on the part that some of his family members “don’t like her”

[this-is-my-canon]

DRAGON BALL FANFICS:

*fics in green are ongoing/incomplete

KakaVege-

Saiyan Uprising: On a Planet Vegeta where Frieza never followed through with killing the Saiyans, but keeps them enslaved for many years. A war is brewing, nevertheless - an uprising. The Saiyans can't defeat Frieza until AFTER they deal with each other.

Blood Lust: The vampiric prince of a foreign country has made his way to a peaceful, coastal city. There, he encounters a man more like him than he realizes, bound to him before they ever met. He intends to expose his true nature and make him his before the humans can intervene

Admit It (for the kakavege week prompts Drugs/Mind Control)

Trapped in a small space (for the kakavege week prompt)

Pretending (for the kakavege week prompt, fake boyfriends)

Again (for the kakavege week prompt, GT)

Nearly Killed (for the prompt, Gore)

Let Go (for the prompt, Riding Nimbus)

Blame the Moon: Following the events of Saiyan Uprising, Kakarot and Vegeta need to settle into their new lives as a newly-freed Planet Vegeta's King and first Super Saiyan. But first, a honeymoon. If they can figure out what that even is.

BardIne-

Saiyan Uprising (linked above)

The Surprise: They already sent their younger son away when he was an infant, but now they're sending him from the planet again as a much different Saiyan, a grown man more capable than his previous self, but just as unaware as the first time about where he is going. Bardock doesn't know why they should bother. Gine is excited.

GoBul-

More Than Friends: They’ve been friends for years. So it comes as a surprise to both of them that now, when they’re both in established relationships, the enduring flame of their friendship grows into a blaze.

GoChi-

A New Experience: Chi-Chi didn't know what Goku was thinking when he put his mouth down there, but it had distracted her all through breakfast. Being newly married was confusing - sometimes embarrassing, but also exciting. Eventually, her curiosity was going to have to get the better of her anyway.

In for a Ride: Chi-Chi is a teenage girl looking for some fun. Only, the annual carnival isn’t doing it for her. Not until she spots an old, forgotten friend, who has fun and then some to offer her. She’s playing with fire, and she knows it, but she can’t resist Son Goku.

Guarded: She was moving up in the world, both in her success and on the notorious murderer’s hit list. He loved his career; he was one of the best. The aftermath of a trial drew these professionals together, leading both of them to realize what their career-driven lives were lacking - each other.

Baby Daddy: There’s nothing like the luxury of a no-strings-attached one night stand. Until…there are strings attached. For Goku and Chi-Chi, those strings will come in the form of onesies and pacifiers and a whole lot of relationship development to unpack in the course of nine months.

Testing: Before taking off for the next purge, Kakarot’s team needs to get acquainted with its new commander. Raditz isn’t happy about the woman put in command. Kakarot can’t disagree with him more, especially not the morning before their first mission when this domineering Saiyan woman decides to put their equipment (and Kakarot) to the test.

Serendipity in College: College is a time for fun and freedom for young adults. In between work and classes, there are friends and some become something more than friends. The DBZ couples meet in their senior year of college. Real world A/U. Mature content for adults only, Language/Adult Content/lemons. Coupling is not canon right away, but eventually G/CC, V/B, K/18. Slightly OOC at times

The Ox Queen: A/U all-human world loosely inspired by A Game Of Thrones series. In a world where power and position trumps everything, and the more powerful you are, the more your life is dictated to you, can we find and keep true love? My world was full of obligations and necessity. Until I met him. Things changed for us as we filled our lives with lies. Mature, dark themes included

VegeBul-

The Devil’s Contract: Her greatest sin was ambition, but more than she realized, she was capable of many sins. That asset, more than her success, caught the boss' eye. A Vegebul one-shot. Mature content.

On Guard: He’s taken this assignment reluctantly. She only has to tolerate him for a couple months until Goku returns. What happens between these two in the interim is, however, unavoidable.

Serendipity in College (linked above)

#Dragon Ball #DBZ fanfics #KakaVege #GoBul #BardIne #VegeBul #GoChi #not sfw links

[mythvoiced]

kazuki, have u ever thought of having children??? hae u ever... thought about being a dad? 🤔 how do u feel when you think of being a dad?

@astremourante | me rn

---

"Don't you have literally anything better to do."

A cloud of smoke blocks the path from his eyes to the ceiling. The cord hanging from the lamp there is a fine irrelevant chain. It's a relatively old house, kept in relatively perfect shape. It has all the traits of a mansion: spacious, the wood is a rich dark colour, every door slides perfectly, every plant seems to mean something, every corner and corridor almost designed to make sure you grow smaller and smaller with each step, while the person guiding you deeper grows bigger and bigger.

You glance out at the internal garden and it's perfect.

And you feel like a bird trapped in a cage large enough to grant you movement, but never large enough for your wings to ache with the effort of reaching the sky.

Back and forth in two swings.

Birds are so fast.

You're so trapped.

Kazuki has never idealized nor romanticized the concept of fatherhood. He believes in the phrase 'everyone can be a father, not everyone can be a dad'.

The word 'dad' is silly and childish to him, suited to a boy of an age that barely reaches his knee, not for a man like him.

His father is father, if they're both feeling a little lazy, a little loose. It's about hierarchy and position and impression and perspective. Calling him by his title, even better, head of it all, the mastermind to have made an art out of the plight of others, like so many before him.

But... how many after him?

Kazuki blinks, slow and unfocused. Something is playing softly in the background. He saved an old radio from somewhere once, it's charming, it's in good shape, and the signs of age it does bear only add to its beauty.

He doesn't even like Matsubara Miki, he lies.

He's never thought about being a father, he lies.

"I'd want to do better," she's too cheerful for his mood, but perhaps the genre of her music dictates it. Hasn't this become a hit overseas in recent years? From Japan's 80s to the US' 2020s. Time is an odd thing.

"I'd want to do better... but I don't know what that means," his voice but barely louder than a drunken mumble.

"I wonder if my father ever thought of being a dad... if he ever thought of having children the way people normally think of having children," there's something almost poetic about how mundane it all feels. He could be in a small apartment in the belly of a large city, look outside and watch the skyline paint it a beauty far into the center where rich people live and move and thrive.

Listen to a train stop and go, not being able to see who's laughing down below the balcony, watch red and pale lights fade as cars move in and out of streets.

He could be standing out on that balcony, smoking his cigarette there, arms on the railing, warm and summery, wondering how much longer 'til the rain season begins, and then feel a tug at his leg.

The real Kazuki smiles, angry and small.

"If it made him happy... I probably wouldn't have any, if it made my father happy for me to have some," open defiance, a rarity.

He looks down in his daydream, and a child smiles back up at him.

She has a wicked little glint in her eyes, she's so much smarter than he'll ever be. Of course she will be, she's so much better than he'll ever be, and that's what being a parent should feel like, knowing you're nothing in contrast to the sight of your child smiling. You're just a vessel for their safety and you want to get it right and you don't deserve it.

Her lips widen into a mischievous grin.

When Kazuki notices who she resembles he sits up, grabs the radio, and Matsubara Miki can only manage to ask you one last time to stay with her, knocking on midnight's door, before her voice disappears in the shattering of components and the silence of a bad man's rage.

Kazuki is a bad man.

"No one like me should have children," he breathes at the wall he's now staring at.

"I have better things to do."

#astremourante #the golden boy;kazuki #the children are our future paint it red;amelia & kazuki #i tear up when i see birds in cages did you know that #especially when you can tell just from looking at the bird that their wings could spread much further than allowed #they can't even flap #GOSH MAKING MYSELF CRY FDKNGFDSLFKH LKHG #anyways have this HAVE THIS I WANTED IT TO BE FUNNY WHY DOES KAZUKI MAKE EVERYTHING SO SERIOUS #call me a japanese city pop amateur but i REALLY like mika matsubara's stay with me GOSH it's? #btw the idea was he's not talking to amelia here but a Disembodied Voice™ KLDSGJDFHGF IDK artistic liberty WAHOO #;queue

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Isabel Wolff

Published: Nov 28, 1992

Isabel Wolff talks to men who have been beaten, battered and bruised by their wives.

`ONE NIGHT I was sitting up in bed when my wife suddenly wheeled round and pulled her fingernails, hard, right down my face. She tore my skin to ribbons. Luckily she just missed my right eye, but my face was an absolute bloody mess. My mother was so horrified when she saw me three days later that I pretended I'd walked into the Christmas tree.'

That was just one of many ferocious assaults on Douglas, a 38-year-old copy-writer, by the wife who tormented and attacked him for most of the three years that they were married. Verbal and mental abuse of the 'God-I-wish-you-were-dead' variety turned into full-scale, full-frontal physical attacks after the birth of their baby son, Tom. 'She went for me once when I was changing Tom's nappy,' he told me in his small office in Kensington. 'She put the most enormous, black bruises on my arm, and she was shouting at me and screaming hysterically. All of her attacks were like that — vehement, violent and sudden. It was terrifying; you never knew when she was going to strike or how, and afterwards there was never ever any remorse.'

`Why do you think your wife attacked you?' I enquired.

`At first I put it down to drink,' he replied; 'then I thought it must be post-natal depression; but now I think — in fact I know — that she's got a personality disorder. She could be perfectly charming and quite normal a lot of the time; but when she didn't get exactly what she wanted she'd attack me physically. It was like living in a prison.'

Over the past 20 years, volumes have been written about wife-battering, but almost nothing has been published about domestic violence done to men. What little data there is shows that men can be beaten, bitten, scratched, slashed, punched and even stabbed by their wives or female partners. They are attacked with carving knives, hit with hammers and scalded with cups of boiling coffee. In one well publicised case last year, a woman, Mrs Doreeth Currithers, ripped off one of her husband's testicles. Surgeons failed to save it and the judge ordered the woman to pay £480 in costs. A judge ordered Mrs Currithers to pay court costs of £480, but did not make a compensation order. On the whole, it is true, men do more damage to women than women do to men — a glance at the murder statistics provides proof of that. Of the 700 or so murders committed in England and Wales every year, 18 per cent of the victims are women killed by their husbands, while only 2 per cent are men who have been murdered by their wives. And when it comes to non-fatal domestic violence, received wisdom and political correctness dictate that the man is always, ipso facto, the abuser. The very phrase 'domestic violence' is tacitly assumed to refer to the abuse of women by men. This is something that men are now beginning to challenge, and some are showing that domestic violence cuts, so to speak, both ways. In order to do that, men have to stand up and admit that they have been victims of female violence themselves.

`A lot of men just can't admit that they're being battered,' says Douglas, who is six foot tall and weighs 13 stone. 'It's the old rolling-pin syndrome, I suppose — they think it's wet and weedy. My ex-wife is very slim and feminine, and I found it very hard to own up to anyone that she could physically terrorise me in this way. I also didn't think that anyone would believe me.'

`A lot of men who pluck up the courage to take their injuries to the doctor have it thrown back at them that they must have attacked their wife first,' says Dr Malcolm George, a neuro-physiologist at London University. Dr George is conducting a research project in which he is collecting data from the testimony of 38 battered men. `We're told that women only lash out in self-defence,' he says, 'but I have several examples of men in the survey who were hit, who had done nothing to provoke such action. They were attacked when they were watching television; they were attacked when they were in the bath; they were attacked when they were asleep in bed. Quite a few of them would lock themselves in a room at night so that they could sleep; one man's wife smashed down the door to get at him.'

According to Dr George, the majority of men who are abused are not seven-stone weaklings with Amazonian partners. The seaside-postcard image of the little, hen-pecked man with the gigantic wife doesn't relate to the facts. 'The men taking part in the survey tend to be well-built, but not aggressive,' he says. 'They're the sort who don't want to hit a man, let alone a woman. So when the violence starts they know they are just going to have to stand there and take it, and that tension produces its own kind of terror.'

Dr George doesn't deny that men do unspeakable, violent things to women and that, in general, they do far more damage, in terms of the injuries they inflict. If a man hits a woman's face hard with his open hand, he will probably smash her jaw. But, he says, women tend to compensate for their lack of physical strength by using weapons and kitchen implements knives, forks, hammers, ash-trays, wine bottles —anything that comes easily to hand. 'With weapons like these you can get some pretty terrible injuries,' he says. `Many of the men in my survey had had broken noses, cracked ribs and crushed fingers. Some had stab wounds.' On the whole, he says, these men made light to him of their physical injuries, but stressed how traumatised they had been by the mixture of fear and humiliation.

Most of the research data about female violence to men has been compiled in the United States by Professor Murray Strauss of New Hampshire University. His studies, carried out between 1975 and 1991, reveal that, although women are seven times more likely than men to sustain injuries in domestic violence, men and women initiate the violence equally. To George Gilliland of the Domestic Rights Coalition in St Pauls, Minnesota, this comes as no surprise. 'There are guys I know here who have been slashed with scissors; there's a police chief whose wife cut his face right open with a hem-ripper, and one woman who killed her husband with a baseball bat because, she said, he "insulted" her!' In Minnesota alone, Gilliland points out, an average of ten men a year are killed by their female partner. 'There are thousands of men out there who are slapped around, kicked and punched by abusive, violent women,' he says. 'But far from protecting them, society just laughs about it. You see guys getting whacked across the face in films, in cartoons — it's acceptable. You see a woman slap a guy in a restaurant you think he must be an s.o.b. who'd got it coming. If a man slaps a woman, everyone's on the phone to the cops getting him arrested and thrown in jail.'

George Gilliland speaks with feeling and with authority, since he has himself been a victim not just of one, but of two violent women. His first wife, he alleges, was violent because of menopausal problems, while the second one was semi-alcoholic. In his time, he's been punched, kicked, belaboured about the head with bits of wood and burnt with boiling coffee. He is about to open the world's first refuge for battered men but, he says, newspaper editors seem reluctant to give it much coverage, such is the power of the feminist lobby in America.

`Battered women's advocates do not want it known that there are thousands and thousands of men out there who are abused,' he said, his voice rising with emotion. 'They're afraid that some of the state tax dollars that pay for battered women's refuges might go to men's shelters instead. They only care about their own self-serving interests and that is battered women only.'

Sandra Horley, director of the world's first shelter for women, the Chiswick Family Refuge, admits that it would worry her if man-abuse became a pressing social issue. `There are resource implications,' she says candidly. 'Refuges for battered women are struggling to survive, and if we put across this idea that the abuse of men is as great as the abuse of women, then it could seriously affect our funding.'

Sandra Horley believes that stories about husband-abuse are just part of a backlash against the advances of feminism, a cynical attempt to redress the balance by portraying men as victims too. 'For some reason, people seem to think that if they can show that men are also abused then violence against women is not a problem they have to think about, and they should think about it. I'm not saying all women are angels, but it's clear that the home is a much less safe place for the woman.'

`At least women have protection under the law from violent men,' says Douglas ruefully. 'But battered men have nothing, not even the recognition that we exist.' In fact, battered men have less than nothing, because of the institutionalised legal discrimination that operates against them. If a man is attacked by his wife and decides to call the police, he is the one who is likely to be arrested. The police loathe being called out on `domestics'; they find them difficult and embarrassing, and their over-whelming priority is simply to keep the peace. They are reluctant to arrest the woman in these situations, especially if there are children, so the chances are it is the man who will find himself spending a night in jail.

`It is not widely accepted that men are battered,' says family solicitor Anthony Lawson, who has acted for several abused men. 'So the law takes a completely pragmatic approach and tries to protect the stability of the household, regardless of who is to blame.'

There's a double penalty for men, according to Bruce Liddington, director of Families Need Fathers, an organisation that helps men negotiate access to their children during a family breakdown. 'Even if he is clearly, demonstrably, the victim, a man is treated exactly the same as if he were the aggressor,' he says. 'He is ousted from the family home; he is ruined financially; he is cut off from daily contact with his children, and subsequent contact with the children is dependent upon his wife, who may be unbalanced. No wonder so many men keep quiet, because they're terrified of losing everything. Did you know that quite a lot of homeless men are men who have been assaulted by their wives?'

Battered men also point to the fact that divorce cases are not heard in open court and therefore, they say, women can make counter-allegations of physical or psychological abuse which are not properly tested by cross-examination. The House of Commons Home Affairs Committee, chaired by the Conservative MP Sir Ivan Lawrence QC, is currently conducting an inquiry into domestic violence, and written evidence from several battered men is being taken. But many of the men I spoke to were not optimistic that any recommendations would be made that would assist them.

'I hope that it will at least bring the recognition that domestic violence against men does exist,' says Douglas. 'Men do get hurt, they bruise like women, and they should have the right to be protected too.

[ Via: https://archive.vn/RHaNj ]

==

https://home.csulb.edu/~mfiebert/htdocs/assaults_bib343_201307.doc

Abstract: This bibliography examines 343 scholarly investigations; 270 empirical studies and 73 reviews and/or analyses, which demonstrate that women are as physically aggressive, or more aggressive, than men in their relationships with their spouses or male partners.  The aggregate sample size in the reviewed studies exceeds 440,850.     

Thirty years later, what progress has been made?

P.S. Sandra Horley sounds like a fucking sociopath.

#Isabel Wolff #domestic violence #intimate partner violence #violent women #abused men #social issues #saying the quiet part out loud #Malcolm George #Sandra Horley #religion is a mental illness

[firstaidspray]

1, 7, 12, 25, 26, 46

1. What is their backstory and why did you choose it? Anabel's backstory is original and made up by me entirely. The game does not dictate what happened to her before lol. So her parents and sister and herself originally lived in Elturel. Her father fought in the Blood War. But since all the tieflings got told to fuck themselves and leave Elturel, now the family lives in the Lower City, where Anabel's parents run a hotel (not seen in game ofc). Anabel and her sister, Joy, have always been independent souls and would go on these big adventures around the Sword Coast and even into Avernus a few times. She originally wanted to be a Cleric, but found herself too impatient and impulsive and bloodthirsty, so Barbarian it was. Next up, Anabel has a rough relationship with sex and thinks she's cursed in that regard, mostly bc of SA she endured when younger (not going into detail, however Raph does make them pay). So she rarely does it, except one fateful day, she was hooking up with some cute tiefling (note that Anabel only fucks other demons and demon adjacent people) and that's when she got kidnapped and put on the nautiloid. It's a sort of homage to her story in her original verse in which she got killed during sex by accident. She's unlucky in that way.

7. Does your Tav have connections to other characters (I.e.: NPCs)? Raphael of course!! Initially just a devil and the pretty little thing he got to sign a contract, they're married now. Also Joy, who is an NPC to her (player to me when I play as her lol) is her sister so there's that connection as well.

12. How does your Tav feel about Us? Did they free them, maim them or leave them behind? Anabel LOVES Us. A cute brain with legs, of course she freed them and took them along!! She was pretty sad not to find them right after the crash.

25. What does your Tav think of Aradin? She thinks he's a cunt. Full stop.

26. What does your Tav think of the Raphael? I think it's well established on this blog how Anabel feels about Raph but let's gush about it anyways!! Initially, when he transported her to the House of Hope, she was like dammmnnnn this guy is hot and charming. Then he showed his devil form and she was like DAAAAAMMNNN HES LITERALLY HOT and from that point, she was wrapped around his finger. Regardless of whether or not he'd actually help her with the tadpole, Anabel wanted more more more of this man. Her initial reaction to this infatuation was the equivalent of a teenage girl doodling her crush's name and hearts in their diary with a gel pen, but as it went on, her feelings became more serious and along the lines of true love. And, as he watched over her, he felt the same- he does say he "grew quite fond of [Anabel/Tav] in [his] own way" after all. I interpret it romantically/sexually. Meeting him again at the Last Light Inn was a dream come true!! Of course she killed his old enemy- for him mostly, but also for Astarion. She took his deal, of course she did- and in my version, the contract had what was essentially a marriage certificate in one of the clauses, and now they're married forever, because Raphael also came to love Anabel. So they have this inescapable, infernal bond- she loves him, devotes herself to him almost like worship, and not to mention her intense lust for him.

46. Does your Tav help Astarion make a deal with Raphael? Anabel jumped at the chance to interact with Raphael in any way, and she wanted to help her closest friend in the party, so of course she did!!

Thank you so much for asking, sorry for the super long answers LOL ❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥

#ask game #long post #anabel lee #bg3 anabel