#Capital & Centric

[msmargaretmurry]

great night on hockey twitter for caps fans

#spoiler: the wag jackets were NOT cute #i know micah's tweets aren't caps-centric but they're too funny not to include #washington capitals #i'm not tagging the other teams involved they're already suffering enough #hockey for ts

[draciformes]

#walkable cities #Car centric infrastructure #fuck cars #city planning #car dependency #car dependent infrastructure #capitalism #anti capitalism #Anticapitalism

[nimona-antifa]

I love how everyone is like. "Oh driving is nowhere near as scary as it seems!" But then when I took my driver's test it was one of the scariest things I've ever done. I failed the test and I doubt I'd be able to pass it now. I can't afford a car or gas. I hate our fucking car-centric "neurotypical ablebodied experiences are universal" society. Y'all don't understand how badly I WISH I could drive.

#fuck capitalism #anti capitalism #fuck car centric society

[italiansteebie]

robin feeling like steve only keeps her around as his side kick,

feeling like no one really likes her,

or pays attention to her, and now that steve has eddie... she was going to be left in the dust.

she'd been quiet.

"rob?"

and he's been bugging her all day.

"oh my GOD, steve. im fine. why do you care? im just your little side kick anyways."

she immediately feels bad because right after she says it steve's eyes go all glassy, and that stupid little frown is spread across his face.

"did. did i make you feel like that? rob. i am so sorry. i- i have never seen you as a side kick. you're. you're my best friend... even if i'm not yours... i'm sorry."

and robin sighs, tears pricking her eyes. "you are my best friend, steve. sometimes i just feel like i can't compare."

"robin."

she looks at him, his face is serious in a way she's only seen a few times.

"you played a major part in the person i am today. you are my best friend. you ARE my person. i always want to be your person."

his arms are stretched out, reaching for a hug. "you are so much more than just my friend, robin. i can't even begin to tell you how you've changed the lives of everyone around you." and robin shuffles her way towards him, head thumping against his chest, curling into the touch as steve's arms wrap around her.

"thanks, steve. you're my person, too."

#robin buckley #steve harrington #best friend robin #autistic steve harrington #best friend robin buckley #platonic stobin #stobin brotp #autistic robin buckley #robin buckley centric #stobin angst #platonic with a capital p #platonic soulmates stobin #supportive steve harrington #stranger things #stobin ficlet #stranger things ficlet

[soupfact]

my opinion on anything watcher has long since passed being relevant but my main thoughts are

privatized streaming is always antithetical to any 'leftist' notion of universal, available services and is going to alienate their most devoted fans (international)

that being said, I also think it is one of the only survivable tools that isn't literally playing into youtube's hands, which the watcher boys have aired grievances about before

editors, camera people, directors, etc deserve fair compensation and reasonable timelines.

and from a very brief glance at view analytics, I don't think watcher is quote-unquote profitable. popular and afloat maybe, but it's not what 2018 was (nor do i think it can be), so they were probably forced to switch gears

watcher is ultimately a business. trying to hold them (esp shane) to the same standards we hold other comrades is impossible as they literally have different interests

steven is (historically) a bigger part of artistic direction than people want to believe (a lot of the behind-camera talent that leads to the high-quality aspect, for instance)

and ryan and shane are a bigger part of business than people think, being literally joint CEOs (knowing to play up and into their friendship, cutting/backburnering shows that won't turn profits)

tldr bad business decision made by people who aren't business people. which is good, because business is about extracting value, but also bad, because there's no good move here and they picked a bad one

#watcher #also shane has never done real praxis but that's truly besides the point #i understand the desire to live off your art!! really!! and to make things that are about you and fulfilling for you!! #but marketing is an unfortunate capitalist essential and it's stupid to act like we already live in some post-capital world where #art is created because we just want to and also we live off it and pay our editors enough on a fair timeline #it's american-centric and it's greedy and it's all the markers of business. but idk. that's business #finally personally--your money is better spent helping those in need in gaza / palestine / sudan #*txt

[deepermadness]

That does it. I'm getting too old and too fed up to not complain about the world any more.

Tumblr? Nah, mate. It's Grumblr now. This is the grumbling platform.

No massive arguments, just ongoing grouchy comments until we fix the shit that's bothering us.

#Like capitalism #Car centric design #Homophobes #Transphobes #Biphobes #And so on #Tumblr #Grumblr

[luluwquidprocrow]

sometimes a family is three orphans, their adopted daughter, one not-so-sad writer, and two triplets

frank, beatrice the second, the baudelaires, lemony, ernest, implied ernest/lemony

gen

3,598 words

In the grand tradition of all parents, the extended baudelaire family find themselves trying to pull a fast one. 

for @asouefanworkevent's woevember day 4, the hotel denouement! some rambling headcanon nonsense half-fic about post-canon family that i had great fun doing. my favorite thing in the whole world is post-canon babybea interacting with her absurd enormous family. i love them all so much.

okay. so bear with me here 

so i think most parents/guardians are at one point or another faced with Pulling The Ultimate Fast One on their children. this is related to Your Beloved Pet Died But We’re Telling You We Sent Them To Live On The Farm, but this version, in particular, is infinitely easier and harder. this one is The Switch. The Replacement. The Double. when the intrepid parent or guardian, under the cover of night, goes to the pet store to purchase The Exact Same Animal because the first animal had an untimely death. i will admit, this is the easiest with like, a goldfish, or something else small where you can usually get one that looks very similar. 

now, for babybea, it’s a pumpkin. 

so babybea (who is twelve at the time this story takes place), at the very end of september, carves a pumpkin, and she goes in with a VISION. she spends a couple hours on this pumpkin, carving an owl. It’s not, yknow, a realistic owl, but she adds a lot of tiny details, lots of lines for the feathers, and she carves a little mouse on the side too, and even gets the side of a tree in there, and the pumpkin carving kit the baudelaires purchased that year came with these little stick lights, to put in the owl eyes after carving, so it has orange eyes!! this is!!!! The neatest thing babybea has ever seen, and she is so thrilled with the results and very proud of this pumpkin. (for the record – violet carves a few pumpkins into a starry night with a moon, klaus carves monstera leaves, and. let’s be real. sunny bites a series of turnips into jack-o-lanterns.) (and then she stabs a couple white pumpkins into bigger jack-o-lanterns, for variety. all of them get different expressions!

sunny, arranging her carved vegetation on the baudelaire porch in order of emotion: perfect.) (no, i don’t know what order of emotion means. But sunny does.)

Then they all pile into violet’s car – pumpkin included!! – and drive almost an hour out of the city to the bildungsroman bed and breakfast. (frank and ernest decided, at this point in their lives, if they were going to commit to anything, it may as well be The Bit.) (it has a local reputation as a place with solid wifi, stellar bread, and great mattresses. The owners are considered minorly eccentric, mostly for the portrait they have in the lobby, of, just one of them. 

some impassioned yelp review: okay so the stay was great big recommend PLEASE try the bread but i cannot figure out the story behind the portrait in the lobby????? it's just one one of the owners?????? but I don't understand why bc they're twins and it's just ONE of them?????? and he's wearing this frog-patterned tie in the painting and when you see them like in person. neither of them wear the tie. what's the deal here 

the locals are sure it's not an ego thing, bc the owners don't seem to be self-centered or anything like that. In fact, if asked about the painting, both of them will say, “oh, that's a painting of my brother.” 

an additional yelp comment: I think. there's THREE of them  a third yelp comment: don't be silly, they're definitely twins.) 

frank and ernest have a very elaborate series of outdoor autumn decorations, with lots of pumpkins and mini gourds and hay bales over the front steps and corn stalks on all the porch posts, and babybea wants to not only show her uncles her hard work, but also put the pumpkin on their steps where everyone can see it!! 

(her uncles also include lemony, of course – I think he did live with the baudelaires for some time after reuniting babybea with them, but has recently moved into ernest's side of the private apartment at the back of the hotel. this was mildly distressing to babybea, who likes everyone she loves under the same roof, but she can't deny that lemony is very happy. and so is ernest. and now she can see all her uncles in the same place whenever she wants!! so the baudelaires tend to spend weekends at the bed and breakfast, because they also miss lemony. and they get to know frank and ernest better, which is very important to them, as people who are important to babybea, and to lemony, and, to the baudelaire's past.) (not to like, detract from the sentiment here, but i do need everyone to know that i imagine ernest spends like, 80% of his working hours just making out with lemony.) (okay maybe not 80%. ernest does legitimately get work done, it’s his hotel too. ………but like, a lot of time.) 

AND SO. the baudelaires arrive at the bed and breakfast, and frank and ernest and lemony are very proud of their niece's pumpkin. they take a lot of pictures. (re: my previous post-canon thoughts, frank has actually acquired a phone now, and does text. it is a flip phone.) babybea places it, very gently, on the third front step, and is so pleased. sunny steals two mini gourds while looking ernest dead in the eye. ernest approves. 

But october turns out to be unseasonably warm, and babybea’s pumpkin, while lovingly carved but now lacking the support an uncarved pumpkin has to keep itself A Pumpkin, does not take kindly to the weather, and babybea actually becomes very distressed at the smallest signs of rot beginning to form in her pumpkin, when it is only the second week of october. She doesn’t TELL anybody, because there’s not really much you can do about a pumpkin doing what a pumpkin does in warm weather, but she’s very upset. (almost uncharacteristically so. usually she’d say, oh, well that’s how it happens, and rather pleasantly move on, but lately, she’s been kind of. quieter than usual.) And frank, who spends a great deal of time at the front desk, closest to the pumpkins, becomes Concerned. 

now, in general, babybea’s family is like, pretty good at being realistic with her. She is of course an optimist, but still Aware of a great deal of the ways of the world, given her family, her upbringing, lemony’s books, her own adventures, everything. You can’t really shield this twelve year old from the ways of the world, even if that way of the world is, a rotting vegetable. All things have their time, and it cannot be stopped. Including seasons, and in-season foods. 

However. She put SO MUCH WORK into that pumpkin, and as the week goes by and the pumpkin starts to shrink in on itself, turning all of babybea’s work black from the inside out, those charming little glowstick eyes CAVING IN, and the baudelaire’s weekly weekend visit grows closer and closer, frank has been imagining her devastated reaction when she sees the pumpkin, and decides, He Must Pull The Fast One. he will re-carve the pumpkin, exactly as babybea carved it, replace the pumpkin, and no one will be the wiser. They get a little more time with the pumpkin, presumably at least until halloween, and his niece gets to see her beautiful handiwork as much as she likes. Maybe, you know, there is a little magic in the world after all, to make a pumpkin look so nice. 

(also, i think frank has. A shaky relationship with babybea, from his end. She loves him, as much as she loves everyone else in her family, and babybea herself would NEVER rank her uncles in order of how well she knows or admires them, but i, lulu vandelay, putting this together, have no qualms in saying she knows lemony the best, bc she has spent the most time with him, between trying to find him and both of them trying to find the baudelaires and all of them having lived together, and she’s rather deeply attached to him – ernest is very personable, and funny, so he’s easy to get along with – and she and frank both like tiny detail work, so they have things in common, but frank always seems very awkward around her. And he is. It’s bc he’s very nervous around her. Frank doesn’t think he’s good with kids. And he is usually acutely aware that in an ideal world, he isn’t the one she’d be spending her time with, that dewey would be so much better at all of this than he is. A better parent, a better brother, a better everything. Because dewey always was, to frank. but, dewey would probably want frank to do as much as he could for her, and would believe him absolutely capable of doing it, without a doubt. So he wants to be a proper uncle to her and THIS is his opportunity, he thinks. He so desperately wants to do something kind and considerate and important for her, like family is supposed to do for each other.) 

the thing about pumpkins, though, is that, for some reason, mid-october, THEY ALL DISAPPEAR. I’m serious, you ever try and find a good pumpkin even like a little over halfway through october? It can be hard. 

frank: i need your assistance. ernest: i’ve killed my quota for the month. frank: i – ernest, please.  ernest: alright, my apologies. What do you need?  frank: a pumpkin. lemony, from the kitchen: jarrahdale or red warty?  frank: no, i mean a carving pumpkin. 

The three of them take a good, long look at babybea’s pumpkin. Uncle Instincts Have Activated. They, very solemnly, bury the pumpkin in the back garden (lemony is the one who takes one for the team and removes the glowstick eyes from the depths of sad, sad pumpkin). And then embark on a mission. Please imagine the three of them packed into a mint green 1960 chevy corvette. Sunglasses optional. Who’s driving? That is up to you, my friend. Oh, google informs me it is cascade green. Imagine accordingly. (yes, no corvette has ever been made with more than two seats, but isn’t that just funnier? They really are packed in there. Lemony sits in the middle.) 

The hunt for the right pumpkin is long. Grueling! Kinda chilly! This is october!! Much comparison is made between potential pumpkins and the pictures they took of babybea’s pumpkin. Snacks are purchased. (lemony, who has recently been introduced to instagram, posts a picture of his pretzel. [ernest is out of focus in the corner, eating a chocolate ice cream cone.] [#pretzel.] 

sunbad: what is that lemonysnicket: I have purchased a pretzel sunbad: without me sunbad: you’re dead to me.) 

(it was actually not sunny who introduced lemony to instagram, although she was his first follower. It was klaus.) (klaus uses instagram mainly to never post anything ever, just to follow his favorite authors, so he wanted lemony to have an instagram, especially since he just moved out.) (klaus……..my heart………..) (oh, frank bought chex mix. he likes those gross rye bread pieces.) 

(don’t get me started on lemony with an instagram……….I think this is a hilarious but also heartwarming thought – this man who has avoided being photographed for years and years and years and YEARS (yes that much repetition was in fact necessary) is at a point in his life here he is not only comfortable of taking pictures of his life, but he is capable of doing it, he’s allowed!! It’s still probably mostly food and it’s so good!!!!!!!! and think of the amount of pictures he keeps just in his phone gallery, too!!! violet’s inventions and klaus’ library displays and sunny’s baking and babybea’s school projects and ernest’s record collection and frank’s breakfast spreads, and nature shots with lemony’s thumb in the corner, AAAAAAAAAAAA) (uh, anyway, these men are on a mission. back to the mission.) 

Eventually, they do find a comparable replacement pumpkin! Does it fit in the car? Lemony, by virtue of sitting in the middle, holds the pumpkin. 

They return to the bed and breakfast. Between the three of them, many different knives, and all of their photos, frank and ernest and lemony painstakingly recreate babybea’s pumpkin, down to the last, smallest detail. Including the little mouse and the side of the tree and the feathers and everything. (frank does do most of the work, because ernest and lemony very much see that this is important to him, but he doesn’t mind them helping, because, yknow. This is about family, and babybea is their family too.) (frank feels like he owes lemony a lot. for trying to set the record straight about their past. or as straight as one could try and set it, with what all of them did. for their niece. for making ernest happy.) (ernest deserves to be happy, with everything they put each other through. ernest thinks the same for frank, too.) 

(ugggggg if you told the three of them when they were so much younger that one day they’d stay up late recreating their niece’s perfect pumpkin masterpiece so she’s not upset about the passage of time………..) 

(who’s in charge of the bed and breakfast while all of this is happening?? 

ernest: mallory, you’re in charge. mallory, a twenty-two year old with a major in hotel management who runs the front desk when ernest and frank can’t: sounds like a plan. 

mallory has a deep respect for the denouements. meanwhile – 

mallory: so you’re lemony snicket. lemony: i am, yes. mallory: you don’t look like your photo. lemony: that’s my legal representative. he has a stamp.) 

meanwhile meanwhile – it is not necessarily about the pumpkin. 

For babybea’s part, she already firmly believes that there is some sort of magic in the world. Even at twelve. Especially at twelve!! Look, she knows it wasn’t magic that reunited her with her family, that it was her and lemony’s hard work, but she wound up with SO much more family than she expected, when she first contacted lemony. And like, that is what there’s magic in. this whole group of people who care about her and love her and want to spend time with her. Babybea thinks she has the best family in the whole entire world. (AND SHE’S RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!) 

But that is also babybea’s problem right now. She loves her family so much, and she loves having them, and it’s been a couple months but she is still not entirely comfortable with people she loves being so far away from her. Not now! Not when they’re all supposed to be in the same space, like they’re supposed to be!! And some kids at school have teased her, not so much about her puzzle-piece family but that she talks about her uncles so much. She’s just proud of her family and she loves them!! But middle schoolers are like, rude as fuck sometimes, okay. And they don’t even think they’re saying anything wrong, just offhand comments about how much she talks about them. They don’t even know anything about her parents, not really, but babybea starts to feel like, it’s the unspoken throughline in what they’re saying, why doesn’t she ever talk about them? Why only her uncles, her guardians? They’re her family, but – 

she feels almost guilty, that she goes through periods where she doesn’t even think of her parents at all, and periods where she can’t stop thinking about what they would look like and what they would be like, and that makes her feel like she doesn’t value the family she DOES have. So it’s not necessarily about the pumpkin starting to rot, what’s making her upset. It’s that, the pumpkin is another thing in a line of things babybea is Thinking about, things that aren’t Going the way she thought they were supposed to go. Her uncle moving out, missing somebody who was supposed to be there, her pumpkin not staying like it’s supposed to, she’s SUPPOSED to love her family but is she loving them right? Is she loving the right people right? Can you miss people you didn’t even know? And babybea has it very set in her head, the things she knows and is supposed to do – this is something she hasn’t quite worked on, but she’ll get to it eventually, she is still twelve – and they keep not happening like that. And now. Something else she worked really, really, really hard on, that isn’t going right either. 

So she spends the week a little gloomy about her pumpkin, and worrying the whole ride friday afternoon after school to the bildungsroman bed and breakfast. Violet and klaus and sunny are very aware of babybea’s mood, and try to cheer her up by asking her about what she’ll be for halloween, but babybea’s heart is not super into this conversation. (she has ideas about a big group costume where they’re all different local birds, but now she’s not even sure about that.) 

And then! She sees her pumpkin!! Glowy eyes and all!!!!! And, mysteriously, those little spots of rot she’d noticed the week before are gone, and, in fact, it looks a little sharper than it had before? And she didn’t think she’d cut the lid quite like that, but! That’s her pumpkin, exactly where it’s supposed to be!!! And it makes her feel just a little better. That’s good. That’s right. But she still can’t, entirely shake off all her previous feelings, about family. But. right now. Her pumpkin still looks very special. 

Later, babybea can’t sleep. So she sneaks out of bed and goes down to the lobby, and sits down on the floor in front of the front desk, and looks at the big painting on the wall, that ernest did of her father. 

This, of course, is where frank finds her. (because frank has never been very good at sleeping consistently, even when there’s nothing to worry about now, and he likes to walk through the hotel to make sure it’s secure.) 

(ernest would say something very clever, like, aha, with a raised eyebrow, but all frank says is – )

frank: hello, beatrice.  beatrice: oh!  beatrice: hello, uncle frank.  frank: may i sit down?  beatrice: yes, please. 

They spend a little while looking at the portrait.

beatrice: um –  beatrice: does it – 

What she wants to ask is, does it look very much like my father, which she then realizes is such a STUPID question if her father was a TRIPLET and she has a mirror image of him right in front of her, who acts like she thinks a father is supposed to act, so, but, it’s not like that doesn’t mean dewey didn’t look like dewey. Just because dewey looked like frank doesn’t mean he only looked like frank. And beatrice forgets, sometimes, that he would’ve just looked just like her uncles. But still! 

beatrice: i mean – the painting, is it – 

But she thinks it’s such a terrible thing to ask!! But frank knows EXACTLY what she means. 

(some time ago, when the hotel had just opened and ernest had just painted the portrait of dewey – 

ernest: i wanted it to look like him. And, it’s not like i, don’t know what he looks like. Looked like. I mean – that could just be me or you up there, couldn’t it. It doesn’t look like it’s him.  frank: no, it does.  frank, knowing exactly what he means and feeling like, he needs to make ernest Not look so abjectly miserable: you don’t look nearly as happy.  ernest, in tears, very amused and touched and still terribly upset: wow! 

The point being, god of course it looks like dewey. It couldn’t be anybody but dewey, even if dewey looks like other people. Dewey looks like himself, he looks like his family, he looks like beatrice, around the eyes. And family means lots of things. It means your guardians raising you, and your uncles raising you, and your father’s portrait on the wall and never knowing him at all, and loving so many people and being loved back by them, whether or not it’s Supposed to be a specific way, and sometimes it means missing somebody, sometimes it means missing different people, sometimes it means being sad for something you’re not sure if you should or could miss, sometimes it means not missing anyone at all, sometimes it means your uncle going to live with his definitely boyfriend even if they won’t say the words out loud who’s also your uncle just on the other side of your family and that doesn’t mean anyone’s going anywhere. Sometimes it means your pumpkin rotting, because things change. uh, does this make sense.) (admittedly, i put a lot of things in this.)

frank: yes, it looks very much like him.  frank: i think about him a lot.  beatrice: ......would he like my pumpkin? frank, without hesitation: absolutely. beatrice: do you like it? frank: i do.

of course babybea already knew that, but it's nice to hear. it's just. nice. it's not, like, everything? just like before. but beatrice is loved by a lot of people, and she loves them, too, and. she feels loved, right here, like she's supposed to, and that's what's Supposed to happen.

beatrice hugs him, and it's not the first time she's hugged frank, but it means more? frank hugs her back.

beatrice: thanks for fixing my pumpkin.  frank: i’m sure i don’t know what you mean, beatrice. 

beatrice hugs him again, and then goes back upstairs. frank looks a little longer at the portrait, and then goes to bed himself, and doesn't get back up until his alarm goes off.

#asoue #a series of unfortunate events #woevember #tadaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa................... #you know what. for as much as i Did In Fact jam in here. bc my thoughts get away from me. i DO think i wrapped it up rather nicely. #the capitals are inconsistent bc i wrote this in googledocs and it just wants to capitalize EVERYTHING. AGAINST MY WILL #i am as stunned as you are that this is frank-centric. but sometimes the words happen. #if you were wondering. yes my parents did in fact Pull This Fast One on me. with. yes. fish.

[stevesbipanic]

Steve had long given up on dating.

After years of bouncing between girls as King Steve, then dating Nancy, then meeting Robin, then back to dates he could never tell the truth to, it all became to tiring. Steve knew he had issues after Nancy, after bullshit, he didn't want to dump all that on someone.

Steve was content with the life he had right now. He had the family he'd always wanted, his kids, his best friend, he didn't need anything else. Sure sometimes he wished he had someone to share his nights and days with. But the kids made sure he was always busy, and Robin was always there with a shoulder to cry on or an ear to lend.

Steve may have given up on dating, but that didn't mean he didn't want his best friend not to get a happy ending. He happily listened to Robin bemoan about Vickie and later about Nancy. Helped her pick date outfits, talked her down from panic attacks. Encouraged her to go for it, that Nancy was safe to tell about her sexuality and later her feelings.

Steve knew he wasn't the only one that changed. Nancy had too, she wasn't the girl that broke his heart, he could trust her with Robin's. Steve had never been happier than seeing Robin crash through his bedroom door rambling about how their first date had gone.

Steve didn't need a happy ending as long as his soulmate got one.

#bittersweet #steve harrington #robin buckley #nancy wheeler #ronance #stranger things #stranger things s4 #st4 #steve centric #drabble #platonic stobin #platonic with a capital p #platonic soulmates

[osterby]

People on here are very keen on the idea of taking back control from corporations, but I only really see this in the context of "eat the rich". It's all well and good to dream of The Glorious Revolution, but in the mean time there are many relatively easy and cheap (or even free) things you can just do to participate a little less in capitalisim, and I don't see much discuision of that hereabouts.

Use a credit union instead of a traditional bank, shop at a grocery co-op or even buy food directly from a local farmer, use Firefox instead of Chrome, install an adblocker, post your fic on AO3 for other fans to read for free, buy a novel from a self-published author, use a public library (including The Internet Archive) next time you want to stream a movie.

It's not all or nothing, and you can take back some of the easy stuff and support groups that have the same goals as you while you're waiting for Bezos and Musk to implode themselves.

#yes this little list is US centric #but it's also just a very brief set of ideas off the top of my head #If you think of more easy and cheap or free ways to opt out of capitalism or support a group with anticapitalist goals #you should add them instead of telling me I missed them

[mildhigh]

People on aj complaining about the modern day irl money bundles for the 802739263th time like. Did y'all just forget that in order to get a snow leopard, lion, or arctic wolf, you had to buy a 3 month membership gift card before the diamond shop appeared? Like be fr AJ has ALWAYS been like this, don't act like it's just NOW a problem

You could ONLY get these animals with gift cards at that time. Only at Target, too, according to this old jamaa journal! I guess what I'm trying to say is, it's kind of useless to act like animal jam has been "getting greedy recently," because they ALWAYS have been.

#“kids are going to gamble” like they didn't with the dinosaurs?? which you can also buy with sapphires? #idk it really feels like “kids learn about how games work” like this has always been a problem and its certainly not an aj centric problem #yeah the bundles should give you more stuff. yeah you should get 3 coins for $2.99 instead of one. yeah its kind of shitty. #but how is this literally any different from how other games akin to aj operate #like fuck WWs! fuck capitalism! absolutely let them eat shit! but idk it just seems odd only now are people having an issue when- #-aj has pretty much always done this #petpetpark club penguin moshi monsters etc all did shit like this as well #idk. it just seems like a lot of anger is being directed at the coins/unicorns specifically when there's more to criticize abt aj. oh well #faust rants 🔥 #animal jam

[iricressent]

the most dystopian thing about futurama is that america still exists 1000 years in the future

#mine #futurama #I KNOW ITS NOT TECHNICALLY‼️‼️ #BUT THE SHOW IS STILL HIGHLY AMERICA-CENTRIC #TRADEMARK LAW STILL EXISTS IN THE YEAR 3000? CAPITALISM STILL EXISTS?? 1000 YEARS IN THE FUTURE??? #🫠

[justastrugglinghotchocolate]

This is a long post!!

Okay, so I’m spitballing here because I just had this idea hit me like a truck so things might be a little incoherent. Anyways, what if Dorian and Basil switch roles? Not personality mind you, just the portrait was never enchanted/cursed/etc, and somehow Basil becomes more susceptible to an amoral attitude?

Here’s the thing, I don’t think Basil would abandon all morals in the same way Dorian did. He’s older and wiser than Dorian, it seems unlikely that he’d change because of the fear of getting older/uglier. For the most part we don’t have a whole lot to work with since all of Basil after the first chapter is only seen with reference to Dorian, so there isn’t (as far as I know) a lot to work with there. So I propose desperation being what leads to Basil’s accidental soul selling.

So the rough idea that came with goes as follows: Somehow, Basil becomes destitute/generally disliked in the public (perhaps believable rumors regarding “unseemly behavior” or something along the lines). Regardless, Basil is struggling.

I like to think that Dorian and Henry would try to help him, but Basil being Basil would probably decline, not wanting to damage their reputations.

In this AU, Dorian becomes a composer and full-time pianist, at the beginning, he probably leaves for a tour in France or something. Before he leaves he makes a song for Basil and has it put into a music box as a gift. This would be the portrait equivalent for Basil.

After being gifted the box, he probably makes some wish along similar lines to Dorian’s in the original, albeit without the being young and beautiful forever part.

I don’t think Henry would be the one to lead Basil astray. Despite my personal hatred of the man, I can recognize that he either a) cares enough (which isn’t very much) not to actively terrorize Basil or b) finds Basil to be too boring.

Additionally with the switch from Dorian to Basil being corrupted, I think the story would move away from more carnal sins and emphasize more capitalist ones. (Maybe Basil’s paintings suck the life out of their sitters and when he finds out he choose monetary security over them, maybe he begins painting the aristocracy more embarrassing/hedonistic and because of his wish the paintings look so lifelike people mistake them for photos and he just never clears that up) The main sin of Basil’s is his profit over the suffering of others. So there would be a villainous capitalist leading Basil down the same road.

Anyways I think this all culminates to Dorian returning from France and finding a very different Basil. He’d probably confront him and then Basil would accidentally kill him. His capitalist bud would get rid of the body maybe frame Henry for it, or something equally nefarious, effectively killing off the last remnants of the Basil Hallward from the beginning/book. If I ever write a fic for this, I think I’ll leave the ending ambiguous, mainly because I don’t know what would be a fitting end, lol. Maybe Basil just dies like Dorian does.

If you took your time to read this, thank you so much and I hope you enjoyed. Please let me know what you think and if you have any ideas for this, please share I’d love to hear them!

EDIT: i have now written a fic

#the picture of dorian gray #tpodg #fanfic #i think #alternate universe #basil hallward #lord henry wotton #dorian gray #role swap au #long post #the real villain is capitalism lol #this is very basil centric #and mostly written because my boy was done dirty in the original novel

[seth-kia]

love duke thomas sm. he's constantly like "my family acts more like aliens than fucking superman, and I Know superman" or say "why am I the only normal one here" and then he immediately proceeds to do one of the following:

See The Actual Future

spend fourteen hours zoning out in the living room to watch the past like a soap opera

engage glowstick mode

like baby I love you, but you're just as fucking weird as the rest of this family you have no right to call yourself "the normal one"

#duke thomas #signal #batman #batfam #duke thomas centric #he's strange with a capital S and i love him for it

[shirkers2018dirsanditan]

crazy to see someone argue america’s terrible cities have nothing to do with capitalism and are actually about racism because other capitalist countries have better cities, and the idea is that  they don’t have racism…..and example that he gives is european cities in countries that are indeed notoriously racist. someone mentioned the united kingdom and he said “well it’s not majority black and white flight never happened in london” yeah but the national front did shit like firebomb a black birthday party and kill 13 children…….

#the UK is not the US so the car- and capital-centric urban suburban and rural design have nothing to do with capitalism #K

[comradenidhogg]

I know everyone wants to say kids and people in general, but kids are especially chained to their phones and screens, but I am very surprised that nobody is mentioning how car-centric infrastructure and car-centric planning of cities, suburbs, and rural areas that are almost completely unwalkable (ie: very limited sidewalks or bike lanes so people can't even go anywhere without having to drive a fucking car and roads that are increasingly getting wide and nearly impossible for kids, elderly people, and disabled people to cross before the light turns back green because all the roads are filled with traffic, and places like stores, schools, libraries, and parks are so far from walking distance in suburban and rural areas that kids can't even go to these places without having parents drive them to these places) is a HUGE factor, and imo probably even one of the main factors as to why kids are on screens more often than ever, rather than socializing with their peers outside in public places.

And while car-centric infrastructure hurts everyone, for older people, I also think that the increasingly long work hours per week (like it's often going up to 50-60 hours per week of work for many people, if not most people) so a lot of people have very limited free time and energy to partake in hobbies to relax and find enjoyment in (especially if they have families to take care of and other duties they need to follow) and also the 24-hour news cycle that keeps older people addicted to phones as well (especially since the news is often, if not always negative and is constantly shoved into people's browsing time even when they try to avoid the news).

Like, it is not just phone companies, but a variety of systemic factors that are making people too attached to their phones.

#car centric infrastructure #car centric planning #suburbs #screen time #technology addiction #late stage capitalism

[gender-luster]

this is not about desserts/general sweets. it's just about the candy flavours/varieties that are either exclusive to the season or just pushed more by stores in the season

#poll #candy #easter #sorry for the christian-centric seasons. that's (US) capitalism for ya