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miyasmagnolias · 2 years

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𝐣𝐨𝐛 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰 ⌨

kenma kozume x f!reader

editing video tutorials for a urinalysis company wasn't exactly your dream job. luckily, your former coworker has a solution involving a certain youtube sensation.

"The background music feels a little…corporate, don't you think?" your supervisor asked, clicking the space bar to pause the video. Your desktop screen froze on the image of a lab technician placing a dipstick into a cup of urine, and — though you'd eaten lunch at your desk several times before — your appetite was suddenly gone.

"It's a tutorial for an at-home urinalysis test kit," you said matter-of-factly, pushing your blue-light glasses to rest on the crown of your head. "It doesn't exactly call for an award-winning soundtrack."

"I know, but we want our customers to really feel as though our test kits are an experience — something they can't get from any other place on Earth!"

Your supervisor talked about urinalysis test kits like most people did a trip to Disney World. With a sigh, you said, "I guess I could toss in some lo-fi music. That's trendy nowadays, right?"

"Now that's what I'm talking about," your supervisor said, standing from your desk chair and giving you a big thumbs-up. "Keep making creative decisions like that, Y/N, and you'll be promoted to senior videographer in no time!"

"Wow," Kuroo drawled when you later told him about the positively glowing feedback you'd received. He took a swig of his beer and gave you that classic, shit-eating grin before saying, "I guess you could say urine the big leagues now, huh?"

"Don't mock me," you said miserably, raising your empty glass towards the bartender for a refill. "When I left my videography internship at the JVA, I really thought I was going on to do bigger, better things. Instead, I'm writing captions on how to pee in a cup and color-correcting b-roll footage of urine samples. Did you know that pee could be amber? My pee has never been that dark!"

Eyes trained on the little beer he had left, Kuroo made a face and gently set his glass down on the bar top. "So it isn't the job of your dreams. That's okay. You'll use it to get a leg up somewhere else!"

"Easy for you to say. Your department loves you. They'll probably have you running meetings before the end of the year."

A valued employee of the Japan Volleyball Association, Kuroo had essentially turned his economy supply services internship into a full-time job within months of being recruited. You'd met him on a commercial video shoot featuring several of Japan's leading volleyball players — many of whom Kuroo had contacted personally to partake in the project. His passion for volleyball and unprecedented networking skills made him instantly likeable among the higher-ups, and though you were interning for different departments at the time, you became friends within a matter of minutes.

"How do you know all of these people?" you asked Kuroo the day of the shoot, still in awe from the handshake you'd just exchanged with Hinata Shoyo from the MSBY Black Jackals.

"Who — Chibi-chan?" Kuroo asked, jutting his chin towards the athlete who'd ambled over to the craft services table. "I played him back in high school."

You wondered what other kinds of insane connections Kuroo had. Knowing him, he probably had the Prime Minister on speed-dial.

"Speaking of meetings," Kuroo started, plucking a wasabi octopus off of the plate sitting in between you. "I want you to schedule coffee with a friend of mine sometime next week."

"Oh, no," you said behind a mouthful of food, raising a finger towards your former coworker in protest. "Look, I know you've been trying to set me up with your high school best friend for forever now — but I've told you, I don't need any romantic charity."

"Don't worry, I'm not trying to set you up on a blind date with Kenma," Kuroo chuckled. His words did nothing to erase the growing suspicion on your face. "My friend Kodzuken is looking for a full-time video editor for his YouTube channel, and I thought I'd put in a good word for you."

"Kodzuken?" you asked, nearly choking on your octopus. You'd never personally watched any of his YouTube videos or Twitch streams, but you always saw his screen name pop up on the top of the Twitter trending page. "You want me to become a full-time video editor for a wealthy influencer?"

"I wouldn't call him an wealthy influencer — that's like, the least interesting part of his personality," Kuroo said. "He's been swamped doing all of the video editing by himself, and I remembered the videos you made while we were both JVA interns. I think you could do it."

"God..." you breathed, looking your former coworker and friend in the eye. You could tell he had something mischievous up his sleeve the moment you sat down for dinner. "How are you even friends with someone who has that many followers on social media?"

Kuroo merely shrugged as he raised his glass to his lips. "We went to high school together."

"Of course you did."

"So, you'll do it?"

"...I don't know," you said truthfully, wringing your fingers in a nervous twitch. Ever since graduating college and starting your full-time job, you had trouble keeping up with what was popular nowadays. Sure, you enjoyed decorating your Animal Crossing island on the weekends and sneaking in quests on Gensin Impact during your lunch break. But editing for a YouTube channel with millions of followers? How did you know that your editing style wasn't completely out of touch with what Kodzuken was looking for? Wouldn't he prefer one of his avid followers edit his videos instead?

Upon seeing the doubt clouding your expression, Kuroo said, "Trust me, it's better that you're not a fan. If anything, it'll make things more organic between the two of you."

"I suppose," you mused, plucking the last of the wasabi octopus from the plate and popping it into your mouth. "You really think I could impress someone like him?"

Something glimmered in those eyes of his, but all Kuroo said was, "You better. Unless you want to edit urinalysis videos for the rest of your life."

Kuroo's words resounded in your brain as you sat at the coffee shop just down the block of your office the following week, adjusting the skirt of your lucky interview outfit and watching the door in an anxious anticipation. You'd taken the past few days to spruce up your creative portfolio and binge watch Kodzuken's YouTube videos, hours of Twitch stream highlights, trendy challenges, and meme reviews swimming in your brain.

He edited all of this himself? you'd thought in disbelief. No wonder he was in need of an editor; the man must've been burnt out.

The door jingled not a moment later, and you lifted your head to see Kodzuken pushing his two-toned hair back with a pair of sunglasses, perching them on the crown of his head before scanning the café and meeting your eye. He donned a hoodie and sweatpants as he did for most of his videos — and though you'd watched him through your computer screen for the past week, there was something inherently different about seeing him in the flesh. There was something softer about his demeanor. More approachable.

"Kodzuken? Hi! I'm Y/N — it's so nice to finally meet you," you said by way of greeting, extending your hand out as he approached. An easygoing, if not slightly confused smile bloomed across his features upon hearing your name.

"Nice to finally meet you, too," he said, an amused breath escaping his lips as he shook your hand. "Though, I find it a little embarrassing when people call me that in real life. My actual name is Kenma. Kenma Kozume."

You froze, your hand still intertwined in his as the syllables rolled off of his tongue and into the space between you. You tilted your head slightly as the puzzle pieces clicked into place. Kenma.

Kenma Kozume.

The same man Kuroo had been trying to set you up with for ages.

Realization dawned on both of your faces as you exclaimed, "Wait — you're Kuroo's best friend from high school?"

"You're the JVA co-worker he keeps telling me about?" Kenma volleyed back in response. You both became acutely aware of the fact that you were still holding hands. Pulling back, Kenma rubbed the back of his neck, hints of pink beginning to color his cheeks as he said, "Ah, I'm sorry about this. I had no idea. When Kuroo told me I had an interview scheduled for a potential video editor, I didn't think it'd be..."

He trailed off, the sight of you in your pencil skirt and blouse making his face go from pink to red a whole lot faster. Kuroo was right; you were pretty.

Meanwhile, your thoughts were racing a mile per minute as you tried to recontextualize the entire person that was Kenma Kozume. When Kuroo first proposed the idea of going on a blind date with his best friend, you'd brushed off the idea without a second thought. But now that you'd actually seen him — what with his nervous smile and tired eyes and perfectly placed set of dimples...

Kuroo's words sprung forth from your memory. "I wouldn't call him a wealthy influencer — that's like, the least interesting part of his personality."

You suddenly realized that you had been staring at Kenma for far longer than necessary. Eyes retreating to the floor, you tucked a strand of hair behind you ear and muttered, "I am so going to kill Kuroo for this."

"You and me both," Kenma chuckled in response. He jerked his thumb towards the counter of the coffee shop. "Would you maybe want to plot our revenge over a cup of coffee? We can look over your video portfolio while we're at it."

Grateful for the change of pace, you both ordered your drinks and settled into a booth in the back corner, passing your iPad back and forth as you showed Kenma the videos you'd produced for your college thesis and JVA internship. You found him laughing at the informal interviews you'd edited for the MSBY Black Jackals, and you explained how certain editing choices could be used to enhance the comedic effect of a joke — a zoom-in here, a green-screen effect there.

"You can even use graphic overlays and keyframing to — " you stopped short, suddenly realizing how much you'd been talking. Kenma merely listened to you from across the table, a small smile having formed at the corners of his lips as you said, "I'm rambling too much, aren't I?"

"Not at all," Kenma replied in earnest. "It sounds like you really enjoy what you do."

"I do," you reassured him, glancing down into your coffee cup. "I currently make tutorials for a healthcare diagnostic company — which basically means I edit videos explaining all the ways you can pee on a stick. It's a stable job, and it pays well, but..."

"It's not exactly your passion?" Kenma answered. You nodded amusedly. "That's kinda how I feel about editing in general. I mean, I love streaming and filming videos, but editing has never been my strong suit. Plus, I don't like staring at my face for hours on end."

"Well, that wouldn't be a problem for me," you answered quickly, a blush creeping onto your face as soon as you realized what you had just said. "I just meant that, you know, since — "

"It's okay," Kenma said, the humored expression in his eyes enough make your face grow even warmer. "I mean, I would hope you'd prefer to look at me over some fake pee on a stick." His brow suddenly furrowed in distaste. "It is fake pee, right?"

His question caught you so off-guard, you began to laugh — Kenma's smile only deepening as you did so. And when you both settled into a comfortable silence, he lifted his coffee cup to his lips and asked:

"So, when can you start?"

Your jaw went slack at how forward he was. No call-backs? No grueling technical rounds? Was he absolutely sure about this?

"I-I mean, as soon as you'd like me to," you responded, straightening your back and folding your hands across the table. "Do you have a video project in mind?"

"Well, I already finished editing this week's video, and I was planning on filming an unboxing video this week..." Kenma set his empty coffee cup on its saucer and scrunched his face in thought. "But since we both intend to get back at a certain mutual friend of ours, I think I have a better idea."

Two weeks later, Kuroo received a notification from you with a link to Kodzuken's newest YouTube video. Titled "Best Friend Destroyed by Fire Noodle Challenge," the thumbnail featured Kuroo sporting a swollen tongue and bloodshot eyes while Kenma sat next to him, completely unbothered. Below the video, a text message appeared:

Payback for the set-up — and a thank-you for the new job.

Kuroo burst into laughter.

©miyasmagnolias, 2022

#haikyuu x y/n #haikyuu x you #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu fluff #hq fluff #haikyuu drabbles #haikyuu imagines #kenma kozume #kenma x reader #kenma x female reader #kenma x y/n #haikyuu reader insert #haikyuu!!#haikyuu #kenma fluff #kenma imagine #kenma kozume fluff #so many tags #kuroo tetsurou

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occult-roommates · 1 year

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Little Baby Saraswati

Eventually, the group made it to the Cox’s house located in the heart of Del Sol Valley. The place was so big, it was probably as big as their three childhood’s house combined. Immediately, Paisley and her husband, Damian, came to greet them.

Paisley: Welcome! Welcome everyone!

Now at their final destination (2000), Akva, June and Athena could settle down. But you know, they were originally here for someone in particular, so Paisley wasted no time to show up her little girl. She came back from upstairs holding a little girl with green hair like her mom, and blue eyes like her...other mom.

Paisley: Akva, this is Saraswati. Swati, say hi. Swati: Hewo. Paisley: You see, I named her Saraswati cause like, I did my research y’know. So I found out Saraswati is a Hindu goddess who is strongly associated with water, and I wanted her to keep a connexion with both her Indian and mermaidic heritage, but it was extra perfect for me cause I always loved the named Sara which just seems like the natural nickname here. Though I am pretty much always calling her my little Swati, it has a nice ring to it don’t you think? Akva: You’re right, that is a greatly thought out name. Paisley: Do you want to hold her? Akva: Uh...Sure.

Paisley gave the toddler to Akva. However, as soon as Swati was in her arms, she started wiggling around yelling “noooooo” and screaming for her mommy.

Paisley: Oh um...well...She’s probably hungry, it’s almost dinner time after all. Also she refused to nap during the afternoon so she might be a bit cranky. Akva: Why? Paisley: That’s toddlers for you. They can be mad unpredictable. Though maybe she was too excited to sleep cause I told her we’re having very special guests this weekend.

And so, Paisley gave Swati a little ham sandwich while the adults sat down to figure out what they were going to eat tonight. They settled for getting food delivered and while they were waiting, they discussed about what they had all been up to in the last few years.

Akva: I’m going to flight school. June: Bitch since when??? Two days ago you were crying to me on Snapchat that you failed all of your classes but one...You’re studying physical therapy. Akva: Going. Future tense. I’ve decided that if traditional college can’t work out for me that’s what I’m gonna do, and it’s currently, indeed, not working out. June: Still? You never ever showed any interest for that before? Athena: Well, speaking of college, I just recently graduated in video editing! Paisley: Wow, congratulation! You know, I’m looking for a new editor for my YouTube channel, the last one quit to work on a movie, so if you’re looking for a job, I’m just saying... June: By the way, why don’t you ever show Saraswati or even say her name? She’s cute, don’t hide her. Paisley: Well, I believe showing your kids on the Internet is highly unethical when they’re too young to consent or even comprehend that. I mean, it’s one thing if you’re just a random person on Facebook who’s only friends with people you know in real life and set on private, but I’m an influencer with millions of followers. I’m doing that for her own safety. June: Oh, that’s actually a great reason. You’re such an unproblematic fav Paisley, it’s crazy. Athena: ...Didn’t she sold diet tea that essentially just gives you diarrhea? June: It was in 2018 and she didn’t know any better! Everyone did that back then! Paisley: Oh my god, exactly! I’ve already apologized a million times let it go. Athena: I will if you pay me decently for that editing job.

Akva sat there. She doesn’t watch Paisley’s content, but June did tell her she rarely talks about Swati, which is why she still didn’t know after 18 months what her name was. To be fair, it’s also because she didn’t wanna know up until now...Still, she was happy she wasn’t parading the little girl around and acting like she’s such a great person for adopting, but like...What if in actually it’s the other way around and she’s hiding Swati cause there’s dark stuff going on behind the scene?

But no, thankfully, everything seemed to be well and Swati clearly loves her adoptive family. Good right? ...So why did it made her so sad?

Swati: I wuv you mommy. Paisley: Me too sweetie! But yeah, anyway, you’ll notice a lot of her stuff are pink, cause like I found out I was gonna have a girl and I went crazy. But like, I’m not forcing her or anything, now that she’s old enough to start to develop her personality, I’m always encouraging her to express herself and I let her pick the colors of her clothes and stuff. Like in the toy store I just let her guide me and she can pick from any section. I don’t care, it’s 2021 my daughter can play with cars if she please just like she can play with doll. We also buy her a lot of pool toys so she can have fun while staying a little hydrated mermaid. Damian: Her favorite toy actually is a horse figurine she found at my parents’ place. It’s adorable, it’s as big as her face. Paisley: And this summer, we’re gonna go to Guyana so she can see her parents’ motherland. She’s still young, but you know it’ll only be the first visit, we’ll make sure she gets to visit it plenty of time growing up. Athena: Actually, that’s only Akva. My dad is Trinidadian and my mom is Greek. Paisley: Oh my god, that’s perfect! We were also planning on going to Greece this fall! Akva: I-I need to go to the bathroom. Damian: Go to the living room, and turn left. It’s right there.

The mermaid left the table with a big smile on her face, which faded as soon as she was out of sight.

Why was this making her so sad, so angry? She knows she cannot raise Saraswati, she doesn’t have the money, resources or space to do so. The Coxs are clearly amazing parents who care for their daughter deeply and love her so much. They are doing everything adoptive parents should be doing so perfectly, it’s almost comical. It almost felt unfair how good Paisley was at being a mom compared to what she would have been had she raised Saraswati herself. She’s the one who gave birth, the one who had her womb hijacked for nine months and now has her body permanently altered, so why isn’t this coming naturally to her??? At the same time, she’s not even sure if she does want to be a mom eventually, and she knows she can’t right now!! And even if she could, Saraswati is already attached to Paisley and Damian and loves them, she can’t take her away from them. Fuck, she herself has never even been to Guyana!

Such a weird, weird feeling to have...

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#ts4 #the sims 4 #sims 4 #simblr #ts4 simblr #occult roommates #akva singh #paisley cox #damian cox #saraswati cox #june crosdale #athena ramdeen #long post #OcRo s2

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thekingsy · 1 year

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"The Lethal Man" Short Story

Project Title

Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy “Story Mode” Trailer

Project Role(s)

Video Editor

Project Description

This video is an edited, 30-second trailer for the video game, Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy from the game's "Story Trailer" made for social media use.

Skills Showcased

Video editing, storytelling, creative asset use, editing for social media

Software Used

Adobe Premiere Pro

Equipment Used

Personal Computer

December 25th. Walking the streets on a dark, cold Christmas night on the way to the bar. The smell of chimney smoke, smog & piss filling the air. People getting in fights on every corner, crime everywhere you look, and no one bats an eye. Never a dull night in Phorrea.

Sitting at the bar before starting the next job. Liquid courage & a stogie before dealing with another case. A necessary evil. Every cop is dirtier than a baby’s diaper in the mud, so I pick up the slack. Good ole supply & demand. At least it pays well. Time to get moving.

I arrive at the address provided by the client. A small, well-decorated apartment. Medical books on the shelves & dexterity tools on the desk. The tenant was either a surgical student or had weird collecting habits. Walking into the kitchen, traces of blood & mud are found.

I go to the bedroom to find it untouched. It looks like a young woman lives here. I hate these kinds of cases. It takes me to that dark place. Back to that night. It’s like a hole I can’t climb out of –

I shake it off & focus.

The trail of mud particles shows the scuffle started at the front door & ended in the kitchen where there are traces of blood. The blood is dried & looks a few days old. Whoever did this had time to come back & try to clean up the mess left behind.

This is bush league. Sloppy. This is the work of some low-level cat, no way this was a professional. Not that I can say much, I’m no professional. I’m as close to a low-level detective as one can be. Luckily, I have a brain that works sometimes, not that it does me any favors.

I search the kitchen drawers & find a roll of clear packing tape. I tear a piece off & use it to grab the dirt particles from the carpet. I take the tape back to the kitchen & grab a glass from the cabinet to get a better look at the dirt. Like I said, my brain works sometimes.

I take one look at the clay-colored dirt & there is only one place in this shithole city it could come from.

The docks. A criminal’s wet dream.

A necropolis of bones & souls of those unfortunate enough to come across some of the crazy pricks this city hosts.

This well has run dry. Time to head to the docks.

As I head out the door, I notice an envelope sitting on an accent table. The senders name & address has been torn off; the letter taken. On the top right corner of the envelope is a familiar crest.

My eyes go wide; I freeze. I’m seething. Consumed with rage. All of those emotions rushing back. I can’t move. I can’t breathe. I’m about to lose it. It’s been 15 years since –

(STOP! BREATHE! NOW’S NOT THE TIME! SHAKE IT OFF MARTIN! FOCUS!)

I stop. I breathe. I focus.

I move towards the door & leave the apartment. I get in the car & I light a cancer stick. It helps calm the devil. Medication & therapy could fix it, but with no insurance, it’s nothing but a pipe dream. I’ll let the stick will take me first.

As I leave the scene, I look in the rearview mirror & see a “Joe’s Cleaning Service” van pull up. Everyone in this town knows Joe’s Cleaning Service is a front for the mob. Professional cleaners for a professional price. Only City Hall crooks could afford a service like that.

Everyone in this town is mobbed up. The police, the lawyers, the DA, and the mob boss himself, Mr. Harvey Short, the Mayor. It’s why I have a job doing this. Anytime something big or little is called in, it’s ignored & brushed under the rug & I pick up the slack.

Halfway to the docks.

(It’s time.)

Investigating that young woman’s apartment reminded me of what happened 15 years ago. It still lives in my head. No matter what I do, it never goes away. Every case, it’s as vivid as a theater screen. My poor angel. If only I got home sooner.

This town. It can change you in a heartbeat.

There is no law, no order. Everyone is their own judge, jury, & executioner. It’s why any case I solve, the criminal doesn’t get a second chance. I am the executioner. The completely incompetent, incredibly sloppy executioner.

I guess that’s why I’ve been given the moniker, “The Lethal Man.”

I don’t care much for it, but it seems to have a boogeyman effect on the trash that live in this town. All I care about is taking out the trash & providing closure to those who need it. Getting paid is a bonus.

Finally, I pull up to the docks. I step out of the car & I’m hit with the smell of old faithful, death & despair. There is no life at the docks. No spirit, no hope. The only guarantee at the docks is finding dead bodies & a stench that will take weeks to remove from your clothes.

As I make my way to the boardwalk, I take in the only impressive part of this dump. Makeshift shops built out of old shipping containers. Drug dens, black-market bodegas, brothels, gambling; if you want it, the docks have it. You’ll pay for a good time with your life.

As I walk down the boardwalk, I hear the sound of & see container doors closing. A normal occurrence for me. It’s times like this I enjoy that I have a reputation that no one likes to challenge. Makes it easy to get through hell pits like the docks.

I reach the end of the boardwalk & take a look behind me. I lock eyes with a sole straggler who proceeds to bang on a container door frantically. He’s screaming, “LET ME IN! LET ME IN!”

The look of fear in his eyes as he stared down the boogeyman. It’s like a drug. It fuels me.

I turn the corner to make my way to the port. Most of the investigations I’ve solved have ended with a body being found in the harbor, so when a case leads me to the docks, it’s the first place I check. I stop to light a butt & it begins to rain. An all too familiar setting.

The rain puts out my match & destroys my last cigarette. As I throw it to the ground, I hear the loud metal grind of the container crane moving. I turn around and look up to find a shocking clue to the investigation.

The young woman!

Hanging from the container, strapped at the wrists by metal chains crying out for help. Similar to how I found my angel all those years ago. My heart rate jumps to 200 bpm in an instant!

I yell out to her, “STAY CALM! I’LL GET YOU DOWN! I PROMISE!”

Flashbacks of that night 15 years ago consume me in a flash.

Getting home late from a shift at the Phorrea police department to find my angel strung up by chains in the kitchen. Eviscerated like an animal in a slaughterhouse. As pale as a ghost.

If only I had left on time. Maybe I could hav –

(WAKE UP, MARTIN! FOCUS!)

I snap out of my haze & book it toward a ladder that would take me up to that storage container. I’ve got to help her. Somehow. Someway. I’ve got to get her down. I’m about 50 yards away from the ladder when suddenly – time stops.

A click. A thud. A crash. Silence.

The crane that – the container that she – had fallen – crashed – it happened in a flash.

She was gone. I couldn’t save her. Just like my angel. Incompetent – sloppy – if had been there sooner – it’s happening again.

I fell to my knees, rain falling on my face in the moonlight. I’m glaring at the moon. Eyes wide, breathing deeply; I feel like I’m going to explode. All of my senses are heightened. It feels like I am trapped in a time loop, being forced to relive that moment.

All of a sudden, in the distance, I hear the splashes of someone running. My neck whips my head around to see a man running away from some barrels nearby, gunning it for the warehouse. I jump up & begin sprinting. My eyes are locked on this man; I have tunnel vision. I’m running faster than ever. Rage has taken over my body. It feels like a superpower.

I feel like I’m being controlled by a motor. As I begin to gain on this scumbag, he turns around to see my eyes stabbing needles through him & screams out for help while trying to run away. It’s no use.

30 yards. “HELP!” 20 yards. “PLEASE HELP!” 10 yards. “OH GOD! HELP!” Zero.

I tackle him to the ground. I turn him over & mount him.

“WHY’D YOU DO IT!?”, I screamed.

“I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING!”, he said in a panic.

“LIAR!” I drove down my fist like a hammer over his nose.

“I’M SORRY!”, he cried out.

“WHY DID YOU KILL HER?!”, I screamed.

“SOMEONE WANTED HER GONE!”, he screamed in a haze.

“WHO?! GIVE ME A NAME!”, I yelled as I raised my other fist.

“I D O N ’ T K N—“, is all that he could say before driving my other fist down.

“LAST CHANCE – GIVE. ME. A NAME!”, I screamed while raising both fists above my head.

“I c a n’ t . – T h e y’ l l k i l l m e.”, he slurred, barely conscious.

(MARTIN! STOP! DON’T DO IT! BREATHE! FOCUS!)

“WRONG. ANSWER!”

I scream at the top of my lungs as I bring down both of my fists AND THEN –

Silence. Everything goes black. Complete darkness.

(Oh, Martin. See? See what happens? Do you see what happens when you can’t control yourself?

When you don’t listen to me? You let the devil in your mind win & now you’ve lost your lead to the bigger fish.

Remember: Stop. Breathe. Focus. Listen to your angel.)

I start to come to. First, my hearing. No sound other than the rain hitting the ground. Then, my vision returns. I’m looking straight up at the night sky, rain falling down on my face. Breathing heavily, my heart rate through the roof. Slowly lowering as I come back to reality.

I raise my hands to see them painted crimson, covered in viscera. I slowly stand to my feet, knowing of the carnage that lay below me. This wasn’t the first time this happened & it won’t be the last. I shake it off & focus. I need to call the client.

A jingle plays.

That man – his phone is ringing. I walked back to where he laid & reached into his pocket. I see the caller ID & my eyes widen. “Maria” is calling. That name – my wife, my angel – this isn’t a coincidence. I take a deep breathe. I focus. I answer the phone.

“Hello, Mr. Williams or should I call you ‘The Lethal Man’?”, the voice on the phone mockingly asked.

I answered with silence.

“I presume you dispatched the owner of this phone. Why, thank you! That must have been very satisfying for you.”, he excitingly proclaimed.

“Why?”, I answered tersely.

“Vengeance, of course! The last time I hired this man for a job he walked away unscathed! I ordered him to gut some nosey cop’s wife because he was poking his nose where it didn’t belong!” he said with malice, cackling like a lunatic.

It felt like my soul had left my body. The man that I am standing over – who murdered that young woman – was the bastard who took my angel away from me 15 years ago. He was hired by this pompous asshole on the phone? Who is this prick?

Suddenly, my phone vibrates.

“Enjoy your payment ‘The Lethal Man’. Oh, didn’t I mention? I’m the one who hired you for this investigation! Isn’t that hilarious?” As he cackles over the phone, I check my phone to see a payment has been sent by an unknown account with a note that reads – “15 years and you’re still coming up short.”

That’s when it clicked. I knew who I was talking to. Thinking back, I should’ve known who it was from the very beginning. Some low-level mobster I busted back when I was working for Phorrea PD. I laughed into the phone.

“WHAT’S SO FUNNY?!” He angrily shouted as I laughed into his ear.

“I’ve let you have your fun over the years, but you are becoming a nuisance to me & my business! THE TAX MAN IS COMING TO COLLECT! Enjoy your last few hours because this entire town is going EAT YOU ALIVE!”

As I let this insufferable man finish screaming & ranting, a calm comes over me. I close my eyes, take a deep breathe, exhale, and focus. Before launching the phone into the harbor & heading back to my car to prepare for the ensuing war, I laugh & say to the man –

“Sounds like a fun time. I’ll be seeing you – real soon – Mr. Mayor.”

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miraculouscontent · 3 years

Video

dailymotion

“Sentibubbler” summary? “Sentibubbler” salt?

Why not both at the same time?

Something a little experimental, though also somewhat reminiscent of some of my past videos. Calling it ��summasalt” for now, based on the word “somersault” because this episode was an exercise of my patience.

It’s basically just me going through the episode with my usual episode summary, but salting along the way instead of making you guys read a wall of text without any images or clips or me making snarky comments.

(By the way, yes, I did in fact have caffeine before recording.)

script below for anyone who wants/needs it:

"Sentibubbler" begins with Marinette having food with the Cesaires and I already know this isn't real because Marinette is actually getting to interact with her best friend's family. That's only happened, like--when, two episodes of Season 2? [”Sapotis” and “Anansi”]

Marinette sees Trixx and points out how they're supposed to be a secret, and Alya asks why while calling Marinette "Ladybug." Marinette plays dumb but is told by Nino that everyone already knows her secret. Chloe is also there, chiding Marinette for her identity rule - it's not Marinette's rule but after "Reflekdoll" I've just gotten used to Marinette being blamed for things she didn't do - and Marinette goes to question Chloe's apperance when there's a knock on the balcony door. Alya invites Shadow Moth in and--[Shadow Moth has to duck to come inside]--huh, I thought Sole Crusher was seven episodes ago.

Anyway, now obviously, Marinette is just being ridiculous and overemotional as usual, because why would Marinette ever think that Alya would reveal any information to--["Feast"]--oh yeah, that's right.

Tikki doesn't transform Marinette and says that Marinette shouldn't have trusted Alya with her secret. Enter Chat Blanc, who says that they can be together now without any secrets. Not really sure what this episode is aiming for with the mixed message of "your identity rule sucks" but also "your fault for trusting someone instead of having a mental breakdown," but a’ight. Trixx also gets another dig in on Marinette for giving Alya the fox miraculous.

Marinette wakes up from her nightmare and panics, but Tikki reassures her that Alya is loyal. [”Chameleon”] Mm. Also, that kind of support might've been nice from Tikki literal seasons ago when Marinette could've used a confidant.

Wayzz - I swear, they've had eyelashes more often than not in this season - points out that Trixx is mischievous and Xuppu talks about Trixx being the cause of the Loch Ness monster rumors, which worries Marinette further. Marinette runs out in her pajamas and I can already predict that neither Tom nor Sabine are going to check on her later or care.

Marinette finds the Cesaires looking for something, their words vague enough for Marinette to think that they're talking about Trixx. Alya brushes Marinette off and tells her to help with looking instead of lecturing her.

Marlena makes a comment that reminds Marinette of her nightmare, only increasing Marinette's stress. A tarantula crawls up a ladle and Marinette freaks out when she sees it, which Marlena has a laugh at because Marinette's anxiety, fear, and panic is hilarious, guys!

This is my laughing face. [not a laughing face]

Nino exits, having been too afraid of the spider to leave the room, so Nora compares Marinette to him. Nino tries to play it cool, then changes the subject to point out Marinette's pajamas. Alya wonders aloud why Marinette showed up and Marinette tries to act casual, but Alya sees through it and states that she doesn't usually lose things when someone lends them to her.

I presume the exception is Marinette's trust. OH-HOOOOHHH, we'll get there.

Nora takes a jab at Alya for losing the spider and Marinette drags Alya away to talk. Nino tries to join but Alya states that it's between her and Marinette, which makes Nino sad.

Nino, does the phrase "guys' time" ring a bell by any chance?

Marinette is explaining her nightmare and is simply told to calm down by Alya, though Marinette is briefly startled by a phone ringing. Marinette puts together what she knows that Shadow Moth knows, including that Alya is Rena Rouge, adding on that Shadow Moth could steal the fox necklace if he figured out that Alya has it permanently. Alya reassures her that no one will ever know and Marinette states that this must include Chat Noir. Alya agrees and brings attention to the fanny pack around her waist, which Trixx has been hiding in, and Marinette has Trixx promise not to show up at the dining table like in her nightmare. Tikki tells Marinette that everything will be fine and Marinette admits that it was silly of her to worry, which it was! ...If you ignore all the anxiety, mental scarring, and constant pressure to be perfect or risk Paris lighting itself on fire, much like I presume they accidentally did with their original script for this episode.

Alya tells Marinette to trust her and also herself - I'll be sure to keep that in mind, Alya, thank you - then Alya loses her temper at the phone continuing to ring. She leaves to find an empty living room, then answers the phone only to hear Shadow Moth on the other line. Alya turns upon hearing Marinette scream to see that Marinette has been trapped in a bubble. Cue the reveal/return of the Bubbler, who is definitely Nino akumatized and not--like--a sentimonster, because the episode didn't spoil it at all with the title of Sentibub--

show, this is freaking embarrassing. Why even bother akumatizing someone when you can mold a sentimonster with the exact power you want?

At least they reveal it quickly, though that also means I have to live with the knowledge that Shadow Moth wINKED AT ALYA, NO.

Anyway, Shadow Moth tells Alya that he wants her to betray Ladybug. Marinette, meanwhile, is panicking over being unable to transform while in public, whereas Tikki remains calm and reassures her that Alya will figure something out and it's why Marinette gave Alya the fox miraculous in the first place.

Weird, I thought it was for the show to continuously validate Alya as a worthy choice for a confidant despite repeatedly covering up her sINS and so the show can push for more anxiety on Marinette's part while simultaneously not having to make a new hero model for Alya, which they would have to do if the realistic decision had been made to give Alya a different miraculous due to Shadow Moth knowing her identity as Rena Rouge.

Marinette texts Alya to inform her that the Bubbler is a sentimonster and so Rena can tell Chat not to use Cataclysm on him or the bubbles will burst due to the sentimonster's lack of control.

Hate to burst the show's bubble but Alya could literally see Nino up in the sky and they could see her; the bubbles are in viewing range. Did this even go through a quality check?

Alya goes to look at Marinette's text, but the phone is bubbled away by Sentibubbler. Marinette sees the phone floating by and panics, only to be reassured again to trust Alya and at this point I vaguely wondered if I was watching this episode on repeat. Tikki also adds that Alya has never let her down - [”Ladybug”] MMMM - and Marinette agrees, also certain that Chat Noir will show up soon.

Oh yeah, he exists. Oh no.

Cut to the Agreste mansion where Adrien is watching the news - dude, how is there never anything better on when you need to be told that there's an akuma? here, look, I'll show you [”Silencer” Lukabug clip] there, much better, see? - and it's pointed out that the bubbles are identical to the ones Bubbler had, yet Nino is in one of the bubbles. Adrien readies himself while Plagg is - for once - okay with leaving since his cheese isn't "edible" yet.

I feel like he should be a little more concerned about Marinette being in a bubble.

Meanwhile, Shadow Moth is explaining to Alya that Ladybug will come to give her the fox miraculous due to the bubbled people in the sky - plenty of other choices that aren't within breathing range of the obvious danger zone, but a'ight - and SentiBubbler will catch Ladybug. Alya brings up Chat Noir saving her but Shadow Moth states that she'll create an illusion of Ladybug and Rena to lure Chat Noir, who won't see Sentibubbler coming, at which point Rena will hand Shadow Moth her miraculous. He adds that her loved ones will only be returned once all three miraculouses are in his possession, though if she tries to warn the heroes then Sentibubbler will send the bubbles into space, too far for any hero to save them.

[clip of space power-ups] Hm.

Also, I would've just let her keep the miraculous as an extra bribe since he doesn't need the fox and she wouldn't have time to recharge anyway - at least to his knowledge - but that's just me.

Marinette is relieved that Alya still hasn't been captured--TIKKI, I KNOW, YOU'VE BEEN PARROTING THIS ALL EPISODE, I KNOW--but Marinette changes her tune when she sees Alya blindly calling out for Ladybug's help, unaware that Alya is buying time. Marinette laments the idea of transforming there and having using the rabbit to go back in time to reverse, as that's never a good thing (seconded), but gets the idea for Tikki to take her miraculous to someone else. Tikki rejects the idea, as the earrings won't go through the bubble, and Marinette realizes that Chat Noir is their only hope.

I mean, it was nice knowing them. Sure is interesting how Marinette has only been getting herself into these situations where she requires saving when the show needed to present Alya as a valid choice for a confidant.

Meanwhile, Chat Noir is leaving a message for Ladybug about the bubbles in the sky, saying that he'll wait for her; I already see where this is going and I don't like it.

Alya mutters to Trixx about how they need a plan to release Marinette. Through Alya Vision, we're shown Sentibubbler, a bowl of fruit, and the bathroom door. Alya tells Sentibubbler that she needs to go to the bathroom and - wow, we're really doing this, aren't we? - which Shadow Moth rejects. Shadow Moth is also on top of a building holding a coffee cup which honestly makes about as much sense as the rest of the episode, so whatever. Alya claims that she can't wait and that it'll be awkward for Ladybug to find her like that, which gets Shadow Moth to relent but also remind her of what's at stake if she tries anything. Alya states that she can't do anything without a miraculous anyway, then purposefully falls onto the table, concealing her long enough for her to transform and allowing an illusion of herself to go to the bathroom while she escapes. She detransforms in the twins' room and feeds Trixx with some grapes that she'd picked up.

Alya explains her plan to trick Shadow Moth and Sentibubbler since they don't know that she has a miraculous, though she also has to make sure that Chat won't ruin things. Rena then proceeds to call Chat Noir and claim that Ladybug wanted her to call him with her plan, but adds that it's a two-person plan and Chat himself isn't needed, so he needs to wait for further instructions. Chat demands that Ladybug call him to tell him herself, but Rena insists that she can't, as Ladybug is very busy. She warns him not to use Cataclysm if he sees the Bubbler, as he's a sentimonster, then promises to talk to him later before hanging up.

She uses Mirage again, making the Alya illusion reappear as well as creating a Ladybug. Chat Noir, infuriated at being left out, destroys part of a building with his baton. He then dismisses the action because Miraculous Ladybug will fix it.

Spoiler alert, it will, which is a very fascinating detail! I mean, I can't imagine another situation where a hero did something while there was an akuma going around and Miraculous Ladybug decided to help 'em out, but it just goes to show what happens when you're the writers' pet. Just look a little pitiful and they'll give you all the sympathy in the world.

By the way, didn't expect them to actually confirm my theory that Chat Noir does Chat Noir things because he knows that Miraculous Ladybug will fix it anyway, essentially allowing him to earn brownie points from Ladybug via sacrificing himself regardless of how it affects her mentally, yet here we are and I don't know whether to be sad, angry, disappointed, or a mixture of all three.

Chat Noir sees the Ladybug illusion jumping off and gives chase, refuses to stay where he is. Marinette, seeing that Rena Rouge's illusions are active, panics at the sight of Chat Noir, as the illusion will vanish if Chat touches it.

I like to imagine the immediate concern is the idea that Chat Noir will try to take Ladybug's hand while trying to flirt.

Anyway, Marinette flails inside the bubble in an attempt to reach Chat Noir, while illusion Alya and SentiBubbler get into position. Chat Noir watches what he perceives as Ladybug heading into the Cesaire house with Alya, but Marinette gets to him in order to tell him not to go anywhere. Chat complains about everyone telling him to stay put, but Marinette explains Rena's plan to him. Chat is skeptical of how she knows that, to which Marinette insists that she saw it from where she was. Chat Noir relents with a sigh and stays where he is.

SentiBubbler watches as the illusion of Alya and Ladybug talk to each other, Rena making it look like Ladybug is piecing together what happened and refusing to give Alya a miraculous ever again due to Shadow Moth knowing her identity. She claims that she'll find another holder and give them an even more powerful miraculous, which interests Shadow Moth and gets him to follow after the Ladybug illusion. Once Sentibubbler leaves as well, Chat sees this as his chance to stop the sentimonster, as the Ladybug illusion will vanish if it's touched. Marinette strokes his ego for the token love square moment of the episode, and Chat Noir fights SentiBubbler while Shadow Moth goes after the Ladybug illusion.

I'm noticing a real lack of tension in this episode. Once Alya has her plan, it's kind of a clean sweep from start to finish with no interference or unexpected roadblocks in the way. Even Shadow Moth following the Ladybug illusion goes fine, with Shadow Moth even punching a building thinking that Ladybug actually got away from him.

Dude, it's fine, Miraculous Ladybug will fix it, just put on your best sad face. Maybe Chat Noir gets it from you actually, is treatment from the writers a hereditary thing?

Sentibubbler and Chat Noir are still fighting. Shadow Moth shows up and Marinette tries to warn Chat, but Chat gets caught in a bubble and Marinette apologizes; she doesn't have anything to apologize for but after "Reflekdoll" I--wait I already did this.

Chat Noir uses Cataclysm to escape, only to get caught in another bubble. I'd just like to throw out there that this guy's a hero three seasons going and the love interest for the main character, yet his role in the episode has amounted to complaining about the authority of a hero Ladybug chose, throwing a property-destroying tantrum over being excluded, and wasting his power without a single thought which just got him captured again.

Chat, does the name "Syren" ring any bells by any chance? I'm just sayin', you could always quit. In fact, wasn't it you literally one episode ago saying that you understood if Ladybug couldn't always come get you? Then, after seeing the jump from "Glaciator" to "Frozer," I'm about as shocked as rubber.

Back with the competent one, Alya notes to Trixx that Rena Rouge can no longer be seen by Shadow Moth or else the jig is up. She transforms and texts Marinette to be ready, creating an illusion of Marinette that simultaneously hides the real version, allowing her to transform into Ladybug.

Chat Noir's bubble gets dragged down and Shadow Moth gets SentiBubbler to mute Chat Noir's bubble.

[clip from “Silencer” where Ladybug takes amusement in Chat being muted]

Ladybug uses Lucky Charm and receives a pot, her Lucky Vision spotting Shadow Moth's coffee cup, then SentiBubbler, then the tarantula trapped in a bubble. Ladybug deduces that the cup is the sentimonster's object, then pulls the horse miraculous out of her yoyo and unifies it with the ladybug--oh.

Oh my.

You know, it's times like this where I'm reminded that the show knows nothing about fashion... or girls... or good writing actually--there's just a lot of stuff they don't know.

Sentibubbler does a countdown, then starts sending the civilian bubbles up into the sky. Chat Noir is about to de-transform while PegaBug notices of Shadow Moth's two miraculous, up for grabbin'. She notes that she won't be able to catch everyone, so she forms a portal behind Shadow Moth and goes for the coffee cup first, thus putting her in control of SentiBubbler, who happily brings the bubbles back down at her command.

Shadow Moth erases SentiBubbler from existence though, causing everyone to fall, but Chat and PegaBug manage to catch them. PegaBug de-transforms and presents the Cesaires with the tarantula, which had been trapped inside the lucky charm. Ladybug and Chat Noir watch Shadow Moth escape and Ladybug laments that it could've been the end of Shadow Moth once and for all because it's not a Miraculous episode without Marinette being at fault or feeling guilty in some way! Chat Noir reassures her [*by “reassure,” I mean he might as well have said, “Well, you saved ME, so you did great!”] - wow, that's two token love square moments for the price of one episode, don't I feel spoiled - and Ladybug leaves to retrieve the tarantula's tank.

Rena Rouge is waiting for her and they hug, with Rena repeating that she doesn't lose something that someone gives her. Ladybug states that she never should've doubted the idea of giving Alya a miraculous and Imma just give you guys a counter real quick. [counter that shows that Tikki has complimented Alya four times, Alya has complimented herself/told Marinette to trust her thrice, and Marinette has said that she was wrong thrice]. Miraculous Ladybug is cast and everything returns to normal, with Alya explaining what she did and Marinette being relieved that Shadow Moth won't be going after her anymore. Alya confidently asks if she was smart and Marinette is happy to praise her, confirming it and stating that Alya is a real superhero and honestly? If the narrative wanted to marry Alya this badly, they should've just used some of the budget to buy a ring instead of projecting onto the other characters.

Then again, the apparent budget can't even afford a new hero model nor new akuma to a very noticeable degree, so I guess they're taking what they can get.

Alya praises Marinette as well for her work as PegaBug and they do a fistbump, thus ending the episode. There's also this ever-so-lovely post-episode scene with Gabriel and Nathalie where Gabriel laments the fact that Ladybug never makes mistakes which--I... has he even watched the series at all? Gabe, babe, Babriel Agreste, it's literally part of the show's formula that Marinette makes a mistake in every episode and she felt guilty like a minute ago over not yoinking your miraculouses when she had the chance, where have you been?

But, yeah, anyway, the episode.

Needless to say, not a fan. Like I said, the show seems so intent on immediately validating the choices they make with Alya in order to make her look like a better character. "Gang of Secrets" basically replaced her with someone different at the end of the episode, and the episode immediately afterwards in chronological order, "Mr. Pigeon 72," did everything it could to push Marinette out of her guardian position long enough for Alya to figure out the grimoire despite having zero onscreen experience with it, the episode even trapping Ladybug in a situation that forced Rena Rouge to come into play to validate that decision as well.

And now we have "SentiBubbler" here following immediately after "Optigami," desperate to reassure its audience that Alya is cool, smart, truthworthy, and that not needing to make a new model--sorry, I mean Alya continuing to have the fox--was a good decision. All the while, they continue pushing Alya's flaws under the rug [Note that it’s not even considered that Alya is even remotely at fault for Shadow Moth going after her specifically after her stunt in “Optigami” when no one else but Ladybug and Chat have ever given out a miraculous], hiding them instead of Alya actually acknowledging them, the only reason she did so in "Optigami" being the same as in "Gang of Secrets"; to make her look good while Marinette makes a big decision in their relationship.

The episode tries so hard to drill in this idea that Alya is a good friend who can be trusted, and I'm just not here for how much they try to hammer it in. Marinette's very real anxiety over Shadow Moth's power and ability to plan things is played off as her being silly instead of something to be concerned about, and instead of giving her a hug and trying to help her calm down - [clip from “Heart Hunter” of Luka hugging Marinette] I miss Luka - she's just told to trust and believe and hAVE fAiTh in Alya.

Shadow Moth is an adult; he has abilities that the teenage heroes don't. I'm not even saying that Marinette isn't overreacting [Basically, her concern about Shadow Moth is valid, especially after “Optigami” where her identity was almost found out], but she has anxiety and some obvious trauma over "Chat Blanc." I was already upset that Alya got a free pass to Marinette's identity, but the constant stressing over how much Marinette should trust her just doesn't affect me when I know Alya and I know the kind of stuff she's done that the show blatantly ignored in favor of pushing for her.

But okay, show, I'll give Alya the benefit of the doubt that she doesn't deserve. Let's say that she's turned a new leaf, and has become the reliable, trustworthy, and loyal partner that Marinette deserves. I'm sure that Alya has Marinette's back, and will never go behind said back in order to do something completely unsurprising and wholly indicative of the character I actually know her to be.

Especially not a mere three episodes later...

#MC's Videos #category: episode summaries #category: salt #video: critique #MC's Renders #render: persona #episode: Sentibubbler #((Definitely let me know what you guys think because I don't know if I should do this more or not.))#((Judging from what the response is will help me make a decision on it.))#((I know my editing could be a little better but my video editor has been physically fighting me lately.))#((Is there such a thing as TOO sassy/sarcastic?))#((idk if I'm actually funny or not so definitely lemme know if there was anything that particularly amused you guys))#((so I know in the future where your guys' sense of humor lies.))#((I don't really TRY to be funny I just do whatever comes to mind/is comfortable.))

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innuendostudios · 3 years

Text

youtube

I was invited to give a talk on GamerGate over Zoom in early 2021. I've long been frustrated that there isn't a good timeline of GG and its origins on YouTube. When people ask "what the hell was GG anyway?" they often get referred to my or Dan Olson's videos on the subject, but both of them were made while GG was ongoing, and presumed a degree of familiarity on the part of the audience. There was just too much to say about what was already happening to spend time getting the audience up to speed, and it was safe to assume our audiences had enough context to follow along. But time moves fast on the internet, and many people who now care about such things weren't there while it was happening, and are lacking the necessary context to follow the better videos. For a long time, I've only been able to direct them to RationalWiki's timeline, which is excellent but so exhaustively comprehensive that it's likely to scare off first-timers.

I realize an hourlong lecture isn't necessarily helping matters, but the first 20-or-so minutes of this video are my attempt at streamlining the timeline such that people can be up to speed on the most important stuff fairly quickly. The rest is talking about what it all meant, how it prefigured the Alt-Right, and using it to better understand digital radicalization.

This video was made with the help of Magdalen Rose, who edited the slides to the audio while I was laid up with a back injury. Go sub to her channel! And please back me on Patreon.

Transcript below the cut.

FUCKING VIDEO GAMES? FUCKING VIDEO GAMES. THEY MADE DOZENS OF PEOPLE MISERABLE FOR YEARS OVER VIDEO GAMES! NOT EVEN FUCKING VIDEO GAMES, FUCKING ARTICLES ABOUT FUCKING VIDEO GAMES. THIS IS WHAT PASSES FOR LEGITIMATE GRIEVANCE. ARE YOU KIDDING ME WITH THIS SHIT??

Hi! My name is Ian Danskin. I’m a video essayist and media artist. I run the YouTube channel Innuendo Studios, please like share and subscribe.

I’m here to talk to you about GamerGate, and I needed to get all that out of the way. I’m going to talk about what GamerGate was and how it prefigured The Alt-Right, and there are gonna be moments where you’re nodding along with me, going, “yeah, yeah I get it,” and then the sun’s gonna break through a crack in the wall and you’ll suddenly remember that all this is happening because some folks - mostly ladies - said some stuff - provably true stuff, I might add - about video games and a bunch of guys didn’t like it, and you’re gonna want to rip your hair out. By the end of this, you will have a better understanding of what happened, but it will never not be bullshit.

Also, oh my god, content warning. Racism, sexism, antisemitism, homophobia, transphobia, rape threats, threats of violence, domestic abuse - I’m not going to depict or describe at length any of the worst stuff, but it’s all in the mix. So if at any point you need to switch me off or mute me, you have my blessing.

Brace yourselves.

Some quick prehistory:

In 2012, feminist media critic Anita Sarkeesian ran a Kickstarter campaign for a YouTube series on sexist tropes in video games. And, partway through the campaign, 4chan found it and said “let’s ruin her life.” And a lot of the male general gaming public joined in. And by “ruin her life” I’m not talking 150 angry tweets including dozens of rape and death threats per week, though that was a thing. I’m talking bomb threats. I’m talking canceled speaking engagements because someone threatened to shoot up a school. I’m talking FBI investigation. The harassers faced no meaningful repercussions.

And in 2013, Zoe Quinn released Depression Quest, a free text game about living with depression. They received harassment off and on for the next year, most pointedly from an incel forum called Wizardchan that doxxed their phone number and made harassing phone calls telling them to kill themself. The harassers faced no meaningful repercussions.

(Also, quick note: Zoe Quinn is nonbinary and has come out since the events in question. When I call Zoe’s harassment misogynist, understand I am not calling Zoe a woman, but they were attacked by people who hate women because that’s how they were perceived. Had they been out at the time things probably would’ve gone down similarly, but on top of misogyny I’d be talking about nonbinary erasure and transphobia.)

Okay. Our story begins in August 2014. The August that never ended.

Depression Quest, after a prolonged period on Greenlight, finally releases on Steam as a free download with the option to pay what you want. In the days that follow, Zoe’s ex-boyfriend, Eron Gjoni, writes a nearly 10,000-word blog called The Zoe Post, in which he claims Quinn had been a shitty and unfaithful partner. (For reference, 10,000 words is long enough that the Hugos would consider it a novelette.) This is posted to forums on Penny Arcade and Something Awful, both of which immediately take it down, finding it, at best, a lot of toxic hearsay and, at worse, an invitation to harassment. So Gjoni workshops the post, adds a bunch of edgelord humor (and I am using the word “humor” very generously), and reposts it to three different subforums on 4chan.

We’re not going to litigate whether Zoe Quinn was a good partner. I don’t know or care. I don’t think anyone on this call is trying to date them so I’m not sure that’s our business. What is known is that the relationship lasted five months, and, after it ended, Gjoni began stalking Quinn. Gjoni has, in fact, laid out how he stalked Quinn in meticulous detail to interviewers and why he feels it was justified. It’s also been corroborated by a friend that Quinn briefly considered taking him back at a games conference in San Francisco, but he became violent during sex and Quinn left the apartment in the middle of the night with visible bruises.

Off of the abusive ex-boyfriend’s post, 4chan decides it’s going to make Zoe Quinn one of their next targets, and starts a private IRC channel to plan the campaign. The channel is called #BurgersAndFries, a reference to Gjoni claiming Quinn had cheated on him with five guys. A couple sentences in The Zoe Post - which Gjoni would later claim were a typo - imply that one of the five guys was games journalist Nathan Grayson and that Quinn had slept with him in exchange for a good review of Depression Quest. Given the anger that they’d seen drummed up against women in games with the previous Anita Sarkeesian hate mob, #BurgersAndFries decides to focus on this breach of “ethics in games journalism” as a cover story, many of them howling with laughter at the thought that male gamers would probably buy it. This way, destroying Quinn’s life and career and turning their community against them would appear an unfortunate byproduct of a legitimate consumer revolt; criticism of the harassment could even be framed as a distraction from the bigger issue. Gjoni himself is in the IRC channel telling them that this was the best hand to play.

The stated aim of many on #BurgersAndFries was to convince Quinn to commit suicide.

Two regulars in the IRC, YouTubers MundaneMatt and Internet Aristocrat, make videos about The Zoe Post. Incidentally, both these men had already made a lot of money off videos about Anita Sarkeesian. Matt’s is swiftly taken down with a DMCA claim, and he says that Quinn filed the claim themself. (For the record, in those days, YouTube didn’t tell you who filed DMCA claims against you.) Members of the IRC also reach out to YouTuber TotalBiscuit, who had been critical of Sarkeesian and dismissive of her harassment, and he tweets the story to his 350,000 followers, saying a game developer trading sex for a good review might not prove true, but was certainly plausible.

This is where GamerGate begins to get public traction.

Zoe Quinn is very swiftly doxxed, with their phone number, home address, nudes, and names and numbers of their family collected. Gjoni himself leaks their birth name. The Zoe Post, and the movement against Quinn - now dubbed “The Quinnspiracy” - make it to The Escapist and Reddit, which mods will have little luck removing. The Quinnspiracy declares war on any site that does take their threads down, most vehemently NeoGAF. People who defend Zoe against the harassment start getting doxxed themselves - Fez developer Phil Fish is doxxed so thoroughly, hackers get access to the root folder of his website.

In what I’m going to call This Should Have Been The End, Part 1, Stephen Totilo, Editor-in-Chief at Kotaku where Nathan Grayson worked, in response to pressure not just from The Quinnspiracy but an increasing number of angry gamers buying The Quinnspiracy’s narrative, publishes a story. In it he verifies that Quinn and Grayson did date for several months, and that not only is there no review of Depression Quest anywhere on Kotaku, not by Grayson nor anyone else, but that Grayson did not write a single word about Quinn the entire time they were dating.

In response, The Quinnspiracy declares war on Kotaku. r/KotakuinAction is formed, which will become the primary site of organization outside of chanboards. The fact that their entire “movement” is based on a review that does not exist changes next to nothing.

Some people start to see The Quinnspiracy as potentially profitable. The Fine Young Capitalists get involved, a group ostensibly working to get women into video games but who have a Byzantine plan to do so wherein they crowdfund the budget and the woman who wins a competition gets to storyboard a game, but another company will make and she will get 8% of the profits, the rest going to a charity chosen by the top donor. 4chan becomes the top donor. They like TFYC because the head of the company has a vendetta against Zoe Quinn, who had previously called them out for their transphobic submission policy, and he falsely accused Quinn of having once doxxed him. 4chan feels backing an ostensibly feminist effort will be good PR, but can’t resist selecting a colon cancer charity because, they say, feminism is cancer and they want to be the cure to butthurt. They also get to design a character for the game, and so they create Vivian James, who will become the GamerGate mascot.

Manosphere YouTubers Jordan Owen and Davis Aurini launch a Patreon campaign for their antifeminist documentary The Sarkeesian Effect and come to The Quinnspiracy looking for $15,000 a month for an indefinite period to make it, which they get.

In what will prove genuinely awful timing, Anita Sarkeesian releases the second episode of Tropes vs. Women in Video Games, and, despite not being a games journalist and having nothing to do with Quinn or Grayson, she is immediately roped into the narrative about how feminists are ruining games culture and becomes the second major target of harassment. Both she and Quinn soon have to leave their houses after having receiving dozens and dozens of death threats that include their home addresses.

After being courted by members of the IRC channel, Firefly star Adam Baldwin tweets a link to one of the Quinnspiracy videos and coins the hashtag #GamerGate. This is swiftly adopted by all involved.

In response to all this, Leigh Alexander writes a piece for Gamasutra arguing that the identity that these men are flocking to the “ethics in games journalism” narrative to defend no longer matters as a marketing demographic. Gaming and games culture is so large and so varied, and the “core gamer” audience of 18-34 white bros growing smaller and septic, that there was no reason, neither morally nor financially, to treat them as the primary audience anymore. Love of gaming is eternal, but, she declared, “gamers,” as an identity, “are over.” Eight more articles contextualizing GamerGate alongside misogyny and the gatekeeping of games culture come out across several websites in the following days. GamerGate frames these as a clear sign of [deep sigh] collusion to oppress gamers, proving that ethics in games journalism is, indeed, broken, and Leigh Alexander becomes the third major target of harassment. These become known as the “gamers are dead” articles - a phrase not one of them uses - and they make “get Leigh Alexander fired from Gamasutra” one of their primary goals.

Something I need you to understand is that it has, at this point, been two weeks.

Highlights from the next little bit: Alex Macris, a higher up at The Escapist’s parent company, expresses support for GamerGate; he will go on to write the first positive coverage at a major publication and cement The Escapist as GamerGate-friendly. Mike Cernovich, aka “Based Lawyer,” gets GamerGate’s attention by mocking Anita Sarkeesian; he will go on to hire a private investigator to stalk Zoe Quinn. GamerGate launches Operation Disrespectful Nod, an email campaign pressuring companies to pull advertising from websites that have criticized them. They leverage their POC members, getting them, any time someone points out the rampant racism and antisemitism among GamerGaters, to say “I am a person of color and I am #NotYourShield”; most of these “POC members” are fake accounts left over from a previous, racist disinformation campaign. Milo Yiannapoulos gets involved, writing positive coverage of GG despite having mocked gamers for precisely this behavior in the past, and gets so much traffic it pulls Breitbart News out of obscurity and makes it a significant player in modern conservative news media.

[Hey! Ian from the future here. This talk mostly addresses how GamerGate prefigured the Alt-Right strategically and philosophically, but if you want a more explicit, material connection: Breitbart News took its newfound notoriety to become, as its Executive Chair phrased it in 2016, "a platform for the Alt-Right." That Executive Chair was Steve Bannon, who threw the website's weight behind The Future President Who Shall Not Be Named, and, upon getting his attention, would then go on to become his campaign strategist and work in his Administration. So, if you're wondering how one of the central figures of the Alt-Right ended up in the White House, the answer is literally "GamerGate." Back to you, Ian from the past!]

In what I’m calling This Should Have Been The End, Part 2, Zoe Quinn announces that they have been lurking the #BurgersAndFries IRC channel since the beginning and releases dozens of screenshots showing harassment being planned and the selection of “ethics in games journalism” as a cover. #BurgersAndFries has a meltdown, everyone turns on each other, and the channel is abandoned. And they then start another IRC and things proceed.

It goes on like this. I’m not gonna cover everything. This is just the first month. It should be clear by now that this thing is kind of unkillable. And I worry I haven’t made it obvious that this is not just a chanboard and an IRC. Thousands of regular, every day gamers were buying the story and joining in. They were angry, and no amount of evidence that their anger was unfounded was going to change that. You could not mention or even allude to GamerGate and not get flooded with dozens, even hundreds of furious replies. These replies always included the hashtag so everyone monitoring it could join in, so all attempts at real conversation devolved into a hundred forking threads where some people expected you to talk to them while others hurled insults and slurs. And always the possibility that, if any one of them didn’t like what you said, you’d be the next target.

To combat this, some progressives offered up the hashtag #GameEthics to the people getting swept up in GamerGate, saying, “look, we get that you’re angry, and if you want to talk about ethics in games journalism, we can totally do that, but using your hashtag is literally putting us in danger; they calling the police on people saying there’s a hostage situation at their home addresses so they get sent armed SWAT teams, and if you’ll just use this other hashtag we can have the conversation you say you want to have in safety.” And I will ever stop being salty about what happened.

They refused. They wouldn’t cede any ground to what they saw as their opposition. It was so important to have the conversation on their terms that not only did they refuse to use #GameEthics, they spammed it with furry porn so no one could use it.

A few major events on the timeline before we move on: Christina Hoff Sommers, the Republican Party’s resident “feminist,” comes out criticizing Anita Sarkeesian and becomes a major GG figurehead, earning the title Based Mom. Zoe Quinn gets a restraining order against Eron Gjoni, which he repeatedly violates, to no consequence; GG will later crowdfund his legal fees. There’s this listserv called GameJournoPros where game journalists would talk about their jobs, and many are discussing their concerns over GamerGate, so Milo Yiannopoulos leaks it and this is framed as further “proof of collusion.” 4chan finally starts enforcing its “no dox” rules and shuts GamerGate threads down, so they migrate to 8chan, a site famous for hosting like a lot of child porn. Indie game developer Brianna Wu makes a passing joke about GamerGate on Twitter and they decide, seemingly on a whim, to make her one of the biggest targets in the entire movement; she soon has to leave her home as well. GamerGate gets endorsements from WikiLeaks, Infowars, white nationalist sites Stormfront and The Daily Stormer, and professional rapist RooshV. And hundreds of people get doxxed; an 8chan subforum called Baphomet is created primarily to host dox of GamerGate’s critics.

But by November, GamerGate popularity was cresting, as more and more mainstream media covered it negatively. Their last, big spike in popularity came when Anita Sarkeesian went on The Colbert Report and Stephen made fun of the movement. Their numbers never recovered after that.

Which is not to say GamerGate ended. It slowed down. The period of confusion where the mainstream world couldn’t tell whether it was a legitimate movement or not passed. But, again, most harassers faced no meaningful repercussions. Gamers who bought the lie about “ethics in games journalism” stayed mad that no one had ever taken them seriously, and harassers continued to grief their targets for years. The full timeline of GamerGate is an constant cycle of lies, harassment, operations, grift, and doxxing. Dead-enders are to this day still using the hashtag. And remember how Anita had nothing to do with ethics in games journalism or Zoe Quinn, and they just roped her in because they’d enjoyed harassing her before so why not? Every one of GamerGate’s targets knows that they may get dragged into some future harassment campaign just because. It’s already happened to several of them. They’re marked.

(sigh) Let’s take a breath.

Now that we know what GamerGate was, let’s talk about why it worked.

In the thick of GamerGate, I started compiling a list of tactics I saw them using. I wanted to make a video essay that was one part discussion of antifeminist backlash, and one part list of techniques these people use so we can better recognize and anticipate their behavior. That first part became six parts and the second part went on a back burner. It would eventually become my series, The Alt-Right Playbook. GamerGate is illustrative because most of what would become The Alt-Right Playbook was in use.

Two foundational principles of The Alt-Right Playbook are Control the Conversation and Never Play Defense. Make sure people are talking about what you want them to talk about, and take an aggressive posture so you look dominant even when you’re not making sense. For instance: once Zoe leaked the IRC chatlogs, a reasonable person could tell the average gater, “the originators of GamerGate were planning harassment from the very beginning.” But the gater would say, “you’re cherry-picking; not everyone was a harasser.”

Now, this is a bad argument - that’s not how you use “cherry-picking” - and it’s being framed as an accusation - you’re not just wrong, you’re dishonest - which makes you wanna defend yourself. But, if you do - if you tell them why that argument is crap - you’ve let the conversation move from “did the IRC plan harassment?” - a question of fact - to “are the harassers representative of the movement?” - a question of ethics. Like, yes, they are, but only within a certain moral framework. An ethics question has no provable answer, especially if people are willing to make a lot of terrible arguments. It is their goal to move any question with a definitive answer to a question of philosophy, to turn an argument they can’t win into an argument nobody can win.

The trick is to treat the question you asked like it’s already been answered and bait you into addressing the next question. By arguing about whether you’re cherry-picking, you’re accepting the premise that whether you’re cherry-picking is even relevant. Any time this happens, it’s good to pause and ask, “what did we just skip over?” Because that will tell you a lot.

What you skipped over is their admission that, yes, the IRC did plan harassment, but that’s only on them if most of the movement was in on it. Which is a load of crap - the rest of the IRC saw it happening, let it happen, it’s not like anybody warned Zoe, and shit, I’m having the cherry-picking argument! They got me! You see how tempting it is? But presumably the reason you brought the harassment up is because you want them to do something about it. At the very least, leave the movement, but ideally try and stop it. They don’t, strictly speaking, need to feel personally responsible to do that. And you might be thinking, well, maybe if I can get them take responsibility then they’ll do something, but you’d be falling for a different technique I call I Hate Mondays.

This is where people will acknowledge a terrible thing is happening, maybe even agree it’s bad, but they don’t believe anything can be done about it. They also don’t believe you believe anything can be done about it. Mondays suck, but they come around every week. This is never stated outright, but it’s why you’re arguing past each other. To them, the only reason to talk about the bad thing is to assign blame. Whose turn is it to get shit on for the unsolvable problem? Their argument about cherry-picking amounts to “1-2-3 not it.” And they are furious with you for trying to make them responsible for harassment they didn’t participate in.

The unspoken argument is that harassment is part of being on the internet. Every public figure deals with it. This ignores any concept of scale - why does one person get harassed more than another? - but you can’t argue with someone who views it as a binary: harassment either happens or it doesn’t, and, if it does, it’s a fact of life, and, if it happens to everyone, it’s not gendered. And this is not a strongly-held belief they’ve come to after years of soul-searching - this is what they’ve just decided they believe. They want to participate in GamerGate despite knowing its purpose, and this is what would need to be true for that to be ok.

Or maybe they’re just fucking with you! Maybe you can’t tell. Maybe they can’t tell, either. I call this one The Card Says Moops, where people say whatever they feel will score points in an argument and are so irony-poisoned they have no idea whether they actually believe it. A very useful trick if the thing you appear to believe is unconscionable. You can’t take what people like that say at face value; you can only intuit their beliefs from their actions. They say they believe this one minute and that another, but their behavior is always in accordance with that, not this.

In the negative space, their belief is, “The harassment of these women is okay. My anger about video games is more important. I may not be harassing them myself, but they do kind of deserve it.” They will never say this out loud in a serious conversation, though many will say it in an anonymous or irreverent space where they can later deny they meant it. But, whatever they say they believe, this is the worldview they are operating under.

Obscuring this means flipping through a lot of contradictory arguments. The harassment is being faked, or it’s not being faked but it’s being exaggerated, or it’s not being exaggerated but the target is provoking it to get attention, which means GamerGate harassers simultaneously don’t exist, exist in small numbers, and exist in such large numbers someone can build a career out of relying on them! It can be kind of fun to take all these arguments made in isolation and try to string together an actual position. Like, GamerGate would argue that Nathan Grayson having previously mentioned Zoe Quinn in an article about a canceled reality show counts as positive coverage, and since Grayson reached out to Quinn for comment it’s reasonable to assume they started dating before the article was published (which is earlier than they claim), and positive coverage did lead to greater popularity for Depression Quest. But if you untangle that, it’s like… okay, you’re saying Zoe Quinn slept with a journalist in exchange for four nonconsecutive sentences that said no more than “Zoe Quinn exists and made a game,” and the price of those four sentences was to date the journalist for months, all to get rich off a game that didn’t cost any money. That’s your movement?

And some, if cornered, would say, “yes, we believe women are just that shitty, that one would fuck a guy for months if it made them the tiniest bit more famous.” But they won’t lead with that. Because they know it won’t convince the normies, even the ones who want to be convinced. So they use a process I call The Ship of Theseus to, piece by piece, turn that sentence into “slept with a journalist in exchange for a good review” and argue that each part of the sentence is technically accurate. It’s trying to lie without lying. And, provided all the pieces of this sentence are discussed separately, and only in the context of how they justify this sentence, you can trick yourself into believing this sentence is mostly true.

So, like, why? This is clearly motivated reasoning; what’s the motivation? What was this going to accomplish?

The answer is nothing. Nothing, by design. GamerGate’s “official” channels - the subreddit and the handful of forums that didn’t shut them down - were rigidly opposed to any action more organized than an email campaign. They had a tiny handful of tangible demands - they wanted gaming websites to post public ethics policies and had a list of people they wanted fired - but their larger aim was the sea change in how games journalism operated, which nothing they were asking for could possibly give them. The kind of anger that convinces you this is a true statement is not going to be addressed by a few paragraphs about ethics and Leigh Alexander getting a new job. They wanted gaming sites to stop catering to women and “SJWs” - who were a sizable and growing source of traffic - and to get out of the pockets of companies that advertised on their websites - which was their primary source of income. So all Kotaku had to do to make them happy was solve capitalism!

Meanwhile, the unofficial channels, like 8chan and Baphomet, were planning op after op to get private information, spread lies with fake accounts, get disinformation trending, make people quit jobs, cancel gigs, and flee their homes. Concrete goals with clear results. All you had to do to feel productive was go rogue. In my video,

How to Radicalize a Normie, I describe how the Alt-Right encourages lone wolf behavior by whipping people up into a rage and then refusing to give them anything to do, while surrounding them with examples of people taking matters into their own hands. The same mechanism is in play here: the public-facing channels don’t condone harassment but also refuse to fight it, the private channels commit it under cover of anonymity, and there is a free flow of traffic between them for when the official channels’ impotence becomes unbearable.

What I hope I’m illustrating is how these techniques play off of each other, how they create a closed ecosystem that rational thought cannot enter. There’s a phrase we use on the internet that got thrown around a lot at the time:

you can’t logic someone out of a position they didn’t logic themselves into.

Now, there are a few other big topics I think are relevant here, so I want to go through them one by one.

MEMEIFICATION

So a lot of interactions with GamerGate would involve a very insular knowledge base.

Like, you’d say something benign but progressive on Twitter.

A gater would show up in your mentions and say something aggressive and false.

You’d correct them. But then they’d come back and hit you with -

ah shit, sorry, this is a Loss meme.

If I were in front of a classroom I’d ask, show of hands, how many of you got that? I had to ask Twitter recently, does Gen Z know about Loss?!

If you don’t know what Loss is I’m not sure I can explain it to you. It’s this old, bad webcomic that was parodied so, so, so many times

that it was reduced to its barest essentials, to the point where any four panels with shapes in this arrangement is a Loss meme. For those of you in the know, you will recognize this anywhere, but have you ever tried to explain to someone who wasn’t in the know why this is really fuckin’ funny?

So, now… by the same process that this is a comics joke,

this is a rape joke.

I’m not gonna show the original image, but, once upon a time, someone made an animated GIF of the character Piccolo from Dragon Ball Z graphically raping Vegeta. 4chan loved it so much that it got posted daily, became known as the “daily dose,” until mods started deleting every incident of it. So they uploaded slightly edited version of it. Then they started uploading other images that had been edited with Piccolo’s color scheme. It got so abstracted that eventually any collection of purple and green pixels would be recognized as Piccolo Dick.

Apropos of nothing, GamerGate is a movement that insists it is not sexist in nature and it does not condone threats of rape against the women they don’t like. And this is their logo. This is their mascot.

If you’re familiar with the Daily Dose, the idea that GamerGate would never support Eron Gjoni if they believed he was a sexual abuser is so blatantly insincere it’s insulting… but imagine trying to explain to someone who’s not on 4chan how this sweater is a rape joke. Imagine having to explain it to a journalist. Imagine having to explain it to the judge enforcing your abuser’s restraining order.

Reactionaries use meme culture not just because they’re terminally online but also because it makes their behavior seem either benign or just confusing to outsiders. They find it hilarious that they can be really explicit and still fly under the radar. The Alt-Right did this with Pepe the Frog, the OK sign, even the milk glass emoji for a hot minute. The more inexplicable the meme, the better. You get the point where Stephen Miller is flashing Nazi signs from the White House and the Presidential re-eletion campaign is releasing 88 ads of exactly 14 words and there’s still a debate about whether the administration is racist. Because journalists aren’t going to get their heads around that. You tell them “1488 is a Nazi number,” it’s gonna seem a lot more plausible that you’re making shit up.

MOVE FAST AND BREAK THINGS

Online movements like GamerGate move at a speed and mutation rate too high for the mainstream world to keep up. And not just that they don’t understand the memes - they don’t understand the infrastructure.

In an attempt to cover GamerGate evenhandedly, George Wiedman of Super Bunnyhop interviewed a lawyer who specializes in journalistic ethics. He meant well; I really wish he hadn’t. You can see him trying to fit something like GamerGate into terms this silver-haired man who works in copyright law can understand. At one point he asks if it’s okay to fund the creative project of a potential journalistic source, to which the guy understandably says “no.”

What he’s alluding to here is the harassment of Jenn Frank. A few weeks into GamerGate, Jenn Frank writes a piece in The Guardian about sexism in tech that mentions Anita Sarkeesian and Zoe Quinn. In another case of “here’s a strongly-held belief I just decided I have,” GamerGate says this is a breach of journalistic ethics because Frank backs Quinn on Patreon. They harass her so intensely she not only has to quit her job at The Guardian, for several months she quits journalism entirely.

Off the bat, calling a public figure central to a major event in the field a “journalistic source” is flatly wrong-headed. Quinn was not interviewed or even contacted for the article, they were in no way a “source”; they were a subject. But I want to talk about this phrase, “fund a creative project.” Patreon is functionally a subscription; it’s a way of buying things. It’s technically accurate that Frank is funding Quinn’s creative project, but only in the sense that you are funding Bob Dylan’s creative project if you listen to his music. And saying Frank therefore can’t write about Quinn is like saying a music journalist can’t cover a Bob Dylan concert if they’ve ever bought his albums.

And we could talk about the ways that Patreon, as compared with other funding models, can create a greater sense of intimacy, and we also could comment that, well, that’s how an increasing number of people consume media now, so that perspective should be present in journalism. But maybe it means we should cover that perspective differently? I don’t know. It’s an interesting subject. But none of that’s going on in this conversation because this guy doesn’t know what Patreon is. It was only a year old at this point. Patreon’s been a primary source of my income for 5 years and my parents still don’t know what it is. (I think they think I’m a freelancer?) This guy hears “funding a creative project” and he’s thinking an investor, someone who makes a profit off the source’s success.

The language of straight society hasn’t caught up with what’s happening, and that works in GamerGate’s favor.

In the years since GamerGate we have dozens of stories of people trying to explain Twitter harassment to a legal system that’s never heard of Twitter. People trying to explain death threats to cops whose only relationship to the internet is checking email, confusedly asking, “Why don’t you just not go online?” Like, yeah, release your text game about depression at GameStop for the PS3 and get it reviewed in the Boston Globe, problem solved.

You see this in the slowness of mainstream journalists to condemn the harassment - hell, even games journalists at first. Because what if it is a legitimate movement? What if the harassers are just a fringe element? What if there was misconduct? The people in a position to stop GamerGate don’t have to be convinced of their legitimacy, they just have to hesitate. They just have to be unsure. Remember how much happened in just the first two weeks, how it took only a month to become unkillable.

It’s the same hesitance that makes mainstream media, online platforms, and law enforcement underestimate The Alt-Right. They’re terrified of condemning a group as white nationalist terrorists because they’re confused, and what if they’re wrong? Or, in most cases, not even afraid they’re wrong, but afraid of the PR disaster if too much of the world thinks they’re wrong.

ACCOUNTABILITY AND CONTROL

A thing I’ve talked about in The Alt-Right Playbook is how these decentralized, ostensibly leaderless movements insulate themselves from responsibility. Harassment is never the movement’s fault because they never told anyone to harass and you can’t prove the harassers are legitimate members of the movement. The Alt-Right does this too - one of their catchphrases is “I disavow.” Since there are no formalized rules for membership, they can redraw boundaries on the fly; they can take credit for any successes and deny responsibility for any wrongdoing. Public membership is granted or revoked based on a person’s moment-to-moment utility.

It’s almost like… they’re cherry-picking.

The flipside of this is a lack of control. Since they never officially tell anyone to do anything but write emails, they have no means of stopping anyone from behaving counterproductively. The harassment of Jenn Frank was the first time GamerGate’s originators thought, “maybe we should ease off just to avoid bad publicity,” and they found they couldn’t. GamerGate had gotten too big, and too many people were clearly there for precisely this reason.

They also couldn’t control the infighting. When your goal is to harass women and you have all these contradictory justifications for why, you end up with a lot of competing beliefs. And, you know what? Angry white men who like harassing people don’t form healthy relationships! Several prominent members of GamerGate - including Internet Aristocrat - got driven out by factionalism; they were doxxed by their own people! Jordan Owen and Davis Aurini parted ways hating each other, with Aurini releasing chatlogs of him gaslighting Owen about accepting an endorsement from Roosh, and they released two competing edits of The Sarkeesian Effect.

I say this because it’s useful to know that these are alliances of convenience. If you know where the sore spots are, you can apply pressure to them.

LEADERS WITHOUT LEADERSHIP

One way movements like GamerGate deflect responsibility is by declaring, “We are a leaderless movement! We have no means to stop harassment.”

Which… any anarchist will tell you collective action is entirely possible without leaders. But they’ll also tell you, absent a system of distributing power equitably, you’re gonna have leaders, just not ones you elected.

A few months into GamerGate, Randi Lee Harper created the ggautoblocker. Here’s what it did: it took five prominent GamerGate figures - Adam Baldwin, Mike Cernovich, Christina Hoff Sommers, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Nick Monroe, formerly known as [sigh] PressFartToContinue - and generated a block list of everyone who followed at least two of them on Twitter. Now, this became something of an arms race; once GamerGate found out about it they made secondary accounts that followed different people, and more and more prominent figures appeared and had to get added to the list. But, when it first launched, the list generated from just these five people comprised an estimated 90-95% of GamerGate.

Hate to break it to you, guys, but if 90+ percent of your movement is following at least two of the same five people, those are your leaders. The attention economy has produced them. Power pools when left on its own.

This is another case where you have to ignore what people claim and look at what they do. The Alt-Right loves to say “we disavow Richard Spencer” and “Andrew Anglin doesn’t speak for us.”

But no matter what they say, pay attention to whom they’re taking cues from.

AD CAMPAIGN

George Lakoff has observed that one way the Left fails in opposition to the Right is that most liberal politicians and campaigners have degrees in things like law and political science, where conservative campaigners more often have degrees in advertising and communications. Liberals and leftists may have a better product to sell, but conservatives know how to sell products.

GamerGate less resembles a boots-on-the-ground political movement than an ad campaign. First they decide what their messaging strategy is going to be. Then the media arm starts publicizing it. They seek out celebrity endorsements. They get their own hashtag and mascot. They donate to charity and literally call it “public relations.” You can even see the move from The Quinnspiracy to GamerGate as a rebranding effort - when one name got too closely associated with harassment, they started insisting GamerGate was an entirely separate movement from The Quinnspiracy. I learned that trick from Stringer Bell’s economics class.

Now, we could stand to learn a thing or two from this. But I also wouldn’t want us to adopt this strategy whole hog; you should view moves like these as red flags. If you’re hesitating to condemn a movement because what if it’s legitimate, take a look at whether they’re selling ideology like it’s Pepsi.

PERCEPTION IS EVERYTHING

One reason to insist you’re a consumer revolt rather than a harassment campaign is most people who want to harass need someone to give them permission, and need someone to tell them it’s normal.

Bob Altemeyer has this survey he uses to study authoritarianism. He divides respondents into people with low, average, and high authoritarian sentiments, and then tells them what the survey has measured and asks, “what score do you think is best to have: low, average, or high?”

People with low authoritarian sentiments say it’s best to be low. People with average authoritarian sentiments also say it’s best to be low. But people with high authoritarian sentiments? They say it’s best to be average. Altemeyer finds, across all his research, that reactionaries want to aggress, but only if it is socially acceptable. They want to know they are the in-group and be told who the out-group is. They don’t particularly care who the out-group is, Altemeyer finds they’ll aggress against any group an authority figure points to, even, if they don’t notice it, a group that contains them. They just have to believe the in-group is the norm.

This is why they have to believe games journalism is corrupt because of a handful of feminist media critics with outsized influence. Legitimate failures of journalism cannot be systemic problems rooted in how digital media is funded and consumed; there cannot be a legitimate market for social justice-y media. It has to be manipulation by the few. Because, if these things are common, then, even if you don’t like them, they’re normal. They’re part of the in-group. Reactionary politics is rebellion against things they dislike getting normalized, because they know, if they are normalized, they will have to accept them. Because the thing they care about most is being normal.

This is why the echo chamber, this is why Fox News, this is why the Far Right insists they are the “silent majority.” This is why they artificially inflate their numbers. This is why they insist facts are “biased.” They have to maintain the image that what are, in material terms, fringe beliefs are, in fact, held by the majority. This is why getting mocked by Stephen Colbert was such a blow to GamerGate. It makes it harder to believe the world at large agrees with them.

This is why, if you’re trying to change the world for the better, it’s pointless to ask their permission. Because, if you change the world around them, they will adapt even faster than you will.

THE ARGUMENT ISN’T SUPPOSED TO END

Casey Explosion has this really great Twitter thread comparing the Alt-Right to Scary Terry from Rick and Morty. His catchphrase is “you can run but you can’t hide, bitch.” And Rick and Morty finally escape him by hiding. And Morty’s all, “but he said we can’t hide,” and Rick is like, “why are we taking his word on this? if we could hide, he certainly wouldn’t tell us.”

The reason to argue with a GamerGater is on the implied agreement that, if you can convince them they’re part of a hate mob, they will leave. But look at the incentives here: they want to be in GamerGate, and you want them not to be. But they’re already in GamerGate. They’re not waiting on the outcome of this argument to participate. They’ve already got what they want; they don’t need to convince you GamerGate isn’t a hate mob.

This is why all their logic and rationalizations are shit, because they don’t need to be good. They’re not trying to win an argument. They’re trying to keep the argument going.

This has been a precept of conservative political strategy for decades. “You haven’t convinced us climate change is real and man-made, you need to do more studies.” They’re not pausing the use of fossil fuels until the results come in. “You haven’t convinced us there are no WMDs in Iraq, you need to collect more evidence.” They’re not suspending the war until you get back to them. “You haven’t convinced us that Reaganomic tax policy causes recessions, let’s just do it for another forty years and see what happens.” And when the proof comes in, they send us out for more, and we keep going.

The biggest indicator you can’t win a debate with a reactionary is they keep telling you you can. The biggest indicator protest and deplatforming works is they keep telling you in plays into their hands. The biggest indicator that you shouldn’t compromise with Republicans is they keep saying doing otherwise is stooping to their level. They’re not going to walk into the room and say, “Hi, my one weakness is reasoned argument, let’s pick a time and place to hash this out.”

And we fall for it because we’re trying to be decent people. Because we want to believe the truth always wins. We want to bargain in good faith, and they are weaponizing our good faith against us. Always dangling the carrot that the reason they’re like this is no one’s given them the right argument not to be. It’s all just a misunderstanding, and, really, it’s on us for not trying hard enough.

But they have no motivation to agree with us. Most of the people asking for debates have staked their careers on disagreeing with us. Conceding any point to the Left could cost them their livelihood.

WHY GAMES?

Let’s close with the big question: why games? And, honestly, the short answer is:

why not games?

Games culture has always presented itself as a hobby for young, white, middle class boys. It’s always been bigger and more diverse than that, but that’s how it was marketed, and that’s who most felt they belonged. As gaming grows bigger, there is suddenly room for those marginal voices that have always been there to make themselves heard. And, as gaming becomes more mainstream, it’s having its first brushes with serious critical analysis.

This makes the people who have long felt gaming was theirs and theirs alone anxious and a little angry. They’ve invested a lot of their identity in it and they don’t want it to change.

And what the Far Right sees in a sizable collection of aggrieved young men is an untapped market. This is why sites like Stormfront and Breitbart flocked to them. These are not liberals they have to convert, these people are, up til now, not politically engaged. The Right can be their first entry to politics.

The world was changing. Nerd properties were exploding into popular culture in tandem with media representation diversifying. And we were living with the first Black President. Any time an out-group looks like it might join the in-group, there is a self-protective backlash from the existing in-group. This had been brewing for a while, and, honestly, if it hadn’t boiled over in games, it would have boiled over somewhere else.

And, in the years since GamerGate, it has. The Far Right has tapped the comics, Star Wars, and sci-fi fandoms; they tried to get in with the furry community but failed spectacularly. They’re all over YouTube and, frankly, the atheist community was already in their pocket. Basically, if you’re in community with a bunch of young white guys who think they own the place, you might wanna have some talks with them sooner than later.

Anyway, if you want to know more about any of this stuff, RationalWiki’s timeline on GamerGate is pretty thorough. You can also watch my or Dan Olson’s videos on the subject. I’ll be putting the audio of this talk on YouTube and will put as many resources as I can in the show notes. The channel, again, is Innuendo Studios.

Sorry this was such a bummer.

Thank you for your time.

#video essay #alt-right playbook #Youtube

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fruitcoops · 3 years

Note

So this is sort of similar to the people writing fanfic about the lions but can you imagine the YouTube edits? Like the videos that are just "Cap having heart eyes for Loops for 10 minutes straight" or "Loops lovingly dragging Caps name through the mud for 3 minutes" like those kinds of things and I can just imagine them doing reaction videos and it just being funny and the world just loving coops

Okay so this wasn't a specific fic request but I got carried away with imagining videos and....here you go. SW credit goes to @lumosinlove, but Grace and Anna are mine! Bonus points to anyone who remembers the easter egg in this one!

Message From: Gracie

ANNA HOLY SHIT

Anna frowned at her phone screen, squinting to read around the spiderweb crack decorating the upper corner. She had tried to convince herself that it was cool, goth, edgy, but in the end she had to admit that it was just irritating. In a tragic turn of events, packing tape couldn’t fix everything.

Message To: Gracie

Wtf did I do

Two weeks of radio silence, then unexplained accusations. Anna shook her head as the grey bubble disappeared for a third time and turned back to her computer. Grace may have been her favorite cousin—and favorite person, if she was being honest—but very few things came between Anna and video editing. Especially editing for a Lions meme video. She had a whole 2,341 followers to attend to, after all.

Message From: Gracie

DID YOU SEE THE FUCKING INTERVIEW???

Message To: Gracie

Wow thank you so helpful

Message From: Gracie

Skip to 2:45 bestie

A link popped up just as Anna cut a segment from the sleep study video, where Loops’ heart eyes were in full effect. It was a rare, precious find for fan editors like herself.

“Come on,” she groaned. Maybe introducing Grace to the deepest parts of her hockey obsession was a mistake. But, really, what else was she supposed to do when she learned her cousin, who didn’t even live in Gryffindor, got to meet her favorite players just by chilling in a café? What kind of cosmic joke was that?

She narrowed her eyes at the embed of the link, then stifled a shriek. Impossible. How had she missed an upload?

As if on cue, her computer pinged with a new notification from the Lion Pride channel. “Oh, fuck me,” she muttered, scrambling to save her half-done video and pressing play.

The interviewer asked basic questions, ones she had heard the answers to a million times while curating her content. It always felt funny to hear people refer to Cap as ‘Sirius’—it was too official, too formal. She had spent countless hours on the compilations of his softer moments, and they were her most popular videos. Cap Having Heart Eyes for Loops for 10 Minutes Gay. Cap Being an Actual Puppy for Six and a Half Minutes. Everyone Wanting Cap Cuddles for Fifteen Minutes. Every Time Cap Smiles When Someone Mentions His Godson. The list was endless. She loved it.

She did a silent fist pump when she saw the interviewer had snagged both Cap and Loops; that would give her a whole new stream of workable content. If she was lucky, she could expand on her series of Loops Lovingly Roasting His Friends, part…fuck it, who was even counting anymore?

Anna was so caught up in her excitement that she nearly forgot about Grace’s suggestion. I’ve never skipped through a video on the first watch before, she thought hesitantly. But maybe just this once…

Her cursor hovered over the 2:45mark. She closed her eyes, and clicked it.

“—have you been adjusting to life as a celebrity?” the interviewer asked. Anna nearly rolled her eyes when Loops laughed. That question had been used far too often to be interesting anymore.

“It’s had its ups and downs,” Loops said with a smile. “Mostly, though, the fans have been incredible and just knocked my socks off with their support.”

“Really? What’s your favorite part of the Lions fanbase?”

He didn’t miss a beat. “Their creativity, for sure. There was a video a while back where we reacted to some of the comments people left, and this person on Twitter made an absolutely beautiful collage of photos.”

“I have it saved to my phone,” Sirius added.

One more clip for the simp video. Anna made a note on the small corner space of her European History notes. The degree can wait for ten more minutes.

“Do you have a favorite creator?”

The interviewer was clearly teasing, but Loops’ smile was genuine. “I don’t know about a favorite, but there’s this person on YouTube who makes a shit ton of videos and they’re hysterical. I saw one the other day about—god, what was it again?”

“Every time I smile when people mention Harry,” Sirius answered around a laugh. “Can you blame me?”

Anna didn’t hear the next question. A ringing noise filled her ears as she sat, frozen, on her shitty dorm mattress and listened to her literal heroes talk about her dorky little channel. “Holy fuck,” she blurted after a moment of silence. “Holy fuck.”

“—subscribed?” The man’s voice snapped her back to reality.

“Of course I am!” Loops said. “You think I’m passing up a chance to watch a compilation of my friends making stupid decisions for the entire internet to see?”

A noise that would have been a shriek if Anna had any breath left in her body escaped her lungs; she clamped a hand over her mouth and shakily exited from the video before going to her YouTube account. 800 new notifications. 700 new followers in the last quarter hour. She was pretty sure she blacked out for a second from sheer shock and joy.

Message To: Gracie

What

Message From: Gracie

You’re famous!

Message To: Gracie

What

Message From: Gracie

I bet he knows your stuff better than he remembers me tbh

“They know me,” she whispered, staring at her computer. The unfinished video showed a perfect frame of Loops’ soft smile as he watched Cap get his toothbrush stuck in his pajama shirt. Somehow, the thought was both exhilarating and horrifying. What if they thought she was a creep? She wasn’t, not really, just a bored college student with not enough free time for a job but too much to keep herself busy with schoolwork. Her 2,341—no, 3,052—followers were just other hockey nerds looking for time to kill.

And the subject of those videos was one of her subscribers.

Anna slipped her headphones back on and began to edit like it was her last day on earth. Her fingers flew across the keyboard on muscle memory while her brain fizzed. Perfect, she thought. It has to be perfect.

In four hours, it was done. She sat back, panting, then hunched over again and began tapping out a title card.

Hello. Idk if anyone saw the new Lion Pride video today (linked below if anyone wants to see why I’m dying right now) but apparently Remus Lupin is subscribed to this channel and has been for a while.

Hi Loops. I’m Anna. You met my cousin once and she said she liked your sweater.

Now that that’s out of the way, please enjoy the next five minutes of our new rookie being the sappiest mf in existence (except for his fiancé). Mr. Lupin, please tell Hattie I say hello.

She pressed upload, peeled her headphones off, and collapsed backward on her bed.

Message To: Gracie

If I die here, tell the world I did it doing what I loved

Message From: Gracie

Will do

OH FUCK YOU FOR BRINGING UP THE SWEATER I SOUND LIKE A CREEP

Anna covered her itchy eyes with her forearm and settled in for a long, long nap. Her brain still needed to repair a few circuits.

#remus lupin #sirius black #coops #anna #grace #sweater weather #lumosinlove #my fic #fanfic #ocs #hattie #lion pride

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soundsfaebutokay · 3 years

Text

youtube

So I've recc'd this video before, but it deserves its own post because it's one of my favorite things on youtube. It's a Tedx Talk by comics writer, editor, and journalist Jay Edidin, and I really think that it will connect with a lot of people here.

If you live and breathe stories of all kinds, you might like this.

If you care about media representation, you might like this.

If you're neurodivergent, you might like this.

If you're interested in a gender transition story that veers from the norm, you might like this.

If you love the original Leverage and especially Parker, and understand how important it is that a character like her exists, you will definitely like this.

Transcript below the cut:

You Are Here: The Cartography of Stories

by Jay Edidin

I am autistic. And what this means in practice is that there are some things that are easier for me than they are for most people, and a great many things that are somewhat harder, and these affect my life in more or less overt ways. As it goes, I'm pretty lucky. I've been able to build a career around special interests and granular obsession. My main gig at the moment is explaining superhero comics continuity and publishing history for which work I am somehow paid in actual legal currency—which is both a triumph of the frivolous in an era of the frantically pragmatic, and a job that's really singularly suited to my strengths and also to my idiosyncrasies.

I like comics. I like stories in general, because they make sense to me in ways that the rest of the world and my own mind often don't. Self-knowledge is not an intuitive thing for me. What sense of self I have, I've built gradually and laboriously and mostly through long-term pattern recognition. For decades, I didn't even really have a self-image. If you'd asked me to draw myself, I would eventually have given you a pair of glasses and maybe a very messy scribble of hair, and that would've been about it. But what I do know—backwards, forwards, and in pretty much every way that matters—are stories. I know how they work. I understand their language, their complex inner clockwork, and I can use those things to extrapolate a sort of external compass that picks up where my internal one falls short. Stories—their forms, their structure, the sense of order inherent to them—give me the means to navigate what otherwise, at least for me, would be an impassable storm of unparsable data. Or stories are a periscope, angled to access the parts of myself I can't intuitively see. Or stories are a series of mirrors by which I can assemble a composite sketch of an identity I rarely recognize whole...which is how I worked out that I was transgender, in my early thirties, by way of a television show.

This is my story. And it's about narrative cartography, and representation, and why those things matter. It's about autism and it's about gender and it's about how they intersect. And it's about the kinds of people we know how to see, and the kinds of people we don't. It's not the kind of story that gets told a lot, you might hear a lot, because the narrative around gender transition and dysphoria in our culture is really, really prescriptive. It's basically the story of the kid who has known for their whole life that they're this and not that, and that story demands the kind of intuitive self-knowledge that I can't really do, and a kind of relationship to gender that I don't really have—which is part of why it took me so long to figure my own stuff out.

So, to what extent this story, my story has a beginning, it begins early in 2014 when I published an essay titled, "I See Your Value Now: Asperger's and the Art of Allegory." And it explored, among other things, the ways that I use narrative and narrative structures to navigate real life. And it got picked up in a number of fairly prominent places that got linked, and I casually followed the ensuing discussion. And I was surprised to discover that readers were fairly consistently assuming I was a man. Now, that in itself wasn't a new experience for me, even though at the time I was writing under a very unambiguously female byline. It had happened in the letter columns of comics I'd edited. It had happened when a parody Twitter account I'd created went viral. When I was on staff at Wired, I budgeted for fancy scotch by putting a dollar in a box every time a reader responded in a way that made it clear they were assuming I was a man in response to an article where my name was clearly visible, and then I had to stop doing that because it happened so often I couldn't afford to keep it up. But in all of those cases, the context, you know, the reasons were pretty obvious. The fields I'd worked in, the beats I covered, they were places where women had had to fight disproportionally hard for visibility and recognition. We live in a culture that assumes a male default, so given a neutral voice and a character limit, most readers will assume a male author.

But this was different, because this wasn't just a book I'd edited, it wasn't a story I'd reported—it was me, it was my story. And it made me uncomfortable, got under my skin in ways that the other stuff really hadn't. And so I did what I do when that happens, and I tried to sort of reverse-engineer it to look at the conclusions and peel them back to see the narratives behind them and the stories that made them tick. And I started this, I started this by going back to the text of the essay, and you know, examining it every way I could think of: looking at craft, looking at content. And in doing so, I was surprised to realize that while I had written about a number of characters with whom I identified closely, that every single one of those characters I'd written about was male. And that surprised me even more than the responses to the essay had, because I've spent my career writing and talking and thinking about gender and representation in popular media. In 2014, I'd been the feminist gadfly of an editorial department and multiple mastheads. I'd been a founding board member of an organization that existed to advocate for more and better representation of women and girls in comics characters and creators. And most of my favorite characters, the ones I'd actively seek out and follow, were women. Just not, apparently, the characters I saw myself in.

Now I still didn't realize it was me at this point. Remember: self-knowledge, not very intuitive for me. And while I had spent a lot of time thinking about gender, I'd never really bothered to think much about my own. I knew academically that the way other people read and interpreted my gender affected and had influenced a lifetime of social and professional interactions, and that those in turn had informed the person I'd grown up into during that time. But I really believed, like I just sort of had in the back of my head, that if you peeled away all of that social conditioning, you'd basically end up with what I got when I tried to draw a self-portrait. So: a pair of glasses, messy scribble of hair, and in this case, maybe also some very strong opinions about the X-Men. I mean, I knew something was off. I'd always known something was off, that my relationship to gender was messy and uncomfortable, but gender itself struck me as messy and uncomfortable, and it had never been a large enough part of how I defined myself to really feel like something that merited further study, and I had deadlines, and...so it was always on the back burner. So, I looked, I looked at what I had, at this improbable group of exclusively male characters. And I looked and I figured that if this wasn't me, then it had to be a result of the stories I had access to, to choose from, and the entertainment landscape I was looking at. And the funny thing is, I wasn't wrong, exactly. I just wasn't right either.

See, the characters I'd written about had one other significant trait in common aside from their gender, which is that they were all more or less explicitly, more or less heavily coded as autistic. And I thought, "Ah, yes. This explains it. This is under representation in fiction echoing under representation in life and vice versa." Because the characteristics that I'd honed in on, that I particularly identified with in these guys, were things like emotional unavailability and social awkwardness and granular obsession, and all of those are characteristics that are seen as unsympathetic and therefore unmarketable in female characters. Which is also why readers were assuming that I was a man.

Because, you see, here's the thing. I'm not the only one who uses stories to navigate the world. I'm just a little more deliberate about it. For humans, stories formed the bridge between data and understanding. They're where we look when we need to contextualize something new, or to recognize something we're pretty sure we've seen before. They're how we identify ourselves; they're how we locate ourselves and each other in the larger world. There were no fictional women like me; there weren't representations of women like me in media, and so readers were primed not to recognize women like me in real life either.

Now by this point, I had started writing a follow-up essay, and this one was also about autism and narratives, but specifically focused on how they intersected with gender and representation in media. And in context of this essay, I went about looking to see if I could find even one female character who had that cluster of traits I'd been looking for, and I was asking around in autistic communities. And I got a few more or less useful one-off suggestions, and some really, really splendid arguments about semantics and standards, and um...then I got one answer over and over and over in community after community after community. "Leverage," people told me. "You have to watch Leverage."

So I watched Leverage. Leverage is five seasons of ensemble heist drama. It's about a team of very skilled con artists who take down corrupt and powerful plutocrats and the like, and it's a lot of fun, and it's very clever, and it's clever enough that it doesn't really matter that it's pretty formulaic, and I enjoyed it a lot. But what's most important, what Leverage has is Parker.

Parker is a master thief, and she is the best of the best of the best in ways that all of Leverage's characters are the best of the best. And superficially, she looks like the kind of woman you see on TV. So she's young, and she's slender, and she's blonde, and she's attractive but in a sort of approachable way. And all of that familiarity is brilliant misdirection, because the thing is, there are no other women like Parker on TV. Because Parker—even if it's never explicitly stated in the show—Parker is coded incredibly clearly as autistic. Parker is socially awkward. Her speech tends to have limited inflection; what inflection it does have is repetitive and sounds rehearsed a lot of the time. She's not emotionally literate; she struggles with it, and the social skills she develops over the series, she learns by rote, like they're just another grift. When she's not scaling skyscrapers or cartwheeling through laser grids, she wears her body like an ill-fitting suit. Parker moves like me. And Parker, Parker was a revelation—she was a revolution unto herself. In a media landscape where unempathetic women usually exist to either be punished or "loved whole," Parker got to play the crabby savant. And she wasn't emotionally intuitive but it was never ever played as the product of abuse or trauma even though she had survived both of those—it was just part of her, as much as were her hands or her eyes. And she had a genuine character arc. My god, she had a genuine romantic arc, even. And none of that required her to turn into anything other than what she was. And in Parker I recognized a thousand tics and details of my life and my personality...but. I didn't recognize myself.

Why? What difference was there in Parker, you know, between Parker and the other characters I'd written about? Those characters, they'd spanned ethnicities and backgrounds and different media and appearances and the only other characteristic they all had in common was their gender. So that was where I started to look next, and I thought, "Well, okay, maybe, maybe it's masculinity. Maybe if Parker were less feminine, she'd click with me the way those other characters had." So then I tried to imagine a Parker with short hair, who's explicitly butch, and...nothing. So okay, I extended it in what seems like the only logical direction to extend it. I said, "Well, if it's not masculinity, what if it's actual maleness? What if Parker were a man?" Ah. Yeah.

In the end, everything changed, and nothing changed, which is often the way that it goes for me. Add a landmark, no matter how slight, and the map is irrevocably altered. Add a landmark, and paths that were invisible before open wide. Add a landmark, and you may not have moved, but suddenly you know where you are and where you can go.

I wasn't going to tell this story when I started planning this talk. I was gonna tell a similar story, it was about stories, like this is, about narratives and the ways that they influence our culture and vice versa. And it centered around a group of women at NASA who had basically rewritten the narrative around space exploration, and it was a lot more fun, and I still think it was more interesting. But it's also a story you can probably work out for yourselves. In fact it's a story some of you probably have, if you follow that kind of thing, which you probably do given that you're here. And this is a story, my story is not a story that I like to tell. It's not a fun story to talk about because it's very personal and I am a very private person. And it's not universal. And it's not always relatable, and it's definitely not aspirational. And it's not the kind of story that you tend to encounter unless you're already part of it...which is why I'm telling it now. Because the thing is, I'm not the only person who uses stories to parse the world and navigate it. I'm just a little more deliberate. Because I'm tired of having to rely on composite sketches.

Open your maps. Add a landmark. Reroute accordingly.

#Jay Edidin #LGBTQ #autism #mind and body #gender norms #why humans need stories #Leverage #Parker #Abby posts Leverage #my faves #Youtube #I did my best with the transcript #sorry for any mistakes

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goddesswritings · 3 years

Text

“Can I slap her for you?” - Corpse Husband | Part One

Title: “Can I slap her for you?” – Part One

Pairing: Corpse Husband x Reader

Summary: Being stuck living with the queen of YouTube drama and partying during the pandemic has seriously worn down your patience. Meeting Pokimane has changed your life for the better, making Among Us a pivotal part of your life.

Word Count: 5.3k

I’m always writing so much plot! I hope you like it. Part Two is in the works.

********

Credit to PIC owner!

This pandemic was hell for you. Being stuck in this apartment with your bitch of a sister was not something you would wish on even your enemy.

When you first moved to LA with her, things were fine, and you got along. She had a budding YouTube career, and you were working a good job. Pretty quickly, she’d hired you as her editor since that was a daily part of your real job, you happily agreed because it meant you could get money on the side and still work.

Your sister was mainly a beauty YouTuber but last year she gained over 3 million followers when she started a series where she would interview people in other lines of entertainment and then test it out. Since then, she’d become a horror to live with.

Now with the pandemic, you’d been furloughed from you day job and working full time for your diva of a sister. She had only been getting worse and worse. Being stuck with her was crap, especially since she was selfish and still went out to party and do collabs with people like there wasn’t a massive virus out there.

“I hope you finished the editing I needed done.” Olivia, your sister, asked as she shut the front door.

You were just finishing up the edits from your spot on the couch. “Yeah, I did it while you were out risking lives.”

“Shut the hell up. I’m an adult and I can do what I want.” She flipped her blonde hair over her shoulder.

“Even when it’s killing hundreds of thousands of people?” You were so sick of her attitude. She has no care in the world for anyone but herself. In the last month, her name had been posted all over the commentary YouTubers channels. Slamming her for partying while the world dealt with Covid.

Olivia rolled her eyes. “Those people are not my problem at all. If they are so afraid, they should just stay home.”

“Why are you so selfish?” Her behavior was completely out of hands these days.

“Do I need to remind you that I pay you?” She sent you a glare before heading off to her room. You grumbled and threw your head back. There was no way you could handle her.

Stressing out over her was no good, so you decided to take your laptop back to your room and play some games to calm yourself down. Among Us was one of those games that allowed to you just play and forget the stress. You booted up the game and joined some random lobbies. It was hard to find good games because you usually ran into some sour players who couldn’t just play the game without causing drama.

A few rounds in, your phone buzzed, indicating a text. You exited the current game, one of the imposters had already killed you anyway, and picked up the phone. There was a text from Poki. The two of you had become quick friends when she appeared on your sisters series but she clicked more with you since you were more of a gamer.

P: Hey Y/n, what are you doing currently?

It was an unexpected text because you had been fairly sure Poki had a stream tonight.

Y/n: Nothing since I just finished editing my selfish sisters video. What’s up?

She knew very well how horrible Olivia was and she’d been the one person who you could talk to about it. You appreciated her for it.

Poki: Damn, did she go to another party?

Y/n: Yup, she sure did. Then threatened my job when I called her out on it.

Poki: Wow, not cool. Hey, so you know how I’m streaming tonight?

Y/n: Yeah.

Poki: So I had everyone set up for the game but last minute someone dropped out. We need one more person and I know you’re amazing in Among Us. Would you join our game?

This was a surprise. You weren’t a YouTuber or a streamer, so for her to ask you, meant she really was desperate.

Y/n: Sure, I’m free. Who’s playing tonight?

Poki: Rae, Lily, Ethan, Mark, Felix, Toast, Sykkuno, and Corpse.

Wow, that was a packed game full of some pretty big names. Your nerves kicked up at the thought of being in a game with these amazing people.

Y/n: Sweet!

Poki: I will send you the discord so you can join the chat and the game code.

Y/n: Thanks.

She instantly sent you the links and you got your self set up with your headphones. Poki connected you into the discord call.

“Hey, everyone welcome my good friend, Y/n. She’s the one who will fill in on the open spot tonight.” She introduced you to the group.

A chorus of hello’s was heard. You knew Rae, so she jumped right into welcoming you.

Pushing the nerves away, you managed to little hello. Your voice was softer than you’d intended. Damn nerves.

“Guys! Y/n is so good in Among Us. Her skills rival Corpse’s.” Rae gushed. You’d played a game with Rae and Poki and a few of the other girls, but no one had been streaming.

“Whaddup baby.” The deep voice of Corpse said. His voice was something else.

“Don’t make her too nervous there, man.” Felix commented which made the other guys laugh.

“Oh no worries, I’m not nervous.” You said even though you really were nervous. You switched into the game and typed in the code Poki had sent you. Immediately the game lobby popped up, filled with everyone who was on the call. Your character popped onto the screen and took the white color.

“Good to know. I look forward to being an imposter with you.” Corpse said making your cheeks heat up just a little.

“You really need to watch out for her.” Lily said making you giggle. She was right. You were a deceitful imposter.

You quickly changed your hat to the halo, making you match your chosen username, Angel.

“Look how fitting her character is.” Mark commented. “Is that an indication of how you will be?”

“Perhaps.” You were starting to calm your nerves. “You will just have to find out.”

“Okay, let’s get started.” Poki said as the countdown started on screen. You muted your mic. The screen flashed the crew-mate title, and you felt a little more relieved. You hated starting as an imposter.

The map you were in was Polus, your favorite. The first thing you did, was the navigation task before also doing keys. Nearly everyone was there, which meant the two imposters were faking the tasks. After that, you ran off entering the building that housed electrical and o2. You looked around for tasks.

“I have my eye on you, Angel.” Felix said as he came into o2.

You unmuted your mic. “Good, then you can watch me teach you how to do tasks.” You sassed, making the group laugh.

“Damn, I already like her.” Ethan said, getting sounds of approval from Sykkuno, Mark, and Corpse.

“Stop simping and play the game.” Poki commented, making you laugh.

Leaving o2, you ran outside to check the weather nodes. Felix was still following you closely. He was convinced you were an Imposter.

“Why is this guy following me around?” You asked, trying to run from him.

“Felix, what are you doing?” Rae asked as she popped up beside you.

“Making sure she’s not an imposter.” He sounded innocent.

“Well I’m not. Now go do your tasks.” Once again you ran from his character and entered the office. You passed Corpse’s black character before heading in, to do card swipe.

Suddenly a body was reported. Felix’s body.

“Whoa, okay, Y/n did you kill Felix?” Toast asked.

“What? No? I left him to go do my tasks.” You defended.

“I can confirm she was in office with me. I watched her do card swipe.” Corpse added.

The thing was, you passed him as he was leaving the office, and he definitely didn’t stay to watch you. He was headed in the direction you had left Felix and Rae. So, both were sus.

“Okay, then Rae where were you?” Sykkuno questioned.

“I left Felix by weapons. I was headed to lab.” You couldn’t decipher a lie from her.

“Hmmm, okay. Skip then?” Ethan offered. The group agreed.

Once back in the game, you decided to head to labs to find the rest of your tasks. Sykkuno followed you but broke off to go through decontamination. You did your scan in peace before another body was reported. This time it had been both Mark and Lily.

“Any sus?” Ethan asked.

“No, I was in electrical.” Toast said.

“I went to o2.” Poki added.

“Y/n, where were you?” Toast questioned. You were sure he thought you were an imposter.

“I was in the lab doing my scan, which I never got to finish.” You hated being interrupted mid-task.

“Anyone see her go there?”

“I passed her while I headed to decontamination.” Sykkuno vouched for you.

“Sure but the body was right outside the lab. She could have gone back to kill Mark after you were gone.”

“But I didn’t. I was doing my task.” You repeated with a little smile. You loved this game.

“Sure. I don’t believe you.” Toast was a hard one to convince.

“She didn’t do it. I entered lab and she was doing her scan.” Corpse spoke up. Again he was covering for you when you know he was not in Lab with you.

“Okay. I guess we skip?” Poki said. Everyone agreed but when it was done, you had two votes but three had skipped, so you had been spared luckily. Toast for sure voted for you, you had no clue who else did but it didn’t matter.

Back in the game, you headed back to lab to finish your scan. Once done, you headed to decontamination, then to the specimen room for a task. As you entered, you found Corpse.

“Hey Corpse, having fun with your tasks?” You asked as you went to your own task.

“I sure am.” He stated before his character was running out of the room and up to the lab. Once your task was done, you had finished all your tasks and headed back to Admin. You entered office to find a dead Sykkuno, so you hit report.

“That was for sure a self-report.” Toast quickly said.

“It wasn’t, but okay.” You said shaking your head. Toast was so sus on you all game.

“I’m sus of Toast.” Rae said while Corpse and Poki agreed with her.

“Wait, Ethan is dead too. Damn, these Imposters got around.” Toast commented. “By the way, I am not an Imposter. Y/n is.”

“She’s not. I have seen her do her tasks all game.” Corpse was quick to come to your rescue. It was sweet how he was vouching for you all game.

“Sure, I’m voting Y/n.” Toast said as his ‘I Voted’ badge popped up.

You decided you were going to vote off Toast because he was getting on your nerves. Apparently the others were feeling the same because everyone else voted off Toast as well. His character was launched into the Lava. Toast was NOT an Imposter.

Back in the game, you ran around, just seeing if you could spot anyone being sus before Poki was killed. Straight after the defeat title showed, and the Imposters were revealed to be none other than Rae and Corpse.

Everyone dropped back into the lobby.

“I told you I wasn’t an Imposter.” You boasted.

“Sorry Y/n, I should have believed you.” Toast said.

“No worries. But hey, Corpse and Rae had plenty of chances to kill me, but they didn’t. Why?” It was interesting to you.

Rae laughed. “I didn’t want to kill you right in the beginning of your first game with us. You deserved to have some fun before you got killed.”

“Well thank you.” It was sweet of Rae to do that.

“I didn’t want to kill an Angel. It wouldn’t be right.” Corpse stated with a cute laugh afterwards.

Felix groaned. “But you have no issue killing anyone else.”

“It be like that sometimes.” Ethan stated which had you in stitches, as well as the rest of the group. “Okay, let’s begin another round.” He added.

The next few games were fun and interesting. You were always a crew member, but someone was always sus on you. But no matter what, Corpse would vouch for you. Sometimes his character would follow you around, do tasks with you. It was pretty freaking cute and clear to see the man with the alluring deep voice had taken a liking to you. It was sweet.

“One more game?” Poki asked after a slew of other games. Everyone agreed. She started the game and after the countdown, the screen flashed that you were finally an Imposter. Your fellow Imposter was of course Corpse. It was only natural.

You and he teamed up and killed many of the others. Starting with Rae and Lily, moving onto Toast and Sykkuno. Then someone finally reported the bodies.

“Four bodies already?” Mark stated as the red x’s showed up on their icons.

“Damn, someone is having fun.” You said, pretending like it wasn’t you who had done half of the killing.

“I saw Poki headed into Electrical where Lily and Rae were.” Corpse said, sounding genuine as always. He was so good at Imposter. His ability to lie was excellent.

“Sure I went to Electrical, but I left after fixing the lights.” Poki said.

“I don’t know. You seem sus.” Ethan said. “I saw you enter lab, and after I saw Sykunno’s body right before someone reported Lily and Rae’s.”

“I swear, it’s not me. I was just doing my tasks. How could I kill four people in that short amount of time?”

“It’s possible. You could have vented.” Corpse was right too.

“Guys, please.” She pleaded as everyone put in their votes. Nearly everyone had voted for Poki and her character was launched into the lava, only to show she was not an Imposter.

“Sorry Poki.” Ethan said before everyone hopped back into the game.

Once again, you and Corpse were teamed up, but you saw Mark head one way while Ethan was going another. Almost silently, the two of you decided to split up and take them. You followed Mark into O2, trailing him into the tree. No one was around, so you killed him before quickly venting away from there. Making sure no one was around when you resurfaced. Corpse must have killed Ethan because the Victory screen popped up for the two of you.

“Damn, I should have known this was a team effort between Corpse and the Angel. You’re far from an Angel when you’re an imposter.” Mark complained.

“That’s part of the thrill.” It really was. You loved being able to shock people that way.

“Good job, partner. You’re a great Imposter like me. We need to team up more often.” Corpse’s words made you feel all warm. It was insanely fun being Imposter with him. Your combined skills made things that much better.

“Okay, I think it’s time to call it a night. Thank you so much for joining us, Y/n.” Poki yawned to show it was getting late.

“Of course. I loved playing with all of you. It was much better than playing with randoms.”

“I get that. Randoms can be very annoying.” Sykkuno agreed. “It was so good to meet you, Y/n. I hope you join more games so I can be an Imposter with you!”

You loved how excited he sounded. “I guess we all want a chance to be Imposter with her.” Felix stated what everyone else was thinking.

“Hey, no one steals my Imposter buddy.” Corpse spoke up, which once again had you feeling some kind of good way.

“Corpse, you’re being such a simp.” Rae laughed, which made everyone else go nuts.

You all bid your goodbyes before you exited the game and the discord call. You found there was a huge smile on your face after that fun you had just had with Poki and her friends. They were all super welcoming of you, despite not knowing a thing about you.

Poki: Thank you for playing with us. I hope you had fun! You didn’t mind being on my stream?

Y/n: I had so much fun, everyone was so good to me. Also, not at all!

Poki: Good because my chat loved you! They couldn’t stop gushing about how much they loved you. It was so cute.

This was not something you had expected. Her stream had never met you, so for them to like you playing a game with the group, that was nice.

Y/n: Oh wow, I wasn’t expecting that. That’s so sweet!

Poki: You also seemed to get Corpse simping for you. Sykkuno is super jealous.

You laughed when you read that.

Y/n: Sykkuno doesn’t have to be jealous. It was a one-time thing, and he can have Corpse back in the next game.

Sure, you wanted it to be more than a one-time thing, but you weren’t going to let your hopes get too high. Poki had many streamer friends, who would get their streams way more viewers than you ever could.

Poki: I wouldn’t count on that. We’re definitely going to use you for more games. You’re one of us now, even if you don’t stream.

Her words warmed your heard. Poki had been one of the very few people you had made friends with when you moved to Cali with your sister and your friendship was only 10 months old. It was nice to have someone who wanted to include you in on the things she was doing.

Y/n: Are you sure? Because I would hate to be taking someone more interesting’s spot.

Poki: You shut that mouth. The group loved you and we’re all looking forward to playing with you again.

Y/n: Okay if that’s what they want.

Poki: They do, now get some sleep. I know you’ve been overworking yourself for your sister.

Y/n: You would be right. Thank you for the fun night, Poki. You get some sleep as well.

Poki: 😊

You liked her message before deciding it was indeed time for bed. Editing those videos did take energy out of you, especially since your sister would review and have you re-edit the things she didn’t like. Not fun at all.

****

The next month passed by with Poki inviting you to more games with her and her friends. Most of those games included Corpse, who’d taken a liking to you. The last few games, he’d been bugging you to tell him who you were and how you met Poki, but you were keeping that a secret. You really didn’t want him or the others knowing you were the older sister of selfish party girl Olivia Bella.

Your sister had found out you’d been playing the game with Poki and her friends and decided she was going to say some shit.

“How did you get Poki to let you play with her and the other streamers?” Olivia said with clear distaste towards you.

You shrugged. “She just asked me to step in for someone one day and now they enjoy playing with me.”

She laughed obnoxiously. “That such a joke. I needed that laugh, thank you.”

You clenched your fists, trying to contain your anger against your sister. She was really grating on your nerves these days.

“Damn, I would do anything to play with Corpse. His voice is so hot.” She muttered looking deranged.

“He’s much more than his voice you know.”

She rolled her eyes. “He’s whatever I want him to be. God, I bet he’s so sexy behind that screen.”

“Please stop, he’s my friend and talk like that is uncomfortable.”

She cackled. “Corpse is not your friend, you loser. He just tolerates you like the rest of that group. I bet Poki only asked you to join out of pity.”

Her words slapped you in the face and threatened to strangle you. It was unbelievable that your younger sister was really acting like this to you.

“Why are you like this to me?” You questioned in all seriousness.

“Because you annoy me. Isn’t it obvious. I meant if I had the money, I would have moved here without you. Living with you is the worst. You know you’re like the most boring person in the world?”

The insults just kept on coming. She truly didn’t like you and it felt horrible. Family wasn’t supposed to be like this. “I get it, thank you.” You walked away before she could say anything else, she was horrible to you.

Her words made you sad. The only thing that could cheer you up was the fact that Poki had invited you to another game. It was something you needed after that conversation with your sister.

Poki: Hey girl, this kills me to do but Sean invited someone else to play tonight. Someone he said was eager to play with us. I’m so sorry.

This was simply perfect. The one time you craved interaction with the Among Us crew, they added someone else to the game. Of course it was always a possibility, but it didn’t stop from making you upset.

A couple of tears streamed down your face before you wiped them away. You wouldn’t let this get to you.

Y/n: No, please don’t worry. I understand it is always a possibility. Have a good stream!

Poki: I think you should know the person joining us is your sister. I tried to tell them it was a bad idea, but they didn’t really believe me. I’m so sorry.

Your sister was the reason you have been replaced for tonight. Perfect. Of course it was her. She always took the things you liked, away from you.

Y/n: Please stop apologizing, I completely understand.

Poki: Should I tell them she’s your sister?

Y/n: No, please don’t let them know that.

Poki: Okay, please know we will miss you in tonights stream.

Doubt filled you. After reading those words. There was no way they would miss you in the game tonight. It was clear you didn’t bring in viewers for the streams, but your sister would be able to do that without any issues. Now your night was truly ruined. Thankfully, you could just lay in bed and sulk all you wanted.

The bedroom door burst open. “Hey, can you set up this game for me? I assume you know I’m playing Among Us with the crew tonight. Told you they didn’t care if you were there or not.” Did she ever stop this shit?

“Why should I help you?” You grumbled, glaring up at your blonde-haired sister. She looked like she was dressed for another party, not an off the cuff stream.

“Well, I pay you and if you want that to continue, you will help me set up the game and stream.” Her hanging your only source of income over your head was really shitty.

You growled but got out of bed, passing by her in a haste. You entered her office and quickly got to work setting up the stream and discord. Then you showed her how to load the game. She just nodded, not looking happy at all.

“Have fun.” You sounded bitter but at this point, you couldn’t hide it.

“Oh I’m going to have so much fun with them. It’s going to be so good, and maybe they will ask me to join them more often and they can stop faking their friendships with you.”

“Cool, good for you.” The audacity of this bitch. You left once you were sure it was set up correctly. She didn’t see, but you shot her the finger as you left. She was a bitch through and through.

You retreated to your room to sulk some more. This day was such a let down for you. Over the last month, you had really clicked with the Among Us group. Meeting more streamers as Poki had more games. They all seemed to like you, but your sister was probably right, they were just being nice because they could.

As you stared at your ceiling, you heard your sister talking and knew the stream had started. Groaning, you threw on some headphones and put on your playlist that was saved strictly for when you were sad. It helped to take your thoughts from the stressor at hand? And ease your mind.

****

Meanwhile, the stream was hell. Sean majorly regretted inviting Olivia onto it. To be fair, he was only being nice because the girl had been begging to join the game for a while now in his DM’s. But it was a huge regret with the way this woman was acting. She couldn’t even be Imposter without outing herself and the second Imposter.

“You guys know Y/n is my sister right?” She said offhandedly as they were waiting in the lobby for the next game.

“Wait what? Is that true?” Ludwig asked in disbelief. This woman was nothing like Y/n. She was a total ditz compared to Y/n.

“Of course it is. I have lived with her for twenty years now, I know a lot of dirt about her.” Hearing her say this angered Poki.

“Don’t go there, Olivia. Just play the game.” Poki didn’t want her to spill anything about her friend. It was messy that she would even want to.

Olivia sighed. “Awe but you would love this.”

“No, let’s just play the game.” Corpse was quick to cut her off.

“Come on Corpse, are you sure you don’t want to hear all the embarrassing things I know about her?” Everyone was quickly realizing just how messed up in the brain Olivia was.

“You do realize most of us are streaming this live?” Rae stated, sounding just as frustrated as Corpse felt.

“Please, let’s start the game.” He all but growled, wanting to shut this woman up. The game started and he pulled out his phone. He was going to finally get Poki to tell him Y/n’s instagram.

Corpse: I know you told me you couldn’t tell me what Y/n’s instagram is but please, can I get it now? Her sister is a fucking bitch.

He has so much more he wanted to say about Olivia and entitled attitude but making sure Y/n was okay was his number one priority.

Poki: She’s going to hate me if I do it.

Corpse: Please, this is important to me.

Poki: You owe me. Here’s her insta.

She sent him a link that led to a private instagram under the name Y/nY/l/n96. He requested to follow her.

Corpse: Thank you, let me know when to pay up.

Poki: Will do, now get into the game or Olivia is going to kill you. She’s imposter.

He got back into the game, hoping Y/n would accept his request.

****

After an hour of ‘sad girl hours’. You decided to do something that could help you not to focus on Olivia streaming in the other room.

Clicking instagram, you saw a notification. corpse_husband has requested to follow you. This was interesting. Either he’s smart enough to figure out who you are or Poki told him.

You accepted his follow and followed him back. He only had seven pictures, and of course there weren’t face pics. You admired him for keeping himself faceless to his fans. Now you hoped he wouldn’t bend to their pressure and reveal his face. Being faceless was good for him and his anxiety. The latest pics were his hand reveals he did for the fans, they made you giggle.

Corpse was good at keeping himself secret and you liked that. You did what you could to stay secret as well. Your Instagram profile picture was not even you, so no one would be able to point you out even if they knew your face. Also, you have hidden the account from Olivia, so she couldn’t send her fans to torment you.

As you scrolled Instagram, you received a DM. It was from the one and only Corpse Husband.

Corpse: This stream is hell without you tonight. Why did Sean have to invite her?

It made you feel a little better to see that Corpse was missing you in the stream tonight.

Y/n: That’s a question you will have to ask Sean. I was looking forward to playing Among Us with the group as well, but hey, it looks like they found someone who will bring in the views.

Corpse: Nope. She’s chasing away everyone’s viewers. Your sister is the worst. I see why you didn’t want us to know the two of you were related.

Your blood ran cold. How did he know that?

Y/n: How did you know she was my sister?

Corpse: She won’t shut up about it. No one can get her to stop. I’m sorry if you didn’t want us to know about this.

Of course, you should have known that Olivia was going to tell everyone that. She was also probably opening her mouth about so much other stuff.

Y/n: Well fuck. This sucks.

Corpse: Hey, don’t worry about it. No one is judging you for this, but we are wondering how you manage to handle her.

A soft giggle left your mouth.

Y/n: It’s not easy. I mean sure I’m the older sister, but she acts like the queen around here.

Corpse: Damn. Here we go again. Your sister is trying to start some drama.

Hearing this, you realized you had to do something about this. There was no way you could let her sit there and continue to mouth off about you or anyone else in her life.

Y/n: Brace yourself, I’m about to ruin her stream.

Corpse: Good luck!

It was time to put her in her place, you got up and headed to the utility closet by the front door of the apartment. The fuse box was located there. You opened it and found the switch for her office and clicked it off. It was half a second before a loud scream was heard.

In less than thirty seconds she was running out of the office with a livid look upon her face. “What the fuck have you done?” She screamed while stomping up to you.

“I heard you were talking shit about me and decided to end it.” You crossed your arms in front of your chest.

“I can say whatever I want. The group was enjoying it.” She tried to act smug.

You laughed in her face. “Do you ever not lie?”

“Do you ever stop being a bitter bitch?” The anger was clear, but you didn’t care.

“Oh fuck off. You were annoying them with your ridiculous bullshit. I completely saved your ass from making a fool of yourself.”

“I fucking hate you!” She stepped up to you. “I’m kicking you out. Pack your shit and get the fuck out of my apartment.” The look on her face, showed she was serious about this.

“Fine.” Was all you said before you turned around and went back to your room, well your former room now. Pulling some bags out, you stuffed some clothes and important items into them. Once filled, you pulled on shoes and made sure you had what you needed until you could come get the rest of your stuff. Currently, you didn’t know how to feel about any of this, but you did need to get away from her.

PART TWO >>

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akookminsupporter · 3 years

Note

As someone who has loved the bond JK and JM share for so long but have always maintained a pretty chill response I must admit that a few moments in the past year or so have been so difficult for me to rationalise which is what I always attempt to do as I don’t want to be ridiculously delulu. The one I keep coming back to and it still shock me to this day and I don’t think we talk about it enough or during Run BTS the 100th ep. Where they’re all playing Badminton and it’s fun, silly and they’re terrible at it but JM gets hit (accidentally) by the rap line team (who were hilariously bad and adorable). The second time JM appears to nearly get hit by Suga, JK’s response to Suga stuns me. It’s this instantaneous response. The way he turns, hits the frying pan with his hand, walks directly for Suga and his tone of voice... he starts to say “sports...” as in Sportsmanship, warning Suga. And then the moment when Suga says something like “it’s a competition, be cool”. It stuns me. I’d be VERY curious to know what K-armies thought of that moment. JK’s face as he’s walking away is something I’ll never get over and Suga’s entire face changes. JK was NOT messing about. He was NOT happy and even Hobi had a look of “ohhh ok” as Jk passed him. It was such a different side to JK but one which says, to me, a whole lot about how he protects and how he feels about JM. The first time it happened, he went to JM and gently made sure he was ok and he didn’t hurt his eye and it was all fun and games at that point but the second time (and May have been more because of editing), it’s so specific to JM as he’s the one who flinches with his whole body and JK instantaneously goes into protect mode. It fascinated me. Because even if their relationship is not romantic, JESUS that’s a close bond for him to go momentarily feral on a friend he holds dear. We’ve seen the guys bicker and even a couple of fights but we RARELY see them like that and I’m even surprised the editors kept that in. For me, that moment spoke volumes about how they feel for one another, romantic or not...! I just wondered how you felt about it? ☺️

Ahh anon thanks for mentioning that episode! maybe you won't believe me, but i was planning to do a post about it, i even made the video and everything!

Anyway! like you, the first time I watched that episode/clip I was surprised, I don't think Jungkook was being funny (during that whole episode he was very active and smiling) in my opinion he was being completely serious when he approached Yoongi with his frying pan. and I kept thinking that Suga is his Hyung! After watching the Behind of that episode we saw that it wasn't the first time Jimin was hit, although in the clip of the official episode Jimin wasn't really hit, but Jungkook still didn't like it, in the behind you could also see that Tae was hit once, but I didn't hear the same reaction from Jungkook as when it was about Jimin, so we can't say that the reaction was because it was a member of his team.

I think Jungkook's protective instinct came out at that moment, no one hits Jimin! Not even by accident 😂. And whoever does will have to answer to Jungkook and his frying pan🤨

As always I pay a lot of attention to the members’ reaction, especially Hobi, I've said it many times but Hobi knows things and he wants to tell them! But being serious, I do think Hobi's reactions are so telling, he had a little smile on his face that reminded me of when Jimin was telling the story of the rainy day fight,

Hobi accompanied? Jungkook when he approached Yoongi to warn him to have better Sportsmanship, cautious of what Jungkook was going to do? I don't know. Also, the way suga responded so quickly to Jungkook was pretty funny. And it’s interesting how the other members didn’t say anything, they didn't even laugh 🧐

I would also like to know how K-ARMYs reacted to that moment, were any important words or moments lost in translation? If by any chance there is a K-ARMY reading this, I would like to know your opinion🙈

#jimin #jikook #kookmin #anon #ask #jungkook

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nim-lock · 3 years

Text

Art Career Tips, 2021 Edition

Here’s an edited version of my 2019 answered ask, because... this feels relevant.

It is a problem of capitalism that folks equate their income as a judgement of their value as people; and let me preface. You are worth so much. You have inherent value in this world. Your income is not a judgement on who you are (plenty of billionaires are actively making the world worse). LARPing self-confidence will go a long way to helping you get paid more for your work, because clients will believe that you know what you are doing, and are a professional.

& real quick—my own background is that I’ve been living off my art since 2018. I went to art school (Pratt Institute). I work in a publishing/educational materials sphere, and a quarter of my income is my shop. Not all of this information may apply to you, so it is up to you to look through everything with a critical eye, and spot pick what is relevant.

So there are multiple ways of getting income as an artist;

Working freelance or full-time on projects

Selling your stuff on a shop

Licensing (charging other companies to use your designs)

This post primarily covers the freelance part; if you’re interested in the other bits there is absolutely info out there on the internet.

IF you are just starting (skip to next section if not applicable) dream big, draw often (practice helps you get better/more efficient), do your best to take "a bad piece” lightly. You’re gonna RNG this shit. At some point your rate of “good” works will get higher. Watch tutorial videos & read books. A base understanding of “the rules”; anatomy, perspective, composition, color helps you know what the rules are to break them. This adds sophistication to your work. One way you can learn this stuff is by doing “studies”—you’re picking apart things from life, or things other people have done, to see what works, and how it works.

Trying to turn your interests into a viable career means that you are now a SMALL BUSINESS; it really helps to learn some basic marketing, graphic design, figure out how to write polite customer service emails; etc. You can learn some of this by looking it up, or taking skillshare (not sponsored) classes by qualified folks. Eventually some people may get agents to take care of this for them—however, I do recommend y’all get a basic understanding of what it takes to do it on your own, just so you can know if your agent is doing a good job.

Making sure your portfolio fits the work you want to get

Here is a beginner portfolio post.

Research the field you’d like to get into. The amount people work, the time commitment, the process of making the thing, the companies & people who work for them.

Create work that could fit in to the industry you’re breaking into. For example, if you want to do book cover illustration, you draw a bunch of mockup book covers, that can either be stuff you make up, or redesigns of existing books. If you’re not 100% sure what sort of work is needed for the industry, loop back into the portfolios of artists in a similar line of work as whatever you’re interested in, and analyze the things they have in common. If something looks to be a common project (like a sequence of action images for storyboard artists), then it’s probably something useful for the job.

CLIENTS HIRE BASED ON HOW WELL THEY THINK YOUR WORK FITS WHAT THEY WANT. If they’re hiring for picture books, they’re gonna want to see picture book art in your portfolio, otherwise they may not want to risk hiring you. Doesn’t have to be 100% the project, but stuff similar enough. If you aren’t hired, it doesn’t mean your work is bad, it just wasn’t the right fit for that specific client.

If you have many interests, make a different section of your portfolio for each!

Making sure you’re relevant

Have a social media that’s a little more public-facing, and follow people in the career field you’re interested in. Fellow artists, art directors, editors, social media managers; whoever. Post on your own schedule.

Interact with their posts every so often, in a non-creepy way.

If you’ve made any contacts, great! Email these artists, art directors, editors, former professors, etc occasional updates on your work to stay in touch AND make sure that they think about you every so often.

Show up to general art events every once in a while! If you keep showing up to ones in your area (when... not dying from a sneeze is a thing), folks will eventually start to remember you.

Industry events & conferences can be pricey, so attend/save up for what makes sense for you. Industry meetups are important for networking in person! In addition to meeting people with hiring power, you also connect with your peers in the community. Always bring a portfolio & hand out business cards like candy.

Active job hunting

Apply to job postings online.

If interested in working with specific people at specific companies, you could send an email “I’d love to work with you, here’s my portfolio/relevant experience”, even if they aren’t actively looking for new hires. Be concise, and include a link to your work AND attached images so the person reading the email can get a quick preview before clicking for more.

Twitter job postings can be pretty underpaid! Get a copy of the Graphic Artists’ Guild Handbook Pricing & Ethical Guidelines to know your rate. I once had a twitter post job listing email me back saying that other illustrators were charging less, and I quote, “primarily because they’re less experienced and looking for their first commission”. This was not okay! For reference, this was a 64-illustration book. The industry rate of a children’s book (~36 pages) is $10k+, and this company’s budget was apparently $1k. For all of it.

Congrats you got a job! Now what?

Ask for like, 10% more than they initially offer and see if they say yes. If they do, great! If not, and the price is still OK, great! Often company budgets are slightly higher than they first tell you, and if you get this extra secret money, all the better for you.

Make sure you sign a contract and the terms aren’t terrible (re: GO GET THE Graphic Artists’ Guild Handbook Pricing & Ethical Guidelines)

Be pleasant and easy to work with (Think ‘do no harm but take no shit’)

Communicate with them as much as needed! If something’s going to be late, tell them as soon as you know so they aren’t left wondering or worse, reaching out to ask what’s up.

And if all goes well, they’ll contact you about more jobs down the line, or refer you to other folks who may need an artist, etc.

Quick note about online shops/licensing and why they’re so good

It’s work that you do once, that you continuously make money off of. Different products do well in different situations (conventions vs. online, and then further, based on how you market/the specific groups you are marketing to), so products that may not do well initially may get a surge later on.

Start with things that have low minimum order quantity and are relatively cheap to produce, like prints and stickers.

If you are not breaking even, go back to some of the earlier portions of this and think about how you could tweak things as a small business. Ease of access is also very important with this; for example, if you only take orders through direct messages, that immediately shuts off all customers who don’t like talking to strangers.

Quick resource that you could look through; it’s the spreadsheet of project organizing that I made a while back

Licensing is when people pay you for the right to use your work on stuff they need to make, like textbooks or greeting cards. This is generally work you’ve already made that they are paying the right to use for a specified time or limited run of products. This is great because you’ve already done the work. I am not the expert on this. Go find someone else’s info.

“I am not physically capable of working much”/ “I need to pay the bills”

Guess who got a hand injury Sept 2020 that messed me up that entire month! I had a couple jobs going at the time that I was terrified of losing, but they were quite understanding when I told them I needed to heal. So: Express your needs as early as you know you need them. Also do lots of stretches and rest your hands whenever you feel anything off; this will save your health later. Like, the potential of a couple months of no income was preferable over losing use of my hands for the rest of my life.

This continues to apply if you have any other life situation. Ask for extra time. Ask for clarification. If you tell people ahead of time, folks are often quite understanding. Know how much you are capable of working and do your best not to overdo it. (I am.. bad at this)

Do what MAKES SENSE for your situation. If doing art currently earns you less money than organizing spreadsheets, then do that for now, and whenever you have the energy, break down some of the tips above into actionable tiny chunks, and slowly work at em.

The original ask I got in 2019 mentioned ‘knowing you’re not good enough yet’. Most artists experience imposter syndrome & self-doubt—the important thing is to do your best, and if anything, attempt to channel the confidence of a mediocre white man. If he can apply to this job/charge hella money for Not Much, then so can you!

Check out this Art Director tumblr for more advice!

Danichuatico’s Literary Agent guide

Kikidoodle’s Shop Shipping Tutorial

Best of luck!

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Once again disclaimer this post is just the ramblings of a man procrastinating on other things that need to be done. I’ve Long Posted my own post so that it turns into mush in my brain if I try to read it, but I wrote this so I should know this content. If you got down here, congrats. Here’s a shrimp drawing.

Yee Ha.

My reference post tag My tip jar

#reference #artist information #UHHHHH I don't know man

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