#evidence that if you get me all het up

[halcified]

teru & socialization

i've posted about this before but something ive been thinking about a LOT is mp100's themes of loneliness (and eventual connections). i think this is an aspect of teru's character (in particular) that gets left out because it's not as explicit but i've been wanting to do a deep dive on it for a while and i finally sat down to do it. just a warning, this post is gonna be LONG.

these two panels are from chapter 16 of the manga (which i'm using for my evidence because i. dont want to scrub through the anime LOL). initial sentiment: teru uses his powers to cheat having friends/a good social life and wouldn't have that if he tried earnestly. this is a fair interpretation of the scene. with what we know, at this point of time (as in within the teru-mob fight) teru would not be able to connect with other people earnestly, due to his mindset. which i think is a fair interpretation, HOWEVER:

(from chapter 17 ^^) the first panel shows teru's expression to be strained and the second is visibly unhappy. this puts the first set of panels into a different context, that maybe underneath all of this, teru doesn't WANT any of this life that he's built. keep in mind that i'm analyzing this with teru's possible autistic tendencies in mind & you dont have to believe he's autistic, im not your dad, but i do find this a pretty meaningful indication of masking if he were

(note: yes, the strain can definitely be read as comp-het, and i would agree but that's not relevant so go read this post on that instead)

even if the rest of these panels show teru content with his life, i think these expressions are pretty vital to how we read his life especially because we know so little of it. think about it, if you were a kid desperate for affection because you couldn't get it anywhere else, especially not in a way that would come off as "mature" or "unaffected", wouldn't you also look for validation in your popularity? even if it aligned you with people who you consider fundamentally different to you? my point here is that teru can't not stand out-- it's in his nature-- and we are shown how he tries to blend in & receive attention in the only way possible to him; which is to say that he molds himself into something that is palatable, likeable, and superior to other people. if he's nothing, like mob, he has spent his entire life covering up for it. if he fails socially, like mob, he has to be good at everything (even if he cheats to do so) so that everyone else can look past it.

(side note for my teru angst enjoyers: this is a panel of his mom. the mom who he hasn't seen in years. doesn't it make sense that, if he hasn't heard his mom say he's proud of him for literal years, that he would overachieve in response? not related to the autism thing i just have the teru bug. also don't be misogynistic in my notes both his parents suck we just get a singular mention of his mom)

so if teru couldn't meaningfully have friends before mob, that could very easily be because of his past mindset, right?

...except, we don't.. really... see him make other friends afterwards.

but, the awakening lab, right?

(ok i lied to you sorry there is one anime screenshot and thats because it stood out to me while i rewatched it earlier this month. sorry.) id like to bring attention to this screenshot during the cultural festival because the awakening lab can definitely be seen as a direct contradiction of this and i'd like to point out a couple things:

1) in this scene the shiratori brothers are in another room 2) them and the other three are friends with ritsu (or at least close enough acquaintances to want to see him).

considering this is one of the only times they appear together for Fun i am more inclined to believe this is an encounter where they went together because they all would've gone separately anyway. this isn't to discount the possible bond that these characters might have, but thats the thing. we... aren't really shown that they're friends and enjoy spending time together outside of this screenshot, where two out of six of the members are not even present. not to mention that teru is still placing himself in a role separate from his peers. despite stripping the superiority away, teru is still the awakening lab's mentor, not friend. teru still views himself as fundamentally different in a context where his psychic powers don't make him that way.

...except with mob. i bring this placement of power up because where he is the awakening lab's mentor, teru declares mob to be his rival, or, in other words, teru is just like him. he is accepting that mob and him are the same. (and if we view mob from an autistic lens... so on and so forth)

as if to hammer in that point even further-- in the summer vacation omake, teru explicitly states that "summer break is just a super long, super boring stretch of alone time." i'm not sure of the timeline here, but guessing from the hair, we're at least post season 1. which gives us explicit confirmation here that teru is spending the break alone despite his relationship to the awakening lab. his connection to mob is a lifeline here because mob is one of the only people who can intuitively understand teru's isolation without judgment

(also, on that point of teru's autistic tendencies: teru does and says a LOT of things that would raise other peoples eyebrows and doesn't seem to notice.

here we get teru actively admitting to his home life, right in front of reigen, WHO COULD CALL CHILD SERVICES ON HIM? this genuinely made me rethink this character entirely. teru's filter is... minimal. he isn't constantly volunteering information and generally minds his own business, but if you ask? Well.

teru is a social person, but to say he is proficient in understanding social situations seems... wrong. teru views his loneliness as boring because, despite being fairly open, does not actually allow himself to think about his own feelings and how they affect him. this loneliness is boring because he doesn't have enough of a reference to realize its not

if we are taking pre-mob teru to be a version of himself who is masking, or at the very least someone who is faking a lot of stuff in a less autistic sense, the fight with mob changes teru to the point where he no longer hides himself. in the same way that mob was able to shake teru's fragile superiority complex i think the change in appearance marks the end of the self teru had built up. from this point on we see him become a lot more... Him. his appearance and his fashion choices are, presumably, completely normal to him and we get no indication that he believes otherwise despite the reactions it gets-- which is... well, i wouldn't be writing this post if i thought it was one of his most neurotypical traits.

in fact, he seems... pretty oblivious to what other people think of him. which is an interesting distinction to make considering the intelligence we Know he possesses (which is not to say that you are unintelligent if you don't pick up on social cues, just that its common for media to depict it that way.) these traits are made pointedly, even if unintentionally, separate, ESPECIALLY when you note the amount of characters who Do ruminate on or stare at teru's appearance.

some examples. i don't even think this is all of it-- case in point.)

#mp100 #mob psycho 100 #mp100 meta #mp100 analysis #teruki hanazawa #fun fact this post was originally going to be about terus autistic traits and then i got scared sorry #mostly bc i was pointing out stuff that made me go Hes just like me Frrrr... #and i dont actually know if thats a good metric bc im only like 90% sure im autistic #tho i think writing 1000+ words on a characters potential autism is. um. its. well. #text #ok ive gone back and forth on posting this a billion times bc ive looked at it too much JUST READ THEPOST

[eleemosynecdoche]

Okay. Oil fire serious posting, huh? Now my friend @rlyehtaxidermist is a patient, forbearing soul, and I've been known to get a little hot under the collar at times. The language may get spicy. You have been warned.

Anyways, there are people apparently trying to do some kind of shipping war over this interpretation of Touhou 19 and of Sanae and Tsukasa. They level three basic charges- that there's no support for it, that it's a shallow sex ship, and that Tsukasa is obviously manipulating Sanae. Let's take it from the top.

1. No Evidence, Not Canon

Well, I could go and take screenshots and get the Japanese text and screenies of confirmed "sex isn't real in Touhou" people trying to puzzle out the parts of the Japanese text where Sanae and Tsukasa use very familiar language with each other. But I won't.

Why does it matter? Like, take it as a given that this is the case, that this ship is created from nothing. What would that mean? That people need to stop talking about it? Or restrict their posting about it to some kind of space for non-canon shipping? Is that reasonable?

Look, shipping characters on the basis of them being in adjacent stages has a history in Touhou. Some of them, like Parsee/Yuugi, got ZUN offering some support for it much later, through indirect means. Others, like Nitori/Hina, are kind of unpopular nowadays. People still make art and comics and doujin novels for those unpopular ships based on proximity. And why shouldn't they?

Some of my favorite doujin works- Ōkawa Bkub's "Charm" series, ALISON Airlines's drug-themed and mind-expanding works, Komaku Jūshoku's Ran-chama shorts- are far outside the boundaries of what ZUN produces. I think it's good that people take what ZUN puts down and run with it. I think that's a much healthier way to creatively engage with an artistic work you enjoy. It also gave us Higurashi When They Cry, Umineko When They Cry, Undertale and Deltarune, and other independent works where the influence isn't quite as obvious.

Anyways, all that freedom brings with it people being allowed to ship in ways you think aren't canonically supported, as part of being able to creatively reinterpret the work they're engaging with.

2. It's A Shallow Sex Ship!

Now let's be fucking clear here- what people are implying by this is pretty clearly "You're using this shipping to get off!"

Look. Do you really think that people are likely to be getting off to the idea of sex that's unglamorous and kinda mediocre, a bit awkward? If there is some kind of fetishist of that kind posting about SanaKasa, I'll buy them a drink to salute their extremely broad and abstract sexuality, which would be quite rare indeed.

I'm being mean. The more likely thought process here is that social assumptions around whether anyone would use direct and somewhat crude language about weird sex without being aroused at that moment or being some kind of perpetually-horny sex pervert are shaping how people react to seeing posts where a foxgirl's tail is used as a proxy for her having an erection.

So set that aside. I'm gonna talk about why the sex posts are meaningful to me personally.

I'm not an old hand of Touhou fandom, I came to it as a grown adult with the period between Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom and Hidden Star in Four Seasons as my entry point. But what I learned very quickly is that there's a lot of Touhou stuff, posting, art, comics, fanfics, where people offer up sexual content that I find deeply unappealing (mostly because it's dull, het, and not infrequently invokes sexual violence). And then, eventually, I realized that there was a kind of reaction to this state of affairs.

This was the sense that Touhou fandom was divided into bad sexual stuff and good desexualized stuff. And sexual stuff from a lesbian or WLW perspective was lumped in as part of the bad, with an assumption it was made for men too. And so if you wanted to enjoy the lesbian overtones of Touhou, the Touhous better not be having sex!

This is in turn correlated, I think, with the sense of Touhou as the whimsical side of the "cute girls having tea parties" media metaconcept. All of this ties really heavily into a broader social understanding of sexual desires between women, between nonbinary people, (or even between men much of the time) as intrinsically predatory and needing to be desexualized to be acceptable.

But Touhou isn't a series about cute girls doing cute things at tea parties in the text. In the games, it's a bunch of rude women threatening each other with violence in erudite ways, then engaging in elegant examples of that violence, and finally going drinking together. There's intrinsic sexual tension to all of that. It's people flirting with each other, showing off their stuff, and then getting to know each other at a bar.

Touhou's gotten more explicit about the sexual side of things. Tsukasa, who's drawn with what are instantly recognizable as sexually charged expressions, lidded eyes and insouciant gestures, whose outfit loosely resembles both short pajamas and a romper dress with the skirt cut away to show off the built-in bloomers, is a noteworthy chunk of that, and then she gets treated both in the fandom and in UDoaLG by powerful beast youkai as, essentially, a born slut.

But the sexual aspects have been there since Perfect Cherry Blossom at the latest. The implicit flirtatiousness, the women with extremely close relationships. So what talking about Tsukasa having bad sex and falling in love means to me is a couple of things- it's an acknowledgement that sex is going on. It's also a way to engage with Tsukasa as a character who's engaged in what is only barely subtextually survival sex work, and offer up the possibility of love in a very normal and unglamorous sense, for Tsukasa to be sexual and yet loved and fully worthy of love.

Making them both transfem or transfeminine-coded (i.e. Tsukasa probably didn't transition, but her penis is still effectively a trans woman's rather than that of a cis woman who shapeshifted in terms of how characters understand her position and body) is in turn an extension of that, of how trans women's bodies are fetishized (especially in sex work). And taking these bodies we, as a group of people, have, and treating them as sexual, but in a more naturalistic way yet playful way. And so for me it's just a matter of being truthful- this is describing the situation in terms of the world as I know it, within certain specific boundaries of Touhou I like to use.

This humongous nerd can have a loving, fulfilling relationship while not being good at sex and having to figure that out. This poor little kon kon can be loved without it being transactional, without having to try and become purified and sweet and "More tea, Miss Sanae?" Even bad girls (in several senses) can love and be loved. If you're gay enough with your cringe girlfriend, a miracle will happen.

All of this is of course my hyperprecise sexual fetish. Every last word of it.

3. All According To Tsukasa's Keikaku

"Tsukasa's just manipulating Sanae!"

Why is it important that Tsukasa be an undefeatable schemer and manipulator?

Let me put it this way. If Tsukasa can manipulate everyone equally well because everyone has weaknesses in their heart or whatever, that's blandly cynical. It makes her out to be some kind of overwhelming malevolence. If Tsukasa is really really good at manipulating powerful, perceptive, and forceful women, but completely unable to affect naive, slightly gullible, says exactly what she's thinking Sanae beyond marginally? That's funny! The one person that should be a cream puff to manipulate is beyond manipulation!

It's thematic! Someone who's open and honest and not trying to manipulate other people can't be manipulated in turn, because she's rejecting the game. It's relevant to Tsukasa's character! UDoaLG makes it clear that tube foxes are despised, that they're seen as weak and unable to fight like real women do. Tsukasa has to manipulate people because it's her only way to keep from being crushed, or so she thinks, because she's immersed in that reality.

Sanae isn't manipulatable, but also doesn't really try to crush her. Sanae offers a relationship between equals, even if they have different power levels.

It even plays into neurodivergence and mental illness- think of Tsukasa as someone unsure if she's manipulating people or not. Sanae being autistic and not manipulatable provides a reassurance that she's capable of doing better.

None of which means she's going to start being a saint or even a decent person, just that she's an awful person whose awfulness is hard to separate from her situation, but she can be in a better situation without having to become good first. She can stay malicious and kinda sucky and we know she's doing it on purpose now! We can say, "you are yucky disgusting, babygirl" and squeeze her into a Pringles tube without guilt. With minimal guilt.

Also, abilities are self-declared and Tsukasa's method of manipulating the other polycule members in Unconnected Marketeers mostly seemed to be encouraging them to do what they wanted to do already. Similarly, she can manipulate Aun in UDoaLG by playing on Aun's desire to be helpful and the dangers of the situation, but Aun also knows it's safe because her other body is back at the shrine. She's not, frankly, massively strong. In demonstrated "power levels" she's a step below Yachie "failgirl" Kicchou. Think about that.

Made it all the way to the end? Congratulations! Imagine a Touhou ending slide where I'm (whatever you think I look like) holding up Tsukasa and Sanae sock puppets.

#touhou #th19 spoilers #oil fire meta #tsukasa kudamaki #sanae kochiya #monstrously large posts

[lurkingshan]

Japanese QL Corner

ICYMI: There are so many Japanese qls airing weekly, so I’m going to start posting this little round up at the end of each week. All but one of these are on Gaga and I highly recommend watching!

Tsukuritai Onna to Tabetai Onna 2

This beautiful show ended last week and I have been deep in my feelings about it. I already wrote a little love letter to the show, and I wanted to share a few others people wrote this week so you can see why it means so much to us. A tiny meta round up:

Final stray thoughts by @bengiyo

Goodbye and thanks for all the love by @littleragondin

Tsukutabe is truly something by @fangirlyness

TsukuTabe S2 is Perfection by @twig-tea

Love is Better the Second Time Around

Oh I like this one very much. These six episode dramas with simple and well-executed narratives seem to be a particular sweet spot for Japan, and it looks like this one is next in line to continue that trend. A very mature feeling story about two high school sweethearts who meet again as adults and reconnect. Iwanaga is a new fav. I love his confidence, I am concerned about Miyata's apparent self-denial and closeted status, I love the natural magnetism between them, I am intrigued by the complication of both of them having a past and other lovers, and I am very excited to see where this story goes.

My Strawberry Film

This show seems to be a continuation of Drama Shower shows that are not actually bl. Because right now, this feels like Ryo's coming of age story where he survives his first experience of falling for his het friend, not a romance between him and Hikaru. Hikaru clearly loves him, but very much not like that, and we are mostly watching Chika be sad watching Ryo be sad watching Hikaru pursue a girl. The way this is set up doesn’t make me root for Ryo and Hikaru to get together, but rather for Ryo and Chika to become besties and for Ryo to move on from this het boy who won’t ever like him like that.

Sukiyanen Kedo Do Yara ka

Sigh. Remember when his show started and we were excited to have a romance between mature adults? Well, the mature adults have left the building, and all we get instead is these two flailing around spending all their time stressing about the future and failing to enjoy the present, communicating very poorly, and giving up at the first sign of a problem without an easy solution. At this point I don't even want them to get back together, because I have seen no evidence they are good for each other. Sakae seems nervous all the time in this relationship, Soga is so preoccupied with trying to please Sakae that he's not thinking about what he really wants, and neither of them are treating the other like a true partner or trying to work through things together. I'm sure they will get back together in the finale, but they’ve already lost me.

#japanese ql corner #tsukuritai onna to tabetai onna #she loves to cook and she loves to eat #love is better the second time around #my strawberry film #sukiyanen kedo do yaro ka #japanese bl #japanese gl

[tetsunabouquet]

House Of Anubis: How the OG Dutch/Belgium show was butchered in its adaptation by Nickelodeon Part 1: Mick & Fabian

Given ATLA and Percy Jackson have gotten butchered again, I have decided to finally open my mouth about my favorite children's tv show: Het Huis Anubis. I am making this in several parts, because god this show was done dirty by Nickelodeon- especially the English adaptation. Today, we will go over exhibit A, Mick and Fabian and how they as individuals were butchered and their bromance was scrapped - all due to Nickelodeon's homophobia because OG Fabian's actor, Lucien van Geffen, came out as a gay man after the show ended. 1. Let's start with the most obvious thing: the boys appearance. Fabian is way cuter and way less nerdy looking in the English adaptation. The dude became Prom King for crying out loud. In the OG, whilst Fabian was cute, he was so in an overtly nerdy way and the idea of him becoming Prom King at all would have been an obvious prank. Mick was the dumb jock, the pretty boy of the cast who got played by a model. As a bisexual, this was the show that would get me bi-panicking because of Mick and Nienke (Nina in the English adaptation). 2. The aforementioned stereotyping was actually part of what made the bromance work. Because stereotypes are easier to understand for younger children and their contrasting stereotypes were written in such a beautiful way as they saw each other's value. Because in the OG, Mick has a lot of things going for him and he has a heart of gold but he has a dream he cannot accomplish being the dumb pretty boy he is but Fabian can. Because in the OG, Mick has a blind younger sister that he would like to cure more then anything but knows he's too dumb for medicine school unlike Fabian. He also knows Fabian is more courageous then he is and sees him as someone with lots of valuable traits whereas Fabian values Mick's loyalty and good, friendly nature as one of the show's primary himbo's. Their stereotypes allowed kids to understand each stereotype came with valuable traits. It's okay if you're a nerd or a jock. 3. MICK NEVER LEFT. Mick always remained the ignorant himbo walking around the house as his friends were busy dealing with cults. He was the breath of fresh air that brought normalcy throughout the show with his romance drama. Though he was ignorant of what they were doing, it's not like Mick was 100% oblivious throughout the entire show. For crying out loud Fabian had to fake his death at one point, with no one knowing he was still alive. Who was the one Fabian went to so he could say he was still alive? Mick. Really, a secret handshake is in no way on the same level as only telling your best friend you are still alive. 4. Which brings me to another character that never left: Nienke! Unlike her English counterpart Nina, Nienke remained as the leader of the Sibuna gang throughout the show with Fabian being the healthy kind of boyfriend who never felt like he had to take leadership away from her or anything. I swear in regards to Fabian in the English adaptation, they tried to hard to make a more alpha male version of Fabian. He's hotter, he gets more girls, he gets to be the leader and more. There is literal evidence they had toxic masculinity in mind: its Fabian falling to the sin of Pride in the show. Whilst the English adaptation was only faithful to the first season, the 7 deadly sins do show up in the first Anubis movie where Nienke is kidnapped by the antagonist. OG Fabian is literally the first person to win from all 7 deadly sins with the sin he ALMOST succumbs to being wrath as his friends and Nienke were about to die. Fabian was the virtuous knight in that movie and they actively made him more prideful in the English adaptation. Why would they change his relationship with Nienke and things like this, if it wasn't to make Fabian seem more masculine and whatnot because Lucien being gay emasculates Fabian in the eyes of Nickelodeon. For fuck's sake, Lucien was literally chosing to stay in the closet during the show because the ship was HUGE. He didn't wanted to break all of the little children's hearts by saying he was gay. Lucien was gracious 100%!

#tetsutalk #house of anubis #het huis anubis #anubis #fabian rutter #fabian ruitenburg #mick campbell #mick zeelenberg #mickbian #nina martin #nienke martins #nickelodeon #homophobia #Lucien van Geffen #Youtube #Mick's eulogy and how he makes Fabian promise not to go away ever again is just-

[saintsenara]

Hey, I've been enjoying going through your takes on various hp ships, and I haven't seen this one. Did I miss it? What do you think of Ginny/Luna??

thank you very much for the ask, anons!

i've hinted at my views on linny in various places, but they don't yet have a dedicated post. so let's rectify that...

while i have a lot of time for the idea of both ginny and luna as queer, i'm sorry to say that linny is a victim of my general view when it comes to luna-centric pairings: that fics in which it's presented as something which works depend on the presence of fanon!luna, who is a beautiful clairvoyant ray-of-sunshine, rather than canon!luna, who is a stubborn conspiracist with the vibes of a golden retriever which can speak.

i don't doubt that ginny is incredibly fond of luna - nor that luna's positive characteristics [like her resilience, loyalty, kindness, and courage] must have been an enormous comfort to her while they're stuck at hogwarts with snape and the carrows - but her fondness always reads as the same sort of fondness you might have for a friend's precocious toddler. it's nice eye-rolling, but it's eye-rolling nonetheless.

which i think adds a slightly condescending element to their relationship which often gets left out of its portrayals in fanfiction, in both the platonic and the romantic sense. ginny and luna become closer just as ginny approaches her hot girl era [and, may i say, the implication of canon is that they're barely acquaintances prior to order of the phoenix, rather than childhood friends], and ginny's interest in keeping her around is evidently rooted in the fact that she views luna as unthreatening - her making luna take harry to ravenclaw tower in deathly hallows instead of cho always sends me, because she basically says "luna, you're unfuckable" and luna jumps up like "right you are!" - to her during her teenage peak. it's not exactly giving "christ, i think you're gorgeous"...

except, of course, that this doesn't matter in the slightest because this is fanfiction - the entire point is for two characters to be shoved together and made to realise they think the other is beautiful! i am perfectly amenable to the idea that linny can be written in which ginny and luna like and respect and are fucking obsessed with each other and which also feels coherent to both of their canon characterisations - and i love that for anyone who's a fan of the ship.

i just don't entirely think i am...

[there's also the... slightly discourse-y point, which is that linny often feels thrown into fics as a secondary ship as a way to enable a harry-centric slash pairing in a way which doesn't require the author to think about unravelling harry and ginny's canonical relationship.]

[i don't think there's anything wrong with this, per se - i break hinny up all the time, authors should be free to do whatever the fuck they want with their stories, not all fics need to do a completely canon-coherent wrangling with the canon couples they're breaking up in order to have their blorbos kiss, and i am increasingly uncomfortable with how some of the discussion i've seen recently pushing back, rightfully, on the misogynistic treatment of female characters in slash subfandoms is starting to sound a lot like "our canon het is pure and good and their non-canon slash is incomprehensible and wrong".]

[but i do nonetheless think it's worth being aware of a fandom tendency to make femslash relationships a throwaway line in order to enable m/m slash ones - and to think about how just smashing two female characters together without exploring how the relationship would align with their canon personalities doesn't necessarily help...]

#asks answered #asenora's opinions on ships #linny #luna lovegood #ginny weasley

[most-canon-non-canon-ship-poll]

they are so cringe

Why Kataang is shit - a submission-based essay

Kataang - a canon het ship from the Avatar: the Last Airbender and Legend of Korra fandoms between Katara and Aang

Do you fancy your babysitter? Does she not like you back? Don't worry, if you kiss her without her consent enough times, eventually she'll come around! Throughout the show, Katara is cooks, cleans, does general chores on behalf of the group, including Aang. She is also primarily responsible for talking him down from fits of wrath (understandable fits of wrath: he's a traumatised 12 year old with godlike powers) and putting herself in harms way in order to calm him. He's also incredibly dismissive of her culture at times, and disregards her feelings when they don't align with his view of the world. SPEAKING OF WHICH he completely ignores her when she explicitely says that she does not want to talk about his feelings for her, and then kisses her without her consent (again). He not only never apologieses for this, but it is never brought up again! She just wanders over him after the battle is finished and kisses him and THAT'S THAT I GUESS?!?!?!!! THEN we get into post-canon stuff. The main cast are really out there doing the most: founding cities, ruling nations, etc... with the exception of Katara. What is Katara in the future? The Katara who was the first woman to be trained in combat-bending by the Masters of the North simply because she Would Not Shut Up until they trained her? The Katara who said she would never turn her back on people who need her? That Katara? She's a wife and mother now and that keeps her very busy. To be honest I haven't read most of the comics because they're famously awful and even Kataang fans don't like a lot of them. it's offensive when a female character exists only as a trophy for the main guy to win, but it's doubly insulting when that female character has so many layers and so much complexity, only to turn into the shiny trophy with no autonomy when she kisses the hero like some kind of awful reverse Princess and the Frog. FURTHERMORE if you look at Katara's utlisation (or lack thereof) in The Legend of Korra, she doesn't do anything!! Of the Gaang members who are still alive, she's the only one who never gets involved in the adventures, which considering that the plot of Season 1 hinges around a water-bender specific power that she has a personal connection to (and even the in the FLASHBACKS to 40 years previously she does not appear). It's very funny to me because a lot of Kataang fans will say "oh Katara did keep working as an adult, she got bloodbending banned!!" and this is brought out as that one thing she did, yet IN A WHOLE SEASON ABOUT BLOODBENDING she does absolutely nothing besides being unable to heal Korra, so that Aang's spirit has to turn up and do it for her. Then Season 2 is about the Water Tribes and involves the hostile takeover of the city in which she lives, but apparently she's not keen on getting involved in that either!! And look, I can't PROVE that this is directly linked to the ship, but it sure looks suspicious to me when taken with previous evidence. And don't even get me started on the fans holy hell. Like, it's perfectly fine to have ships with problematic elements (don't we all) but they truly will bend over BACKWARDS to say that there's nothing wrong with the ship OR the way it went down in canon and that they're the Pure and Wholesome ship, standing in opposition to the Evil Colonizing Zutaras. Even suggesting that hey, might it have been better if they'd taken some time apart to really grow as individuals and then gotten together in their twenties---instead of at 12 and 14 without ever fixing the mother/child dynamic or talking about the time he sexually assaulted her---will be met with outright hosility by certain members of the fandom.

#anti kataang #avatar the last airbender #adding a tad more in the tags cause word limits: #The 12/14 thing also just skeeves me out like... what 14 year old girl has ever been romantically interested in a 12 year old boy?? Those a #the (s)hit list #propaganda #not a poll #why [ship name] is shit #also i got rid of the stuff abt the comics so i could fit it in one post

[dirkification]

I know I talk about this sort of thing a lot on here, but...

What makes "fandom drama" worthy of extensive documentation and coverage vs that being considered weird stalker hoarding screenshots for drama/shit stirring?

I'm still reading through the tale of Msscribe and *that* included publicizing IPs to try to prove she had multiple sockpuppets and was even fabricating her own harassment. And her defenders at the time said that even the attempt to publish IPs was creepy stalker behavior along with all the other "defamation."

I haven't gotten to the big Cassandra Clare controversy deep dive, but I know part of that is because she published books. Then the "who owns het omegaverse" drama is widely documented because it's a lawsuit.

Lindsay Ellis covering that got her sent some unactionable legal threats herself. Which brings me to the Homestuck fandom (these sorts of things will *always* bring me to the homestuck fandom) in which Sarah Z got legal threats for just *mentioning* the Kickstarter kerfuffle and linking to Gio's blog.

Which maybe that doesn't count since it involved the actual creators/staff and not strictly by fans between fans?

Maybe once I'm done with the Msscribe stuff I will see that the point was to prove that Msscribe did a bunch of shit to manufacture her own popularity and some of her harrassment, so the end goal isn't strict documentation but to collect evidence to draw a specific conclusion. Or, at the very least, let readers look over the provided information and have their own thoughts.

Are we missing out by not documenting other big fandom happenings? What qualifies as "big"? What can we do to ensure preserving information remains separate from a list of receipts or a callout post, especially if it primarily involves one or two people? Is there a distinction outside of how the information gets used, which you can't control as soon as you publish it?

Obviously I think there is some merit to documenting Homestuck fandom... Drama? Occurances? And not just for my own personal satisfaction, but because there are so many things I and other Homestuck readers miss out on by not having been active in the fandom while the comic was ongoing, especially since the forum is gone AND now that there won't be any more book commentary. Homestuck was in constant conversation with the fandom. There's the obvious early prompt-based happenings of the first few acts and how the kids got named, but there's also lesser known trivia like how Tavros is in a wheelchair because fans theorized he was in a wheelchair.

But it's not just Homestuck.

I think having a clear account of the Voltron fandom's shipwars would be really interesting and valuable since, from my perspective, it helped kick off the "antiship" culture that dominates every fandom space today, not even mentioning how the fairly new ability to yell at individual Voltron staff was particularly terrible.

Then there's the various cults of personality that pop up in fandoms. Homestuck had its fair share, for sure, and I think Steven Universe critics had one or two. I'm kinda talking out my ass and going based on vague things I remember, but to me that's all the more reason to preserve "fandom drama".

But how do we figure out what to preserve? How do we differentiate genuine archival attempts or things that need to be brought together to give full context from veiled harassment and stalking?

#jax yacks #fandom meta #fandom culture #fandom history #msscribe #cassandra clare #voltron #homestuck #steven universe #omegaverse lawsuit

[geddy-leesbian]

why the Darkside Chronicles RE2 retelling feels like comp het Leon propaganda to me

disclaimer: not trying to start any sort of discourse here and imply this is the correct take. This is just my own personal headcanon, heavily influenced by my own life experiences, you believe whatever you want about Leon's sexuality.

also it's been a hot minute since I've played Darkside Chronicles and there's no convenient script of the whole game I could use to brush up on so it isn't as fresh in my mind as I'd like, but I'm just cranking this out now anyway

A key aspect of comp het crushes is them seeming unattainable. An actual real boy (for this opening part I'm drawing on my experiences as a lesbian, not getting to Leon yet) at school? Not a good comp het crush, because there's a real chance of them liking you back, and that's Scary. A celebrity? Almost perfect. Extremely unlikely to ever actually meet him, so they're a safe crush you can talk about and use as evidence you do like the gender you're supposed to, while feeling safe because you won't actually have to interact with him romantically.

A fictional character? Even better than a celebrity! Perfect! See, Heather, you do like boys, look at all these fictional men you're crushing on! You daydream about kissing them and going on dates with them, you're totally attracted to men! Just keep liking the fictional boys and not the ones at school, so you don't have to actually act on attraction, because that's Scary for Reasons.

Now moving on to Leon:

One of the main reasons I love Darkside Chronicles and consider it my favorite RE2 is that Leon and Claire don't split up, instead being together for the vast majority of the plot. And the way Leon still shows no romantic interest in Claire, instead wanting to chase after Ada, feels incredibly comp het to me. Of course you can just see it as Leon simply not being attracted to Claire but genuinely attracted to Ada for whatever reason, but again, to me it really screams comp het.

Claire is not a suitable comp het crush. Leon is spending large amounts of time with her. Nothing about her is sketchy, she seems like a good person. She seems like she might be attracted to Leon too, so HIT THE FUCKING BRAKES. Leon can't convince himself to have a crush on Claire, because it isn't safe. Claire might like him back, and it's a lot harder to convince yourself you're attracted to someone when things get real and you're actually dating the person. You get physical with them, talk about mushy stuff like feelings, and you feel nothing at best or feel uncomfortable at worst. Safe unattainable comp het crushes are useful because you can tell yourself that you would enjoy all those things with the opposite sex, but only the right person. You convince yourself someone unattainable is the right person, so that you never have to confront the reality that there is no right opposite sex person.

Ada is suspicious and shows zero interest in Leon. He's even got Claire pointing out that she's sketchy and they shouldn't go after her, but Leon insists because she's a good comp het candidate. Leon can convince himself that he's in love with Ada, love at first sight, and that's why he's not interested in Claire, the person he's actually bonding with. He's just falling too hard for Ada. And it's safe to like Ada. She's not interested. She's suspicious and running off trying to do her own thing. Leon can try to chase her down to prove to himself he really likes her, and he won't have that delusion shattered because she won't reciprocate and make him face the hard reality that he feels uncomfortable doing romantic things with the person he's supposedly in love with. And Ada is never going to want to settle down and have kids with him, so he can convince himself he wants that so he can feel normal, without feeling uncomfortable because it'll never actually happen.

Then the scene where Ada kisses Leon while faking her death. Despite the fact there's real physical contact, it's really an optimal comp het scenario. She's dramatically "dying" in his arms, says something about barely knowing him but knowing he'd say that, and then kisses him before "dying." If he felt uncomfortable with the kiss, it's easily explained away. It was such a traumatic situation, of course he's not going to enjoy kissing. If only Ada had lived so they could have escaped together and had a happier moment for their first kiss, then Leon definitely would have enjoyed it.

And, similarly to this shitpost I made, he gets to keep using her for comp het purposes. Why isn't he attracted to any other women, like he should be? Obviously, it's Ada. She was the love of his life. His soul mate. But she died, and he just can't ever move on, that's why he has no desire to be with anyone else. Boom, he's definitely attracted to women, completely straight.

TL;DR Leon and Claire are together for the vast majority of RE2 and bond more, and Claire also points out the red flags Ada is waving. Objectively it makes sense for him and Claire to have some type of romance going on, but he's still fixated on the person with zero interest he's interacted with significantly less. Because he isn't attracted to women. Pretending to be attracted to Claire would be much harder than pretending he's attracted to Ada.

#leon kennedy #leon s kennedy

[olderthannetfic]

You might get a kick out of this article someone linked me to, to try and argue that BL is in fact fetishizing (because Yada Yada women consume it and produce it and all that)

https://www.youthoutright.org/articles/fetishization-of-the-queer-community

Article is a fairly short read. But I have to chuckle at it as "evidence" since it makes a fair amount of claims with 0 sources:

That young teenage women make up a majority of fandom (and that's whose consuming/producing BL)

Straight, white women get paid more to write gay romance novels (and that these novels often feature Adonis like males with 0% body fat and no body hair; play into gender/hetero norms)

Etc.

Honestly the....article, if I can even call it that, isn't cohesive. I do find myself agreeing with its first two paragraphs...and surprisingly only the first two. However, this article spends a lot of its time focusing on fetishization of Trans bodies and chasers who go after transfolks bodies (which I'm not too familiar with this so if anyone wants to speak up on this point...)

I'm very confused by how someone could read this and think "this proves my point!"

--

Sigh.

I don't even agree with the beginning. Trashy "girl-on-girl" isn't what's making men think women exist to serve them. Society is doing that. Porn is a reflection, not a cause.

Not to mention the fact that f/f-for-dudes is astronomically common compared to shitheads pestering lesbians in bars. The latter are too common because the correct amount is 0, but just based on the numbers, a lot of dudes are capable of consuming this porn without being confused about what's fiction and what's reality.

The mass quantities of f/f-for-dudes do make it hard to find f/f-for-ladies, but this article has taken the wrong message from that. The correct takeaway is that we need better labeling and search features that are driven by the nerdy desire to categorize and not by algorithms that want to sell you stuff.

As long as het romance novels or porno movies for straight guys or bestselling thrillers or whatever are popular, they're going to drown out the algorithmic results for more niche things one is interested in.

Libraries and AO3 don't have this problem. Amazon and Youtube do.

the world of “slash fiction” (fanfiction portraying a romantic and often sexual relationship between characters from a given source) began centering gay men

Wow, article writer. So you know nothing then.

it’s been claimed that straight, white women are paid more than gay men by publishers to write gay romances

I'm honestly embarrassed for this article writer. First, most of this burgeoning field is selfpub anyway. Second, many established writers in the romance field are women, and established names will probably have a shot at better pay than new people.

Third, anyone who injects "white" like this is a moron and a wanker. If we're talking about racism in the Romance field (and boy howdy is there a lot), white gay men are no better, and men's race is just as relevant as women's. Either we're talking about race or we're not.

As it stands, this author just comes across as a misogynist piece of shit.

The overwhelming majority of these romances portray relationships between white, cis, abled men with no fat or body hair.

I have bad news for them about cis gay men's media. (Well, okay, some of that has a lot of body hair and interminable descriptions of the smell of ball sweat and stinky armpits, but still...)

Men who fit the first archetype will take the position of “top” in the numerous, inaccurate, graphic-as-possible sex scenes that are central to these stories and also appear to be central to many readers’ enjoyment.

I see we're in the usual "I, a sex-repulsed person, speak for all of humanity" mode.

People like horny art. News at 11.

These are complex issues deeply rooted in society. It’s difficult to envision mitigations and solutions. However, somewhere to begin would certainly be promoting more positive, intersectional, realistic representations of queer people and queer relationships. A vital action that can further this goal is choosing to consume media with queer representation that was created by queer people whenever possible.

Honestly, my response to this ending is:

Fuck off, you entitled git.

This uninformed little whiner is equating all kinds of unequal things. Chasers are all over the place, but they aren't the ones writing fanfic or any other amateur, personal writing. We have no right to other people's hobby time. Sure, we can vote with our feet, and we should, but this article doesn't really sound like it's advocating that: it sounds like it's crying that other people have different taste from the writer. Boo, hoo, hoo, someone I don't like got attention.

It's the usual ignorant trash.

Embarrassing.

[lord-squiggletits]

Salty Ask List: 1, 5, 14, 22 ?

1.What OTPs in your fandom(s) do you just not get?

Dr/atc/het 100000%... I just don't understand what their chemistry is supposed to be together. It's partially ruined for me by Drift in MTMTE being an absolute mess of a character who got most of his planned plotlines cut or changed, and partially ruined by the fact Drift spends most of MTMTE straight up absent from the story, and then he and Ratchet meet up in Empire of Stone and come back during Dying of the Light and are just...together romantically now? I don't understand how they have any chemistry at all much less romantic lskdjflkds

I know a big one people talk about is "Ratchet saved Drift's life and then told him he believed in him" but... the way their meeting was written didn't come off as particularly romantic to me? Ratchet saved Drift the same way he's saved countless other addicts in the Dead End and then his parting words to Drift were to tell him to go to the Functionists so they could get him a job. Very "pull yourself up by the bootstraps" kind of advice that clearly didn't work since Drift stayed impoverished, his friend got killed by police brutality, he went into the underworld to be a hitman, etc etc. Like yeah in theory it's very romantic for an OTP's first meeting to be one of them saving the other's life and treating the impoverished person kindly for possibly the first time in their life. It's just that that moment in canon doesn't have romantic vibes to me at all, it's just a doctor-patient encounter in which Ratchet is nice to Drift like he's nice to everyone, except it's also kind of condescending/ignorant bc Ratchet basically tells Drift "oh just get a job and get clean and you'll be fine" as if it's that easy to stop being a homeless/jobless drug addict?? If an ER doctor did that shit to me I'd be more likely to see him as an asshole than to admire or like him at all sdklfjsd.

Then Drift was a Decepticon for millions of years, then he joined the Autobots on Earth and like... he and Ratchet sure existed on the same team together dlkfjldsjlkds there were zero interactions of worth b/t them in phase 1, their ship dynamic came entirely from JRO's writing and even then I feel like it's an informed romance more than an organic and believable one.

5. Has fandom ever ruined a pairing for you?

I actually used to like O/Pli/ta when I first came here, but as I stayed longer it became evident that the overwhelming majority of the fan content of it reeks of "we are very sorry for having a heterosexual ship, let us compensate for it by making the woman a Girlboss Xtreme and the man a weak simp so that you can be sure the woman isn't being Oppressed and Stereotyped by being in a heterosexual romantic relationship" which is one of my most detested types of fan content, so now I have the ship tag blocked sldkfjlsdkdskl. Literally it's just the same "the woman is a TOTALLY COMPETENT AND COOL ACTION HERO and her man is a TOTAL SIMP FOR HER" that's interchangeable with most het ships in other fandoms, where there's no actual personality or chemistry for them and instead it's just the same Fandom Approved Heterosexual Relationship Dynamic.

That and a significant amount of content I see for it is just like blatantly ripped off from Me/go/p dslkfjsdfsjl or like, taking the main MOP dynamic and just swapping OP and Elita's places so now Elita is the cool action hero who's rival to Megatron and OP just Exists as an emotional support husband I guess. Or like Elita is made into a daring action hero while Optimus is reduced to a meek little wallflower who's no one of any real importance and just follows in her wake. It reeks of insecurity and unoriginality, as if the fanbase is cripplingly aware that Elita was made to be the Token Girlfriend and instead of just making her a better character and making the romance she's a part of more equal and compelling for both characters, they have to violently overcompensate by having Elita steal OP's role and everything interesting about him. 😂Like I'm begging people to just be normal about hetero ships. You can ship a man and a woman together without having to diminish the man and girlbossify the woman to prove you're a Real Feminist.

14. Unpopular opinion about your fandom?

Continuity soup is boring and for the most parts creates purely fanon plots/ideas/characterizations that have tenuous relationships to actual canon. It's nice that people have the creativity to make their own AUs, but I also want to read about the actual continuity in question and not someone's mishmash of it.

Like UGH when I read a fic tagged IDW1 I want to see cop Orion not archivist or dockworker Orion. When I read a fic tagged IDW1 I want to read about the Senate led by Proteus and the reigns of Nova/Nominus/Sentinel/Zeta, not about the Council from TFP. When I read a fic tagged IDW1 MegOP I want Orion being a simp for Megatron after reading his stuff/meeting him one (1) time sdkflsdkf not yet another iteration of the tired "one day an archivist and a gladiator became great friends! then they broke up."

It's not hate for other continuities, I'm just tired of the fact that continuity soup is so prevalent that even when I'm specifically filtering for content of the one continuity I want to read about, the fics I find keep having random shit from other continuities interjected into it. I think each continuity has really interesting takes on lore that have potential to be wholly unique for each one, so it's really frustrating when the average fic I can find is just a random mishmash of continuity elements, or more often than not just an IDW knockoff taking place in a separate continuity. Like guys, I'm an IDW stan myself, but wouldn't it be cool if we got more fics that explored ideas that only happen in G1, or only happen in Animated, or Aligned, etc?

Doesn't help that when I AM looking specifically for IDW stuff, most of the content I look at (MOP) does continuity soup for the sake of replacing IDW OP with some sort of aligned/g1 lite OP which makes me salty as hell

22. Popular character you hate?

Drift for sure sdklfsdlk. I mean when I first read about him in the comics (the Drift miniseries) I was like, he's fine I guess he's an action hero whatever. But then literally the more of the comics I read the more his personality and story were just incredibly corny, stereotypical, or boring as hell no matter what writer was controlling him. And he got bounced around between writers a lot, and then even the "main author" people know Drift from (JRO) kept changing his plans for what Drift was supposed to be (and cutting plots related to him) so any hints towards a storyline went nowhere. And then Drift spent basically all of MTMTE gone elsewhere on some exile-adventure, and then during LL he just kind of. Is there, existing.

So like, honestly Drift is a victim of getting bounced back and forth and having his writing changed so often he doesn't reach his full potential, which isn't really "his fault" as a character. It just so happens that I also think the bits of his character that exist are either boring or overhyped or in one case (portrayal of his religion/religious worldbuilding in general) outright offensive. He's basically written like some hippie stereotype with vaguely Asian/Japanese flavoring (the extent of which is basically his name + fighting style) and then he barely like... does anything in the plot? I think he's supposed to be like, ~mysterious and shifty~ but then all of the plotlines that involved him being a secret traitor got cut, so Drift basically just became Weirdly Suspicious For No Reason and his genuine personality/motivations felt indistinguishable from what he was faking and what plots got cut from him. Absolute mess of a character that got almost no payoff for any of the things planned for him, and all that's left is some kooky hippie personality of "hee hoo I believe in auras and mystical vibes and magical colors, also I'm dating an atheist who's openly dismissive of most of my religious beliefs (that I do or don't actually believe in depending on what part of the story I'm in) and this somehow doesn't get in the way of our personal/romantic chemistry

But then the fanbase are basically making him some kind of Gary Stue, obsessed with making headcanons like "Deadlock wrote/edited Megatron's speeches for him too!" and "Drift defected from the Decepticons to try and make a point to Megatron!" and generally trying to make him the Decepticons' Specialest Boy Ever and it's just. Ugh I get that he was under-written in canon, but every bit of fanon I've encountered doesn't make him interesting either. They just kind of make Drift the center of the world where he's actually the coolest, most talented and interesting person ever where other characters owe their accomplishments partially to his influence and I'm just. I don't get it, I don't understand the appeal of fanon and I don't even understand the appeal of canon either. I think part of it is for representation reasons (e.g. Asian, lower class, former drug addict) and it's nice that people can pull something meaningful out of the mess that is canon. It's just for me, canon Drift is so mediocre I don't get why anyone would even WANT him as representation sdlkfjsdlkf. I guess fixing what the writers failed to explore the potential of is an understandable motivation though.

#squiggle answers #long post #as far as asian coded tf characters go cyc and WB have mountains more character and meaningful plot imo #plus their depictions of religiousness are way less offensive and actually play more importantly into their characters #like idk am i the only one who thinks most of JRO's worldbuilding re: religion is an absolute joke #it's a combination of multiple antagonists who are religious zealots (not offensive on its own though) #plus very shallowly explored religious beliefs that mainly come up for plot reasons #plus a lot of the religious beliefs that DO come up are like incredibly unimaginative and boring and stereotypical #plus the plot basically being a deconstruction of the entire religion like. sike all of the ppl you worshipped and myths you believed in #were lies. they're all assholes and also cyberutopia doesn't exist #it's just one of those things where in isolation/in theory none of these religion related things are offensive in and of themselves #but when they're all stacked together it comes off as a kind of Reddit Atheist view of religion #where the more religious a character is the more likely they are to be evil or literally insane/mentally ill #and what religion IS represented is portrayed as nothing more than like. paint colors and a few holidays #as if religion is nothing more than an aesthetic as opposed to a whole philosophy/way of life w a lot of htought behind it

[rainbowsky]

Anonymous asked: Hi rainbowsky,I don't know whether I should ask you this or not but it's been bugging me a lot and I can't even sleep last night due to my findings about [emphatically redacted].

With all due respect, Anon, wake up.

That BS is thoroughly debunked, and the (very meagre) 'evidence' is so obviously photoshopped, grasping and fake, that it amazes me anyone could believe it. There is no evidence that the two have ever even met, let alone been in a room together.

These aren't 'rumors', they're anti attacks. They exist for one reason and one reason only: to try to cause harm.

I mean this in the most affectionate way possible, Anon, but you shouldn't be a rube who gets sucked into believing lies spread by antis. Use your head.

I will encourage you do do what I urged people to do regarding another bunch of BS - consider the source. Where did you hear this bullshit, and what is their opinion of the person they're slandering?

Do those people hold any credibility for you?

What seems to motivate them?

What do the things they are saying tell you about what their goals might be? If you follow their claims to their logical conclusion, what would you be led to believe or do? Is that an outcome you want to support?

Why is what they are saying important to you personally, and how do their words change your feelings about GG or DD? How might it change your behavior? What does this tell you about the potential intentions of the speaker?

What assumptions are implied by their words, and how do their words reinforce those assumptions?

How does their approach differ with regard to how they treat their own claims vs how they treat the claims of their opponents? Do you think they are being fair? Honest?

What impact do their words have on others, and how might that impact serve the motives and goals of the speaker?

What isn’t being said? What’s been conveniently left out of the discussion?

Is the speaker artificially limiting the possible explanations for things? What are some other possible perspectives on and explanations for what is being claimed?

I'd also encourage you to check your homophobia, Anon, because it is so utterly homophobic to be more willing to believe hateful things about them than to believe they might be gay.

Some people will completely ignore and disregard the mountains of evidence of a relationship between GG and DD, while immediately believe in the first het rumor they hear. That's heteronormativity at work, and something I encourage you to reflect on.

To be clear: you are under no obligation to believe BJYXSZD, and I encourage you to question it and form your own opinions, but if you're throwing over GGDD in favor of some hateful lies, then I don't know what to tell you, Anon. That's pretty fucked up.

Don't lose sleep over things like this. Do a proper analysis, work on your critical thinking - you'll find that it's all a bunch of BS.

Here is a related post I recommend checking out.

#antis go home #really fake rumors #i'll take homophobia for 800 alex! #ask

[dearweirdme]

I actually think a lot of Taekookers believe it was him in the video, all of the accounts I follow do. Not long after the video went public there was a Twitter space meeting of Taekookers, and some big accounts hosting it and everyone believed it was him and discussed the whole circus starting from that point. No one was using that to drag him, but I've seen so many people try to argue the other side act like it's insulting to him to even suggest he would participate. Well if someone thinks that, that's their problem to work through. If him participating is a show of bad character to you, YOU work through why you think that. Because I don't, and none of the people I know who believe it was him in the video think that. It's a media play. It's a business deal. There is some pretty compelling evidence the companies already had a plan worked up for this particular fake couple years ago. The Paris walk was actually pulled off brilliantly, and then the whole thing got really weird from there and now we know just sort of fizzled out with some "insider" leaking break-up news with Jennie re-signed and Tae enlisting. But if the purpose was to get people talking (they stirred the pot whenever there was some other big news), and to closet Tae it did its job. The walk was also really the extent of Tae's involvement and he seemed uninterested in giving anything more than the bare minimum needed. Taekook_lives who has been mentioned in the comments on posts about this today released a video not long after the Paris video "debunking" it, but she jumped on the "cosplayer" who tried to claim the whole thing immediately. That "cosplayer" was Akio. They run an Instagram account that is still spreading rumors about Tae. I didn't understand why Taekookers were rushing to hype that account up because I looked at it back in May and they were saying they had been hired to film that video to make Tae's other Parisian ex-girlfriend jealous. It was obvious bs. Taekook_lives is an au writer and has almost every sensible Taekooker on Twitter blocked, she's been around for years and there is plenty of misinformation in her videos. If it wasn't clear, I believe it's Tae in that video. I'll allow for the possibility it was filmed some other time, but his manager is wearing the same clothing he was at the airport when they departed from SK. I believe the Elle magazine was the March issue so it would have had to be sometime between March and May, which is funny because of that Taennope account who tweeted in March that a May Paris date was confirmed. Tae is obviously not happy about anything going on there. The walk next to the river is painfully awkward, very robotic from him. He's not even looking at her. It was obviously a set-up. So they only got blurry video of them together, and I noticed Jennie was actually pretty careful and turning her face away from the cam. Then the only HD pictures we get are of them walking separately with their managers wearing the exact same clothing. It's brilliant, and almost every het K-pop shipper uses the same trick. Maybe they learned a little something from them. Anyway I am glad it's over, and I hope Tae knows that he's got so many supporters who love him and are by his side in all this.

Hi anon!

Yeah, I agree. To me it’s logical that it’s Tae.. celebs and their companies just don’t hire stand-ins for these things. It looks like Tae and Jennie to me.. posture, body language, everything. They had opportunity (timing wise). And they had a clear goal. So I’m really not doubting it.

Taekook-lives and all other accounts (including mine) are all fan accounts. We all deal with the same images and info we just all might differ in interpretation. I never go blindly on any account ‘s opinion, because when watching analysis vids I often come across things I personally disagree with. So when someone says to me “this account says that” or ‘twitter says this” I take that with me, but I still make my own judgements. I might be wrong at times, others might be wrong at times, we all can be right at times.. but there’s no-one out there who probably got it all right.

#fandom shenanigans #taennope

[canichangemyblogname]

With about five days left of Pride Month, I want people to keep something in mind going forward: supporting queer rights in the public and political sphere does not mean you have created a safe and welcoming environment for queer people, especially in private spheres.

Glass closet jokes, implying real people can "queerbait," discourse around whether "straights" can be at pride, and comments like "are you sure you're not just a [insert any identity other than queer]" make personal spaces inhospitable to queerness and personal expression.

Glass closet jokes are often made at the expense of people who are gender non-conforming in some fashion. They reinforce stereotypes and gendered norms. People point to "stereotypical behavior" for evidence that they knew you were queer and, in the process, reinforce queerphobic ideas about how queer people act and present themselves. EX 1: me being told, "The closet is glass. I mean, you dress like a lesbian." Explain to me how a lesbian dresses without relying on misogynistic gender norms and lesbophobic stereotypes of queer women. EX 2: my (straight male) friend being told, "You paint your nails? Shit, there's no closet at this point. Just come out, bro." Explain to me how painting nails is gay without using gender norms to police men's self-expression and without resorting to queerphobic stereotypes. People need to do more to unlearn the idea that personal fashion taste is evidence of queerness.

Implying that real people can queerbait also polices self-expression. Real people might be closeted. Real people might be cis het and gender non-conforming. Real people will resist categorization and classification. Real people will not fit perfectly into societal ideas on how a man or woman should dress or present themselves. And real people should not feel pressured to present as the most stereotypical version of their assigned gender or "straightness," lest they be bombarded with people critiquing their choices and spamming their photos with comments that read "egg moment" or "deNile is not just a river in Egypt" or "I know something you don't 🧚‍♀️ 💅." These types of comments are all just repackaged homophobia and transphobia. No one owes you coming out, and no one owes you conformity.

Discourse around whether "straights" can be at pride similarly ignores how some people are closeted and how queer people aren't going to act as how you think queer people "should." Recently, I saw a TikTok video of a pride event where a seemingly well-meaning individual was telling cis het people that they should not be at pride, all while videoing "couples" she assumed were "straight." First, don't video people without their consent. Second, this ignores the fact that there are queer people who date queer people of the opposite gender. For example, m/f bi couples and T4T couples exist. Third, this ignores the fact that there are gender non-conforming trans people. Trans people do not owe you SRS or HRT, or gender conformity. Fourth, this also ignores how there are gender non-conforming people in wLw and mLm relationships who often get mistaken for the opposite sex.

(EDIT: There is a conversation to be had between queer people about how LGBTQ+ safe spaces are becoming popular spots for people who are often offended by queerness or the assumption they might be queer. That conversation does not revolve around what I was critiquing here. That conversation instead revolves around how these are safe spaces, so if you don't like queerness, if queerness makes you uncomfortable, and if you are made uneasy by the assumption you might be queer in a queer space, then leave these spaces alone. I can personally attest that no one is offended by- say- an "ally" [me before I was out] sitting in a gay bar because they are their friends' designated driver.)

"Are you sure" questions straight-up invalidate an individual's identity. When someone "comes out" to you, it's not because they have just made a huge, new revelation about themselves or are possibly still unsure of themselves. Rather, it means they have deemed you safe enough to know about their identity or sexuality. They already knew this about themselves and likely have for some time. There is a good chance others know this about them, too. You are neither the first nor the last person they will tell. I have been asked by cis queers and cis hets alike, "Are you sure you're not just a woman who just hates femininity?" Yes. My gender and sexuality are not a result of what I wear or how "masculine" I am. And who said I hate femininity?

#LGBTQ+ #queer #pride #thank you for coming to my TedTalk

[loser-female]

I think we really start to pay attention to what kind of message are regularly sent to het/bi women on the subject of love, romance etc.

And when I say "pay attention" I mean "also including leftist messages", otherwise the analysis will always be incomplete. And I think this is why no one relates to the "men are dangerous!" Kind of thing.

As I said in a previous post, (I don't really have the time to go search fo the things I'm saying) women are constantly sold four things:

- Romantic relationship are the best achievement one can have;

- Men have changed and "think the patriarchy also harm them";

- Choice is everything that matters;

- 50/50 means equality

And when I wrote "sold" I mean it. Check every "feminist" advice column on the subject: you are sold that you can be an happy housewife with no income, still pay for 50% of the bills because men now are taking on responsibility.

But this isn't the truth. It's not that being an housewife is bad because it's morally wrong, it's bad because by eliminating your financial gain you are making yourself dependent on someone else. And if something happens, divorce (not necessary abuse, I will expand later), death, house on fire etc you will have to return to a career you left 20 years before with no qualifications. And there is nothing that damages you in a work setting like having holes in a resume. I know because due to my disability I have many.

The 50/50 model, that seems to be the default right now, doesn't account for the earning disparity, chore and emotional labour disparity. It just doesn't. And women are kept poor because they have been told that they need to "pay their share" otherwise they are "useless gold diggers", but they don't earn enough to sustain paying 50/50 in the bills, mortgage or loans. And I've seen multiple "stay at home mums" still having to pay "their expenses" with absolutely no income.

Women lack financial education to make correct choices on the matter, and are sold this idea of equality that is in favour of men.

And it's not true that men are taking on responsibility. Some men are, some men always did and maybe the % of men taking at least some chores has been going up, I don't really know. But they also think "women's rights have gone too far". They exploit women's work in the home because "they earn more", so they feel entitled to being take care of and slack the parenting and homemaking, especially if you don't work or earn much less than him, so he needs to pay more.

This is actually how inequality works in 2023. It's not because "women are stupid" or because of romance novels or anyway. Choice feminism told them that men have changed. But they didn't, and at the same time no one addressed the economic disparity in the household, combined with the emotional labour and the homemaking time a woman spend.

I know it sucks to talk about money, no one wants to do that. But once you do the math you really understand how many lies choice feminism has sold, but more important we need to start taking account on the financial oppression of women. Women in the world have much less money than men, which in a capitalist society means less power.

And less power means not being able to leave an abusive situation, because you can't afford it.

Not only that, you have been told that "women are favoured in courts"(not true, men who ask custody even if they have evidence and convinctions of abuse they still get custody). You get told that "abuse is your fault", that "if you open the relationship or watch porn" everything will get over. And it's always someone else.

I know how trauma works and y'all should have heard the sad excuses I made when I contested the definition of trauma on the things that happened to me, not even DV or sexual related.

"but others have it worse!"

"I'm not sure if this actually happened"(it did, I even have proof)

"it's my fault, I am wrong".

And all the lingo. Scratch the surface of "domestic violence awareness" and you will find such excuses. That you know they are excuses, mind you, but you cannot cope with what really happened.

Instead of a thing that's structurally a problem, abuse is treated as something that "happens to others" sporadically, that has nothing to do with women's systematic oppression. And when it happens you cannot believe it, because it always happened to "someone else", not you. And men successfully weaponised "therapy language" to claim they are the ones being abused. And they get believed over any evidence that says otherwise, because guess what, men wrote the laws that men constantly complain about.

I don't have a cool ending, but really, this is what I noticed.

#radical feminists do touch #radical feminists do interact #radfems do touch #radfems do interact #radfem safe #radical feminists safe #gender critical #household disparity #financial abuse #choice feminism #men #ada.txt #relationships

[paintingformike]

I got really curious after one of your latest posts about your thoughts on bi mike vs gay mike. what's your main evidence for bi mike?

personally, I was a bi mike truther until I started my latest st rewatch a week ago. I always thought that mike had a genuine crush on el in season 1 but this time I noticed that mike didn't really show any romantic interest in her until lucas pointed out that mike likes el. before that, it was just mike being his friendly and caring self. and idk, every romantic moment between them seemed so forced to me, like mike was just doing what he thought he was supposed to be doing. and yeah, that whole dialogue before their first kiss was also weird. I haven't started season 3 yet, so maybe there will be some moments that'll show that mike is bi but for now, my only evidence of him being bi is byler/rockie parallels because vickie is clearly meant to be bi. I'm just so confused now, honestly, because I was so sure that mike is bi before this rewatch lol

sorry if some of these sentences don't make sense, my English is really bad...

nooo anon dont worry about your english, you’re perfectly understandable! to me personally i do see them portraying mike having genuine (but shallow) feelings for el via the inherently romantic tropes applied to them in s1-s2 (getting interrupted, the tiny bit of tension between them and all that), but that’s it, and the way i interpreted the painting plotline also makes me believe he had a shallow infatuation for el, but i’ve read a lot of gay mike analyses that have made me reconsider my stances on his sexuality and the byler storyline.

the byler/rockie parallels are also strong evidence of bi mike (and byler getting together in general) but it’s not really enough for me to discount the possibility of gay mike in the show considering a lot of points that make me believe they might go that route are narrative choices for his character. one example being the way he only showed interest in el after it was pointed out to him by other people, like you said, the stark contrast in how they make lucas and dustin show interest in multiple women but little to nothing from mike in comparison, they’ve also made him mirror will in this aspect (the way they both react to max in s2 compared to lucas and dustin).

season 3 was the most “i’m just doing what i think i’m supposed to do in typical het romantic relationships” season for mike because...he really was just being coached around by lucas constantly, looking totally clueless without him and most of his actions just him trying to adhere to societal expectations like getting his girlfriend a gift (?) and just. not initiating anything himself out of genuine love for el, he really needed a third party to hold his hand through navigating his relationship 😭 also the byler fight in s4 and how he said “thats because shes my girlfriend will” emphasizing the status of their relationship instead of saying something more genuine like el being important to him so obviously he’d write her letters...the majority of it was just him putting up a performance.

tbh he can still be bi and conforming to whats considered “normal” and thats what i was always firm in, but it can also be that they’re trying to portray how he really has no clue how to act when it comes to girls because he just feels no attraction to them. like the reason he needs his hand held through his relationship with a girl is because as a gay man it was never meant for him from the start, and the reason he can’t tell her he loves her is because...it was always impossible for him to feel anything towards her. he didn’t realize it at first (he wasn’t even sure of the difference between platonic and romantic before they kissed) but by s4 he was fully aware he only felt platonic care for el and was scared of losing her if he was honest about his true feelings (which explains the desert heart to heart he had with will.)

the duffers (or any other person from the writer’s room) have watched shows that portrayed internalized homophobia and characters that dated women while being cloested gay men, such as dawson’s creek and eyewitness, so that’s another factor that makes me think they could be writing mike to be gay because they’ve already gotten ideas of what it’s like, they’re not completely clueless. anyway this got too long (sorry anon i got carried away asjdksj) but the bottomline is i think both bi and gay mike have equal chances of being canon and are strong contenders in their own right, and while i used to think they wouldn’t explicitly confirm his sexuality, i realized they basically have to because they also need to clarify in the plot the true nature of mike’s feelings for el throughout their relationship and if he ever really loved her or felt attracted to her, it goes hand in hand with his sexuality arc and they can’t really just brush this over without leaving some kind of gaping hole in the storyline. mike’s gonna have to express how he really felt about el throughout their relationship so yeah...those are my two cents 👍

#i hope i was able to answer your question on anon #i feel like i ended up going in circles and went into a deep explanation of my thoughts oops #ask #byler #mike wheeler

[ageofgeek]

on second thought i dont really want ops notifs flooded w this so dont reply there if you must

Thank you! I don't want to clutter up OP either. My reply is somewhat long, so don't feel compelled to respond if you're not interested. But I wanted to get some of these thoughts off my chest.

So, to respond to your first point: "yeah but this is all operating under the assumption that they were ever intended to be ace rep, or rep for people who dont have sex. which is just an odd and very specific expectation to have for seemingly no reason, why them specifically? no one ever makes comments about het ships like this. all youre saying could be true but also could not be true. its just a really unecessary thing to insert into a post like this"

For one, Neil Gaiman has explicitly accepted the interpretation of Crowley & Aziraphale as ace and/or aro. He (and fans who HC A&C as ace) primarily bases this off of several lines in the book identifying angels and demons as "sexless." This has been interpreted by both Gaiman and fans as meaning that angels & demons are non-binary/agender (and rightfully so!). However, as Gaiman points out in his tweet, it is just as easy to interpret this as angels and demons literally not having an interest in sex.

So, if you're asking why some fans have latched onto A&C as ace rep, it's because (1) one of the authors of the book - and the creator and writer of the TV show - has explicitly identified asexuality as a possible interpretation, and (2) there is explicit textual evidence supporting such a reading. That doesn't seem like "seemingly no reason" to me.

As for it being unnecessary to go into ace discourse on such an innocuous post, I completely agree (so ty for sending this ask so it doesn't continue in OP's post). I understand my fellow ace fans' frustration or disappointment with the season 2 kiss, but it's unnecessary to be complaining about it in completely unrelated posts.

To your second point: "its kind of raining on someone elses parade when theyre excited abt azcrow just having been established as explicitly romantic in the show talking about their own interpretation of the two to make comments like that. the headcanons are fine on their own but read the room"

For the record, I ship Aziracrow in the TV show as romantic. I read them as romantic, I think they're explicitly canon as a romantic couple, and I think it's pretty difficult to deny that. I'm one of the people celebrating Aziracrow as canonically romantic! So I certainly hope that I'm not raining on my own parade. But just as you mentioned that "ace people can have sex," ace people can also be in romantic relationships. It's actually very common. It is completely valid - and moreover, compliant with TV canon - for fans to interpret Aziracrow as an asexual romantic relationship. And as I discussed above, there is Word of God and explicit textual support for this reading.

This is more tangential to your point, but I'd like to link this blog post by an ace GO fan and this post about GO non-binary rep. They both make the point that queer representation is not and has never been limited to two cis gay men in a romantic relationship. Relationships with non-binary people are queer. Ace relationships are queer. Queer-platonic relationships are, you guessed it!, queer. The relationship between Aziraphale and Crowley is inherently queer, regardless of how that relationship presents. This is true in the TV show, and it is true in the book, which was published over 30 years ago!

I am happy that Aziracrow kissed in season 2. I am happy with the direction the show is going. And yet, it's disappointing that some fans interpret the kiss as the "moment" that Aziracrow became romantically canon, or the "moment" that they became queer. Because for many fans - especially ace and non-binary/trans fans - they had been in a queer relationship all along! As that ace GO fan pointed out: "In our sex-steeped culture, the idea that deep, devoted love does not have to involve sex is unfathomable. It’s why the very existence of asexuality is questioned."

And if you HC Aziracrow as sexual beings, that's 100% valid! I'd be lying if I said I had never read Aziracrow smut. But I simply argue that an interpretation of Aziracrow as asexual is no more and no less valid.

#WOOF it's been a long time since i've written meta #good omens #good omens 2 #ineffable husbands #aziracrow #azcrow #asexuality #asexual #ace aziracrow #ace aziraphale #ace crowley #meta #rant #lgbtq #mine