#i think you guys need this context when i lose my mind over OUR ARGUMENTS WITH THE ORLESIANS ARE A THING OF THE PAST

[vigilskeep]

“And with what wit has my cousin silenced so sweet a voice?” Celene asked into the expectant silence.

Melcendre paused, uncomfortable, but Gaspard dipped his head, a bow just barely sufficient to avoid undeniable insult. “Your Imperial Majesty,” he said, still chuckling, “I was pointing out that the young lady’s song had a melody similar to ‘King Meghren’s Mabari.’”

The assembled nobles tittered, scandalously amused. Celene kept her smile in place. It was a good first strike. The song had been popular and harmless decades ago, during the Orlesian occupation of Ferelden. It told the story of the unhappy Meghren, sent against his will to Ferelden by Emperor Florian. In the song, the hapless noble was comically frustrated at every turn by rough Fereldan culture, including a slobbering mabari hound that ate his mask.

While never forbidden, the song had lost its popularity after King Maric of Ferelden killed Meghren. Since coming to power, Celene had done her best to strengthen ties between the two countries, and the song mocking the crude Fereldans and their uncultured customs had never come back into fashion.

Until now, it seemed.

“I remember singing this with the men during marches,” Gaspard said. “It took us back to the days when Orlais stood poised to conquer the world. Poor Meghren, trapped far from the Maker’s gaze, trying to make himself at home among the dog-lords.” He was a tall man, broad in shoulder, and his doublet and hose were cut with hard lines and silver trim to give the impres- sion of armor. His mask was gold, set with emeralds to match his family’s heraldry, and a tall yellow feather sprouted from the mask—like Ser Michel, he was a member of the chevaliers.

He was also standing not ten paces from Bann Teagan Guerrin, the Fereldan ambassador. The man’s face, bare of makeup, clearly showed his anger at hearing his people called “dog-lords.”

“It was a sad time for all of us,” Celene said, turning to the ambassador with a smile, “and Orlais is pleased to count Ferelden as a friend in these trying times.”

Teagan smiled gratefully and bowed. “Your Imperial Majesty, Ferelden hopes the same.”

“Of course.” Gaspard strode forward. “What’s past is past, eh, Teagan? And now we’re just two old warriors.” He clapped the Fereldan on the shoulder, and Bann Teagan stiffened at the familiarity.

“Did you bring your dog with you to Orlais, my lord?” Melcendre added, the dark-haired bard the very picture of innocence, even as the crowd chuckled.

Teagan turned to her, fists clenched at his sides. “Yes, though not to this ball. I doubt he’d appreciate the food.”

That got a laugh from the crowd. While not a master of the Game, the Fereldan noble was smart enough to see when he was being set up and to try to get the crowd on his side.

“Someday I’ll have to see your dog, Teagan,” Gaspard said, not to be distracted from his play. “But tonight, in celebration of the friendship between our empire and your, ah, kingdom, I brought something for you.” He snapped his fingers, and a servant rushed up carrying a long bundle wrapped in rich green velvet.

Gaspard took the package and handed it to Teagan with a wide smile. Reluctantly, knowing he was stepping into a trap but unable to find a way to avoid doing so, the ambassador unwrapped the package.

Inside, as Briala had informed Celene earlier in the afternoon, was a sword. It was Fereldan in make, largely functional but with a few hints of ornamentation around the hilt and cross guard to suggest that it was the fighting blade of a noble. It was worse for wear, with nicks along the blade and a few spots of rust.

“Grand Duke Gaspard!” Michel moved to put himself between Celene and the sword. The weapon should never have made it into the hall—guards at the palace entrance checked all packages to prevent an assassin from bringing a weapon inside. Which was, Celene reflected, why Gaspard had gone to so much trouble to get the package smuggled in and hidden in the hedge maze earlier that day.

“At ease, chevalier.” Gaspard eyed the blade. “I’d as soon come at someone with a fireplace poker as I would wield that thing.” He nodded to Bann Teagan. “It was taken off the body of some Fereldan noblewoman who got caught making trouble for poor Meghren. Moira, I believe.” Behind his gold and green mask, his eyes twinkled with good humor. “Our servants had been using it to kill rats in the cellars.”

Teagan had gone still, looking at the sword in his hands as though the rest of the court had vanished. The green velvet bunched around his white-knuckled fists.

“That was a noble’s sword?” Melcendre asked, adding just the right touch of doubt to lure the crowd into laughing at the battered blade and drive Teagan further toward saying something that Gaspard could construe as an insult.

i don’t know how many of you have read the masked empire but to me it’s the only depiction of orlesians that really hits and i did mean to share this bit when i read it bc i actually gasped. for the unfamiliar, moira theirin is maric’s mother and thus cailan and alistair’s grandmother, she was ferelden’s rebel queen under the orlesian occupation. she was murdered by orlesians when a fereldan bann betrayed her to them and her head was put on a spike in denerim

#long post #i think you guys need this context when i lose my mind over OUR ARGUMENTS WITH THE ORLESIANS ARE A THING OF THE PAST #they would have eaten cailan alive.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

A while ago, I made a post that said I was going to give my thoughts about the Oscars thing with Chris Rock and Will Smith, and then behind the “keep reading” link, I explained that it was an April Fool’s joke and of course the world doesn’t need my thoughts on Chris Rock and Will Smith. Well, I feel like it should be a joke again this time, because I know the world doesn’t need my thoughts on this one, but I am actually not joking when I say that beyond this “keep reading” link is a bunch of stuff I think about John Mulaney and his various controversies.

I apologize. I just had to write this down here because if I don’t I’ll still be thinking it and I’ll end up talking about it the next time I see the only person I know who has any interest in discussing John Mulaney, and that’s my brother who’s a massive fan of his, and my brother and I just had an argument two days ago because of his refusal to wear masks in public indoor spaces, and I don’t want to have another fucking argument about this. So I’m putting it here. 

Okay. So when all the weird stuff happened with John Mulaney last year, I thought it was very messed up that so many people were talking about it like it was any of their business, and I still think that, but I did have to admit I can understand commenting on it. Because he did have quite a bit of material based around the idea that he was a “regular” guy compared to many celebrities, his wife was not famous, he was not going to make jokes at her expense, he was just trying to live a good family life. I love his “my wife is a bitch and I like her so much” joke, and that joke doesn’t stop being funny just because they got divorced, but it does add context that makes it feel a bit different. And if you happen to be a big fan of John Mulaney and really invested in him as a great comedian, it’s fair to say something about that when he does all that stuff he did last year.

I have seen all of John Mulaney’s specials and think he’s an amazingly skilled comedian, but I would not call myself particularly invested in him. So while I was judging all the people losing their minds over a development in his personal life last year, I tried to think of how I’d react if this happened with a comedian in whom I do have emotional investment – if he were known as a down-to-Earth-for-their-level-of-fame family man who loves his wife and talks about her in his material but only talks about how great she is, and has built some of his comedy on how he doesn’t need a “showbiz lifestyle” he only needs his lovely non-famous wife, and then he suddenly turns around and does something so strongly at odds with all of that. And I have to admit… yeah, if Russell Howard suddenly ran off and impregnated, like, Emma Watson, I would probably at least mention it. I’d love to say I have enough anti-celebrity gossip integrity to just go on posting on this blog as though that did not happen, but I can’t say that. If Russell Howard even impregnates Emma Watson, this blog will be a source from which you will be able to learn that that happened.

But I would try to mention it with lots of caveats about how it isn’t actually our business and it seems like a weird thing to us because we don’t have the context of what was going on in those personal relationships and we shouldn’t have that context because it’s none of our business. And yeah that is going to make it a bit weird if we go back and watch old jokes Russell has made about how much he loves his wife, but just because someone made some jokes based on how their life was at the time doesn’t mean they’re obligated to keep their life that way forever just so the jokes continue to work.

So I tried to keep that in mind when judging the John Mulaney fans who collectively lost their minds on the internet last year. I’m not better than the ones who said, “Well shit, that’s a very fucking weird thing that happened”, because I’d do the same if it were one of the comedians I’m really invested in. But I think I would not take it farther than that, and last year there were a hell of a lot of people taking it much farther than that. Which I know about because my brother is a massive John Mulaney fan, as are a number of my Facebook friends, and they were sharing some really bad examples of people thinking their opinions are needed about the personal lives of people they’ve never met. When I write this blog, I spend some time thinking about where the line is between what it’s okay to say in public discourse about public figures, and what isn’t okay. If I ever get concerned that maybe I’ve gotten too close to that line, I just remember what the John Mulaney fans did last year and then I don’t feel so bad.

Anyway. I maintain that what John Mulaney did last year was his business, and whether or not it was very kind on a personal level (and honestly, we have no idea, it’s possible that if he were a friend of mine I’d hear a side of the story that would make me think he made all the right choices, it’s possible that I’d hear a side of the story that would make me want to stage an intervention, I don’t know, he’s not a friend of mine), it was not worth canceling him or harassing anyone involved or judging people as an outsider or anything else. It was worth saying “Well shit, that was weird” and moving on.

I first saw the stuff about the new John Mulaney story a couple of days ago. I actually thought it was a joke at first and also thought I didn’t care enough to find out what happened, but then I kept seeing people mention it, and decided to look up the actual story just so I can understand the references. And yeah, this one is very notably different than the last one. So different that I shouldn’t really talk about them in the same post, because I don’t want it to seem like I’m equivocating them. I’m only putting them together because this story made me think of the last time John Mulaney was in the news for something besides a really good joke he’d made, and I remembered how my main reaction to that was “Jesus, all the people in the world who do not personally know John Mulaney or his wife need to chill about this”. And remembering that reaction really underlines the difference in reaction this time, because this time it’s… God damn it, they are right this time. This one was a properly shitty thing to do that is fair game to talk about because it’s not a private issue, it’s something he did very much in public, and to the public.

At first my understanding of the story was that he just brought Dave Chapelle out and Dave Chappelle did some regular material, and that would be pretty bad if people weren’t expecting him, especially because statistically a group of people the size of John Mulaney’s audience is going to have some trans people in it. That would be true even if you took a random sample of that number of people, and it’s more true because of the fact that John Mulaney tends to be popular among queer people. Not only among queer people; he appeals to just about everyone. But he definitely is one of the straight cis white dudes that Tumblr has accepted, and understandably so, because he’s a very funny comedian who doesn’t do jokes at the expense of those minority populations.

Taking an audience with trans and other queer people in it, when they’re expecting to just see John Mulaney (or they’re expecting John Mulaney and some John Mulaney-type opener), and throwing at them a guy who’s been in the news for months for being openly transphobic – that’s a bad thing to do to your audience. That’s a bad thing even if Dave Chappelle just did some of his regular material – and by “regular” I mean “stuff that was written to be funny rather than just written to get him into the tabloids for transphobia and thereby boost his ticket sales among assholes” – and then left the stage. Queer people in the audience would still be feeling blindsided by having to deal with this guy who represents so much of the type of hatred they deal with in real life, when they were just trying to watch John Mulaney not do that sort of thing.

But according to the story I read – and I’ll be honest, I read a couple of articles to learn enough so I can understand what people are talking about and that was it – Dave Chappelle actually did a bunch of his homophobic and transphobic material during that set. That wouldn’t have been an accident. That means that at some point, John Mulaney and whoever else was involved in planning this said to Dave Chappelle, “You know how you’re really famous right now for being a dick to queer people? Why don’t you come to my show and spend some time specifically being in a dick to queer people, and then that will make the tabloid news?”

My first reaction to that was holy hell, that is an absolutely awful thing to do to an unsuspecting audience. Because that goes against the argument that people make, doesn’t it? People who say “Well if you don’t like offensive comedy, don’t watch it. No one’s making you watch it.” These are people who had specifically chosen to not watch that sort of thing. If they’d wanted to see homophobic and transphobic comedy, they’d have paid to see a comedian who’s known for doing that sort of thing. Instead, they specifically paid to see a comedian who doesn’t do that sort of thing. And then they got hit with this. I guess technically no one was making them do it, they could have left. If they wanted to be the person who gets up in the middle of a bigoted joke and leaves, with everyone looking at them, knowing it might cause the bigoted comedian on stage to call them out. And if they want to waste the money, and the travel time and babysitter-finding time and whatever else, that they put into the chance to see John Mulaney.

My next thought upon seeing that Dave Chappelle did a bunch of queerphobic jokes to a John Mulaney-expecting audience was – wait, what? Why? If I were emotionally invested in John Mulaney, I’d be a lot more upset on a personal level. But I’m not that invested in him, so I don’t feel personally let down or anything. I’m just confused. What did John Mulaney possibly think he’d gain by joining Dave Chappelle on the “martyr to cancel culture, lauded by assholes” train? Does he need media attention that badly? He had lots of tabloid attention last year, presumably more than anyone could want. And that aside, his career as a very good comedian who performs to massive audiences and can sell any new special he wants to the highest bidder – that’s going very well. He doesn’t need to generate controversy-based articles like the ones being written about him now.

I can understand how Dave Chappelle benefited from becoming a “cancel culture martyr”, because his fanbase has always included lots of the sort of people who love an “edgy” guy who shits on minorities. With the stuff he did last year, he rallied his own base, and drew in more of that crowd. He alienated some of his fans – I know there are lots of transgender and trans-allied Dave Chappelle fans who left his fanbase and wouldn’t pay for his tickets anymore – but he probably gained more fans than he lost. Overall, he got the sort of attention he wanted to advance his career.

But I don’t see how this works for John Mulaney. He’s going to alienate a lot more people than Dave Chappelle did if he goes down this road, because he has a lot more queer and trans and just progressive people in his fanbase to begin with. And he’s not going to bring a lot of new fans in, because the sorts of people who will start watching his stuff just because they love a guy who “stands up to cancel culture” are going to quickly find that John Mulaney doesn’t make nearly enough jokes at minorities’ expense to actually entertain them. So… I don’t see why John Mulaney thought that creating what he had to know – like, 100% definitely knew – would be a media storm would be a good idea.

I realize this whole post has looked at it from a very outsider perspective, and like I said, I can do that because I’m not really invested in him and I wasn’t actually at the gig where I was suddenly blindsided by a bunch of homophobia and transphobia when I’d paid to see John Mulaney. It’s fair and right that most of the reaction to this is about how and why it’s harmful and, on a human level that ignores the tabloids and the cynical career moves, a really shitty thing to do to the people who have made him famous. But most of the time, when someone famous does something shitty like that, I can understand why they did it. How they understood that something resulting from that bad thing, usually the media attention that they expected to create, would be good for them in some way.

I don’t get this one at all. Aside from being awful thing to do, which it was, it’s just deeply fucking weird. John doesn’t make transphobic jokes or statements himself – he didn’t even alienate his fans as a way to stick to his guns about one of his own jokes that he wanted to make. He did it for the sake of… getting to bring a friend on stage? What’s the point of that?

Anyway, those are some thoughts. They’re not thoughts that the world needs, they’re just thoughts that I have. This is a weird one.

Here’s a less depressing thing: I saw Nish Kumar perform his most recent show, Your Power, Your Control, live a couple of nights ago. That show did contain a rant about comedians who run out of funny things to say so they just do Netflix specials where they shit on minorities instead, and that ran was followed by the words, “Fuck Ricky Gervais, Fuck Dave Chappelle” (for a split second I thought Jimmy Carr’s name was going to come out next, probably for the best that it didn’t - for the record I don't think Jimmy is the same as those other two because those two say "these are my actual views, now I'll tell some jokes about them" while Jimmy just does one-liner jokes and has never expressed an actual view in his life, but he does belong in the general category Nish described of comedians who use the cheap trick of shitting on minorities in Netflix specials for attention from the "comedy should be offensive!" types). The only reason I bring that up is as an antidote to any sentiment that might go around about how it’s not fair to expect such lofty moral purity from celebrities as refusing to be friends with other celebrities who are bigoted assholes. It turns out that some people can do it, and it is fair to expect that at bare minimum, comedians do not subject unsuspecting audiences to bigoted rhetoric who paid to see something completely different. Because… because it’s a shitty thing to do, but it’s also just such a weird thing to do. What the fuck, Mulaney?

[adamarks]

If one more person says simon snow should lose his wings i’m gonna lose my goddamn mind: a meta

Alright you guys, I’ve had ENOUGH. Simon cannot lose his wings unless you want him to break up with Baz, and this is why.

Let’s start with Baz.

This analysis is obviously Simon-based, and yes i’ll get there, but first we need to look at the biggest key we’ve been given to what Simon’s wings could possibly mean subtextually and metaphorically for the story at large. That key is: Baz’s vampirism. 

Baz being a vampire is constantly compared to/mentioned in tandem with his queerness in Carry On. In his first chapters, what are the three most important traits that we learn about him? 

he’s a drama queen

he’s a vampire

he’s hopelessly in love with simon snow

If you boil his character down until he’s basically just a stick figure, that’s what he is: an over dramatic vampire in love with Simon Snow.

We’ve all read the books, we all know this, and we all know he’s much more than that. What of it?

What’s important is that Baz’s vampirism is treated almost the exact same as his homosexuality. 

Hiding it from everyone, being ashamed of it, knowing what you are but being terrified of it. His dad being “definitely more disappointed in my queerness than my undeadness.” 

I mean, holy shit, let’s look at this bit in Carry on from Chapter 51:

“I think if I got married, to a girl from a good family, my father wouldn’t even care that I’m queer. “

This scene really hits, because how many times have you wondered “What if I was straight? Maybe this thing wouldn’t be as bad?” “What if i was just a straight poc?” “What if I was only gay and not trans?” “What if I was only disabled and not gay on top of it?” What if, what if, what if. Would my life be easier? you wonder. Would I get hurt less? Would people treat me better?

If Carry On is about self-realization, then Wayward Son is about the struggle of self-acceptance. 

Baz going to Las Vegas and meeting Lamb probably seemed familiar for some of you people that are LGBT+. It’s how you feel when you’re from a small town and you go to a big city like New York or Orlando or LA for the first time and you see gay people all around you. Flamboyantly gay! Gay people holding hands! Gay people kissing! Trans people that don’t fit the gender norms! Older trans ladies just walking down the street!

It’s exciting, it’s exhilarating. Your baby-gay brain is so confused because no one’s giving them dirty looks. They don’t look nervous or ashamed. Is this allowed?

The party in the penthouse is glamorous and beautiful and alluring and none of the humans there are scared or look like they’re in real danger. It’s because they aren’t. None of those vampires are there to kill people. 

This is where Baz’s fear of his own nature comes in. Let’s hear it for all you homosexuals in the crowd that are/have been terrified of being predatory. Of turning the gender you’ve been told all of your life you’re not supposed to want into pieces of meat. You feel ashamed for wanting physical intimacy. You feel wrong for wanting emotional intimacy. 

Lamb is the older gay that you meet/learn about/watch on youtube or whatever that makes you learn that no, you’re not inherently evil. Lamb is the queer history, the queer movies, the queer people that you discover that make you learn that “no, i’m not bad. I’m not broken. I’m beautiful. I’m beautiful.” 

Baz thinking the sight of Lamb drinking that guy’s blood being alluring and beautiful is crucial to his arc. Baz needs to see that all of him is beautiful. 

So homosexuality = Baz being a vampire? How in the flying fuck does this have anything to do with Simon?

Remember, Baz is our key. His struggles have been happening since book one. Simon just gained his “creature” status at the end of Carry On. He’s new to this. Which means we’re new to the subtext. Which means: let’s dive on into the next big point.

Our Big Bisexual Boy

Whatever label you choose to use for Simon is up to you. As long as we all agree he likes more than one gender then it’s whatevs. I’m going to be using the word bisexual for this meta, though. 

We’re all well aware that Simon is Struggling with his bisexuality in this book. 

“I still haven’t sorted out whether I’m still attracted to women or whether I ever was, or whether I’m some kind of Baz-only-sexual. But the cleavage at this place is abundant, and I’m not mad about it.”

(taken from chapter 21) 

Like....... y’know. We know. It’s... we get it. 

The important part of that quote is that it’s at the Ren Faire. The Ren Faire is the first time Simon’s had his wings out in public since god-knows-when, if ever. This is also the first time he really considers kissing Baz in the book. Kissing Baz in Public.

Any of you that have been to Pride probably got a little bit of the warm fuzzies during this scene. The faire brought back such deep memories of my first pride it was a little bit emotional. I talked to random people, people ran around in rainbow outfits. There was body paint! Stupid hats! Weird dye jobs! The classic pride-flag-as-a-cape look! I talked to so many people and 

“Everyone here is so friendly.”

(also taken from chapter 21)

Everyone was so nice to me.

Baz feels right at home; Simon is all smiles. The only one not having a blast is Penny and she’s (I’m sorry, Penny) the token straight friend in these books. 

I don’t know how Rainbow did it, but she made me relive my first pride through Simon, and I’ll never not be grateful for that. 

“Today I’m someone else entirely. Today I’m just a bloke with fake red wings.”

The Pride/Ren Faire parallels were pretty obvious, but I wanna get a little further into the whole “wings = being bisexual” thing. 

We’ve established with Baz that being a magical creature or whatnot is Gay, but while Baz is fully magical, Simon’s “half-normal.” Kind of. It’s a weird situation there but half-normal works for the argument. 

“’Smells like dragon... but also smells like iron. Another abomination!’” 

(chapter 35)

Now the word “abomination” is really fucking unfortunate in this context, but biphobia exists so idk man. I’m gonna start talking in gay/straight terms and I absolutely know bisexuality isn’t half-gay half-straight but we’re talking in metaphors and i’ll tie it together at the end so just stick with me, okay?

He’s part dragon, part Normal (kind of). Simon’s not like Baz where he’s absolutely, 100% a vampire. He has traits of dragons and humans. This is why it’s so bad that he hates his wings half the time. They are part of him. They may not be “normal” and he may have to hide them, but he can’t just cut off the gay part. Our queerness doesn’t define us, but it’s a defining feature. 

Penny says she wouldn’t be her if she wasn’t a mage. Simon wouldn’t be Simon if he wasn’t bi. 

The mistake Simon and almost everyone else makes during this book is that they think of his wings as these separate entities. There is no gay part and straight part of Simon Snow. All of him is Simon. From the tips of his toes to the tops of his wings, all of him is Simon. He might’ve discovered this part of himself during a tragic point in his life, but that doesn’t mean it has to be something bad. It doesn’t have to be something tainted. 

Sometimes you discover things about yourself during the hardest moments of your life. When you’re already down in the dirt, beaten and bruised, sometimes a mirror is put in front of you and you realize something. You realize you’re trans. You realize you’re gay. And sometimes you resent those realizations because they came to you at the worst possible time. “This is just one more thing on my plate,” you think. 

This series is about reclaiming the things that where taken from you by the ones that hurt you. 

Simon’s going to have to learn to love his wings, because even though they remind him of something that hurts-- hurts more than anything-- they’re part of him. They are him, as much as the rest of his body is. Simon’s going to have to forgive himself, and learn to love himself for all that he is. 

Because all that he is is beautiful. 

We all know it; it’s time for him to understand that.

All right, bitches. Let’s get to the bit we all REALLY care about. this is the one that really fucks me up my dudes. Because it’s Brutal. But anyways here we go.

His wings are the Big Baz Love 

What are the two things that Simon’s  considering cutting off in this book?

“That’s what I’m going to say when I break up with Baz.”

“Dr. Wellbelove said he could remove the wings. And the tail. Whenever I’m ready.”

(Chapter 2, Epilogue)

Yikes!

My guys..... Simon and Baz don’t kiss unless Simon’s wings are out.

I truly do not understand how some of you are out here saying Simon’s gonna lose his wings I really don’t. It’s stressful. I’m stressed. Ms. Rainbow Rowell, you have me stressed. 

His Wings! Are! His Love!

On Love’s Light Wings!

Goatman dances his nasty little fingers all over the bridge that is Baz’s ass? Wings out, uses his tail to help kill the guy. Lamb is hitting on Baz too much? 

“’Spell my wings off.’”

(Chapter 45)

In the airport, when a lady is giving them the “don’t be gay” stink eye he immediately checks to make sure his tail is hidden. 

Baz can’t spell his wings off, guys. 

Baz can’t spell his wings away.

“’Snow needs you to cast your angel spell on him. I hid his wings for breakfast, but they’re still there.’“

(Chapter 19)

In Chapter 41, the biggest kiss scene we get, Simon wraps his wings around Baz to hold him. He’s embracing him in his love guys. Guys. 

Have you people noticed how i’m suddenly less articulate? It’s because i’m in crisis. Set me on fire I wouldn’t notice. I’ve been living with this terrible knowledge.

The first scene we finally see them kiss is after the scene at the Ren Faire when Simon’s wings are finally out and he finally got to fly.

“Simon catches up with me and traps me against the car. He’s kissing me before I see it coming.” 

Simon is so dtf in this scene Penny throws a water bottle at them, and it hits him in the wing. 

“’So hot,’ Simon Says. ‘Got to see you fight without picking a fight with you myself.’

Bunce throws a plastic bottle over my shoulder, and it smacks Simon in the wing.”

(Chapter 22)

She had to smack him right in the love for him to calm down, my dudes, my guys. Do you realize how hard it was for me to annotate this goddamn book with this knowledge? Every. Single. Time. Simon stretches a wing or flaps them around it’s about Baz. It gets to the point where you have to put the book down or you’re gonna explode. 

Simon’s wings are always out around Lamb. He’s jealous as hell and he hates that motherfucker’s guts. The only real injuries Simon sustains in this book are to his wings and they’re almost always when Baz gets hurt too. 

When did Simon get his wings? Only a day after he first kissed Baz.

Simon’s love for Baz is so big and so obnoxious he can’t hide it. His wings and tail have spikes, because that’s all Simon knows. He’s rough around the edges, he’s been hurt, he’s been used.

He’s never been in love before.

His love is spiky; it’s loud. It’s hotrod red and you can’t miss it when it’s out. Baz can’t see it, because Simon’s tucked it away. He hasn’t flown with it. He hasn’t wrapped it around Baz in so long. He doesn’t know how to handle a love this big, where to put it, when to unfurl it. 

Simon gets jealous. He gets scared. He’s insecure. He wants so dearly to finally give to someone instead of feeling like he’s just giving in. Like he’s still just taking from Baz.

What do you do with wings? 

How do you find somewhere safe to fly?

The Resolution.

I said earlier that if Carry On is a story of self-discovery, Wayward Son is a story of self-acceptance.

Simon has to love himself, and learn that his love for Baz is a good thing. As he accepts himself (and his dragon powers evolve go read my dragon simon meta it’s good.) he’s going to start to shine. 

This is a story being told to us with nothing but love. This is a story about a boy that’s his own worst enemy-- as all of us often are. It’s so scary to accept our wings. It’s so scary to accept our fangs. Especially when they’ve come out of such a hideous occurrence. 

We need to accept these dark times and acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, we were made more beautiful because of them. Maybe the light we give after we’ve been in darkness is more vibrant, because we know how scary the dark is. The things that happened to us were horrible, and hideous, and terrifying, but we aren’t. We’re different from how we were before, but we’re still beautiful. 

Simon Snow is going to accept himself.

Simon Snow is going to accept his past.

Simon Snow is going to finally, finally tell Baz he loves him.

And for the first time, Simon Snow is going to see that he’s beautiful.

If you’ve liked this meta you should also check out this one where i explain how they’re finally gonna get their relationship together. Also the one about the scarf

Special thank you to @singerofsimplesongs for listening to me howl and screech about this damn thing. 

Tagging some people that might be interested!

@neck-mole @watfordwallflower @carrybits @theflyingpeach @fight-surrender @shitty-posty-times @wisest-girl @slaying-fictional-dragons @gucciglitzy

#carry on #wayward son #any way the wind blows #rainbow rowell #simon snow #snowbaz #baz pitch #Penelope Bunce #tyrannus basilton grimm pitch #tyrannus basilton pitch #wayward son spoilers #meta #wayward son meta #carry on meta #this will end in flames #agatha wellbelove

[twdmusicboxmystery]

When a Grady Actor Confirmed TD and Other Reasons the Spoilers Don’t Spoil TD

Okay Everyone, I’m gonna cover a few of things today that I hope will help everyone to continue feeling at least somewhat better about the spoilers. 

***More spoilers below (same ones as yesterday, actually) but don’t read if you don’t want to know. You’ve been warned.***

1) Could the spoilers be fake?

I got plenty of messages and comments yesterday, too. Some of them claiming these spoilers aren’t even true and the person who spoiled them is a troll and unreliable. 

Now, before everyone starts messaging me and commenting about how you “know” these are true and the screeners are out, please note that I’m not making a claim either way. The account that spoiled this isn’t one who normally gets and reviews screeners, which means they could be false. That doesn’t mean that account didn’t get these from a reputable source, which means they could be true.

As I said yesterday, overall, I think they’re probably true. I think they were probably intentionally leaked to hype up the fandom and gauge our reactions. And I would rather you all make your peace with them being real rather than holding out hope that they’re totally false. But I think it’s worth reiterating that they haven’t been 100% confirmed, yet.

2) There’s a whole other person involved in this Leah arc that we don’t know about yet.

You know how yesterday I went on and on about how we don’t have anything near all the details of this arc? Well, someone pointed this out to me. Don’t feel bad if you totally missed it, because I did, too, and I haven’t seen anyone talking about it.

Look at the picture of Leah below carefully. Look at what’s behind her. If you look closely, there’s someone kneeling on the ground. They’ve got one knee resting on the floor, and the other one pointed toward the ceiling with their foot flat. You can see one shoulder to the left of Leah’s hip.

Spoilers make no mention of this person. We have no idea who they are or how they fit into the story.

This looks to me like it’s when she and Daryl first meet (hence, she doesn’t trust him and is holding him at gunpoint) and she seems to be protecting this person from him. Whoever it is, it probably has to do with why she’s out there to begin with, and will probably factor in how/why she disappears.

And I have no doubt that this shot is purposeful, guys. If they wanted us to know about this person directly, they would have given us a more obvious shot of them. And yet, they have put hints of the person in the shots they DID release. Isn’t that just like them?

But my point is, this is proof that there is a lot about this episode the spoilers are leaving out. So please keep that in mind.

3) When a Grady actor directly addressed TD.

So, for the past few days, as you can imagine I’ve been talking with and consoling people about these spoilers. I just keep going back to the stuff we KNOW. Like that there are missing scenes Emily was in from S5. Those have nothing to do with Leah and suggest Beth’s return. And if she’s returning, I promise you, Bethyl will be a thing.

The other thing I mentioned to people is when Jarod Thompson (guy that played one of the Grady cops) addressed TD directly. 

I quickly realized I needed to repost this because no one seemed to have any idea what I was talking about. Then it took me an hour to find it because I didn’t give it its own post when I first posted it. It was buried at the bottom of this Rick’s Fate post from S9 and not properly indexed. But I did finally locate it.

So, here’s the rundown. Right after the episode where Jadis took Rick away in the helicopter, Jarod Thompson tweeted this:

I’m pretty sure you can’t find this tweet anymore. It was taken down. But let me make a couple of points here. 

First, the obvious. TD has nothing to do with Leah. She wasn’t even on anyone’s radar back then. So what he’s telling us here has nothing to do with Leah. He’s basically telling us that Beth will return. 

Translation: Leah doesn’t matter. Beth is coming back. 

This is just one (of many) things that keeps me strong in TD. Because the actor actually confirmed this for us. And then it was quickly taken down, which is always suspicious to me. Why? Well, I’m sure some people will be quick to counter with the argument that maybe he was just trolling or making fun of us. But I don’t see that as a terribly logical argument. 

He’s never done it before or since. 

We have other evidence (HERE) of him working with Emily post-season 5, and possibly in the hospital setting. 

The timing is suspicious. This happened after Rick left. And I personally think that what he referred to here was the CRM. 9x05 was the first time they really came front and center, an active part of the story. So I think he was hinting that Beth is inside that organization as well and that now that the audience knows who they are, the stage is set and things are in motion for her return.

For the record, it was not long after this that we started getting the massing amount of Beth/Emily promotion on social media. 

Most importantly, his tweet was removed, probably by him at someone else’s request. Think about this really logically, guys. They don’t remove tweets about Caryl happening. They don’t remove teases about Daryl and Connie. They only remove suspicious posts that might tell us something about Beth’s return. There’s a reason for that. 

Furthermore, consider this. He’s kind of a small-time actor on the show. Of course I don’t mean that in a negative way. He’s fabulous. But I mean he’s not a main character on the show like Andy or Norman or Lauren. And HE knows all about TD, what we want, obviously what is going to happen, and which events in the show constitute room for us “to breathe.” 

So what does that tell you about other actors on the show, the writers, and any higher-ups connected to the show?

Yeah. Exactly.

Which leads me to my next order of business:

4) Kirkman’s Post/Poll

I think most people saw this last night, but if you didn’t , here it is. 

You can still vote HERE. I took the screenshot last night. I just checked again and the percentage has gone down a couple of points (still at 47%) with more than 9500 votes at this time. So the ‘bring Beth back’ option is still the runaway winner.

Here’s the thing. The timing on this is super-suspicious to me. When was the last time Kirkman tweeted something about Beth? I have no idea, and don’t care to go digging through his Twitter account to find out, but I promise you he hasn’t done it in a long time. He’s said things about her and Bethyl during interviews and such, of course, but he doesn’t just randomly tweet about her. Like...ever.

So you’re telling me that on day 2 after these spoilers leak, when the fandoms are loosing their collective minds, Kirkman just so happens to post this? No way. I don’t buy it.

Look, I know most of us don’t like Kirkman. And I’m not defending him. I don’t like him either. But after watching his interaction with tptb all these years, I have come to believe that they do use him. 

Gimple (and now Kang, I’m sure) are very careful about what they say. Guys, I’ve watched and analyzed this VERY closely over the years, which is why I always say that they never directly lie to us. Misdirection? Yes. Hyperbole? Of course. But they never look into the camera and tell us something blatantly untrue. 

I believe that’s because they don’t want the fans to be able to point at anything they say and accuse them of falsehood. That’s why they can’t ever say much, because it’s either give spoilers (which they won’t) or lie (which they also won’t). That’s why their answers are always so vague and general and very, very irritating. 

But Kirkman isn’t one of the showrunners. He’s connected to it, of course, and I think he knows a lot about what’s coming down the pipeline, but if he says something that’s untrue, tptb can simply shrug and say, “he’ doesn’t make executive story decisions.” Because of that, I believe they use him to sew discord and misdirection. 

And again, I’m not saying this isn’t troll-ish. I’m not saying I like this tactic or that it’s a good thing. I’m simply saying this is what they do. 

So when Kirkman says anything TD-related, I pay attention. Not because I think we should take it at face value, but because the timing, context, how he frames it, and what’s going on in the fandom at the time can tell us a lot about it and give us some clues. 

So, in this case, I think tptb are watching the fandom’s reactions to the spoilers and trying to do a little damage control. But here’s what really gets me: he only mentioned Beth, and specifically in the context of bringing her back. I mean, ALL the shipping fandoms are freaking out right now. All of them are hating these spoilers and losing their shit right now. But he ONLY mentions Beth.

I truly believe that this is tptb, through Kirkman, addressing TD specifically, and just kind of throwing us a bone. They’re not addressing the others because there isn’t any hope for those other ships. 

I know there will be people who disagree with him and think he’s just making fun of us. I understand why people think that. But guys, if that were the case, we’d see at least SOME comments about other characters or ships. There aren’t any. And hey, look through the comments on his tweet. There’s a ton of Beth support (which is why she won the poll) and a few haters, but there are also lots of people who are kind of mystified, saying things like, “How about bring back Glenn? Or Rick? Or Carl?”

See what I mean? 

5) The time Gimple Confirmed Something that was NOT Going to Happen on the Show

Okay, gonna end by reminding you of just one more thing. Just a couple of months ago, before the finale of The World Beyond, S1, one of the actors teased on TTD that we might see Rick in the finale. 

Now, that was totally false. The finale came and went with no Rick (obviously). The actor was just trolling and trying to get people riled up, which he succeeded at. A few days later, Gimple was giving an interview to a clickbait site and they asked him about it. Gimple started to give his run-of-the-mill, vague answer but stopped mid-sentence and said this:

ComicBook.com asked Gimple if World Beyond was working up to a Rick Grimes reveal. 

“You know what? I’m very happy to say… I’m not happy to say the answer,” he said, clearly aware he was about to disappoint people. “I’m happy to be definitive with people. It is not.”

That’s one, I don’t know if people are being cagey about that. But I feel that one’s important not to be cagey about…I think people could watch this show and learn a lot about the mythology that Rick Grimes is caught up in. And they might even see places where Rick Grimes has been. But yeah, he’s not swinging around the corner. And I don’t even know if I’m making people upset saying that, but I just don’t like people watching it, sort of expecting Rick.”

Full article HERE.

Guys, they’ve never done that with Beth and TD. EVER!!!

I’m just saying.

And I can already hear counter arguments about how they’ve never shut down other ships like C@ryl or Donnie either. You’re right, but those characters are still front and center on the show. If Beth is dead and not coming back, why wouldn’t they put her to rest for us the way he did with this Rick rumor? (And I’m also going to argue that they’ve given us very clear indications in the show about a few of these ships, and the shippers just don’t want to accept them. But that’s not entirely relevant here.)

Thoughts?

#beth greene #beth greene lives #beth is alive #beth is coming #td theory #td theories #team delusional #team defiance #beth is almost here #bethyl

[alewyren]

I dislike redemption arc culture.

I hate seeing arguments over which characters are “irredeemable,” and this notion that every villain story has to be a morally didactic narrative in which the bad guy gets punished, the end.

I’m almost tempted to say we were all spoiled by having Zuko as a formative experience, because he’s really just the picture perfect redemption arc. He started out as a legit villain, but he never did anything too atrocious, had a tragic backstory that explained why he was like that, and went through three whole seasons of gradual character development. Like, Zuko was an amazing character. That’s the problem, though; he set our expectations too high for what “the perfect redemption arc” should be. Everyone expects their “reformed villain” characters to follow those same beats, but not every story is that cut and dry. There are lines between redemption and reformation, reformation and rehabilitation, rehabilitation and just... continuing to exist but no longer hurting anyone, and there’s a lot of nuance lost when people try to cram all that into the box of “redemption arc.”

Gonna be bringing a lot of different examples to the table here, but let’s start with Azula for ease of transition. She went through the same abuse that Zuko did, but she never got a redemption arc in ATLA proper. Some people say this isn’t fair. I disagree. This is not to say I don’t think she should be afforded the opportunity for post-canon character growth, because I absolutely do. I fully think she is capable of Getting Better, and spinoff media has consistently portrayed her as a sympathetic character. But like... she’s done some shit. She was a straight up war criminal, and emotionally abusive towards basically everyone in her social circle. I understand why. She was a 14 year old raised in an environment that rewarded that behavior, and never given a healthy outlet for her aggression.

The difference, in my opinion, is this: Zuko was fundamentally a good person from the start. Far from perfect, but he has a strong sense of values even as a child. Azula is not. Redemption for someone like Azula would look much different than it did for Zuko. Besides, in ATLA proper she was already filling an important villain role. She’d need her own show. (Which would be awesome, actually.)

But I think that’s where you have to ask the question: what even is a redemption arc? Is it any story where a villain stops being a villain? Is there a scale for like, “must do X amount of good deeds equal to Y bad deeds to qualify for redemption”? Must they be sufficiently punished for their bad deeds? What if reformation is possible without punishment--is punishment for its own sake truly justice? The focus people have on penance and atonement feels very baked in Christian moral philosophy. People don’t work like that. There’s not a cosmic scale of right and wrong, or a cosmic sin counter, there’s just... actions and their immediate impact. Bad people being let off the hook too easily can leave a bad taste in your mouth, and there are of course things with unfortunate real world implications which can’t be divorced from real-world context which are... irresponsible to allow in the hands of Certain Groups, but I hate this notion of “villains must be punished appropriately for their crimes, always, even if they have extenuating circumstances, even if they have demonstrated the capacity for personal growth, because that personal growth will never negate their misdeeds.”

In real life, it’s different. In real life, you can never be sure what’s going on in another person’s head. But the prison system of justice is fundamentally broken. People are rarely fundamentally evil, but there are some people who are too twisted and dangerous to society to be allowed to live without, at the very least, constant supervision. True evil is banal, rooted in social systems, not individual “bad people.” People have individual will, but ultimately they’re just the products of the environment and systems that fostered them. Setting aside the questions of whether people can be born evil or at what age you become personally responsible for your actions, you will get bad apples in any sufficiently large group of people. If someone has to be punished and removed from society, that’s not a success of justice. The fact that they reached that point in the first place is a failure of society in and of itself.

In fiction, technically everyone is redeemable. You can get into the heads of the bad guys and do basically whatever you want with them. Fiction should be responsible when dealing with real-world issues that affect real people, but it does not have to be morally didactic. Sometimes there just... isn’t an easy, morally didactic answer for dealing with morally complicated characters or situations. And more importantly, sometimes the morally didactic answer isn’t the narratively interesting answer. 9 out of 10 times, what’s more interesting to read about? A horrible villain being put to death, or a horrible villain being forced to live and grow?

Some hypothetical examples to ponder, purely in the context of fiction.

Horrible war criminal villain with a body count in the millions has all memories of their crimes wiped, or is forcibly brainwashed into being a better person. Setting aside the ethics of brainwashing: are they still required to “repent”? Would a victim still be justified in seeking penance from this guilt-free shell? Would this change at all depending on who was responsible for the mind-wipe?

More realistic: horrible war criminal villain with a body count in the millions straight up retires. Gets older. Bloodlust, national zeal, whatever once motivated them to do such evil loses its edge. They fall in love. Start a family. As they grow as a person, learn the value of life, the weight of their crimes starts to sink in. They atone in little ways, through little random acts of kindness and helping the people around them, but for one reason or another (not wanting to risk harm to their family, knowing they’ll be tortured for information? you decide) don’t turn themselves into the proper justice system and are never punished. Should they be punished, or allowed to continue existing? Would this change at all depending on the surrounding political circumstances, i.e.: whether their public execution would hold any symbolic value, whether affected groups are calling for their death? Does it matter at all in deciding justice whether this hypothetical villain feels personal guilt or regret over their war crimes? Why or why not?

Child villains. IRL there are documented cases of violent crime in children as young as grade school age, not all of whom had violent backgrounds. Should they be held to the same standards as adult villains, even if the scale of their crimes are the same? What’s the cutoff age? Are all villains under 18 capable of rehabilitation, no matter how horrible their crimes? How about 16? 14? 12? What about villains whose ages aren’t really clear, ie Cell from DBZ being like, six?

How much does backstory matter? Should it matter if there’s a good reason someone is Like That, or should their actions be judged as-is? It doesn’t matter to the victims whether or not the villain had a bad childhood, right? Moreover, does it matter at all whether someone is “fundamentally a good person,” at least insofar as genuinely caring about the people around them and caring about a moral code? People do evil things for reasons other than “being evil people.”

Morally bankrupt person who regularly fantasizes violent harm on the people around them, wholly selfish with no love for any other human being, fundamentally incapable of meaningful self-reflection or growth. Just a complete piece of shit all around. But they never have, and never will, commit any crimes, either due to some divine ordinance or just plain self-preservation/fear of getting caught. They might, at worst, just be a toxic asshole, but not one who holds any power over others. Should they be punished solely for their moral character, rather than actions?

There aren’t always easy answers. It’s okay to acknowledge that, and it’s okay to tackle hard moral questions like this in fiction. And I hate seeing this boiled down to “stop trying to redeem villains who are Actually Horrible People” or whatever. Especially in kids’ media which takes an optimistic stance on people being capable of change in the first place. Y’all gotta stop holding it to the same level of moral realism as gritty stuff for adults.

On the whole, I think we should do away with the term “redemption” in the context of morality entirely. Like redemption arc, redemption equals death, what does that mean? It implies one has sufficiently made up for their past deeds, that that’s the gold standard, but is that really ever possible? Like I said, there’s not a cosmic good deeds | bad deeds counter for every person, or at least not one that living people have any way of knowing about. And that’s a flawed way of thinking to begin with. Those bad deeds can never be erased, ever. There plenty of examples of villains who commit crimes they can never realistically atone for. Regardless of whether they want to atone in the first place, it’s like I said: in fiction, it’s often just... more fun to force them to live and deal with the consequences. But on the flipside, there are so, so many people who see themselves as “good” and use that to justify their own bad deeds. Which ties back into what I said about the whole discourse reeking of Christian moral philosophy, because lmfao @ corruption in the catholic church.

The point is. There are shades of grey. Not everything has to be a full-blown bad guy to good guy redemption arc. You don’t need to “properly atone for your sins” to be worthy of life or love.

Here are some better questions to ask than “is this character redeemable”:

Is it believable, from what we know of this villain as a character, that they are capable of becoming a good, law-abiding citizen?

How about capable of love?

Guilt?

Are they capable of any personal growth whatsoever?

Are they capable of being a positive impact on the lives of the people around them?

Is it actively harmful to leave them alive, even with clipped wings?

Is it interesting to leave them alive?

How morally didactic is the narrative as a whole?

How much forgiveness are they offered, versus how much could they possibly ever deserve?

How abstracted is this character from reality, ie: are there any real world parallels that make it uncomfortable to frame this character in a sympathetic light? (be careful not to fall into a black and white abuser/victim dichotomy)

Would further punishment or suffering be productive? (Productive, not justified, that’s a key distinction--punishment for its own sake is just pointless cruelty.)

Even the most vile, irredeemable bastards can still be dragged like... an inch. And that’s still a fun and valuable story in and of itself, even if it’s nothing remotely approaching a redemption arc and they’d very much still deserve to rot in Hell by the end of it. I don’t believe Hell is real, as much as I personally wish it were sometimes, but like. If it were, or in fictional universes where it is.

But also, there really are some characters and botched “redemption arcs” that just come off insanely uncomfortable. And there is a subjective aspect to that as well, but more than once I’ve seen people say “X villain did not deserve redemption/forgiveness” and 9 times out of 10 I’m like “that’s... really not what they got, though?”

It’s complicated.

#idk how coherent it is #i just saw a tweet that annoyed me #''villains deserve happiness and redemption arcs *guy who murdered 20 million people* no not him'' #i don't even entirely disagree but it's... complicated #musings

[good-omens-classic]

Hi Good Omens fans, ever since making this blog, and trawling through the archives for old art, I have been thinking again about trends from before the TV-show, and the way people draw Aziraphale and Crowley.  I wanted to make this post addressing it but this is not “discourse” or to start a fight, in fact I would be perfectly content if all I did was make people think critically about what I am about to say and not even interact with this post at all, but I feel like I need to say it.

Talking about any racist undertones to the way people draw our two favorite boys usually makes people dig their heels in pretty fast.  This is not a callout post for any artist in particular, this is not me trying to be overly critical of artists especially since they have more talent and skill than I do, and I’m going to address some common counterpoints that I frankly find unsatisfactory.  Let’s just take a moment to set aside our defensiveness and think objectively about these trends.  It took me a while to unlearn my dismissive attitude about these concerns so maybe I can help others get over that hurdle a little faster.  Now let’s begin.

I’ve been kicking around the Good Omens fandom since maybe 2015 and for art based in book canon, whether it was made before the TV show came out, or because the artist is consciously drawing different, original designs, I’m going to estimate that a decent 75% of all fanart looks like this

Aziraphale is white and blonde and blue-eyed while Crowley is the typical “racially ambiguous” brown skin tone it’s become so popular to draw podcast characters as nowadays.

And the question is why?  With the obvious answer being “it’s racist,” but let’s delve a little deeper than that.

A common thing I hear is that people get appearance headcanons fixed in their mind because the coverart of the book pictures the characters a certain way.  My first point is this only shifts the question to why the illustrators drew them that way, when there aren’t many physical descriptions in the book.  My second point is that while there definitely are cover arts that picture Aziraphale as cherubic, blonde, and white and Crowley as swarthy, dark-skinned, and racially ambiguous...

(side note: why is Crowley’s hand so tiny?  what the hell is going on in this cover?)

It’s much more common for the covers to simplified, stylized, and without any particular unambiguous skin tones

I don’t know about the UK but the most popular version in the United States is the dual black and white matching covers

And while you could make an argument that the shading on Crowley’s face could suggest a darker skintone, it seems obvious to me that lacking any color these are not supposed to suggest any particular race for either of these two, and the contrasting colors are a stylistic choice to emphasize how they are on opposite sides.  If anything, to me it suggests they are both white.

In short I simply do not buy the argument that people are drawing Aziraphale and Crowley this way because that’s how they were represented on the cover art of the book.  If you draw them the way they are on the cover then whatever, I don’t care, but I don’t believe that’s what’s driving this trend.

The second thing people will say is that Good Omens is a work of satire, and it’s based in Christian mythology which has this trend of depicting angels as white, and it is embodying the trope of a “white, cherubic angel” paired with a dark-skinned demon for the explicit purpose of subverting the trope of “white angel is good, dark demon is bad” since Aziraphale is not an unambiguous hero and Crowley is not a villain.  “It’s not actually like that because Crowley isn’t a bad demon, and Aziraphale isn’t actually a perfect angel” is the argument.  This has a certain logic to it and allows some nuance to the topic, but to this I say:

Uncritically reproducing a trope, even in the context of a satire novel, is not enough to subvert it.  Good Omens is not criticising the racist history of the church, and while the book does have some pointed jabs at white British culture (such as Madam Tracy conning gullible Brits with an unbelievably ignorant stereotype of a Native American) it is not being critical of the conception of angels as white and blonde or the literal demonization of non-white people.  That’s just not what the book is about.  So making the angel white and the demon dark-skinned, playing directly into harmful tropes and stereotypes, is not somehow subversive or counter-cultural when doing so doesn’t say anything about anything.

Please consider fully the ramifications of the conception of white and blonde people as innocent and cherubic and dark-skinned people as infernal and mischievous, especially in modern contexts...

Black people are more likely to be viewed as violent, angry, and dangerous.  Priming with a dark-skinned face makes people more likely to mistake a tool for a gun.  Black people are viewed as experiencing pain less intensely by medical professionals.  Black men are viewed as physically larger and more imposing than they actually are.  The subconscious racial bias favoring light skin is so ingrained it’s measurable by objective scientific studies, on top of the anecdotal evidence of things like news stories choosing flattering, “cherubic” pictures of white and blond criminals while using unflattering mugshots for non-white offenders.

This is why I say that if you’re going to invoke the “whites are angelic” trope, you better have a damn good subversion of it to justify it, because this idea causes real harm to real people in the real world.  And Aziraphale being a bit of a bastard despite being an angel, I just don’t see that as sufficient.  I am especially cautious of when it’s my fellow white fans that make this argument, not because I believe they do this out of any sort of malice or hatred of people with dark skin, but because I know first-hand it stems from a dismissiveness rooted in not wanting to think about it for too long because it makes us uncomfortable.  Non-white people do not have the luxury of not thinking about it, because it’s part of their life.

Now the strongest textual evidence people use, in the absence of much real descriptor, is this:

"Many people, meeting Aziraphale for the first time, formed three impressions: that he was English, that he was intelligent, and that he was gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide. Two of these were wrong; Heaven is not in England, whatever certain poets may have thought, and angels are sexless unless they really want to make an effort" 

This piece of art has circulated in the fandom for so long I don’t know the original artist and it’s been used for everything from fancovers to perfume.  This is where I found it and it’s one of the first things that come up when you google this quote about Aziraphale.  

Doesn’t it just feel like this is the man that’s describing, some blonde effeminate gay man?  Well guess what, there’s the “blonde as innocence” trope rearing its ugly head again, because the stereotype of gay men and effeminacy as being a white and blonde thing is--ding ding ding you guessed it--racism.  And why would intelligent suggest a white and blonde person, except if the stereotype of a dark-skinned person is less intelligent?

Now the point of “people assume Aziraphale is British” is another sticking point people will often use, claiming that the stereotype of a British person is white and blonde.  I guess this has some merit, since the British empire was one of the biggest forces behind white colonial expansion, and it seems disingenuous to assign “British” as “nonwhite” as soon as we’re being satirical, in the same way I found it distasteful that the TV show made God female when so many of the criticisms of the church are about its misogyny and lose their teeth as soon as God is no longer male.

However consider that 1.4 million Indian people live in the UK.  I heard a man say aloud once that the concept of a black person having a British accent was a little funny, as though Doctor Who doesn’t exist and have black people on it.  And I’m not overly familiar with the social landscape of the UK, but I understand they’re experiencing a xenophobia boom and non-white Brits aren’t considered “really British.”  The stereotype of non-white people not being British only exists because of reinforcement in media.  If you really want to be subversive, drawing Aziraphale as Indian goes way further than drawing him as white IMO.

Now let’s talk about Crowley.  He is almost always drawn with a darker skin tone than Aziraphale, even when they are both white, and while I’ve outlined above how this is problematic on terms of linking light skin with innocence, I think it does have an extra layer.  I think it also has to do with the exotification and fetishization of brown skin and non-white people.

This artist’s tumblr is gone now but their art is still on dA and while it’s definitely beautiful and well-done, I think this is a very good example of what I’m talking about.

Crowley and Aziraphale necessarily contrast each other, so describing Aziraphale as “British” might suggest that Crowley is “foreign-looking.”  I also know *ahem* that the fandom generally thirsts over Crowley to hell and back, so making him a swarthy, tall dark and handsome is not necessarily surprising.

An interesting thing happened when the TV show came out, and everyone started drawing Michael Sheen!Aziraphale and David Tennant!Crowley more and more often:  It’s not ubiquitous, but it does happen that sometimes artists will draw David Tennant’s skin darker than it actually is.  The subconscious urge to see Crowley with dark skin is for some reason that strong for many people.  And I really encourage people doing this to think about why.  Not naming any names but I’ve working with fanartists before for collabs who I had to ask to lighten “bad guy” demon’s skin tones because it looked like they were making the skin darker on purpose to make them look scarier.  This person is a perfectly pleasant person who tries not to be racist!  And we both still fell into it accidentally, and it took me a while to notice and point it out, because the ingrained stigmatization of darker skin is pervasive yet often goes unnoticed.

What is the solution?  I don’t know, and as a white person I’m not really qualified to make that call.  Do we draw them both with the exact same skin tone?  Is it better to make them both white?  Should we make both of them non-white?  Should we only make Aziraphale non-white?  I am consciously aware of the fact that the Good Omens fandom is mostly white people, so most of the art we make is being both made by and consumed by white people, so I don’t feel comfortable saying “draw these characters of color specifically” because that can also veer into fetishization territory very quickly.  This is not specific to good omens but I think we should pay attention to what fans of color say in all fandom spaces and weigh our choices even if they seem insignificant.  And it’s important to realize that fans of color will not be a monolith in their opinion either, and it’s our responsibility to recognize that everyone can be affected by racism and social issues differently, the same way all women are affected by misogyny differently so just because one woman says such as such is misogynistic and another says it’s not.  I’m sure there are non-white fans who think it’s perfectly fine to draw Aziraphale as white and Crowley as ambiguously non-white.  I’m not saying they’re wrong.  And I’m not saying you can’t reblog this kind of art, or that people who make or made it should feel bad about themselves.  But so often this sort of thing goes unaddressed just because people don’t like thinking about it, and well, avoiding hard questions never really goes well I think.

#? #voice of mod #?????

[thisselflovecamebacktome]

All the little reasons (so far) why The 1 is my tied favourite off of Folklore

Continuation of 'classic Taylor’ patterns:

The 1 helps to carry on the tradition Taylor has put into her albums since RED where the beginning of the stories actually starts with song three. The first two songs are instead used to heavily allude to the story and themes about to be told but aren’t directly part of them and especially not the beginning of them. 

In RED, we get State of Grace which alludes to the intense love and positive side of “red” emotions with hints of ignoring red flags whereas Red shows the painful and negative “red” emotions and alludes to the themes of heartbreak. 

In 1989 we get Welcome To New York, alluding to trying to get past someone and new beginnings before transitioning into Blank Space indicating that the opinions of others, particularly surrounding her dating, is something that was going to cause issues.

In Reputation we got ...Ready For It, where the verses again show a somewhat satirical take of how people see the both of them in a dark, “edgy” beat that is often used for “angry” tracks mixed with a “softer” tune more used for happier music for the chorus where she talks about being alone with him and doing what she actually wants to. Then we get End Game which serves as a contrast and connecting piece to the “angry/unhealthy” and “happy/healthy” sides of the album. We get the big declaration of love and showy attitude with hints of insecurity because that’s ultimately what Taylor saw as love in the past which contrasts with the quieter moments of love in the later half of the album such as squeezing hands in a cab or building metaphorical fires in locked up houses to keep each other warm.

In Lover we get I Forgot That You Existed to indicate the theme of figuring out who and what’s truly important in life before moving onto Cruel Summer which not only shows the theme of holding onto each other when things are rough, but the importance of communication in a relationship.

And what about Folklore? The 1 and Cardigan brings us into the fantasy world of Folklore by first asking “What If?” and reminding us that life is full of choices and those choices matter in the grand scheme of things. While the rest of the album tells seemingly unquestionable stories relying on how the characters actually felt, The 1 and Cardigan both rely on nostalgia before reminding us right at the end of each song that that wasn’t how the story went and that certain choices were the reason for that... Which leads me to my next point:

One thing being different would not have made everything different today:

As I previously mentioned, one of the major themes of Folklore is that choices matter. Another interlocking theme is that things just don’t happen out of the blue. The choices we make add up and can cause a perfect storm. 

Looking at this through the lens of the love triangle, in order for James to be in the position he’s in in “Betty”, it wasn’t enough that August happened to be there. The guy Betty was dancing with had to ask her to dance, James had to feel insecure about it AND be immature enough to sulk and leave rather than telling Betty how he felt, August had to show up when she did, James had to make the continuous choice to spend the Summer with August, Inez had to tell Betty what happened and finally Betty had to be offended enough to break up with James. The situation the three of them found themselves in could have been prevented at several different points, making it impossible to say if one thing had been different, it all would have been. 

Despite the lyric, The 1 also shows that one thing being different wasn’t likely to have the desired effect of the pair ending up together through several lyrics throughout the song.

In my defence I have none for never leaving well enough alone - This gives the implication that the narrator was prone to starting arguments over topics that didn’t need to be fought over.

If you wanted me you really should have shown it - The narrator shows that the other person didn’t make it seem like a serious long term relationship was an option. Though this could have been a miscommunication, it also implied to me that the other person wasn’t ready to settle down and acted as such meaning that a long term relationship probably wasn’t on the cards.

Rose flowing with your chosen family.... In my defence I have none - So I’m going to go into this a bit later because it relates to a couple of the reasons I love this song, but in short, the narrator impliedly did not make an effort with aspects of the other person’s life, in this case loved ones, that meant a lot to them nor did the narrator have those aspects for themselves.

But it would have been fun if you would have been the one - Connecting this reason with the theme of nostalgia, I find the word ‘fun’ an interesting choice from a songwriter who tends to use intense words like ‘magical’, ‘fearless’, ‘permanent’, ‘wild’ and even ‘really something’ to describe the loves of her life. In comparison, ‘fun’ feels very casual. While not a choice of the relationship, the use of the word along with lack of hard moments shown in the song does imply to me that the narrator has based this ‘what if’ on pure nostalgia and makes me assume that there several reasons things turned out like they did.

Its links with other songs on the album:

Anyone who knows me knows that my favourite aspect of an album is feeling like I got something out of listening to those songs in that order together that I couldn’t have gotten from listening to the songs alone. Often this comes from contrasts in songs like how I mentioned End Game’s production and lyrics contrast the back end of Reputation, relatability like how 22 is in between All Too Well and I Almost Do because that time with her friends is merely distracting her from her pain or hearing how the same things can be seen differently like how WANEGBT, Stayx3 and The Last Time come one after another to show the relationship was on and off, why she stayed in said relationship and those same traits that kept her staying were now why she was at the end of her rope with said relationship. Really in general RED as an album is a brilliant example because while a lot of people don’t get it, the whiplash of positive and negative songs really does represent what it’s like to be in that kind of toxic relationship.

But I’m not here to talk about RED or Reputation, I’m here to to talk about Folklore. While many people would probably say that the love triangle songs are the best representation of what I’m talking about, I honestly think The 1 and Peace are the two songs that most benefit from the context of the other songs in the album. Specifically, The 1 benefits in the following ways in my honest opinion:

The 1 serves as the other side of the same coin to Invisible String. The 1 discusses a relationship where circumstances didn’t line up to make it work whereas Invisible String describes a relationship where the stars aligned and it all did work out. Further, The 1 asks the question ‘what if things were different and this one relationship worked out?’ and Invisible String answers with ‘well thank goodness it didn’t’.

You know the greatest films of all time were never made versus I think I’ve seen this film before: the automatic assumption and link that the love in Exile was not either of their greatest loves.

If you never bleed you’re never going to grow links so well with But now I’m bleeding and Peter losing Wendy from Cardigan.

Though it’s not connected with other Folklore lyrics, the little links of things like never leaving well enough alone being in The 1 and past songs (in this case ME!) and the Sad Beautiful Tragic vibe that the second prechorus of The 1 gives always brings a smile to my face.

And finally, my favourite parallel of this whole album:

In my defence I have [no chosen family] and its link with Family that I chose now that I see your brother as my brother from Peace. To me, this parallel brings together everything I have said so far. It brings the album together and once again reinforces that a theme in Folklore is how choices dictate our lives. The fact that somewhere along the lines the narrator realised that there didn’t have to be a ‘his loved ones’ and ‘her loved ones’ and made the effort and choice to incorporate themselves into their partner’s life and found that to be an important part of why they are working out in a way they didn’t with their past partners lives rent free in my mind, heart and soul everyday, not going to lie. Like I don’t know how to explain it, but that link alone just added so much to both of those songs for me personally.

Other little things:

This song is beyond relatable. Like I could not tell you one person who doesn’t have that one past thing or relationship, romantic or otherwise, they wish could have been different and fantasise/romanticise what that would have looked like.

The 1 and August are the two funnest songs to sing to from Folklore and even though both are relatively sad lyrically, always give me a good boost of serotonin when I sing them.

Relating to the two points above, singing “In my defence I have none” loudly when you don’t have family and feel like none of your wishes like me ever came true feels like free therapy lmao.

While I know Taylor didn’t write The 1 from a fully autobiographical point of view, the idea of her seeing one of her multimillionaire exes at the bus stop makes me laugh every time.

It’s a grower. While it was always in my top six, as I mentioned in the title, it’s in a three way tie with August and Exile as my favourite song from Folklore right now.

All in all I just really love this song and all the tiny little details that make it amazing and honestly think it’s a very underrated song in Taylor’s discography.

#the 1 #taylor swift #folklore #this is literally every single thought i've ever had about this song placed into one spot for me to refer back to

[sorrelchestnut]

from the discard pile: Geralt, Emhyr, Yennefer

This was from what was supposed to be a long plotty story called “Strange Bedfellows,” which I finally admitted I’m not ever actually going to do anything with.  So instead here’s the emotional core I actually cared enough to write, which is essentially the follow-up to Geralt and Emhyr’s conversation at Stygga, which the game kinda... skimmed over.  The context, as much as it needs any, is that they’re in Nilfgaard for Ciri’s wedding, and in the previous scene Geralt and Yennefer saved Emhyr from an assassin at a banquet.

"Can I ask you something?"

"I'm sure I won't be able to stop you," Emhyr said, very dry.

Geralt briefly considered whether or bringing this up while Emhyr was trapped in bed was entirely fair.  Then he decided he didn't give a shit, and asked anyway.  "Why did you change your mind, back at Stygga?"

Emhyr was silent for a long time.  So long, that Geralt gave up on looking politely out of the window and twisted around to face him, curious what emotion had caught hold of his tongue.  Whatever it was, it wasn't visible, not even to Geralt's heightened vision.  His face was pale, but that was just as likely to be the blood loss; his jaw was set, but that could be anything from lingering pain to irritation at Geralt's effrontery.  Geralt was pretty good at reading people, after all these years, but he'd never been able to read Emhyr worth a damn.

"I suppose you'd like me to say that it was your blandishments that swayed me," Emhyr said, after a time.

Geralt snorted.  Figures he'd try a run-around.  "What I'd like is for you to tell me the truth."

"The truth is complicated, witcher.  Surely you've learned that much, if nothing else."

"I learned it years before the crown first touched your father's head," Geralt said evenly.  "That doesn't mean I don't have a right to ask for it."

"No, I suppose not," Emhyr said, glancing wryly at his leg.  "Very well then, if truth you would have of me, then truth you shall receive.  Your speech was not without impact; I won't deny you that.  'If the world is to be saved like that, it would be better for it to perish.'  Yes, I remember the words exactly," he added, to Geralt's no-doubt-surprised expression.  "There is very little I have forgotten about that day, our conversation least of all.  But that wasn't what changed my mind."

"Yennefer," Geralt said softly.  He'd suspected as much for years, but it was Emhyr's very unwillingness to say it aloud that confirmed his pet theory.  "It was Yennefer."

Emhyr's jaw worked, in temper or self-loathing Geralt couldn't tell, but one thing he'd never been was a coward, and after a moment he nodded.  "Yes."

Emhyr wasn't the only one who remembered that day.  Geralt could still hear Yennefer's words as if she spoke right into his ear.  Please, as far as possible, don't harm my daughter.  I wouldn't want to die with the thought that she's crying.

"You couldn't bring yourself to hurt Ciri," Geralt said.  "Could you?  Not even for the fate of the world.  No matter what you said."

"No," Emhyr said.  His voice was harsh.  "I knew it when I saw her, I think, but your lady's words were nonetheless… impactful, on that front.  Perhaps I would have understood sooner, had I thought there was a limit to my barbarity.  For I am of course a monster, far worse than any you were raised to slay, but even I…  I note you show no signs of leaping to convince me otherwise," he added, with something not unlike amusement.

"What, you want me to lie to you now?  You know what you are.  What you've done."

Emhyr nodded far more readily.  "Oh, yes.  And whatever you think me capable of, witcher, I can assure you I've done far worse.  And yet in that moment I knew that this one thing, this final monstrosity in a long line of them, was the one I couldn't bring myself to accomplish."  He shrugged, as if the memory didn't pain him, but Geralt saw faint lines of strain at the corner of his mouth.  "So I didn't."

"Just like that."  Geralt knew he sounded skeptical, but he couldn't quite help himself.  "Fifteen years you spent, working towards this exact end, and then just- never mind?"

"What do you want me to say?"  Emhyr spread his hands.  "I couldn't bring myself to do it; therefore, it couldn't be done.  And if it couldn't be done, then the prophecy that demanded it must have been false."

"Vilgefortz," Geralt said, still bitter all these years later.  "You trusted a prophecy given to you by Vilgefortz."

Emhyr shrugged again.  "He had, until then, been a very useful ally."

"Because he wanted to kill Ciri," Geralt said.  "After impregnating her, aborting the fetus, and taking the blood, as many times as it took to drain her power.  He wanted to make himself into a living god.  That was who you trusted?"

"I don't trust anyone," Emhyr said.  "And he was not the only one to espouse that particular interpretation of Ithlinne's Prophecy.  It was only after Cirilla's disappearance that I was able to lay hands on an older version of the text, one uncorrupted by imperfect translations.  Had I located it earlier, things might have been different."

"Yeah," Geralt said tiredly.  He knew that feeling, all too well.  "Gotta admit: really fucking wish you had."

"On that point, witcher, you and I can readily agree."

Geralt sighed and looked out the window again.  Why is it always towers, he wondered.  Thanedd, Stygga, Tor Gvalch'ca - even Tesham Mutna was a tower, once upon a time.  Just once, it'd be nice to have my world turned upside down in a nice sunny meadow or maybe an orchard.  Just for a change of pace.

Then again, Ciri had left him by the side of the road, and that had been the worst day of his life.  Maybe he should be careful what he wished for.

"May I ask you a question in return?"

Geralt turned back with a quirk of his eyebrow.  "It's not like you to ask permission."

Emhyr gestured wryly to his leg.  "The alternative seems discourteous, considering."

"Not like you to care about that, either."  But it turned out his curiosity was stronger than his desire to get the last word, so he flicked his fingers in absent permission.  "Sure.  Hit me."

And because Emhyr had never held back in his life, he didn't hesitate but immediately said, "Do you ever regret saving me, when Calanthe bid you to strike?"

"No."

Emhyr's pause was fractional, but it was long enough to know that Geralt had actually surprised him.  "That was definite."

"What's the point of regretting something when neither of us really had a choice?  All the shit you did, everything that happened because of that - it happened because it needed to happen.  Don't fool yourself, Duny.  It was all destiny.  Not just the parts that made it into the ballads."

A muscle in Emhyr's jaw flexed - yeah, didn't like that, did he, the thought he wasn't the supreme agent in his own life.  Good.  Let him get a taste of what the rest of the mortals felt.

"And is that the only reason?"

This time Geralt was the one holding silent, struggling with his response.  Not because he didn't know the answer, but because he did, and it might not be the one Emhyr wanted to hear.  And while he liked to tweak the tiger's tail as much as the next guy - okay, way more than the next guy - he had a feeling that if he got this one wrong, he was losing a lot more than just the emperor's forbearance of his usual disrespect.

Well, no other way but through, as Vesemir liked to say.  It wasn't like Emhyr wouldn't be able to tell if he was lying even if he did want to try it.  Might as well be honest and hope for the best.

"Ciri," he said.  "Without you, there never would've been her."

"Not, strictly speaking, true," Emhyr countered swiftly.  Not an unexpected answer, then.  Which wasn't the same as welcome.  "Pavetta was already pregnant.  That was, after all, the nature of your claim."

Geralt made a gesture, wiping away that argument.  "She would have existed, true.  Who knows, maybe she still would have ended up on your throne.  But she wouldn't have been Ciri.  She wouldn't have been the Witcher Girl."

"Are you so certain?" Emhyr inquired.  "As you say, destiny is a powerful thing.  And a river, denied its intended course, will jump its banks and carve a new one through unweathered ground.  How can you be so sure she would not have been promised to you regardless?"

Geralt snorted.  "You think Calanthe would have opened herself up to the Law of Surprise?  After watching you make a claim on her daughter?  No.  And I wouldn't have thought to ask, either - only did because you kept insisting, and that only happens for one reason."

Emhyr made a thoughtful little mhm noise.  "And so, for your intervention, destiny bound us together in that moment in time, so that it might create a savior of a very particular shape.  A witcher girl, a learned sorceress, a killer with a will of steel.  The child of the Elder Blood that would face the White Frost and save us all from extinction."

"Well, that's what the prophecy said, anyway," Geralt said.  "I never gave a shit about any of that.  All I cared about is that for a little while, she was mine."

After a long moment, Emhyr said, "You must hate me very  much."

Geralt didn't pretend to misunderstand.  It would have been easy: he had a lot of reasons to hate the Emperor of Nilfgaard, and every single one of them was earned.  But Geralt had never been one to take the easy path, so instead he said, "You know, back then - before Thanedd, I mean - everyone from Triss to fucking Djikstra was always so eager to tell me that I couldn't hold onto her, that she didn't belong with me.  Even Vesemir.  Even Yen.  But you know what's funny?  I never thought otherwise.  Crossed half the world to find her, but it wasn't because I thought I could keep her.  Only ever wanted to keep her safe."

"Interesting," Emhyr murmured.  His gaze lingered on Geralt's face, missing nothing.  "I was certain you blamed me for taking her away."

"Guess you had to be wrong about something," Geralt muttered, and rubbed a hand over his face.  "No, I always knew she was meant for bigger things.  Okay, so I didn't guess this," and he waved a hand toward the window, meaning the city, the realm, the bloody continent now held in the palm of Ciri's sword-calloused hand.  "But something more than slaughtering drowners at ten crowns a head.  And even if I did - what'd be the point blaming you, anyway?  It was Ciri's choice.  Think I'm going to be mad at her for trying to make the world better?"

"Interesting," Emhyr said again.  It was impossible to read his expression, but that didn't stop Geralt from trying.  "I underestimated you, it seems.  Again.  Not a condition I suffer often, and yet it's become very nearly a habit where you are concerned."

Geralt snorted.  "I wouldn't worry about it.  Doubt you'll have much opportunity in the future."

"Do you think?"  The effort of the conversation seemed to be tiring Emhyr out; even his hawkish gaze was beginning to blur.  "And yet here you sit, witcher.  And here I lie, when by all rights I should be dead.  I'm not so certain that we are done, you and I.  Destiny might have something in store for us yet."

                                         * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Emhyr fell asleep soon after, which Geralt figured was just as well; he needed a little silence in his head.  He didn't want to think about what Emhyr had said.  What was the point?  If he was right, fate would reveal her fickle hand sooner or later; nothing mere mortals could do to hurry it along.  You could go mad, trying to live your life like that.  And in the end it didn't matter - you'd do the right thing, or you wouldn't, and you could never know which was which, not really.  The best you could do was make the choices in front of you, and try not to let yourself regret.

It was about two hours later when he heard someone approaching down the hall.  Geralt roused himself from his light meditation and tracked the footsteps - one set of heels clicking against the marble and one set of soft leather slippers, designed to be nearly inaudible to human ears - until they reached the door.  It opened silently on oiled hinges, followed by the whisper of fabric and displaced air from a bow.

"Thank you, Mererid.  That will be all."

"Of course, my lady."

The door closed once more.  Footsteps tapped closer - quieter now, making an effort.  A gloved hand rested on his shoulder, delicate yet firm.  Geralt inhaled the familiar smell of lilac and gooseberries and relaxed for the first time since he saw light flash on the assassin's blade.

"How is he?" Yennefer asked, keeping her voice low.

"Better.  Sleeping.  He was up for a while earlier, though.  Didn't seem addled-"  Massive understatement.  "Just tired.  Probably good as new in a day or two."  He picked up her hand and kissed the inside of her wrist, right where her cuff and glove left a gap.  The steady throb of her pulse under his lips leeched away a little more of the day's poison.  "What about Ciri?"

"Cloistered with Rousarde, Vattier, and about a dozen imperial accountants.  One of Vattier's men managed to track down the account used to make the payment, and they're currently following the thread through a series of shell companies at Central Banking.  Rousarde assures me it's only a matter of time until they find the source of the money."

"Must have a lot of it, whoever they are," Geralt said.  "Killing an emperor can't be cheap."

"If you combined all of the contracts you've ever completed in the entirety of your years on the Path, you might approach the payment that young man would have enjoyed had you not intervened."  Yen laid her palm against his cheek, stroking the hinge of his jaw with her fingers. Her gaze was very warm, though her glove was as cool as ever.  "You did very well, you know.  I didn't get a chance to say as much earlier."

"Wasn't the only one.  Potions wouldn't have done shit if you hadn't held him steady long enough for them to work."

Yen inclined her head in acknowledgement.  "Consider the practice I've had in that arena.  I could almost thank Avall'ach for getting himself cursed."

"Wouldn't if I were you."

"No, probably not the done thing."

They shared an exhausted smile, and then Geralt decided she was still entirely too far away and tugged at her wrist.  She gave him an unamused look, but acceded to his silent plea and stepped over the footstool to climb gracefully into his lap.  He held still, allowing her to arrange their limbs to her satisfaction, and then buried his nose into the silken fall of her hair and inhaled gratefully.

"You should get some sleep," she said, after a few minutes had passed.

Geralt didn't bother responding.

 "I know you must be very tired."

"Ciri said guard," Geralt said, and left the remainder unspoken, too obvious to need words: so I guard.

Yen's shoulders rose and fell in a sigh.  "You're going to sit here until Ciri comes to tell you otherwise, aren't you?"

Geralt didn't bother responding to that either.

Her head shifted on his shoulder, and he knew she'd turned to regard the bed, or more precisely its occupant.  "He looks quite peaceful like that, doesn't he?"

Geralt only barely held back a snort, which was sure to wake Emhyr as their quiet voices hadn't.  Not a lot of people laughing around the emperor.  "It's a trick."

"Yes, of course, but it's quite a good one."  She was playing with laces of his doublet, winding the string about her fingers and then unwinding it the opposite direction.  It made a tiny shushing noise, a fractional rasp of fabric against skin, that was oddly soothing. "He was awake earlier, you said?"

"Yeah."

"Did he say anything?"

"Oh, yeah."

He felt her frown against the side of his throat.  "It went that poorly, then?"

"Yeah- well, no.  I guess.  Hard to tell, with him."

"Of that, I am entirely too aware."  Shh, shh, went the laces.  Yen rubbed her thumb thoughtfully against the little v of skin below his collarbone.  Nilfgaardian fashion favored closed collars, but he'd had a rough day.  "What does he want from us, Geralt?  Really."

"You mean, besides saving his life?"

She let out an impatient huff of air.  "Yes, aside from that."

"I think... I think he wants absolution," Geralt said slowly, puzzling it out even as he spoke.  "Or- he wants to want absolution, and he's hoping like hell that's close enough to count."

"But why us?" Yen said, with a plaintive cast Geralt heard only very rarely.  "Surely Ciri-"

Geralt sighed.  "He loves Ciri more than any other person alive," he told her, too tired to be anything but honest.  "And I'm pretty sure he knows he doesn't deserve her."  He tucked her head a little more firmly under his chin.  "Would you be honest, if you were in his shoes?"

There was a brief, sullen silence.  "No," Yen said, finally.  "I don't even like it with you."

That was at least halfway a lie, and anyway, Yen didn't think she deserved him, either.  (She didn't think he knew that, but he wasn't an idiot.  He totally knew.)  Before, he hadn't been in any kind of hurry to disillusion her in case she noticed it went the other way around; these days, he was finally starting to figure out that they just about deserved each other.  Yen wasn't there yet, but that was okay.  They had time.

#fic #discard pile #the witcher #the witcher 3

[goldenvalentyne]

Castaway

Masterlist

Word count: 2111

May 20

You never meant to lose your temper. It just happened. One moment you and Ashton were fine. You could be snuggled up, watching a show, and the next second you’d be in a full blown out war. That is exactly what happened that night.

The previous weeks had been tame in the context of your relationship with Ashton. There was no fighting, minor remarks to one another, but for the most part you had been relaxed. Ashton had gone out for a guys day while you stayed in and had some much needed self care. He came home at a decent time and had dinner with you. Everything was going smoothly, until a stupid photo emerged. One you should not have been jealous of, or even taken a second glance at. But the relationship had been too solid, you were in need of drama, something you often got caught up in and enjoyed a little too much.

You knew she was only a friend and that she even had a boyfriend. You felt no threat by her, but you let it all out. You hit below the belt in this argument. Every little thing that Ashton had done in the 2 weeks prior that pissed you off in any way was spewing from your mouth. He was caught off guard by your sudden anger, but that did not stop him from releasing some of his own pent up aggression.

It ended with you leaving his apartment, making sure to slam the door, leaving the place to raddle

June 27

The next time you would see Ashton was on stage at a festival. Against the advice of all your friends, you still went and watched their set. Your heart ached watching him. He looked just plain sad the whole time, not like he was enjoying every minute of it which he always did. You stuck around in hopes that he would come out and you could “accidentally” bump into him, but that never happened.

Instead you went back to your apartment, no longer filled with pictures of the two of you, those were smashed or stuffed into the back of your closet. The last piece of evidence that Ashton had ever been there was a teddy bear. So cliche, he had won it at a fair for you in the early days of your relationship. You held that damn bear close to your chest the whole night and let the tears flow. In the weeks since you had left you never once blamed him. You knew that you had been the one in the wrong and that he did not owe you anything, but it still hurt. He didn’t answer the phone calls the days after you stormed from his apartment, but you never expected him to. You had been unfair to him, and he was protecting himself.

July 7

It was Ashton’s birthday. You spent the whole morning contemplating if you should call. You weren’t friends and no longer lovers, but you felt like he deserved something from you, after the way you had treated him.

It was after many drinks and three rom coms before you actually built up the courage to call him. You did not even hesitate at the point. You didn’t not expect an answer, and you did not receive one. Then you left an embarrassing long, slurred happy birthday message along with an apology. By the end of the night you left five more. In the morning there was finally an answer from him. It was a short text asking you not to call him again. Even though it was a generic message you could feel that he was hurt, and you did not want that for him.

September 29

The fall was setting in quickly. Leaves had already started to change. Emotionally you had been improving. Every second of the day was not spent thinking about Ashton but there were the occasional moments when he would slip in your mind. Then it would get bad again. You weren’t hurt that the relationship was over but more upset how you had hurt him.

You saw him again. It was the first time since the summer. He had his hand wrapped up. You could tell that the injury had taken place not long before. It was at a party. He had the same daunting look that he had at the festival. Everyone was dancing around him and having a good time. You sat across the room, intently staring at him. He was beautiful. You always made it a point to tell him that. Had anyone told him he was beautiful in four months?

He locked eyes with you. It was a cold look that you felt in your body. It was one of hatred. You left soon after. Then spent the rest of the night replaying the way his eyes looked. They were dull, but there was still a spark somewhere deep inside them. Maybe he was forgiving you? But you had not forgiven yourself, so that felt like a long shot.

October 25

It was your birthday. The first one in three years that would not be spent with Ashton and his friends. The first one that was not going to consist of a large party, music and drinking too much. Instead you sat yourself on the couch and prepared for a long night of sad movies, the only feeling that you had felt in so long.

Deep inside you wished that Ashton would call you. Maybe he would just send a text letting you know that he had not forgotten about you. It was just a hopeful wish.

The afternoon turned into darkness. Raindrops tapped on the windows. You cried a lot that night. You did not know if it was from the movies or the fact that you were spending the day alone. Sure you had friends and family that sent birthday wishes and reached out to get together. But all you really wanted was Ashton.

It was 3 am. You felt the vibrations against your leg. Your heart was climbing out of your throat. You grabbed for it as fast as you could. The shaking of your hands weren’t helping. All of the adrenaline left as you realized it was not Ashton calling. Instead it was Luke, someone who you also had not talked to months.

“Hello?”

“Happy Birthday y/n”

“Thank you Luke”

“Did you think I would forget?”

“Considering it has been over for 3 hours, yes I thought you forgot.”

“Hey I’m just a little late.”

“Can I ask you something Luke?”

“Sure.”

“How is he?”

“Y/n, lets not get into this.”

“Just tell me if he is okay.”

“He’s doing better okay. He still gets upset and punches things. But he’s better at controlling it all. You really fucked with him.”

“I kinda fucked with myself while I was at it.”

“Don’t get yourself worked up about it though okay. You weren’t right for each other for months before you broke up. Even though it hurts, I think it’s better for both of you to be apart.”

December 27

It took everything out of you to get through family Christmas alone. You watched all your cousins, even those younger, with their partners. They looked extra in love during the holiday season. All while you sat on the couch, looking miserable to others.

The days following Christmas were harder. There was a rumor Ash had been seen with another girl. The same one from that night you left. This time they walked hand in hand. If you were being honest, it broke you. You screamed until your throat was on fire. You found all the pictures shoved in your closet just to smash the glass.

The remainder of the night was spent looking out the window as snowflakes drifted down. A tear would slip down your cheek every once in a while. At some point you fell asleep curled in a ball beneath The window.

February 17

Days had gotten so much easier. You got back into the routine of being alone and even picked up extra time at work. Life felt great for the first time since last spring. You felt like you could breathe again. Everything was almost perfect again. But nothing stays like that for long.

It was 3:00 on the dot that afternoon. After a short two months he had broken up with her. It was like breaking news all over you social media. You couldn’t help but feel relieved that she was no longer taking your spot, but something didn’t feel right. You knew he was probably at home, broken all over again. Everything he did to forget you and move on, probably all ruined now.

It took everything to not call him that night and give your condolences for the lost relationship. You wanted so badly to go to him in a time of need. Maybe he would be with you for the night. But you knew that would just be playing with him in a vulnerable time. So instead you just sat quietly in your room hoping he’d give you a call.

March 16

The hardest day of the healing process was when you talked to Ashton. For some reason you ended up at Luke’s house, and of course Ashton so happened to also. In the end you knew it was a set up.

Ashton yelled a lot. You took it though and let him explain his frustration.

“Do you understand how fucked I was y/n! Cause you walked out and left me stranded, nothing left but broken picture frames”

“I’m sorry Ash. I don’t know why I acted that way that night, but you didn’t deserve it. But don’t you think we are better off apart?”

“Of course I do y/n! But I just keep asking myself how’d we drift so far away?”

“Times changes people. We spent so much of our young years together and were still growing up. As we grew, we grew apart. It happens.”

His body softened. He sat down and but his head in his hands. You wanted so bad to reach out and hold him, but it would make the situation even worse.

“Late night conversations led to complications. You know I was stupid and got jealous. I’ve grown over the past year, I really have Ashton. Neither one of us could if we didn’t separate.”

“That’s all true but it doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt any less. Everyday I wake up and hope it wasn’t true. My heart aches for you. It’s heartbreak I can’t escape. I’ve tried to move on so many times and I just keep seeing your face. Eyes closed, all I see is good time disappearing. And yes our relationship was complete shit at times, but I loved you. You left in such an unfair way. I feel like it’s a sinking ship that I’ll never save. Now my heart is in my hands and I’m lonely like a castaway.”

Every word tugged on your heart more. You knew that you had hurt him, but not like this. Your head was spinning. Flashes of that night in May were swirling around. You reached for his hand and to your surprise he let you hold it. You met his eyeline. His eyes were filled with tears but that was no different to yours.

“I’m sorry Ashton. I was awful to you in the end. You did some terrible things too but that does not excuse how I acted. I loved you and a part of me does and will forever. But I know we are better off not together. If I could change how it ended, I would go back a thousand times until I was all okay.”

“And I’m trying to hold on. I don’t know what to. The rest of my life maybe, or everything you were a part of. But everything feels wrong. But maybe after tonight, things can get better once and for all.”

You gave the smallest smile you could because that warmed your heart. From that you knew you could move on and not worry about Ashton anymore.

May 20

It took two months from the confrontation for things to feel okay. Ashton was not on your mind every second of the day. You knew he was okay and he was getting better. For the first time you felt that you could move on if you wanted. You smiled and cheered him on as a friend. That longing for him was disappearing. Life felt content, like a weight was lifted.

#5 seconds of summer #5sos #5sos blog #5sos blurb #5sos imagine #5sos writing #ashton irwin #ashton irwin blurb #ashton irwin imagine #calum hood #calum hood blurb #calum hood imagine #michael clifford blurb #michael clifford imagine #michael clifford #luke hemmings blurb #luke hemmings imagine #luke hemmings #5sos blurbs #5sos requests #5sos updates #5sos icons #5sos audio #5sos pref

[imgettinrealtiredman-blog]

yes hello there im amber

And I’m coming back (and immediately disappearing) to make exactly one (1) last post on the Content(tm) that is the shitshow.

I’m going to make a note for anyone reading this (as reading text can be odd because you can’t decipher a tone) -- I’m not angry. I’m not. I’m extremely calm and level-headed writing this. Also, I’m not tagging SSO because the tag doesn’t deserve this. And people not directly involved don’t deserve to see this. They’re here for cute pixel ponies, not discourse.

Now then, let’s begin.

This happened in... what, April? May? In any case, it happened months ago. Everyone, including the “victim” and “suspects”, has moved on. Not only have they moved on, but they’ve recognized their wrongdoings and stopped.

They’ve grown.

They’ve changed.

And there’s proof of it.

Despite this, the topic keeps being brought up in vague posts. Despite this having happened months ago and nothing wrong going on since (at least to my knowledge), it... keeps being brought up? This confuses me greatly. If the people who were the direct issue have changed and moved on, why have the accusers *not seen this change*, and not *embraced it* and also carried on with their lives? If you hate it so much, why do you continue to surround yourself with something that no longer exists?

A little reminder in case you forgot: I’m not mad, I’m asking a genuine question to get my facts straight. Anyone that’s known me knows I will always see both sides to arguments, even ones I don’t necessarily agree with and have an open mind. (I expressed that numerous times to Piper, Bern, and others when they were in the server.)

Arguments, debates, etc. All these things can be filled with emotion. Emotions are valid. They’re unique and really give us a humanity that we all wish to have. But when it comes down to it, emotions can get in the way of things. When there’s any form of debate or argument, it’s one thing to get passionate, but it’s another to get emotional. It’s another to be filled with anger or sadness. It meddles with our brains and changes our words and creates misinterpretations. I cannot express to you the number of times Sam and I have gotten into arguments over simple misinterpretations. It happens. It’s human.

When things like this happen, it’s best to put your head down, back away, and return when you have a clear head. That way you can be at your best! You can be ready to either admit your wrongs or further persuade your argument with factual information. And... that’s the thing. From what I’ve noticed as of late, whenever the argument is brought up, it’s just... insults. Insults do nothing to an argument but entice emotion and if anything, show a lack of maturity. Lack of maturity in a serious topic like this instantly makes a reader lose trust in your side.

Think of it like this. One side is saying “We’ve changed, we’ve moved on” and the other is saying, “you guys are clOWNS”. What does that show for anyone? Other than a mess (which again, this poor pixel pony game doesn’t deserve this shitshow in the tags).

Speaking of arguments being derailed or being less authentic, I will continue to stand by the “feeling for Sam” and “trying to protect Sam” does not fall under the list of actions this group truly intended to do. Here’s the thing. If you’re trying to protect someone, you don’t block them. You don’t lose all contact with them. The only reason you would do something like that to protect someone is if you were trying to protect someone from yourself.

Saying you’re protecting Sam, and then immediately blocking him, it just... doesn’t make sense. It’s as if a teacher says “I’m here for you if you’re being bullied!” and then completely ignores you when the bully is punching you in the hallway. It’s as if a fireman just completely ignored the sirens.

An accuser “trying to protect” a victim, but then blocking the victim, completely invalidates any actions the accuser does, at least in my eyes.

Speaking of this, I’d like to bring up another point. What happened was... an accident. Burgie and Sam legitimately did not know there was a law in place against the whole thing.

Guess what?

Neither did anyone else.

Literally, no one did.

As soon as this all came to light and we found out? Everything changed.

Burgie deleted the fics. The NSFW channel(s) in the Discord were blocked to anyone without a specific “18+” rule. The interesting thing is, while these changes were going underway, one of Piper’s friends was taking screenshots and still sending them out of context to make everyone look terrible. Despite them doing what was right and making the change. They ignored it and kept trying to make it look like people were continuing the bad things when they weren’t.

That’s the thing. Tumblr has this mindset of “once a sinner, always a sinner”. Tumblr has this mindset that the world is black and white. It’s so incorrect in so many ways. If anyone has ever stepped outside for one day, they can tell that. Life is shades of gray. There is no black or white. We’re raised being told mistakes happen and that we learn by mistakes, and that some mistakes are worse than others. We learn that some opinions are worse than others, and even then that’s judged morally.

Tumblr doesn’t like when people fix their mistakes, no matter how big or small. That mindset is so incredibly toxic. People learn. People grow. Sometimes people are raised arrogant and ignorant and it isn’t until much later that they learn to have an open mind. People, Tumblr especially, need to be more understanding that certain mistakes can be corrected and can help someone grow into a better person.

Was this entire thing a mistake? Fuck yes.

Was it a giant mistake? Extremely, yes.

Is it reversible? No, it’s not. Nothing is.

Are people correcting their wrongs? YES.

Yet somehow, despite this being a yes, despite people growing, changing, moving on, and being better human beings than they were before, you guys keep holding onto it. You hold onto this little bit of negativity that happened months ago. Can’t you see that we’ve changed? That we’ve moved on and fixed our wrongs?

Can’t you see that no one but yourselves is listening to you rant, and the only reason anyone is saying anything now is because we’re tired of listening to a broken record play for months on end?

We’ve changed.

Burgie stopped writing those fics.

We know the laws. We won’t be fucking it up again. Meanwhile, you’ll probably continue to call us “clowns” (which I mean, they’re popular right now so I’ll take it. Ha, get it? “It”? I’ll shut up now). And again, that’s not an insult, this is just an observation.

I remember you guys before this all happened. Come on, now. You guys can do better. Do yourselves a favor and carry on with your lives. This doesn’t matter anymore. Go on, go home. Go play the pixel pony game and have fun. Stop beating a dead horse. (Yes I’m being a bit of a hypocrite here but like I said, this is the last time I’m saying anything. I’ve got more important things to worry about.)

[rogue-barnes-16]

SECRETS (part V/?)

Summary: Detectives James Barnes and Y/n Y/l/n never really got along, despite being partners for seven months. You could say they hated each other, however, when James’ past shows up threatening to break him all over again, the truth about their feelings comes to the surface.

Pairing: cop!Bucky Barnes x cop!Reader

Genre: angst

Tags:

Permanent taglist: @notexactlythatgirl @thisismysecrethappyplace @sofreakinmanyfandoms @pizzarollpatrol @bubblycypress87 @1a-girl-has-no-name1 @loislp @lovenaturefirst @dyanna-corona @2ptonpt @goodnightmode @disneyprincessbuffyannesummers @mannls @cutie1365 @catch22inareddress @mybooradley @sebastianisasnack @butifulsoul125 @unlikelygalaxygiver

Warnings: language, makeout??? Not really.

A/N: previous parts are on my Masterlist under the name of "Secrets".

Rogue-barnes-16 masterlist

I saw my phone starting to ring due to the alarm that Bucky had begged me to set up after we had called Steve, and I quickly reached for it to turn it off.

The reason why I had been able to observe the alarm go off before it had actually done, was because I hadn't sleep again. I couldn't sleep after the fit Dot had thrown in my living room just a couple of hours ago.

Well, 'throwing a fit' was a goddamn understatement, considering Barnes, even asleep, was still gripping my hand like his life depended on it.

"Hey, it's time" my words, even if they were softly spoken, made him instantly retreat from his initial position. "chill, we got time" I reminded him, when he started to change his clothes.

"I know" he replied dryly while he was buckling his belt. "I just wanna leave already."

"fuck okay" I yielded through clenched teeth, sitting up to change my shirt and pants to outdoor clothes. "Did you sleep?"

"yeah" his eyes were everywhere but me while he grabbed his jacket and phone. "c'mon, we're already late"

I held back the scoff, and I held back the sarcastic comment, because I stole a glance at him to see that he was now completely composed, as if nothing had happened.

As if there wasn't now a bullet hole in my wall, as if Dot hadn't come all the way to my house, just for him.

He was completely composed, and that made me wonder how many times he had to put himself together that quick after his so-called wife had done something like this, or even worse, to him.

"c'mon Y/l/n, we're already-"

"I heard you the first time for fucks sake" I got up and picked up my things before following him to the entrance of the apartment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

BUCKY'S P. O. V.

I guided the way when we entered in the precinct, but as soon as Y/n spotted Steve coming our way, she took the lead to reach him first.

"Thanks for covering us" Steve replied with a dismissive but concerned nod at Y/n's low voice.

"what happened?"

I took a peek at Y/n who was already staring at me, silently asking if it will be okay, to which I replied with a nod. "I'm gonna leave you guys alone."

When she left, Steve took a step towards me and I pulled him aside, away from any nosy ears. "she came to Y/n's"

The blond man needed a moment to process what I had just said "wait what?"

"she came in" before he questioned how she had, I answered. "I opened the door. I didn't know who was it and then she was inside and- I don't know."

"Did she hurt you?" Steve inquired concerned.

"I... I don't think so"

"what do you mean?" another question, this time quieter. "you don't remember or she... She insulted you or--?"

"Kinda. I don't know" I took a deep breath, passing one of my hands over my face. "I remember, but at the same time I don't."

"fight or flight" I nodded at Steve affirmation. "and then? Y/n-"

"she was yelling something at me and I shut my eyes and when I opened them-" I looked at the girl that had stood up for me a few hours ago, the same girl that had been helping me to actually put myself together, and not just the facade.

The same girl that was now eating a sandwich from the vending machine with her feet crossed over her desk while she went over the files of the case like this morning hadn't happened.

"Y/n was there." I turned to Steve again. "Dot lost it"

"Did she hurt Y/n?" this time he was louder than any of us would have wanted, and we saw Y/n directing us a warning glance.

"Y/n aimed her gun at Dot" I swallowed, suddenly remember vividly that instant of the morning, in which, for a second, I thought the woman that had been hurting me for so long was going to die. "Dot was convinced it was a bluff. Y/n gave her a warning shot and then kicked her out."

Steve stared at me for way too long with that look.

"what?"

He didn't answer instantly. Instead, he waited a couple of seconds to measure the words that would leave his mouth. "Today you sleep at my place." he whispered.

I scoffed so loud at his stupid solution that I made Y/n look up from the files. "what the hell?"

Steve looked down and took a deep breath. He closed his eyes for a second and I just knew he was trying not to lose it. "this was a bad idea in first place" my puzzled expression made him sighed exasperated "staying in the apartment of the girl you've been-" he checked on Y/n to make sure she wasn't paying attention. "crushing on for months- months Buck— was definitely not the best idea."

"it wasn't"

"And it's even worse if you consider that you two fucked while you were blackout drunk."

"You're walking on thin ice, Steve." I warned him when I started to feel an emotion I couldn't really describe, apart from the fact that it was bad.

"let's not forget that you stayed with her in first place" my fists clenched trying to hold back what I was feeling. "You're hiding from your mad wife."

It was anger.

"You're mad wife, who is dangerous."

No, not just anger. It was guilt, because I knew Y/n was now caught in the crossfire.

"Shut up"

"She's really dangerous, Buck."

"Steve, I swear to fucking God--"

And it was also shame, because why didn't I think it through? It was me who got Y/n in the middle of all of this, right? I shouldn't have explained my situation any further.

"Y/n had to shoot her gun for her to back off."

READER'S P. O. V.

I looked up to check on the two men I had left standing in the corner of the precinct, like I had been doing periodically since I heard the sentence 'you sleep at my place' coming from Steve.

This time, something happened that made me double check. Steve's voice started to raise gradually, which made Natasha and Sam take a peek at them.

Now Barnes' fists were clenched and his teeth gritted, as if he was planning on punching his bestfriend in front of all our colleagues.

That was a big no. I stood up as casual as I could and made my way to them, just in time to subtly tug the brunette back by his forearm.

"what the hell, guys?" my eyes went from Steve to Bucky, who was staring at me like he didn't know where I had come from, nor what had just happened. "you both get down to work. Now." Barnes glared at the blonde, which made me tug his arm again, this time to divert his attention from his friend. "Now."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Steve, Bucky and I were the only ones left in our department.

I didn't want to make things uncomfortable for Bucky, so my plan was staying and working in the case until Steve left with him.

But Steve stared to pick up his things and Bucky didn't move. He was hesitant, observing me and from time to time, peaking at his bestfriend.

The blond man walked to the door and stopped for a second before leaving to look at Bucky intently. It seemed to me like they were having a silent argument only using their eyes.

After a few seconds of tension building up, Steve decided to give up. "g'night, Y/n." he spoke. "be careful, 'kay?"

I looked away from the whiteboard in front of me, and, turning my torso to Steve with my arms still crossed over my chest, I replied "sure. Don't worry," I glanced at Bucky, who was pretending to be immersed in the report he was writing. "I'll call you if something happens."

He nodded and, after I had mimicked him, he turned around and left.

"I thought you were leaving with him" I spoke the moment I heard the elevator door closing.

"I wasn't planning on it" he replied, quiet and absent.

"why?"

"I like your bed more than I like his couch"

I spun around to face him. "I'm serious"

"And Peggy doesn't like me one bit" he continued with what I supposed was another excuse. "I don't wanna cause any arguments." he kept typing in his computer carelessly.

"Barnes" he swallowed when I called his last name "I swear if you give me another lame excuse-"

"she knows where you live" even if he was using the same monotone voice, I could tell he was opening up now. "I don't want you to be alone." the typing stopped and one of his hands, the one that had previously been over the mouse, started to fidget with his ring. "And get hurt 'cause I got you caught in the crossfire."

'I can take care of myself' was the first reply that came to my mind, but considering the situation and context, it didn't seem appropriate.

Despite knowing that, for some reason, I wasn't able to find an appropriate response to my colleague's words.

Maybe it had something to do with the fact that his words sounded like an encrypted message, almost as if he was trying hard to tell me something that, at the same time, he wanted to keep to himself.

Unable to come up with the answer he wanted me to give him —or most likely the answer he needed me to give him— I opted for another way to communicate.

I made my way to his desk in silence and, once there, I sat on the table right besides his computer, and let my hand travel to his fidgeting one.

His eyes searched for mines, and when they found them, I gave him a smile. A tired one, though, because I was spent.

Spent because of the unsolvable case we were working in, spent because I had barely slept lately, and spent because I wanted Dot away from him and I had no idea of how I could accomplish that.

He was exhausted too, I saw it in his smile, which probably looked just like mine, just a little bit sadder.

"c'mon" I climbed off the desk and tugged his hand lightly for him to follow me. "we're going home."

We picked our things up without letting go, and made our way to the shitty, tiny elevator, where we let our fingers untangle, not before lingering on.

We both rested our backs against opposites walls while the elevator took us to the first floor.

His gaze was trained on me, and mine on his.

And for an instant, those words he hadn't told me before, those words that he had kept to himself no matter how hard he had wanted me to understand, were shown in the blue of his eyes.

And maybe, just maybe, the words that I hadn't said, those words that I didn't know I needed him to know until a couple of days ago, were shown in mine.

I wasn't sure who got close first, nor who closed the gap between us.

Maybe it was the both of us.

It didn't matter now that his left hand gripped my hip while the right one held my cheek.

It didn't matter now that my right hand's fingers were tangled in his hair, tugging it lightly, while my my left hand's fisted his shirt.

It didn't matter because it was an instant, a moment that would vanish in a couple of seconds, when the elevator gates opened.

But they opened and Bucky was still holding me still.

They opened and I was still gripping his shirt and tugging his hair.

#marvel one shot #marvel miniseries #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes masterlist #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes x you #bucky x you #bucky x reader #bucky barnes smut #40's bucky barnes #james barnes x you #winter soldier x reader #bucky imagine #james barnes x reader #bucky barnes series #bucky barnes #reader insert #sebastian stan masterlist #bucky barnes fic #bucky barnes oneshot #james bucky barnes #bucky barnes x y/n #white wolf x reader #sebastian stan imagine #bucky masterlist #bucky barnes miniseries #bucky barnes smut masterlist #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes x ofc #cop!bucky

[keelywolfe]

FIC: Pillars of Creation ch. 3 (baon)

Summary: It’s not a date, thank you. Edge only agreed to take Stretch to the planetarium, that was all. That doesn’t make it a date.

Prequel to the series, set after “Seeing Stars Through Clouds’

If you were ever curious how these two got together, well, here you go, their first date outing together! It’s super!

Note: Everyone’s been enjoying the fluff, right? Excellent! Hold that thought, read the tags! It’s not THAT bad but I don’t like to surprise people.

Tags: Spicyhoney, First Time, Pre-Relationship, Some Angst Regarding Past Memories, Implications of Depression, Brothers Can Be Pains, Underfell Was Not a Nice Place, Neither was Underswap Really, They Were Both In a Not Good Place, But Never Fear, Good Ending!

part of the ‘by any other name’ series.

Read it on AO3

or

Read it here!

~~*~~

The trip back to New New Home seemed to be much shorter with Stretch chattering next to him. The pause at the security gate only took as long as swiping their ID’s and in no time, he was pulling up to the Swap brother’s house again.

There was a light on downstairs, Blue was probably downstairs watching the new Mettaton special. It was a little too early yet to say he was waiting up for his brother, even if there was likely some truth to it.

Stretch didn’t open his door immediately when they came to a stop. He fiddled with the strap of his bag and his smile was hesitant, “hope you didn't have too awful a time. deb’s a sales shark, but it’s worth it, they have damn good coffee and—"

“Why do you do that?" Edge broke in. He kept his voice low, even, using the same care that worked on his group at the Y.

Stretch only blinked in startled confusion, “do what?"

Edge turned off the car and the quiet was stark. Coupled with the darkness, it was an illusion of privacy even with the top down. “Belittle things like that. I didn't have an awful time, at all, so why would you suggest I did?"

Had he always done that, disparaged himself? Edge couldn’t remember.

"i...uh…" Stretch shrugged. His lighter was in his bag, along with his cigarettes, but that strap was wound haphazardly around his fingers, clenched briefly tight. "better to get it out there before anyone else does, right? cast the first bone and all that.”

Edge sighed. “Stop.”

“sorry, sorry,” Stretch chuckled, “had to get it out of my system.”

He still didn’t get out of car and Edge…found that he didn’t want to ask. He hadn’t wanted to admit it the whole night but now—

“Is this supposed to be a date?” Edge asked aloud. It sounded strange, not wrong exactly, but almost forbidden, nothing he’d ever expected to say.

Stretch’s eye lights went wide, and a flood of color filled his cheekbones, tinting them ruddy orange. There were no cracks or divots in his skull, no visible injuries. Much like Papyrus and perhaps they’d all shared a name once but to Edge’s gaze, they didn’t really look that much alike.

The curves of Stretch’s skull were slightly softer, less angular and a touch slimmer, and he was—

“hey, you asked me out,” Stretch said lightly. And before Edge could revert to the childish retort of ‘you did it first’, Stretch added with hesitant care. “but. only if you want it to be? if not, it’s only two guys who could maybe be friends. i could do friends. what do you want this to be?”

Part of him wanted to push back against that, protest the unfairness of putting that choice on him.

But.

Friends. None of their previous interactions could ever be called ‘friendly’.

It brought to mind an argument they’d had some months ago. Everyone had been there, all of the skeletons in their group; Edge no longer remembered the context, but he recalled that much. They had only just arrived at the surface, everything was still in turmoil, yet Papyrus and Blue were determined to build relationships between them, and Edge agreed. Allies were necessary in this new world and he would do what needed to be done to get them.

Red and Sans were simply uncaring; they followed where their brothers led without protest, offering laconic comments and puns and little else. Stretch often did the same, but somehow, he always grated in a way that the Sanses did not. Any pointed comments about laziness beaded off Red and Sans like water from a particularly lethargic duck.

Stretch would return any insult with one of his own and his retribution was swift. He and Edge been sniping at each other all day despite Blue and Papyrus’s increasingly exhausted and pleading attempts to interfere, and the tension between them was poised to snap when Stretch waited until the others were out of earshot to murmur.

“tell you what, why don’t you wash the dust from your hands before you get back to me on what a piece of shit i am. better scrub hard, killer.”

They could joke about idiocy all they wanted but in truth Stretch was exceptionally clever; no warrior but he knew how to make words a weapon, finding chinks in armor and using them with brutal efficiency.

The others never made references to Edge’s LV; they knew, of course they knew, and past any fumbling attempts at consolation, they let it be. To have it so pointedly dragged out, a reminder of something he didn’t, couldn’t, forget, but he tried—

Crimson had washed over his vision, coupled with something very close to hate, and Stretch knew, he knew. He’d smiled lazily, not even glancing at where their brothers had yet to notice them, a lit cigarette dangling from his fingers. “go ahead,” he said, softly, singsong sweet. “what’s a little murder between friends?”

He’d thought at the time Stretch knew he wouldn’t hurt him. Looking back, he wondered if Stretch hadn’t cared if he did.

In the end, Edge walked away from him and never had he been more grateful for his iron control. They hadn’t spoken much after that, not really, certainly never alone, nothing past a little sneering at movie nights and dinners, but even that had dulled, their insults eventually losing their sharpened points, and Edge never questioned why. They simply stayed away from each other and Edge hadn’t thought anything of it.

Until Stretch walked into his office last week. Tonight was the longest they’d ever been alone together, much less managed to be civil to each other and Edge was having a difficult time reconciling how this Stretch fit on top of the one he’d known before, trying to line up those edges and failing.

But he also remembered a few children from his group at the Y, the way they sometimes snarled and slapped away any kindness offered them at the beginning. Their jibes had been less unerringly accurate, but they’d been meant to wound in the same fashion.

And Edge had sent more than his share of verbal barbs back then as well.

i wasn't exactly at my best when we first got here. i'm kind of hoping people don't hold me to that first impression for the rest of my life.

Stretch was looking at him, waiting patiently, and only the way he was clutching his bag gave away any of his anxiety.

“I don’t know,” Edge said finally, the words coming slowly. The Stretch he’d seen tonight was far different than his previous experiences, but it didn’t nullify them.

Stretch nodded. “that’s fair. think about it and let me know what you decide?” He finally opened the door and slid out, and he was waving even as it swung shut, “‘night.”

He was gone in a flash and pop of teleportation.

Edge sat a moment longer, waiting. The upstairs window opened and there was a brief flicker of flame from a lighter, the tiny glow of a cigarette. Convenient to be able to bypass the questions his brother would surely have.

Blue had been less than amused when he’d discovered Edge managed to get around him to talk to Stretch by sneaking into his room. It was disconcerting how much he could suddenly appreciate Stretch’s exasperation with the way his brother tried to interfere with his life; he’d never given it a thought before, always thought Blue was in the right when he dealt with his brother—

He couldn’t tell if Stretch was looking at him and he turned the car back on, backing out of the driveway to head home.

His headlights flashed over the porch as he pulled into the drive of his own house, giving him a glimpse of Red sitting on the steps, like a sudden prophecy come true concerning controlling brothers.

Edge sighed. It was still early but he was tired, and this night out left plenty for him to think about. Dealing with Red could be exhausting when he was at his best.

There was nothing for it. Edge climbed out of the car and walked up to where Red was sprawling against the stairs. He was smoking one of the foul little cigars he’d discovered on the surface; the smell was reminiscent of a burning trash dump and Edge wondered at times if he’d chosen them specifically for that trait. Smoking had been an unaffordable luxury in Underfell, but here he could happily annoy others with passive revulsion if he wanted to.

“What do you want?” Edge asked in resignation, stepping past him to open the door.

"nothin’.” Red crushed the cigar out on the cement step, leaving a mark that Edge would be scrubbing away tomorrow.

“I don’t understand why you won’t simply move in if you’re only going to stop by to harass me daily.” Edge held open the door to allow Red inside, waiting with exaggerated patience as he shuffled through the door.

“nah,” Red said lazily. He must have been in a decent enough mood, toeing off his shoes on the front mat without being reminded. “we’re all grown up now, ain’t we, boss, we need our space. and like i want to end up like those other codependent fuckers?” Red shook his head as he wandered into the kitchen. “papyrus and his shitheel brother have that covered. you should be grateful you have me as a bro and not that piece of shit.”

Edge never quite understood the problem his brother had with Sans, but watching his brother paw through his refrigerator didn’t give him confidence in that assessment.

“bet you like having your own place.” Red took out a container and held it to the light, studying the contents.

“I might if it was ever simply mine.” Edge took the container away, pulling out a plate and dumping the contents on it, sticking it in the microwave. His brother was the only reason he even owned one and Edge leaned back against the counter to watch the plate turning within it.

Since they’d come to the surface, Edge was slowly experimenting more with cooking, moving past the simple pasta meals he’d made in Underfell, utilizing the wonder that was YouTube with mixed results. At least with his brother constantly devouring the leftovers he didn’t have to worry about his cooking attempts going to waste.

Red climbed up on a stool, propping his chin on a hand, and his grin was too wide to be comforting. “heard about your date with the honey bun, came by to see how it went."

"It wasn't…" Edge started automatically, then hesitated and shook his head.

A mistake. Red’s grin widened into something vicious. "well, come on, do we have to hide a pile of dust or not?"

"That isn't funny." The microwave beeped and Edge yanked open the door, dropping the plate in front of his brother hard enough that a little spilled off onto the counter.

Red only wiped it up with his fingers, licking them clean. "oh, it ain’t, that right? you had a good time.” It sounded like an accusation.

"He managed to not be completely unbearable for a handful of hours." Edge pointedly set a fork next to the plate.

"you had a good time!" Red crowed, plate and fork rattling as he pounded on the counter. "i knew it! why the fuck do you think i gave him that flyer?"

Thinking of that soured some of Edge’s already tumultuous mood. “Yes, I’m sure you only had my best interests at heart.”

“not very friendly, bro,” Red sighed, shaking his head sadly even as he finally gave up trying to eat curry with his bare hands and picked up the fork. “i raised you, clothed you—“

“Left me alone for days at a time. Beat me when I disobeyed you.”

That got him a hint of a glare, tainted with sardonic amusement. “i slapped you one time and you were about to get your ass in a dustpan sassing off to a guard. you call that a beating?”

“When it was the best you could have mustered, yes. And I never said I didn’t deserve it.”

“bet I could mustard something a little better now.”

Edge closed his sockets, pained. "Enough. What do you mean you ‘knew it’? Knew what?"

"oh, come on, bro, no one hates on someone the way you two do without wanting to fuck them." Red leered at him. With his mouth full, the effect was more grotesque than normal. "did you nail him in the back seat of that cockmobile of yours, or did he invite you in like a ‘civilized person’." His fork trailed sauce on the counter as he made finger quotes.

"We went to the planetarium and had coffee," Edge snapped. "There was no fucking, in the car or otherwise. I dropped him off at his own house and came home after an acceptable evening. That’s all."

"uh huh," Red studied him. "when you going out again?"

"We aren’t."

"you mean you haven't asked him yet?"

"No, I mean we aren't.” Edge wet a cloth, wiping up some of his brother’s mess. “I have enough to do without spending my time babysitting an emotional toddler."

Red snorted loudly. “you’re one to talk.”

That gave him a pause. He gave his brother a narrow look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“nothin’ i want to explain. look.” There were few things quite as unnerving as Red looking at him seriously. "he'd be a liability, you know that. but he'd be a pretty one. you think you can protect what's yours? then i say go for it. or what's the fucking point of being up here?" That seriousness faded and his brother licked his teeth, winking, “ever seen him without that sweatshirt?”

“And he asks me these things as if I could possibly be interested,” Edge said to no one in particular. He took away his brother’s empty plate and turned on the hot water, scrubbing it harder than necessary.

“paps.”

That was enough to make him still, leaning against the side of the sink, the running water a low gurgle. Red had readily set aside their previous names when they’d come to this universe and these days, they used them only rarely.

Behind him, Red sighed. "never thought i'd get the chance to say this, bro, but you're allowed to be happy, if you want. otherwise, why the fuck am i even doing all this?"

"I am perfectly happy,” Edge said, calmly. He returned to washing the dish, cleaning away any lingering sauce. “I have a job I enjoy, I no longer live with you, and I have my volunteer work. I don't need anything else."

"you probably don't. but it's okay to want something else,” he hopped down from the chair, his grubby socks scuffling against the floor. Deliberately, Edge knew, Red was only heard when he wanted to be. “now if you’ll excuse me, i'm gonna go puke. a little tip? make up your mind over the honey bun. stretch is an okay guy, but he's got issues, don't jerk him around. besides, he might not kill you over it, but i wouldn't put bets on blue."

There didn’t seem to be anything he could say to that, no protest that his brother would hear. Instead, Edge asked, “Are you staying to watch Mettaton or not?”

That got him a snort and a truly amused one at that. “you still watching that shit? c’mon, i’ll add my netflix account to your tv. they’ve got some real cooking shows.”

The door swung on its hinges as Red walked out and left Edge alone. Slowly, he set the plate into the drainer, not really meaning to think of Stretch. But he couldn’t stop remembered his hands, those slim, delicate fingers, the way he gestured when he was excited, describing the heavenly bodies above them. The soft flush in his cheekbones, the sparkle in his eye lights while he watched Edge sampling coffee, and that strange warmth rose in his soul again with the memory, lingering in his chest.

It was late after a long day. Stretch was probably asleep. One thing he’d learned since coming to the surface was that low HP Monsters weren’t necessarily lazy, they needed their sleep, although he wasn’t completely convinced where his brother was concerned.

A liability, Red called him. But a pretty one.

The Stretch of tonight was not the same as the one he’d first met. Which one was the truth?

There was only one way to find out.

Before he could think too much about it, Edge took out his phone, pulling up a contact that was only there in case of an emergency, and sent a text.

Would you like to go out again?

Almost immediately a smileyface emoticon came back in reply, followed with, yeah, i'd like that. where we going?

Edge hesitated, then sent back. I'll let you know

sounds good, i like a surprise!

He probably would like a surprise. Edge needed to think about it. Someplace else that would draw out that excitement, bring the sparkle back to those eye lights. Let him see all that bright enthusiasm again, to make sure it wasn’t a fluke.

For now, he shook that thought away and went to join his brother, reluctantly curious about these cooking shows. He supposed they couldn’t be too terrible, and it was possible he’d learn something new.

It was worth a try.

~~*~~

Read Chapter Two

Read Chapter Four

#spicyhoney #papcest #keelywolfe #underfell #underswap #underfell papyrus #underswap papyrus #underfell sans #by any other name

[johnny2071]

F is for Family - Bill’s Letter and Apology (Deconstructed)

Bill running away and finally calling out his parents is a major turning point in his character arc, and hopefully, the entire family. In these connected scenes, there's a lot of deep contexts, and I will be analyzing each of them. If anyone here has ever watched Mystery Science Theater 3000, Rifftrax, or any Channel Awesome reviews, you should understand what I'm doing here. Pay close attention to everything written in parenthesis within the transcript, as I will explain each note at the end. Bill's Letter: ----------------- Dear Mom and Dad, By the time you find this note, I will be long gone because I'm running away. Dad, I'm sure you won't care too much being that I'm such a big disappointment to you and I'm always bothering you with my problems. And I know you think I'm a pussy. My reasons for saying this are A, I heard you say it to Mom (Bill was there during the bedroom argument). In conclusion, I'm sure you will all be better off without me (Bill has been burned or neglected by all four members of the family). Mom, I'll remember to brush my teeth (No ill will?). Maureen, even though I'll be gone forever, you still can't have my room (Bill's less-than-kind sister has been moved into his bedroom space). And Kevin, you were doing something (Bill is that turned off by his masturbating, followed by his usual excuse). Sincerely yours, Bill. P. S. Watch out for Phillip (Who has a murderous mind and has gone ballistic twice). Bill's Calls Out His Parents & Rescue: ----------------- Frank: Bill, we're here! Daddy's gonna save you! Bill: Go to hell! (Bill strikes!) Frank: What the fuck did you just say to me? Bill: I'm fucking mad at you! You don't care about me, Dad! You never cared about me! You didn't take me to hockey tryouts because your stupid fat boss was eating chocolate in your truck. Pogo: (*"Now, there comes a point where a reasonable man will swallow his pride and admit that he's made a terrible mistake. The truth is, I was never a reasonable man"*) A Puerto Rican forced me to do that! (Pogo proves that he's not a reasonable man to own up to his mistakes) Bill: All you ever do is yell at me and call me a pussy. A guy exploded in front of me and you told me to shove it down. And when I needed you today, you told me, "Not now." Well how about now, Dad? (Bill has called out his old man) Frank: Jesus Christ, he's right. Son. I'm I'm sorry. I have been a terrible father lately. (Frank finally gets it, ….for now) Sue: Your father is very sorry, Bill. (Latching onto someone else's apology like a captain's parrot) Bill: I'm mad at you too, Mom! (You ain't off the hook, honey!) Sue: What? (MGS alert sfx) Bill: You spent all your time with that stupid scissor-spoon that I cut my fingers on! (Bill clearly holding back for some reason) Sue: (*cue Shopping Jaunt music*) It was called the Forkoontula, and it's still in the development stages, but you're right. It's just this new baby coming really threw us for a loop and then we got all wrapped up with the new neighbors. (How to construct an legitimate excuse over an apology to a very upset 11-year old boy) Mrs. Vanderheim: Well, I guess I ain't such a bad mother after all. [BLOWJOB] (Crass humor fodder insert) Sue: But that's all over now. (What's over? The pregnancy? The dead/arrested neighbors? The Forkoontula? The abuse?) Frank: And we're sorry. (Frank either hijacks Sue's "apology" for more .temp glory, or spares her the burden of responsibility) I told myself I'd be a better father than my own dad, and that starts now. You kids mean…. you mean a lot to me. I love you people. Just please come on home. We'll talk about it. (Which is either forgotten, or a discussion is had among the parents, while the children are elsewhere having zero-input) Bill: Can I have my old room back to myself? (A wish off the top of his head) Sue: Of course! Frank: Jesus, Sue, the house is a fucking mess! Sue: Frank! Frank: Sure. Your own room again. (Wish granted) Bill: I just want to go home. (Bill is back) Epilogue: ----------------- Frank: Well, I know things got a little crazy this summer. But now your mom and I, we got our priorities straight. Sue: Our most important job is being your parents. And I swear to you, we'll never forget that again. (Good luck with Frank's jerk father and your pregnancy still a thing) Notes: -Bill was there during the bedroom argument - Bill's parents knowing this is important, because the last time he mentioned this, the entire matter was preempted in favor of Major going missing. It should also tell them that he fully knows about their sex act right afterwards, and raise the question of why was Bill underneath the bed in the first place and not in school? He was suspended that day. Why was he suspended? He got into a fight with Jimmy Fitzsimmons. Why did he get into a fight? Fitzsimmons harassed him on Halloween night, when he was left home alone. -Bill has been burned or neglected by all four members of the family - Frank has been abrasive towards him, like every else he screams at. Maureen has zero-respect for him, blackmailed him, and was the first one to push him over the edge. Even Kevin (who isn't the friendliest guy) has begun to sour towards Bill as early as Season 2. And Sue, the one person you think would be closer to Bill (unlike of rest of Frank's personal juniors, Boy-Frank and Girl-Frank), has been nothing but hostile towards him in the rare moments they actually interact, for next to nothing. -No ill will? - After the way Sue has been hostile towards Bill, including this season, all the Bill has to say is that he ensures her of proper hygiene, a response so generic, he has nothing notable to say specifically to her in his goodbye letter. -Bill's less-than-kind sister has been moved into his bedroom space - After the way Maureen has treated him in the past, Bill is not fond of sharing his bedroom space with her, or giving her the satisfaction of ownership of his room. -Bill is that turned off by his masturbating, followed by his usual excuse - Given Kevin's boy-ish nature and questionable means of pleasure, and the fact that Bill's mind hasn't sexually matured yet (since he's barely in double digits), close encounters with sex-related matters make him squick very hard. In short, Bill is disgusted by Kevin for this. -Who has a murderous mind and has gone ballistic twice - Bill has already seen Phillip's kill book, depicted horrible acts of torture and murder to anyone who upsets him. Phillip himself has also flipped out at Bill for so much as liking a girl. Not to mention Phillip completely losing it on the Hobo Jojo Show. -Bill strikes! - After all the abuse both his family and the outside world has finally put him through, Bill finally lashes out at his father, all while hanging on for dear life. Frank and Sue finally come face-to-face with Bill's rage, something that's been long overdue since episode 5. -Pogo proves that he's not a reasonable man to own up to his mistakes - A reference from a quote from Big Fish. This was originally meant for Frank, except he does just that. Sue is a good alternative, but not only would the quote not make sense out of context, but Sue actually dances around this. Naturally, Pogo has been as much (if not more) of an asshole as Frank. I got the whole quote idea from a YouTuber's video. -Bill has called out his old man - In this season alone, Frank has been horribly dismissive towards all three of his children, especially when they needed his attention/any helpful advice the most. Here, Bill actually succeeds in calling Frank out on just that. -Frank finally gets it, ….for now - Frank, who's been extremely close-minded of anything his children say, actually has his mind opened by Bill, and is nearly left speechless. For the first time ever, Frank sincerely apologizes the Bill for being a bad father. However, this Frank we're talking about. Believe it or not, this isn't the first time Frank has made a passionate speech or apology. In fact, he has done this for each season final up to this point. By now, you would think that he would've because a better person by now. However, this show brands itself on bitterness and misery, and unfortunately, gets nothing but praise for it. In order for the show to keep its bitterness, Frank has to remain an over-the-top salty, powder keg, jerkass. Based on what resonates with this show's audience, it's Frank's defining trait, down to his threatening catchphrase, which is used towards the people he spends most of his interaction with: his children. Based on this and his track record of resetting back to default each season, it seems impossible and and out of character for Frank to change, much like Bojack Horseman (a character who actually tries to change, despite many characters in that show closing their doors on him). -Latching onto someone else's apology like a captain's parrot - Rather than apologize herself for her own mistakes, Sue decides to chime in and repeat back to Bill what Frank had just said, like a parrot or a one-dimensional yes man. -You ain't off the hook, honey! - It's good to know that Bill has resentment towards his mother as well, considering that she was actually worse to him than Frank was, even though the show tries to pretend that these moments never happened, yet throw off people (especially those hoping for better) by giving us more when we least expect it (or when scenario do not call for it at the slightest). You can tell that Bill (despite his situation and limited rage) is using this opportunity as his best bet to call BOTH parents out (since he's been a victim of bad timing and has run out of steam before he can get started, leaving him vulnerable). -MGS alert sfx - A sound effect from Metal Gear Solid that should've played alongside Sue's ridiculous reaction. what's baffling here is the fact that she's that shocked that Bill is angry at her, as if she's done nothing wrong to him, as if she's been nothing but kind to him, as if one of her children holding hostility towards her is such an outrageous out-of-the-left-field concept. It just sounds so fake coming from her, almost as cartoonish as The Simpsons, in a show trying to be as dark and real as possible. -Bill clearly holding back for some reason - Out of all the things Sue has said and done to Bill up to this point, THIS is the thing Bill decides to call out on. It's almost as Bill had a brief flashback of all the Sue-Bill moments and intentionally held back, by only referencing the most immediate she's done during the summer, or at this point, he's literally running out of steam and doesn't have enough stamina and anger to call her out on everything else (like he did with Frank). He isn't WRONG about all her time going into the Forkoontula, and the invention DID amplify Sue's ugly side. However, Bill was unintentionally spared from any instances of Sue's wrath pertaining to the Forkoontula. The only who wasn't so lucky and got the cold shoulder/venom is Maureen. "The Stinger" and "Punch Drunk" are prime examples. -*Cue Shopping Jaunt music*/How to construct an legitimate excuse over an apology to a very upset 11-year old boy - Shopping Jaunt is a public domain stock music piece often associated with assembly line production sequences. This is a reference to Sue/Laura Dern's lack of sincere emotion and patronizing/near-robotic delivery in her line. It's the equivalent of a someone making an announcement over an intercom in a professional environment, as opposed to a mother deeply apologizing to her son. Hell, she doesn't say "I'm sorry" to the the boy, not even once. Instead, she just brings up the news of the baby, as well as the new neighbors as the cause of their problems. The baffling thing is, it's not like Sue/Laura isn't capable of delivering a sincere apologetic tone. She did in episode 4 of this season after she learns the truth of what the other wives though of her invention, and actually apologizes to Marie for yelling at her. -Crass humor fodder insert - Did we really need this? This is supposed to be an emotional moment where the family finally sees first hand how upset Bill truly is, and finally gets his dues. But the impact is muddled by an insert scene of yet another crude one-note, one-dimensional, one-timer character taking up already limited screentime (given Bill's situation, how late in the season it is, and how late in the act it is). -What's over? The pregnancy? The dead/arrested neighbors? The Forkoontula? The abuse? - In a show like this that tries to stay faithful to its branding and reputation its built up, what exactly does Sue even mean by that? Last time we checked, Sue's still pregnant, and they only have a few months left. Will she decide NOT to have a fourth child and get an abortion, even this late? If she's referring to the new neighbors, of course that's over, since Nguyen-Nguyen poisoned Chet and got arrested. Will Sue finally give up on the Forkoontula (and future inventions), considering how it's bought out the worst in her and caused problems or everyone else, and focus on improving as a person and communicating with her children (which brings us to the "end of abuse" factor)? -Frank either hijacks Sue's "apology" for more .temp glory, or spares her the burden of responsibility - We've seen Frank constantly attempt to make up for his recent mistakes enough times already (spoiler alert: Someone like him, especially in this show, can never change). Why not have Sue be a person for once and own up to her mistakes. Just one apology to her children (in this case, Bill, and to a further extent, Maureen). "Sue: And I'm very sorry, Bill, for the horrible way I've acted as a mother." Is that honestly too good for Bill, or the viewers? We get it. Frank is the main character, but when you have a character like Sue act that scary and hostile towards the ones that don't deserve it, they have to take responsibility for their actions and amend for it so they can be sympathetic/likeable again, especially if they're part of the main cast: the family. -Which is either forgotten, or a discussion is had among the parents, while the children are elsewhere having zero-input - The phrase "we'll talk about it/we'll talk about this later" has been used very loosely in this series, with almost no promise, delivery, or payoff behind it. In the Murphy family, do they even HAVE family discussions? Do they actually talk with the children, instead of just barking orders and threats? Do Frank and Sue actually care about their opinions and how they feel, or just how they APPEAR to feel? At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't "talk about it" at all, especially after five months of dead silence after the events of season 2, only for similar mistakes to return and get as bad as they did in this season. -A wish off the top of his head - Bill sees that his parents are desperately pleading for his return, so he uses this opportunity to ask them for anything as a reason to come home. But considering who his parents are, Bill simply asks for the first thing he can think of in reason. -Wish granted/Bill is back - With this request granted, Bill is ready to return home, and his resentment towards his family has faded. With that said, is this the end of Bill's character arc? Will Frank and (mainly) Sue get along better with him, and the rest of their children? -Good luck with Frank's jerk father and your pregnancy still a thing - Despite Sue's promise to never forget that "being their parents is their most important job", there's still the matter of Sue's pregnancy, and all the hormones that make an already volatile person worse. Also, the introduction of Frank's jerkass father, who will have no problem driving everyone in the house crazy with his baggage (based on Frank's experiences with the man). And even without those glaring issues, what exactly does Sue mean by that? More work specifically for Frank (the least-suited man for the job)? Or does it mean simply mean paying more attention to their kids, but without improving communication/reasoning with them, and being more hostile towards them, over the slightest infraction at the wrong time/mood? In conclusion, I was initially ecstatic over S3E10 (since it was the closest we were going to get to a true happy ending, especially after all the crap that went down in season 2), but after I did more research (since I actually didn't sit through this season and skipped to a transcript of the season finale) and learned about everything else that happened, I learned that this ending wasn't enough to make up for it.

#f is for family #bill murphy #bill burr #frank murphy #sue murphy #analysis #breakdown #frank the father #bill murphy's night off #season 3 #season 4 #netflix #2018 #critical thought

[fhylie]

Eleven days ago, my divorce was finalized.

I want to lead with that, because if feels like I've been holding myself in for a long, long time. Probably unhealthily long. I think it's a signature of the relationship that I ended that I feel like me having emotions revealed to someone else can only end badly. 'Why not just avoid that,' I constantly say to myself, 'and then other people don't have to get hurt by me?' You can see the obvious wrongness in that line of thinking, I hope. Hiding my feelings from people was an unhelpful poison and only wound me up repeatedly back on myself until I could only snap angrily or float emotionlessly, usually the second.

In the interest of self-help, I want to try and lay out the course of what prompted me to end my marriage. Maybe having it out there will help, maybe it won't. What I don't intend to do is name names, because that's not really good for anyone. Frankly, the people that know me already know who anyone I'm about to describe is.

Let's start at the end and work backwards, I suppose. On October 23rd, 2016, I had a heated argument with my ex-wife about whether or not I was allowed to be friends with a girl I met online through FFXIV. We had been friends for a while before that, probably a good year or so, and my ex-wife knew that the two of us talked about our personal problems when we couldn't get past them ourselves. I think that my ex-wife deeply envied that connection, because over time I had come to not be able to have those sorts of discussions with her, and mostly this was because almost all of the problems I had been having had my ex-wife at their root.

Going through the list, the problem we had with the most immediacy was my ex-wife's refusal or inability to leave our condo, which meant that the condo we had bought together relied solely on my income, and that any and all tasks requiring interacting with the outside world fell to me. I don't want to suggest that we divided things in an equal way, either, as almost all of the cooking and most of the cleaning was myself as well. In fairness, she was always the one to do laundry, and she rarely asked for help with that. However, it was a status quo I had been handling for a very long time, and so it felt very natural, but not enjoyable in any way. With my public transit commute for work, my usual days began at 5am and I would be home at 6pm, a little later if grocery shopping was needed, after which I would handle the food. When we spent time together it was usually to play games or watch shows together, which usually meant I stayed up very late - a habit I still haven't broken.

Anyways, the reasons behind her habits were a deep depression and anxiety about other people which were brought on after her mother passed away some years earlier (I want to say around 2007-2008 but can't recall), as well as her development of fibromyalgia, which left her in pain and exhausted. Looking back, I feel like I didn't do enough to take care of the first part of things, but I don't know if I ever could have done anything about the second part. I don't know that I ever could have felt like I did enough, honestly, and for a long time my role in our relationship was of a caretaker. Besides that, her emotional problems had been present before her mom passed, and we were not physically intimate for a considerable time before this October argument; probably years. It's difficult to recall when, specifically. All of these things resulted in a grinding lack of confidence in both of us, but I feel like she was always less determined than me to carry on and do things that needed to be done, even before medical problems with a concern.

Let's continue backwards in time. At the time of our marriage in 2012, my ex-wife had a best friend, of sorts, who she had met online through various games, and during 2011 and 12 actually lived with us in Canada, sharing an apartment and then later our condo with us and her husband. They were American, so there were constraints on what sort of jobs they were able to obtain, but the best friend had moved here ostensibly to go to school at the local university, so that only mattered for her husband. He was a nice enough sort, liked to read books and talk about writing. A bit of a weird guy, awkward, but then so am I.

We never really got along, I think, because of the greater context of my ex-wife's and her best friend's relationship. Before the American couple moved in, late in my relationship I was still very unhappy with the burden of responsibility I had - still with those 13-14 hour work days in 2009 or 10. I did mention I had been doing this for a while. But the important part of that time period was that one night, my ex-wife tearfully confessed to me that she thought she loved the best friend she still had not met in real life, and who was also married, and that she didn't want to lose me because of it. She asked for permission to be polyamorous, and I was some kind of combination of emotionally dishonest, a big idiot, and afraid of losing someone I had been with since 2001, so I said it was okay. That was what I had always done: let her have what she wanted and thought would make her happy and paid the cost myself. It was why it had been okay for her to leave her job after her mom died, as well, to me, even though what I knew I should have done was push her towards better recovery instead of seeking solace from people online.

So the Americans moved across the continent from the far southeastern states and the best friend and my ex-wife began their relationship. Maybe to their credit there was a minimum of physical intimacy between the two of them while I was present, but again, let's keep in mind how often I wasn't. During this time I was still physically intimate with my ex-wife as well, though probably not often enough that it mattered enough for her to even seek out a second partner. My ex-wife maintained during our divorce proceedings and to this day that they were not ever physical, though I clearly remember her embarrassed conversations on the subject with the best friend while I was around. More to the point, I specifically asked the best friend after the October 23, 2016 argument about the physical nature of their relationship and was told that I was right, and that she was upset because she thought I knew.

As a side note, the best friend is probably not a trustworthy witness for any of this, since she had/has her own emotional problems, but to be honest, I can't bring myself to be angry at her. It's not her fault I was bad enough at relationships to let it get that far. I know that after she moved away from Canada due to the cost of living here and other things related to her husband's family she had a serious breakdown, and I hope that her experiences with us didn't contribute to that. She was a good person, I think, when her presence wasn't actively fucking up my relationship with my ex-wife.

After the Americans had been around for a while, my ex-wife had decided to finally seek the benefit of psychiatric help after shutting herself in since 2007, so this would have been about 4 years, I think, of that, and less than a year or so of being with her friend. I remember feeling upset but not upset that she listened to advice about seeking help from her friend and not me, but she was getting help, so it was a net good, wherever it came from. I wanted what was good for her, and this was an extremely positive step.

After starting on antidepressants, there was a very brief spark, I think, of the person she had been nearer to the start of our relationship. She had energy, she had positive emotions, both of which had been very rare. She left the house at first with me and then on her own and looked for work, and then got a job which she stayed at for a long enough period for us to be able to move from the small apartment we were sharing with 2 other people into a good sized condo. I felt like things might have started to get better. She asked me to marry her, saying that the new mental clarity she had had from the drugs had led her to realize the depth and importance of everything I was doing for her, and thinking a dark time in my life was finally over with, I said yes. We got married in the spring of 2012, and the best friend was in the wedding party. I'm not actually clear if she was maid of honour, but it's not really important.

Then my ex-wife stopped. The antidepressants weren't enough, the counselling sessions didn't help so she stopped going, the fibromyalgia got worse, and there were too many things she didn't like about her job. I started going with her to her counselling sessions, paid for by her employer in an effort to get her back to work, to make sure she was doing them. There were maybe two times after that where she bothered to go. After a time she lost her job and, over that time, lost her willingness to go outside for any reason. The Americans moved away due to a death in the husband's family and the cost of living in this town, as I mentioned above, and I remember helping them pack their boxes and move their things into a van to go all the way back across the continent, marking one of the only times that my ex-wife came outside of the condo for any reason that year. While they were leaving, the husband took me aside privately and expressed his concern that we might not be able to afford the condo, to which I smiled tightly and said we would manage. We did manage, barely.

I became very depressed over this entire ten year time period, and I think my depression echoed hers. I felt like I wasn't good enough, that my job wasn't enough financially and so I felt like a failure there, and that I wasn't enough emotionally and so that was what made my ex-wife seek out this other relationship. Other failures in my life with education and friendships didn't help much either. I cut off contact slowly with friends, cancelling our then weekly D&D games citing my inability to run a game and manage the increasing emotional demands of my relationship. They all knew my ex-wife was jittery about having people over, even if she was friends with some of them and sometimes had played with us. In truth that was partially it, but I was also feeling ashamed at my failures and didn't feel like I could hold up being a good host anymore. It was easier for me to run away from that, and so I slowly faded away from that group of friends.

When I started playing Final Fantasy XIV at the start of A Realm Reborn, it wasn't the first MMO I played. I had played World of Warcraft for some years with the very same friends I was moving away from emotionally, not to mention my ex-wife and her best friend. I met some of the other people at PAX in Seattle a few times as well. I guess what I was unprepared for was the tremendous difference in community between WoW and XIV. Apparently, Blizzard games don't have the most friendly fan bases, and the way I had conducted myself in public forums with endless levels of concern trolling and meme yelling in trade chat certainly didn't exclude me from that judgement. But even at the outset, XIV felt different. Maybe it was because it was new, maybe it was because I was lucky, but I hit upon TALE, the free company I am with now and the one I would like to have said I always stayed with, and they were this strange group of wonderful people and roleplayers. Some of them were weird as hell, but so was I and they put up with my brand of weirdness. I had resolved to have a way better online persona in this community, and it paid off hugely.

My ex-wife and I and the best friend were all members in this time period. We all made friends and roleplayed with people in TALE and out. The ex-wife and her best friend both liked to ERP on their male characters with each other (not new behaviour, mind you), whether or not I was around. It shocked some people when it came up that we were long term dating, then married, since they knew about the other relationship first. When their relationship became more distant after the best friend moved away, my ex-wife found various new ERP partners and I didn't bat an eye, because I had been dealing with it for so long. She had stopped asking me if it was okay a long time ago, anyways. To their credit, some of those partners which found out about our relationship messaged me to ask if it was okay, which I said it was, because what basis did I have to start having a problem with it now?

I met a friend living in the same town as me through TALE. I met people I'm going to Fanfest with this year through TALE as well. I even met people that I felt like I could talk about my personal feelings regarding my relationship with. Some of them were the ERP partners of my ex-wife; I think it's significant to note that they didn't stop. A small few of them, great people all, actually had tips to try and make things better, or were disturbed that the gamer couple relationship they had seen from the outside and admired wasn't what they thought it was and wanted to prop it up since I was very open about wanting to fix things and being willing to take on anything I could to do so. One of those was a girl my ex-wife started an argument about.

I want to be clear that I think there was something to admire in our relationship. We had been together for such a long time, we were easy in each other's company, we did things together. If you didn't know the other things about our relationship and you took the way I acted about and the words I said as truth, it looked like we were a couple that was weathering the storm and our love was getting us through it. In the end, though, that wasn't true.

What my ex-wife saw is that I stayed up late to talk to a girl, I think probably more than a few times. It looked to her like I was cheating on her. Now, I know what the initial outside thought is: hey, didn't we just get through a million words about her polyamory and ERP habits? I'd like to contest that thought, but I can't. It always made the entire thing ridiculous to me, and it was the bedrock of why our marriage ended. So, having this problem with me speaking to this girl over IMs or in game, my ex-wife decided to implement controls.

At first, I was not allowed to speak to her on voice chat if my ex-wife was at home, which was always, and this became while she was at her computer, which was most of the time. This was fine, because I never got on voice chat except for raid stuff. Then, she discouraged us speaking over instant message while my ex-wife was around. Kind of weird, but I guess in an out of sight out of mind way it works. Typing to each other in game was apparently okay, because of... reasons? Once before October she got very angry that I was on voice chat at the same time as the girl while doing some content stuff with other people, which sparked a small argument about what it is I was allowed to do and who I was allowed to speak to. I felt beaten down.

I left TALE for a brief period and the both of us joined a different free company who are, by the way, wonderful people. I strongly recall someone saying something extremely minor to me and one of the officers very quickly PMing me to say was that okay? I think at this point my skin was so thick from dealing with emotional distress that I didn't even notice, but I played it off as sure, no, I'm not offended. Nevertheless, I had a difficult time really connecting with this new group of roleplayers, both because it was a new group and because I had a lot of misgivings with leaving my old one under very strange pretenses. Not that I didn't still talk to them sometimes, but we all know it's hard to feel included when you're not in the main channel of discussion. If you folks from the other company are reading this, I wish things could be less awkward.

So, October 23rd, 2016, after Thanksgiving and before Halloween. I'm still not exactly sure what made my ex-wife flip her lid, but I think it was partway between her delusion that the girl and I were hiding an affair from her and the fact that all of her controls were not having whatever the intended effect was supposed to have been. Either way, she just lost it and started messaging the girl in a public channel we were both in about how dare she do this to us and that I had lied to both of them about the things she said about what I was allowed to do. At the same time as acknowledging that I wasn't allowed to talk to her. Since the two of us were in the same room, the back half of this argument was the two of us yelling at each other in our condo. Her yelling and crying at the same time, and me trying to placate her and slowly but surely growing more frustrated until she gave the ultimatum that I had to choose my ex-wife or this girl I talked to online, and I told her fuck you, you can't tell me who I can be friends with, either you trust me or you don't. I stormed off with no explanation to the girl until much later. I sat in the bathroom of our condo with a spinning head and felt sick for a long time. I couldn't believe the violent physical reaction I was having to all this.

It was at that time that I first thought to myself that I had to try one more time, and if it didn't work I was going to get out.

A few days passed without resolution to the argument. I messaged the girl with what had happened, because she deserved to know, and found out that my ex-wife and her had spoken about this very same subject months earlier and been reassured that no, we were not having an affair. I supposed it made sense to my ex-wife that of course we would lie about it. At the end of those few days I told my now ex-wife that I wanted a divorce over the way she had treated not just me but many other people, but me most of all, for years. It was fucking hard to do and I'm not sure how I did it on that specific day.

She resolved to try harder, to start trying to leave the apartment if I would help her by going on walks, we resolved to go to couples therapy, where I got out many of the things I've said above. It didn't take. I sought my own help for depression and told a physician that I thought I was trapped in an abusive relationship. The person I was referred to was ... not good, for many reasons. My ex-wife did not try harder. She fought me every time I tried to get her out of the condo for a walk. She hated the times of day we could go (walking in the dark could be bad!) and was actively spiteful to anyone we interacted with if the walk was also to go and accomplish anything, like walking to the pharmacy for her medication. I knew nothing was going to change. It felt like she was just going through the motions to get me back to where I was before, and I couldn't be in that place anymore.

When I told her we were going through with the divorce, she cried and I felt numb. She asked me if there was anything she could do, and I told her if she had another relationship that she should absolutely not decide it was polyamorous partway through. Yes, a lot of allowing that is on me, but if there was any root to the failure it was that. She cried at that too.

I spoke with my parents and the real life friends I had cut off years ago and I was free. Some of them with strong views on the sanctity of marriage said I should stay the course, but I knew what the right decision was the entire time and I knew that telling her that the things she had done were okay was the wrong thing to do. I reconnected with a lot of people in my life and I kept talking to the girl and the rest of my online friends and I knew that everything was going to be okay eventually.

On October 12, 2018, which would have been my 17th anniversary of the start of dating my ex-wife, our divorce was finalized by the government of Canada, but if you ask me, that argument about whether I was allowed to choose my own friends was when it really died.

#personal #there's so much more that I left out #but this is the gist of the reasons behind the divorce #I still feel like I've only scratched the surface too #apologies for this being kind of all over the place timewise but that's just how it fell out #and I feel like it was time to get it out

[wellamarke]

Laura’s Choice: An Exploration

My initial reaction to the now-infamous ‘Choice’ scene was abject horror and disgust. I couldn’t believe that Laura, of all people, would sacrifice poor little Sam, after everything she’s done for her supposed belief in synthetic humanity.

For what it’s worth, I still worry it was a bit of a manufactured plot point, but this is Humans, you guys: I’ve never been able to hate anything about it for long. I did try to, in series 2, but both times – with the Mattie/Odi storyline as well as Sophie’s Synthee arc – I managed to talk myself around by writing a good old essay.

So that’s where we’re at now. Rather than berate the scene from a writing angle (because there is a lot of really awful stuff to be considered when taking this scene in the context of the race relations parallel they’ve emphasised so much this year), I’m going to explore Laura’s choice from a character angle. 

In the days since the episode aired I’ve been through numerous emotional states, engaged in many debates, and in general come up with a number of arguments that defend Laura’s decision, not as the right choice objectively, but as something that makes sense for her character. Stay with me.

The first thing we have to decide, I think, is this: what question was Laura actually answering? Anatole says she has to choose somebody to die. But was she really choosing:

1) the person she really thought should die,

2) the person she thought had the best chance of survival, or

3) the option that was mostly likely to resolve the situation?

The DigitalSpy interview with the writers would have you believe it’s the first option, and that Laura genuinely chose “her kind” over “theirs”. I… take issue with that. An alliance in which one ally does not seriously consider the other their equal is not, in fact, an alliance. If Laura seriously chose Sam for that reason alone, then Anatole is in the right, as this excellent Twitter thread points out, and if episodes 7 and 8 somehow confirm that reasoning then I’ll snap straight back to my kneejerk reaction of absolute revulsion.

But even within the first item on the list, there is room for discussion. One point that’s been well made by @TheSynthWhisperer on Twitter is that Laura may honestly, truly think that she considers synths as our absolute equals, and yet still, under fire and the threat of harm to her family, fold at the crucial moment. I don’t want to believe that of her, but I have to admit it’s a possibility. As Mia points out in 3.1, up until now Laura’s devotion to the synths’ cause has not come at any actual cost to herself. Not the kind of cost that counts. Sure, she’ll sacrifice a career, a marriage, those things aren’t anywhere near the scale of say… Sophie. Who’s standing right there in the corner, easy fodder for if Anatole gets mad. Who of us can truly say that we wouldn’t give up our ideals in that situation? I’m sure we’d all love to say “Me!”, but unless you’ve had them questioned in circumstances similar to this one, you’ll never really know. Sorry. 

So that’s one theory, though not my favourite, for Sam being Laura’s honest choice for 1: when it comes down to it, her ideals are not as deeply-held as she’d like them to be. She does possess fears and doubts that she has not yet been able to purge from her soul, however much she’d love to, however much she thought she had.

Is there evidence for this line of thought in Laura’s previous actions? Arguably, yes. Every time I watch the series 2 finale I’m surprised by how determined Laura is that Mattie not upload the consciousness code. She’s the character whose relationship with Mia the show has focused on most, and yet she’s the loudest voice saying “No, this isn’t worth it, don’t do it.” Of course, the two situations are by no means the same, but perhaps there is room to argue that Laura’s ideals are subject to her propensity toward panic, when stakes grow to that kind of height.

The other reasoning for point 1: she wasn’t comparing organic life to synthetic life: she was comparing death. We had this hinted at in episode 5, with Sam’s line, “We don’t die in the same way you do.”

Now, in context, he’s talking about Karen, who we’re just supposed to accept is actually irretrievable, and truly gone (despite the fact that only Joe was there to confirm it, He Who Knows Nothing About Synths, for all I kind of love him now). But let’s look at Sam’s line in relation to the synthetic deaths Laura has witnessed first-hand.

She had braindead Max laid out on her dining-room table for a good while, and then saw the code magically make him good as new. She watched Mia and Hester die and then be miraculously brought back to life, even though Mattie wasn’t there in person to do it. We, the audience, remember the bleaker fates of characters like Karen and Flash, but in terms of the ones Laura has actually seen… synth death seems to be an undoable, tragic-but-not-absolutely-final concept.

So while Sam’s life may seem equal to the old man’s, his death does not. Laura has never seen an organic human return to life the way Max, Mia and Hester did. In the heat of the moment, I can perhaps see her clinging to this reasoning, hoping that somehow they’d be able to restore Sam if he did die. ‘They are as alive as us, but perhaps they’re never as dead as us’ - that kind of thinking.

We know this isn’t true, of course, because we know from the Elster Sisters roadtrip that the code is now offlining of its own accord. But Laura’s grasping at straws here. Whatever she chooses, she has to be able to live with it afterwards. A phonecall to Mattie might do the trick with Sam, whereas it’s not going to do Old McOld any good at all.

But what if Laura wasn’t answering Anatole’s question at face value at all? What if she was trying to make a tactical choice? This brings us to point 2, which I like to call “The Max Factor”.

In 3.1, we saw Max faced with the difficult choice between saving Christabel, a synth we didn’t know (but presumably he did) or preserving Leo, his brother, who we know he truly loves. Max, because he’s been elected leader of the railyard, has to set aside his own feelings and choose to sacrifice the person who is, objectively speaking, in the least danger. Christabel is moments from certain death. Leo has about a one-in-three chance of survival. Numerically, the answer is obvious: he should save Christabel, so he does.

To what extent is Laura’s choice comparable to Max’s? Well, although she doesn’t have a computer brain to tell her the percentages, it’s pretty clear from Laura’s viewpoint that the old man is in more danger than Sam is! We happen to know that Anatole doesn’t mind sacrificing the odd fellow-synth here and there to get his point across (RIP Agnes) but all Laura knows is that he’s a purist who’s asking her to set one species above the other.  Clearly, he favours his own kind, or he wouldn’t be here. Out of the two possible victims, Sam has a higher claim on Anatole’s mercy.

Both Laura and Max choose to sacrifice the person who means the most to them personally, and because of that choice both of them risk losing others who love both victim and decision-maker: Max and Mattie’s friendship (which used to be about hugging on sight, remember) is in tatters, and he gets serious words from his big sisters about it too. Laura is making this choice in the sight of Toby, Sophie and Joe, and we see at least two of them shunning her for it later.

Both Laura and Max choose to save the person who they think needs saving most. And in both cases, nobody ends up dying. So technically, both of their tactical decisions paid off.

There’s another similarity between Max’s choice and Laura’s, though, and this one’s particularly fascinating because it’s actually a difference. Both situations have been orchestrated by Anatole. (Whether this is a particular hobby for Anatole or just something he saw work once and decided to use again… perhaps remains to be seen.)

Max, though, has no reason to suspect that Anatole is playing him. He is content to take Anatole’s word for it that (a) Christabel really is dying, (b) Leo really does have a chance and (c) there is absolutely no other way to save Christabel than to redirect the power from Leo’s ventilator. Sorry, guys, what are these lights doing on? You really couldn’t get power from anywhere else, huh? (And gruesome as it may be, especially since one of them’s Flash, but…  there are at least two synths lying around the place who aren’t using their batteries any more. If Anatole’s such a whizz surgeon, couldn’t he do some transplanting? No?)

Because Anatole seems so trustworthy, and has even built up his apparent reasonableness by acknowledging Max’s mysterious attachment to Leo and expressing regret that it should come to this, Max doesn’t second-guess him at all. Looking back at the scene now, we can see obvious hallmarks of Anatole’s manipulation. In a very dark retrospective twist, we might even suppose that he was the one who ordered Flash’s escorts to desert her in the town, thus leaving Max extra vulnerable. Anatole was the one who’d asked her to go on a supply run without Max’s authorisation, after all.

Laura, on the other hand, is acutely aware that she’s being manipulated. Anatole is not a trusted friend - he’s come into her life as a marked villain. And this takes us on to point 3: was she merely choosing the option that would most likely resolve the situation?

Unlike Max’s choice, Anatole hasn’t even tried to dress this one up as a real life-or-death issue. Nobody has to die. He’s being pretty open about the fact that it’s a question of morality, not medicine. There’s no logical reason for this choice to be made at all – especially since Laura is fighting for synth equality, not synth supremacy. It’s completely and utterly fabricated, and Laura and Anatole both know it.

So what should she do? Argue for a third option, like “neither!” or “take me instead?” Either of those would have been a lovely gesture, and I’m sure we were all thinking it while watching. “Neither” is, ethically, the correct response to the question, and “take me” is the one that seems most like the person we know Laura to be – courageous and compassionate.

But she’s also not stupid! 

Of course she considers this. Come on, now. Of course she thinks about trying to outwit Anatole. She’s a lawyer by trade. She relies on her ability to out-logic her opponent on a day-to-day basis. But how often, in the past, has she faced someone who honestly intends to commit cold-blooded murder in her own living room?

Well, once, actually. 

When Hester paid a visit in 2.8, Laura tried valiantly to talk her down. She did exactly what we’re asking her to do in 3.6. She delivered some series-best dialogue, some really hard-hitting, beautiful lines of logic, and what happened? Did Hester suddenly go, “Oh, you’re right, humans are wonderful! I do apologise, here, have your neck back?”

No. Laura’s attempts to reason with Hester only escalated the situation. Hester went from scarily-but-calmly waiting for Leo to arrive to literally brandishing a weapon in Laura’s face, all because Laura tried to go all lawyery on her.

So, faced with a similar showdown: is Laura going to risk it? Is she really going to try and talk Anatole down? Because let’s remember that with Hester, all Laura had to lose was her own life – they were the only two people present. This time, two of Laura’s children are watching, and so is their father. Wouldn’t it be so much better to end the situation before Anatole gets really mad and starts picking people off? He’s come with a miniature army – what’s to stop each of his lackeys getting hold of a Hawkins throat and pressing down until Laura stops wailing “take me! take me!” and changes her answer to one of the actual options?

Nothing! This is a very scary situation! Anatole is clearly not going to be reasoned with. Were he a reasonable person, he wouldn’t be here asking her to choose a side as a test of equality. Anatole, honey, that’s the literal opposite of what equality is.

Which he obviously knows. Because really it all comes down to that line of his: “You’ve already made your decision”. While Laura quite possibly hasn’t, at this point, done anything of the kind, that line makes it obvious that Anatole doesn’t want to test her, he wants to prove himself right! He doesn’t, for one single instant, think that she is going to do anything but what he’s scripted for her.

So she can’t choose the invisible third option. It’s definitely going to have to be one or the other. All right, so who should Laura choose?

Let’s say she does what we secretly wish she’d done, and picked the old man. For a start, there’s tonnes of horrifying ways that could go down, involving the types of blood geysers that put an end to Helen Aveling and Pete Drummond (RIP, guys). Laura obviously doesn’t want to see that, and she certainly doesn’t want Sophie to witness it.

And since this so clearly isn’t what Anatole wants her to do, even the chance that it’s a bluff might not be enough to save the old man. Imagine, okay, let’s imagine she points a finger and says “Old McOld”. (I really wish they’d given us a name for the sake of this essay, but I see that it was a very artsy decision not to, adds to the whole anonymity vs. familiarity angle, hmm yes very clever)

Laura putting one synth before one human isn’t going to prove SQUAT about humanity in general. (Hester again: “Our existence is meaningless to all but a few out of billions…”) Choosing that option is going to make Anatole angry, because he’s come here to be proved right and he’s damn well going to prove himself right. If Laura tries to make a stand for what (we presume) she actually believes (that Sam’s young life IS more worthy of preservation than the old man’s, by virtue of his greater potential for a future) then Anatole, like Hester before him, is not going to suddenly beam and say, “Thank you, Laura, you’ve shown me the error of my ways.”

He happens to believe Laura won’t practice what she preaches anyway, but even if she, personally, does put Sam first… What, suddenly all humans are fine? No, his whole point is based on Laura being an outlier. So really if she tries to prove him wrong she’s just prolonging the (very dangerous) situation.

Anatole will almost certainly push her to switch for her “true” answer, the one he wants her to go for. Personally, I don’t think he’s even considered what he’ll do if Laura chooses to kill Old McOld, because he’s so sure she won’t, but I can see him having Stanley apply as much pressure as he can, get as close to going through with it as is biologically possible before actually killing Old McOld, to give Laura the longest possible anguish and try and force her to change sides. Anatole claims later that he was bluffing, but I think he was only bluffing so far as he knew what she was going to go for.

On the other hand, if she chooses Sam, then Anatole has made his point. Having manipulated, humiliated and demoralised Laura to the point where her own family can’t even look at her, he doesn’t even need to kill Sam - and as mentioned in point 2, Sam was probably never in that much danger in the hands of a fellow synth, anyway. Choosing Sam is not only the option that is least likely to lead to the death of one of the binary options, it’s also the option that will shut this whole thing down fastest. Remember again that Laura’s family is in the room. One of the lackeys has already made an attempt on Joe’s life. This was never just about saving one of the two people in front of her.

Of course, Laura can’t think any of this out loud, and it’s not a novel so we can’t read her thought process – and, crucially, neither can her family. Like us, they’re looking on in horror but they, themselves, are not the ones being called on to make this choice, so they’re not considering the options as deeply or as quickly as Laura has to. I think she knows full well that they’re going to hate her decision. But having decided that Sam is the most logical choice, she can’t exactly go, “Don’t worry, Soph, I’m sure they won’t actually kill him!”

She could explain it afterwards, of course, but it’s going to sound like making excuses, isn’t it? It’s going to sound weak and defensive, and Laura is anything but weak. So she lets them shun her, she doesn’t shout her reasoning through the door Toby’s just shut in her face, because she understands why he’s feeling like that, why it’s better for Toby and Sophie to grieve about it together before she asks them to see things from her point of view.

Nothing Laura did in that room, from the moment they opened the door to Anatole, was going to make the tiniest difference to Anatole’s hatred of humans – except maybe to heighten it. The safest, most logical thing to do was not to hedge, not to pull the concept apart, but to accept it as the binary choice he demanded and just choose what he wanted her to choose.

Of course, in this case, the safest choice was also the most painful. She runs the risk that Joe and the children will never understand what she did, or that she or one of them will die before a reconciliation – that’s the world they’re living in now. So even though she may have chosen the option that gives her the most peace of mind, it’s not… it’s not a LOT of peace of mind, is it? So of course she leaves her phone and keys and flees into the night.

I started out so angry with her, but I’m coming around to the idea that she really did think this through, and her thought process wasn’t “Sam’s a machine and we aren’t”. I don’t want it to be that. I believe in Laura Hawkins and I always will.

PS. i love debating this subject but please don’t reply to this post with any speculations about episode 7′s Big Ole Death, because I’m trying really hard not to find out beforehand! For once lol 

#c4 humans #amc humans #humans spoilers #laura hawkins

[someonetotaketheedgeoff-blog]

15.09.2018 - Journal

(Some of this was written when I travelled with my family in America in the last 2 months)

4.07.2018

I picked a good time to quit comedy… just moments before Nanette. Maybe I’ll actually do something good if I make music instead of making jokes about fucking myself with an ex-girlfriend’s dildo.

I wont stay up late waiting to go on. Or be brutalised by Open Mic magazine on Facebook. Anything not to upset my fragile sense of self-esteem. There’s not much that's funny to me anymore… oh well… who gives a fuck anyway…

… So Liam goes into his little room and quietly dreams up his last open mic set…. hahaha… comedy can get you pretty fucked up! ... who gives a fuck anyway…

9.07.2018

Whenever I’m in a big city all I hear is it whispering (or perhaps screaming) to me - ‘can I just have some fucking money?!’  

I wonder how much I’m a product of my own fear. And also how much of what I make is a response to that fear.

It’s mostly been about death for me for the last 3 - 5 years. All I’ve done is use death to explain everything. I’ve used it to draw a line under certain things within myself and the exterior world. Seems lazy to me now.

Is laziness the fear of pain? Is a lack of motivation due to fear? A fear of failing?

It seems fear’s only a good motivator when you’re aware of what you’re afraid of and why.

23.07.2018

Travelling in America/being in America’s like being in GTA but you’re not any of the main characters.

24.07.2018

Not doing anything or not trying IS FAILING!

25.07.2018

Saw a guy stop in the subway, put his bag on the ground and re-adjust himself to get out a camera so he could take a photo of some graffiti on the wall that said ‘I love porno’.

Being in an all black neighbourhood I feel as if the black people are annoyed at me or my presence.

I keep think about the word ‘nigger’ and I keep thinking about the word ‘cracker’.

The current most popular, agreed upon philosophy on slur usage is do not say any word that has negative history associated with it and do not say ‘nigger’ if you’re not black.

Recently ‘retarded’ has been considered more offensive than it used to be and if you happen to use it you’re now accused of being an immoral person and presumably you think people that suffer mental deficiencies are bags of shit and you want to set them all on fire.

I have no problem with discussing words and I’m not even so much of a Doug Stanhope/iDubbbzTV nerd that I think the best world is a world where you say everything all the time in every context.

What I have a massive problem with is the presumption of hate and the pompousness of people downright attacking people that slip out ‘x’ word when a word is still in the process of being fazed out. It’s bloody political correctness gone quickly without open discussion and kindness!

Words are simply the end point of a vortex of shit and ideas and slang and culture. They are the bookend to a concept and when people get really caught up with words it kinda scares me.

The problem with these kinda bullshit discussions (especially on the internet) is that when you argue or discuss this shit the assumed reason for your questioning is that I want to be able to say ‘nigga’ with my friends for some unknown reason. But I don’t and I don’t understand why anyone would want to other than the fact that they’ve been told they can’t or they’re at a Klan meeting.

What I’m confused about is if words hold so much apparent power and evil due to their history then isn’t simply being white the most offensive and on the nose thing you can do? Probably, kinda, yeah.

Yet black people don’t fucking loose their shit when you walk into a room being all white and whiting the whole place up by being white. They simply get on with their lives. I believe the same shit could be applied to words. At least in a reactionary sense… it doesn’t make sense to berate a stranger with venom for saying that the fact that none of the self serve screens in Macca’s were working was retarded. I don’t know if this metaphor works. I’m just slightly confused as too why I get all my information on how to best treat minorities forced onto me from young well off white people in beer gardens. I just sit there and listen for a bit and then I stare into the reflective glare coming off their nose ring.

1.08.2018

Saw a full American fat guy in a servo. He was so fat I had to focus on not double-taking at him by staring intently at the fridge at the Dr. Pepper selection.

He looked beyond human.

13.08.2018

For some reason I am smoking again. It’s a never ending battle. Oh well. Strangely I don’t mind.

I smoked a cigarette I crafted from all the butts I could find in my parent’s house. Something I’ve done probably over 100 times in my life.

I find that I clench my jaw all the time. I’ve only noticed it recently. Through meditating and not doing drugs. I’ve noticed it. I thought I had neck cancer but the strange feeling of ache comes from my constantly clenching my jaw.

I worry that maybe I’ve done drugs and drank for so long now and started at a young age that the tracks within my brain are a little fucked. Or maybe I just have too high hopes for a sober life to be a more peaceful, and mentally stable one. Maybe the only thing I’ll gain is a healthier body.

I’m just afraid of all the horrible shit that’s inside my head. I’m afraid of being unlovable because of my desires and my personality. I don’t want to face in fear of losing Tash and revealing to her that I’m evil.

This seems to be the crux of all relationships. All of them. In the whole world. You know that you need to face the truth to get to the next stage. But it seems it will be so lonely, so terrifying and so cold… we don’t want to see the monsters that might lurk within us.

The thing is it’s almost impossible to have an honest relationship and never have turbulence. You can have a dishonest relationship with turbulence but the turbulence will be about bullshit like - ‘you said you were going to clean the extractor fan in the kitchen weeks ago…’ or ‘stop leaving your guitar on the couch…’ and such things might blow into massive arguments.

Relationships are designed to be a nightmare. Not by anyone in particular but by our hope for them and isolation and alienation we all experience internally in this society.

A relationship is a small life within your life.

Dependant on the extremity of a relationship (and obviously that is a relative thing but for sake of argument we’ll say a relationship where you truly considered that you would commit yourself to this other person until you or they or both had died) it could possibly be an interesting simulation of life after death (at least in an abstracted way).

When a relationship of said extremity begins to fall apart (for whatever reason) it’s interesting to note that you feel as if you’re dying and that there’s in fact no perceivable life to lead after the break up or if their is one it will be hellish and a subhuman existence not worth living.

When you survived a relationship that you’d committed everything to how did you feel?

I assume it was horrendous. But assuming you’re still alive and reading this… you must’ve started to feel somewhat normal once again.

Like awaking from a vivid dream it fades away rapidly. You played a different character, you lead a different life. You feel a horribleness deep inside. Not about the person but about the situation. Is this how it has to be? That the people you commit so intensely to, that you fuck and spend countless hours with then have to perish abstractly and then repressed as they fade into the background sometimes never to be spoken about or spoken to again…

I have a girlfriend now. And it terrifies my to think that the pattern may repeat.

***

We believe the internet is everlasting. Whether we research it or not, whether we know it consciously or not.

As much as we might make comments about Facebook and say things like- ‘be careful uploading those photos of your arsehole… you know that stuff will be up there forever’ I believe we’re secretly subconsciously screeching with joy at the fact that these photo’s will be up forever. As much as people have a disdain about Facebook and social media we adore it’s implied permanence. We believe that Facebook will be around after we’re dead. I say ‘believe’ because do you know how the fucking internet works? Do you know how a website is created? I fucking don’t. I don’t know if the internet would still exist if all the power plugs in the world were pulled out of there sockets. I’m a fucking idiot! A fucking idiot that has faith in the permanence of the internet… I mean… obviously… I write a blog mostly about death and existential dread and it put on… the internet.

The internet is now our saviour. It is the modern sleek titanium, bomb proof, indestructible, deathless park bench where you can scratch ‘L.D. was here’ and have a more solidified faith that it’ll be around for a while. And the longer it hangs around the more eye balls will see it, eye balls connected to a concious brain that’ll have no choice but to think ‘hey that guy was there’… and even if it’s just for one second your existence has been stretched just a tiny bit longer.

(People that love us are what we all orbit around all of our lives. If they happen to reject you at some point or disappear we then break away from that orbit and hurtle through abstract nothingness).

17.08.2018

Going to the pub was a bad idea. I went there thinking - ‘well… I kinda want to have just one drink’. The legs were aching and my poor sense of personal entitlement to some kind of ‘treat’ was raging within me. A very problematic thing for anyone that isn’t fulfilled in the work that that do (i.e. most people). I felt as I for some reason I deserved a beer. Also it was freezing cold. My feet were soaking wet and frozen due to my old decrepit shoes. I continued walking up the street. I noticed I had all these thoughts swirling in my mind. They all flew past me whispering - ‘it’s OK to have a beer’.

I watched them all swirl around in my head. I crossed my metaphorical arms and tutted. As I tutted I looked at the swirling thoughts and said - ‘fuck off… are you serious? You know this’s absolute bullshit. We don’t ‘deserve’ a drink… we don’t even probably technically want one… why are we actually going to do this?’

‘Yeah but we’ll only have one! Not even a pint mind you and then we’ll write a new to-do list and then maybe we see someone maybe we don’t and then we head off home and get down to work for a couple of solid hours before we go to bed’ said one of the thoughts.

‘Well OK… when you put it like that… that sounds nearly OK… but don’t you think there’s a chance that we might throw all that shit out the window and because we actually weren’t planning or trying to get drunk…. you’re going to use reverse psychology on me and then we actually will get drunk and most likely indulge in more heavily than if I’d actually planned to indulge…’ I replied.

‘Look don’t read into it just get into that pub… get a beer… have a cigarette in the beer garden, get out you’re little notebook and it’ll be just a quick little pop in, no worries, blah blah, etc, tomato tomato’ ’

‘Well alright then you’ve swung me round, but surely just like a small drink, like a ten ounce… you know we’re trying to focus on money and we’re only starting to face the fact of how much money we piss away on alcohol and other similar shit…’

‘Yea, yea, yea don’t worry just a ten ounce… don’t you worry about that’.

I walked up to the bar.

‘Yes what can I get you?’

‘Ah… could get a ten ounce of Little Creatures?’

‘Ah it’s actually $5 a pint right now and $10 dollars for a jug?’ she grinned slightly.

‘Ah…’.

I turned to the floating thoughts. I gave them a warning look. They all looked back at me like a pack of hyenas.

I began drowning internally - ‘Ah fuck! Na, na, na, I knew some bullshit like this was going to happen… action stations… we gotta think of some other shit… what else do they have on tap… maybe a stubby? Fuck!’

‘Hey this is great news! What a bargain! Don’t worry about it we’ll just drink that one pint and leave… no worries’ cackled the hyenas.

I ended up drinking maybe 5 pints. A bunch of my friends turned up and I talked a bunch of shit for a long, long time. It was as if ‘the plan’ had been completely erased from my mind like the bar lady had men in blacked me with the shine of her bar blade and I was back in the drinking business and also the business of not following my dreams and the business of having no self control.

The arguments in the pub got very heated. I have a few friends that can get heated during argument, (I mean who doesn’t) but I have to say it stresses me out a bit but even more so it confuses me. Every time an argument gets to that stage I don’t really trust anything that’s happening anymore. Your/my emotions are taking over and also everyone’s pissed. I think it’s interesting to me to watch people’s attention spans disintegrate at the pub. The more everyone drinks the quicker a group conversation subject topic can change hands. It’s not hard to do, barely anyone notices it and you can do it in a matter of seconds. You could be having a super intense discussion about anything and if you just interrupt everyone enough and interject a barrage of some current novelty bullshit topic that’s circling you can derail shit very quickly.

21.08.2018

Last week at the pub a friend told me that he basically waits for inspiration. He felt he should never force himself to create anything. Recently I’ve been getting back into the Stephen Pressfield way of thinking that he explains in the book The War Of Art. A book that basically shows you how to be a professional whatever, artist, musician, sports player, whatever. It’s a book that gives tools to fight the part of you that doesn't want to sit down and do the work. In other words it fights the notion of ‘waiting for inspiration’.

Very, very few times in my life have I been struck with overwhelming flaming inspiration to do anything. It happened more when I was a child. When I’d wake up early on a weekend I’d have the inspiration akin to fucking Michelangelo to go and make Lego spaceship car things out of all the see- through green pieces of Lego.

But when you get to around 7, 8, 9, 10 and beyond I think (I’m not a psychologist) you begin to second guess all that shit. You begin to be your own worst critic. Because fascinatingly nearly every kid up until that age will be happy to do a bit of drawing or play various characters in a fictional story they create on the spot. And then it all stops and this horrible awareness kicks in.

I define it as the point where you used to play with toys as a kid in your room. Each character having a crazy back story and way of speaking. You’d play, alone and be completely immersed. Your mum or dad would pop there head into the room to ask if you wanted cornflakes or some shit and you’d be like a focused director waving off an intern - ‘yea yea, sure, just have it on my desk, I’m working right now’. But then something changes around that age and when one of your parents pops their head into the room you freeze and quite your voice. You suddenly feel cripplingly self aware, maybe even stupid. You tell them to go away maybe or wait for them to leave before you get back into to the action.

Then one day you go to the studio (aka your bedroom with a mat on the floor resembling a city that we all had) and the juice is gone, the mojo is gone, you pick up the toys and you try to croak out their particular voice and you just feel stupid, looking quickly back at your bedroom door, making sure no one heard.

All of this stuff reminds me of a Picasso quote [R.I.P. 25.10.1881 - 19.06.2018*] - ‘Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up’.

I’ve always found it interesting. I think encapsulates what I’m saying. Most people have some kind of creativity or at least blissful ignorance of expression at an age and then their brains get bigger or something and they become pimply teenagers that struggle to even walk down the street without worrying about everything detail about themselves and then they learn to just manage that shit as they enter adult life.

*I’ve chose Picasso’s death date to be the release date of Nanette. I can’t really be bothered explaining why that is right now so I guess if you really want to know you’ll have to watch Nanette.

30.08.2018

I’m often confused as to why everyone has an opinion and why you seemingly have to have an opinion.

’I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing’ - Socrates

In my college years I used to be a bit of an air headed stoner art wanker and I still am but the difference is now I have opinions on things. Back then I didn’t really have opinions. And I did it on purpose because I knew that I didn’t know anything. However it didn’t really help me socially and it didn’t help in my relationships and it didn’t really help with my self-esteem. Not initially but eventually I started to feel like I was just drifting away into an abstract world of nothingness. People don’t really take you seriously when you don’t have any solid opinions. It’s probably not a ‘masculine’ trait.

Reminds of a Dylan Moran bit:

‘Men; strong opinions with no information’

#Relationships #Facebook #America #Retarded #Dylan Moran #Someone To Take The Edge Off #liam donnelly #American Fat #self esteem #nhilism #death #Journal #The Pub