#heavy stuff

[lycunthrope]

in every video that's been coming out lately about stalls and changes in the U.S. economy, there's this incredibly charged silence in all of them.

for example, i was watching a video on what happened to cause the decline of 'mid-budget films'. all sorts of factors were discussed, from the streaming wars, to corporate consolidation, to low attendance in theaters. all true, yet... low attendance in theaters is attributed to streaming, market pressures, and big names not pulling people in- also true.

but not once was the fact that 1,140,278 people in the U.S. alone have died since 2023 mentioned.

there are 1,140,278 less people to fill those theater seats than there were in 2019. That is 1,140,278 less people making, shipping, and selling our goods. that is 1,140,278 less people taking their earnings home and spending what little they have left on those goods, the only thing keeping our manchild-ran economy from crumbling into recession.

our workforce decreased by 1,140,278 less people because you KNOW it was the working class, out there dying for everyone else. our workforce decreased by 1,140,278 less people due to one cause alone.

but no one says it. no one factors it in. countless thinkpieces, videos, news segments, conversations overheard in packed restaurants full of maskless, spitting faces about how our economy is crumbling under its own weight because of the internet, because of countless natural disasters battering our country from all sides, because of global trade, because of anything but the factor that we lost 1,140,278 people to preventable causes.

this 1,140,278 people, gone from our lives, and this doesn't even begin to touch the number of people permanently disabled, unable to work. but that number is far bigger than we can reliably calculate. more than we could begin to process.

this, by the way, is the number for the U.S. only. the country i live in, who ranks second worldwide in deaths per million due to this one cause.

and after three years of this constant, ongoing mass dying, we don't say its name. there's an eerie silence around it, a gaping hole we dare not touch. lest we violate some sort of social rule, heaven forbid. we spit on the deaths of those 1,140,278 people every time we forget, and every time we let our government get away with not protecting or caring about its people.

tell me, when was the last time you acknowledged COVID?

#covid19 #heavy stuff #im just. angry #grieving #and offput by this eerie hole in the discussion of. anything #those were all people with fucking lives. #edit: added a paragraph acknowledging how many are left not dead but disabled #as that is a huge part of this too

[trans-queen-administrator]

I will never fucking be over Speck. We all watched the girl we spent 1.6 million words with, that we saw grow and fight and bleed and never give up, slowly and noticeably degrade and become a paranoid hollow shell of her former self. She slowly lost her ability to speak, read, write, comprehend words, or read body language, and everything she lost made her break down more with the realization. So many themes reached their peak, from Taylor's desire to throw herself away and burn up for a good cause, to her willingness to commit truly horrifying acts for the greater good, to her desire for everyone to just fucking band together and put aside their differences against a common foe. There's so many amazing moments like Lisa verbally eviscerating her, to the breakdown when she thinks she killed Dragon, to her handing Dinah the "I'm sorry" note before taking control of her. And I haven't even gotten into the ever increasing connection between her and her passenger and how damn well that was done, or the way her thoughts become shaky and unhinged, or the conversation at the end with Contessa, or the way Rachel steps into her radius because she trusts her, or Aisha singing the entire time and comforting Taylor as she unravels. I swear to god I barely covered half of what I love about Speck in this post, it has so much and it's the perfect ending to the such an interesting character and story. It's genuinely my favorite piece of writing ever, I have not once managed to read it without crying. She tries so fucking hard and in her infinite determination and disregard for herself she kills god. God it's so good.

#worm #parahumans #taylor hebert #khepri #speck #worm spoilers #3am time to ramble about Speck. I love it so much #genuinely makes me sad when I learn some people just read worm fics or stopped reading worm early because they missed out on speck #like I get it #heavy stuff #not for everyone #BUT ITS SO FUCKING GOOD #speck permanently rewired my brain #ALSO khepri is SUCH a cool name

[embrace-your-inner-kid]

I see so many people saying "Imogen would break the world for Laudna" when really she's going to try and save the world for Laudna.

She is not Delilah, she hates Delilah, and that conversation between Imogen and Laudna shows that Laudna doesn't want her to be like Delilah if she dies.

If anything, Laudna is most likely to be like Delilah if anything happened to Imogen. She's the one who's soul is literally intwined with the woman. She's confused and scared, but Delilah's influence is there by no want of her own, and devastation or the thought of it will likely cause her to lean into it.

#heavy stuff #the angst levels are off the charts #imodna #imogen x laudna #imogen temult #laudna #critical role #critical role spoilers

[jam-n-jay]

The Onion once again going straight for the goddamn jugular (link)

#israel vs palestine #gaza #israel palestine conflict #palestine #heavy stuff #war tw #go read the article #if this post gets more than 3 notes im 100% muting it

[soulreapin]

fair warning, this gets kinda heavy.

tldr: keith bends and bends underneath the weight of everything, and finally, he cracks.

this was really cathartic for me to write, so even if you read it here give it a kudos on ao3 just for me.

—

Keith’s mouth tastes like rubbed-away Carmex and ash.

He’s doing okay for himself, on the castle of lions, he goes and he dons his suit and he does his job and he fights with Lance and then he comes “home” and peels his suit off piece by piece and stands underneath the shower with bad water pressure until his skin turns pink and his joints stop clicking together as he walks and then he goes to bed, just to do it all again. Keith says he is doing okay for himself to the people he saves every single day, to the people he lives with every single day, but he doesn’t say it to himself.

To himself, he’s drowning. The words to what he’s feeling warp in his throat and feel caught in a web, choking him out until he can’t breathe. He is floating on the surface of something horrid, and his palm slaps on the surface of the water but there’s nothing for his desperate fingers to cling on to, so Keith slips.

With every day he slips, back and back and back until the stitches holding him together strained against the weight. Then Keith hauls himself forwards, and forwards a little more until there is just enough lessened on the stitches for him to keep going, just a little longer.

It doesn’t feel like anything anymore. The butt of a blaster slammed into his chin three days ago, and his jaw popped out of its place for just a moment on his left side and sometimes he can’t touch those back teeth together, but that doesn’t feel like anything. He took nine space tylenol and called it a day.

Most nights after he gets three horrible hours of sleep, Keith sits on the bow of the ship. He doesn’t know why the bow is so comfortable, but he did know that if he closed his eyes and drifted out far enough, sometimes the rock of the ship felt like the simulator deck at the Galaxy Garrison. He spent hours out there, even when classes had ended. Shiro slipped him into the sim and made him promise not to cause too many problems.

He’s there right now, staring at the empty, pin-pricked abyss that the castle lingered in. The galaxy they’re floating through is close to Olkari, but not close enough to patch through a call.

Keith, at four in the morning, is completely alone out here. No one on his team likes him, his lion is working against him, his bayard wouldn’t get fucking going this morning and cost them precious seconds that could’ve been used to save lives, and his belt loop got stuck on the door.

Nothing else bothered him, he shook off the dislike and let his lion roll of his back like water, Keith made up for his bayard by racing the clock and getting a group of younglings out of a tight spot, but his belt loop yanking on the door handle and keeping him trapped in the doorway of his room was the final straw. He took dinner in his room, because if Lance even looked at him with his stupidly cute face and surprisingly thoughtful words, Keith would start to sob like a child and he cannot have that.

So he sits on the bow.

The bow is quiet, there’s nothing on the bow but him and the built in chairs and the endless, expansive stars.

Keith sighs, a whistle through his throat, and starts to absentmindedly comb his tired fingers through his hair. It sat in a ponytail lately, so he could better wedge his helmet over it, and there was a noticeable dent in his hair from how little time he had to wash it and how often he wore it like that.

Silence envelops him for just a few more minutes before he hears the soft woosh of the automated door open and close. Almost immediately, fight or flight gripping him tight and refusing to let go of him. Keith turns his head and grips his knife, the flat of the blade pressed to his forearm, and watches as Lance edges into the bridge, holding onto a pillow.

Oh.

Fight puts its knife down and flight folds in its wings. Keith lowers his blade and lets it clatter loudly onto the floor, lest Lance assume he’s alone on the bow. Lance looks around wildly for just a second until he sees Keith sitting in front of Red’s chair and relaxes, nodding almost to himself and trudging to the very front of the bow, right in front of the glass.

He watches Lance as he drops his pillow on the floor and tucks his forearms beneath it, turning his chin towards the stars and saying nothing.

But Keith can’t sit in silence like this. He feels like he’s been ripped into a storm and thrown around and around until his head is barely hanging on, so Keith delicately clears his throat and says, “You’re up late.”

“Et tu, Brute?” Lance responds groggily,

Keith laughs slightly, a short bark that comes out a little drier than he intended. “Couldn’t….couldn’t sleep.”

Lance shifts a little so his head is turned to Keith instead of the stars. “Yeah, me too. I didn’t think you came out here. Training deck finally handed you an eviction notice?”

“I like it here.” Keith says defensively; what could he possibly be defending?

“Relax, Red, not here to give you the third degree.” Lance’s eyes slide from open to closed a few times, like he’s fighting sleep.

He doesn’t respond to that, but pulls his knees into his chest and loosely wraps his arms around them, bony kneecaps digging into his collarbone. Keith watches Lance acutely like a predator as this boy, this friend who he flew alongside every day and ate next to and slept in the same hallway as buried his face into the pillow he’d brought with him and his breathing starts to even out.

It comes on like a cold.

Keith sniffs once and coughs and just like that, warm tears bead up in his lower lashline and trickle down his face, bouncing from small freckle to smaller scar and then dripping onto his hand. Slowly, Lance’s head inches upwards, peering at Keith in the low, blue light. His words rattle out of him, “Do you want to talk about it?”

No. Yes. He’d rather kill himself. He’s going to kill himself if he doesn’t. Keith forces all of this down and clears his throat, wiping the tears away from his eyes and coughs again, “I think so. I shouldn’t.”

“You can. If you want. I’ll listen, Keith.” Lance’s voice is low and careful, treating Keith like a scared lioness kept in captivity, and he didn’t mind it.

Keith. It’s always Red, or Mullet, or Rascal Flatts. Never Keith.

He swallows, and trudging every goddamn step of the godforsaken way, Keith tries to articulate what holds him down, night and day.

“I just. I don’t know. I feel like I’m struggling.” He speaks up to the ceiling. “It feels like its climbing up my throat, almost, and I am struggling to keep going with it. I do, I get up every day and do what I have to do as the red paladin, but as Keith Kogane, I am trying so fucking hard, and I cannot keep going like this. I’m going to break and I am fucking scared of it.”

Lance makes a soft, neutral noise.

“And nobody, nobody likes me, I know it, not even you and you’re like, the light of freedom and friendship in this dark fucking hellhole, and I keep failing everything and I want to give up. But if I give up,” Keith pauses very briefly to clear his throat again, because he’s going to sob if he doesn’t, “If I give up, then I’m going to doom the entire universe.”

“That’s..a lot for just one kid.” Lance sounds…worried. “How do you…do it?”

Keith knots his fingers in his hair. A nervous habit. “I just. Do. I guess. Shove it so far down I can’t even think about it and then just keep going, because if I stop, then I’m going to drown.”

“That must have been a lot for you.” Lance says reassuringly, getting up slowly and making his way towards Keith, slumping down against the chair and looking out at the stars right in front of him. “I’m sorry that we put that pressure on you.”

“We–” Keith’s head snaps over to Lance, tracing over the curve of his nose. “Shit. God, this has all happened to you and I’m the only one that’s responding like this because I can’t fucking take it. It’s not fair to you that I’m such a goddamn wreck about it when everyone else has just…figured it out. “

The laugh that spills out of Lance sounds wet. “You think we’ve…figured it out? Keith, we’re all fucking struggling through this together. We’re all hurting.”

Keith presses his lips together and swallows the hurting sob that bangs against his teeth to be let out.

“We thought you’d talk to someone. Shiro, maybe. Keith, you can’t hurt on your own forever. It’ll eat you alive and then chew on the bones until those are gone, too.” Lance’s hand rests on Keith’s elbow, and Keith doesn’t yank it away. He finds a little bit of comfort in the warmth of those fiddler’s fingers.

“You don't know that.” Keith bites out, his fingers digging into his knee.

Lance, to his credit, sighs thoughtfully. “I do. I absolutely do because I lived it. The Garrison was…misery reincarnated. No one liked me. I was almost entirely alone, even with Hunk and Pidge. But I kept moving, every single day until I snapped and started crying in Shiro’s office because he was nice.”

“I remember that day. Shiro came home all emotional because one of his students had trusted him with something so important. Figures it was you.” Keith laughs gently as he recalls the smile on Shiro’s face as he moved around the house making dinner that night.

“Yeah, that was me. I started talking to Veronica after that whenever I could. She got her doctorate in psychiatry and became a therapist, did you know that? I’m so fucking proud of her.” Lance’s voice shifts and it sounds blurry when he brings up his pride in his older sister.

It pulls at some loose string in his soul. Keith’s free hand reaches over and rests gently over the one sitting on his elbow. “She knows. I promise you, she knows that you are proud of her. Even all the way out here.”

“I’m glad you think so, Keith.” Lance looks over at him with a wet shine in his eyes and a weak, fond smile pulling at his lips.

They’re hurt together.

Keith cannot be fixed with just one conversation and a hand on his elbow.

Lance’s longing for his family cannot be mended with a glance at the stars and a hand on top of his.

But while they hurt together, they can start to heal intertwined.

—

ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/53325874

#vld #voltron #keith kogane #vld keith #lance mcclain #keith voltron #klance #vld lance #voltron fanfic #fanfic #heavy stuff #soulreapinfic

[dappercritter]

I reblog a lot of political posts on here so I guess it's only natural I'd make one myself at some point. Anyways... (*deep breath*)

While Genocide Joe absolutely deserve to have his approval ratings plummet for ongoing support of the IDF's brutal invasion of Gaza, I worry about what this means for the elections this year.

I worry about how many people realize that refusing to vote blue at all in November to protest a genocide could lead to another one in their own country over an angrier Trump.

Palestinian lives matter, do not get me wrong. Do not stop talking about Palestine. But we all know Trump's not going to fix it. He's going to endorse it.

Just like how he'll endorse America becoming its worst possible self at this point.

I don't know if it will get as bad as Gaza, but I know that I have a lot of friends who mean so much to me that could be put in serious danger if the government doubles down on rolling back basic human rights. Especially internet privacy and protection for queer people.

I know it's sickening to see another POTUS endorse another attack on an Arab country with all the horrific casualties it entails, but listen.

I watched the last one endorse turning the country into a living nightmare with influence still felt today, wondering if my friends--my only real friends at the time--would make it if he got another term.

It's not a perfect solution I know. But unless you guys are ready to storm the White House for different reasons this year, and you have a plan to keep this kind of scenario from ever happening again, you need to vote in the Democrat primaries and/or vote Democrat in the November elections.

And yes,

Palestine still matters.

But so does the trans community.

So does the gay community.

So does the ace community.

So does the black community.

So does America's own muslim and arab communities.

So does every community living in America under threat.

#vote blue no matter who #palestinian lives matter #free palestine #us elections #democrat primary #election 2024 #joe biden #genocide joe #donald trump #politics #us politics #vent #I'm not using my usual critter rambling tag because this is #heavy stuff #cw genocide mention

[returnsnull7404]

Ok, given the fandom I write for I'm gonna talk about it briefly.

Wilbur's statement was bad, not an apology, and also had significant lies in it (if someone uses a safe word and you dont stop that's not consensual, Wilbur).

I'll make a separate post about my writing cause frankly here isn't the place for it.

Support Shelby Shubble

#heavy stuff #wilbur soot #no i will not be elaborating

[irbcallmefynn]

This bedpost is kinda heavy... Not in the fun way either.

A day or two ago I had a thought that I. Wasn't the biggest fan of? I sometimes kinda feel like I don't deserve everything I have in my life. I don't do anything, I can't bring myself to do anything of "value" by societal standards. But here I am in a fairly comfortable house with a good dad, I'm well fed, I have tons of stuff, I have a fairly good life. But I don't feel like I deserve it sometimes. So many of my friends seem way more skilled and talented at what they do, they have jobs and can drive and all of that. But they're in terrible conditions. Unloving families and surroundings, so many things they want but can't have, not being able to eat as much as they want. Sometimes I feel like they deserve everything I have and I deserve nothing...

I'm able to pull myself out of it fairly easily, but it's a thought I have more than I'd like (I'd like to have it not at all). It sucks. I wish the best for so many of my friends knowing I have it really good, but I can't share that good with them, it's not something I'm capable of... sigh...

#bedposting #heavy stuff #kinda rant #long post #is this imposter syndrome? feels like it

[phantomchick]

PSA pets and children

Please don’t let your pets near infants, please do not leave animals unsupervised with young children, a cat might love you and still sit on your face for warmth or nip/scratch you if you annoy it, it’s a cat it doesn’t understand why that can be more dangerous for younger humans or sleeping humans, it also doesn’t possess human morals. Dogs will get overexcited sometimes, dogs will get anxious and aggressive sometimes.

I understand that there are a lot of ‘cat meets baby’ ‘dog babysits new sibling’ videos online these days because dog videos and baby videos combined result in more cuteness and more views. But I see a lot of shit in fanfic and in online comments and in a lot of copies of these videos, that show an unsettling level of awareness. A pet is an animal and an animals is an ANIMAL. Domesticated or not.

I just saw a news article about an 8 year old girl getting savaged in her backyard by the family dog. She unfortunately did not survive. Is the dog to blame? It’s an animal that was left unsupervised with a young child, it doesn’t understand the concept of blame in the first place. Tiktok videos featuring pets and children aren’t always false, but that doesn’t mean those dogs aren’t still dogs, aren’t still animals. Don’t let a pet near a baby’s face, don’t leave them unsupervised with children in general, unless the child is old enough and the animal small enough that there is no danger should the animal get aggressive. It might be fine, maybe nothing would happen anyway, but it is not worth the risk.

#psa #i just keep seeing pet on kid violence in the news lately #and it's like 'knew this was coming not happy about it' #animals #child death mention #serious things #heavy stuff #dog videos #cat videos

[casvessel]

#sleep token #vessel #heavy stuff #Spotify

[mythrilpencil]

A Tribute

A year ago today I lost one of my best friends.

We served together for the better part of at least a year during our service missions, and we were released only weeks apart. He was one of the funniest, sassiest, most spiritual and insightful men I’ve known.

He also had narcolepsy.

He was never one to let it stop him, and I never heard him complain. He was always a light to me and those around him. But after he was released from his service mission, his condition got worse.

According to his parents, he never prayed for God to take away his narcolepsy…until the night before the accident. The next day—today of last year—he was killed in a car accident. First responders said it was instant.

It’s…been a struggle. For quite a while after the accident, I struggled with how unfair it felt. Not to him—I know it was fair to him; he’s free, and he’s on the other side now serving a new mission, I’m sure—but to me. Because of the lost opportunities. I never realized how much I liked him—and how much he liked me back—until he passed.

His mother described him as an angel, a heavenly superhero, so that’s what I drew him as. He’s free from his moral trials now, and is serving those on the other side of the veil.

But it’s still hard for us on this side.

But we’re doing our best.

I guess what I’m trying to get at here for all y’all is this:

Grief is hard. Whether you believe in an afterlife, as I do, or not. But whether you’ve suffered a loss just recently or a long time ago and are still struggling, you’re seen more than you think you are. There’s people around you whether you know it or not.

And it’ll be ok. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow. But it’ll be ok someday.

#my art #cw death #cw car accident #tribute #grief #hope #heavy stuff #artists on tumblr

[queens-unheard-thoughts]

Part of me hurts. My heart is breaking, yet at the same time it's not. One of my Big Brothers killed himself. It was on mother's day when he used an electric cord to hang himself. My sister in law did cpr on him until the ambulance got there. A part of her regrets it because he was already gone. He could breathe with life support but he was brain dead. He has 3 kids. But they don't know the full truth. They only know that he died from heart complications. And that's partially true since he did have a few heart conditions. But they, hopefully, will never know the full truth because it would kill them.

But it sucks. I can't grieve him fully because I have to hide the fact he killed himself from his kids. I know it's for the best but a part of me feels like I can't full grieve because the full truth hasn't been told. I've been sick, I've eaten at least once a day. I cry sometimes, other times I just watch hours upon hours of videos or I just sleep. I'm in college and I want to quit. I'm tired I'm so tired. But I'm not going to kill myself. Nothing like that, I don't want my Mama's or my Daddy's heart to break again like that. But I miss him.... I miss my Big Brother. The day of the funeral was the day I was supposed to see my best friend get married. I was her maid of honor but I just.... I don't know. A part of me feels numb. A part of all of this feels like a bad dream. I'm supposed to be with my big brother right now, visiting him and surprising my nephew for his birthday.

People tell me, sorry for your loss, they give condolences, once they find out. I told my friends and they have been my lifeline to be honest but.... I feel like I'm bothering them in a way as well. So I stay quiet and I push my emotions down. I know that's not healthy but I have to be the pillar of strength. I break sometimes but I shouldn't have to do this. I shouldn't even have to try and feel okay again. I should be with my big brother having a good time. But I can never again do that. I miss him..... I wish he was here. Why did he do this? Why did he let a fucking cult get into his head about not needing his depression medicine. Why did he drink 3 cases of beer..... Just why?

I shouldn't feel jealous of other people in the family having significant others but I am. They have someone who they can lean on but I have no one. Yeah I have my friends but I'm just a bother if I break down crying.... I hate that I'm like this.... I just want everything to be okay again. I wish this was all a nightmare and that I could wake up.... I wish... I could just disappear

#emotions #tw depressing stuff #tw depressing thoughts #heavy stuff #sads crap #sadnees

[shandycandy278]

Man while I was writing two fluffy drabbles, y’all came in and dumped some hard angst

#random #don’t worry I love it and I don’t mind #but DANG #heavy stuff

[wonderlandleighleigh]

Are people all good/bad or is it more complicated

I think it's more complicated, because morality is complicated.

You have to be able to define "Good" and "Bad" in a moral sense, and I can do that for myself, but not for like...the world, right? Because my definitions of those words are going to look different than someone else's.

In GENERAL. I like to think people try to do the right thing.

But then I look at guys like Elon Musk who have the ability to literally use their wealth to help the world, and they...don't.

They could. They don't.

Those kinds of people get to a specific wealth bracket, and their moral compass just runs out of battery.

So does that mean that people are inherently bad? Because with enough resources we just default to selfish, greedy behavior and fuck the fact that the planet is dying and so are the people on it in varying terrible ways? Are they outliers? Just highly publicized unique cases that don't come along very often?

It's a big question, and I don't know the answer.

People are just people I guess. I like to think we're all doing our best to survive and if we can give someone else a leg up in some small way, we try to do that, too.

#heavy stuff

[returnsnull7404]

Alright, post about my writing cause the fandom is obviously in turmoil.

I'm going to finish my current projects. I still love characters from the DSMP like Tommy, Tubbo, and Techno's character and I'm not letting a shitty person involved absolutely destroy my relationship with a project Technoblade loved and put a lot of effort into.

I already didn't have much planned involving Wilbur’s character and that's not really going to change, so if you don't want to see anything from him, congrats, that's not a concern over here.

If I'll write anything in this fandom after I'm done with my current projects totally depends on if I'm inspired to do so.

I'm planning on posting about other things I'm interested in on this blog, including other fandoms and possibly some original work, so if you're interested stick around for that.

I don't really have anything else to add in this post. I won't be arguing with anyone about anything related to this, I use the block button liberally

#my fics #heavy stuff

[is-gabenath-confirmt-yet]

The Story being back with putting the D in Dilemma

#gabenath #gabenath ff #gabriel x nathalie #nathalie sancoeur #gabriel agreste #miraculous ladybug #mlb #miraculous ff #fanfiction #ao3 #drama #trauma #heavy stuff