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caffernnn · 3 years

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Final stroke spoilers: ⚠️‼️

I just saw a post on Twitter about the Haru and Rin scene and how they didn’t feel that it was that ooc of Haru. I thought I was the only one who felt that it was kind of justified on Haru’s end. Because both Rin and Ikuya put Haru and their friends through so much when they were lost and wanted to swim with Haru again. And I get that professional swimming is entirely different than what they’re used to, but it really sucks that as soon as the competition got a little hard they decided to just drop free and only swim their preferred styles. That’s got to be a slap in the face to Haru, because what was all of that other stuff about? Like Rin wanted for YEARS for Haru to swim on the world stage and after the first race is like “you’re on your own.” He honestly deserves it to be honest even if Haru would’ve never said anything to protect their friendship he was clearly thinking or thought these thoughts. For a show where Haru is the mc we rarely get to see how he feels about things. I wish we can see the movie soon, cause I really wanna see how that whole sequence takes place.

⚠️ Talking about Free! Final Stroke spoilers below the cut ⚠️

It’s wild to me (it probably shouldn’t be surprising; idk) how even going off of just spoilers, there is a clear divide in the reactions people are having to Haru’s actions in the movie, especially in reference to the sudden shift leading up to the fight with Rin. I can see why people are surprised by it on a base level because so much of his successes in DttF, paired with the camaraderie everyone seems to have for a majority of the movie, leads you to believe Haru has emotionally matured and stabilized since high school, which is true! He’s more open to change and examining his emotions, especially as he starts to grapple with a high-stakes long-term goal for what feels like the first time. With that said, all of this can be true at the same time Haru is going through a steady breakdown that can/will likely lead to burnout. So many people who’ve been put through rigorous academic programs or career training or anything else equally as intensive can attest to the frustration of feeling like every few steps forward (gaining experiential knowledge, making connections, learning more about your identity in reference to x goal, etc) are followed by a step back (exhaustion, plateaus, expectations you can’t meet, mistakes spilling out when you can’t keep repressing the negatives in the name of “productivity”). Haru was able to make it this far because he has grown and started to heal some of the cracks in his support group, but the sheer amount of pressure makes it easier for him to break, and old wounds that never fully healed have time to fester.

I probably sound like a broken record in these movie-related posts when talking about Haru getting obsessed with becoming stronger and not knowing what to do with that fairly new and overwhelming drive. I can’t be mad at Haru completely for his choices here (can’t wait to be called a Haru apologist when the movie comes out in more places jfjdjd) because he partially fell victim to circumstance. This is one of the first times Haru takes the expectations of him being a “hero” or “prodigy” into consideration, and now he’s trying to navigate the expectations of success that come with those titles while not being sure 1) what exactly they are beyond winning, and 2) not being sure if they’re actually attainable for him. Along with that, he’s putting faith in Ryuuji’s instruction and guidance because he needs someone with any sort of credibility or experience with the pro circuit to show him how to get to the top. Even though from an outside standpoint it’s easier to discredit and reject Ryuuji’s assertion that everyone at the top has to give something up to get there, there are a number of reasons Haru reconsiders the notion with everything he’s seeing. He’s seeing his newest rivals reach crazy success and strength through isolation, and Ryuuji is dangling a golden opportunity in front of his face by going to Haru in the moments where he’s most vulnerable and saying “yes, that strength you crave is possible for you, but only if you pay this specific price for it.” Nobody should bear the weight of “saving” Haru from his circumstances (especially not his friends on their own journeys… Ryuuji and other mentors watching this trainwreck can eat my shorts tho), but dealing with this ultimatum while his core support group is pushing forward through their own challenges and/or busy in another country, I can’t be too surprised when he starts to overextend himself and burst at the seams.

As far as the blow-up with Rin, I won’t say it’s fully justified, but it’s understandable. The way Haru has had to make peace with his hardships with Ikuya and Rin has largely been by atoning for his own involvement in those rifts and trying to turn over a new leaf without expecting much in return. He took the opportunities of swimming with both of them again to replace any apologies on their parts and largely made peace with it. As much as it’s going to hurt to watch, I’m interested to see this fight play out because it sounds like it addresses a problem we bring up a lot in meta analyses posts: there needs to be more explicit conversations and apologies between characters, or the closure feels flimsy and temporary at best. This fight isn’t about closure (it’s about a lot of things both involving and excluding Rin, but I ranted about that in the other spoiler post) but it’s acknowledgement after all of this time that there’s still a need for it. Having Rin back in his life as a rival and friend has held the caveat in the back of his mind that Rin will leave his side again if Haru’s friendship/rivalry stops serving all of his interests. Haru’s ultimate fear of being abandoned by people, of people using him without understanding him and then throwing him aside for someone/something else, is drastically coming back to the surface in all of his stress. Rin and Ikuya choosing to continue their pro careers with strokes that better suit their strengths isn’t abandonment, just like Makoto choosing a university in Tokyo wasn’t, but Haru is so lost in his own stress and despair that he can’t see these choices as anything but personal attacks in the moment. These choices don’t have to do with Haru and we’re never meant to hurt him (which he comes to realize by the end of each fight), but the unresolved issues mixed with his fears make him explode.

It’s not a black and white situation where only one side is in the right, and I hope whatever resolution comes in the second movie acknowledges that. Rin didn’t deserve Haru’s taunting and wrath in that moment, but I do want him to reflect on the whole mess and recognize that Haru’s in a desperate place not unlike the one he was in when he first went to Australia and seemingly cut everyone off. I want them both to consider that avoiding airing out those insecurities because it’d be uncomfortable or embarrassing ultimately led them back here, unsure how to talk about changes and concerns without first having one of them explode or hit rock bottom. They can be friends outside of swimming, I’d want them to be friends outside of swimming, but I think Haru isn’t blind to how much of their connection is reliant on intrigue in the water, and a part of him is scared that Rin won’t have a reason to stick around if they aren’t rivaling each other in the same stroke anymore.

All of this can make for a great chance of resolution in the second movie, if done well. There’s opportunity for Haru to realize that the trajectory of dreams can change, and just like Rin changing his stroke or Makoto changing his training emphasis, you can honor the parts of the dream that first inspired you while finding a path that honors the person you’ve become. There’s opportunity for Haru to break from the dangerous echo chamber he’s currently in telling him he has to do this all alone in a few ways. Maybe he’ll have a moment where he’s like “I gave up everything and still couldn’t get stronger, so now I need to get back to finding what gives me strength personally.” Maybe he’ll have a moment where he’s like “if my only option is a path paved in loneliness, I need to find a new dream.” There are so many directions the story can go in at this point, and I’m excited to see what happens next (and maybe write about the paths they don’t choose lol).

#spoilers #final stroke spoilers #once again turning crumbs into a feast #I’ll get back to non-spoiler convos soon dw #the Haru brainrot is real though #thanks for sending!#anonymous

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dourpeep · 3 years

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Seeing people complaining about the lack of anniversary rewards is getting so tiring. The game's ratings dropped to like 2 on Google play, all comment sections of official accounts are full of complaints. I know and understand that people are upset but it's just so so tiring to the point where I unfollowed most accounts that aren't related to fanart or fanfiction because of all that negativity

I personally spent (a little) money on the game so I get where p2w players come from but idk. I saw that we didn't get anything and moved on pretty quickly. Maybe that's just me, idk

Maybe you have a different view on this and if so, I'd like to hear it

Sorry for ranting in your inbox

hehe no need to apologize because I have quite a bit to say myself nodnod

Read if you like, don't if you don't--this is just my opinions and stuff based off my experience knowing Eastern gatcha games as well as talking about using a 5* vs 4* of the same build + slot

This got kinda long ehe-

Like really long.

Anyway

My turn for a Hot Take (tm)

Yeah I understand this--I've been feeling so drained and my enjoyment of the game and writing has diminished immensely because all I see everywhere is just that.

I understand that the event rewards suck but at the same time? I realize how gacha aren't really popular here in the West--and I have seen a lot of comparison between Genshin and Cookie Run but they're also two entirely different genres despite both being gacha. Not to mention that Cookie Run is fast at first until you get to around uhh Kingdom lvl 37~~ and you're stuck and can't go forward because things cost too many materials or your cookies aren't strong enough even though you have several stars on your team consisting of epics built as optimally as possible-

So the maintenance rewards for Cookie Run have been the only significant amount of gems I've been getting for a few weeks now compared to when I first started and could do 10 roll after 10 roll.

Also also, Cookie Run is PvP (arena, guilds, etc). Being able to get more rolls is absolutely a gamechanger. If you can't get a good defense cookie or healer cookie, you're fucked.

So!! That's why Cookie Run is more generous with rolls. You're not going to want to keep fighting other people in the Arena or doing Guild stuff if they don't add in those generous rewards.

On the other hand, Genshin Impact is an open world rpg w/ co-op (note, co-op doesn't count as pvp because you're collaborating) where you can build pretty much any of the characters to be viable (dps/vampire Barbara is one major example, Noelle is a guarantee roll character for that beginner's banner and she can easily be built to be a tank/healer/dps to fill whatever slot you desire)

So they're not going to be incredibly generous w/ rewards because the characters you have--meta or not--don't really effect your ability to play the game (unless we're talking spiral abyss which really is considered endgame anyway) when you're able to get at least one character of each element for free I mean, you start out with traveler who can be anemo, geo, or electro once you get to the respective places, Amber, Kaeya, Lisa, Barbara (iirc, you need to get to rank 20?), Xiangling (complete spiral abyss floor 3), and Noelle (reduced cost 10roll w/ guaranteed Noelle).

Which would be one of each element and a variety of one of the 5 weapon types nodnod.

Time to talk about builds and why it's not necessary to have a 5* unlike in other gatcha games like Cookie Run (again, a kingdoms builder) before going back to the anniversary stuff

But continuing, like Eula is considered a fantastic 5* character who features a kit that is based around her being a physical damage character. My sibling, C, has her built and she does some insane damage.

On the other hand, I have Xinyan built as a physical dps and if you were to compare their damage?

With crit, C's Eula deals 9k to 14k with Skyward Pride (5* claymore w/ energy recharge substat). With crit, my Xinyan deals 8k to 13k with Song of Broken Pines (5* claymore w/ phys substat) OR 7k to 10k with Prototype Archaic (4* craftable claymore w/ attack substat).

Both C and I agree that they're pretty evenly-matched in the sense of damage output.

We have similar builds focusing on physical damage, however, C's Eula uses 4pc Pale Flame and my Xinyan uses 2pc Bloodstained, 2pc Pale Flame (both have the 25% phys damage bonus for the 2pc). It's also good to note that both their Eula and my Xinyan have a physical dmg % cup.

So just by stacking up more phys on Xinyan, you get a physical dps (with some elemental support capabilities due to her E and Q) you can easily make her deal consistent, reliable damage that is comparable to a fully built Eula. Ofc, I'm sacrificing Xinyan's shield, but since she's built to be a physical dps, it doesn't matter anyway.

Another thing is Zhongli is an incredible shield support. His shield?? Absolutely insane because it's based off his hps. Guess who else has a hp-based shield and heals??? Diona. Another incredibly good support 4* with a shield and healing would be Noelle!

But with Diona, specifically since I did kinda cover over Noelle already, she can easily be built along with her shield having over 100% uptime (like how Zhongli has over 100% uptime). The fact that Diona is also a healer definitely is a perk too.

Ofc the difference with this is that Zhongli can be built as a burst support/dps while Diona is not. But the point isn't that--the point is that you don't need a 5* shield support to have a good, reliable shield support.

But regardless of 4* or 5*, to get a viable character, you need to build them well. So if your character isn't doing satisfactory damage, you just have to take a quick peek at what artifacts they're running and fix as needed!

Another thing--

Talking about the rewards and stuff for the anniversary-

Generally, gatcha games aren't really that generous with rewards and instead usually have some sort of event. In this case, I'm pretty sure that Moonchase is considered a part of the anniversary which is why it's giving so many rewards- just the primos from the first day alone with the chests and quest was enough for two rolls (40 chests * 5 primos each + 60 from the quest and a few that I forgot where they come from but are from the event) as well as the 4* Luxurious Sea Lord claymore.

Before you say that it's shitty for them to make a festival into the anniversary event, I'm certain that people would complain if the anniversary rewards were just a little more than the 10x fates and stuff and that's it because it'd feel like they're skipping over the anniversary entirely. (keep in mind, festivals don't normally give this much stuff in terms of primogems from what we've experienced so far--they're mainly focused on the free event weapon you can get and build like with Festering Desire, Windborne Ode, Dodoco Tales)

Also companies love taking advantage of festivals to make an event bigger + more fleshed out. It'd be otherwise kinda boring to have to just log in every day for a week (not to mention, not everyone does that) and encourages players to play to get rewards.

yeah, that's supposed to work in their favor because they want to keep interest.

So the fact that there's a lot of backlash on everything going on is tiring and also?? I want to make the point that they'll only listen to so much. Getting heard is important, but there will be a point where Mihoyo will just stop listening to the players entirely because all they're getting is a constant barrage of "this event is the worst" "no one likes that character" "(insert character) when???" "okay but where's (blank) rerun?" pasted over the forums, discord, twitter, facebook, instagram--

You can't keep demanding more while also talking shit constantly about the new stuff added because then they'll just not add those new stuff because we (general) seem to never be satisfied.

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if they end up just cutting Genshin Impact as a loss entirely if this continues as it has and gets even worse.

But I digress.

Anyway, I agree that it sucks that the daily login rewards for the anniversary are just cut and pasted from the Lantern Rite, but as someone who's played a lot of gatcha games, it's pretty much the standard.

Have a daily sign in for rewards and a big event featuring a ton of stuff you can get instead of having an 'official' anniversary event.

I'm sure there's a lot I'm missing because it's not coming to mind, but yeah. These are my general thoughts on what's happening with the discourse.

#anon asks #discourse #anyway that being said--make sure to get some rest anon #stuff like this is incredibly draining so take care of yourself nodnod #I'm not sorry for this being so long I got carried away but at the same time this is something I'm pretty passionate about #And I'm not at all excusing the stuff going on but at the same time us (general as players) are also not really being the best

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annakie · 3 years

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Are we out of the woods yet?

Hey all, haven't been on tumblr in a few days!

I have been living through what so many other Texans have been living through, so I thought I’d write a bunch of words about it, for posterity. My story isn’t nearly as bad as so many others, but hey, it was still a fairly major historical event so... writing it for my own memories. :)

Post title because that particular Taylor Swift song was stuck in my head for most of the last few days, for obvious reasons.

So the last week has been an adventure! Last Friday I got my first Moderna Vaccine, and I posted about it a few times, but by Monday was feeling pretty good. Of course, it snowed overnight. I'd been so out of it all weekend I didn't realize quite how bad it was going to be, but when a friend who lives nearby told me his power was out I kinda went "uh oh", baked myself a box mix of orange cranberry bread, fortified some windows with blankets, and crossed my fingers. Also starting that morning I'd reduced the temperature in the house, and shut off and unplugged everything non-essential.

I was feeling pretty happy when the power stayed on all day. My friend's power came back that evening so I thought I was out of the woods.

And then at 10pm... plunged into darkness.

I threw some more blankets into areas where the cats hang out and my bed, let some friends know, and tried to go to bed, hoping for the best in the morning. Couldn't fall asleep for hours, worrying, as the temperature was plunging to the negatives for the first time in living memory in Texas. Finally fell into a restless sleep, and woke up a few hours later, no power.

The worst thing about no power is like, all the things you can't do. My phone started at 100% charge and I'd charged all my devices including my backup battery, but still tried to conserve power. The scary thing was hearing that this could last for days. And boy the news that day was bleak about the possibility of having power again anytime soon. The house, however, stayed at about 51 degrees the entire day. So, it was cold, but very bearable with a few layers and blankets. Whichever cats I was near were very cuddly though.

I was really glad to have the cranberry orange bread because it was tasty and easy to eat. Also had a sizeable amount of beef jerkey, and chips, and I'd bought about 48 bottles of water at the start of the pandemic that I never drank, so I had no worries about what to eat for the time, luckily. I figured, worst case, I'd figure out a way to do soup over a candle to have a hot meal eventually.

I’d been dripping the bathtub and checking the other faucets regularly. I’ve never had a burst pipe in the normal cold we have, and was hoping for the best this time as well. All seemed well the entire day.

I slept a lot when I wasn't scrolling twitter and nextdoor for information. And early afternoon there was a knock on the door. My mom literally called the cops to do a wellness check on me because I hadn't answered texts in a few hours, lol. I thanked him, and called my mom. Internet had been spotty and her calls weren't going through, nor notifications when I got texts. So that was... notable.

I tried doing some reading, and playing on my Switch but to be honest, I was so anxious about everything that I couldn’t relax and keep my mind on anything but the lack of power and when it’d come back. I did take about four naps though. Considered bringing some of the cats into the car with me to warm up but realized I’d have to lift the garage door manually to run the car without, you know, dying, and instead just turned it on for less than a minute twice that day to keep the battery fresh...er... without carbon monoxide poisoning. (My garage door is solid wood. Even with good springs... it’s heavy.)

By the time it started to get dark, I started to worry about how much longer this would go on. I have a friend who has a 4-wheel drive... idk a land rover or something. He lives about 30 minutes away normally. It'd probably take well over an hour for him to get there now, especially since there was another storm coming that night. Since learning my power was out, he'd been asking if he could come get me, and they had steady rolling blackouts in their neighborhood, several other people I knew nearby were also saying their blackouts were rolling along.

I resisted, because I really didn't want to move the cats but I would never ever abandon my pets. But also it would be very difficult to move them. Patchy doesn't get along with any of them -- she stays in the master bedroom 100% of the time. There was a short period of time last year she would explore the house, but she got along with everyone else, especially Fry, so poorly that she decided she did not want to explore the house anymore. Fry sometimes wanders into the master bedroom and if they're both on the floor there's lots of hissing and yelling, and maybe swatting. She also has nothing but hissing for Pemily and Leela if she sees them. The master is her domain, the rest of the cats can have everything else.

Everyone else can be mean to Leela, though she gets along OK with Pemily most of the time.

But Fry is just... hoo boy he is nothing but a problem child I don’t want to subject on others. He’s a bully and an asshole and yells loudly when anything doesn’t go his way. He would really, really not take a new environment well. He hates the outside, and runs away when I even open a door. And getting him to the vet involves kitty sleeping pills, though he also still fights through it enough to freak out the entire time he’s in a carrier badly, yeowling the entire time and literally rips all his nails off trying to get out, still trying to dig his way out with bloody paws. It’s a nightmare. So the thought of getting all four of them into carriers at the same time, then putting them all in a car for well over an hour (and the entire trip would be nothing but all four of them crying the entire time with Fry being the worst), then bringing them into someone else’s house, and needing two separate rooms because I can’t put Patchy in the same room as the other three... and trying to keep them all calm in a whole new situation when none of them were used to any other environment than my house (aside from yearly trips to the vet) man... moving them was a last resort.

But around 10pm when I had been sitting in the dark for 24 hours, I texted him and said in the morning, if the power wasn't on, we'd talk about him coming to get me and the cats in the morning.

I fortified Leela’s bed with a blanket fort. (Pic above was from later, when I got power, and was way more open than I kept it when it was cold.) I couldn’t get her to move anywhere else... it actually worked pretty well.

I fortified the master bedroom with blankets over the sliding glass door on Monday and then put Patchy’s cat bed on the bed and fortified IT with more blankets. After she was settled in I managed to get her covered up. Then I went into the living room, which is the smallest room in the house and a room most would use as a bedroom, and snuggled into the couch with Fry and Pemily, the door cracked for ventilation, and four candles burning.

Fell asleep around 10:30.

Around midnight I was woken up by a terrifying sound... running water. Honestly thought I was dreaming for a moment, had to work to pull myself out of my dream, and my heart froze in terror that I may have a burst pipe. And then I heard a very, very good sound... the furnace turning on.

POWER! 26 hours later.. POWER. The running water sound was the cats’ water fountain.

Got out of bed, nuked myself a small frozen pizza, checked around the house for everything and everyone being OK, plugged in all my portable devices to recharge, and went back to sleep. Woke up around 4 and still had power. I thought... I really wanted a hot meal and should cook something that wouldn’t be bad as cold leftovers for lunch, as I’d finished the cranberry orange bread when I woke up at midnight. I didn’t want to use too much power so uh... I made Fettuccine Alfredo, and ate half of it... at 4am. What? It was good.

Also... I hadn’t seen the stray cat I’d been taking care of since Sunday night. He hadn’t even visited because there were no tracks in the snow. Checked the backyard randomly and he was there!!! So he got food and water. I was very happy.

THERE’S THE BOY! I call him Patchy’s Boyfriend. Taken through the blinds as to not scare him.

Animal tracks in the snow!! I was glad some birbs got some water, too!

Went back to bed in my own bed. Woke up a little later than normal for work with the power still on. Texted my folks to tell them the good news. Got up and went into the kitchen, started contemplating coffee and pancakes for a hot meal. Opened the fridge for the first time and checked the milk. Sadly, it didn’t survive, and realized I was a dumbass for not just.. putting the groceries... in the garage... where it was cold...

And just as I sighed and started to decide if I wanted coffee without milk... the power went back off. Aw, damn.

My spirits were lifted, though, at having power and a warm house overnight. I checked in with work and let them know I’d be out again unless the power came back, told my friends and said NOT to come get me, decided NOT to tell my mom the power was off again, because all that would do is make them worry about me all day again, checked on the cats and tucked them in, and went back to bed. Got some more sleep.

Relaxed more that day, with the house taking longer to cool down. Actually played some Switch, read the first couple of books in the Mass Effect Comic Collection. Had cold Alfredo and an apple with peanut butter for lunch. Scrolled twitter a lot more, not afraid to have to go to my backup battery if needed.

Right around the time I’d usually be knocking off for work... the power came on again.

And it didn’t shut off. Yay.

In total I was without power somewhere around 34 hours. It sucked.. but also... I didn’t have my pipes burst... they didn’t even freeze. The house never dipped below 50, thanks insulation! My water was always running, though for a few hours it was very low pressure, and always clean. My city government and congressman were both very involved and communicative, doing their best to help people and get the word out. City had two warming centers should I have needed them, one of which was pet friendly. I had plenty of food and water, enough for a week or more easily. I had friends willing to put themselves at risk and through inconvenience to make sure I was taken care of.

A lot of people had it much, much worse. So yeah. I don’t ever wanna do that again, but for me, it wasn’t all that bad.

Shoutouts to:

My nearby friend Eric, who would have let me stay at his place if needed.

My far-away friend Marcus for offering to come and get me, and suffer the inconvenience of my cats. Other friends would have if I’d asked, too.

My queen sized purple fleece blanket for being so warm and comforting.

My warm fuzzy bathrobe, messy bun beanie, and fuzzy slippers for making sure I was never all that cold.

My cats for weathering things well. They also learned that maybe they DO like being under covers now.

My LED Headlamp for providing hands-free light for hours and hours.

My mom for a bag of candles she gave me YEARS ago I always would see and want to throw out, but didn’t let myself just in case I needed them someday. I burned many of them and they kept me warm that second night.

Also my mom for... calling... the police... on me? I know she loves me. Also that cop for having a sense of humor about it and telling me to call my mom more often lol. ACAB and all, but I shoulda checked my texts.

My Switch and Mass Effect Comic Collection for being huge piles of entertainment when I could finally relax and read them.

My coworker Monica for suggesting I make something I could snack on easily in case we lost power. That cranberry orange bread was perfect.

Me for never throwing away a blanket. I should probably donate some, though. Between the cats and covering windows and me, though.. I used... a lot of blankets.

4am Fettuccine Alfredo.

My municipal utilities for already saying our bills wouldn’t be drastically higher from this month. Although, I take it back for being real bad at the ��rolling” part of the “rolling” blackouts.

Also, one more thing... FUCK YOU TED CRUZ, YOU DESERTING PIECE OF SHIT. BETO O’ROURKE DOES YOUR JOB BETTER THAN YOU WITHOUT THE TITLE, POWER, OR PAYCHECK.

#personal post tag thingy #snowpocolypse2021

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bciwasinlove · 3 years

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Ok so it's been almost 2 days for me I have been reading what others have said on twitter and tumblr stans, I've had the time to process my thoughts and now here is my thoughts I get...

So some people hold their favs on a pedestal which is why those people are the ones SUPER hurt by what happened. We shouldn't have our favs on a pedestal or we will be let down everytime they make a mistake. They are humans just like us and aren't above others we have all made mistakes heck I've made more mistakes then I can count. We love our favs and need to hold them accountable when they do something they shouldn't but like I said their humans and they aren't perfect. A lot of celebs haven't really been following guidelines bc their so out of touch with reality and have quite a lot of privilege [especially if their white] and that is a problem that should definitely be talked about.

It is very sad and disappointing what happened the last few days both of the breaking covid restrictions with everything happening here in California and how this will negatively [ actually already has negatively] effected both Olivia and Harry. A lot are just so confused and hard and just over all tired of all this. Everything we have had to deal with as of late and now this it's just idk gut wrenching knowing all the things families [including my own] have gone through bc of the pandemic and they do THIS.

I 100% agree with people [mostly mean this next part with the twitter stans] calling Harry out for what happened it should be talked about but my issue is with some OT5s not treating each member who didn't follow covid guidelines the same. Some OT5s say they have a lane but there is a difference between having a lane and having said lane on a pedestal while having another member half out the door on supporting them. Example of what I mean their was an OT5 I saw who has a Niall lane and when we got pics of him at a large dinner party with no one wearing masks they defended him to the tooth and nail but with the Harry thing they were so upset and wanted to leave. Another example was an OT5 with a Liam lane fought tooth and nail when we got pics of Liam and Maya surrounded by a ton of people during one of the protests with neither wearing a mask but with the Harry thing they were very upset with him.

You must hold ALL who haven't fullly followed guidelines accountable bc if your giving "your lane" a slap on the wrist and then seeing flames with another member does something then it doesn't seem like you actually care about the problem at hand and you CLEARLY love and support one over another in a negative way. TBH Zayn is the only member who has FULLY followed covid guidelines throughout this entire pandemic and for that I respect him a lot more.

If your a newer stan this PR pap walk is a nightmare to you it's ok it will be ok bc if you talk to an older stan then they will tell you this is sadly not the worst we've been through. 2015 we had to deal with louis close to tears announcing he was going to be a dad when he wasn't and then had the nightmare of 2016 BG stunting every week and Dani pap tuesdays all to hide the fact that Louis is gay. So this is not the worst and to me it's welp another stunt I hope will pass soon.

Thanks to this shitty stunt they pulled Harry has yet another label on to the list of horrible labels GP or media have on him bc of Harry's management. He was already seen as a queerbaiting womanizer and an arrogant ahole who doesn't care much for his fans but now he looks like a homewrecker who sleeps with people to get movie roles. Neither Olivia or Harry will be taken seriously after this when it comes to movies. So I don't know whose idea it was thinking this would help with movie promo bc this helps no one and makes everyone involved look like a piece of shit.

I know the biggest thing that rubed people the wrong way [besides the wedding happening at all] was Harry looking happy and officiating the wedding so now some think Harry is possibly friends and actually likes jeff. But look at it this way we have pics of Harry with the CEO of Sony who EVERYONE knows is basically the devil in disguise who you don't want to mess with. Jeff's dad has ALOT of power in the western music business and when winning an award they said he was like the devil but we all love him WHAT?! MJ and Prince made it clear how BAD the music business is and many dont speak up like they do bc those who speak out it doesn't go well.

Harry has been in and dealing with the music business for almost a decade joining when he was only 16 he must have learned by now how things work and how he has to act and play apart where it seems like he likes these people bc Hollywood is all about pretending, with fake smiles and fake lives. To think it's not possible he was acting when he has 10 years of expereince of faking being happy in the business is not a stretch. When he was only 16/17 you saw him cry and be insecure now he has learned how to fake being happy and except what is going on.

A lot think it is a stretch that the wedding was all a pre planned thing to help push a narrative but look at BG. At the beginning of BG it seemed crazy to think they faked a story and changed louis whole image to make it seem like he got some girl pregnant and had him fake having a kid to hide his sexuality but it became clear that's what happened. I get called crazy and delusional on other apps daily for thinking that kid is not louis saying they wouldn't do that to him louis wouldn't allow this to happen BUT IT DID bc he isn't free and has NO say it what happens So this wedding being fake just to push a PR stunt relationship and the H is good friends with Jeff narrative is not a stretch.

There are articles that prove Jeff was already married to his wife since at least February 2020, we have more pics and articles about Harry and Olivia then of the married couple, why were there paps or drowns at a small intimate wedding of someone who isn't well known when big wedding of big celebs have no pap pics and if it was a guest list of only around 20 then why was Harry allowed a plus one date and heck why was Harry himself who is just a coworker allowed at this small wedding? If you were the couple you would JUST have immediate family and maybe your closes friend not a coworker and their 3 week gf. I think this was all an massive stunt to push a couple narratives.

One think I never get is the fans who when anything happenes stunt wise with louis they say this is all a stunt, it's fake, he has no control over anything and he's no where near free but when this happened with harry they go he's fully free, start thinking maybe Jeff and him are friends, and saying they wouldn't go to this extreme to push a narrative. NEITHER Louis or Harry are anywhere near free! I'd say the Azoffs have as much if not more power then Cowbell ever did.

My thoughts [more directed towards twitter stans here] hypothetically speaking if this was some kind of wedding ceremony for Cowbell and Louis was there everyone on twitter would say the ceremony is a stunt to make them look like their still friends after Syco parting. Just bc Harry gets promo or more response from GP, and people knowing his name then Louis doesn't mean he is anymore free then Louis. Realistically no one in the industry under Sony is free every aspect of their life is monitored and controlled.

All of what I have seen and read shows this stunt worked well even better then BG did bc I do see some fans who now think H might actually be friends with Jeff, the GP thinks he sleeps with people to get roles, the media are making jokes about this "new relationship", some henries are making jokes about him being a homewrecker. In ZERO WAY was this a good idea at all and helps NO ONE! The people running what happens to harry need to be careful bc if they keep going as they do soon EVERYONE [except henries who think he's hot] will hate him and not want to hear about him ever again. That is if this mess didn't do that already bc this stunt rubbed so many people the wrong way I wouldn't be surprised if people said I'm done I'm leaving I can't with this anymore.

I will say for myself I have been around almost 10 years supporting them hoping one day we will see them be free and happy. They are trying hard, harder then ever to get rid of us. They WANT us gone but I won't leave, I can't go anywhere not when I've been apart of this for so long already. I'm here, I'm staying, I WILL stay until they are out and free even if that takes another 5 to 10 years.

#my thoughts on the last 2 days #harry stunting #pr relationships #harry's image just keeps getting worse #harry is nowhere near free #if they aren't careful everyone will hate harry

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tonyglowheart · 3 years

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This entire thing is a rant, feel free to ignore it, but I saw your post about how destiel fans can’t win in this context, and yeah. So have some rambles.

I’ve been thinking about the fact we (current spn/destiel fans) can’t win all night... I’ve seen so many people talking about how homophobic it is - and while I would very much like to argue, as every point I’ve seen made by a non-spn fan has been wrong so far, if I did everyone inside the fandom would agree and everyone outside would either call me straight or pity me for believing it’s okay.

(Cas wasn’t even sent to hell lmao. He was sent to angel death (the empty), a place he has escaped in the past. Other points, like that meta about spn has been predicting exactly this for months, that Dean ended up sobbing on the floor because he was so upset, like that death means next to nothing on spn, like that there is two episodes left, etc etc. you feel me right? I just don’t want to post wank to other spn blogs atm, we’re getting enough frustration as it is, no need to add to it.

It’s also worth pointing out that the bar is very, very low. Spn is a prominent TV show - not a Netflix show, or indie, or whatever - and it just said “main character in gay love saved the world”. [insert gif of ghostfacers dude saying that gay love can pierce through the veil of death and save the day here]

I just saw someone saying that spn having Naomi try to brainwash Cas out of loving dean makes spn homophobic (it is a conversion therapy parallel). My first response to that is that Naomi was the villain lmao? I guess we can’t write villains doing anything homophobic because having villains do homophobic things makes, uh - checks notes - villains look homophobic, and clearly we can’t have that.

There certainly are legitimate things to criticise spn about, but this isn’t it lol.

Also now some people are unironically trying to cancel Jensen because “his acting was homophobic, and so he’s clearly homophobic”, nevermind that he’s an actor and his character struggles with understanding his emotions (which I think he played excellently, myself. That scene had a very Dean delayed emotional response), nevermind the support he’s given to us queers in the past. Like. Idek man.

We would have been laughed at if we got no destiel, too.

It would have been worse, had the writers pulled a dumbledore. At this point I also trust the writers not to pull a GoT - they have explicitly criticised that ending in spn’s canon.

Spn’s writers did that by making the main villain of this season, Chuck / God, say GoT had a good ending. To reiterate a previous point I had: villains do bad things because they’re bad. And the bad things they do make them bad. For the people out there not still following, if someone does something in a story and it makes them a villain, that is explicitly telling you the story (and probably the writers) thinks that thing is bad. In this case, Chuck likes to write things for him, and we the audience have been shown and told that is bad.

Apparently thinking a gay confession is good in 2020 makes me straight. Seems unlikely, but whatever. Sorry for the length, I guess I went overboard, I’ve been holding it in lol. Anyway, DESTIEL IS CANON 💚💙 hope you have a good night

Helloo supernatural anon I hope you are living your best life right now. Yeah I’m like..... skeptical and leery myself but having lived through some absolute garbage discourse that is general purity wank, as well as the C/QL greater fandom here and on Twitter I find myself... much more wanting to question the “general wisdom” of things esp in terms of negativity, bc a lot of the time I find.... it’s wrong? Like so wrong. Or at least presents such an incomplete picture of the whole situation and also presents it in such a removed context that words that have meaning and are operationalized in a certain way for a reason, no longer have meaningful usage.

Anyway I don’t... know too much about the specifics of Spn but someone I follow is into it and talks a lot about the Gnostic stuff and that all was very fascinating to me, and I also have been grappling a lot with cultural Christianity bc of cmedia and the way ppl just *clenches fist* unthinkingly or uncritically slap some Christian norms on it and call it a day 😩 help I’m Tired. My thing here being... I actually got tired of the uncritical “superhell”s at some pt bc I am, in fact, incredibly exhausted with cultural Christianity, and because it does seem like, even possibly(?) without the Gnostic stuff it’s different from a “hell” or other Protestant-derived afterlife concept, and also yeah that it wasn’t seeded out of nowhere, it was set up to happen, which then... lends credence to the idea that whatever the current era of Spn is doing, the current showrunners are doing it with purpose.

And idk I just... refuse to believe the concept that ALL of the fans of Spn - esp the ones who have been following it still, or got back into it and are following it currently, are acting under delusion or are fooling themselves into liking it or thinking it’s good or whatever. I personally find that kinda infantilizing and patronizing and playing into issues of dismissing things women and/or other marginalized identities like.

Plus I find the concept that (from what I think I’ve been seeing Spn fans say) that the current era of the show is quite actively grappling with itself, its past, its legacy. to be very interesting and compelling; it hearkens back to like an old lore kind of feeling, of a thing that has grown into a nigh undefeatable monster and realizing that, also realizing that the only way to defeat itself is through grappling with its own nature and transforming and transmuting itself into something else. I personally find that more plausible and compelling than “Supernatural has been actively and continuously queerbaiting for 15 homophobic homophobic years., so right now we’re all very sorry for you because this maybe is no longer queerbaiting but it’s still homophobic and it can never be anything different ever.” I’ve been sort of tangentially aware of Spn thru the years and didn’t we agree, around the time of that in-universe play about Spn and with the lil Destiel shoutout, that Spn has come a ways as far as coming to terms with its fandom and working to treat its fans better? Why the sudden regression into “oh no, Supernatural is and forever will be homophobic and a hate crime”? 🤔

The rest under a cut bc the ask is already long and then my rambling will get longer-

But yeah I mean..... I get that the legacy of Supernatural has been certifiably Rough, but I think people also forget how different of a time 2005 was? Hell, how different of a time 2015 was, even, prior to, say, Obergefell v. Hodges. Now I’m not saying that to blanket-excuse Supernatural, but like, you look at mainstream shows from the era and... there’s a lot of shit lmao. The fact that Supernatural has existed this long seems to me like.... maybe we CAN look at how it’s developed through the years vs just insisting it is what it was 15, 10, hell, 5 years ago. Especially since, to my knowledge, there’s been showrunner changes? Which seems to me like it would... affect things? I mean honestly, I remember back when I got into Spn for a hot second because of Castiel, I remember watching panel, Q&A, etc vids thru the years, and like... I thought we agreed that... it was the fans who were going a bit far pushing the shipping question like literally ALL the time to the actors, who are not in control of the show and.... like at the time.... that could have had personal implications for them? And yes homophobia bad, and people can still be allies despite that, but again like.... I do feel like - from what I’ve seen - that these guys were NOT ready to deal with a lot of that but they’ve (okay Jensen I’m talking about Jensen here) genuinely grown and learned? Also how many years ago was the essay autograph thing that people keep trotting out, like what year was it in and what year of spn was it, and what were the prevailing opinions on LGBT issues and bisexuality then.

I’ve been seeing some murmurings of identity politicsing surrounding ppl who enjoy Supernatural, and I’m sorry that that’s happening to you, it really fucking sucks and it’s also the dumbest way to “make” or “win” an argument because it shouldn’t ever be a final determiner, just factors to consider when considering what life experiences might have informed someone else’s PoV and views as well as maybe how you can better communicate with them. Instead of it being a “weapon” or “tool” to either dismiss someone or de facto validate an argument.

Also yeah I get it that you don’t want to send discourse to spn blogs bc I imagine you guys ARE actively grappling with all the bs rn and it’s a lot. Even just from like, the stuff I see around, I’m like tired of it. I’m genuinely having more fun with ppl who are having a good time with Supernatural than the ppl who are hating on it, even in this sort of backhanded “oh we’re not clowning YOU we’re clowning the writers and showrunners who think you should be satisfied with this,” when... yeah? the people who HAVE been watching the show and therefore... know what’s up.. DO seem to be? And all this based on *fake gasp* context. And that’s where the backhandedness becomes kind of poisonous to me, because it implies that it IS bad, and that you SHOULDN’T be satisfied, but poor little you are but don’t worry, we’re not making fun of YOU for liking garbage, you’re just the hapless victim who is consuming the garbage bc... idk, whatever reasons ppl are coming up with ig.

idk man it’s 2020. Fandom isn’t activism, performative or otherwise, it’s okay to let people enjoy things even if you think they’re “objectively” bad, and like... I don’t know if people can call something bad when they’re not even working with the whole context and instead are dealing with rumor and reputation.

#supernatural cw #I tag this for ppl who I know want nothing to do with spn rn and are blacklisting and so it doesn't end up in main tag #Anonymous #asks answered #long post

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sometimesrosy · 5 years

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Did you hear the news about The 100 prequel today? I’m pretty intrigued, but I don’t like the idea that it’s going to take away an episode from The 100 in its final season, as it’s a backdoor pilot (already confirmed that it’s going to air as an episode in season 7). So now we have 15 episodes of The 100 itself, and that makes me sad. I wish they could just do it after the final episode and not in the middle of the final season. I want as much time with our current characters as we can get.

Yes I heard about it and I made the mistake of reading the comments on twitter.

I was horrified by how negative and entitled our fandom has become, how dismissive of JR and of the story that HE is telling. Downright insulting. Don’t listen to those people. Don’t listen to assholes. This season already has more episodes than a regular season, he can tell the story of Bellarke and the delnquents in that time.

Why do you people ASSUME that he can’t tell this story to your satisfaction? If you hate his stories then you shouldn’t be so attached to them in the first place. If you dont’ like his writing or storytelling then you should let go of this show because you don’t like it and you dont’ think he can do a good job.

Instead, people act like the dude who has stubbornly refused to to be moved by ANYONE away from the story he wanted to tell is somehow going to sell out.

Set 97 years before the events of the original series, the new project starts with the end of the world, a nuclear apocalypse that wipes out most of the human population on Earth. The adventure follows a band of survivors on the ground as they learn to cope in a dangerous world while fighting to create a new and better society from the ashes of what came before. [x]

I mean. This doesn’t sound bad. If we think about what we’ve already gotten about this topic, none of the prequel era episodes we’ve seen have been disappointments. Watching how Becca/ALIE were connected to the end of the world was fascinating. Watching Josephine in her flashbacks was fascinating. Meeting Diyoza and the eligius prisoners was fascinating. Seeing the Sanctumites land and colonize Alpha was fascinating.

None of this storyline has so far made the story of The 100 lesser. In fact, it has enriched it.

None of these stories took away from the current characters. They in fact, can all handle being their own stories.

If we get something along the lines of Thirteen, when we found out how Becca was connected to the grounders, not only do we get backstory that moves our story forward, but we also expand into a world that... now is going to be its own story. It turns out we’re going to be GETTING that story.

You know. I first hear that information about the back door pilot, and as usual, I derived and entirely different meaning from it.

You see, what I thought was:

time. travel. TIME. TRAVEL. time travel time travel time travel.it's still possible

I got real excited thinking about HOW they might manage to work this pre apocalypse story into the story so many centuries in the future. And I’m like, because the Anomaly offers a gateway into the past and now ALSO onto the earth? HOW ARE WE GETTING BACK TO EARTH? None of our current character saw the apocalypse. Even Diyoza or Russell who were legit alive and on earth before it all went down, they LEFT before it happened. The eligius missions were gone. The only one who was there was... sheidheda. or maybe not. we don’t know when he became heda. but we was the only one there after the bomb.

Then I went over to see JR’s tweet and stupidly read the comments. And y’all are just like *but i’m not getting what I want and i hate you because it’s not about me and my ship.* and i’m just so fed up with fandom.

You’re given all this new shit and you’re just like, but what if my headcanons dont’ come true?

COME ON MAN. Get over yourselves. Think about what it could mean to the story that might go somewhere rather than just what you don’t like. Stop thinking about how it affects YOU and start thinking about how it affects the story.

Like. Did any one of you think that if we have some sort of ACCESS to earth at the time of the apocalypse or pre apocalypse that maybe OUR HEROES will be going back there too?????

I mean. Where the hecking heck is Diyoza? And Hope and Octavia, where were they? There’s a place. With a culture. And they live there.

Did anyone one of you think that this backdoor pilot might actually be... not just the apocalypse, the first one, but... what if it’s OUR DELINQUENTS who are sent back in time. What if THEY are the ones living in the apocalypse. We now have Clarke, Echo, Murphy and Emori who are nightbloods. Why? Why Echo? She didn’t get a minddrive, just the nightblood. THEY are more able to survive in a nuclear apocalypse now.

I don’t know for sure that our heroes might carry on over into the new pilot, but I don’t know for sure they don’t either. Maybe it’s Hope’s world. Maybe it’s the world that Becca showed us. IDK.

BUT THERE ARE POSSIBILITIES and we don’t know that those possibilities are bad. Why anticipate them sucking? Maybe they’ll move OUR story forward too. Stop being so jealous.

I also found this.

Back in August, Rothenberg himself revealed that The 100 will end with the upcoming season 7. And when EW asked the showrunner if anyone would get a happy ending in the series finale, he laughed. “I think that’s an interesting way to put it,” Rothenberg said. “A happy ending? I’d say that’s probably, well… it’ll be our version of a happy ending, how about that?”The showrunner laughed again before continuing. “But I definitely can safely say that we’re trying to say something more with season 7,” Rothenberg added. “The ending of a story always is the point of the story, the moral of the story. We have yet to reveal the moral of the story, but it will be revealed in season 7. And it won’t be ‘People are horrible, we all suck, we’re willing to kill everyone and everything and do anything to survive.’ There’s a higher purpose.” [x]

See. Now. I hear that, and I think what he’s doing is all part of a plan. If you think Bellarke isn’t part of that plan, you haven’t been watching very well. If you think this backdoor pilot isn’t part of the plan or won’t fit into his plan, you aren’t noticing how much of a creative control freak JR is.

#the 100 #the 100 s7 #prequel #i interpreted it very differently than fandom did #i'm excited

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chenoehi · 5 years

Text

I'm angry and tired. I'd say I can't believe everything I just saw and read but it's par for the course from such people who are OT6. What gets me is the number of notes on their most recent post which is oddly enough not openly hostile and just so happens to be supportive of jikook. And I'm finding myself really questioning if people ever look at the comments anymore. As in, actually read them.

I'm not the only one who's angry. I've talked to people. This fandom has got a problem. The constant ship vs. ship war in which we just blindly support whoever 'stans' our ship along with giving toxic people a pass because well, they belong to our ship, our 'tribe' and since they post cute things or because they support our ship and ours is the 'best' and the 'realest' (different mindset whether you're a shipper or a believer) we'll just, idk, defend them to our death.

Quick question: why do OT6 and akgaes both feel like they have to stir up drama, creating their own narratives for these guy's lives and influencing others' perceptions, all the while invading other people's tags and dragging everyone into the mix, which gives both the fandom as a whole (ARMY) and it's biggest subgroups a bad reputation? And we just casually scroll past with no care but still giving likes and reblogs because well, it's supporting jikook and so we can ignore any negative tone or undercurrents in the message that could be harmful.

I believe they are in a relationship. I may be wrong. I accept I may be wrong. Just knowing that is enough. I enjoy discussing things with like minded people,

but if I thought for a second that something I wrote or a message I presented could be used to promote hate for any of them or promote a harmful narrative that could end up hurting them? If I found out I was supporting other people who were saying things that caused tension, strife, and hate in the fandom and toward the guys and I thought I would rather stay supporting these blogs or these Twitter accounts because I valued their content so much as opposed to dropping them so that I could avoid further harming these guys, who try their damndest to earn our love and support?

If that was how I felt, I would say it's possible I was being a hypocrite and that I should reevaluate my priorities and question my thought processes, specifically why I thought it was justifiable and OK to support people who do harm.

I've taken breaks from stan tumblr several times because of how toxic it's become and I feel like I need to reiterate for anyone that doesn't know, I'm a relatively newer fan who knew about them for years but didn't stan until last year. I just didn't want to because of how hyped they; it made me think I'd be disappointed, and then the first one I heard in 2017 wasn't my jam. I come back because I like the community and I like being able to share content in this bubble, but there are times when I know that being here on stan Tumblr or being on stan Twitter is absolutely, unequivocally not worth it.

I always try to see the big picture with anything. This fandom? The jikook subgroup just by itself? I can't see that what's going on right now and what's been going on for a while and has been increasing in intensity is going to be anything good for these guys we all claim to love and want to support. I just don't get it. For all of the progress they're making and the support they're gaining and the history of this moment, the undercurrents right now in this fandom are not good.

It's not about being their protectors or having to be on the attack all the time; on Twitter, it's not even worth it to do anything but just report anti accounts, block, and move on. It's about everything we do comes back both on them and to them eventually. One way or another, it affects them. I'd rather them be affected by more good things than bad things, that's all.

Social media and what happens here isn't that deep until is. And bad stuff is happening.

#theres a big problem in stan tumblr and stan twitter #problem fans are getting a pass for the sake of ships #and it leads to no good #it leads to negativity and it leads to the guys getting hate #it leads to them getting de*th th*eats #it leads to that because hate and negativity comes from altered perspectives #altered perspectives create alternative narratives #it is toxic and it is not good #im fucking telling you #jikook #kookmin

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seesarahaccomplishstuff · 3 years

Text

Therapy today helped a bit.

I told my therapist how I’ve been having intense breakdowns since Monday and haven’t been doing okay.

She asked what happened and I told her how I thought the childhood stuff wouldn’t bother me because it was so long ago, but it’s so frustrating to see how much my parents fucked me up. And now there’s this huge list of ways I’m broken that won’t stop growing. And it’s my entire personality. And more people are leaving and that triggered my anxiety, and someone that I’m trying to trust massively crossed a boundary that made my rejection issues even worse.

So she nodded and said “you have a lot to work on. And you really jumped all into it, which is really great, but you’re going to feel like you’re losing for a while. It’s going to overwhelm you a lot. And it’s going to feel easier to lock yourself in your room and off yourself.” (Which I didn’t expect her to say, but she’s right) So I said, “I just don’t fully see the point in trying to fix 30 years of broken.”

“What’s wrong with your personality?” “It’s all fucked up. Everything I do is codependent.” “Sure. Give me an example.” And I couldn’t think of one offhand, so I said, “the thing I realized the other day was I do something for someone because I care right? Which is fine. But also when people are stressed about their situation they get mad. And when that happens I get snapped at and shoved away. So I help to avoid that too I think.”

She was not sold on that. “You used to buy dinner for friends a lot. You did that so you wouldn’t get in trouble?” “No. I did it because I like when people do nice things for me and they don’t always make sure they can eat so I do it so they feel cared about and are healthy.” “That’s just being kind. When you would pay a bill for them they typically pay it right back. So is that codependent?” “No. They need help so I help and they pay it back.” “The times you did it when you didn’t have money to spare. (Which I argued and she called me out lol) The times you let them blow off repaying- that was codependent. You do have a lot of codependent tendencies. But kindness is inherently codependent. You can’t rip apart any time you’ve shown someone kindness. Your biggest codependency issue is not holding boundaries for yourself.”

“You need to repeat the phrase ‘People treat you the way you’ve taught them to treat you’.” “My friend used to say that to me at least once a week.” “Yea well, they’re smart and we’ve covered that you needed to listen to what they’d tell you more than you did. You also need to remember that you don’t control other’s emotions. And other people don’t control yours.”

“People think you’re manipulative and controlling. That’s what they’ve taken from your behavior. You can’t control that. You know it’s not what you intended. You know you’ve been improving for many months. I know you have. But you made them feel a certain way and their opinions didn’t change. You can look at that and acknowledge it and re-examine your behavior like you are. But you can’t change their minds. And their feelings don’t make you that person. So fixating on it doesn’t get you anywhere.”

And then she asked me if I was doing all of this for me or them and I told her I’m having a hard time prioritizing myself. That it pisses me off when people pull the “great pain means great growth. You’ll look back and smile” bullshit. Because the way this feels is terrible and I hate it. So, I know I can’t change anyone’s view of me, but I’m doing all this to try and be who I wanted to be for people who had to leave because of my behavior. And she accepted that.

I also have to start some EDM... pretty sure it’s 4 letters. It’s something to work through past trauma. She said she’d send videos to watch. My alanon group leader asked if she did that sort of thing last week so I guess that’s just where we are. Wait lol... edm is music lemme actually Google the acronym so I seem less ignorant. EMDR, damn dyslexia. Anyway. That.

But basically, I need to really work to not shred myself when I’m low. It’s gotten bad. I also need to start on my books that came yesterday. 2/3 are here. She wants me to try and list my codependent behaviors. I also need to start painting and journaling again. I like this outlet and it’s easiest for my brain, but the way I was doing it all in my watercolor notebook was really therapeutic. It’s just been a bitch of a week.

I’ll be fine and I feel less like having a breakdown or dying. I think I know another thing that is really fucking with me through everything, but I don’t feel comfortable posting it here right now I think. I also can’t do anything about it.

Last night in alanon a woman said “when one door closes another one opens, but the hallway is hell.” And like, yea. Fuck dude. I took a psych class once where the teacher had a gazillion psych type degrees and would open the class with us getting to ask about mental health shit. And one kid asked if it was possible to change personalities. And he said “sure, but you usually see it following a trauma where it rewrites your thought processes. Because it’s hell to do otherwise, and a lot of people can’t handle it.” And I get it now. I thought he meant habits and comfort zones. But it feels like being handed a pile of shards that used to be your brain and given a timelimit to reassemble it. But half the pieces are trauma copies and you have to figure out which parts are imposters, but they actually fit better than the pieces that should be there. And if you fail you lose everything.

Anyway, that’s where I am today. I queued a couple posts last night so you might see random downers, but what I’m thinking of doing is only reblogging positive stuff, and queueing negative stuff that resonated for like, 7am. And I say that because sometimes I rescroll my blog to recount the day or previous day to either feel good with the good posts again or reevaluate the things I’ve said the day before. Since with my mood they don’t always apply still or I may have a totally different approach at that thought. And I do that when I go to bed around 2. So at 7 I won’t be seeing negative shit right before bed. Cuz I’ve fallen asleep and woken up bitter the last few days.

We’ll see. I have lots to do today. I’ve been off twitter so no children have reminded me to do my taxes. I also have to get a new phone today so I’m fully out from under my mother. And I have insurance stuff and inspection cleaning to tackle. It’s only 1 and I’m ready to call it a day.

I hope what my therapist said helps anyone else who is struggling. I like hearing the lines that have stuck with patients and really helped them. So when it doesn’t fuck with me I’d like to be open about what I discuss in therapy. I always used to think it’d solve so many of my problems if I could send my friends zoom links of my sessions since I’m so bad at expressing myself lol. So this is also a bit of an exercise for me to be more outspoken about my feelings (if this bothers anyone you can send an anonymous ask) And therapy isn’t accessible to everyone so maybe it gives someone what they need to go forward a bit in their struggles. (Alanon and CoDa are free and on zoom now though! Definitely look into it if it applies to you!)

There’s a line in a bts song. Idk which one honestly, Ik it’s in the BE photo book though I can post a pic. It comes to mind because my friend would write it a lot when they first heard it. And it’s something like “sometimes we get to know that broken is beautiful”. My therapist today said “you are broken, everyone is. And no one is as broken as they think they are.” I hope one day this feels like a beautiful moment in my life and not the purgatory it feels like. I hope I grow enough for it to be worth it.

#4/15 #alanon #coda #codependency #growth #Thursday therapy #pmdd #motivation #broken #hope

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fykenta · 7 years

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thoughts on people boycotting kenta's supposed fanmeet? I think it'd send a stronger message of "hey kenta get out of the shitty company" but i feel like he'd be really down and might take it as him having no support

I will try to be really objective about this because I don’t support it but at the same time I do ahjkfdg and i do agree with what you just said anon. Ok be ready because i may ramble a lot and i apologize for that 🙈

Let’s start with the positive things that may come about ‘boycotting’ Kenta’s supposed fanmeeting (yes, it is a supposed fanmeeting because although Star Road announced it can’t be sure when will it happen or if it’s official) It will indeed send a stronger message to kenta telling him to get out of the company and find one that would treat him a lot better and will make him succeed. It can make Kenta realize how does the korean entertainment really works as him being japanese may be a bit hard?? (that’s my point of view) I say this because he may be easily manipulated and controlled which I would hate as Kenta will become the company’s doll and that’s not how is supposed to be at all. Kenta should be the one making the decisions while the company supports him. Kenta has little possibilities of debuting this time because the company doesn’t have trainees (only 2 including Kenta) so how much would we have to wait? And if he does debut with Star Road, he may only have a temporary success as the company doesn’t have much to fully support him. Besides, Star Road is a really small company which means that they don’t have any songwriters, producers, trainees, etc. Many people have been saying that the song quality that Star Road produces is really low quality and that may be the reason why they can’t go on broadcast?? (idk about this so please correct me if i’m wrong) And as you all know Kenta is an all-rounded and talented guy a Gem™ that deserves to succeed no matter what so getting him out of Star Road is the best option imo.

This is about P101 and how Star Road didn’t really do much for Kenta. There has been an image going around Twitter that stated how Kenta was practicing the KOREAN version of “Sayonara Hitori” (by Taemin) but CJ E&M asked for the JAPANESE version 2 weeks before airing (source) and at the end Kenta’s performance wasn’t even aired when CJ told them to do the Japanese ver. and Star Road didn’t do anything about it and I’m really mad at that. Did you guys all notice that lack of screen time Kenta had throughout all the episodes on P101? Well, everyone blamed the PD about this but it’s really not his fault at all when the company (Star Road) should’ve asked for it but guess they didn’t as well ://

Now to the negative things about boycotting the fanmeeting. As you said anon, Kenta may feel really down and sad about it thinking no one supports him and I agree with that 100%. Having no one attend to the fanmeeting would make him feel terrible and it would be really disheartening for him maybe even leading him to not wanting to be an idol anymore and maybe going back to japan (worst-case scenario) i don’t want to sound rude so i apologize if i do, but Kenta may also realize the real reason why people are trying to boycott it or maybe not and he would open his eyes and see the reality that is surrounding him. But i’m not Kenta so I don’t really know how he may feel at all. Also when people started the boycott issue, i didn’t realize that people were really serious about not attending, I thought that maybe they could attend to it and tell Kenta everything about it with the staff being there and all?? so they realize how terrible and poor the management and company is in general managing the artists and let Kenta end his contract so he can join a better company ://

This is getting so long ahhh why do i talk so much please forgive me, but i just wanted to end things by saying that at the end, is all Kenta’s decisions and we can’t really do much about them. We can try and help him as best as we can but if he decides and wants to stay with Star Road that’s his decision and we should be here supporting him no matter what and I would always wish him the best~

P.S. YOU SHOULD ALL GO READ THIS!!!!!!!

#takada kenta #produce 101 #it is so long omg please forgive me you don't have to read it all ahjkdf #there's a link at the end of everything which resumes everything i just said 🙈#i'm so sorry i ramble a lot and if i don't make any sense ahh #answered

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sanguinesprout · 7 years

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Things and stuff... and things... and stuff... and things... .__. (some more thoughts and frustrations, talk about troubles and general feels)

Hmm.. I’ve put off writing again and forgotten things again... things lately have been... kind of bleh... melancholy and non-progressive. I’ve got the negative thinking hat on right now, I know. I wanna take it off though, it’s snug to the point my head hurts but it doesn’t seem to wanna budge yet so imma just roll with it a little while longer. Forgive me for my excessive and probably incorrect use of ellipses, it’s just really hard to find the words, I just smh to myself all the time whenever I try writing really.

Maybe I should make a twitter or something so I can briefly write my thoughts when I actually have them, I’ve thought about this quite a few times in the past. It seems kind of an effort though... my phone is busted and whipping out my pc whenever or writing on paper is kinda out of the question cause I’m much too cowardly and paranoid. I’ll save the thought for another time though (another time probably meaning never orz).

Everyday just feels... heavy and bleak. Like there’s rainclouds permanently hanging over my head even when it’s a sunny day and everyone outside is chirpy and happy. I’m so foggy and sickly feeling from the moment I wake to the moment I sleep. Everything’s so overwhelming, the thoughts, the senses, all in overdrive and concentration on anything is impossible. I can’t help but feel like don’t know what to do or what I’m even doing has a point and I’m spiralling into the sea of darkness again. I’m lost, so terribly lost, but I can see a small light in the distance. Although it’s far, if I keep going maybe I can still find my way back out. I won’t ever give up hope, even if I feel like there isn’t any at all a lot of the time. I just need to keep going..!

Hmm, okay, I've been tidying my room and pc some more lately. Came across my dyslexia reports (mentioned in one of my previous posts) which I’d been wanting to take another look at since it’s been years, so I did. I read through them both and the first thing I would have to say is that I’m an idiot. Not in the sense of anything related to the disorder or report itself or anything offensive, but in the fact that I disregarded and was negligent towards the diagnoses and advice. I don’t know why I’m so skeptical or maybe still in denial towards this, I think I’m still rather uniformed myself even though I have researched it quite a lot but keep forgetting or misinterpreting details. I feel unsure because like I said at other times, things relating to mental function overlap/can have multiple possible causes. It’s that ‘I don’t want to put all my eggs in one basket’ kind of feeling, if that makes sense. I don’t want things in general to become self fulfilling prophecies, because once my mind goes running, it really doesn’t want to come back.

Maybe because I’ve had these struggles all my life I just saw it as normal, as just how I am or something and so to casually dismiss it. Or maybe... it just feels like because maybe no one else around me took it seriously, that I then followed them and didn’t take it seriously either or was too scared to. Being told you’re lazy and slow and things like that all the time and finding out you have legitimate explanation or cause for these troubles, it should be a good sort of thing to know, act on and inform people of. But... instead I have the feeling that it sounds like just an excuse to everyone else, it’s just so easily misinterpreted and kind of difficult to comprehend, explain or believe I guess, idk... :<

The first report from college said I had mild dyslexia and the second more detailed report from uni said I had Dyslexia, ADD (is it called Inattentive ADHD nowadays?) and Irlen syndrome (will maybe write about another time). The Dyslexia mentioned in both was mostly relating to my processing and memory being meh I think. Even though I read them the other day I can’t remember the contents properly, lovely .__. ADD is actually a lot more than I thought it was... I googled it again recently and a lot of the symptoms are similar or overlap with those of AVPD and other things. I want to find an article to link it (though it’s not really necessary) or re-read the report again but even now my head hurts so bad and I just wanna go flop on the bed. I’m really struggling, the mental effort is so strenuous with everything little I do. Even the simplest things wear me out so much that I’m just getting so frustrated and exhausted over and over again.

Some advice was to go to the doctor for medication to help with the ADD (which I obviously didn’t do). I’m wondering if I should try now, even though it’s been pretty long since the report was written, even though my parents will probably just shun the idea, even though I’m scared of side effects... If it helps, if it makes a difference, it could even be a life changer maybe, or even if it doesn’t help, I’ll never know unless I try... it’s tough... I need to research it some more.

I really badly want to get this post done because thinking about it for so many days (like every other post) has left me with so much anguish, but it’s so hard to formulate the words to express what I really want to say. I feel like I’ve set too much of a structure with my other posts and the general flow of the blog. Also like I’ve set up a certain standard for myself that I feel pressured to try and match every time. I’m just such a ridiculously troublesome and self sabotaging person ughhhh! No no, stop being so negative...! ><

I think I will keep it brief this time and re-visit and elaborate when I can think more clearly next time. Don’t be so hard on yourself, silly... Maybe I should just bullet point my thoughts and stuff so I’ll stop worrying about the structure and grammar and whatever, but I guess it might make less sense then... but when have my posts ever made sense lol... One of the things in one of my dyslexia reports said my writing sample was good but I played it safe with the topic and vocabulary and my paragraphing sucked hahaha. But with more practice, there is improvement. I mean my paragraphing is probably still pretty weird, and my punctuation, I do remember having trouble with it when I was little, but I think I have improved in the general writing department, I’m kind of proud-ish, yay!

Moving on from that subject, I’ve been feeling pretty sad and worried about my family... or well my parents in particular. It’s like... I know I have a very poor quality of life because of health and lack of social stuff, but so do my parents and they never speak about this (no surprise here), but I know about it and I really want to help but when I do they just brush it off or get annoyed... :/ They sacrifice so much of their health for work, and they work so I can live and leech off them pretty much :<

Ugh I’m too brain foggy and distracted... I need a break... :c ...Hmm okay, distracted myself for a bit, nao back to writing something... or not....

*A few days later* welp, uhh... still very groggy and very neck muscle/jaw tension wow. Per usual I forgot what I wanted to say even more lol. I don’t like writing negative/personal stuff about my parents, feels bad man x 10000 .__. I don’t like writing any of this stuff at all, but I can’t give up! Or well, I won’t give up! c: I went back and edited/added to the stuff I wrote, good! Now to continue!

Hmm... in relation my parents having not much concern over their well-being(?) uhh, let’s take the other day for example. I was just saying to my dad that he shouldn’t use expired stuff or things for purposes they’re not designed for or overwork and he got annoyed instantly as usual. I was saying it because I care for him and am worried about his health but I was finding it really hard to express this because of the language barrier. I still tried my best though and after quite a while remembered a certain phrase which is something like wishing or wanting someone to be healthy/have a healthy body. I remembered it because I just heard it a lot the past year and recently (probably a few months ago now) my dad’s bro phoned and said it to me and my dad. He actually wasn’t annoyed anymore after that, maybe because he caught on to what my intentions were or maybe just because he saw me looking upset idk (I got a bit teary but tried to keep looking down and stuff).

Something I also remember and have been wanting to mention, is that my uncle also said to me that same time while my dad was there (he was holding the phone on loudspeaker), that if there is anything troubling me, I shouldn’t hold it all in (my heart) because it’s no good for my health and should speak about it with my parents and stuff (...um maybe this would be possible in an alternate world, but it seems unlikely to work or happen here .__.). My dad’s bro is such a wonderful person and I’m really so thankful and glad my dad has been able to keep in contact with him lately, and to actually see him happy and stuff. I just wish I could’ve talked to him better myself but I froze up cause language barrier and avpd life ugh. That reminds me of another thing, I have relatives but they are all like strangers to me and there’s the language barrier again and it’s just hella awkward... it sucks :c

I need to stop being such a weenie about everything. No, I say stop too much. I should cease and desist from being such a weenie. Hm... I need to cease and desist from putting myself down and beating my self up, unless it’s beating myself up with only positivity, if that is even possible. Haha that’s a thought... replacing the negative stuff with positive but keeping it in the same attacking tone of voice, it’s pretty amusing. Reminds me of those rap battles I saw on the internets which have complimenting instead of dissing lmao. The more sensical phrase would be to lift yourself up with positivity. Imma make sure to do this instead, lift myself up off my sad butt and get moving. Do you even lift bruh?Lololol :3

I’ve been kinda avoiding going out a bit more lately, I’m so self-conscious and it’s just been getting worse and worser, especially since I’m exposing myself to all these seemingly perfect people on places like Instagram. I can’t help but compare and feel inferior and just ugh. All these people I see are not afraid to like what they like or do and say what they want without feeling ashamed. I aspire to be like them, truly. Seeing that they like things I also like (that I feel stupidly ashamed of and just hide), think and say things similar or exactly on the point of what I would like to (but can never muster the courage to) and are still appreciated and liked is kind of eye opening and reassuring. It gives me hope that if I just really be myself someday, then it’ll actually be okay.

There’s a lot of stuff I wanted to write but kinda just slipped my mind as I focused on other bits, but this post is pretty darn long enough already anyways and my eyes and head are hurting. I guess it’s a good time to end the post and catch some Z’s. I’ll give myself a pat on my (sore aching granneh) back for managing to write even though I felt like I really couldn’t (and wanted to avoid doing so more) and to write out some things I thought I wouldn’t. I did it and I want to continue to get better at expressing and understanding myself! Go go silly me! ^^

Good night~!

#feelings #avpd #add #depression #mental health #dyslexia #family #the whole post is just this .__.#and rambling #mopey mopeness #idk #don't be so hard on yourself #don't push yourself down with negativity #lift yourself up with positivity #get back on your feet and kick ass #you can do it!

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cinnamon-grump · 7 years

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Can someone explain to me what's happened with CJ and stuff? From his twitter I'm gathering that he's claiming ownership of anti? He seems to hate Mark for whatever reason too! And he responds to septiplier hate... all the time... I am confused.

i was gonna answer this privately cause im tired n wanna like.. just not post more about it on my blog, but... fuck it. here we go. I’m sorry for the rambly bs ahead, I’m trying to be as thorough as possible.

What you’re seeing about anti is... they’re basically orphaning their specific renditions of anti and dark. They for some reason had the most prevalent and popular versions of them, and people would draw fanart of their fanart constantly. it was kinda ridiculous but like... I think it was partly because they held some drawing contest or whatever and people wanted to mooch off their popularity.... idk, point is, they’re not claiming ownership of anti as a concept, but rather are giving up their physical rendition of Anti (and Dark) and letting people just use it however they like, without having to come to them and ask if it’s ok first.

Hates Mark for several reasons. here’s where things are gonna get a little vulgar on my part. I apologize, please proceed with caution as some of this will definitely be upsetting to hear...

they had managed to get him to follow them on twitter at some point, and that kinda... fueled their obsession with him? and things got weird. While he was following them, they not only posted NSFW septiplier art publicly where he could see it, but also was posting some pretty weird nsfw/implied nsfw shit of their sona/mark as well. He unfollowed them then, which sent them into a rage on several different social media platforms. They complained about how septiplier is such a great ship, and to prove some incoherent point about how nsfw stuff is okie dokie to post in the tags they even went so far as to repost other people’s smut without permission. (this was the part that I witnessed personally, in the brief time that I was following them there. It was a mess and I was honestly floored that they’d go so far as to steal and repost people’s stuff just for the sake of getting attention and undeserved sympathy.

I guess they happened to be one of the people who won an ipod in a charity stream giveaway a while back. Very soon after that stream, Mark’s friend Daniel committed suicide, which was very hard on him. CJ was pissed that the ipods weren’t sent out right away because of this, and blamed the delay on Daniel, called him selfish, specifically because of the point in time that he chose to go... They were incredibly disrespectful to Daniel and Mark alike, and went crying to anyone and everyone hoping for some kind of response from them. That didn’t quite work out, but I believe Keemstar did write some bullshit about it.

they apparently managed to meet Mark recently, and he allegedly straight up told CJ that their obsession with him was unhealthy, which sent them into yet another tantrum, which became the mess you can now see on their twitter. They have since then been accusing him of being selfish and wanting nothing but to show off how rich he is or what the fuck ever. Saying that he only does charity stuff to flash his money, and that he’s totally taking a percentage of the funds raised and keeping them (which is absolute bullshit... you can’t point out a “portion of the proceeds will go to charity” disclaimer on physical merchandise and scream about injustice when, in the real world, making the merchandise has a fucking cost, they can’t just produce massive amounts of shirts and stuff for free??)

as for the responding to hate thing, it has become more and more clear that CJ just... doesn’t WANT to have any kind of positivity on their blog/twitter/what have you. They certainly are getting a lot of friendly and kind responses alongside the hate, but ONLY respond to hate because... I don’t know. They thrive on the negativity. Positivity just gets ignored. It’s a mess and isn’t worth anyone’s time.

also pain anon if ur reading this hi, I know u didn't mean u wanted a witch hunt, I wasn't trying to imply I thought u were calling for one, I just wanted to accentuate that we don’t need one and should not start one, because I've already had one person come directly to me and show me the hate they sent CJ so proudly, and that is unacceptable.

Spreading facts is different from spreading hate. Don’t be a dick.

#that last line also isn't meant for u pain anon #just to be clear #it's a general statement again #I'm sorry I keep doing that to you oh man #I don't mean to #cjdiscourse #ok this is the last one and I mean it this time #this one got a little more uh... blunt #more so than I intended it to #but im too tired to care right now and I am going to go watch grumps until I pass out #doitsu-kunxitaly-kunftw #asks

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kietamitai · 7 years

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An extremely long vent and personal thoughts post

I have to title it because it is what it is. And honestly, I’m going to explain everything that’s been going on with my personal feelings, mental/emotional state, and current situation.

I have somewhat vented/talked about this on twitter but making a long post on my blog seems to be much better. This is likely to be my last resort of anything. Nothing bad will happen but this is to tell you that I am currently not in a good mood.

All I ask is that if you read the post, just like the post. And maybe give it a few days before asking if I am alright. DO NOT REPLY TO THIS OR SEND ME A MESSAGE I BEG OF YOU (I am not saying it to be avoidant like I will end up sounding angry if you do).

Don’t read it if you’re not in the right mood to read it. It has some questionable bits but yeah.

OK so on the first and forefront of current situation cause it’s probably the shortest.

Personally speaking, nothing is happening at home, however, I am left with a vague sense of I have to do something because everyone in the family sees me as lazy and undisciplined.

I am worried that if I started to move, that everything is going to go pretty bad. This fear is completely normal on any standard, but the problem is that this feeling is immensely different from what people may think.

Since I had recently learned about people with ADHD having Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD), everything I have experienced up until this point finally makes sense.

It is that fear of unwanted “rejection” and “negative response/feedback.”

Needless to say, some things have happened in the past that drastically shaped who I am today and my rather laid back personality, but this fear of failure came as a result. It can sometimes make me immobile.

When I get paranoid over whether or not I fuck something up, I LITERALLY FREAK OUT SOMETIMES OK?

But aside from this foreboding feeling about needing to do something (which will come in due time because I have a feeling that I’ll take that step out there sooner or later), here’s the more social part of the situation.

After what feels like I offended a friend and some what apologizing and owning up to my own reactions, I sorta ended getting slapped in the face with them implying that they don’t care. Like, I have a feeling that it’s not what they actually meant, but it’s also quite obvious that if I tried to ask for clarification, I will get yelled at for being stupid and I HATE THAT THE MOST CAUSE I GET THAT A LOT.

And this is just on the personal side of things— I dunno what their intentions or implications are. They just don’t seem to want to say that it is possibly their fault that it happened, even when I pointed it out that it is. And well, they seem to have misinterpreted the whole point of my message as well, but I just gave up on even trying to clarify myself any further cause I just woke up from a nap at the time and I almost didn’t even want to respond to that with the way they word it.

I’d rather not go into detail about that since it is an insanely minor thing, but with the way they sorta avoid me in general, it just feels like they’re scared of me or something. I’m not one to push on to make someone uncomfortable for answers so if they read this and recognize it’s them, good job I guess?

I’m probably not on their radar anyways cause they got their own shit to worry about, so really, I’d only be surprised if they ended up reading this pile of mess and then going up to my IM/ask and be like, “You fuck ass are u talking shit about me?”

On that, it is only complicated feelings coming from me. I’m not here to shit on someone for their circumstances, but in the meantime, I’m avoiding them cause like I feel like if I start talking again, I WILL FUCK UP REALLY BADLY or even worse, THEY WILL FLAT OUT JUST IGNORE ME.

My answer will most likely not be positive with them specifically if questioned in such a rude way.

And RSD likes to make things worse on the social side of things even if I simply just want to check up on them and ask if they’re doing alright. Similar situations has happened before, and when that happens, trust me, that’s when I know a friendship isn’t meant to be. I am not distant because I don’t know how to get close to people.

It’s happened too many times. Really, even if it hurts, I have to stop caring and let it go.

But on that regard, after talking to some more people, I end up getting this feeling of... isolation. I had read somewhere that ADHD may make it so that it ends up feeling like I can’t connect to people.

It sorta reels in the whole experience.

It isn’t like I want their kind of friendship, but in any friendship, I can tell that I don’t get a lot of attention. It’s like seeing a friend connect to another friend better than you can connect to either of them. I’ve always been left alone a lot so honestly, it’s nothing new.

I don’t like it when people are too too clingy to me but when they’re insanely distant, it makes me feel like my existence is just around for them to waste time.

In most cases, I just end up asking for people to say hi to me or something and get no response. Well, I know everyone has lives to run, but it doesn’t stop me from feeling insanely bitter or even bad to the point where I feel like I’ve been annoying and trying too hard and people are just FED UP with my antics and choosing to ignore me.

After a while, you get used to the feeling and you stop caring.

But in summary, if I had done a small mistake that warranted a negative response (or in a way I perceive it as negative) then I will remember that for a long time and my fear is that you’ll bring it up again cause by that time, you’ve already seen me in a different light and you’ll probably subconsciously remember it and maybe bring it up subtly where I’ll be like “o fuck did I fuck up again” and PARANOIA ENSUES.

Another summary is that I’ve been feeling like I’m lacking a sense of self again.

This isn’t an uncommon dilemma. I’ve never given it much thought as long as I can make it believable to an extent. I stopped caring because I’ve been disciplined a lot for smaller things and been compared.

Not to mention a big part of it happened when the grandma I live with decided to berate me one day. That was the day I felt like a stranger to my own family.

I’ve been living with constant less praise and more reprimanding. When people praise me, I am happy, but I am always left feeling that I am deceiving them.

People call me one thing but I dunno which am I. I have come to find out that it is who I am. I am probably like a chameleon lol

But really, I have a terrible sense of self and sometimes when I really think about it, I have no idea what really makes up me. I’ve been collecting and amassing different personalities and stuff like that.

Perhaps that knowledge is how I come to understand people fairly easily.

The more I try to find out more about myself, the more I end up losing a sense of who I am. The less I try, the more I end up feeling like nothing.

My feelings of being worthless isn’t because of any emotional reason, it is a fairly logical reason. I am simply not someone that resources should go to.

In fact, sometimes I wish I can suffer, but apparently, I can’t have that either. It takes too much time for me to just make myself suffer, it’s just easier to do nothing. I don’t even have the energy to make myself hated enough to want to be forgotten.

From drifting between being worthless and having my mistakes rebound on me, making it more than enough for me to want to stab myself, to feeling just slightly better about my day, it has been kinda tough.

Sometimes it’s not that I want to think about it and sometimes it just happens as a thought. But sometimes, something triggers my thoughts.

I’ve been having a lot of thoughts and well I’ve started to notice that it’s making me less likely to do stuff I wanted to do or just to do anything at all.

I am for once getting in to a unstable state of mind.

It could be that I am drained from watching my other grandma for the past month and a half, or that I feel like I’m being RUSHED to do something people expect me to do.

I don’t know if what I’m thinking about doing is the right choice.

I’m not sure if I’m important to people anymore. I feel like an expendable. Do people even care about me enough to understand how I feel? Do people know me enough to tell me, they know me? Do people really know who I am?

I’m beginning to wonder if I’m joking about dying or not. It sometimes feels like it’d be better if I can somehow die and be forgotten.

None of these feelings are new, perhaps maybe thinking that death is a fiscally better and logical option might be something a little more new.

I don’t know any more at times. My feelings tend to fluctuate daily and I have days where I’m a little better off then most lol

It’s probably also this bad because jet lag and some stuff making me really anxious??

I dunno but since I was getting distracted, I have no idea what I wanted to type by the time I got to this point. But I’ll end off with something—

I’ve always felt pretty meh about life. Perhaps MAYBE due to ADHD, it may influence my own ability to stay emotionally attached/devoted for too long. It’s almost like feeling you’re both half full and half empty when I’m not feeling anything really. But I guess it was better than the me before I turned 20.

Perhaps that’s just me. I haven’t been feeling like... myself.

It’s a little hard to explain, but what else can I do than to wait it out?

I never experience a feeling for long anyways lol

My days have been feeling kinda dreadful and tiring. Idk if I can keep up with people in general anymore.

This is probably what I get for being who I am.

#teru's incessant mumbling #negativity/////

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kinetic-elaboration · 7 years

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February 10: Thoughts on 4x02 Heavy Lies the Crown

I sat down to write my reaction to 4x02 and wrote basically a novel because I have no self-control. I talk so big about being barely invested in the source material anymore and then this happens. I cannot be trusted.

I wrote this before I saw any fandom reactions at all so it’s really just my unfiltered and uninfluenced thoughts.

Tl;dr version:

Team Jaha all the way

Loved the Arkadia stuff especially the Clarke and Jaha stuff and Clarke’s speech

Intrigued by the possibility of waiting out the radiation in the Ark

Interested to see Bryan develop, worried about Miller/Bryan

Legit thought Bellarke were going to kiss when they were saying goodbye

I would have voted with Miller and Monty but I also think that Bellamy’s final decision was the only possible outcome morally and narratively and that for this reason that whole story line was meh for me

A+ Monty characterization

Why does no one care that the Arkadia government has been decimated? This is some grade A nonsense.

...Jasper

I'm probably going to nit pick a lot and sound like I didn't like, but overall I actually really did. I'm never going to stop being nostalgic for what the show could have been, but I think it's doing the best it can to come back from the mess of S3.

I'm going to organize my thoughts by storyline this time since, I don’t have definite negatives and definite positives like last week.

POLIS

I have made the tentative decision to avoid absolutely as much as possible all content beyond the actual episodes themselves—that includes preview scenes and bts stuff released before the show airs, as well as interviews, Twitter statements, etc. (I will watch the trailers because I just love trailers in general but that's it.) I have a variety of personal-preference reasons for doing so but I think the opening of this episode really solidifies my episodes-only position. Because such a fucking meal was made about the glowing butterflies, and what did we get? Literally, no one lied: we did see a glowing butterfly, very first thing. But everything that glowing butterflies are associated with (associations the people doing the teasing are very well aware of)--including early S1, the glowing forest, the beauty of the Earth, a sense of calm, etc.--was missing. We get the exact opposite instead: mutilation, death, blood, loss, grief. Wow. I was not impressed. In fact, I felt very cheated. I guess one central reason I'm cutting extras out of my viewing experience is because I feel that most of them are designed to create this reaction, designed to tease and trick on the one hand, or just to outright spoil on the other. They decrease my enjoyment of the show and make me feel like I'm being fucked with for sport.

Not to make too big a deal out of it though, because I feel like my language is harsher than my emotions... Anyway I didn't like the intro is what I'm saying. I don't want to say too much because this is a larger point about the episode but one I'm not sure is fair on my part but...it felt a little too...on the nose? Rote? Like a very simple story was told very quickly and unsubtly: we know Ilian has issues because ALIE had him kill his whole family like it doesn't get shorter and simpler than that. And considering I have nothing but negative associations with ALIE, I'm a little...don't subject me to this please.

I'll reserve most of my judgment because he's barely been introduced but so far Ilian is boring and I don't care about him. Next.

Also boring: Trishanakru (sp?). Again, I know it's early, but what I got out of this episode was that, for all they spend so much fucking time on the Grounders, the PTB really do not have very many ideas for them. Because so far the total variation of the clans has been in degree of warlike qualities (average: Trikru; high: Azgeda; low: Flokru). If we hadn't been told Ilian and dead guy were part of a new clan about twenty times I would have just straight up assumed they were Trikru because they're pretty much impossible to distinguish. And I know, I'm being unfair because it's only been one episode but like...I'd always been under the impression there were real and obvious differences among the 12 clans? If there aren't I literally never have to see any other clans I mean it's bad enough I have to be subjected to those ugly white Azgeda tattoos or the Undergrad Common Room aesthetic of Luna's people.

Kane and Abby: everything's going along in just exactly the way I'd expect with them, which means that my interest level is pretty low tbh. I have a very calm sort of appreciation for them, but no particular thoughts or high emotions. Nothing wrong with two attractive people in bed. But like...the main plot point of their relationship was about Abby deciding what to do with Jake's ring and considering I've already thought about that in a fandom context repeatedly and in more depth—without even being a hardcore Kabby shipper—I was a little underwhelmed by it here. Also actually a little disappointed that she ultimately took it off. Like I know why she had to but I also thought that Kane's earlier statement about Jake being a part of her was his acceptance that she would continue to wear it, and I thought there was something rather nice about that—because Jake was his friend too, and what's really wrong with someone whose spouse is dead simultaneously remembering the deceased and having a relationship with someone else? IDK. I guess...it was all fine but not very deep.

Octavia: I have to say I'm kind of surprised by Octavia so far because I was under the impression that she would immediately cut ties with everyone and have a totally separate story line. So that she's still hanging out, at least in body if not spirit, with Kabby and that she hasn't been, like, universally shunned or even officially banished or whatever is just.. I'm not sure what to make of it. What I mean is: does no one but Bryan care that she assassinated the Chancellor? (Also tbt that time she had a big fit about Bellamy attempting to assassinate the Chancellor lol how times have changed.) I'm personally pretty ready to forget literally everything from S3 in a lot of ways but realistically stuff that happened mere days ago in the show should probably be addressed and it's just really weird to me that there's been next to no consequence for her. Also I don't think the show has any idea what to do with O now (which is also why I have an eye-rolly reaction to 'Lincoln died to further O's story line' arguments because IMO almost the opposite happened: Lincoln died and O's story fell apart.) Anyway I don't care about her.

I am STILL BOTHERED by the fact that O got a tattoo in the S2-S3 hiatus but we only got the barest hints of it in S3 and are only getting full views of it now, a season later. And no one's ever mentioned it. I mean maybe this is my Conservative view of tattoos but imo inking your skin is like kinda a big deal and even if you don't think it is in the here and now... tats are a Grounder thing, a permanent alteration of your body that only Grounders do...so it feels like her getting one is sort of a big deal within this society and I would have liked to see it, if not on screen, at least...like a plot point? Or honestly why the fuck even do it. Like literally why subject to Marie to additional make up, why take on the added burden of continuity checks about her tattoo, if it's not even remotely important to your story??

Speaking of tattoos, I forgot to say this before, but if literally everyone has tattoos (and pretty much every Grounder we've ever encountered has had tattoos, whether they're warriors or not, as far as I can tell), how does it help a Spy not to have them? I mean...if there's only one person hanging out with no tats...would you not automatically suspect that person of spying?? Also it kinda looked like Echo did have a tattoo in that fight scene with Roan, a black one on her arm, but it was hard to tell. Coulda been her shirt I dunno.

AKA the world building on this show leaves a lot to be desired but what's new.

These people are shit at keeping secrets for real.

ARKADIA

I'm intrigued by this idea that they could hide out in the Ark itself during the radiation—for a lot of reasons. I fucking love the Ark, first of all. It's an idea I hadn't previously thought of or seen anyone else think of so it's actually surprising to me, and creative, and unexpected, unlike a lot of the rest of the show at this point. It's way better than going into space, which is tragic in its comic ridiculousness. It makes a nice full circle. I think there's something O.Henry sad about it in a way too because if that's the solution they use...they'll live, but they'll never see the outside again. They're creating another Mt. Weather in a way (and I think they semi-know it: "If there's another Mt. Weather out there, the Grounders will know")--and we know how that worked out for them. (I think the lesson from Mt. Weather, honestly, is that if you can't evolve you don't get to live.) Then of course there's the lifeboat problem which, personally, at this point, is getting a little boring. But I definitely caught Raven saying at the end that only "a hundred" of them would fit without the water machine, so that's either significant or bad story telling.

Also finally my boy Monty coming back into the genius fold. I'm still a little...wary of how they're developing Monty because I remain dissatisfied with his post-Mt. Weather story but what can you do. Promising so far at least.

I literally stopped the video and laughed when I saw the Bellamy/Miller/Bryan scene because of Bryan's gratuitous shirtlessness. Like...I know the implication is not that Bellamy walked in on anything because Bryan was in pajamas and Miller was dressed but it was still fucking hilarious to me anyway because I have the sense of humor of a 12-year-old and always will. (More on them below.)

TEAM JAHA all the way. Okay, I've been thinking a little more about him and... I think it's important to differentiate between liking a character as a character and liking a character in universe. By liking a character in-universe I mean 'if X were a real person, I would like him. I agree with his choices, his sense of morality, and he has an agreeable personality.' Sometimes I dislike Jaha in-universe; I think he was objectively wrong in S2 when he chose the City of Light over getting Our Heroes out of Mt. Weather. But it also isn't important to me to like a character in-universe. Plenty of characters do bad or wrong things and if everyone always did the right thing, there'd be no conflict and no story. What I can't stand is characters who don't make sense as characters and I've been, as I said, uncertain about Jaha. I don't think the show's done him any favors by separating him from so much of the cast for so long (aside from Murphy, has he had any extended interaction with any major cast member since S1? This isn't a real question. The answer is no.) He has often just been not as entertaining as other characters because of this. And I think he's on a long arc, starting all the way back in mid-S1. Combine these things—a long arc that requires a long attention span to understand, developed slowly and in separation from most of the rest of the main cast and main events—and you have a good recipe for a widely-disliked character. I don't dislike him, but I've been frustrated by him, and uncertain how to separate in-universe frustration from badly-drawn-character frustration. BUT I increasingly think that Jaha is an excellently drawn character, probably one of the more consistent on the entire show (certainly way more consistent than Kane lol), and I'm really enjoying seeing him, the real him, again. Jaha is sounding a lot more like his S1 self. And bringing him together with Clarke is A+. More of this please. More philosophical conversations about leadership I can get behind. I love that he used to be an engineer. I love that he's unflappable—never defending himself, never self-flagellating for others' sick pleasure. I love the hair (or...lack of hair). I love the lines he's given, like the 'no leader sets out wanting to lie to their people' one. (I stg if that line doesn't make its way into fandom lore I will riot. I need recompense for every single Clarke "I bear their burdens" gifset I've ever seen.) Just...yes, more Jaha, good stuff.

I like Clarke's new/old outfit and shorter hair but I don't like that little pouf on the top. That must go. I also like, tentatively (it's always tentatively with me and Clarke because if I were to rewatch 2x16 tomorrow I'd insta-hate her again so), where Clarke is going. I like that she's still pragmatic and a little ruthless but that this is mixed in with that old idealism of hers. I do think she's becoming more of her old S1 self, while still taking into account her other experiences and how she's grown and changed. So...yeah I don't feel I have much in terms of analysis on her after having only seen this episode once, but I'm encouraged.

I know I literally just said mere hours before watching this episode that the show had abandoned the relationship between Clarke and Raven but then what do you know, a pleasant surprise: they are interacting again. I liked it. I will always want more because they're one of my favorite relationships on the show but this was so good. I like seeing Raven challenge Clarke and Clarke actually take it into account. I like the tension between them. I like seeing Raven owning her own department. And I liked the tension with Jaha because it's consistent with her general character, very hard nosed and unforgiving.

...There's a part of me that wants to ship Monty/Raven but it's just so hard to ship, in-universe, Monty or Jasper with pretty much any other character because they're so much younger. I know the show doesn't treat them like they're younger and at this point pretty much every delinquent (except Bellamy) is in the "rough contemporaries" category but... Raven is still 19 or almost 19 and Monty is still 15 maaaaybe 16, and that's a big gap, it just is. It makes me semi-uncomfortable. Especially because, even though I think difference in life experience matters more than difference in calendar age, I still think Monty and Jasper were introduced as like the little brothers of the group and it's hard for me to break out of this conception of them.

I know we didn't really see anything new with Jasper in this episode, like that wasn't in trailers or whatever (I didn't see the shower scene clip before I watched 4x02 so I that was semi-new to me), but... I still love him. He is definitely incredibly damaged and it's still fairly remarkable to me that literally no one seems to recognize that he is sick—but I have no problem watching incredibly damaged characters so I am having a good old gay time with his story. Just don't let it end in death. As always, I love any reference to him and Monty being stoner dorks and the high five did not disappoint when given greater context. Actually it got better. And I'm glad he has a spear-scar still, although—and I have no idea how spears or scars work so maybe it was realistic—I wish it had been bigger/more obvious.

I'm pretty angry that my characterizations of Jasper and Monty re: their sexualities are backwards in the angst story and almost everything else I've written of them. Dammit fandom, letting your gay!Monty headcanon seep into my brain. I have no problem with seeing Monty as gay, but there was never actually any indication that he was and, more importantly, there was indication that he's into girls going all the way back to the pilot ("Note to self: next time save the girl," and, from mid-S1: "Are you kidding me? That was there for the taking."). Anyway, it's fine; sexualities are there to be messed with in fic. More importantly, bi!Jasper becomes increasingly canon for me every day. Monty's all "I am hella uncomfortable with your nudity" and there's Jasper like "I give no fucks anymore, I'm enjoying my slow suicide and I'm going to do whatever, wanna hug???? We can get high later and whatever happens happens!"

Fuck, Jasper's taste in music is bad though. IMO. As with the Violent Femmes song in 3x01, I get that the lyrics work well and I get why this song was chosen, but I just thought both songs were obnoxious to listen to. UGH. Where's my Joy Division.

I definitely thought, when Clarke was saying goodbye to the road trippers, that she and Bellamy were going to affectionately kiss goodbye. Like, obviously I didn't think this in the intellectual sense. I just had this sudden flash of feeling: this is where the goodbye kiss goes. And then when it didn't I had to sit back and think—all this happened in a handful of seconds obviously—oh yeah, they're not established yet. That's how easy and natural their chemistry is. It's really refreshing.

Clarke's speech at the end was very interesting. Honestly... I know why it had to be her, narratively speaking, but I kinda wish in a way it had been Bellamy. Because I like his speeches more. But it wouldn't make sense so this isn't a criticism. I liked that she was responding to Jasper and Raven and Jaha all at once. (And I especially liked the call back to Jasper, the sort of delayed convo, survive versus live versus thrive.) I thought it was an interesting moment too because not only did it call back to the Ark government's season 1 decisions, but it also called back to Bellamy's early decisions on the ground. I'm thinking in particular to how he used the threat of the Grounders to inspire the camp to work and build a wall—and listen to him, of course. He instinctively harnessed the threat and used it to power the forming of the community. He was even willing to lie to keep it together: to let everyone believe Wells had been killed by a Grounder, even when Bellamy knew better. And that's what Clarke's doing, she's giving a version of the truth to the people to inspire them and to get them to work. I wonder if Bellamy sees this parallel too.

It's been 9 days since Clarke pulled the lever and now not only does Arkadia not have a council but it doesn't even have a chancellor and no one cares. NO ONE CARES. All of their government is totally gone, not just Pike but Kane and Abby (the prior de facto leaders), Sinclair (the head of a major department)...Jaha is around but he's clearly disgraced and powerless...who is running the show??? By which I mean, lol Clarke obviously. But why?? How? From where does her authority with non-delinquents derive? It's just this really weird hole in the story line imo because she's a child who 99% of the people have never met (okay arguments can be made about S2 but imo she was more Grounder-liaison than Arkadia head of state) and there's just... no...explanation...of how the community survives on the day-to-day. Except for the scene where Jasper oversees the party, which I guess, fair enough, is probably what would happen. This is all the more frustrating for me because the idea of a leaderless lawless community coming together was a major initial theme/plot of the very first episodes, and I've been missing it ever since, and here's another opportunity to engage in those themes and questions again and instead it's like...don't look over here at this humongous plot hole!!! Don't look!!

FARM STATION

I'm so tense about Miller/Bryan because in my opinion it makes sense to keep them alive and keep them together but with this show who ever freaking knows. They're the only long-term couple on the show, and the only m/m couple the show has ever had; their story's barely been told; Bryan couldn't stand on his own at this point and I feel like the pr nightmare of killing another queer kid just isn't worth it... But there have been plenty of other nonsense deaths on this show and I don't trust it. So. Anyway. I'm tense but I'm liking what I'm seeing so far. I like that we're seeing more of who Bryan is. I like that they're not forgetting where he came from or what his experiences are. I like that he's a little hard and a little on edge and a little dangerous because I think that's a good sort of person for Miller and it's more interesting. I like that they addressed his sudden change of heart last season because, while I'm not bothered really by everyone's easy forgiveness of him (I think it made narrative sense if not in-universe sense—not ideal but I can live with it), I do think that they organized that episode around the surprise of his about-face, without really explaining why he made the decision he did. Because that decision making process occurred off-screen in order to keep the surprise. I mean obviously it was pretty clear he did it For Love but I'm nevertheless glad they're discussing it.

I'm a little confused as to how Miller/Bryan ended though... I asked my mom (before I watched) if they broke up and she said no and I agree that on its face that does not look like a break up. It looks like a fight. If I were Miller or Bryan I would view it as a fight not an ending. BUT. This show doesn't really do relationship arcs, so much as it does relationship plot points here and there and you have to fill in the rest. I think. I guess it's hard to tell given how few relationships there have been, as opposed to hook ups or more informal romances, but that's sort of my feeling. A developing theory. So I guess I mean I wouldn't put it past the show to just act, next time we see one or both of them, like it's obvious they're not together anymore. I hope that's not how it goes down but I'm floating the possibility.

I asked my mom about M/H content too, so I could brace myself, and she said that, had she not known they were together, she would not have guessed based on 4x02. I agree and that makes me happy. The less of that the better. Also...while obviously I know that there's more to a relationship than just kissing or fucking, and that it's a bit silly to say "well I couldn't tell they were a couple because they didn't kiss in this episode..."—that in fact is not what I'm saying. Or what my mom was saying. My point is more that, if a couple has a basis for being a couple, like any sort of compatibility at all, you'll see it all the time, not just when they're on a date or in bed together. But what is the basis for the M/H relationship? There's nothing there to remind you why they're together when they're not...literally together...because it's random!! Because we know nothing of their common likes or interests, nothing of their way of interacting, nothing of what they like about each other, nothing about what makes them compatible—nothing! They're two names drawn out of a hat! Like the moment I thought that Bellarke would kiss even though they're not a couple...that could never happen with M/H because they have no substance! AT ALL! You can think they're cute as much as you fucking like but that doesn't give this story line any weight and I will continue to judge it harshly and bitterly until my contrary heart stops beating.

As to the actual Farm Station story line... the eternal small tragedy of high expectations I guess. I was...underwhelmed but I don't know why. I wanted to like it. I was looking forward to it. And I can't quite pinpoint what didn't do it for me in the narrative. But it seemed a little off.

One possibility is that it just didn't go into the details I most like. I am desperate for more info about the Ark, so if we're going to go to Farm Station, let's fucking go to Farm Station. Let's take a tour. Let's see Monty's bedroom. Let's take the space weed from behind the wall idc. Let's let Bryan and Monty interact even more than they did. Let's reminisce about the past. Realistically and objectively, I know that's not the focus of the show or the episode and I did get several small details of the sort I love and I shouldn't complain. I'm not complaining exactly. I'm just saying this might be a source of my personal disappointment.

Another possibility: the alleged Big Moral Decision of the Week was an easy one. Too easy. I feel a bit weird saying this because I actually came to the opposite conclusion of the majority, and not only did I come down on the Miller + Monty side of the debate (the first and so far only time they have agreed on anything in case anyone was keeping track of the State of their Relationship), but it was an incredibly obvious and easy decision for me morally speaking. Which is sort of a separate problem but I'll get to that in a minute.

However, what I really mean by it was too easy is that the actual conclusion, to save the immediate victims at the expense of later people, was literally the only place the narrative could go. Which meant that the conclusion wasn't a surprise, and the tension leading up to the conclusion was lacking. Bellamy as a character, regardless of what one thinks of the 3a massacre, cannot handle more immediate deaths on his hands, in terms of casual viewer reactions and after all of this consistent narrative shaming. He just can't be seen standing over dead bodies, literally or just-off-screen, right now in the story. So obviously he's going to save the slaves. Also it's only 2 episodes in and there's no way they can come home with the magical mystical life saving machinery this early. It's too easy. Not that one problem can't be solved and then followed by ten more new problems but that's not how this show operates. It piles on the problems, resolves some mid-season, and the rest at the very end. The only moment of actual surprise I felt was when I saw them walk out with the thing, but even then I recognized in about 0.2 seconds that it was a fake out—of the audience and of the Grounders themselves. When the seemingly deep debate is about a non-issue it loses all of its sense of importance and becomes essentially a waste of episode time instead of the center of the episode.

So that being said... I know it's a hard argument to make to say simultaneously that the conclusion of the narrative is obvious and that I came to an equally obvious opposite conclusion. And I also know that something can be obvious and still narratively tense/morally gray/difficult to watch/otherwise captivating (for example: destroying Mt. Weather in 2x16). BUT. I think there is a disconnect between how obvious it was and how obvious it was supposed to be. I think the intention was for it to be a reasonable-people-can-disagree sort of thing. I think it was supposed to cause internal conflict in the viewer and its conclusion was meant to anger at least some of the audience. But that's not how it worked out for me. Perhaps this will sound callous, but I really did not care about the enslaved Sky People. I have no idea who these people are. I don’t even get what they're doing there, like what the purpose of them for Azgeda is. I'm sure they used the word 'slave' not just to be accurate but to immediately bring up certain associations in the viewers' minds; it's a really charged term for good reason. And obviously, intellectually, I know slavery is bad, and Azgeda is bad, and these are Sky People, and Bryan et. al. know them, and that girl is really small and sad looking. But none of this resonated for me emotionally. Maybe I'm dead inside. But it felt an awful lot like being told instead of being shown. I cared about the Mt. Weather people, because I knew some of them well after an entire season and because I'd been mediating on the tragic impossibility of their situation in general for roughly as long. Their deaths were narratively and in-universe inevitable, even heavily foreshadowed, but it still hurt to see. These people? They matter less to me than saving all the characters I already know, people who may have to be sacrificed later in order to protect these Unknowns now. It's no contest. This is obviously very much a question of perspective—Harper made a good point in saying it's like them at Mt. Weather, because Jaha then wanted to do essentially what Miller and Monty wanted to do in 4x02, which is to say sacrifice a few of his own to save the many, and I thought that Jaha was objectively wrong in that instance. (Part of that is that the narrative later proved him wrong: almost all of his merry band of cultists died on the journey to the CoL. But even up front, the idea of sacrificing the main characters is untenable within the story, so he was automatically wrong.) But it's the narrative's job to shape the perspective, and it has a lot of power to make an issue morally gray or clear black and white. I don't think the narrative did its job in this instance.

I'm still not sure I'm doing a good job explaining (or defending) my lack of emotional response here. Basically, I felt like the Farm Station story, like the intro with Ilian, and like the Kabby stuff as well, was paint-by-numbers. It was 'okay let's get this done, one two three, all the bases touched, story complete.' Rote. It didn't have the nuance of the show at its best, like the last episodes of Season 2 or even the Clarke and Jaha convo in this very episode.

I did like the scene where Monty confronts his father's killer, first because of Bryan's line about this being "Monty's kill" because it speaks to how he lived for four months during the S2-S3 hiatus and that interests me, but also because I thought that scene was spot on for how I see Monty. He is ruthless in a lot of ways but he's not a hands-dirty type. He doesn't hesitate in his moral judgments and as far as we know he doesn't have much of any regrets (I've been annoyed at him not reacting enough to Mt. Weather—maybe he really isn't plagued by guilt about it at all—an interesting possibility but one I still think should be on screen a little). He's very sure of himself. But he's barely even held a firearm (like once in S2 and then a little in S3), I'm pretty sure his only one-on-one kill is his own mother...and that's pretty unusual on this show. (Clarke, Bellamy, Jasper, Octavia, Miller, and Harper, and I'm going to have to assume Bryan, have all killed, sometimes with their bare hands, and/or were consistently using firearms going back to S1.) I definitely would have been surprised to see him axe that Ice Nation fellow in the face. But I also would have been shocked to see Monty show him mercy. I thought that the route they went, having him sentence the man to death without ever touching him, was such a good choice, a powerful moment for real without being out of character.

I feel like I haven't said much of anything about Bellamy....again, wonderful. He is such a great leader with these kids. I think he really walks the line between military-style leader and just straight up Dad. (And yes I thought he was adorable with the small child at the end.) It might be more subtle than last episode, but I still think groundwork is being laid for Bellamy to fully come into his own as a leader, to the same extent that Clarke already (BIZARRELY AND PREMATURELY) has, if not more. Basically what I'm saying is Blake for Chancellor 2018.

I have long headcanoned that Farm Station crashed in Pennsylvania. It's cold and snowy enough to be "Ice Nation" territory; close enough to be reached within a day by Rover, as we saw in 3x01 (and here? IDK how long this episode was supposed to cover but it looked like a pretty short period to me); but far enough away that Pike, Hannah, Bryan, et. al. could easily be lost for 3-4 months without running into our heroes in Virginia. I still think this is a plausible theory but man, those mountains do not look passably Pennsylvanian to me. Not that I'm a Pennsylvanian mountain expert. And not that they shot in Pennsylvania honestly. Anyway my headcanon remains.

I thought the moment with Clarke meeting Riley again was really sweet. It somehow helped more than the Bryan stuff at the Station itself to remind me that these are Sky People—not just poor mistreated human beings but poor mistreated friends and neighbors. Also again this is my favorite society so seeing some more unexpected connections among them was cool. I do hope we see Riley again, not because I care about him yet, but because it's annoying to see someone obviously foregrounded as a New Character to Watch only for them to disappear. Like with Mel in season 2. Ruined expectations are really annoying and not to be confused with "being realistic" or "being shocking."

#the 100 #the 100 spoilers #s4 reactions #clarke griffin #raven reyes #thelonious jaha #monty green #jasper jordan #nathan miller #bryan #bryan the 100 #bellamy blake #spoiler alert grounders boring #occasional shit talking even though i liked a lot of it #the year 2017 #2017: fandom thoughts #2017: the 100 s4

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ifuckekureto · 7 years

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Thoughts

Putting this under a readmore because it got way longer than I intended it to lol. To summarize, it’s my thoughts on some character interpretation in the ONS fandom (not meant as discourse!!!). Sorry in advance for being a bit disorganized.

I feel a bit distanced from the ONS fandom, but I get a general impression that most people dislike Kureto. And just to preface the next few sentences, I of course think it’s completely natural for everyone to have their faves/non-faves and individual interpretations of characters. That’s what being in a fandom is all about! With that being said... well... I think my interpretation of Kureto differs from the rest of the fandom. And I’m probably just being salty, but this does bother me in a sense because: A) I’ll totally admit I’m a Kureto Apologist™ but more importantly B) if you look at Kureto on a superficial level, disliking him is a natural conclusion... but I feel like not many people look beyond the superficial level when it comes to Kureto. I guess it’s not so much that I think their analyses are incorrect, just incomplete.

In one sense, yes, he does bad things - he experimented on a helpless child and killed innocent people in order to activate a magical superweapon. Killing innocents is usually where I draw the line. But Kureto did this not in the name of power, but in the name of humanity. The vampires were planning to destory the JIDA headquarters, and he stopped them in their tracks. Don’t get me wrong, if I was there, I would be slapping Kureto upside the head. I always believe another solution is possible. This theme of finding another solution seemed to be prevalent in the light novels too (though *a bit spoiler-y for LN 7* such efforts seemed to be largely meaningless in the end). But it does raise the question, what would have happened if Kureto hadn’t initiated the ritual? Would the vampires’ assault have been stopped? Would the JIDA still exist? Would our beloved characters still be alive? Kureto also said that the deaths of the soldiers would be an honorable sacrifice. He wanted to respect their lives, though you would think he would have the respect to tell them ahead of time... rip... In a sense, it is a bit odd to me because you would think there would be plenty of soldiers in the JIDA who would willingly sacrifice their lives, making a surprise murder ritual unnecessary. Of course, you have the elements of maintaining top secrecy and some humans being born outside the world of magic who probably don’t have an unflinching loyalty to the Hiiragi. And there are a bunch of other complicated factors that could be a whole post of their own. (Not to mention the mechanisms to keep the plot rolling, haha.) Long story short, Kureto believed he was doing the right thing, and while I vehemently disagree with his methods, it is a bit different to me than a villain. One of my favorite quotes ever comes from the Mass Effect series, and it describes such a situation as part of “the ruthless calculus of war,” with the idea being that you have to make incredibly hard sacrifices here to save countless lives over there.

As for his ambition to take over the other human organizations... Honestly, I’m not sure what to think of this yet. I think I will need to see more of this ambition explained before I can form a proper judgment. My first impression is deeply negative. Kureto... what are you doing... One could say it is coming from Raimeiki, but to be perfectly honest, I don’t think that is necessarily the case. Seeing as the vampires have almost globally domesticated humans, my thought is that Kureto either seeks to upend the current way most other humans live or replace other human resistance organizations that exist due to the JIDA having been the only organization to unlock the Black Demon cursed gear (Kagami confirmed this about the JIDA on Twitter, I think). My guess would be the latter. But that’s the Kureto Apologist™ within me... I actually don’t have a positive outlook on what this ambition will lead to.

Anyways, as for the LNs... God, they fit my headcanons for Kureto almost perfectly. So much I could comment on. In my opinion, he really is a good guy by the end of the 7th LN. But many people seem to leave the LNs with the impression that Kureto really is a bully. I did not get that impression at all, to be perfectly honest, especially since he willingly put up his life as a sacrifice to save the world numerous times (though thankfully, it always worked out in the end). The only thing I can think of is when Kureto was on the phone with Mahiru and discussed the brutal ways in which he would torture Sakae. I actually just messaged a friend about this because I do not have a good memory of this passage. I do remember thinking that Kureto was bluffing, and I think Mahiru said so herself, but I really am not sure about this at all. This could be the Kureto Apologist™ within me, though, so take it with a grain of salt. One day, I’ll find the passage and reread it and update this post.

Well... this is somewhat related to the ideas of the first paragraph (but not to Kureto), but a lot of fans seem dissatisfied with Chapter 53. And yes, this will obviously have Chapter 53 spoilers... So if you haven’t read Chapter 53, just skip this paragraph. But some fans seem to think Narumi was a jerk to Mikaela. I... disgaree. First of all, Mika was involved in the skirmish in which two of his squadmates died. I don’t blame Narumi for being a bit wary of a vampire, especially with a demon poking and prodding around in his heart. Secondly, the issues he raised were extremely valid. If Mika can’t restrain his desire for human blood, they’re going to have a tough time on the battlefield together. But Mika lasted soooooo longggg without tasting human blood, that I’m sure he’d be fine. Narumi probably does not know much about this, though. Mika even had to explain how long he’d lasted without tasting blood. And full-blood vampires aren’t always bloodthirsty, as Chess remarked she was full once after drinking from a human. But again, Narumi wouldn’t know this. Also, as a plot device, Narumi’s questioning of Mika also provided much exposition for the reader in terms of what it really means to forsake humanity and become a vampire. And, at the end of the day, Narumi didn’t come off as particularly hostile to me.

And Seishiro... Haha... honestly, there’s not much in canon to redeem him at this point... Just the cute things like he feels relaxed when fixing his dumb hair or the fact that he loves Star Wars enough to name his dog (he has a dog!!!) after Chewbacca. I do think he will be important, though. Kureto said he would be useful. Which... okay, I really hope Kagami explains more of their relationship because Kureto was a big meanie head to Seishiro :’( I guess the biggest thing about Seishiro is that I saw some discourse in which someone called him a would-be rapist (in reference to LN 2, I think... Idk, I got the English version which combined the first two LNs, so I’m not sure). And... hoo... I just... I mean, obviously, he was attempting to humiliate Sayuri, which is just mean, but I’m not sure that there was really any sexual motivation behind it. Also, they were in a school-sanctioned fight. The Hiiragi family is crazy. But this means to me that it wasn’t just some random incident. It was part of the school’s examinations where students are expected to go all-out. The novel mentions that students have even died in these fights, and deaths were not exactly a rare occurrence. That shows the degree of sanctioned brutality in the fights. I use the word sanctioned here a lot because it really carries across the idea that the school’s environment fueled the circumstances for such a situation to happen. Also, Seishiro is just a dumb insecure 15 year-old trying to get approval from his peers who were egging him on. Not an unfamiliar narrative. I know it sounds like I’m defending Seishiro, but unfortunately, I don’t think I can communicate effectively enough to discuss the other layers to his actions without it coming across this way. Also, since there’s so little information on Seishiro, I have a myriad of complex headcanons about him and his behaviors... so I know that I myself am adding a biased layer to this discussion. Anyways, I just think it would be hard to grow up in a society driven by ambition and be inherently less powerful than your peers. He has probably been overlooked for most of his life, and I think his actions in the LNs are desperate ploys for attention and acknowledgement. Gah, heading into headcanon territory here, I better stop myself now.

Yeah... this had less to do with Kureto than I thought it would... But... one last thing... It seems that a lot of people in the fandom still like Ferid even though he gruesomely murdered children (and I don’t think this is offset by his implications of resurrecting them). But Kureto makes a tactical decision and gets h8 for it? Just sayin’ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Though I actually don’t really care for this argument because I have soooo many double-standards myself that this is actually pretty hypocritical of me haha.

Sorry, this isn’t meant to be discourse! And I’m definitely not hopping off the ONS hype train anytime soon. And this isn’t meant to be a complaint about the fandom. It’s just that I figured I might offer my perspective too since so little seem to share it. Gah. If you read this far, thanks, lol, and feel free to send a message if you want to discuss it further.

#kurethoughts #i didn't proofread this #rip

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