#but very succinctly put anon!!!

[jewish-sideblog]

hey, so im Palestinian and a strong activist for my people's liberation. i wanted to ask for some info/advice on avoiding antisemitism in my activism for Palestine. im on anon bc i don't want to be called a racefaker for caring about Jewish ppl. i know antisemitism is on the rise right now (and generally over the past few years) and i want to make sure i'm not unintentionally contributing to it.

Hey there! I wanted to start by genuinely thanking you for asking this question. Partially because I don't actually get any well-intentioned or helpful questions in my inbox anymore, but also because I understand the amount of bravery it takes to reach out with a question like that at a time like this.

Next, I want to apologize to all my followers who hate long posts. Judaism is a very complicated ethnoreligious group, antisemitism is a very complicated form of bigotry, and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is arguably the most complicated international issue that has ever existed. I'm going to try to go through everything as succinctly as possible below the cut-- I am also going to ask other Jews to contribute to and make edits to this list as needed.

And finally-- I'm writing this as though I were speaking to someone with very little knowledge of the subject. I understand that as a Palestinian, you probably know a lot about what's going on here. But I want to make sure that I'm covering bases for anybody else who might need to use this post. So if you're like, Yeah, Obviously I Knew That. Please remember that a fuckton of people on tumblr are engaging in Israeli criticism without obviously knowing that.

There are two primary forms of antisemitism in anti-Zionist spaces-- antisemitic conspiracy theory, and criticism of Israel that no other country receives. The first kind is the easiest kind to pick out, and it makes a nice bulleted list, so we'll start there.

Dual Loyalty. A global stereotype that has skyrocketed since the establishment of Israel, but it's been around for a lot longer than that. Simply put, it's the idea that Jews are more loyal to Israel (or some global secret kabal) than we are to the countries we currently reside in. With I/P, it manifests as the idea that All Jews are directly responsible for Israel or the idea that All Jews secretly support Israel. If you see a Jew who isn't directly engaging in I/P topics, don't ask them what their stance is. Plenty of us have never even been to Israel, and it's fucked up to assume that we're all experts in geopolitics.

The Holocaust was a Fabrication or a Lesson. The idea that Jews made up the Shoah has been around since the Shoah was still happening, and it's always been ridiculous. Today, you'll see three primary lines about this. Either it's that Jews made up the Shoah as an excuse to establish Israel, that the Jews deserved the Shoah because of what's happening in Israel today, or that the Jews "should have learned their lesson from the Holocaust" because now Jews are "the new Nazis". Frankly, I wish goyim would stop treating the deaths of millions of Jews like a TV show. Palestinian deaths are genuinely horrible, but this isn't some kind of "narrative parallel" to the Shoah.

The Kazars Theory, or All Jews are White. This is the DNA test nonsense. The idea is that Israel (or Jews at large) are only pretending to be indigenous to the Levant and that secretly Jews as a whole are actually indigenous to Eastern Europe. It's a lie, started by a German professor of Russian history in the early 1800s. Meanwhile, the vast majority of genetic, historical, and archaeological evidence points to Jewish origins in the Israeli/Palestinian region. There have been literal hundreds of genetic studies on this. Most of them suggest that Jews, even "white" Ashkenazim, are nearly genetically identical to Palestinians.

World Domination. The idea that Jews control the world began with the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in 1903. If you're encountering criticism of Israel that suggests that world governments, particularly European or American ones, are being controlled by Jews, you've got yourself antisemitism. White supremacists like to use the term "Zionist Occupied Government" or "ZOG" as shorthand for this conspiracy. The next two points are born out of this same ideology.

Controlling the Media. The idea that Jews are in charge of Hollywood and/or major news organizations around the world. Regarding I/P, I've seen a bunch of people say something like "Western media outlets won't cover this! (Because you know who controls them!)" only to look online and see... Western media outlets covering it. See also: "My source is tiktok! I don't trust the news!" While it's obviously a fair criticism to say that some Western news outlets certainly have a pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian bias, it's certainly not every single one of them. Reuters and the AP are once again my go-to's here.

Controlling the Financial World. I haven't actually seen this come up regarding I/P, but considering how things have been going, it's only a matter of time. We don't control the banks. We don't control the stock market. We're not in charge of American aid being sent to Israel. HaShem knows that if we controlled all the money, I'd certainly be living larger than I am now...

Those Bloodthirsty Jews. This one arguably started with Blood Libel in the 1100s, when Christians started accusing us of stealing and eating their babies. Straight up, I have met Christians who still believe this in 2023. You see this a lot with I/P-- the Al Ahli Hospital is the biggest example. More than a month later, most reliable intelligence organizations agree that a misfired Hamas rocket landed in a parking lot, killing about 100 people. But a ton of people are still saying that Those Bloodthirsty Jews intentionally bombed the hospital dead on, killing 470 people. I want to be clear-- Israel is killing a lot of civilians. But if you see a bandwagon of people focusing on the one group of deaths that Israel probably actually didn't cause? Consider why.

Causing wars, revolutions, and calamities. Hamas has straight-up got this one in their founding charter. No, the Jews are not responsible for any major global conflicts, revolutions, or counter-revolutions that don't directly involve Israel. We didn't do WWII. We didn't do the October Revolution. See above-- we're not secretly plotting massacres on Shabbat. A lot of people are saying that Netanyahu and Likud let Hamas in to justify the invasion of Gaza... I'd be shocked if that was the case. All evidence points to a classic intelligence failure. We're not orchestrating bloodbaths.

Section 2: Criticisms only levelled at Israel

It's important to recognise that Israeli civilians are no more collectively responsible for the actions of the Likud coalition than Palestinians are collectively responsible for the actions of Hamas. No Palestinian deserves to be stripped of their rights to self-determination in their ancestral lands because of the October 7th attack. Likewise, no Chinese person deserves to be displaced from China because of the CCP's human rights violations in Tibet, Uyghur and Hong Kong. No Russian person deserves to be ethnically cleansed from Russia because of the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine. But plenty of people do believe that Jews should be stripped of their rights to self-determination in historically Jewish indigenous lands because of the actions of the Israeli government.

After October 7th, I've seen people argue that Israeli babies deserved to be kidnapped because of their national origin. I've seen people argue that Israeli women deserved to be sexually abused because of their nation of origin. I've seen people argue that the seven million Jews living in their ancestral homeland deserve death or displacement because of their nation of origin. Justifying or allowing brutal harm against people because of their national origin is hateful.

I want to make this part very clear-- I do not have an issue with calling out Israeli war crimes or crimes against humanity. But I do have an issue with treating Jewish civilians differently than civilians of other nations responsible for similar horrors. Amplifying bias against a particular group because of that group's nation of origin is called bigotry. Taking a stand against Israeli settlements in the West Bank is anti-Zionism. Collectivizing the label of "white colonialism", and forcing that label upon refugees forced to move to Israel, or Mizrahim with uninterrupted 8,000-year histories in Israel, is antisemitism.

Part 3: Moving Forward

So where do we go from here? If advocating for the destruction of Israel is advocating for the elimination of Jewish self-determination in our ancestral lands, but advocating in favour of the Israeli government is advocating for the elimination of Palestinian self-determination in your ancestral lands, then we must find some middle ground. A solution that allows seven million Jews and five-and-a-half-million Arabs to share the same holy land, without fear of persecution, displacement, or death. For me, this means a few things.

First of all, the recognition that most Israelis disagree with Netanyahu's approach to Palestine, and most Palestinians disagree with Hamas's approach to Israel. And that brings up a question-- why are Likud and Hamas in charge of Israel and Gaza respectively if most people disagree with them? Without getting into the complicated intricacies of the Knesset and the PNA on an already very long post (and without explaining your own government to you), the simple answer is international funds.

Israeli crimes against Palestinians are bankrolled by American Evangelical Christians, who believe that when Palestine is gone, all the Jews will go to Israel, and Jesus will come back to kill the world's infidels. They actually fucking believe that. Meanwhile, Hamas is bankrolled by Iran, which believes that the more often Jews and Sunni Muslims kill each other, the easier it will be for Iranian Shiite Jihad to take over the world. They actually fucking believe that.

So what steps can we take during our advocacy? Not for the destruction of Israel nor the destruction of Palestine, but for America and Iran to get their noses out of our damn business. I genuinely believe that a defunded Likud and a defunded Hamas will allow Israelis and Palestinians to work together for a peaceful two-state or joint-rule solution. Something that will keep my Palestinian friends from feeling like they can't safely travel from Jaffa to Tel Aviv. Something that will allow my Jewish family to visit and pray at the Cenotaphs of Isaac and Rebecca and the Temple Mount. Something that will let Israeli children from Kibbutz Nirim and Palestinian children from Khan Yunis play on the same playgrounds together, instead of sheltering from missile fire.

Frankly, we nearly had that when the Supreme Muslim Council and the Assembly of Representatives began collaborating against the British Mandate instead of against each other. Clearly, it's possible, we just need to stop being pitted against each other by foreign powers.

[mecachrome]

Hi k! I love reading your ojp scholarship, as he has crept up on me and taken over my brain. Weird question but why do you think he picked Lando as his guy to be a bit weird about?

hi anon 🥺 first off thank u for indulging me & also that is not a weird question at all!!!

ok obviously this is just me saying Anything so i apologize in advance T__T but tbh i think a lot of it ultimately goes back to the idea of lando's ~Proximity~ and how a very specific mélange of career circumstance laid out a foundation for oscar's interest extremely early on... which. let me explain!!! more behind the cut:

not to go on too much of a tangent but if you look at the current drivers in f1 who are roughly within a few years of oscar's age and could have feasibly been someone he'd looked up to coming up the ranks, i'd say the cutoff is like, 2018? so the group is basically charles/george/alex/lando, of whom the first 3 were alr in intrepid together (albeit in diff categories) when oscar had barely started karting at all. also alex moved up to single-seaters very early and his career/road to f1 is obviously a lot more complex than the others, so in reality the only ones oscar would have properly "followed" are lando and george, and then having gone through rfm & british f4 himself it makes sense that he'd lean more toward lando.

...idk how to put this succinctly but basically it's Like: so you're a kid in australia who believes in yourself so much you're willing to move halfway across the globe and attend boarding school by yourself while all your friends and family and the World As You've Always Known It grows and changes without you, and the team you're determined to prove yourself at has semi-recently achieved victory with a guy named lando norris, who is now british f4 champion and runs three separate series the same year you move to europe and goes on to win them all, who is extremely accessible on social media and is kind of awkward but charming and uses dumb unfunny gifs that match your level of online humor exactly, and all the while you're learning to navigate a new country, learning what it really means to prioritize the endless grind of motorsport, and you wouldn't dare look too far ahead into the future but sometimes you see him and think if he can keep winning everything then why not you?

So. also i think what always krills meeee about young_814 lore is that you have to really envision what they looked like circa 2016 like they were undersized dweebs for a majority of their lives!!! anyway. but also nasdlfnagk every time oscar is like i thought you were 30 with your goatee going on haha xD it's like U knowww he's flashing back to that image of little baby lando in his mind..... ok i need to relax.

there are of course other people oscar could have been weird about but in the end it's kind of just a Skill Issue thing / matter of attrition. like from the rfm pack max and logan and guanyu never progressed the same way lando did, and you also have to remember that by the time lando was a mclaren junior he was genuinely their Golden BoyTM, and i know we often talk about lando's competency kink but oscar is also similar to that but in like a ........ he needs to respect you on some fundamental level to be obsessed with you. so the fact that he genuinely rates lando contributes (imo) massively to the fundamentals of their dynamic!!!

also tbh to me one of oscar's biggest mental strengths is specifically that he isn't a very sentimental person, as in if he left to another team i don't think he'd be torn up or anything about not having lando as a teammate lol. but i DO believe he's someone who adapts very well to unfamiliar environments and is always willing to match someone's energy/meet them where they're at (again - especially when he respects them), so he's basically the perfect person to vibe with lando's idiosyncrasies and engage in all the lighthearted push/pulling they have going on. because like he genuinely thinks lando is funny and is more than happy to follow along his meandering bantz and the weirder lando is the weirder oscar is in response and that's just how they Work ?__? so At the end of the day it's: oscar was once a teenage boy who followed (still does) at ladbible instagram and watched the same gaming streamers lando likes or whatever and has seen lando grow into the man he is today (way more confident and "visible" and successful, very much a menace, brutally honest as ever) from this Very Specific vantage point of basically the only other junior after lando to have followed the same path to f1 and been Equally as good / achieved the same stock.

*__* does any of that make sense. 

do u ever think about how lando (extensively nurtured by the team as their only junior) and oscar (basically crashlanded belatedly into his seat) are the only driver pairing in team history to have both debuted with mclaren........ do you ever think about how in a way lando's karting success indirectly influenced oscar's move to europe. do you ever think about how if alpine weren't an abject mess we would have never gotten 814 as teammates and lando would have just been Another Guy On The Grid to him........ 😮‍💨

#ask #me: i'll be brief. also me: (writes 20 paragraphs)

[vveakfish]

do you have any thoughts about the core four whose gender(s) are basically just a trans fruit cocktail that you would like to talk about? because I would love to listen

oh boy DO I !!!

I have So Many thoughts about them Anon, so thank you for giving me an excuse to try and put it into words beyond “Damn, these bitches trans! Good for them.”

Honestly, there are so many different ways to explore these characters genders based on how you choose to interpret their life experiences, and their aesthetic changes, and their relationships with each other. I am of the belief that any of them could be trans in any direction

But, that said, I Do have particular gender headcanons for YJ that i am very fond of, so thats what I’ll be talking about today.

(Small disclaimer. I have not finished all of the comics referenced in this. I am using the information i have to inform these, but you know, i might come back to this post at some point in the future and look at it like “wow, i don’t agree with any of this anymore.” And i think thats okay.

I’m just here to have fun, and i thoroughly enjoy these little guys, and think abt them alot, so enjoy

(also if you dont want to read 4.1k words of blorbo gender analysis, or would like to avoid spoilers for Superboy (1993), Young Justice (1998) & (2019), and Red Robin (2009) in varying degrees of detail, or you just want to see what lables i assigned them, scroll down to the bottom <3))

lets get started.

Bart:

Bart's gender is the most complex, but his thought process about it is also the most simple. I think his view of gender would be very much influenced by the fact that he grew up in VR in the future like…

A body is just an avatar, do what ever the fuck you want with it.

That said, the lil guy has always given me transmasc vibes. These vibes, however, are by no means binary.

He understands that in the 21st century a lot of people do not have his sort of “throw things at the wall and see what sticks” approach to gender, so he’s okay with being put in the box of Boy™. But his gender is a lot more * hand waves vaguely *

Clothes don’t have gender in his eyes, they’re fabric you put on your body. Wear what ever you want forever!

Bart in skirts is something i have seen many people draw/talk about before, and its something i agree with wholeheartedly. He likes hair clips, and like, those loud (actually loud and visually loud) beaded bracelet type things that ravers wear. He like nail polish. He doesn’t grow facial hair, but he wouldn’t care if he did. He’s not on hormones, but he definitely considered it for the bit. “Gotta drink my boy juice” Kind of vibes.

For him gender has Nothing to do with performance, its all about comfort. About wearing what feels right, regardless of whether or not he’s adhering to expectations of masculinity.

Yes, he Will wear that god awful outfit out of the house, haters can die mad

Cassie:

Anon, I need you to understand how much i love early yj98 cass. She is everything to me — her process of coming to terms with herself, and being able to watch her start to feel at home in her own skin. It makes me absolutely feral.

lets see if i can explain why… succinctly

When we first meet her in yj98, her identity as “Wonder Girl” is this sort of amalgamation of What it Means To Be A Hero in her eyes. She has her party city blunt bob wig (Because Diana is who she looks up to), the gloves, leather jacket, goggles combo (that so clearly take inspiration from Kon).

At this point in her life Wonder Girl is not really her. Its very clearly a mask she’s putting on. which is what makes it the perfect avenue for her to explore gender expression without it having to actually be about her gender.

I think the part that specifically makes me feral though is her… we’ll call it admiration of Kon.

The girl is a self proclaimed Superboy stan + theres all the weird not-drama between Cassie and Cissie over wanting attention from Kon. (And i say Not Drama bc its like… Kon flirting with cissie (which like… have you met 90’s Kon?? he flirts with everything that moves) and Cassie being upset that he’s Not flirting with her. and cissie is just along for the ride. She’s not quite as much of a flirt as kon is, but she has her moments)

All of this to say i feel like its impossible to have a conversation about Cassie’s gender without also talking about her experiences with comphet and lesbianism.

At the beginning, Cassie sees Kon — this cocksure, conventionally attractive boy with powers that (at first glance) seem very similar to hers, and felt something about it. And, in the way of teen girls who have been told since grade school that they’re supposed to like boys, Cassie comes to the conclusion that what she feels for Kon must be romantic in nature, right?.

All of this, the jealousy over Kon and Cissie flirting, basing her costume off Superboy’s (intentionally or otherwise), the fact that she wont let her team see her without the wig and goggles at all for so much of yj98. To me it all reads as the tangled mix of undiscovered lesbianism and gender dysphoria that the poor girl simply doesn’t have the words to define yet.

So, then what IS cassie’s deal with gender???

i am so very glad you asked.

She, too, is a transmasc of the nonbinary variety.

I think her relationship to femininity is complex, and ever changing. She doesn’t feel comfortable performing femininity the way the world expects her to, but she is also part Amazon. And i think having a relationship with both Diana and Donna would greatly influence how she felt about femininity as a whole.

The Amazons are strong, their femininity isn’t about beauty, or being soft spoken — it isn’t about Men at all. On Themyscira, to be a Woman is about bravery, honor, skill, and in some ways, divinity. Getting closer with her Amazonian sisters would change her relationship to womanhood immensely.

But it still wouldn’t feel Right. She would be able to see that womanhood can be defined differently, but that wouldn’t change the connotations that womanhood had as she was growing up. She’d never be able to lean into it the way Diana or Donna do — they both grew up only having woman defined as strong and brave and confident. Their experiences are not analogous.

The baggage of growing up a girl under the patriarchy wouldn’t just… vanish because she sees that it Doesn’t have to be that way. In some ways, the knowledge that it didn’t have to be that way could make her dysphoria all that stronger (especially if she hasn’t quite deciphered that dysphoria is what she’s feeling).

but i think there would be a point where two things sharpen into focus for her.

fiirstly she has a big fat crush on cissie king-jones.

and second (which would only come AFTER realizing her feelings for cissie) is that what she feels for Kon is Not the same as what she feels for Ciss.

She didn’t want to be with Kon romantically, she just wanted his gender.

I could see her experimenting with wearing a binder, liking that she can get rid of her boobs if she isn’t feeling them that day.

She already has her short hair, and her leather jacket and jeans, and shes big and buff and strong (because she deserves to be butch!!! okay???).

I still think she would use she/her pronouns, but she wouldn’t be picky ab it (if she gets called sir while at the pizza place, she’s not going to correct them.)

But here’s the kicker — I think leaning hard into her masculinity would be EXACTLY what she needs in order to actually ENJOY expressing femininity again.

When putting on the mask that is ‘womanhood’ becomes something that she can Choose to do, rather than something that is being forced on her, it can be pleasant. Like playing dress up.

She has a new appreciation for it, especially since her friends respect her gender, and she knows at the end of the day, when she takes the makeup, the clothes, and the wig off, underneath it all she’s just her.

(Small addendum re: TT’03 Cassie’s fem phase. I have Many thoughts about this as well, and while they end up in roughly the same place, i exploring her experience with comphet and her decision to dress in a more traditionally feminine in that run is something id like to explore in another post (once i’ve actually read the run too.)

Cissie (bonus):

This one should be shorter than Cassies, mainly because my reasoning for it is much simpler.

YJ'98 (#11)

She lists all these names, all of them feminine except for Fucking Ralph. “One weird phase” she calls it.

To me, Cissie is a transgirl through and through. She has this huge list of femme names she tried on while she tried to find the one that fit best. She mentions ralph in this off handed way, as if its not important, and i think thats just her way of dismissing her deadname as something of little consequence.

(that said, i think there’s lots of fun to be had with transmasc cissie, or tried transing-her-gender and realized it wasn’t for her Cissie. But as a transfemme, tgirl cissie is So important to me <3)

Kon:

other people on here have made posts about Kon’s gender that are much more coherent than this will be, but i’m putting the words down anyway. bear with me.

Kon’s experience with identity (especially in his earlier years) is almost entirely about the external rather than the internal.

Kon has his whole life planned out for him from the moment he opens his eyes. It’s simple really — become Superman.

So you have this freshly hatched teenage boy, saving the world as Superman (not the Only one, but definitely the coolest one (Kon would argue)). All eyes on him, all the time. In some ways, performance is inseparable from who he is. From the very beginning, everything he does is on display.

He starts his life with a Name (Superman), a life path (…again, Superman), and all the confidence of a sixteen year old jock with nothing but wins under his belt. then it all gets taken away.

Turns out Clark ISNT dead, and the world doesn’t need its pint sized superman anymore now that its got the real thing.

enter Superboy

Kon’s entire identity, his whole purpose for being alive, was to step into the shoes of a dead man who is no longer dead. So where does that leave our genetically engineered test tube baby?

lost, and extremely confused.

But he’s good at using his charisma as a shield, and even better at keeping himself busy. His problems aren’t there if he doesn’t have the time to think about them, right?

and i think that’s true about his gender as well.

Similar to Cassie, his discovery and exploration of his gender feels incredibly tied to his sexuality (to me). If you’ve read sb93, you know Kon’s deal with women. He is cute & conventionally attractive & he's like superman with a fashion sense, so of course there are people fawning over him.

And he loves the attention. He likes that people want him, or that they are looking at him. The issue is he doesn’t have the life experience to realize that their reasons for paying attention to him are often very shallow, manipulative, or selfish.

He isn’t treated as a person very often. He’s a brand, a product, a tool, a weapon. He’s arm candy, he’s a photo op, he’s a headline, he’s a paycheck. And it takes him a long time to be able to tell the difference between someone Liking Him & someone Using Him.

For the longest Time, Superboy is all he is. He doesn’t have a name outside of that identity (except for the various pet names the women in his life give him (kid & pup, mainly)).

And even when Clark does give him his real name, Kon-El, its still Attatched to his identity as Superboy.

I dont think that he would really even be able to start dissecting how HE feels about his identity until he’s much older.

Part of this would come from the space to be someone else that gaining a civilian identity would give him. As Superboy, the goal has always been to stand out, to be seen, to shine like the sun.

As Conner Kent, he has to blend in. He doesnt want to draw attention to himself, or the Kents, or Clark. He has to fit in, which was never something he had to do as Kon. And i think it would kind of chafe at him — but he wouldn’t really know why.

I think he’d chalk it up to how different of an experience it is. Not being loud, having to be normal™. And so i think he’d just… continue to play the part. For a while anyway.

And like, part of being Normalest Boy Conner Kent would also involve actively un-queer coding himself for the sake of fitting into the ecosystem of Smallville High. and its like…

Young Justice, as a friend group, is SOOO queerplatonic. The lines between romantic and platonic intimacy are so blurred, and Prior to Kon’s YJ days he he was also like… living with these woman who he had complicated relationships with that also blurred the lines between platonic, romantic, and sexual (…looking at you, Knockout).

So learning where the line is when it comes to how he can acceptably interact with his civilian friends (particularly the boys) would Really open his eyes to just how close he is with Bart and Tim, and how similar his feelings for them are to his feelings for… lets say, Simon Valentine.

But i dont think That is what would actually tip the scale. I think realizing that these feelings for his friends aren’t considered ‘normal’ would make him shove them down deeper. As ‘Conner’ anyway.

from here it could go two ways, right?

Either we get Teen Titans ‘03 t-shirt Kon, who sheds his GNC 90s swag in exchange for adhering closer to traditional (read; boring) masculine gender roles.

or we get a Kon who leans Harder into his punk roots, but its a conscious choice now.

(this isn’t even digging into how he would feel once Jon comes into the picture, because while Kon cares for that boy Deeply, his feelings abt the new kiddo in the family could also be very complicated. But that’s a post for another time.)

Personally i prefer the second one.

Kon has always been a curious kid, i love the way he makes pop culture references, and how he bases his behavior off of 90’s teen tropes that he Most Definitely learned from TV. In his early days this wasn’t done in a research way necessarily, but he Did want to learn what it was like to Be a Teen™, and TV was the easiest way to figure that out.

(and, playing in the space of Kon adaptations, his love of media/pop culture, and just over all thirst for knowledge, are present both in the Reign of the Supermen Movie, and in his iteration during the n52 (which is one of the few things i personally have internalized from reading n52 Superboy/Teen Titans)).

But post gay awakening, i feel liked he’d be interested not just in behaviors, but also the context of them. Digging into punk as a subculture rather than as an aesthetic. Learning about its connections to queerness, and community, and self expression. And i think this would be extremely freeing for him. (especially if this were around the time of Jon becoming Superboy v.3, but again, not the point of this post.)

this all culminates in Kon being like yk? gender just… isnt for me. Like, it takes im a long time to get to this point, but realizing that the path that was set out for him is just one of the potential paths he can take, and while he might not know where this new path will take him, its his, that that matters.

And also like, Because his friends are who they are, he’s seen different versions of queerness, and transness, but i think it would take him a bit to see himself as someone who Isn’t Cis bc like… he doesnt have dysphoria in the traditional sense.

He’s still the beefcake he’s always been, but i think he’d start playing with makeup when he realizes it makes him feel good (he shows up the the cave one day with smudgy eye liner and Cissie is immediately like a) you look so good and b) can i Please do your makeup? (and then she does it, and he looks so pretty, and he gets these weird giddy feelings that he doesn’t realize is gender euphoria until his friends start talking abt gender euphoria)

His uniform starts to get more personalized too, like the designs where he has knee patches, and all his little belts, and stuff. maybe he starts experimenting with showing skin. bc he deserves it

(’its for maximum sun exposure!!!’ is the what he tells clark… he’s not sure if clark bought it or not)

And hey, exploring gender presentation more as Superboy might help him do the same as Conner. Cassie will take him thrifting, he’ll try of a flowy skirt or a sun dress or something and then its Over. Gender euphoria part two, electric boogagloo.

In the end, its about realizing that adhering gender roles (and truthfully, any socially imposed ‘rule’ about self expression) is something he can simply Choose not to do. And i think this freedom would be something that benefits him in his civilian life as well.

His gender is: literally what ever, man.

Tim:

Ok, here’s the thing about Tim and gender, right? I think he’s kind of just comfortable as he is. He’s good at playing the roles he needs to in what ever situation hes thrown into. ‘Robin’ and ‘Tim Drake’ (and even ‘Tim Drake-Wayne’ if you want to split hairs) might be masks he wears, but that doesn’t mean they’re any less him. if that makes sense. like…

Lets look at the differences between Bruce (or Brucie) and Batman for a second. They really are different people. Batman is who bruce is at his core, ‘bruce’ is this sort of liminal space between the cowl and his public persona, and then theres Brucie™, and well, you know how he is. These are personas that Bruce puts on.

With Tim its like he just highlights different aspects of himself when a situation requires it. (oh no, the autistic!Tim head canons are being loud today.) But like, he’s Always been masking. And i think this is something he would look at as like… getting a good grade in adapting. or something. He’s comfortable, all the roles he plays are ones he’s familiar with, and he doesn’t really question who he is outside of who he needs to be.

That is, until Caroline Hill makes an appearance.

I feel that the decision to go undercover as a woman was a wholly practical decision in the moment. It’s what the mission required, and therefore tim stepped up. Its just another mask, right? Surely this wont awaken anything in him…right?

But this is an entirely new mask. And i think it might like… shift the way he looks at/thinks about the other masks he puts on. He was able to step into a role that was very foreign to him, and it Worked. (and he felt pretty, which like… woah, thats a new feeling. and he kinda liked it? file that under ‘thoughts he doesn’t have the bandwidth to process right now.’ Bruce needs him back at the cave! its time to debreif! and he has a biology test tmrw! no time for gender scaries!!!).

I think it would take a while for him to be able to admit it to himself though. Because like… hes Not uncomfortable with his body, but he also keeps thinking about how good he felt dressed up femininely, and how he felt powerful, in a way. That putting on that mask felt just as good as putting on his domino.

Personally, i think itd be funny if instead of coming out right away, Tim doing undercover missions essentially in drag becomes a recurring thing. And i imagine some people give him a hard time. (not in a transphobic way or anything, i just mean like, teasing him fondly or what ever.) (Also, i like to imagine that when cissie Did kons makeup, bart and Tim jumped in there too bc like hey why not, and hoooooo boy, if Tims egg hadn’t cracked before then, it sure would have cracked after.)

The thing about him is, i’m not sure if he’d come to the realization himself. You know, that he would like to present femme sometimes, in a situation that has Nothing to do with a mission.

I could see Tim convincing himself that its a pointless or frivolous desire, which is Why he relegates his time presenting femme to when he can prove that it’s useful.

but i have this image in my mind, right? Of him, taking his makeup and wig off, and hes chatting with whoever is in the room with him (literally anyone else mentioned above… or Dick). And Tim’s just talking about how he wishes he could present this way in situations other than missions.

and the other person in the room is just like… i mean, you literally can.

and hes just like…. shit you’re right. i Can :0

I could probably go further into depth abt this, but i think this just frees him to start playing with gender more as Tim. and start to recognize when he’s feeling more masculine, more feminine, or somewhere in between.

His gender isn’t consistent, its this thing he’s constantly listening to, and trying to understand. but in the mean time, he can paint his face, and wear pretty clothes, or dress like just Some Guy, or be a hedgehog dressed in traffic light colors, or what ever his heart desires.

As far as like… how He describes his gender, i think he’d say something corny like bi^2 (bi of both the sexual and the gendered varieties). Or shrug, handwave, generally give a non-helpful vague description. Or tell who evers asking to buzz off.

(small addendum wrt Kon and Cassie in TT’03. I haven’t read this run yet, so i didn’t really include it in this post. But i Do have thoughts about what might cause the two of them (my gnc besties from my comics books) to lean sooooo hard into traditional gender roles after being So Queercoded in their other appearences. Before i talk abt that though, i want to read the comic. So, that will have to be a post for another time)

ANYWAY, heres that TL;DR i promised.

Bart: NB Transmasc Cassie: NB Lesbian (of the transmasc variety) Kon: Agender Tim: Fluid (bi-gender) + Cissie: Transgirl

Thank you soooooo much for giving me the opporrtunity to ramble abt the silles and how Not Cis i think they are. Love you forever.

#𓆟 #𓆟 | 📨 #anon #disclaimer: this all for fun! i love these kiddos & am working on reading more of their comics #And my thoughts here are based on things that i have extrapolated from what they have gone through in canon & how that might influence #their relationships to their own genders #Core Four #Young Just Us #Bart Allen #Cassie Sandsmark #Cissie King Jones #Kon-El #Tim Drake #LOL will Tumblr let me post this now? #(i spent like... 15 minutes futzing with the formatting just for it to go 'srry cant post this hehe'

[delphines]

An anon recently asked me what process I use to color my gifs, and the short answer is: gradient maps! But since that process is a bit difficult to explain succinctly, I thought it was best to turn it into a tutorial. I don’t color all my gifs this way, but it is my favorite and most frequently-used method.

This tutorial assumes you have a basic understanding of gifmaking (cropping, sharpening, etc), and are using the timeline in photoshop. Tutorial under the cut!

1. Basic Adjustments

Alright, so here is what I’m starting with - the gif after just being cropped and sharpened, no coloring yet:

Before I start any coloring, I do a couple basic adjustment layers. I usually start with brightness/contrast, then curves (using the dark and light eyedropper tool), and levels. Here’s the gif now, after applying those basic adjustments:

2. Channel Mixer (if necessary)

Some shows/scenes have very strong filters put on them already, a fact most gifmakers are painfully aware of. These filters can make scenes challenging to color because you’re not starting from a neutral base, but thankfully there is a solution: the channel mixer! This adjustment layer is explained in more detail in this wonderful tutorial by @selinakyle​, but essentially it allows you to isolate certain colors to correct them more accurately.

For this scene, I’ll be using the channel mixer to counteract the strong yellow-green filter that’s already baked into the footage. As you can see from my settings below, I’ve set the output channel to “blue” and then adjusted the “green” slider. That means that I’m adding blue into the green tones in the image. This will remove that yellow-green tint from my gif and allow me to start coloring with a better base.

3. Color Balance

Next, I add a color balance layer. This layer allows you to adjust the color of the shadows, midtones, and highlights of your gif separately. To be honest, I feel like this layer is all about experimentation; you never know what’s going to look good until you test it. You can see me testing out the sliders below.

It’s not usually a good idea to move the sliders around as drastically as I did here, I did that to give you a visual of how much the color balance layer can change the look of your gif.

The color balance settings I ended up going with are below. You can only see my midtone settings here, but my shadow and highlight settings are similar.

4. Adding the Gradient Map

After the basic coloring’s done, I add a gradient map, which is also located in the adjustment layer panel.

When you first add a gradient map, it will automatically add a gradient of your foreground and background colors, which is usually not the look you’re going for. To edit the gradient, simply click on the gradient itself in the properties panel and it will open up the gradient editor.

In the gradient editor, click the tiny squares on the bottom of the gradient to edit each side of it. You can also add more colors to the gradient as well if you want more than two. It’s usually a good idea to put the darker color(s) on the left and the lighter color(s) on the right so that they correspond to the shadows and highlights properly.

Now that my gradient is added and the colors changed to my liking, my gif looks like this:

5. Adjusting the Gradient Map

The colors are nice, but I don’t like the way they just sit on top of the image, I want the gradient to look more natural. So it’s time to adjust the gradient map’s blending mode.

Every adjustment layer’s blending mode is set to normal by default. Adjusting it is easy - simply go to the layers panel, click the button that says “normal,” and scroll through the choices in the drop-down menu.

Like so many parts of coloring, which blending mode works best really depends on the scene and the look you’re going for. I usually start with overlay and see how it looks, but other popular blending modes are multiply, soft light, and color. I’ve also used hue and color burn.

For this gif, I decided to use overlay. Now that it’s been changed, my gif looks like this:

6. Adding a Layer Mask

The purple color looks great, but now the character looks unnaturally purple as well. In order to remove the purple from her face and hair, we’ll need to add a layer mask.

To add a layer mask, select the gradient map layer and then click the icon at the bottom of the layers panel that looks like a box with a circle in it.

After you click it, a small white box should appear beside your layer’s name.

Make sure it’s selected, then select the brush tool. Set the brush to black, increase the size if necessary, then start painting over the character’s face. Painting on the layer mask will obscure part of the gradient map layer itself, so that only the basic coloring we did before is visible. The darker the brush, the more opaquely it will remove the gradient map. Also, the larger the brush, the softer the look. Since I want a soft edge to my layer mask, I’m using a larger brush.

This is what a layer mask in progress looks like:

7. Keyframes

Now I’ve successfully removed the purple from the character’s face - so I should be done, right? Well, let’s export the gif and see:

Nope, still not ready. The layer mask I added is stationary, but the gif itself is not. This character moves around quite a bit, and since the layer mask stays still, it means that she dips in and out of the purple and sometimes reveals spots of the basic coloring on the wall behind her.

To fix this, we have to animate the layer mask so that it moves with her. We’ll do this using keyframes. To add keyframes, you’ll first need to unlink the layer mask. Go into the layers panel and click the little chain icon next to the mask.

Once the chain icon has disappeared, the mask is unlinked from the layer.

Next, go into the timeline, find the proper layer, and click the drop down arrow on the left side. This should show you a list of properties with little stopwatch icons beside them.

Each stopwatch toggles the keyframes for their respective property. Since we want to animate the layer mask position, we’ll want to click the stopwatch beside “layer mask position.” Now, it should show a small diamond beside the stopwatch - this means that keyframes have been enabled.

To animate the mask, make sure the timeline slider is placed at the very beginning of the gif. Drag it slowly across the timeline and stop as soon as the character moves beyond the mask. When this happens, use the move tool (do NOT use the transform tool/ctrl + t!) to drag the layer mask into the proper position.

Since keyframes are already enabled, every time you move the layer mask, you will create a new keyframe. This means that photoshop will animate the space between the two keyframes automatically. You’ll know that you’ve added a new keyframe when a small diamond shape appears at your slider’s position in the timeline.

Continue doing this throughout the whole gif, being careful to move slowly, as it’s very easy to miss a spot if you go too fast. This is how many keyframes I ended up creating for this gif:

Once you’ve gone through the entire gif, you’re done!

8. Exporting the Gif

Something that’s annoying about using keyframes is that, when you either convert back to frames or save and open the gif separately to adjust the frame delay, your frames will be duplicated. What does this mean? It means your gif will look like this:

Not great. The solution is easy, but tedious. Simply select every other frame and delete them before changing the frame delay (0.05 is the standard) and exporting. Now the gif should animate at the proper speed:

And you’re done!

I feel like a lot of coloring/keyframes/etc is really hard to explain, especially through text, so feel free to send me an ask if you need further clarification. Also, my lovely friend Sole (@fionagallaqher​) recently made this tutorial using a very, very similar coloring method, where she explains both how to use keyframes and how to color frame by frame. Please check that out if you’re interested in learning more!

#mytutorials #rambling #usersole #useralison #userannalise #useryoshi #userelio #tusersoph #usershreyu #uservalentina #userfnuggi #uservivaldi #supervalcsi #usernums #tuserkay #userkarolina #tuserrex #userdean #usercera #usernorah #tuserjen

[red-moon-at-night]

you are not losing your mind by yourself about this. we are losing our minds together. 🤝. i went through the drama cds and made a list. es has hit every single male prisoner except, ironically, fuuta. (which is interesting, because fuuta tried to attack them twice in the first interrogation. instead of responding with violence, they just make fun of him.) that being said, here’s my Es Violence Compilation:

1. Haruka: Slapped “with all [their] might” for his self-deprecating comments. (Es got mad that he said they would abandon him.) First trial.

2. Haruka (again): Slapped for attempting to attack them and “being an idiot”. Second trial.

3. Shidou: Kicked in the shin (hard) for treating Es like a child and patting their head. First trial.

4. Mikoto: Smacked to wake him up after being knocked unconscious by Kotoko.

5. Kazui: Slapped in the face to prove a point after Kazui speculated that since they couldn’t attack Es, Es couldn’t attack them, either. (Understandable, given the initial panic caused by Kazui’s little stunt at the beginning.) First trial.

6. Kazui (again): Punched in the face (hard) for being condescending and staring at them. Second trial.

7. Amane: Held in place briefly to prove a point about her “God complex” or something.

8. Muu: Shoved away when she tried to shake them while they were having a breakdown over their identity and free will.

My main takeaway from this is that they don’t like to be touched. For starters, their reaction to Shidou patting their head is… genuinely worrying. Like… man (horse). Part of it is Es being mad about Shidou treating them like a child, but the shaken voice and shaky deep breaths following the little head pat are backstory crumbs, I can feel it. Probably. Also, after punching Kazui in the second trial, they say “it was an instinctive reaction.” The common denominator between these two events is Es saying “[Relieved sigh] I feel much better now.” (I compared the actual audio to double-check the translations I was reading. Es says “sukkiri” in both instances, which translates to “refreshing” or “I feel better”. It’s the kind of thing you say when you get a nice glass of water after being out in the sun for a while, or something. Very funny detail to me.) The other obvious instance that leads me to this conclusion is that time Es was having a breakdown during Muu’s first trial interrogation. Muu shakes them when they don’t respond, and they shove her away and shout, “Shut up! Don’t touch me!” (There’s a sound effect here that implies they gave her another shove or smacked her away from them, too.) Of course, the clearest problem presented by this incident is the fact that Es has a mental breakdown when asked if their decisions are made with their own free will, but I’m not focusing on that right now. I don’t know why I suddenly switched to proper capitalization and punctuation in this. I am filled with both dread and excitement at the prospect of learning more about Es’s backstory. There’s Something Going On There.

anon I want you to know that when I received this ask I practically exploded into fireworks out of sheer joy and delight. thank you for this addition!! thank you!! 💜

I dont have anything to add at this point in time because I think you did such a great job of succinctly putting this together... I completely agree with your analysis!

There's definitely Something Going On Here and I think we're slowly gonna be drip-fed crumbs of their backstory and it's our job to pay attention and piece it together. Unless of course they give us a huge infodump at the end of t3 and then I shall simply go feral on sight

You are so super cool by the way for going back and checking all the voice dramas!! I'm really grateful for this list it's a good reference so thanks again!! you're a legend ilu

#milgram #Es #analysis #ask #I wish I could put into words better how much I love this ask ;w; I am filled with whimsy and joy... #we are losing our minds together indeed 🤝 #the sukkiri tidbit is making me laugh btw I love that for them asdfghjkl #also I saw ur extra ask and I think you got all the trials right?? I'm not seeing anything incorrect I think you're good dw!! #fav

[burinazar]

I'm sure you've mentioned it before, but I was wondering who your favorite Made in Abyss character is and why they're your favorite? :3

I love all the main kids as well as many other characters so it's hard to choose but I think I'd have to say mine is Faputa. Not only is she a super interesting and cool character, but she's also A Creature. A little ball of fluff that can kill

---------------------

Thank you very much for the ask, anon! haha, "little ball of fluff that can kill"...yes, Faputa is great, and I think the main cast of Abyss is very endearing and very well fleshed-out. I was having a nice exchange on AO3 the other day regarding how GOOD the characterization of Abyss is and how it's often overlooked in favor of the also-extremely-good worldbuilding and plot, and why that might be, and was considering how it links together with some of my other Thoughts about ways this fandom is different from my other ones as far as what people are into (I need to finish the self-reblog I was gonna do about that on a recent related post actually). Anyway, pretty much the whole cast is endearing and/or enjoyable to watch in some capacity. But there is a definite answer as to favorite(s).

I put these up on my wall this evening, which may help to answer your question.

(Please note the scrolls. I missed the Amiami preorder period for those two because they closed earlier than the rest for some reason, but was able to get them from Suruga-ya eventually. They'll be on the wall at some point too.)

The story and cast prior to s2 I enjoyed in a, like, normal way, and then the Ganja squad arc hit me like a damn asteroid. These people...I've thought and felt and said so much about them, and after a year and a half I'm still brimming with something that feels like it has to be poured out, onto blank canvases and into the written word, and there's no end in sight. I have never had characters that were such good muses to me except perhaps for a couple I made up myself. Belaf has to be called my favorite at this point, but for a long time it was Vueko, and I really, really like Waz too; the manner in which these three characterize one another makes it a little painful to try to separate and rank them, but yes, that's the order. I dote on B and V in particular.

(Self portrait circa August 2023.)

At this point I have so much to say about them that being asked why I like them is hard to answer succinctly. Belaf is so, so sweet, but in an unusual weird, intense nerd way that I find incredibly endearing .....and then that kindness and strength of character fucking destroys him and it's tragic and beautiful and there is so much to pick apart in the manner and meaning of his transformation and his absolution, and it's also a great deal of fun to depict him as he was before. "Before" Belaf is such a fun sort of quirky nerd and his relationships wth Waz and Vue and Iru offer, like, SO much to turn over and look upon fondly, humor and friendship and loyalty and love.

And yet, when I write about his years of friendship with and loyalty and closeness to Wazukyan and Vueko and his parenthood and tutelage of Irumyuui and (note: hallucinatory) camaraderie with the other Ganja, hanging over my shoulder always is his downfall and it makes all of those things so much more beautiful, the tinny note of tragedy that is always playing at the edge of our hearing once we see it all and know how it must end.

(Another crispy fried self portrait from last year. I don't really draw myself these days at all EXCEPT in the context of making fun of my sages obsession.)

As for Vueko, since she's fairly popular maybe explaining her appeal isn't needed...or maybe it is, because it's so much more than the shy and gentle and somewhat silly person she is on the surface, it is so, so much more. Under the Layer of Fuheh she's made of steel --it's just that she's very, very softspoken, which people mistake for passivity and spinelessness. Even fans who purport to like her sometimes reduce her to victimhood and weakness. Perhaps because it's a misconception she clearly holds about herself, and a viewer can be forgiven for not putting together that Vueko might literally be the sage that acts with the most agency. There's so much more I can say that I love about her and her story, especially in the context of the other characters and the way she subtly skews some narrative and trope-related expectations, but I think that's the heart of it -- yes, she was endearing as soon as I met her, but when I saw the subtle yet unmistakeable strength under it all (and parsed that she never saw it herself, I think that little pop of tragedy really makes it hit for me lol), I think that's what made me adore her.

This next little bit might be kind of fucked up but what really makes that strength into something that haunts and compels me is that Vueko has so much determination and strength of character that she will unhesitatingly act to destroy the people she cares about very very much if she has decided at that moment that it is the best thing for them (Irumyuui, Belaf, Irumyuui again.) I can trace the real beginning of my obsession with these characters to when s2e8 aired and this is pretty much why.

So...yeah. Belaf and Vueko! Aaaand there's no way I can write about Waz here without making this post way too fucking long but.

One more shitty self portrait from earlier in the obsession should do it.

Yep!

#made in abyss #Orphan hole tag #i say she 'destroyed' him because 'Perpetuated His Soup Based Mindbreak' would not fit the tone of the post. #at that juncture this was the only way she could save his life. and after all he'd done for her...she would be strong for him now. #no matter how he might beg her not to. : ((( #also obviously i like irumyuui and pakkoyan a lot as well. i think my fanworks make this clear #but i can't deny the sages are the Obsession Provokers #btw i know i refer to the anime a lot in this post but i've read various portions of the manga as well and am 'caught up' #but like. .... ...this is weird but for me it felt like s2/Ganja arc is 'the part i'm in the fandom for/of' #i'm interested in the rest and will enjoy it in the same way as s1 but the part my heart will continue to dwell in is the story of the ganj #and the sage obsession is unlikely to transfer to further characters. this is why i sort of say i'm in 'a fandom in a fandom' sometimes. #anyway thanks again for the ask and sorry the answer is. So. Much.

[lockandkeyhyena]

as someone who was consistently abused as a child (albeit never sexually,) i do think it is deeply important to humanize abusers. i saw someone previously talk about how people will dismiss accusations because someone is "so nice" or whatever, and i dont want to speak over them or anything like that but it got me thinking about it a lot. and my personal take on it is that it happens because abusers are so heavily dehumanized.

when you live with a worldview that all abusers are simply horrible, evil, fully irredeemable and unlikable people, it is extremely difficult to come to terms with the fact someone you know, on a personal and human level, could ever be an abuser. this hurts victims of all types of abuse, and to speak from personal experience for a moment, it especially hurts victims who happen to be children.

and i dont just mean from people doubting their claims, either! it can make it so difficult to realize that someone you care about is abusing you, even if it seems like it should've been obvious in hindsight.

abusers can be nice, even to their victims. sometimes especially to their victims. abusers do have interests and quirks. abusers are human. and if people just talked about that more, people like me would've realized there was a problem long before the point i did.

i understand being uncomfortable with the concept, and theres no shame in needing to distance yourself from it if it's whats best for you. but there very much is and should be a place for a story like this

thank you anon! i think you hit the nail on the head with what i was going for, you put into words my exact thoughts so succinctly!

#yeen rambles #ask #csa ment #abuse ment #alvin's infurno

[teaveetamer]

Not trying to start anything but being prejudice against white people won't actually solve anything.

Having that kind of attitude about it doesn't actually help combat racism. I like reading your blog and all but as a POC it's really jarring, from a personal perspective, when you start saying things and acting as if being prejudice against white people will fix anything. It won't, it just makes identity politics seem like a gotcha game.

I appreciate you caring about the issue but the approach of acting like using someone's status as a cis white guy to discredit them, even if it is the asshole raxy, just comes off as needlessly instigating the issue to be worse.

Sorry if it comes off as concern trolling but it's just incredibly off putting when youre usually so caring and aren't that antagonistic about it and then suddenly you are. Again, sorry if it seems like concern trolling.

I think your perspective, anon, would be very fair IF the message of anything I’ve been trying to say was intended to be “it’s okay to be prejudiced against white people and that'll fix everything” or "cishet white men are evil". That was never the intended message of any of this. There's a cut because this got long.

Here's my main point a little more succinctly: a cishet white man can be an ally, but he can also discard his allyship if it becomes inconvenient for him to be an ally. He may see oppression, he may even understand oppression, but if he doesn't want to deal with the backlash of oppression then he always has the option to walk away. That is a privilege in itself. I don't get the option to walk away from being a woman. I don't get the option to walk away from being queer.

So if you are going to be a cishet white man speaking on issues such as misogyny, racism, queerphobia, etc., then the first thing I'm going to look at is whether or not you are being a good ally to me. Do you understand my struggle? Do you stand by me even if things get hard? Do you respect me even if you don't agree with me?

Specifically with regard to Raxy-poo: I have seen no evidence that he actually cares about these issues beyond what he can use to "win" fandom arguments. He'll use the Supreme Court potentially killing queer rights as a "gotcha" to win a petty fandom argument, but then he'll attack a queer woman for trying to voice being uncomfortable with corporations commodifying her sexuality and he'll say nothing when his buddies are chuckling in "private" about how I'm a fake queer because my favorite character from a video game is male. That is why I keep pointing out his identity. Because he keeps claiming to speak for groups he doesn't belong to and then doesn't respect members of those groups when they disagree with him.

The racism thing I'm going to address further down below the cut because it's way too long to summarize up here.

I'm not interested in prolonging anything. He's the one who continually stalks, harasses, bullies, and berates people who blocked him months ago using these flimsy accusations of sexism, queerphobia, racism, etc. as "proof" that we deserve it. I mean his buds on that server literally accuse us of being Holocaust deniers or of being like Andrew Tate or Tucker Carlson or Alex Jones. Raxy helped instigate such severe harassment that it led to two people leaving the FE community entirely. I have said numerous times that if he would just leave people alone and respect the damn block button then I would never mention him again.

With regard to race, I will repeat: his race would not be an issue IF he had not made it an issue. He has been harassing BWIIDT for over a year now specifically because of her criticisms of a fanfic. He has accused BWIIDT all over the internet of lying about Cap to slander him (particularly with accusations of him being a racist), and he's been spreading her name around to try and bait uninvolved third parties into dogpiling her and shitting on her.

So we have a white man, in defense of another white man, harassing a mixed race woman in part because she feels uncomfortable with the way one of those white men wrote a mixed race character (and she criticized that publicly). I don't think I'm out of line to point out the very uncomfortable implications and power dynamic there. Especially when he's just lying about the things she said. AFAIK she's never specifically called Cap a racist, she's just said that she thinks it was unintentional, but still the way he wrote it is uncomfortable. Which is something she, as a mixed race woman, has every right to feel and point out without getting harassed.

Keep in mind that she has had him blocked for months now. He still stalks her blog with an alt account (he's literally flat out admitted that he has an alt account just so he can keep stalking and harassing the people who blocked him). He only treats you with respect if you already agree with him, and if you don't then he's more than happy to stalk and harass you. It is literally peak performative allyship.

Now on a more general note:

I didn’t take “you’re racist against white people” anon very seriously because, bluntly, “don’t you know the REAL racism is against white people” is an extremely common alt-right straw man/deflection tactic in America. It tries to discredit the concerns about racism by framing any discussion of racism as racism against white people. Essentially, it's a shorthand to try and "both sides are as bad as each other!" racism to distract from the damage that centuries of systemic oppression have caused for modern communities of color. So I'm approaching it from that context.

No, I am not saying that it's okay to be shitty to white people. I'm acknowledging that the power differential between white people and the communities they have historically oppressed makes the effect of bias a fundamentally different experience.

Just as an example of what I'm talking about: if you call a Black person a slur then it's going to invoke that entire history of enslavement, Jim Crow, disenfranchisement, violence, and generational trauma. If you call a white person a word like "cracker", it's going to invoke that entire history of... when white people did a bunch of really horrible things like enslavement, Jim Crow, disenfranchisement, and violence to someone else.

And I'm not discounting how uncomfortable and upsetting that can be for white people to experience, especially if you consider yourself an ally. I mean no good person likes living with the knowledge that they benefit from the dehumanization and subjugation of another group of people. No good person likes knowing that people they're directly descended from are responsible for some really fucked up shit. No good person likes hurting others, even by accident. It sucks to have to acknowledge that you're still benefiting from the horrific sins of your forefathers. It's bullshit that we're still trying to put everything back together because people of the past failed us. It's okay to acknowledge that those things are upsetting, and all of those feelings are valid. You don't have to stop feeling these things just because someone else had it worse.

But it's not the same kind of hurt. It is not equivalent to the racism experienced by people of color. Feeling uncomfortable about racism is not the same as experiencing racism. Someone pointing out that you're benefiting from racism is not the same as experiencing racism. To try and equate them in the way the alt-right does is insulting.

You can see a similar thing happening with TERFs and the word "cis" or "cisgender" or even the term "TERF". And I was going to go on because honestly anon I could write a dissertation on the dynamic here because it's an extremely nuanced and fascinating topic, but I'm trying to keep it brief.

Back on the topic, the "you're racist toward white people!" seemed like an obvious troll ask to try and get under my skin (I usually get a few whenever this bullshit fandom stuff flares up again, like the time I was talking about sexual violence shortly after a different Raxy incident and an anon told me to "get over your victim complex"), mostly because so little of my original postings were actually about race. I focused on queerness and being a woman. Like. Yeah I was a little mean, because I don't view alt-right talking points as worthy of my time or patience. I generally try to approach anyone coming to me with a measure of good faith, but you have to give me something to work with. Just spewing an alt right talking point on anon and then doubling down on it is not going to inspire a lot of confidence in me that you actually want to have a conversation about this incredibly charged topic.

If you're uncomfortable with the "you get one free pass to be racist toward white people" anon - I took that anon as an obvious joke poking fun at the alt-right strawman arguments not, like, a serious endorsement that it's okay to be a dick to all white folk, or that being a dick to white folk will actually solve anything. I can see why that might be unsettling and I hear you, but I have a bit of a dark sense of humor sometimes so it didn't clock my radar as anything that would be taken genuinely.

As I said in my original post, allies have an essential role to play. They can amplify marginalized voices in spaces where we're not respected or welcome, and the ones who do so with care and consideration are welcome in my books. I also have sympathy for the folks who just haven't woken up yet, but maybe aren't actively bigoted, and for the folks actively deconstructing from harmful ideologies who aren't quite there yet.

It's the people who claim to be allies but then treat people like shit who I have the biggest problem with, because they're purporting to represent me and people like me. My cause has no room in it for stalking, harassing, bullying, or speaking over instead of with the people you're claiming to represent.

#cw racism #cw transphobia mention #cw america

[mapsofnonexistentplaces]

hi cubeguy i sent u an anons a while ago that i dont use tumblr but i periodically check ur blog bcus it specifically rocks & im back. i listened to an album u recommended on here but im curtailed by the character lim to give a review so i typed out a real time extremely long reaction to the songs LOL definitely the logical nextstep. its @ pastebin.com/Ejd8E9VX idk if im allowed to link shit on tumblr?? anyway i hope to get around 2 other musiks u like bcus i lovedd this btw its get to heaven that i listened to THANK U 🎀🙇‍♂️💋💗💗💗

HEY YOU HAVE AN AWESOME WAY OF TALKING ABOUT MUSIC. GRINS SO MUCH. i’m glad you enjoyed gth it’s so so special to me genuinely the album of all time …. my favorite songs off it are s/s/w/d the wheel and blast doors Lways a joy to see someone go crazy about them

^ really fond of this descriptor here also i think it succinctly puts a lot of what i love about ee’s songwriting down into words…. the weird entanglement of love and hate and confusion and clarity it’s a very very special moodset

also YEAH the way you described the vocals…. the early everything everything albums play a lot with like. roughness and scratchiness and the kind of ‘animalistic’ register of the human voice. (honestly everything before raw data feel. this is literally because the singer just decided to learn how to sing in high registers without falsetto for the first time which is like cool but also AUGH i miss that old sound

OK SO the thing about this bit

absolutely YES the thing about get to heaven is that it’s literally just like. a complete album of bangers. going down through their other stuff is gonna be a little more rocky, you might enjoy the like once-per-album weird slow ballads you might not, even though i’m lazy about listening to some of their weaker stuff when i do go through the entire albums i still find a lot of quirks in the instrumentation or lyrics that manage to impress me. i’d recommend delving into either man alive or arc next those are basically on par with gth although a bit more weird and morose? if you’re feeling it id then recommend raw data feel which oscillates more around pop/new wave but still has some really interesting musical constructions, gets extremely electronic and synthy…. a fever dream is like a 50/50 split between really long slow songs which are just Fine and really fast heavy bangers. just go listen to notln, can’t do, desire, good shot, run the numbers and ivory tower LOL. uhhhh reanimator is arguably their weakest album probably the most unremarkable but it’s also like my second favorite right after get to heaven. it’s weird and glowy and flimsier than their other tunes. that enchants me i guess…. they’ve also got an upcoming album that once again seems to be more pop oriented, cold reactor is the best of the singles they’ve released for it yet. what else. there’s like a youtube playlist out there of demo/outtakes/non album stuff that you can find real easy, there’s some really good stuff in there. personal favorites are the come alive diana demo, even the dogs and dna dump

ok so the fucking thing about the “lore” of this album. there technically isn’t any and most of ee’s albums are a per-song thing usually revolving around like. modern social commentary. the genius pages for most of their songs have like. direct songwriting annotations by the band and explain the thought process behind them. however for gth there’s also like a small layer of overarching lore about this one guy called thomas silhouette as a character. he’s not so much the crux of any narrative or presence as much as he’s just like. funny anagram arising from a lyric in fortune 500 that gets alluded to in later albums because he’s loosely representative of a lot of themes that get tackled in ee songs like capitalism and dread and shit like that

#ask #ee #<- can go in there !

[itsclydebitches]

I fear Ted might go back to Kansa because of Henry and because Dorothy leaves Oz and Mary Poppins goes back to wherever she came from, so if the series does that, I couldn't really say it came out of nowhere, but I'm also really hoping as hard as I can that it isn't the case, because Ted needs his found family and friends, and thinking about him alone in Kansas (even with Henry and Beard) just breaks my heart, so I wanted to say I really loved reading your meta about it!!!

I'm so glad you liked it, anon! Honestly, it's nice to hear that I'm not alone in thinking this. There's been so much meta lately arguing that Ted will go back to Kansas - which, as you say, I think is both likely and something the story has set up long term - but it doesn't feel like many fans are talking about whether he should. Given how focused the show is on these bonds and the growth everyone undergoes... damn, it would feel really bleak to me if Ted were to simultaneously leave the community and effectively go back to where he started: Kansas, (American) football, a rocky relationship with Michelle, Henry. I'm just imagining a finale that carts Ted off to where he's not only got to deal with everything he's still got going on (anxiety), but also is smack-dab in the middle of new struggles (many more "Who's playing dad and giving Henry money?" interactions + "Oh yeah, I'm perpetually reminded that my former therapist broke his professional oath and is dating my ex 🙃"), all without the support system he's built. Maybe he'll have Beard with him but god, that's so depressing to me!! I'm praying the writers have picked up on all the negative implications here and the return setup is just a red herring... but I'm preparing myself for that disappointment. Unfortunately, Ted Lasso would not be the first show that got caught up in the idea of a circular ending, not realizing how much that undermines the core messages at play...

Also, I just want to highlight some of @queen-mabs-revenge tags on the post. I didn't have the energy earlier to delve into the intricacies of why the Mary Poppins parallel doesn't work for me, but this lays it out succinctly:

#fr the mary poppins point like the metas are great but it's the idea of it that just deeply depresses me#bc honestly in mary poppins — it's not about mary poppins when it comes down to it#you don't really learn anything about her life because it's not about her it's about the family she leaves behind#like it kind of would feel like a slap to be brought so deeply into ted's inner life and journey for them to pull a mary poppins#like part of the reason why it's ok when mp leaves is bc she's already practically perfect in every way#she doesn't need the family so it's ok for her to leave#you're not invested in her character growth bc she doesn't really have any#that very much doesn't translate over to ted's story!#he needs the richmond fam as much as they need him#it's qualitatively different!

Bolded for emphasis because YEAH. THAT. Mary Poppins is almost more of a narrative device than she is a character. Which isn't to say she doesn't have personality, but that she exists to forward the growth of the family she visits, not develop herself. That is explicitly NOT who Ted is. In fact, the show has gone out of its way to say that Ted's tendency to put everyone else before himself and power through life with an endlessly positive, one might say "perfectly perfect" way is deeply unhealthy. He's had a whole arc about unlearning that! So to have him just leave like Mary Poppins does... oof. As for the Dorothy parallel, that just feeds into what I was arguing in the original post: Ted no longer thinks that there's "no place like home." You can love and miss a place deeply while recognizing that it's no longer where you need to be and I very much think Ted has hit that point in Season 3.

Plus, uh... there's the fact that Dorothy's journey is all a dream and she/the audience realizes that every loved one she "left behind" was really just a fantasy version of the family she already had. Dorothy was only and always going home to her family, not leaving a new family because they're one-in-the-same. Ted would just be leaving, period. There's no real - and therefore superior - version of Rebecca, Roy, Trent, Higgins, Keeley, Nate, Mae, and all the boys waiting for him in Kansas.

#Ted Lasso #mymetas

[ofwraithsandwords]

This is somewhat weird question, do you consider "default" alucard and vladcard to act differently? I know the latter form is only on screen for like 2 minutes. I sometimes see them being portrayed as behaving differently by fanbase. His other forms act no different so I always found it a touch odd. I know this might devolve into Fanon due how little the form actually shows up, so I was curious about your thoughts on it.

THIS IS NOT A WEIRD QUESTION, ANON. Like you said, many people in the fandom believe that Alucard and Vladcard act differently. When we see Alucard take on the form of his "predecessor", Vlad Drăculea, it is apparent that that this version of the Vampire King acts quite differently from Alucard despite only seeing him for a short time.

Vlad spent much of his time appearing rather somber (save for his interactions with Integra, Seras, and Anderson), providing us with the notion that he's taking all of this very seriously. He is poised and dignified, a reflection of his past as a chivalric member of the Order of the Dragon. Meanwhile, Alucard does not stray from putting on theatrics, toying with his enemies and waiting for the fatal final act as if he were in a Shakespearean tragedy. It's as the saying goes: "All the world's a stage, / And all the men and women merely Players..."

As for his other forms, which I assume you are mostly referring to "Girlycard", I know that Alucard took on the form in order to tease Walter when he was a boy during their missions during WWII. From what little I've seen of The Dawn (since I'm sure Hirano will never finish it), Girlycard seems to be even more of a trickster than Alucard is. It could be that he decided to act more childish while in a young girl's form just for shits and giggles—I honestly wouldn't put it past him.

But to answer your question more succinctly: yes, I do think Alucard and Vladcard act differently. Whether it's because Vlad is a persona within Alucard that he compartmentalized, a separate entity all on his own, or just Alucard playing another role is totally up for debate.

Personally, I think that it could be a bit of all three.

#hellsing #alucard #vladcard #girlycard #alucard hcs #ask #anon #hellsing headcanons #alucard & vladcard

[thesherrinfordfacility]

https://thesherrinfordfacility.tumblr.com/post/727753998120140800

I was generally asking/ranting. Your ramble made perfect sense and I do agree with pretty much all of it. I have more I must rant about though and I hope you don't mind me throwing this all in your inbox. It's not aimed at you specifically, don't worry.

Why did this fandom decide Neil suddenly thinks Aziraphale and Crowley are not in love just because he said two scenes were not sexual? The oxribs could be taken that way if you want, but it wasn't written to be. The kiss had nothing at all to do with sex and everything to do with a desperate being trying to make the person he loves understand. Neil saying neither of those situations were sexual does not mean Crowley and Aziraphale are not in love. He's said the opposite, along with both Michael and David, far too many times for years now for anyone to believe that. And yet here we are.

Just a few weeks ago we were praising the kiss as smashing the queerbaiting allegations and now half the fandom is right back to saying he's never really thought they were a romance. Insisting that because he thought the idea was odd several years ago it must mean he's lying about it now. That he and Terry didn't plan it this way since at least 2006. Or, even worse, that he thinks gay sex is gross and would never put anything like that in without being manipulated into it.

Because he said sometimes an oxrib is just an oxrib and a desperate attempt at communication wasn't at all sexual.

It's been giving off very strong feelings of "this queer romance doesn't count unless they have sex" goalpost shifting. We've already had more than enough proof that Aziracrow are completely in love, but unless they have sex then Neil's just a queerbaiting liar? Do people not realize how alienating that is to read as an ace fan, even one who wouldn't mind a fun sex scene?

It's also spitting in the face of a man who's been an ardent ally for longer than most of this fandom's been alive.

This rant is about people telling me I'm wrong for supporting this beautiful queer love story because two male-presenting characters aren't having sex and so it doesn't actually count as a queer romance. This is about people telling me I'm wrong for supporting the man who gave us this incredible story because he said two scenes aren't sexual in nature and so he is nothing but a manipulative liar. This rant isn't about defending Neil. He doesn't need me or anyone else to do that.

(for anyone that wants it, a direct link to the previous ask anon has copied above)

hi again anon!!!✨ personal thanks from me - im always humbled (and never have any objection to) when someone feels they can come to my askbox with these kind of commentaries, it really does make me so happy that they feel they can!

i just do occasionally worry if sometimes what im reading as an upset/angry tone (not saying yours was, it was just how i read it!) is a direct result of something ive said/done. so again, thanks for calming my anxiety surrounding that, and popping back to clarify!!!

now idk, by nature of this being a rant, if you wanted to get any answers from me or my opinion, but you're on my boat and im the captain, so it's a bit tough-titties im afraid💕 and once again, will probably repeat a few things you've put more succinctly than i have, but fuck it.

honestly? i cant even begin to give you a basic answer, anon, because i just... don't get it. i think from the tweet exchange that (kinda?) blew up, people took neil saying, "Why did you see it as sexual?" a little bit out of context. to my mind, the op of that tweet literally referenced "The very end of season 2", and that's what neil was responding to (and later confirmed in an ask); the kiss was never intended as sexual, exactly as you've said.

i think possibly some have read it as him being shitty about the concept of sex and specifically in reference to aziraphale and crowley, cross-referenced this with other things he has said (again, more than likely never meant in the context they're being interpreted), and arrived at the above conclusion. it's strange to me, because he has categorically stated that their relationship is intended by him as the co-author as a romantic one. at the very least.

now, he (and sir terry) may not have personally intended them to be romantic at the beginning. but a) neil has been very representative of queer culture and identifications in his other work; the queer element in GO is not exactly strange to be coming from him (ie it's not a bolt out of the blue, and therefore would be potentially performative or queerbaity). and b) as i said in the previous ask, there is a lot of queer representation in GO, of all different types, including gay/lesbian rep. it's not just aziraphale and crowley that are queer in the story, and therefore easily deniable - that's literally not the case. so i do not understand, on this basis, where people can draw the inference that he is homophobic. i just can't - that's a pretty hefty con to have played for so long and so diligently.

i think, from what ive seen, that one of the things that people take issue with is neil's assertion that as supernatural beings, any label as to their sexuality or gender (and how one informs the other) is not applicable to them. i think this has been seen as dismissive of aziraphale and crowley being gay and/or potentially having a sexual relationship. in my opinion, this assertion is narratively clever. first of all - no, they are not human, so on a very base level, sexuality and gender as constructs do not apply to them. they are originally gender/sexless. but this i think only serves to show that aziraphale and crowley are multiple things, and none of those things, all at once. they can be anything you want or interpret them to be, until expressly told otherwise in canon.

on screen, their faces and physiques and chosen presentation however, to my mind, present as human males. but, being crass, we do not know what genitalia or body parts they may or may not have at any given time. they have never described their sexualities (although, in aziraphale's case, assumptions have been made by others). so if you want to interpret them as cis, or intersex, or trans, or non-binary (including non-binary, genderfluid, agender, or bigender), arguably all of those are correct! the only confirmations we have had, iirc, are that, between them, they have used "he/him" pronouns, used the title "Mr", crowley has confirmed he is not a 'lad', and he has previously presented as female. no, human constructs do not technically apply to them, but that leaves their gender and sexuality open to interpretation. i personally hc aziraphale as a cisgender, gay male, and crowley as a non-binary, but usually male-presenting, bisexual person. others may agree, others may not. that the beauty of it!

narratively, these are two supernatural creatures that are, however, going more and more native - they have assimilated to and absorbed a lot of how humans present themselves and interact with each other, on multiple levels. as supernatural beings, they are practically alpha centauri itself (genderless, non-human things that are in a constant orbit and relationship with each other - and then throw in the fact that they love each other deeply). as supernatural-beings-that-have-been-on-earth-for-millennia, however, they are arguably becoming more like what i mentioned above - human. this to me, personally, means that they may identify as male and nb respectively, and may identify as gay and bisexual respectively, and (again, imo) i think would - at this stage - be open-minded to the act of sex. but as i said, once again, in my previous ask - it's perfectly valid if others do not interpret their journey this way.

This rant is about people telling me I'm wrong for supporting this beautiful queer love story because two male-presenting characters aren't having sex and so it doesn't actually count as a queer romance. This is about people telling me I'm wrong for supporting the man who gave us this incredible story because he said two scenes aren't sexual in nature and so he is nothing but a manipulative liar. This rant isn't about defending Neil. He doesn't need me or anyone else to do that.

about the above specifically? im really sorry that you're being faced with this, anon. that is grossly and completely unfair. i don't think you necessarily need me to tell you this, but in case you do - imo, you are completely reasonable and justified for reading them as a queer romantic couple that, canonically, have not had sex (and that this has no bearing on their love story). romance and sex are not the same thing, one can and does exist without the other, and the concept of that separation is not deserving of being pathologised. whilst neil certainly doesn't need anyone to defend him, i think it is always still nice to support the author that has written a story this beautiful, symbolic, and illustrative - and imo, not deliberately misunderstand what he has or hasn't said✨

#good omens #ask #big virtual hugs or otherwise reassuring gestures to you anon 💕✨

[pure-jeff-ward]

Frankly, I haven’t paid much attention to Billie lol she seems nice though

Going by the other anon’s ask, it does sound like a very typical pandemic relationship wherein both parties can’t figure their shit out after all the global chaos settled down (I should know lol).

I just wish Jeff all the happiness in the world, no matter who he ends up dating/settling. And I’m rooting so hard for him. He’s been hustling and trying to make it in the industry for more than decade now. It’s good to finally see him achieve some meaningful recognition. I hope it only continues to go forward from there!

Sorry I’m rambling now. I know this is about Billie and Jeff. It’s fun speculating and it’s easy to get sidetracked. But I think we can all agree we were first drawn to Jeff cos of his talent and charisma rather than his personal choices and dating life!

I think you've put it very succinctly - it's just one of those things where it's like you said, we're all rooting for him to find happiness whenever it comes his way, with whomever he meets - but yes, we should also remember that he's doing some wonderful work in his professional life and making strides in the industry and leaving an impression on everyone!!! and we are all proud of Jeff and wish nothing but success and happiness for him!!! <3

#buggysamawaifu #replies #jeff ward #billie jd porter

[imagineitdearies]

Hey! I really admire your writing and seeing your answers to other anons you seem pretty approachable so I wondered if you could give me your view on an issue I got about making content.

I really want to start doing content for the bg3 fandom, I have been in fandoms befor but always just watching/reading but with bg3 I really feel like it would be cool to actually write something or post things about my tav but when I start I often feel like "Is this really worth posting? Maybe I should just not bother." I was wondering if you ever had a problem like that?

And maybe if you got any tips on actually keeping up with pushing yourself to bring all the things in your head to paper. I sometimes feel like I almost get lost in how scenes are in my head, so when I start to write I feel like I can't do it justice. Do you ever hit a roadblock like that?

Thanks in advance! Looking forward to reading more of perfect slaughter!

Hi anon! I'm glad I seem friendly, I try to be 😂

I was also super nervous about writing for the bg3 fandom at first, because I'm used to writing for an established ship with two characters that anyone clicking on the tag are guaranteed to want to see together! But even if you're writing for the most popular Tav pairing (Astarion/fem!OC), it doesn't mean people care about your Tav. Really, Astarion is the only tie that binds at the start, not the other side of the ship. And that can make it super nerve-wracking and harder for people to be interested--which might be why there's a high prevalence for Y/N or reader insert pairings.

I knew readers would need to like my Tav fairly quickly or they'd click out of the fic (and I'm sure many have). With that plus the fact my story content was really dark....I wasn't surprised when I saw little interest until chapter 4, but I was definitely asking the same questions as you. Luckily the right kinds of people started to find the fic around then, however, so I felt motivated to keep sharing!

But as far as motivation to write in general, I think all great fanfics have one thing in common--they're as self-indulgent as possible. You're not getting paid for this, after all!! If you as the author aren't having the time of your life writing, worried about what other people might like, you won't have fun and you'll likely end up abandoning the story (speaking from past experience). For Perfect Slaughter, I had already written chapter 12 by the time I posted chapter 1, because it was first and foremost for me and posting it to share with others who might like it was very secondary, almost an afterthought. I wrote simply because the idea burned like a Cazador compulsion in my head, like a tadpole in my brain!!

So, to put it more succinctly, I'd recommend you find a story/premise you're passionate enough about that you want to write it whether you think someone else will end up reading it or not. That way, you're having a great time, and your story is more likely to be unique and interesting to others!

#ask me anything #writing advice #hopefully this makes sense #i think ive come to a personal conclusion that writing for anyone else but me is something i need to be paid for lolol #which has allowed me to really be self-indulgent in my fanfic writing of late #and ive honestly never been more inspired to write #like literally every day!

[dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram]

So people who don't want to eat the fatty skin of the chicken or cakes are 'disordered' and there should be grave concern about them, but chainsmoking and drinking vodka every day is fine and should never be commented on? I don't understand this blog.

Anon 2: What makes me so angry about this formulation in this case - is how transparent the moralism and selectivity . It's only ever 'I want someone to live so they shouldn't do this thing that I've decided with bad'. ///

But today you're very upset by Harry's choices of food, which you've decided are bad and evidence of an eating disorder?

Anon 3: So it's okay to worry that Harry might have an eating disorder because Niall said he didn't eat chicken skin or cakes in 1d, but not okay to worry about Louis' heavy smoking because we shouldn't be policing an individual's choices? I'm lost.

********

Oh anons. You're wrong about what I've said about eating disorders and you're wrong about what I've said about drugs and alcohol.

I haven't made any comment today about the likelihood of Harry having an eating disorder (yet - I'm about to in a few paragraphs). I certainly haven't described anything that Harry's doing as bad or expressed grave concern. I'm really fucking careful about how I talk about eating disorders on here.

You're also at the wrong blog if you think I don't want vodka and other substance use commented on. I talk about drugs and alcohol within 1D quite a lot - and always have. I'm quite committed to breaking the shame and silence that has been quite common. What I object to is treating use of substances as evidence of addiction.

The irony is that my thoughts about boyband members and eating disorders are the same as my thoughts about boyband members and addiciton. We know that boyband members are at high risk for eating disorders and addiction, so I think it's important to hold those possibilities in our minds

Or to put it more succinctly - I do think both Harry and Louis might be dealing with eating disorders and addiction but that's because they're in a boyband and both are really common among boyband members. Not because of anything Niall said or anything that's happened on stage. With both addiction and eating disorders I'm also going to be very careful about how I talk about them.

There's nothing wrong with worrying about them, because of the risks they face with their lives. There is a problem with expressing that worry with false certainty and judgement, or acting as if the fact that you're worried should matter to them, or to anyone else.

#oh anons #obviously I wasn't upset at Harry's choices of food #but I was sad to hear that he was smelling cakes rather than eating them #when he was a teenager #huge love to all of them #it's a tough life

[pinkbowsandprettyprose]

Chain respond to your replies from the anon who made the questions. 1. Seeing as your new one is more challenging to write out I'm certain it will be worth the wait, as you will be putting so much thought to it. You've been getting quite some compliments too,so it only shows how good you're at it. keep it up though! 2. I didn't exactly had a theme or trope on mind for this one. but thinking of it, I'd say "enemies to friends to lovers"? if that is a theme at all 3. You put so much passion in your characters in the story, I bet anyone would love to see you post art of those OCs

1. Thank you so much! ❤️

2. Sure, I can recommend a few! Some of these leapfrog over the “friend” stage faster than others, and these all start Quiche and Ichigo on more friendly terms since they’re all post-series.

Obviously, there’s Curiosity Killed The Cat by the incredibly talented @apricotti that explores something similar to my Fickle series re: aliens returning and working at the café — outside the Re-turn canon. An older fic with slightly more amateurish writing but an interesting premise I’ve recommended before is I Belong To You by Sukistrawberry2468 on FFnet — again, it’s postseries, and this one introduces interesting OCs with a fantastic backstory payoff at the end. Another older oneshot I’ve recommended before that kind of does a speed run of this trope is Petite Fours Part 4: Apocalypse by Cooking Spray on FFnet. It very succinctly explores a post-apocalyptic setting where Ichigo and Quiche have to work together to survive. And finally, it’s not complete and hasn’t been updated in a hot second, but I really enjoyed Of Happiness (And Other Pesky Side Effects of Impulsive Altruism) by Advocaat for the chapters that were written for it — it’s a true “failed to be just friends” setting that feels very sweet (dare I say wholesome), but again, it’s incomplete.

3. Aww, thank you :) Maybe I should get my iPad fixed soon so I can share some more art here.

#asks #long post #fanfic #thank you for the ask !!