#idk i feel like. very specifically there's been a focus on BUT YOU MUST LIKE MY OPINIONS and. please stop.

[utilitycaster]

This is probably something that will be obvious to many but: writing about fictional works but not creating fanfiction/fanon to me tends to fall into four categories, and I think it's really important to get how they intersect before getting weird about other people's posts.

Opinion. Eg: I like relationships based in mutual understanding. This is my opinion. It is correct for me. Might not be correct for you! Note that this is pure opinion, with no argument.

Interpretation: Eg: Beau and Yasha's relationship shows a great deal of understanding in each other's shared experiences, including abusive parents; a shared tendency to believe, at least earlier on, that things will go badly and that they don't deserve better; and difficulty expressing their feelings verbally but letting out frustrations through fighting.

Fact/Evidence: Beau says she is unused to things turning out good, and Yasha believes herself to be, as she says, very unlucky or cursed. Her letter covers that she expresses herself through fighting.

Conclusion: I like Beauyasha.

Argument is Opinion + Interpretation; a valid argument is Opinion + Interpretation + Evidence. Meta can include opinion but ultimately is Interpretation and good meta is Interpretation + Evidence. It's fine to post just an opinion, but if you want to change minds, you need an argument, and if you want to be able to hold your own against a counterargument it better be valid.

You can have the same interpretation and facts and different opinions and therefore different conclusions. Someone else could say "I like messy relationships (opinion) and so Beau and Yasha's shared understanding (interpretation, same as mine) is not interesting to me (conclusion)." You can also have a different interpretation from the same facts, either because you are including a different set of facts on a topic or because there is ambiguity and room for different lenses.

If your goal is to change someone's mind - and to be honest mine usually isn't - you are unlikely to change their opinions. Eg, If someone says "I don't like Beauyasha because I prefer messier relationships" I'm not going to convince them on the grounds of "you shouldn't like messier relationships." I need to either put forward an interpretation that supports a messier relationship, or, more realistically, say "understandable, have a nice day" and move on with my life.

That last bit is important - a lot of people also argue on the basis of "well obviously this interpretation is the only one, so you should draw the same opinions from it." and that's likely to fail; either the person disagreeing with you overall does agree on the interpretation but has different opinions (as in the above example), or they have a different interpretation (eg: Beau and Yasha have attacked each other repeatedly) and that is the basis of their opinion (I don't like that). You need to figure out which is going on and address that should you wish to change their mind. And again, I think you should ask why you want to change their mind.

The last point is that all of the above is valid given the text and reflect different perspectives. But if someone were to say "I don't like Beauyasha because Beau turned into a porcupine and moved to France, and I don't like long-distance relationships" the invalid portion is that this literally did not happen (fact leading to interpretation). If someone can correctly dispute the facts of your interpretation (as they stand at the time, obviously; no one is penalized for not being precognitive) then you are fucked, argument-wise. If I point out that Beau did not turn into a porcupine nor move to France, this person's argument falls apart. They can still dislike the relationship, but if they want to justify it with an argument they better find a new interpretation, and fast.

Before I move into the end I will note that you can also just not vibe with something, and that's purely in the realm of opinion + conclusion, a la "this rubs me the wrong way" or "I find this annoying" or "it's cute" and all of those are valid to hold for yourself, and also inaccessible to anyone else

The conclusions I draw from all of the above are first, making posts that are only your opinion/conclusion is always fine - say what you want - but treating it as an argument is a waste of time, and so anything of the order of "how could you not like xyz (unspoken: because I did)" is pointless because my answer is going to be "easily, and with confidence." Secondly, I think it's valuable to look at posts, even those with arguments, as primarily interpretation rather than opinion. Putting forth a separate interpretation is a disagreement, but it's not a disagreement necessarily directed at you; it's disagreeing with you but the parallel play option is available! You do not need to go out trying to convert all to your same mindset. I think a healthy fandom ecosystem has multiple interpretations and opinions and respectful disagreement; the positive version of "let people like/dislike things" (ie, they can like it or dislike it and if you're normal, your enjoyment is not contingent on theirs). Thirdly, get your facts straight or suffer the consequences. And finally, if you are trying to make an argument for an ongoing work and do so over time, your opinion must be fairly consistent even as the interpretation naturally evolves otherwise it becomes clear that you are arguing in favor of a foregone conclusion (often via moving the goalposts). If you say "I like characters who are willing to make painful and difficult choices, and Blorbo always takes the easy way out, so I don't like them" and Blorbo develops into a character who is able to make painful and difficult choices, if you start critiquing Blorbo now on the basis those choices that's still fair but you better come very correct, and it might be wiser to just say "I don't fuck with Blorbo, if you do that's great but I don't."

#anyway this is an effort to improve the caliber of good faith meta also it was just helpful to write out #idk i feel like. very specifically there's been a focus on BUT YOU MUST LIKE MY OPINIONS and. please stop. #and also tbf i specifically feel a lot of the dor/ym dislike (valid even if i disagree) is VERY goalpost moving in nature #and it's like. no it's chill if you dislike a ship i like but could you up your game. #it's like. i take a fencing class and sometimes i'm against partners who are scared to hit. and it's like i can't learn if you won't stab

[olderthannetfic]

Getting this off my chest:

Back from a small fanfic hiatus, and I am absolutely flabbergasted by all of the fic authors now practically begging their readers to READ THE TAGS.

I’ve been seeing this warning written in summaries, in author’s notes, highlighted in all caps in the actual tags. I’ve read so many apologies written by authors in the comments in response to people chastising the author for writing what they wanted to write, for what they tagged correctly — for what essentially comes down to nothing more than having had other people actively ignore their tags or read despite them.

And there seems to be this bizarre, somehow largely accepted idea that it is the creators job and responsibility to beseech their readers to ‘use caution’ and to ‘stay safe’, to ‘be mindful of their health’…

I am beyond confused here.

Since when??? did exercising the most basic form of common sense and acknowledging one’s personal yeas and nays, likes and limitations, become some other random stranger’s burden rather than one’s own? And especially a random person who tagged their work correctly??? Does no one remember how to harness their own powers of discernment and self-regulation???

This little jaunt back onto ao3 has been unlike any that I’ve ever experienced before. What. Happened?????? Who is this new, apparently severely emotionally unstable and obstinately tags-reading resistant audience everyone has come to focus on?

It all feels so out of touch. The basic concept of ao3 is for the reader to seek out what they want, not what they don’t want. And to actually read. But there seems to have been an extremely strong shift away from reading. On ao3. A site built specifically for reading and writing. (And other fandom artistic pursuits, but not my focus, atm; though I’m sure whatever this is has crept steadily into all spaces there.)

Plummeting reading comprehension must be somewhat to blame; the popularity of fanfic amongst younger and wider audiences, as well. But… young people have always been there, as far as my own experiences go, and it was never like this. It’s as if too many readers don’t know how to make good or even practical decisions for themselves anymore, that they’ve lost the skill of choosing, and now believe that they must consume everything that passes before them; — that they have, for some reason, adopted the belief that any turmoil or dislike or discomfort felt within themselves is harm purposely being done to them by the author.

Idk. Idk, idk, idk. It’s just such a bummer to see how much nervousness and distress has entered the community. Authors notes and comments used to be hilarious fun, or a peek into someone else’s real-life world, used to be casual and full of personality, whereas nowadays, there seems to be an underlying hesitancy and distrust, a sort of growing divide between writers and readers, groups which, until recently, very much were not mutually exclusive.

--

Idiots have been around forever. The more you cater to them, the more entitled they get. It's best to shut that shit down fast and use no warnings that indicate a willingness to entertain stupid complaints.

[metalheadsforblacklivesmatter]

I'm not gonna find this tweet because quite frankly I don't feel like going on Twitter

Aside from the fact that this tweet is classist, not everyone can afford lasik, and lasik has been known to cause issues with your eyes, and it's a temporary solution (your eyes will worsen as you get older anyways).

This tweet really ignores how much the optometrist industry is just in general a really shitty and gaslighting industry for people that have issues beyond just astigmatism and vision issues.

And you're probably thinking "Like that's only a small fraction of people. What about everyone else?" That's kind of the fucking issue. I've had shit vision my ENTIRE life. Literally. Was so fucking blind when I was born that it caused long lasting damage in the nerves in my eyes.

Which means I've been to a lot of optometrists, and if you have any vision problems beyond what's seen as "common" (near sighted or near sighted with an astigmatism) they don't know shit.

And I could go into shit like how none of the optometrists thought to point out that I probably don't have depth perception until I was 23. But that's a niche issue regarding a disability I have due to my vision being so shit when I was so young.

Let's go into an issue that's less common. My prescription was +5.00 or worse my entire life. Plus I have an astigmatism. And a lot of contact companies don't make prescriptions for such severe farsightedness with an astigmatism. (They make prescriptions for -5.00, but not +5.00)

Every time I go to the doctor they're like OH MY GAWDS YOUR CONTACT BRAND IS SO BAD ITS LIKE YOUR EYES ARE SUFFOCATONG I MUST GET YOU A NEW ONE. And every single year I'm like "Trust me. You don't have any options in my prescription." And every time they're like OAH MAH GODS THEY MAKE ME EVERY YEAR LET MEH CHECK.

I'm like "Sure. Whatever."

Guess what? Last I actually checked 7 brands carry my prescription in monthly. A few carry my prescription in contacts that need to be changed every 2 weeks. But none of them carry my prescription in contacts that need to be changed every week or every day. (Which is apparently better or something. Idk.)

Why the fuck would I trust the doctors that gaslight me every year about what contacts I can use to suggest surgery for my eyes?

And that's not even getting into the very weird specific issues I have with my vision that eye doctors just.... shrug off... like they legit just ignore it. Like no matter what prescription they put me in I can always tell my vision doesn't match up to my peers even though I technically test 20/20.

(I know about the whole relax your eyes when you test thing. I literally tell my optometrist "Yo. Like this shit so blurry." And they just tell me that this is the best they can correct me to. Just try to focus my eyes more. This this isn't fucking normal.)

Idk. Ableds (derogatory) need to stop demanding disabled people get their shit fixed and instead ask "What the fuck is wrong with the system that these disabled people don't trust it to fix their shit?"

(Not everyone that wears glasses considers themselves disabled. If you don't consider yourself disabled, good for you. But my vision literally can't be fixed to match my peers, so... not to mention glasses can cost people hundreds of dollars and if your vision is shit enough the weight of the lenses can seriously wear and tear on your frames and your face.)

-fae

#disabled pride #disability pride #disability awareness #disability pride month #disability #disability awareness month #glasses #visual disability

[atopvisenyashill]

Who are Sansa’s potential contenders in your opinion?

i’ve talked about this before but i’d love to talk about it again lmao. i think the potential romantic endgame contenders are (in order of most to least likely) jon, brienne, theon, and podrick (there’s a wide gap between theon and podrick) and i use the term romantic like……i mean a little loosely. i’m gonna explain my criteria a bit.

sansa’s suitors must be

within a decade of her age

someone who has, when they meet her, a claim to a seat powerful enough to at least be in the same ballpark as the Starks

someone who would be willing to relocate to winterfell or near winterfell

someone who won't feel threatened by her title

shares her romantic sensibilities

someone whose identity subverts the typical Westerosi idea of what a True Knight and a Proper Husband is

someone who is actively trying and at least partially succeeding at being a good person, but specifically someone who has themes associated with what she desires - a True Knight and Hero From A Song

so let’s explain.

firstly, when we’re talking “potential contenders” i think everyone is picturing something slightly different. i’m talking about like. the relationship that will be one of the focal points of her story going forward, the relationship that will mean the most to her bc it fulfills her dreams while matching her growth and maturity, the relationship her story is building towards her meeting. i think there’s a lot of,,,idk confrontations on the horizon. theon hearing bran in the trees. dany’s nightmare about (probably) euron. everyone and their mother hearing wolves howling in the distance. half these characters are like on a boat, on a dragon, on a walk in the woods, literally on the way to meet someone when we leave them in feastdance and sansa is no exception to this - the Themes Are Coming For Her.

i think there’s been a build up over sansa’s story that she is going to meet The Hero Of Her Dreams, but they will not fit the typical mold of a hero. They will help empower her, protecting her physically while she protects them politically. There will be genuine love, and dedication. A bond to rival Naerys & Aemon, Florian & Jonquil, a person who will love her until the end of her days…a person who is also going to be helpful when it comes to her new role as The Stark In Winterfell. this means a) the line of succession will be dealt with in a practical manner and not swept under the rug and b) someone who likely has some sort of background in either politics or battle.

Maybe it’s a contradiction to say this relationship can be romantic and satisfying to read while also saying there's a chance it will be “subtext” but…I just think, looking at his inspirations being soooo focused on things like courtly love, chivalry, that a spin that involves Sansa feeling a deep affection for a Knight protecting her, with no men around (but again, crucially, having discussed how the hell she’s going to have kids, with a partner who will not shy away from a frank discussion like that) is still a satisfying "romantic" arc. Yes i am saying this is how I have my cake and eat it too, where Braime fucks and then Jaime dies, then Brienne stays in the North with a conveniently (publicly) single Sansa who leans on her for comfort. This is my meta and we're never getting the winds of winter to disprove it, but also I'm thinking specifically of the focus on rumors surrounding the sexualities of a lot of characters in F&B - Alyn and Addam Velaryon, Rhaenyra Targaryen, Laenor and Laena Velaryon, Rhaena the Black Bride, to name just a few very obvious ones - as well as the repeated princess and knight dynamic that follows both Sansa (with Dontos and Sandor) as well as is present in F&B (Rhaenyra & Harwin, Rhaenyra & Criston, Alysanne & Jonquil Darke, Aegon & Visenya imo also fits this) that this dynamic can be romantic but also not explicitly stated to be a sexual or romantic relationship. MOVING ON.

I think it’s actually most likely that Briensa and Jeynsa that are winning the “so which one is actually gonna go canon” war bc they’ll be single, in the same place, and clearly devoted to each other while like, Jon/Theon/Aegon/Sandor/Tyrion/Basically Every Man Shipped With Sansa are miserable and cold or dead elsewhere. (littlefucker isn’t included bc he’s definitely dead 😁). I just need everyone to understand my definition of “goes canon” is so so loose. ANYWAYS. EXPLANATIONS-

within a decade of her age

i am once again saying that every relationship with a huge age gap that starts with one of them below the age of 17 ends badly and the reason is bc george is not a pervy moron, he is actually writing about the ways in which the hypersexualization and forced child marriages in westeros are damaging to these girls. “but he said dany & drogo were in love!!” he’s very clearly the sort who likes to find the romantic and erotic in the grotesque and horrific, and looking at this from the character’s point of view. i think his comments line up just fine with the justifications these girls make to themselves about the marriages they are forced into. also he’s just an old man and he phrases things in ways that make you cringe sometimes, pls be serious 😭 the only exceptions to this rule are really Rhaenys/Corlys and arguably Rhaenyra's various romantic ties but a) none of Rhaenyra's romantic relationships end well and in fact help speed her right along to her gruesome death and b) Rhaenys and Corlys' relationship is fraught with political problems and also, he has an affair with a teenager so again, george is Saying Something about the reasons why certain types of men prefer women much younger than them. "but what about roose and fat walda?" they are both gonna die horribly, next question.

SO. it’s not gonna be tyrion. it’s not gonna be sandor. it’s not gonna be littlefucker. they’re too goddamn old and sansa spending the rest of her life rationalizing these guys perving on her when she’s barely even middle school aged is not (imo) the ending she is going to get.

this leaves us with the rest of her more popular ships - jeyne, margaery, harry, sweetrobin, aegon vi, jon, theon (admittedly pushing it here! i can be logical about this!), podrick, and brienne (technically bran and arya are here too ig, i mean if we want to be really fair to all ships). onto the next criteria-

someone who has a claim to something in the same general social circle as winterfell

technically i do think there’s a chance george goes for something radical at the ending like abolishing the monarchy and if he does that i will kiss him on the mouth (with consent from him & parris). BUT. i think the most likely ending is more of a loosening of the feudal system - showing us the next few hopeful steps away from absolute monarchies. what i’m saying is The System still exists and will still exist throughout twow and ados, so I think it’s logical to assume that Sansa is not going to marry “beneath” her. if anyone does, it's arya.

anyways that’s a double pass on sandor & littlefucker. this is also why i admit pod is a stretch - the paynes aren’t nobodies but pod himself is from a cadet branch, so fairly low in the pecking order . i mostly include him bc i think he’ll make a name for himself alongside brienne, potentially enough to overcome that gap and he fits the rest of the criteria too well imo to completely disregard him. “why can’t sandor or littlefucker do that” bc sandor doesn’t have enough time before the end of the series to make up for all the shit he did as the hound In The Eyes Of The Public Or, Crucially, Sansa’s Family and littlefucker is going to die 😁

you could argue this also crosses out jon and jeyne. COUNTERPOINT - jeyne is a girl it literally doesn’t matter so long as she’s high enough to be one of sansa’s ladies and she is, so she passes; jon is one of three targaryens left alive (and even if aegon's a blackfyre, he doesn't know that so still counts!!) and all the secrecy around jon's legitimacy + robb’s will means clearly something is cooking here. also he has an impressive resume on paper.

someone who would actually live in Winterfell

I don’t feel it’s necessary to argue that Sansa is going to be IN WINTERFELL and END UP IN WINTERFELL bc she lichrally builds Winterfell after Arya, the sibling she interacts with the most, hears a prophecy about a girl slaying a giant IN A CASTLE MADE OF SNOW. This does not feel subtle nor like a stretch. Whether she’s a regent for Rickon/Bran, a ruling lady, or a queen, she is GOING HOME the same as the rest of the Starklings and she will be important in helping rebuild it. Therefore, the person she’s with has to not only be cool with being at Winterfell often, they have to not induce immediate fury and rage in her siblings.

sandor? triple dead. tyrion? we’ll call him 1.5 dead to be polite. aegon vi? doomed and dead. harry hardyng? does Not seem likely to relocate. littlefucker probably would relocate but good luck getting two steps into the north or riverlands without every living starks’ “it’s time to beat that annoying fuck up” alarms blaring in their heads ready to run him through.

theon is a hard maybe but since he actually feels bad & also grew up with them, i think he has plenty of time in the next 2k pages of story to make up some ground with jon, arya, and bran. margaery feels like a hard maybe as well - it’s looking bleak for the tyrells & i don’t think margaery’s family is going to let her move to the north without a good reason. but i also feel like. there’s too many unknowns to technically count her out.

brienne & pod Will be living in the North and they Will be on the guard and That Is That. jeyne & jon don’t seem to have any plans on leaving the North any time soon either.

someone who won't feel threatened by her title

this is a near constant through line in her story - that whoever marries her will want her for her claim first and foremost. it's going to factor into her relationships, specifically about how she's going to have a child. whether she has a secret marriage, longstanding affair, or a public husband, it's going to be someone who is not constantly trying to usurp her power literally or metaphorically.

that means no aegon vi, no sweetrobin, no harry, no littlefucker, no tyrion. tyrion's claim to the westerlands is a competing one with her, and tyrion himself is interested in her title way more than sansa as a person (it's why he doesn't see her escape coming and why he's so bitter over it - the whole time he thought she was a silly girl and had no idea she was plotting to escape and nearly did escape at several points. he thought she was helpless! you can bet your ass he is going to feel threatened by the idea that she does not need his ass). sandor, imo, will also feel threatened by her having such a lofty title, and i cannot see him being capable of any sort of secret marriage. "well they could just marry publicly" she's not publicly marrying a man known to be a child killer. to be completely honest, i think margaery would feel threatened by her title as well.

jon, podrick, brienne, jeyne are all people who would not only not feel threatened, they would be proud, celebrate it, actively fight to keep her in a state of power. theon is imo a maybe - the theon we meet in the beginning would objectively feel threatened by Sansa having a title loftier than his. a theon who has lived through everything he has by the end of the dance is imo much more likely to be happier out of the spotlight. all of them as well would be willing to be frank about how she's going to have a child, and would not mind Sansa saying something like "my children were fathered by a wolf."

someone who shares her romantic sensibilities

listen. she's gonna like, get along with her suitor. someone who won't laugh at her for wanting to be swept off her feet, someone who also craves a more romantic life.

this eliminates, imo, harry, sweetrobin, littlefucker, and sandor, probably aegon vi as well.

brienne, jon, theon, jeyne, and podrick are all romantic types - jon imagines having children named after ned and robb just llike sansa, theon had dreamed as a hostage of marrying sansa and calling ned father, brienne dreams of lofty knightly ideals of protecting the weak, and podrick and jeyne both have stories very much tied to subverting the ideas of a true knight and a damsel in distress.

someone who is an Atypical True Knight

💙✨this is a post about briensa✨💙

true knight/hero from a song themes + marginalized in some way in Westeros = brienne, jon, theon, tyrion. sandor feels relevant here in that he is not a true knight but he clearly wants to be after his encounters with the stark girls and also he doesn't look like one either.

aegon vi could arguably count due to being dornish, so i guess i'll give him a .5 in this category. harry is as typical as they come, and neither margaery nor jeyne have anything that links them narratively to the concept of a true knight or hero from a story (except, i suppose, for jeyne's link to theon). podrick is also fairly typical but again, kinda lowish for a noble so i guess .5, and he also has several scenes where he's expressly linked with being an Atypical True Knight (mainly, the scene where he saves Tyrion during the Battle on the Blackwater).

a True Knight

i simply do not think the lesson sansa is going to “learn” here is that no one will ever love her for who she is and her marriage will be about her claim and nothing more because there are no True Knights left. every time someone is like “she won’t have a romance bc her story is about not needing love” i find it mind boggling because in what world is asoiaf about not needing love, first of all, and second of all, her arc wrt her desires for marriage and love has so clearly been tied to this concept of a True Knight and the idea that a True Knight does not always ~look good~ and that someone who is not a knight may be capable of good and that you can always just Choose To Do Good at any point but you have to Make That Choice, and that is all very different from “not needing love.” Sansa is naive yes but!! Sansa is Dunk sitting there surrounded by strong handsome men in expensive, gorgeous armor and asking if there are any true knights among them-

EXCEPT SOMEONE WILL STEP UP TO THE PLATE.

“a dream of spring” means there will be just a little hope. so help Will Come and they will be a True Knight they just won’t take a form she expects. this is a large part of the reason why i’m on the briensa train. Brienne is The Truest Of True Knights! She serves a King she's in love with who doesn't love her back faithfully, she swears a vow to Sansa's mother after comparing Catelyn's courage to that of a knight's and laments the fate of women who die unremembered in a birthing bed, she's on a noble quest to find Sansa with an assist from The Most Infamous Knight In Westerosi History, she’s the secret descendant of The Other Truest Of True Knights, and I feel it’s very clear from geography, theme, and foreshadowing standpoints that Brienne and Sansa are going to be linking up soon.

I have always felt that the Ashford Tourney Theory is linking Sansa to both Jon and Brienne narratively - Jon for being the dark haired Targaryen Prince defender and Brienne for being the Dunk descendant and True Knight that interrupts the tourney. Not only that, but Jon has that "she wished for a hero to strike him down" "ed, fetch me a block" parallel that I think is really important.

BUT. They're not the only ones with links like this. Theon has the similar link of how life is not a song and is actively grasping for redemption when we last left him. Podrick, like Brienne, is on a True Knight's quest to save Sansas and is discounted as a hero despite having several heroic moments for himself - including actively seeking Brienne out to help with her quest. Tyrion frequently struggles with concepts of morality but is on an absolute downward trajectory.

Who is not tied to these last two concepts nor acts at all like a True Knight? Aegon VI (arguable I suppose), Harry Hardyng, and once again, Littlefucker.

IN SUMMATION

Who doesn't fit any of the critera? Littlefucker, and that's why his ass is grass.

Who fits very little of the criteria? Tyrion (too old, not likely to live in Winterfell, cares too much about her title, on a downward spiral), Sandor (too old, too low born, not a True Knight and not becoming one any time soon, plus Arya will kill him if he tries something), Aegon VI (would not relocate, is not tied to the concept of a True Knight, plus he's doomed), Harry Hardyng (would not relocate, cares too much about titles, is not a true knight nor atypical in way, doesn't seem given to romantic sensibilities).

Who fits most of the criteria? Jeyne Poole and Margaery Tyrell. However there are pretty big plot reasons Margaery won't have any sort of romantic, subtext or otherwise, long lasting relationship with Sansa so even though on paper she fits, I think she's highly unlikely to impossible.

Who fits all of that criteria, ie, close to her age, has an important name (or has a reason why it doesn't matter), and is an Atypical True Knight with a romantic outlook on life with narrative links to Sansa? Brienne of Tarth and Jon Snow, and arguably Theon Greyjoy and Podrick Payne.

Anyways I think Sansa should start a bisexual polycule in the North. Thank you for coming to my ted talk.

#asks #anons #sansa stark #fathered by a wolf #rani attempts meta #briensa #theonsa #jonsa #anti sansan #anti petsa #anti sanrion #book jonsa

[unpretty]

do you mind sharing what web browser add ons you use? you seem to know your stuff and i feel like there's helpful stuff i've missed

my firefox extensions are pretty boring and sometimes cringe

AliExpress Superstar - okay so this one is the cringiest one. i like to buy a lot of dumb shit and it gives me a camelcamelcamel-type graph of what the price has been doing because sellers on ali love to have 'sales' that actually cost more than the item does normally. not really useful unless you also love bad decisions.

BitWarden - i switched to bitwarden as my primary password manager from lastpass and i regret nothing. i've been using the free version no problem but i keep meaning to upgrade so i can use my yubikey again.

ClearURLs - this gets rid of all the stuff after the ? in a url, in theory. lately it's been missing some cruft in twitter urls, and also has been interfering with pocket somehow? very confusing. i give this one a mixed review.

Facebook Container - keeps facebook in an isolated shame zone so they don't know what i'm up to.

Firefox Multi-Account Containers - firefox has containers built in but you need the extension if you want to set certain urls to always open in certain containers (i do this for amazon, aliexpress, google, and twitter because i don't trust them). iirc they recently added security features that maybe make the containers obsolete anyway? idk man

Greasemonkey - for installing userscripts like the ones on greasyfork. i don't have as many of these as i used to, but whatever.

Ignore X-Frame Options - this one's Niche lmao. websites disable loading in an x-frame because they don't want their site being embedded on another website or whatever but that means comic-rocket doesn't work on their site. and i like using comic-rocket to keep track of where i'm at so i can go back later if i accidentally forget to read anything for six months. which has happened. anyway that's the only reason i have this extension. hiveworks please stop blocking comic-rocket, i already disabled adblocking for comic-rocket, i'm not going to disable ads for every comic on your fucking network, calm down.

Library Extension - EVERYONE SHOULD INSTALL LIBRARY EXTENSION. god. it has saved me so much money. stopped me from so many impulse purchases. and it lets me look up whether something is on scribd instead of just the library which is handy for me specifically, since i have scribd and my library can be limited.

Inoreader Extension - i use inoreader so i have the extension. pretty self-explanatory. tells me how behind i am on reading the entire internet, also makes it easy to subscribe to feeds when i find a new one.

RSSPreview - firefox used to let you preview rss feeds by default but they broke it because they lack my dedication to keeping rss alive

Snap Links - okay. this one is maybe a weird one. it lets me click and drag with the right button to make a box and then open every link in the box in a new tab. sometimes there is a long list and i want to read all the things. or else load up a bunch of forum pages to read while i'm offline.

Something Awful Last Read Redux - i don't have to explain myself to you but also you will take keyboard nav out of my cold dead hands

SponsorBlock for YouTube - self-promo is fine but i don't need to hear about expressvpn

stutter - it does that thing where it lets you read things one word at a time to read really fast. i already read pretty fast but sometimes this forces me enough to focus on something when i'm having attention issues.

Stylus - this is the good one after stylish turned into spyware or whatever. i need to be able to tweak css to live.

Tapas RSS Button - tapas still has rss feeds but it hid them so i installed a thing to bring the buttons back. i could probably be using a userscript for this but whatever.

Translate Web Pages - it's pretty much google translate, i feel like there must be a better one because this one kind of sucks to configure but i'm lazy

uBlacklist - just recently installed this to never see pinterest or fandom.com in my search results. i will probably add more shitty websites as time goes on.

uBlock Origin - still my ad and script blocker of choice. makes it relatively easy both to block elements as well as to opt out and explain that i clicked that ad on purpose, which is a thing i do sometimes and i need my ad blocker to respect my poor choices without forcing me to permanently enable whatever website i wanted to see.

Web Scrobbler - yes i still use last.fm in 2022 and will continue to do so. i am trying to get scrobbling from rockbox to work as we speak. it's 2022 but i'm reverting back to 2008. catch me on myspace soon probably.

XKit Rewritten - imagine using tumblr without xkit. i would die.

#original #how to internet #i didn't actually need to tell you ALL of them like i'm confessing my sins but here we are

[livlepretre]

I was wondering when did Elena exactly become accustomed to the horrific actions of her vampire suitors? I know it must’ve been a gradual change, but my guess is that after she was rescued from her 3 year exile, she must’ve acknowledged the fact that she must accept to live with these murderers without being phased or bothered (as long as she’s not the focus of the violence) in order to enjoy her life to an extent. Like to me, in FE 64 it seemed like her moral compass was so unbalanced compared to the usual (maybe it seemed like that to me because we had to wait a while for the update but idk) - it was clear that one of the main themes of this chapter was to emphasize the mental change Elena has underwent since the beginning of the story. Would you be able to give us some insight?

Also how are you how are you doing? I’m planning on starting to read 100 years of exile and some of your other book recommendations cause I need to get my mind off of this fic in order to not torture myself on waiting for the update. 💝💐

Quite a question.

I think a lot of this actually starts on the show before the point of canon divergence.

In episode 7, she slaps Damon because of how "[he] hurts people"-- this, to me, is an expression of Elena's baseline sense of morality-- a very normal, well-adjusted disgust against harming others, and a willingness to take and articulate a moral stand-- and to back it up with force if necessary. She does her best here, and she also does her best a few episodes later to try to stop Damon from opening the tomb-- in large part to prevent the tomb vamps from escaping and wreaking havoc, if I recall correctly. (If I don't, forgive me: it's been like a decade since I've watched season 1).

(actually, this probably means I should go rewatch season 1 now)

By the end of the season we get some unnerving hints at things. She's not too torn up by Stefan attacking that girl at the founder's ball. Isobel gives her that warning about the path she's on so long as she has a Salvatore on each arm.

then: she forgives Damon for murdering her brother. HUGE red flag. Yes, it was undone, but he still did it.

She also moves on from Caroline eating that guy in 2x02 like it was just a small misdemeanor. Remember, it's Bonnie who cares that that happened, Elena just wants to move on with helping Caroline adjust.

then, in Kill or Be Killed, Damon, Caroline, and Stefan are responsible for the murders (and consumption!) of the Sheriff's deputies. Elena literally does not bat an eyelash. It's astonishing. I feel like SO much more weight should be given to this, because she literally hangs around while people she presumably knows at least as acquaintances get murdered. but she pretty much just moves past it because the ones doing the murdering are her friends and beloveds.

We have tons more examples-- classmates getting dropped like flies, acquaintances getting killed and eaten-- she's less and less affected by it.

I think she has a horror in the beginning of Fairytale Ending by the scale and the gruesomeness of the vampire attacks she witnesses-- but a lot of it is also tied up in her feelings of powerlessness. She tried to help Sasha and Zoe. They both died. Klaus promised her not to kill Matt-- so he had Stefan do it instead. But even in those early chapters, with things like the head detaching and rolling across the parlor floor, or the party where Stefan drains all of the guests, or any other incident-- she's not really thinking about the specific horror of those people dying. She's thinking about her jealousy, her relationship with Stefan, how she pities him and feels so upset on his behalf; she's analyzing her power dynamics with Klaus, and Rebekah, and the sexual dynamics between Klaus, Rebekah, and Stefan.

The only REAL horror she seems to have is when she kills that witch-- because that is the first murder on her hands-- and later, when she sets up Klaus to murder their way out of the compound in chapter 22.

She gets over it, but it does stick with her.

Like, she can and does cope by reminding herself of what they would wish to do to her.

There is a lot of bloodshed after that, at the Abattoir when they return, but she's by now got skin in the game in terms of finding the bloodstone, and she's seen a lot, and it's only the ones she loves that she actually cares about.

That's why Tyler's torture haunts her. She loves Tyler, and his torture was her fault.

She faces this directly within herself that summer in exile with Rebekah-- she realizes that Rebekah's out hunting, sometimes, and she decides not to be upset about it. It definitely took her exile and loneliness and emotional catharsis and survival to get to this point, and it did transform her. She talks about this explicitly around the time she arrives in New York-- she tells Klaus that their hunting won't bother her and points out, with Rebekah confirming, that she never complained a peep about it over the summer.

So by the time she's in New York, she's definitely observing a lot of their predatory behavior, fully aware of where it's going, and she's not especially affected by it. Like, there is still revulsion there, still unease and horror, but it gets less and less with time.

I did want to bring this transformation in Elena into focus in this last chapter, which is why it's brought up numerous times, but really, she's been on the road to this level of non-concern for quite a while. Hopefully, if you ever plan a reread, with the chapters back to back rather than spaced months (or years!) apart, this will gel more fully and feel more gradual.

And! did you ever read 100 years of solitude? because! that is just so my very favorite book of all time!

#asks #fairytale ending

[future-crab]

Please..tell me everything that’s on your mind about hesitant alien, I’ll start: Haunted house is underrated

Haunted House IS underrated, you’re so right anon

Anyway, I have SO many thoughts about Hesitant Alien that I don’t even know which ones to focus on (hence why it took me like 2 months to answer this ask) but one thing that I’ve been thinking about a lot recently is tracks on Hesitant Alien that feel like sister songs to stuff from mcr. I’ve already talked kind of a lot about Drugstore Perfume and Kill All Your Friends, but the ones I’ve been thinking about lately are How It’s Going to Be and Foundations of Decay. They both evoke for me (tho obviously there’s multiple ways to interpret them) the specific feeling of, like, “I spent my whole life thinking I would die young, and then I didn’t, and now I’ve reached an age I never thought I’d get to and I have to figure out what to actually do with this life.”

And there’s something I find so fascinating about the contrast of Foundations, a song with a very dark, moody sound that is, at heart, deeply life-affirming (“you must fix your heart,” and all that) vs How It’s Going to Be, a song that sounds on the surface really saccharine and lighthearted but that has an undercurrent of deep anger and resentment (“You said we’d all be dead by twenty-five,” “Your disappointed sighs,” “We’re just bored you’re still alive,” etc). Idk. Much to think about.

#now that i think about it desert song how it’s going to be and foundations make a really fascinating tryptic #but you asked about hesalien so this really isn’t the time to get into that #anyway thanks anon! sorry it took me so long to respond! #i had too many hesalien thoughts to sort through #mcr #gerard way #hesitant alien #baby you’re a haunted house #how it’s going to be #foundations of decay

[genderkoolaid]

Honestly, I was not expecting that kind of a response, thank you. And yeah, I guess I am just kinda hurting, when I was a small little trans boy in a small little Christian town, online trans spaces were the only place I could go and so many of them were filled with transfems putting down transmascs. And I guess it’s just kinda like, after you see enough of that shit you just kinda give up on having an ally in that group. Because yeah one or two isn’t bad, but when it’s constant like it is in a lot of Reddit/twitter spaces which was where my trans ass was, seeing people saying we should all just band together and forget our differences, idk, it just kinda hits me as naive. Obviously this isn’t to put down transfems, no group is a monolith, there’s just a very vocal minority of transfems who I had my first experiences with and it was like, okay, what the fuck am I trying to do allying with these ppl. Idk, it still seems a little bit fantastical to all band together. Plus pretty much (especially white) transfem I’ve met believes they are in some way more oppressed for being trans even if they acknowledge trans men “kinda face oppression too”, idk, it just seems like lumping us all together is like putting us in a get along tshirt and not realizing that some ppl don’t want to be around ppl who have historically hurt them a lot. Idk.

It makes sense that when you hear transunity your first thought is of the people who have hurt you the most, and that must have been traumatizing. The online community in general tends to emphasize the most divisive opinions & also tends to be dominated by the more privileged and sheltered people in the community, which is why many people find that people they meet in physical spaces tend to have much more diverse and open opinions. When that's the dominant way you experience the community, it definitely leaves you feeling like community is doomed to fail. This (both intra-community violence in general and transandrophobia specifically) has been allowed to fester in trans spaces for far too long. I get how while you logically know its a small minority your view of trans solidarity has been stained by that & that can be really hard to change, especially when that kind of thing is still a problem in the community.

If you want my opinion: taking care of your own mental health, especially as it relates to gender, and exposing yourself to transfems & other trans people who are openly supportive of transmasc activism, is vital. Running this blog I've found a lot of transfems who support the conversation around transandrophobia, including people who are extremely supportive and vocal about it. When you see people like that more and more, you start to focus on the ways we can help each other more than the ways we harm each other. I see other trans people talking about transandrophobia and transunity and it affirms to me how they are people who take this seriously and want to build a safer community for everyone. cipheramnesia is a pretty big transfem blogger who's been vocally supportive of transmasc activism discussing transandrophobia, and the reason I got into this discussion in the first place was through seeing a trans woman talk about it and insist that it wasn't inherently transmisogynistic and that transmascs do deserve to be heard about the details of our oppression. I may have never made this blog at all if it weren't for transfems being vocal allies of transmasc activism.

I've also seen a lot of trans people with awful, divisive, and bigoted takes; I know those come from people who are also hurting, who are lashing out at people they have biases against because it lets them feel some kind of control and release. Its tempting to step back and leave the whole thing behind- and if that's what you need to do for your mental health and safety, that is your right. But to me, the hardest and most important thing about activism is acknowledging how real change has to come from opening up and making connections and risking pain and rejection for the sake of transformation.

Transunity is, fundamentally, about taking that risk because we know its the only way we can unwork the thing that keeps all of us oppressed, the only thing that truly and consistently benefits from the infighting. Transunity is a direct response to the behavior you describe, created by trans people from multiple different groups. Its still very, very young as a movement but the more it grows, hopefully, the more people who will be vocal about the issues in our community and how open discussion and active solidarity are vital to our liberation. There may always be discourse and assholes lashing out, but there will also always be people putting in the work and showing compassion, so those people will find each other and work for the betterment of everyone, including those trying to tear each other apart.

Like I said, its also important to take care of your mental health. Alienation from your community is traumatizing (as plenty of aspec people can tell you), and that leaves you with defense mechanisms meant to keep you safe that can be hard to get rid of. I think transmasc-focused spaces can be really, really helpful in healing that kind of trauma and help you feel much more stable and supported in your transness & as a person, which in turn makes you more willing to take that risk and open up for a chance at solidarity and community. A lot of times, you need to take care of yourself and get in a good place before you can really engage in community activism, so I don't blame you at all for being wary of transunity when you are obviously still hurting. Healing is fucked up and messy and its alright to have complex emotions about people and things while you are dealing with that pain. Like I said, at the end of the day I wish you the best, and I hope you find yourself a community that supports you like you deserve.

#m. #ask box #transunity

[firemama]

Jafar's return was essential to the Aladdin story. Sure the movie sucked in the way it was made and let's not even talk about the animation quality but to fully scrap Jafar's return would be to get rid of a crucial part of the original Aladdin that ties in with the sequel. Jafar wasn't dead yet and it's just normal he would seek revenge after all. Plus, Jafar was the most favorite villain of all of the Aladdin villains (not even Mozenrath sufficed according to fandom surveys). You really gotta cut Jafar some slack.

i WILL cut Jafar some slack cause he *is*, you're right, a pretty terrifying disney villian all things considered.

But I really truly think he's only at his best as working from, y'know, inside the system. He's a scary bad guy because he's bribed, threatened, and manipulated his way into a very high seat of power; he's scary because he blackmails and gaslights and lies.

Jafar as a genie is uh, very specifically... less interesting? it loses the metaphor of corruption in the high ranks, and it's more about the "innately evil strong monster" kind of character, and he doesn't even function as a particularly good or interesting foil to Genie, the other member of the species? Like, if we WERE going to do a whole movie with a focus on Jafar Returns in 'my' version of re-written aladdin...

well, I think i would have focused a lot more on juxtaposing Jafar to Genie for starters. Jafar was a human that became a genie out of greed for power and it inevitably enslaved him to another's will (again, movie 1 is definitely good with jafar, because thats such a good metaphor for politics) so I would have a movie focus a lot less on the redemption of a magical talking bird (is Iago funny? yeah, but not enough to drive plot, sorry) and focus more on it maybe revealing more about Genies as a species, or about The Genie himself. was *he* human, or was he born a powerful being? What are the implications of that, was he ALWAYS enslaved or was he born with a semblance of freedom, and how must genie feel about having watched a man simply gain the same powers as him, become bound?

Idk. I think Jafar aught to be confined to the first movie, in my opinion, and in true kids movie fashion instead of being Killed by Laval, he aughta just be imprisoned in the lamp indefinitely in the Cave of Wonders. If I DID do a return-of-jafar movie, i think i would change from a triology to four movies, and i might put it as the very last fourth movie; return of The Big Bad style, and maybe do a little bit of exploring of Genie's backstory now that it's been revealed aladdin's father was a previous master of the genie. But im still not really convinced on how to do a good job of utilitizing Jafar as a villian, because he's *scary* as a moralless man, but not as a genie; he's merely Strong as a genie.

(Also, if we did the fourth movie thing with a Genie vs Jafar foil, I'd probably make there some point in which we find out The Genie had a name. as it stands in my triology, I think The Genie is the only genie until Jafar makes is fucked wish and that 'Genie' is his name. But if we were doing a Thing where we compare them, i think Genie should have been born/created/etc to different name and that 'The Genie' would have been a title he was given as, y'know, a legendary tool?)

#i have thoughts #and im not dissing Jafar #im dissing the Second Movie #munchatter #no idea if this is coherent #i just spent 12 hours packing in preperation for a move so i think im a lil Frazzled lmao

[youremyheaven]

I'm currently in my Venus md and although it is supposed to be a good dasha, it's been kicking my ass since the beginning 😭 Ketu dasha was a strange experience, a lot of turmoil in friendships (and BRUTAL breakups) but mentally I felt kind of stable like almost stoic. But girl Venus dasha is something else, idk what's going on in the stars but it's like the guardian angel had enough and decided to troll 💀 I have Venus in taurus krittika (praying for a sun/venus man 🙌) conjuct Rahu and aspected by Mars, what do you think about this ? Do you know how to balance Venus influence ?

Btw I love your posts 💜 your insights are so interesting and unique! Can't wait for you to expand more on spirituality 💫

2022 was a Venus year and it was easily my most unhinged, chaotic and delulu year lmao,,, i was def experiencing all the typical Venusian themes of love, indulgence, feeling gorg, but also feeling sad, excluded, unable to connect to others etc,, it was very imbalanced and out of proportion. i attracted a lot of attention but that included a lot of negative attention as well

i think your experiences reflect your placements. you must have a good Ketu placement if you felt stoic during it omg😩

i think the Venus conjunct Rahu is what is causing the imbalance. Rahu blows things out of proportion and exaggerates the effects of Venus,,, on top of it all, its also aspecting Mars?? 😩girl which house is your Venus?? Mars has a tendency to be destructive 😬so the overblown Rahuvian Venus keeps running into accidents 😔

the thing that has helped me a lot is decentering my fixation with Venusian things (beauty, love, relationships etc) and channelling it thru other more "stable" venues like making art, writing, finding new hobbies. the more you feed Venus, the more it grows. im not saying you should starve Venus but you need to cut its air supply a little bit, if you catch my drift. i lose myself in relationships very easily and im VERY aware of that, so detaching from it to consciously focus on myself helps me "balance" my Venusian influence, its also easyyy to hyperfixate over beauty, romance etc and honestly i find it very freeing to not look in the mirror picking myself apart and tbh i feel like ive become prettier since 🤪 they key is to distance yourself from Venusian indulgence and focus instead on Venusian creativity. you can appreciate beauty through music, film, art etc instead of making it a self centered activity (i dont even know if these are things u struggle with bc of your Venus dasha but im just sayin')

affirmations have helped me a lot and doing spiritual tingzzz and dabbling in glamour magic and witchcraft has helped me feel beautiful from within. feed your spirituality and watch your peace and vibrancy grow. i started praying to my ishta devata during my Venus year as well <333

tysm<333 id love to post more about spirituality tbh,, lmk if there's anything specific youd like for me to talk about

#spirituality

[musiclover2732]

@zexalmonth Day 8: Dress-Up Day

so for today i wanted to assign Eras Tour outfits to different characters. this will just be a list because that is way too many outfits to try and draw.

gonna limit this to one outfit per Era otherwise it might get confusing since there are some variants and she adds things to the base outfits like jackets and shirts and idk if those count as a separate outfit or not. there will be a bias towards the dresses from my show.

Lover Era bodysuit w/ blazer - Rio Kamishiro: the blazer that Taylor wears during The Man (and just that song itself) fits Rio so well. it’s sparkly and fun, but still has an aura of power. and Rio would definitely enjoy flexing her muscles in front of over 70,000 people! the Lover Era in general fits her very well. trying to be confident but still visibly insecure and unsure. there are less love songs on Lover than Rep and it shows. all color variants of the outfit work well with her too honestly.

Fearless Era dress - Mizael: it’s too perfect. specifically the variant that looks like a flapper dress. like, can you imagine him doing the little twirls that Taylor does while she sings Fearless. it’s an Era about discovery and embracing new changes, so that can be compared to how Mizael has his whole sense of self shaken when he finds out he was once human. the outfit also just generally fits the aesthetic we see from him in the show.

evermore Era orange dress - Thomas Arclight: the depressed and forgotten middle child. am i talking about IV or evermore? the world may never know. the orange dress specifically because it’s for ‘Tis The Damn Season since the No Body No Crime dress was too sparkly and badass for him.

Reputation Era asymmetrical bodysuit - Vector: my second favorite Era goes to my second favorite character. i almost wore this Rep-inspired top that i have but remembered that it’s a three hour concert and decided to prioritize comfort. he is Rep Era to a T however. the black and red suit him as do the snakes. the bridge of Don’t Blame Me takes us swifties to church which is incidentally how i feel watching Vector duel. vaguely sexual but clearly the focus is on being bitchy. Taylor mocking and flipping off the other Eras during LWYMMD is very Vector.

Speak Now Era ballgown - Michael Arclight: this one is obvious but so fitting. fairytale era for the history nerd. he is so the Speak Now Era with his sword and sweetness but also with his deep longing for the last which has been lost and a ruined childhood you can never get back, but still you must move forward with optimism tainted with fear. he also just deserves a big, beautiful, sparkly dress. honorable mention to Durbe in the one long sleeved SN dress that i don’t particularly care for at all.

Red Era 22 outfit - Yuma Tsukumo: ah yes the playful t-shirt that will say “A LOT GOING ON AT THE MOMENT”, “WHO’S TAYLOR SWIFT ANYWAY, EW”, or “WE ARE NEVER EVER GETTING BACK TOGETHER. LIKE EVER” alongside the famous black hat that is handed to one lucky fan each night. this is just so Yuma. joyful and fun, but still very kind and generous. the energy from 22 is very much his style, spending time with friends as a way to let got and distract yourself from the scary and sad stuff.

folklore Era green dress - Astral: first and foremost Astral would look amazing in green. but more importantly, folklore is an Era that involves a lot of self reflection and having wisdom from experience. there’s the playful sassiness and joy of betty, the 1, tlgad, and even august. those long sleeves were clearly a lot of fun to move around in; very gentle and floaty like Astral. but then there’s the pain and anguish of the illicit affairs bridge (which calls to mind Yuma’s betrayal at the Sargasso duel). the quiet acceptance and sorrow of my tears ricochet. and finally the knowledge and looking back while also looking forward while loving someone not quite as mature as you in cardigan. (the white dress could also work here, but not the purple one)

1989 Era orange two-piece - Anna Kozuki: the fun and peppy pop Era, my favorite Era! cheerful, yet destructive. i could so see Anna wearing this while destroying a man’s possessions with a golf club. still a hint of romance, but also this is where Taylor shows the Lover house being burned so y’know how it is. i actually debated putting Anna as my favorite girl on Day 4 but i had felt bad about not liking Rio before and she tied into the OC i talked about. i’ve loved Anna since the beginning tho and she is so underrated much like 1989. they would both kill a man with a smile on their face. Anna uses a bright pink cannon and Taylor has a light-up golf club so you can see the similarities. (the pink variant would also apply here but not the green one)

the Surprise Song dresses - Kaito Tenjo: because the surprise song is different every night there really is no theme or deeper reason. i just think he would look cute in them. he also has acoustic guitar vibes.

Midnights Era t-shirt - Ryoga Kamishiro: the depression shirt. i could fill a book with characters that fit the lyrics of Anti-Hero (my self-insert OC included) but not only does Shark fit that song (along with some of Midnight Rain, which is sung for part of when Taylor wears this outfit), he also would look the best in the outfit. we see the leggings for the rest of the set, but they aren’t the focus. the oversized and sparkly shirt is very Shark in a way i can’t quite explain. i actually drew inspiration for this by dressing my doll custom (who i still need to do the eye-swap for) in a similar outfit. it also kind of parallels the Lover outfit which i already assigned to Rio. (bonus: Kyoji Yagumo in the outfit for Vigilante Shit would kill. it already reminds me of his canon outfit anyway. i think he deserves to do a sexy chair dance after all his trauma. plus he likes getting dirt on corrupt people and making them pay!)

so that’s my list. i may draw these one day, but today is not that day.

#tumblr bumped me out of this when i was nearly done and i almost died but luckily it saved it #this is late because i ended up scrapping a different but still swift-related idea since i didn’t wanna draw today #hope this is comprehendible to normal people #might carry this theme and do day 3 at the end of the month #it would be assigning a character or ship to all 44 songs from my tour night #zexal month #zexal month 2023

[tame-a-messenger]

Re: the last ask but only about the smosh games part, because I don't have fully formed opinions on pit tbh

I feel like with the amount of videos smosh games puts out, they couldn't do "love is blind" type videos 3 times a week. Logistically, energy wise, and financially.

The guesses videos are just a lot easier to produce and I feel pretty confident about saying that they need to do that to keep up the posting schedule. (Technically not those specific videos, but formats in that ball park.)

If they should is another question but probably they have to, because money. Idk how much profit smosh makes, but their margin must be a lot slimmer than people imagine. All the salaries they have to pay, etc. And yk how shayne and stuff talked about feeling like smosh would had to shut down if Anthony didn't come back. That makes me feel like they were barely turning profit in those times and now it prob is better, but not extremely more.

Smosh games is simultaneously the one that makes the best and the most boring videos. From all smosh channels, it is least consistent, and I think it very much has to do with the amount they produce. And realistically, that won't change.

They good thing is that you can skip a bunch of uploads and still have multiple new smosh games videos you can watch per week.

But yeah if all those considerations weren't on the table the perfect smosh games would be a lot of gaming content mixed with high energy character videos (love is blind falls under that too). And of course the pinnacle, characters playing video games.

Sadly my wish won't come true, because of what I just stated but also because the types of videos I enjoy typically get the least views on top of that (not always but yeah). I suffer from too great of taste djkds.

I think what you said about them having to turn profit is the sole reason they do so much of the "lackluster" content like the Guesses videos. Those videos get consistent views for all uploads (averaging about 600k views which I believe makes them "roughly" $18k if monetized) and are really easy to make, for filming and editing.

Like I've said and am sure everyone is aware of, they make a lot of videos because they know it'll get a certain number of views. Look at Reddit Stories! Whereas if one-off videos don't get views they don't do them again typically.

The topic of why they decide to certain videos isn't really what I'm the most peeved about. (even though it DOES peev me! It's at the least understandable why they do it)(we talked about how they could transition to doing other videos without loosing money here)

The main thing I want from Smosh is for them to better focus on what the ACTUAL community wants! somebody has to watch their content so they can make money? I don't understand why it's far and between when they do stuff for the fans. We've been saying that we want the Summer/Winter Games back since it's been gone, it's like whoever runs the creative directing(?) (whoever decides the video concepts) pays almost no attention to comments/generally anything Smosh related on the internet. It's like they only focus on their personal timeline and the trending tab.

(Rant incoming!->

Full shade, I really don't think the social team takes their jobs seriously. Something has to be going wrong behind the scenes for so much shit to come off so weird. Mainly talking about the disaster with Sword AF S2, idk who's idea it was to let the community know they couldn't do it WHEN IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE RELEASED. Their is no good reason they couldn't let us know sometime before. (however I am open to what they have to say) It just felt like they didn't really care about people that were excited. I had popcorn ready and my schedule cleared for the day so I could watch it :( waiting on the clock to watch the upload, just to get-> "Ooopsie! teehee! We didn't finish it! So sorry lol!" ...

They still haven't teased/released any further info about when it's coming back which makes me think they FOR SURE knew it wasn't gonna be ready by the date THEY FUCKING SET THEMSELVES, which again if they knew they couldn't do it in time why not announce like a week before? even an hour before would have been fine! but no, they sent out the community post at 10am pst when they were supposed to drop S2..)

The only thing the social team (if they handle this even) is the YT shorts and the Tiktoks. Pretty much everything else I can think of they could do better in my opinion

Sorry to rant about stuff I've already talked about, but this is really just to easy of a fix to not point out when I can.

Pay attention to what your community wants. You WILL get rewarded for it.

#smosh #smoshblr #smosh games #smosh pit #sword af s2 #sword af season 2 #sword af #rant #smosh social team #sucks #hire me instead fr

[altschmerzes]

hi !! what’d you think of the new episode of Ted Lasso?

OKAY getting to this a few days late i'm sorry. as usual, i have about One Million Thoughts. in short, i thought it was fine!! it wasn't like, AMAZING, but not every episode of something is gonna be, and it was overall pretty solid. i liked it more than last episode by a good measure but not as much as

here is, as is traditional for me, some more specific thoughts in no particular order on ted lasso 3x05:

i feel like this episode was sort of a return to form in some ways, from some of the stuff that's been causing what i'd call..... some issues? in the front half of this season so far. it feels like they've been trying to do way too much at once? which has led to a bit of a disoriented, frenetic feeling. i think this was sort of a way to.... cut down on some of that? with what would seem to be the wrapping of the zava and shandy plots (which i'll.... get to). this is overall i think a good shift. let's redirect a bit. focus a bit.

oh my gd the stuff with ted and henry was so good. i also was like. really in my feelings immediately when beard was so protective the instant they thought henry'd been bullied. and then ROY was too. man. that got me where i live :')

and man. man. the bit after where ted talked himself down from that panic attack with 'he's okay, he's okay, he's okay.' i about cried at that.

this is gonna be extremely predictable from me and i know i've mentioned it already but i really did expect like. literally any acknowledgement of playing man city being a Big Thing after what happened last time. for jamie particularly. wouldn't need to take much space, just like. a nod to them being mindful of keeping an eye on him that week, or a quick 'you good?' or yknow. anything.

that said. man am i ever so proud of jamie. his speech to them was really, really good - especially if you actually do consider what contemplating playing against city for the first time since the wembley thing must have been like for him. still, he rallied and gave this really effective motivating speech that got the team going.

until zava took over and repeated what he said lmao but still. (also the bit of him like. grabbing at and holding jamie's head? WHOOF that was hard to watch. jamie does Not want that man touching him, and watching him just sorta hunch a bit and Deal With It until deciding he'd had enough and ducking away was. whoof. what a little scene.)

dunno where this psychic thing with rebecca is going but i do kind of love the shift her story has taken, if this is gonna continue to be a focus (pursuing the possibility of motherhood). idk if this is like..... a controversial take in some way or whatever but i actually always kind of thought that it would make more sense for her narrative arc to go more in the direction of searching for that as a possibility than of searching for a romantic partner? it's something she clearly wanted very much but couldn't have because of rupert and that whole. thing. i think it's a much more interesting avenue to go down with her, and idk if it's gonna go anywhere else but. yeah. enjoyed her storyline in this episode a lot more than i have in some others.

i dunno how to feel about the whole bit with nate and jade the woman at the greek restaurant. i feel like i kind of get what they're going for with it but i'm not really sure where i land? like my romance allergy aside, i was ruminating on it and i wish we'd had like. idk. she has been pretty...... weird and rude to him in every single scene we've seen her in and i really think in order to actually know how i feel about how that was played i would need some more context. i wish we'd seen her interact with other customers? if that makes sense? like i want to see if this demeanour she has with nate which is pretty shitty and bizarre is just sort of. how she is and she's a weird and rude person generally, or if she's somehow treating nate differently than other people she interacts with at her job.

man i really did otherwise like nate's bits in that ep though. his scenes so far have been fucking stellar this season - though i didn't like last episode much, his part? oh my gd it was incredible. and then in this one it's like- rehearsing what to say on the phone was fantastic, and the part where he's trying to explain to anastasia what that place means to his family (which...... buddy. man. that made me sad, it doesn't seem like he's been very well treated there, but it's such an important figure in his family. feels like a metaphor.)

was a little disappointed we didn't get a bit more west ham follow-up? like they got, what was it, three red cards in that ep? that's three suspensions. how long were they suspended for? obvs we didn't see the immediate subsequent matches but yknow. that's a Big Deal. the way that match went is a big deal. otherwise, i did like the switch from the big win streak to this winless streak after the west ham loss. that was a satisfying The Epic Highs And Lows Of Sports detail.

keeley sleeping with jack? GET IT. not sure how this is gonna shake out in the long run and has the potential to get messy and i generally don't.... know how i feel about jack yet but for now? get it.

i answered a whole ask about this, but in brief: i thought the zava wrap, if that was actually his whole wrap and he's not gonna return in some dramatic fashion, was anticlimactic to the way he and his arc were introduced. i think it was..... misplayed overall. they should've either not played so hard into seeming like he was being set up to be a major factor when he was first introduced and then had that focal episode, or they should've followed that energy through. instead he had his intro and then that huge focus episode and immediately following that he just kinda..... faded and was a nonissue and then abruptly decided to ride off into the sunset. makes me wonder what they were going for at all when they didn't really resolve any of the big stuff that whole thing brought up.

i feel similarly about shandy. it seemed like they were setting something up with her to be a Thing and then she ended up not like.... her arc wasn't anticlimactic in resolve, it was actually extremely dramatic, but it happened very fast and in a way that felt kind of. cartoonish? keeley Learned A Lesson i guess about being a boss which is a tough thing to do, and that was neat, but it felt like. idk. i think they could've done that without introducing a whole new character who felt like she had a lot of potential to have an interesting arc with keeley and then kinda built tension in the background for a bit only to resolve it pretty quickly and in a pretty. what's the way i want to put this.

interested to see where it goes from here!

#gav gab #gav answers #ted lasso spoilers

[goblins-riddles-or-frocks]

What are your thoughts on Alina being Shu in the show? If canon Alina was from Shu Han do you think it would've made any difference? The show kind of wasted this storyline but idk if I prefer Alina actually having a solid backstory or book Alina being this nobody from nowhere that's now a reverred saint. Also I've seen a lot of people from the book fandom hc darkling as shu looking.

I like her being specifically mixed race a lot! Especially with how it ties into her unmoored feeling where she isn’t sure there’s anywhere she truly belongs. I think it could bring really interesting context to her perspective.

When the show and casting were announced I suspected they chose to have her be half Shu because the books are uh pretty racist in that regard! It starts out in subtler ways with the only Asian characters being either the fucking karate teacher trope or Tolya and Tamar as both having essentially renounced their heritage and country completely in order to be counted “one of the good ones” but also the way they’re employed as the only genuinely faithful characters (devoted to the in-books white lead) in the main cast, while shdhff also being presented as untrustworthy when they sell them out to the Apparat?

But then the SoC duology gets sooo much worse with the parem being given a not!opium position as the scary dangerous Drug From The East and the hardcore dehumanized super soldiers from Shu Han whose name I forgot how to spell but omg it really felt like they only existed to be killed in really gruesome and mean spirited ways. Not to mention Wylan’s magic yellowface! That would be terrible on its own but then that’s how the book attempts to remotely deal with racism sjfhfgff by the character in yellowface experiencing micro agressions. It’s just. It’s bad!

I think someone must have said something to LB by KoS or she just realized the implications were decidedly not great because she tries to course correct really hard and shift most antagonistic focus to Fjerda instead. (Too little too late imo 🥲)

So I was assuming the half Shu Alina choice was in a similar vein? But yeah the show did absolutely nothing with it! What a missed opportunity! I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt with season one where Alina being Shu was only used as an excuse to hurl made up slurs at her, thinking that it might be building to something? …But then it didn’t lol. And that retroactively made the slurs and focus on racism feel so pointless and mean spirited. It felt like an admittance that her being hit over the head constantly with racism wasn’t at all integral to the story and she could’ve been a mixed race protagonist all along without any of that!

But yeah all that being said, I like the concept of Alina being mixed. But I also wouldn’t trust Leigh Bardugo with it? Like everything I already mentioned in the books aside, I think she has a terrible habit of giving her POC characters very racialized suffering in their backstories. I strongly disliked how she handled race with both Inej and Zoya. Zoya was worse imo because she was initially clearly written to be white, but once we got a race retcon for her she suddenly has a never before hinted at poverty and child bride backstory when she’s primarily been associated with privilege before? Like the problem isn’t that she has a tragic backstory, but all the choices felt very racialized. I also just found it slimy how officially commissioned art etc had her visibly brown then the books make a point of saying multiple times that she just… looks white? Just leaves a bad taste in my mouth like she wants the representation brownie points without being willing to commit in canon. So idk as much as I’d love a POC protagonist, if Alina was half Shu in the books as well I wouldn’t trust LB to not give her a weird racial caricature tragic backstory. I do think we could still have the “no backstory just came out of nowhere” thing with her being mixed, I don’t think that has to be canceled out. Like it’s mentioned that Keramzin regularly takes in “war orphans” and border areas tend to be racially mixed. But yeah I just think LB would probably get weird with it. (She was admittedly better with race in Ninth House, but I suspect that also had to do with the real world contemporary setting)

Also the Darkling thing isn’t an HC it’s from a one off line in Demon in the Wood! It’s mentioned that he can, and has, passed as Shu. It’s ahdhf never mentioned again though and kind of wild tbh considering the very visibly white face casts she’s talked about for him in the past?? But that’s just word of god whereas the line in DitW is canon so 🤷‍♀️

#grishaverse #shadow and bone #i ramble sometimes #all the bendy punctuations #a mysterious stranger has appeared

[melrosing]

Part 1) With taking a great interest in mothers, seeing the dead ladies club, and noticing posts and takes on father and their kids relationships. I’ve grown to become interested with mothers and type of mothers in asoiaf specifically. Thus, what it shows about westrosi society and how they and their parenting effected their sons and daughters as that’s been done a few times for fathers. I was wondering for opinions on these six mothers and then the seventh being the mother in the seven:

Cateyln Stark-her five children, Cersei-three kids, Mellario norvos with being physically distant but prior she was desperate for the physical connection- how do you think that effected her kids both prior and after she left, lysa and Robert Arryn, Olenna Tyrell w/ Mace and any headcannons with her daughters, Alannys Harlaw with Asha and Theon. Then of course, the seventh being the mother of the seven. The influences the god mother has on westrosi mothers. Human/Narcissism/martyr nuance.

Catelyn: idk, Cat's kids have quite disparate personalities but they're close - I know Sansa and Arya don't always get along, but they're not incapable of it, and I think that's because Cat (and Ned) have raised them with a focus on familial cohesion. lmao what a way to put it but yeah. I don't think Cat's an especially strict mother either, she obviously scolds her kids from time to time but she is very aware that her children are their own people and that there's no uniform approach she can take to parenting each of them. and they all adore her.

Cersei: again quite disparate personalities amongst her kids. I think she's over-focused on Joffrey, with whom the impact of her parenting is... pretty tangible. Myrcella and Tommen seem to have been left with their septa for the most part, or have just generally enjoyed being spoilt by the rest of court whilst Cersei stayed at Joffrey's side, so her younger kids seem kind of shaped by her absence for the most part lol. Tommen is getting a crash course in Cersei's parenting in AFFC, he's obviously always known not to talk back to her etc but you can see he's not especially practised at engaging with her.

Mellario: I guess Arianne and Quentyn both crave approval, and are driven to relative extremes to garner it, so maybe the absence of a parent can be felt in that.... they absolutely feel like the children of divorced parents tbh :( difficult to guess at much more than that though, their relationship with Doran definitely overshadows the memory of Mellario

Lysa: idk her relationship w her son makes me sad, it clearly comes from a place of deep love for him but the result is its own kind of abuse, she just doesn't let him grow as his own person and treats him like a possession. lukewarm take that I know

Olenna: you'd think Mace would seem more beaten down than he comes across in the books given how Olenna speaks to him/about him lol. but Mace is confident of his own importance, so... a little incongruous, but I think that even though she has a barbed tongue Olenna prizes House Tyrell as a functional unit above all else so she must've been offering him some level of reinforcement in the background idk.

Alannys: again hard to say. Theon seems to have been shaped primarily by his experiences as a hostage of Winterfell - he doesn't look for Alannys when he returns to Pyke. I guess maybe it's hard to confront her as someone who knows the softer side of him and wants that over the front he's presenting to his father? idk. Asha on the other hand... I mean she clearly cares for her mother - we have no real idea what Alannys was like besides 'doting' so hard to say what Asha might've inherited from her or learned from her. who knows really, I think we can just infer that Alannys was a loving mother.

THEE Mother: I think similar to the impact of the OG Mary on the Christian world lol. That women's role is motherhood above all else, that they must perform in perfectly. their youth is swallowed by motherhood and once their children are grown they're become crones. interesting that the 'female' side of the Seven follow the life stages of women whilst the 'male' side doesn't really do the same for men. anyway. the Seven are all round George showing his catholic ass. I see you grrm

#ask #catelyn stark #cersei lannister #lysa arryn #mellario of norvos #alannys harlaw #olenna tyrell #slight edit to final section iykyk

[psychewritesbs]

Kind of disappointed that the last few chapters have been a big fight scene followed by everyone constantly telling us what's going on like it's a bit overwhelming but also it's just a bit of a boring format?? Idk I just wish it would maybe focus more on specific interactions between sukuna and gojo mid fight rather staring at them hit and dodge and hit and domain and then everyone telling us what's happening every 2 seconds.

YO! Welcome to another JJK-Sunday Confessionals (published not on a Sunday). Also another apology for the late reply.

ok so, what I'll say to this is that I feel like this is THE battle for power scaling nerds. And as per usual I used the word nerd in the best possible context.

Thing is... the power scaling in jjk is VERY psychological in this weird Gege-way. And it's truly an irony I don't get any of it given I'm the self proclaimed anime psychologist. So much for that. pshhh...

So I must admit that, because I am not into the power-scaling, my weekly experience of reading the manga lately is...

That said, I can totally see why the battle makes sense and why the people who love it love it.

Either way, I do share the sentiment about (initially) not liking the execution and yet I totally get why Gege is executing the way he is? Not only is the battle highly technical, it also requires recall of obscure af details from way back when, so I have to give Gege props for finding a way around providing exposition without a narrator.

Between you and I, I still prefer Kin-chan vs. Kashi-chan. But shhh.

Now, since it's taken me so long to reply and as we approach chapter 231, I wonder what's going to happen now that both Gojo and Sukuna are beat up af and can no longer spam domains on each other. Perhaps we'll get those interactions you mention. Perhaps Sukuna will bust out with the second pair of arms and arm-wrestle Gojo into oblivion!

Anyways, personally, I cannot wait for some non-battle focused plot progression even though I really did like ch. 231.

And no Spooky, it isn't juuuuuuuuust because of Megumi!

Thanks for stopping by!

#ask the mental gymnastics anime girl #god I love jujutsu kaisen