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winepresswrath · 5 months

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hi! i always love your MDZS/CQL takes; can i ask what are the questions you think CQL is asking, as compared to MDZS?

I haven't actually revisited either canon in ages, which is making me nervous. what questions the novel is interested in can be pretty contentious all on its own! @mikkeneko has an excellent answer in the notes here which I reccomend to everyone. My own thoughts are honestly pretty scattered- I keep on deleting things and going hm, that's not quite right.

So, for the obvious-to-me example, people reasonably zero in on the creation of innocent doctors/radish farmers who Wen Ruohan is holding hostage. In CQL it's easy to infer that Wen Qing and Wen Ning are maybe the only cultivators and almost certainly the only combatants among the Wen remnants, and their status is much more ambiguous in the novel, which I personally think is asking, essentially, "and so what? were they wrong to run, when they had a chance? Do they deserve what Jin Guangshan will do to them if they go back? Aren't they just people, actually?" Whereas the question that CQL is asking is more to the effect of "What does Wen Qing owe these people, when she is their only defence? What is she entitled to do to save them, at other people's expense? If she fucks up that moral calculus, what then? Does it matter if she's personally fond of some of the outsiders who are going to get hurt? If one of them saved her brother? Later, this question will flip to what Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng, and the parallel to Jiang Cheng's situation in particular is, I think, genuinely pretty fun. You're giving up the Wen as soldiers who've laid down their arms in exchange for Wen Qing also grappling with leadership and the question of how many horrors she can stand to look the other way on to protect her own people. one reason I keep deleting so much is that a lot cql's changes were motivated at least in part by censorship, which I think we mostly share a general and justified distaste for! but I also think that within the bounds of that censorship the creative team put a lot of work into actually doing something interesting with those changes. Or, for another example- nieyao! There's a much greater emphasis on the nmj-jgy relationship, it's unambiguously very close and they are clearly extremely important to one another, and I think that's because the cql team has a lot to say about love, trust, power, and the ways those things interact, and that reflects back on all of the other relationships in play, including Wangxian. Almost every time, when CQL chooses change a relationship they make the characters in question closer- that's true for Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji, for Wen Qing and the Yunmeng contingent, for Zixuan and Mianmian, and Huaisang and Meng Yao. It's even true for Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian, who have a close and trusting relationship in first life! CQL puts a much greater emphasis on "all right, so you care, what next?" How do you choose someone and then choose to be good to them? What if there's a massive power disparity between you? What if you seriously disagree about your priorities and morals? How do you trust someone who's betrayed you? When is it a stupid choice to trust at all? How do you have faith that you know someone well enough for that trust to be meaningful?

for legal reasons i would like to specify that it's not that mdzs isn't interested in these problems. i do remember wangxian's literal trust fall. cql is asking these questions all the time about everyone. also for legal purposes i'm not suggesting that cql lwj and jc love each other. but! they establish a three month wartime partnership looking for wwx and then jc immediately drops him on wwx's say-so despite apparently having a positive enough opinion of him to tell wwx he thinks they should make up twice. lan wangji will later tell wwx he thinks he should loop jc in on the second flautist! these are people trying to navigate some kind of relationship/shared interest/community, as opposed to a hateful void. cql wants to say hey, how do you go about this? while I'm here and rambling cql also puts a lot of emphasis on wwx's connection to yunmeng and changes things up so instead of feeling alienated right before he leaves our last glimpse of him there is happily picking lotuses and playing with a kid! in both stories the narrative is asking who do you protect? who do you leave behind? can you ever get it back? but the angles are very different.

#why are there so many people who simultaneously argue that cql dumbs down mdzs and also that mdzs is the slow reveal of how wwx is a #perfect angel who has never done anything wrong in his life #being let down by everyone around him #surely you have to pick an option #but lan wangji and wei wuxian being close friends in the first life really does change everything #i have seen people (reasonably) be annoyed with this as an adaptation choice #but! i like this change a lot and i think they do interesting things with it #There's still a lot of emphasis on what makes them so particularly perfect for each other but imo moving Lan Wangji into the category of #people wwx loved in the first life #shifts the focus from #when will they get together #to #What it would take and what would they have to do for these people to have to do to have a successful partnership?#If loving someone is the first step what comes next? Who do I want to be to the people around me?#i love the focus on wwx's trust issues as trust issues! problems that he's had with lwj specifically before!#and the solution isn't just oh well lwj is perfectly trustworthy #though that's obviously part of it #wwx has to like. decide for himself to do some things differently this time around in order to reap the rewards of being really in it with #someone. and lwj does too! it's a journey they're on together #i have simply rambled in all directions i'm sorry anon

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blueskittlesart · 10 months

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do u have any navi thoughts from your oot replay

i've been waiting to answer this until I actually beat the game in my current playthrough because navi is another one of those characters that i think of in like a "set" with several other characters who serve relatively the same thematic purpose; in this case that purpose being the "mother" character, and i wanted to have all the characters in that set fresh in my mind. it's notable that while oot shows us very clear and consistent instances of the ways in which the adults of hyrule fail to protect their children, there ARE several adults who DO go out of their way to both oppose ganondorf and protect and nurture the children under their care. All of these characters are adult women, and all of them explicitly help the children out of some sort of parental responsibility or sense of duty towards them. in this group I include link's late mother, impa, nabooru, and navi.

all 4 mother characters, despite being adults or adult-coded, reject the inaction mentality which characterizes other adults in the game. they become either direct supports or shields to their children from the conflict the world has to offer them, and they are always explicitly punished for their interference--link's mother is killed trying to protect her son, impa's village is burned, nabooru is brainwashed. The mother's fatal flaw is that she will protect her child above all else, even in a world in which children cannot truly be protected. however, with the exception of link's mother, these characters manage to persist even in the face of her punishment, and this is where I think navi becomes the exemplary character.

Navi, after a lifetime of being link's only support system, the only adult in his life he could truly, consistently count on, receives her punishment at the hands of ganondorf--in the final battle, she is pushed out. she is unable to reach her child. she cannot protect him. However, BECAUSE link has grown up with her at his side, he is strong enough to take ganondorf down. and when ganon rises again, navi is there to support link, promising not to leave his side, and the intuitive targeting of that battle (a mechanic which navi is inherently tied to!!) makes it a cinch to win. Navi, and the other mothers we meet, are a reminder to the player that the world doesn't HAVE to be the way it is. Their persistence when punished, their insistence that their children ought to be protected, is a reminder that good adults do exist, and that good adults raise good children. link and zelda are able to win in spite of the adults who refused to help them, but also BECAUSE of the adults who DID. It's a reinforcement of the core theme of oot--that childlike idea that the world SHOULD be good and fair and if it isn't, it should be changed until it is. The mothers of oot are examples of what the world COULD be, reminders that it is possible to grow up without losing hope or growing bitter, and they are examples of the next step for the children they've raised to change the word--to continue fighting even in the face of punishment, to refuse inaction, and to foster that same hope and persistence in the generations to come.

#one thing i've really been noticing this time around is the specific way in which navi's targeting works #because even though other 3d games have that targeting mechanic navi's targeting is noticeably different #in two ways. the first being that she specifically targets weak spots in enemies almost as if she is pointing them out to link #and the second being that she is capable of targeting things link himself doesn't see #whether it be invisible enemies or triggers that are out of his reach or scarecrow points or whatever #it's really reminiscent to me of the way you teach problem solving skills to a kid. you see them struggling with something and beginning to #get frustrated and you say 'hey let's look around. do you see any solutions?' and if they can't see the solution themself you might point #and say 'hey what's that?' just to get their attention on it and help facilitate that train of thought for them #because like in most other games targeting is sort of assumed to be link's own intuition in battle #and therefore it will usually allow you to focus on one enemy within a swarm of them but it won't explicitly light up the weak spot for you #navi does that for link because she's essentially the mother teaching her kid how to problem-solve.#and when she's taken away in the final battle link is able to fight anyway BECAUSE she put so much time and effort into raising him #that he no longer needs her to facilitate that problem-solving process. he already knows how to beat ganondorf #because he's done it with her before. and that's exactly the mother's role in her child's life #protect him and raise him as best you can so that when you can no longer be by his side he isn't afraid.#foster that sense of justice and encourage him to keep fighting to change the world even when it seems unchangeable.#god. ocarina of fucking time #zelda analysis #asks

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lowpolyshadow · 10 months

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just need everyone to know despite my emo posts and wailings and being completely normal over sa2 that i think shadow should be an asshole. just a complete bastard. fuck that guy

#his HUGE well thought out plan to destroy the entire earth was 1. for maria’s sake 2. IMPLANTED IN HIS BRAIN BY GERALD?!??#LIKE THE DIARY READING MAKES IT VERY CLEAR. WAKE UP THIS ‘THING’ IF YOU WANT TO USE ‘IT’ IT WAS A LOT!!!#shadow is so fucking stupid okay. hes very brash. hes very impulsive. hes completely reckless. he has a couple brain cells but they #focus target whatever the problem/the supposed solution would be and gun for it full shot 10000% no take backsies #hes at his most thoughtful when hes Confused and Sad but now hes no longer confused and sad now hes here to punch someone #if its the easiest option to his goals (it often is. its so easy to punch someone guys. its so simple)#the complexities of shadow the hedgehog is that his end goal is usually pretty good but by god the shit he pulls to get there #speaking

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omniaspec-rat · 5 months

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me when I have the "reacts really bad to anything" disorder and I'm part of the "there's not a single decent reading interpretation here" website: 😥😥😥😥

#some of you seem to think that activism is randomly arguing with people because you think they had bad intentions #and not #idk #trying to be normal and focus on the problem and the solution to it

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teabutmakeitazure · 5 months

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listening to a 1 hour video of complete silence that's occasionally interrupted miguel o hara's sound effect and its actually helping me focus

#i get startled every time and my focus is back #modern problems (adhd) require modern solutions (dumb)#zuri rambles

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konfizry · 18 days

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Anyway speaking of the sun did I ever tell you about the tales of arise eclipses

#im thinking about it again xyhdfgdchdchjh #do you think they like. considered it #i MEAN ofc they did #they cided that sun disappearing behind rena but dO YOU THINK #that they initially planned to have that actually impact like. the WORLD #in a significant manner?#with the actual luminosity level being affected and all #because like for cyslodia iirc this means no sunlight in the morning #(or cyslodia that we get to explore cyslodia's pretty big after all)#but like i can see how this is a problem like #you liberate cyslodia that is the One Realm where its always nighttime except when you end the renans' grasp on the region there #it still doesnt get a full day of sunlight because of astronomical reasons that we cant do anything about yet #also probably the region of the Central Ocean is in perpetual darkness as well but for those same astronomical reasons #like it GERS CONFUSING it would confuse everything idk #but heres the solution: you ditch that cyslodia in endless nighttime idea bc it was stupid in the first place #like. in calaglia they harvest fire astral energy so its a fiery place. theres fire everywhere. in menancia theyre harvesting #earth astral energy so its super lush and green. and so on and so forth #and in cyslodia theyre harvesting light astral energy so theres. theres no light. its dark. because theyre stealing it!!!!!#well why usnt menancia a barren wasteland then. why isnt ganoth super dry. wha #i COULD accept it if like. maybe. if like the completely stealing the light thing us like. ganabelt specifically.#like hes just a Special Boy and found a way to pull all the stops #and something like that has never been done before in the history of the crown contest #but no this has been going since the great conquest apparently so???#like how arent the other lords doing something like that too?#is light astral energy like so fundamentally different that the harvesting process is the opposite of what happens in other realms?#and if thats the case why dont they ever explain it in the game. or just make a pasing comment about it. I'm not picky #aaaanyway. just get rid of that specific cyslodia plot point #and THEN you can focus on how living in the shade of rena influenced what parts of Dahna #like. to just kinda like. cement the world building a bit?

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fondcrimes · 8 days

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I can already see how the male centered characterization of the “loneliness epidemic” is perpetuating more harm against as well as assigning blame to women who are dealing with the same fucking issues. the only difference is that entitled men who might struggle with mental health or alienation are trying to kill people about it while women (specifically those who are doubly marginalized as well as alienated) kill themselves and quietly fade into the background. it’s just very bleak

#even the conversation about how incel figureheads are taking advantage of neurodivergent men erases their female counterparts #the constant need to gender connection and loneliness harms women #kind of like how the love languages guy was misogynist and was like women need feelings men need touch #in both scenarios we engage with women as a flattened antagonistic concept that must be conquered by men to get what they want #and sympathy from women is demanded. but nobody gives a fuck about neurodivergent or disabled or marginalized women in general #patriarchal coddling is so toxic but at least women are incentivized to find solutions outside of it #men cant talk about their personal problems without maligning women they don’t even want to solve it until women are punished #at the end of the day it’s not even to mens benefit… it doesn’t bring them any closer to happiness or fulfillment #the prescriptive focus on male loneliness is just compulsive sexuality doing its thing #posting this here bc I cant stop thinking abt it. I think I need to up my adderall dosage

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moe-broey · 2 months

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One thing about me is before Alfonse and Sharena became The Proxies it was actually Takumi and Corrin with a side of Sakura.

#there'd be some focus on the hoshido family as a whole too but it was mainly those three.#but i think bc takumi accidentally became such a personal proxy for me. it's actually v hard to revisit him at times #i still adore him so much he's v special to me. and ofc i love him as a standalone character too he's so funny #not to sound to silly but i almost feel guilty about it too like takumi i'm so sorry........#knowing who you are as a character i am so sorry. you are still so special and so important #but maybe the solution is just. he's minding his own business now. he starts seeing what #moe and alfonse have going on and is like you know what. i'm gonna head out. you guys are insane #i think they're all still friends but takumi has his own problems. he's not looking for new ones.

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king-roland-ii · 3 months

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king roland, may i ask what forms of punishment you have for unruly or criminal citizens in your kingdom (i imagine the crime rate is pretty low because of citizens like carol of the arrow but just in case i commit see a crime, i want to know what happens)

That's, an interesting question.

I'd say based on severity and whether the person is guilty or not, punishment can vary. There hasn't been a crime too grand to deserve anything lethal, in fact, we stay away from capital punishment and instead keep people away so they aren't able to harm others. The best way to prevent crime however, is to understand why crime happens in the first place.

Say that someone steals a loaf of bread. It's easy to lock the person up for theft, but that would be ignoring the actual problem. What if the person didn't have money to afford bread? What if they need to feed themselves or their families? What if others in the kingdom have the same struggle to secure a meal? Would it be fair to lock everyone up because they can't afford to survive? The solution isn't to punish the person, but to make it so they don't have to steal. They might not have enough coins to pay for the bread, so help them find work so they can pay the baker for the bread. Make sure their employer is treating them fair and can pay them a livable wage. Make sure the farmers are able to produce wheat for bread and pay them graciously for their hard work.

Have it so people can live without having to break the law.

#By the way #My wife is teaching me how to bake!#I'm not too good at it at the moment #but I'm slowly improving!#Learning how to bake made me use the loaf of bread example #but as I said #finding solutions to problems is the key to solving crime #because humans are naturally good and poor conditions can make them do bad things #that's why it's important to focus on making things better for everyone #Rollie Responds #King Roland II

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jlf23tumble · 1 year

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lmaoo are you really pulling the fucking misogyny card here as well?? it's creepy for a 30 year old guy to date a 22 year old, there can be a huge power imbalance in a relationship like that... she's my age and i know multiple girls who had their life completely fucked over by a guy that much older than them, men take advantage of women that much younger than them, when they're that young especially..and if it was the other way around it would be just as bad, someone in their early 20s is barely an adult, trust me i know... nothing about pointing that out is misogynistic..i really don't get your opinion on stuff, it's really fucking contradictory a lot of the time and you don't even realize it, everything is misogyny to you

#yep i'm pullin' the misogyny card again!#why oh why are so many things misogynistic gee idk man! must be me!#you're sooooo close to so many points #sit down and have a think #and while you're at it #think about the super simple solution to your problem which is #if you 'really don't get my opinion on stuff' ... well that's a you problem #control your destiny and unfollow #get that post-nut clarity on one of the shittier blogs that'll yank your dog chain and tell you how right you are #women really DO get a good break in the one direction universe!#it's so fair to them! they deserve every ounce of shit they get!#something something dog whistle power imbalance etc etc!#i don't understand how someone who's 22 is an adult!#and i'll say with my whole chest that this is a stunt and she's a beard!#but instead of doing anything about it in terms of the man hiring her!#i'm gonna make it that she's too young and stupid to figure it out!#because i too am and/or have been young and stupid!#bb this isn't the place for you but believe me there are so many...god bless and i hope you enjoy your same dumb thoughts projected back #god i wish this shitty bathroom picture was in sharper focus #that's my cross to bear i suppose

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fotoecitazioni · 11 months

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Mettere a fuoco

"Il problema non è che non si individui la soluzione, è che spesso non si mette a fuoco il problema" (Gilbert K. Chesterton)

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an-aro-made-of-aspen · 11 months

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I love seeing those posts with the parents celebrating their queer kids, tbh.

But it's like a bittersweet, double-edged sword for me. I'm so happy for these people and it means so much knowing people are out there that are respectful and accepting of their kids and of the LGBT+ community.

And it just reminds me that the people I'm around, that I work with or live with/near just... aren't. They aren't like that. They don't accept us. Or they just dismiss me and my feelings. My sibling is the only one who isn't like that in my life. And it hurts to realize that. But, at the same time, I'm not in the worst situation, I'm not in physical danger (if you don't count my general workplace hazards). I just. Can't be out. I can't go around wearing my flag in the open. I can't casually mention that I'm aro or queer in some way without scorn or dismissal. And I can't talk about the problems I have or the successes I've found. Because they don't wanna listen. Because I don't matter to these people outside of a "carefree" smile and "Disney Princess" attitude.

I wish I was more.

More courageous. More interesting. More well-spoken.

More palatable.

But I'm not. And I never will be on at least a couple of those things (working on the courage, lol). And I shouldn't have to wish for that just so people would listen to me or take me seriously. I'm 24. I know my voice is squeaky. I know I act carefree and easy-going. But that doesn't mean I don't want to be taken seriously or don't want people to listen to me.

Or that I don't want to be myself.

I want to be a whole person. Not a caricature of myself or a shell of a person I don't know.

I'm tired.

#im so tired #aro #arophobia #or just.#queerphobia #i guess. i dunno #im just #ranting #im sad and tired and so very very angry #im so happy for these people. but i cant help that little seed of envy in my heart on days like this.#honestly. im just so tired. tired of having to hide. tired of being reminded how much people either hate or dont care about me.#and its not anyone's fault in particular. certainly not the poster's. its just been a very stressful time lately.#and with it being pride month. its the easiest problem for me to focus my stress on. even though i dont have any real solution.#sorry for ranting. im probably going to bed or something #good night

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roobylavender · 2 years

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i think one of the most frustrating things to see whenever people get into spats about bruce’s romances is the intentional reduction of selina as a character solely in pursuit of establishing her as the superior love interest. it’s baffling how people retroactively rewrite her history prior to helena’s introduction via the idea she was always written to end up in a marital relationship with bruce. selina was set up as a formidable femme fatale counterpart to bruce and maintained a significant independence as a character for years despite expressing her occasional sympathies with him. the earth two story where she ended up married to bruce did so and killed her off within its first five pages to prop up her daughter’s character, and the subsequent earth one stories of the 80s near completely reduced selina’s personal priorities to being with bruce rather than keeping the focus on any of her moral complexities. obv the way their romance can be executed effectively varies but i don’t understand how no one sees a problem with arguing that selina’s one true purpose is to be the love of bruce’s life. it completely erases any contention with her personal circumstances or morals bc in any scenario where this ideology is posited her personhood has to come second to wanting to fit into bruce’s life. it shouldn’t be any prominent bruce love interest’s purpose to be the love of bruce’s life even if you could find a way to argue for it. that’s the last thing i would be worrying about when approaching female characters within a genre that already affords them so little consistency outside of their relationships with men

#every time i see these arguments i want to maul someone like can you WAKE UP. there has to be more to these women's existence than this #it esp baffles me with selina fans bc it's like. you guys aren't even in a talia situation #where she was built to be restrained by her relationship with bruce and writers subsequently had to break her out of it #selina was literally independent from day one. she HAD all of the space to be her own character with her own goals #and somehow in a modern landscape this is consistently deprioritized to focus on making sure she ends up in a relationship with bruce #like it's just terrible. do i like where her solo book is going right now no is the solution to put her back with bruce ALSO NO #the solution would be to literally just focus on her. and her morals. in like any substantive capacity #that doesn't make her sex life the focal point of her storytelling #that's where your problem is. her personhood has no value with editorial and it hasn't for years it makes me miserableeee #and to think there was a glimpse of it with ram v before howard took over the book [gag]#to be deleted

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unproduciblesmackdown · 2 years

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a post because i saw one that annoyed me:

One of my goals in thinking about redefining the way we view relationships is to try to treat the people I date more like I treat my friends—try to be respectful and thoughtful and have boundaries and reasonable expectations—and to try to treat my friends more like my dates—to give them special attention, honor my commitments to them, be consistent, and invest deeply in our futures together. In the queer communities I'm in valuing friendship is a really big deal, often coming out of the fact that lots of us don't have family support, and build deep supportive structures with other queers. We are interested in resisting the heteronormative family structure in which people are expected to form a dyad, marry, have kids, and get all their needs met within that family structure. A lot of us see that as unhealthy, as a new technology of post-industrial late capitalism that is connected to alienating people from community and training them to think in terms of individuality, to value the smaller unit of the nuclear family rather than the extended family. Thus, questioning how the status and accompanying behavior norms are different for how we treat our friends versus our dates, and trying to bring those into balance, starts to support our work of creating chosen families and resisting the annihilation of community that capitalism seeks.

A lot of the things I'm writing here go to the basic notion of what we think loving other people is about. Is it about possessing them, finding security in them, having all our needs met by them, being able to treat them in any way and still having them stick around? I hope not. What I hope that love is—whether platonic, romantic, familial, or communal—is the sincere wish that another person have what they need to be whole and develop themselves to their best capacity for joy or whatever fulfillment they're seeking.

Monogamy has stopped making sense now that I see it as an implicit agreement with someone to only have certain kinds of relationships with everyone else in your life. This basically means drawing boundaries all over someone else's life...boundaries that don't make much sense to me anymore. Just because someone doesn't have sex with anyone else doesn't mean they aren't going to be attracted to anyone else. Just because they don't label a relationship with someone in a certain way doesn't mean they aren't going to feel love for that person. It seems silly and arbitrary to draw lines in terms of physical affection. Hugging is ok, but not kissing? Cuddling is ok, but not sex? It seems even more impossible to draw lines in terms of love and feelings.

I had never been very good at drawing lines between the love I felt for my friends and the love I felt for people I was in romantic relationships with, even when I was inhabiting the universe where those lines were made to seem very important. I was perpetually "falling for" my friends in this way that could only ever end in reciprocation or heartbreak, because in that universe I was definitely not allowed to be "in love" with my friends, especially not if I happened to be interested in sleeping with them. But in this new alternate universe I don't need those lines, and it makes perfect, beautiful sense. I can just feel however I feel about people without worrying about the way our relationship is labeled. What really matters is defining that relationship for ourselves, not for other people. What that means is having conversations about what we want, and what we are willing to give.

I've learned that I need to be straight up about how much time I want to spend with someone. I need to be specific about it. I would rather talk about how often we want to see each other and what we want out of our relationship than use labels like "primary partner" or someone I see "casually". Just because I'm not spending a huge amount of time with someone doesn't mean they don't deserve honesty, communication, and clear expectations for our relationship. This goes for friendships as well, and I would like to have way more conversations with my friends about our relationships and expectations. If in this universe I have friends that I'm in love with and lovers that I'm friends with, then why does one relationship deserve more care and attention than another? Why should we have these conversations with people that we fuck, but not with those that we don't? The people in my life that I don't have sex with aren't less important to me, so I don't want to treat them that way.

I want to do this because I want to challenge the frameworks that I am expected to base my relationships on: gender, marriage, the nuclear family. Hetero-monogamy is part of a narrative that I want no place in: the creation of an atomized family unit, whose boundary delineates the space in which I am allowed to care for others, outside of which my relationships are dominated by fear and the logic of my own self-preservation. I want to create families that are based on intentionality, affinity, and support. I don't want a family based on a role that I was born into. I feel like the only way I can really break through my isolation is to build relationships on my own terms, with my own frameworks and beliefs.

I want to resist the commodification of my body by never considering myself the possessor of someone else's, and not needing my body to be given value only through its possession by others. I want to confront ideas of sexual objectification and ownership every time I feel them rise up within myself. Any moment that someone shares their body with me is precarious and fleeting, and that shared moment doesn't give me any say in what else that person wants to do with their body (unless it pertains to my own health and safety). I also don't want to make assumptions about what someone is willing to share today based on what they shared yesterday. I am never entitled to someone else's body.

Saying 'yes' in this context means so much more than agreeing to see each other 'steadily'. At its most severe, going steady gets tied up with the tacit promise of a supposedly long-term and exclusive relationship where Joe and Molly can navigate a blueprint, building happy coupledom. By not explicitly defining what Joe means by going steady, the relationship passively slides onto tracks bound for 'a happy life together'. This slide can happen because we are all well trained in making assumptions about what the structures of a relationship are. These implied structures constitute a hetero-romantic relationship ideal which in turn translates into a minimum level of commitment, sexual exclusivity, long-term investment, nuclear family building, and much more. The overarching ultimatum of living a relationship through undiscussed and rigid relationship conventions is that either the conventions are maintained (the expectations are consistently met, the blueprints are followed) or the relationship will end in, at the very least, a romantic separation—no more affectionate physical contact, no more intimate emotional support. If the relationship does not follow and match the blueprint, Joe and Molly are left with the choice of either getting things back on track or romantic separation. Those who do not want to choose between the happily ever after and a life of romantic solitude, those who cannot or do not want to play out the blueprint, are pushed to find and create other ways of doing relationships.

Often, when rejecting the going steady blueprint we slip a little and end up rejecting monogamy. Once monogamy is unqualifiably bad, it is a pretty quick step to figure out that polyamoury is good: having a sexually exclusive romantic relationship means conforming to an archaic patriarchal and power laden script so, having an anti-patriarchal, politically conscious, and critical relationship means you should have more than one sexual partner. To be clear, I am not trying to rescue or defend monogamy. I am arguing that a preoccupation with a monogamy/polyamoury binary prevents a more useful and more critical analysis of the ends of the political potential for romantic relationships. The locus of the potential for relationships is not a reductive tally of the number of sexual partners a person can juggle at one time. The number of people a person manages to sleep with does not say all that much, however, more revealing are the questions of how relationships are structured, how relationships are political, how individual relationships are affected by norms and the capacity individual relationships have to shape new norms. Reducing relationship politics to a monogamy vs polyamoury manicheanism means dismissing other harmful norms and assumptions that are affecting us as un- or less important.

i have enough love to go around. its not a commodity. i'll make you breakfast at 5pm on a sunday night and when you leave to go to work, i'll go out dancing and make out with someone i've been flirting with for weeks. and its not sneaky and behind your back. and its not taking anything away from how i am when i see you. i might not have a lot of time, but i have a lot of love for the people in my life and i'm willing to think hard about how i distribute my time. and i'm willing to say something when i need you to hold my hand, to have my back. and i trust that you'll do the same.

and if we ever get married, we'll know that it's for immigration purposes. and if we go through periods of time where neither of us are sleeping with anyone else, we'll know it's not because we possess each other. and when we hit rocky patches and it's fucking hard and we're taking turns falling apart, we'll know that at least we've communicated enough in the past to probably deal with it. probably. because even though i'll never promise to love you forever, we've gotten pretty far and i don't have any intention at the moment to stop loving you. and that time qualifier doesn't make it less meaningful. it means that this is a decision i'm making over and over again, every time we schedule a hang out, i'm doing it cause i want to see you. cause i want to be there.

I still think that having multiple sexual and/or romantic partners is do-able, and that I could be someone's "secondary" partner again, but I think this requires hard-core honesty about needs & expectations from the get-go, and really good communication. For example, I'd rather someone say "I like you, but can only see you once every two weeks, because that's how much I'm willing and able to give this relationship" than "I'd love to hang out more but I'm just really busy", which evades responsibility and isn't clear about expectations. Plus, everyone is busy, so you make time for people you prioritize and want to see.

I also think that people need to be very careful about how they treat their "secondary" partners, and any lover, friend, roommate or family for that matter: these are not people you can just call up whenever you're lonely (unless that's your arrangement), and ditch whenever life gets to be too much.

I think it's important to constantly re-educate ourselves on these issues: so we can learn to be better in all our relationships, so we can be honest, non-jealous, and caring partners and friends, and so we can avoid, as best we can, people getting hurt, feeling pushed aside, feeling secondary.

- excerpts from “this is about more than who we fuck (and who fucks us).” zine

#i.e. i see a post abt romance that of course is gonna be annoying to me? a dialogue...#sounded like an interpersonal problem of ''so when you're venting abt wanting a romantic relationship you just want listening rather than #any proffered solutions'' but spun into ''ugh i'm sick of society invalidating / deprioritizing desire for romance'' lmao is it doing that..#Well I'm About To Be Sickening #and add op's choice to describe suggesting focus on nonromantic relationships as ''infantilizing'' like uh. perhaps dismissive; patronizing #quite a Particular Word Choice....so i'm like well what's enough of the opposite of what's going on here #that is: par for the course vague desire for romance with a perspective that's barely analytical & weirdly so?#i know the queer / relationship anarchist quotes are out there....then i find this zine like fun i'll peruse that. then i make this post.#and here we are today for our fun and enrichment #The General Wisdom of Aromantic People would've also counted. like clearly this doesn't touch directly much on aroaceness as is relevant #to me / my personal wavelength. but it's The Same Matter of autonomy. the autonomy to date someone / have sex? = the autonomy Not To.#anyways just transforming irritation into having some fun collecting quotes #long post ///

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