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ellie-mayflower · 3 years

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You've spent a lot of time arguing with people over Lewis and Max supposedly saying the same thing so Max shouldn't be getting any heat. But he's getting heat because of his bad joke. One Lewis and several F1 people were uncomfortable with. I'm not sure why you're using Shaw (who's a Max fan) or misinterpreting Lewis as an excuse when you could just say, wow, Max sure says dumb stuff and leave it. Using misinformation to seem right? Disappointing from you when you seemed smart in past posts.

Whoa buddy, what misinformation? That’s a big word to be throwing around without anything specific.

Anyway, I wasn’t saying that Max shouldn’t be getting criticism, I was saying it was hypocritical to *only* criticize him while praising Lewis for supposedly saying something different.

That was 100% the issue at hand. Max wasn’t getting criticized because of a “bad joke”, he was getting criticized for the content of his answer, for saying that he didn’t believe a driver should be able to opt out of continuing a race like Sunday’s.

I'm not sure why you're using Shaw (who's a Max fan) or misinterpreting Lewis as an excuse when you could just say, wow, Max sure says dumb stuff and leave it. Using misinformation to seem right?

I’ll be sure to let Edd Straw (I’m assuming that’s who you meant?) know that he can rub out silly things like “editor-in-chief of Autosport” from his CV and simply put in “Max fan” instead.

He took part in the press conference in question and then wrote an article about it, why wouldn’t it be extremely relevant that he explicitly said that the answers Max and Lewis gave were the same in substance but not style?

We’ve seen that Lewis is perfectly happy to correct inaccuracies in the media when reporters misrepresent something he said, I can’t imagine his press officer missed such a prominent article.

But the only reason people started arguing about Lewis’ answer vs Max’s was because it was a classic case of people twisting themselves into knots when the fun of bashing someone they dislike is complicated when the zoom-out reveals that someone they like said it first.

It’s exactly like that situation after Baku 2017 when that quote of Lewis saying that if Vettel “wants to prove that he’s a man, I think he should do it out of the car face to face” spread like wildfire and buckets of ink were spilled on castigating Lewis for his ‘toxic masculinity’.

I mean, that quote made headlines in every mainstream outlet, not just the F1 press and fans on social media.

Except, as it later emerged, the language he used was simply echoing Vettel’s own statements about racing as men to explain away his decision to swerve into Lewis under the safety car as a response to his (incorrect) feeling that Lewis was brake-checking him.

Vettel’s words were put to Lewis in an interview and that’s what provoked his response. Yet it was only Lewis’ response that got those headlines and made all that buzz, and fans had a grand old time criticizing Lewis and Lewis alone.

Like now, ultimately both Lewis and Seb used the same sort of heavily criticized language and displayed similar attitudes.

Like now, only one of them found their words spread and got criticized, in part because just like Max, Lewis’ phrasing was more extreme and delivered far punchier headlines.

And just like now - when people pointed out that if Lewis was getting criticized for this supposed toxic masculinity then why not dish some of that criticism out to Seb too, the response was to try to claim that actually what they said wasn’t the same and shouldn’t be put in the same category etc etc.

What Max said in that press conference was pure gold to those who don’t like him and they gleefully seized on the opportunity to talk at length about how he was a sociopath who lacked any empathy for not thinking drivers should have the chance to opt out after seeing something shocking.

Which is perfectly fine, that’s a valid opinion.

What drives me up the wall is that when it emerged that Lewis also didn’t believe that they should have that option somehow not only are the standards completely different, people refuse to accept that the bottom line of both their answers is the same.

Idk, I mean, I understand why that’s the case. Once you’ve said something so extreme about Max it’s hard to either put Lewis in the same category or climb down from that oh so very high horse.

#Anonymous #so much for not being on tumblr except during race weekends jfc #max verstappen #f1

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notveryglittery · 6 years

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trampoline

summary: moral of the story: don’t leave patton and roman alone when they’re bored. words: 1,779 | ships: platonic royality & moxiety. platonic lamp. warnings: roman and patton acting like drunk fraternity boys, panicking notes: this one was so much fun. inspired by this post from @prinxietys!! “theo-doze-a” nickname from @katatles-the-fish‘s post here!

read on ao3! | read more incorrect quotes ficlets!

It was any other day in the Mindscape.

Logan was in his room, working on various schedules. Thomas had spent the last few days visiting his parents and as such, had been in full on relaxation mode. Not much had gotten done and the Sides, for the most part, hadn’t minded. Now, though, Logan felt it necessary to make up for lost time, and was making plans for the last few weeks of the month. No one blamed him for wanting to be ahead of the game and Virgil, in fact, encouraged it. They all understood that it’d help Virgil out in the long run and so even Roman and Patton had left Logan alone. His door was open, just in case, and classical music could be heard drifting down the hallway.

Virgil, meanwhile, was in the Commons. While he’d normally spend this time in his own room, listening to music or a podcast, he had decided the living room might be more comfortable today. He had taken up most of the space on the coffee table, with various adult coloring books. He preferred colored pencils but there were crayons and markers available to him as well. Roman had provided the mediums where Patton had offered the art. Instead of listening with headphones in like usual, Virgil had his music playing quietly through the speakers of his phone. Sunlight spilled into the room through the open blinds.

Patton and Roman, ever the extroverts, thought spending their time alone sounded dreadful, and as such, were in the kitchen together. They’d already baked three batches of cookies (chocolate chip, snickerdoodle, and oatmeal raisin) and were working on a double layer cake. It’d be frosted with buttercream and they’d decorate it with pink flowers and raspberries and it was going to be delicious and beautiful. Their baking spree came to a halt, however, when Roman slipped out of his long sleeved maroon henley and down to the simple tank top underneath. It’d been getting warm in the kitchen, what with the oven on for so long. Patton found himself distracted by Roman’s arms and a thought came to him quite suddenly.

“Roman,” he began slowly, setting down the piping bag he’d started to fill. “You’re strong, aren’t you?”

Roman had seemed confused for hardly a second before he was beaming at Patton, looking a perfect mix of delighted and cocky. He made it work, somehow.

“Of course!” He boasted, flexing. Patton swooned a little. “As a Prince, I must be in order to rescue damsels in distress!” He continued to show off before Patton’s curious, yet slightly mischievous, look caught his attention.

“In that case…” Patton peeked around Roman and into the living room, where Virgil was still distracted by his coloring. He leaned in closer to Roman and whispered, rather conspiratorially, “how far do you think you could throw me?”

They tried to be careful as they snuck out the front door but their giggling caught Virgil’s attention. It might also have had something to do with the bad feeling he had suddenly in the pit of his stomach. He followed the pair outside, from a distance, and rolled his eyes at how utterly unaware they were. Virgil watched as Roman first conjured a trampoline; he couldn’t hear them debating on how far or close to put it to the house, but he got the idea after they moved it a couple times. That bad feeling intensified when Roman created a ladder next and gestured grandly for Patton to climb up it first.

Before Roman could follow, Virgil darted forward and caught him by the wrist.

“What are you two up to?” He asked, not meaning to sound distrustful. He must’ve failed at it because Roman pulled away, looking slightly insulted.

“We’re testing my strength!” Roman defended. “You have absolutely nothing to worry about!”

With that, he ascended the ladder after Patton, and before Virgil could follow, snapped it back out of existence.

“Roman, I swear...” Virgil muttered darkly, before bolting back into the house.

Meanwhile, Logan had closed his door and was laying down on his bed. He’d decided a break to rest his eyes would be advantageous, and was admiring the swirling galaxy that was his ceiling. It was quiet and peaceful and—

The sound of footsteps bounding up the staircase and down the hallway pulled him from his reverie. He’d just sat up when the door slammed open, banging against the wall.

“Virgil,” Logan said, “what ever has gotten into you?”

Out of breath, Virgil gestured wildly back to where he’d come from.

“Roman… is about to… yeet Patton… off the roof!” He was shouting, or trying to at least, while sucking in lungfuls of air. “Onto a trampoline!” He inhaled sharply one last time before approaching Logan, who’d had yet to move, and grabbing his arm. He yanked him off the bed and out of the room. “You’ve got to stop them.”

Logan stumbled after Virgil, whose grip wasn’t loosening any, and adjusted his glasses as they went.

“I don’t know how you expect them to listen to me.” Logan sighed as Virgil led them down the steps. “You know how those two get once they’ve got an idea.”

They continued outside and around to the back of the house. The trampoline had been relocated a few more times and they could hear Patton laughing.

Virgil finally let go of Logan and began to pace nervously.

“Roman, Patton,” Logan called, cupping his hands around his mouth. “I’d like to speak with you, please.”

“Oh great,” Roman yelled, peering over the edge of the roof. “You went and told on us?!” He shot Virgil a look of betrayal.

Patton appeared next to Roman and waved. “Hi, Logan!”

“If I recall correctly, to “yeet” is to throw an object forcefully over a long distance.”

Virgil groaned. “Yes, Logan.”

“Ten points to Ravenclaw!” Patton cheered.

“Am I to understand that you plan on throwing Patton off of the roof and onto this trampoline?”

“Yes, Logan, congratulations.” Roman said in a tone entirely too mocking given the situation.

“Have you considered how reckless and dangerous that is?”

“Aww, Lo! It’ll be okay!” Patton reassured. Virgil wanted to scream. “Roman’s super strong! And I’m the softest puffball we got!”

“Patton,” Virgil clasped his hands together as if he were begging, and honestly, he was this close. “Please do not do this.”

“We’re doing this, Theodozea!” Roman argued. “He’ll be fine! Won’t you, Patton?”

Patton nodded rapidly, glasses going slightly askew from the motion.

“Here!” He said suddenly, pointing to the trampoline, and snapping his own fingers. A plethora of blankets and pillows appeared, covering the surface so thoroughly that it was a good thing there was a net surrounding the frame to keep them from spilling over. “Is that better?”

“Patton,” Virgil repeated, voice pitching higher, and sounding extremely distressed.

Without warning, Roman scooped Patton up into his arms. He squealed excitedly.

“Ready, darling?” Roman asked, striding to the edge of the roof closest to where the trampoline was set up.

“Roman!” Virgil snapped, finally having apparently reached his limit. “Roman, I swear to God, if you throw him off that roof—!”

“Honestly, you two, I fail to see how this is beneficial in any way, whatsoever.”

Roman spun in a few circles, as if trying to gain momentum, before he swung his arms out, and tossed Patton over the roof. Virgil screamed. Logan’s gasp came out strangled, as if he was properly surprised Roman had actually gone through with this ridiculous plan. Patton let out a peal of laughter, tucking his legs against his chest. He went flying through the air and Virgil felt his heart trying to beat itself out of his chest.

“Patton!!” he cried, rushing towards the trampoline. “Patton, oh my God, Patton, fuck, fuck, fuck.” His hands were shaking terribly as he watched Patton disappear into the pile of cushioning. Logan was following, face gone pale.

Before anything else could happen, Patton burst out of the nest of blankets and looked around gleefully.

“Judges?!” He exclaimed, as if Virgil and Logan would rate his landing.

“Patton, move over!” Roman called from the roof. While he backed up to get a running start, Patton scrambled out of the middle of the trampoline and off to the side.

“Oh, for…” Logan mumbled, sounding like he was going to be sick.

“Roman, no!” Virgil’s voice cracked, hands reaching uselessly up, as if he could stop Roman from launching himself off the roof and onto the trampoline.

Roman was stupidly graceful in his movements and Virgil was going to murder him for the unnecessary backflip, among many other things. Much like Patton, he vanished underneath the padding, before appearing again, hair an absolute disaster, and out of breath.

Roman snapped his fingers and the trampoline dematerialized. He and Patton and Patton’s pillows and blankets landed on the grass. Patton fell over, laughing himself silly.

“I hate you both,” Virgil panted. He allowed Patton to reach forward and take his hand, pulling him into the pile.

“We aren’t friends anymore,” he insisted, “unfollowed, blocked, reported.” As he went on, he wrapped Patton tighter and tighter in his arms, until there was absolutely no chance of Patton getting away.

Roman crossed his arms, pouting. “See! He’s fine! I told you there was no need to worry!”

“You did no such thing,” Logan pointed out.

Virgil could have mentioned that Roman did say so, before Logan had arrived, but he had no intention of standing up for Roman right about now. Logan stood out of reach so that he couldn’t be dragged into the cuddling.

“Are you finished with all of…” He gestured to the mess, “this? I have more important things to be dealing with.”

Roman huffed. “Sure, yeah, fine, whatever.”

He moved to join Virgil and Patton in their snuggling but Virgil pierced him with an absolutely murderous glare. Holding his hands up in surrender, he sighed in a very long-suffering sort of way.

“I get it. Not your favorite person right now.” Still, Roman smiled sweetly at Patton as he stood. “I’ll go get those cakes ready to decorate, dearest.”

Patton nodded happily, still quite content to be enveloped in Virgil’s arms. Once the two were alone, Patton gently nudged his nose against Virgil’s neck. Virgil shuddered at the contact but held Patton all the more, as if the touch was further proof that Patton was okay, safe, alive.

“Sorry to scare you, kiddo,” Patton apologized.

“Just promise it won’t happen again?” Virgil requested, rocking them back and forth a bit.

“I promise,” Patton agreed.

#sanders sides fan fiction #incorrect quotes ficlets #royality #moxiety #lamp #dani writes

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mild-lunacy · 7 years

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The Continuity Axiom Strikes Back

For what it's worth, even though I admit I was wrong, it seems a bit ironic that the main arguments people have against TJLC still ring false to me. Possibly because they haven't evolved with the times. Quite the opposite: there's many signs of the same old fannish polarization we see in society at large in response to divisive social or political issues. I guess saying 'well, that wasn't what they were going for after all, but good points!' doesn't quite give people that certain... schadenfreude. So the arguments I do hear are, 1) Moffat and Gatiss are bad writers; 2) Moffat and Gatiss should simply always have been taken at their word. There's also 3) we're reading too much into things and indulging in confirmation bias. One is perhaps a little subjective but largely obviously incorrect (look at the awards, if nothing else), and two is objectively ill-advised, since they've said they lie and cannot be trusted multiple times. Personally, I've always had a particular sore spot for the argument that boils down to 'Moffat and Gatiss are bad writers', and I take issue with those who argue against or otherwise mock the idea of canon Johnlock without both understanding and loving the show first. Even so, I realize it can be difficult to understand both perspectives at once. I just think it's important to integrate if there's any desire to engage with the different sides of the Johnlock fandom, and honestly the Sherlockians at large at this point.

The core of the issue cognitively might be summarized by the TJLC interpretation of this quote by Moffat: he initially said they wanted to do the show not just to update it but to correct everyone else, to say 'Now this is the way it should be done'. This ties in with all the hype-- and the hope-- about the BBC LGBT report and the way the BBC hyped Series 4 as 'making history', though I personally was taking a break from fandom at the time and in any case, always take such things with a grain of salt (at best). My point is that there's certainly been circumstances aside from 'confirmation bias' that lead people to think something a bit bigger and more exciting than... Sherlock's origin story and journey to being a 'good man' was going on, which culminated in TFP, as @ivyblossom described. That is (more or less) what I currently think Mofftiss were *going for* with that quote, but the fact is that Gatiss admitted he's interested in 'flirting with the homoeroticism in Sherlock', and they certainly followed through with that on a large scale. I think that it's a bit of a case of po-tay-to/po-tah-to, honestly. When you build a character growth arc where the main character is being 'humanized' by his relationship with his colleague/best friend/conductor of light/family, *and* you add many classic romantic tropes and rampant queer coding and subtextual homoeroticism... what you have is a love story, pure and simple.

Regardless of intent, it exists and is valid at least as much as an accented pronunciation of the same word would be equally 'valid'. In Sherlock's case, I would argue they'd gone far enough (too far) with the subtext and tropes, and indeed the romantic reading became the primary, most fully correct textual reading. At this point, I imagine this situation got out of Moffat and Gatiss's control... which is a huge challenge for any writer, and one that they didn't really address (in part because of a penchant for self-indulgence, I think), but this still doesn't make them *bad writers*, per se.

Obviously, I'm not saying this in self-defense or to 'prove' explicitly romantic canon Johnlock at this point. Besides, I do think that critique number three makes a good point, in that plenty of meta *was* reading too much into things, but you can say that about any type of meta, of any flavor. For example, I realize I tried way too hard to deny the surface reading of HLV, which... I clearly should have integrated more closely instead, if the Mary storyline resolution in TST is any indication. And many, many people enjoy speculation and pattern-matching and playing with metaphors or symbolism, but don't make a hobby of analyzing either their own thinking or other people's, perhaps understandably. Many fans who had donned the 'conspiracist hat' haven't been as vigilant as we could be about other people's analyses, never mind our own work. Anyway, overall, I still think any truly competent literary/media critic of BBC Sherlock I've ever seen would have to acknowledge the queer/romantic subtext in it at some point, even if they disagreed or simply wouldn't care about it becoming explicitly textual. So just as a total lit nerd, it's unfortunate that people can now continue to think that being dismissive and heteronormative is somehow a superior mode in analysis. And it's also unfortunate that 'bad writing' continues to be a one-size-fits-all approach to excusing one's lack of understanding of the show's deeper layers, more or less.

Basically, my point is that I still believe that Moffat and Gatiss are good-- or at least intelligent, often complex and certainly fundamentally competent-- writers in many ways. They do have their own preset ideas about what they want and don't always communicate those ideas to the broader audience effectively. And I have to further qualify that by saying that the thing I object to is dismissive thinking and 'explaining' stuff that doesn't make sense in the text with the offhand response that 'the writers suck'; I don't mean you can't simply have that as a subjective opinion, obviously, or critique the lack of follow-through in the writing. I definitely need to admit that they can be sloppy and leave plot holes when they lose interest in following up on the details, or introduce significant plot elements that they try to build and build without slowing down and integrating properly. I think @girlofthemirror's postmortem on what went wrong in Series 4 definitely speaks to this issue of too many 'spinning plates' in the plot and no room to breathe, particularly starting with Series 3. Just like Sherlock, they can get arrogant and try to be too clever for their own good. Worse than simple plot holes fixed by mild retcons, like Eurus shooting John with a tranquilizer, or the genre-related writing choices that @plaidadder took issue with in TFP, there's the truly unfortunately executed stuff like Mary's arc or that baby. Including a baby as a plot device to keep John and Mary together and then basically doing nothing else with it is inexcusable. Even with all those caveats, Moffat and Gatiss are so good in other ways that I really don't think you can hand-wave all analysis with 'it's just incompetence', surely.

Even if that has gotten much more battered after Series 4 and TFP, I haven't given up or decided TFP means the old continuity is destroyed, really. I think it's important to read for assumed continuity even when it's hard; perhaps *especially* when it's hard. If you have difficulties finding the textual pattern in characterization or the plot arcs that makes sense, it doesn't necessarily make sense to assume that it's automatically the writers' fault, basically. Even if there's problems in the writing (as there almost always will be), the chances are that there are more preconceived ideas and more incorrect conclusions to prune in one's own analysis. If you're invested and interested, then the best thing to do next would be working to dismantle your own preconceptions of the show. I've already done it once when I accepted canon Johnlock, but that doesn't mean it's the only time. There may well be multiple times. It does get easier, once you gain some emotional distance, assuming you're still interested at that point (granted, most people aren't). If you agree insofar that Authorial Intent matters in analysis (not an automatic thing by any means), then it makes sense to assume that the writers have some kind of *goal* or purpose to the characterization, especially given that it progresses in an apparent growth arc.

This is basic stuff. One should always assume that the writers have something to say in literary/media analysis, no matter the quality of the text. This is necessary in order to then be able to say anything coherent about 'real' or 'apparent' interpretation of the text in the first place. Further, one needs an understanding of the goals if one wants to judge the work as artistically successful or fundamentally 'well-done' or consistent on the larger scale or not.

That has always been the best claim to fame for TJLC: that frame exposed the logic in the show, while other types of analysis focused on their favorite bits of characters and dismissed everything that didn't fit as plot holes and pointless fluffery. For example, this definitely applied to Mary Morstan fans: she was seen as already redeemed and her marriage with John was unproblematic because Sherlock said so (and while she was more or less redeemed, it was only in TST, and their marriage continued to be plainly portrayed as quite troubled until the end). Anyway, in order to make sense of the show, we all picked at bits and pieces and disregarded what's inconvenient to some extent, but canon Johnlock did that the *least*.

Essentially, I'm saying I have a bone to pick with people who take this opportunity to accuse TJLCers of sloppy thinking, denialism, projection, fetishizing queer ships and so on, while offering only sloppy thinking themselves in return. The fact is, many TJLC-friendly meta writers have long challenged people to challenge *us* on our own terms, but of course no one did. It has definitely long been difficult to integrate this show for most viewers, from Series 3 on into TAB (which confused many), and finally into Series 4. Many non-TJLCers (including critics in the media) have said Series 4 jumped the shark and/or disregarded internal plot and character continuity, same as what happened with Series 3 except worse. In general, TJLC-friendly analyses are really the only ones I've seen that have presented a unified view that offered a cohesive and understandable reading of the entire show after Series 3. Here I'd also include many implicit or platonic Johnlock readings like Ivy's or stuff like this old meta of Skara's on TSoT, for example. The tricky thing is that (to the best of my current understanding), Mofftiss were essentially trying to write a near-classic love story without making it about sex, as Moffat once said. So a lot of people (rightfully) found that romantic and expected an explicitly textual romance. Regardless of whether it's actually *become* a genre romance, though, the romantic frame is inherent in the intensity and drama of John and Sherlock's relationship.

It builds up, too. Taken separately, there are platonic explanations for most Johnlocky things, but together these things create a sense of continuity, to the point where I can easily read an implicit romantic resolution after the end of TLD simply because of all this context. For example, think of Sherlock leaving the wedding early in TSoT. You *can* interpret that non-romantically and have it work for quite a while, so you'd still understand the show and Sherlock's feelings, as Skara once demonstrated. Even then, this only works if you essentially still fully accept that John is the most intense, most important, most passionate relationship of Sherlock's life. But then there's HLV, and the classic, epically romantic trope of Sherlock coming back to life for John, which would be 'just' epic friendship, except this is after his friend's wife shoots him again... in her wedding dress. If you have any understanding of narrative tropes in fiction, it's hard to miss the romantic tropes at work here, and we know Steven Moffat does. Except that's not enough, and we have Sherlock's heartbroken expression when he tells John he's 'abnormally attracted' to dangerous people (like himself and John's wife, naturally). And this kind of paralleling between John's obviously romantic love for his wife and his feelings for Sherlock goes on repeatedly in Series 3, and all this mirroring and subtext and acting simply... goes on and on. It would take a real and ongoing mental effort-- and/or a personal commitment to implicit or open-ended romantic relationships in stories-- to be aware of all this and resist the natural conclusion.

At a certain point, 'romantic' or 'platonic' becomes a question partially of your own internal definitions for interpersonal relationships and partly of your judgment of Moffat and Gatiss as show-runners and/or 'old white men', both of which have nothing to do with the show. The important thing for predictions would probably be determining Moffat and Gatiss's own definitions, and that was always going to be a difficult endeavor. We made some guesses, like using Moffat's interest in The Princess Bride and the fact that he wrote the most romantic episodes, such as ASiB, but there's only so far one can go with that. I'd say most people made the choice initially based on their own preferences for where they wanted the show to go, given they understood the text as it stood in S3. But the people who just said 'they're bad writers' simply didn't do any of this work; they dismissed the importance of the underlying question itself. Fundamentally, I think thinking critically about the text and reading it closely is always positive and to be supported, particularly in an environment that *exists* to celebrate and focus deeply on said text, such as fandom. A lot of people in fandom project onto the characters or use them for their own purposes, within or without the TJLC community. That's just how fandom is. But that's certainly not *all* we were doing, and thank god for that.

#fandom meta #sherlock meta #the great divergence #series 4 #writing #narrative #sherlock feels #tjlc #analysis kink #reader response #sherlock spoilers

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