#i've never identified with a fictional character so hard

[pacific-rimbaud]

i was reading your thoughts on how fans felt about l&oha and while i concur it is a perfect piece of work in my head and have reread it 5x, i wonder if you think fans tend to be harsher/more critical of hermione and let draco slide? i see it a lot in fics where he's more of an alphahole type

Oh, man. Okay. The can is open, the worms are loose. Rant under the cut.

I'm actually going to set men aside entirely. Just. To the side with you. I desperately need more realistically complicated men, too, but that's a whole separate discussion. Right now: women.

There must be whole dissertations out there on the phenomenon of readers hating female characters with negative traits. I'm a fandom old, so I didn't grow up identifying with Hermione, and wouldn't have even if I'd been young enough to. I did that "which character are you" test just now and my top three matches were Janis Ian from Mean Girls, Jughead from Riverdale and April from Parks and Rec, which, massive grain of salt, etc. BUT gives you an idea. I am not a Hermione and never was, so she's never been a comfort character or self-insert for me. Some of my favorite fictional women are Sophie Hatter (mean, irrational, petty, old and mostly loving it), Harrowhark Nonagesimus (evil stick), Phryne Fisher (zero fucks to give). What I like about Hermione is how imperfect she is. I'm a "cleverest witch of your age I've ever met" truther (book!Lupin is absolutely saying "you're the canniest 14 year-old child I have personally met, saying this as a guy who doesn't get out much," not "you are a once-in-a-century genius"), and from my perspective, she's often wrong and often a dick, and not in a fun and fiesty burn-down-the-world BAMF way. Which. Good for her! Be human.

And that's the thing. I personally don't want Hermione to be perfect, I want her to be what I think she is, textually, which is intelligent, hardworking, loyal, competitive, compassionate, controlling, belittling, rude, petty, insecure, vindictive, volatile. She has the right to be that way, because she's human. The desire for perfected women (or unapologetically and unstoppably awful ones, another brand of female power fantasy) is not limited to Dramione fandom. I think it's amplified in DHr by many readers who DO identify as former gifted children, books-as-coping-mechanism kids and Strong Female Personalities who felt marginalized in childhood and want to see Hermione have it all: she's slim, she's tiny, she's fragile as a bird, she'll break your neck, she'll step on your throat, she'll tear down the system, she'll heal all wounds, she does not need help, she holds all the knowledge, she holds all the cards, she is forever wronged, she can do no wrong, her vagina is tight, her nipples are hard, her hair is on point, her waist is tiny, her tits are bouncing, her ass is in the style of Now. And like. This isn't at all unique to DHr and Hermione. It's pervasive in fiction written by and for women. Female power fantasies are obviously feeding a massive hunger. It's just not what I personally want. Personally, I find it alienating and uncomfortable, which I know equates to, "That is wrong and shouldn't exist" to a lot of people, but that's its own tale as old as time.

There's a disconnect that happens too often where a reader wants one (1) thing from their fiction, and receives something else, even when the contents are clearly labeled on the tin. In this case, wanting a female power fantasy and encountering a woman who's written with flaws makes people upset. And maybe if we could be more honest with ourselves about what we're looking for when we read, work to accept that not everyone wants the same experience, and learn to close a book when it's not working for us and say, "No shade, this isn't for me," it would be less upsetting when we encounter a character who isn't written to meet our personal expectations. I will open a book, realize the FMC is a female power fantasy archetype and close it, because that's not what I show up for. I like my women gritty and weird and foolish and vulnerable and liable to hurt people and feel terrible about it. Give me all the exhausting chatterers and evil sticks and jocks with swords and their hearts on their sleeves (their hearts ripped out), give me shy Anne Elliot and her suitcase full of regrets and the ugly fuckup who never has a glow up, give me dirtbag stoners and Fleabag and Alicent Hightower apologetics and every role Natasha Lyon has ever played. It's not a moral high ground, it's about a preference for seeing actual, demeritus flaws on the page and on the screen. Blame that woman. It's her fault. She has so many faults. Then show me how to forgive her so I can figure out how to forgive myself.

The thing is, I love women. I love women so fucking much. I want to be around them, to get to know them, to read about them, to watch them on TV and see them in films. And personally, I like them ugly. Physically. Spiritually. Morally. Give a woman a Bad Personality and watch her succeed in the most self-injurious way possible, fuck you. Give her a gaping chest wound and line it with teeth. Stick a piece of grit in that girl's tightly sealed shell so that a pearl is her only option. Make her love other women, make her fuck it up, make her have to earn them back.

Thankfully I do feel like we're getting more ugly women in fiction, especially BIPOC, queer and marginalized women who deserve gross, weird, nasty representation and not just didactic moralism, patronization and misguided sainthood. Some readers won't want that, and that's fine. Again, personally (it's all so personal, please, please remember that when you hit that comment button), I'm here for it. If you write about women like this, know that you have a thirsty reader here. I'm swallowing them up. I'm smacking my lips. I'm smashing my mug on the cafeteria floor and calling for another.

#you asked I answered #rant #long post

[bbygirl-obi]

Hello, I just wanted to say I appreciate your detailed and thoughtful response to my reply. I do think I accidentally fell into an ongoing discourse I'm not really familiar with so I'm taking responsibility for that miscommunication/misunderstanding on my part. I in no way ever meant to imply, nor do I believe, that the genocide on the Jedi is anything other than a tragedy. Even if people have faults that never justifies violence. I'm very sorry that was not clear. I don't identify as an anti and I am chill with the Jedi. Lots of things you wrote about are reasons I like the Jedi and SW in general.

Since it seems I've caused harm I don't really see value in me trying to "defend" where I was coming from but I might be wrong, I'm not sure. The interpersonal relationship section of DBT has always been the hardest for me to grasp and I think that's really showing right now. So, sincere apologies again for my miscommunication.

(This ask is in reference to this post)

Hi, thank you so much for reaching out! I was a bit heated when writing that response, so kudos to you for not getting defensive and for hearing me out. I do really appreciate it. I'd love to help you understand a bit more why this hit me so hard, especially since this was unintentional on your part. There are three things that I think are important to understand here. I'll talk about them below.

1. There's kind of always been a worrying amount of racism, sexism, and anti-Semitism that's baked into big parts of the Star Wars fandom. It's unfortunate, but it's there. Many of the women and/or PoC characters/actors have experienced awful slews of online hate throughout the course of the franchise, specifically for being women and/or PoC. Ahsoka, Reva, Rey, Finn, Rose... the list goes on and on. There are also communities of fascists or incels who use the Empire as inspiration porn. These groups do not make up the entirety of this fandom, but they are a very loud part of it. AND their influence extends beyond their circles into the rest of the fandom, in the form of things that other people with privilege do not always register as bigotry.

2. Star Wars is unfortunately one of those fandoms where a lot of the discourse tends to step on the toes of real-life cultures. As I mentioned, the Jedi are based heavily off of Buddhist culture (George Lucas has been very explicit about this), and the targeted genocide is very similar to the real world's Holocaust. The rise of the Empire is pretty directly based off of the rise of Nazi Germany, to the point of the Empire's aesthetic being based off of the Nazis and Palpatine's rise to power directly paralleling Hitler's. Because the real-life connections are both significant and explicit, Star Wars intersects with the real world a lot more than other fictional or sci fi franchises do. There's a greater burden on members of fandom to investigate things before speaking on them as a result.

3. There are a lot of fandom misconceptions about the Jedi, including that they stole children, that they erased cultures, and that they were emotional, unfeeling people with no relationships. There are also a lot of sentiments that the Jedi were at fault for, or deserved, what happened to them (either because it was "balance" or because they created the man who genocided them). Some people arrive at these conclusions because of the racism mentioned in #1 intersecting with the non-white cultural influences mentioned in #2. Some people arrive at these conclusions because they see it elsewhere in fandom (from group #1), and don't recognize the dogwhistles because they aren't familiar with the cultures being trodden upon.

So when someone says the kinds of things you said in your post:

Jedi children are "stolen from their homes and raised devoid of their culture and families"

All Jedi initiation "traumatizes their subjects"

"Attachments are human relationships and…are integral to mental health"

All Jedi "have absolutely nowhere to turn to for comfort"

"The Jedi order is more akin to a cult"

The Jedi "sterilize" and "manipulate" DBT and force their practices upon their members as "the one true way to live"

The Jedi are "about eradicating big emotions"

Their "goal [is] indoctrinating the children they stole"

"Anakin is the direct product of their failure"

Sure, the first thing that jumps out is the misinformation. But since almost everything you're critiquing about the Jedi is something that also exists in Buddhism, you are simultaneously deriding Buddhism as something that is detrimental to mental health, that provides no support network to anyone, that is sterile and emotionless, and that is a form of indoctrination.

The paternalistic idea that Buddhists were victims of backwards, harmful cults, and needed to be "saved" from their own culture by white people, is both old and insidious. These are things that have been said about Buddhism with the intention of painting it as stupid and even harmful, so that white people could justify oppressing both Buddhism as a religion and the PoC cultures who originated and practiced it. This is still used today as a justifier for modern-day forms of racism, but it's also been used for centuries as a justification for the colonization of entire countries.

I've discussed the genocide aspect in my other post, but I'll just reiterate that the sentiment "the Jedi are not to blame for their genocide" cannot coexist with the sentiment "Anakin, the perpetrator of said genocide, is the direct product of the Jedi." The idea from your tags that the Jedi "killed" Anakin is also a tricky one, since the idea that Anakin's death was Vader's creation is a popular fandom trope turned canon with the "you didn't kill Anakin Skywalker, I did" line in the Obi-Wan Kenobi series, and to say the Jedi killed Anakin is therefore to say the Jedi created Vader, their genocider.

I guess part of me also wonders why, even if it is true (I think it isn't, but people can and do disagree), it's relevant to bring up under the type of post I made. Take the example of a school shooting. People have died, children have died, a member of their community has betrayed them, and the community is hurt and grieving. Let's say someone makes a post celebrating the community, celebrating how kind and supportive they are to one another. And let's say someone decides to comment below that post saying that the other kids in the school were mean to the shooter. Even if it were true, I hope this example helps illustrate how (1) it comes across as excusing the shooter's actions, and how (2) that sentiment is just so incredibly tone-deaf and victim-blamey. That's kind of how it feels to have someone comment these misinformed things (of racist origin, even if they are not of conscious racist intent) below a post that I made celebrating the practices of a culture that was genocided. It's neither the time nor the place.

And remember what I said in point #3, about how people arrive at these conclusions one of two ways? When I read stuff like this, it's really hard to tell which of the two groups a person falls into. It's hard to tell if the coded racism is simply going unnoticed, or if it's there intentionally. But it's there, regardless. And in my experience, the hidden or unintentional racism can be the most dangerous, because people will often get defensive and gaslight the hell out of you when you try to call it out. Thanks for not doing that, but you're unfortunately the minority.

So when people say these things, I usually have to assume that they are not a safe person. Because like I said: Whether or not the racism was deliberate, it was still there. You might have not originated these ideas, but you were willing to accept them without investigating further, to adopt them as your own, and to spread them further online. I think there's something to unpack there for you. Some great next steps would include doing research into the following topics:

The nuclear family and how it ties to white supremacy and homophobia (this gives context for the institutional aversion to the Jedi's form of community; you can find an article by a Black man about this here)

The American Jewish Committee's resources on identifying subtle or hidden forms of anti-Semitism (this gives context to how seemingly innocuous statements can have very problematic histories; you can find it here)

The phenomenon of "Holocaust Distortion" (a real-life example of how harmful it is to distort facts to place greater blame on the victims of genocide; you can find an article from the Holocaust Remembrance Alliance about it here)

The history of Buddhist groups suffering religious persecution (this gives context for ways in which the religion has been deliberately misrepresented for the purpose of harming Buddhists; Wikipedia is a great place to start, here's an introductory link)

The colonization and oppression of countries with large Buddhist populations (this gives context for the global racism I mentioned; look into the countries of Japan, Cambodia, China, India, Vietnam, etc.)

Though there can also be room for excitement, not just depressing homework, because it seems there's a lot of great stuff about the Jedi (and Buddhism) that you didn't know about, and now you get to learn all about it!

#like this is good news i guess because the things you were mad at the jedi for doing aren't things they actually did? #but also... the fact that these are word-for-word irl racist ideas should be more obvious to you & if it isn't it's a sign you need to lear #i appreciate the willingness to learn and i do appreciate the apology! #ask #asks #answered #jedi #jedi order #jedi council #jedi culture #pro jedi #jedi appreciation #in defense of the jedi #anakin skywalker #anakin #order 66 #tw genocide #tw holocaust #tw hitler #genocide #holocaust #hitler

[selfship-confession-box]

I'm hesitant to identify as fictoromantic due to the stigma in the selfship community. I know the community is largely accepting and open, but there's still some issues people have against fictoromantic selfshippers. I've hardly ever had crushes on real people, maybe once or twice in my life, and even then they were based on us being into the same media, or I really don't know why I liked them, and it was never very strong. But I've had consistent and strong crushes on fictional characters ever since I was a kid, which carries over to nowadays where selfshipping is a personal and comforting thing to me that I take seriously.

The problem is fictoromantic people are still seen as weird fans "faking an LGBTQ+ label" or as those stereotypical "weird fans" in general. This is a sentiment carried by the wider LGBTQ+ and some parts of the selfship community, if they know about the label at all. It's hard to try to find people who I can really relate to or find comfort in a label that I've been connecting with when I see ficto people be shoved into controversy just because they don't see selfshipping as some side hobby and it actually means something deep and personal to them.

I wish there was a more accepting attitude towards ficto people as a whole because I've been seriously considering that it might fit me, but I'm hesitant to identify with it or talk to anyone about it due to the stigma and stereotypes, so I'm still really on the fence about using the label still

.

#self ship #selfship #fictoromantic #fictoromantism #lgbtq+ #selfshipping community #self shipping community #thats so real honestly anon

[belit0]

HEYYYYYY!!! Thank you so much for working and accepting my request! I was the one who asked for the Madara oneshot where his wife gives birth to his son. IT TOUCHED ME SOO SOO MUCH YOU ARE SUCH A GOOD WRITER A LITERALLY CRIED AS I READ THE PARTS WITH IZUNA IT WAS TOO EMOTIONAL. You did so much more then i expect and i can’t thank you enough. The way how you wrote that Oneshot, the way how emotional ans touching it was, you let me cry too much for that it was too good you brought me to tears!😭 i love your writing very much and i love how unique ans beautiful your works are because you alway work on such good request and that is what makes your writing style so special. No one would be able to write auch complicated characters as Indra and the Uchiha’s in such a realistic and relate able way, you truly have the talent and if i am being totally honest, i read your works almost every time no matter how many times i read them. They never get boring for me because of your well written way you represent the characters in your oneshots or request, you do have my talent because you are the only one who actually sees the truth behind the cold mask of the Uchiha’s. You write them so realistic ans that is what makes me read your writings all over again. I love this blog so much it’s my safe place. Whenever i feel down or in a bad mood, i would always check ip on your blog to just read your mesmerizing work! (I am so sorry if i write to much but i honest just CAN’T stop to praise you since you and your blog means so so much too me😭‼️) If i may, i wanted to ask for another request for Madara. (I apologize again, i can’t get enough from this man😭) About Madara confession his love to his s/o after pushing her away and hurting her countless times because well.. he is Madara. How will he confess it to her after denying it for so long? I know it’s a very.. weird request but i hope you will understand it. I love your blog and your the only writer i do admire so much. Taking care of all your request is truly admire! Your work’s are so overrated just like you because you are way too good at writing the Uchiha’s. There is no need to accept my request, i just wanted to make you feel loved and appreciated. You mean so much to me please never disappear🫶🏻

You have no idea how happy I am to know that this is someone's safe place. This blog started as a tacit and fictional way to vent, my own safe place, and it makes me so happy to know that it extends to others, that someone feels comfortable and supported here, that's all I've ever tried to achieve!!😭🙌🏻💕

I'm not going to lie, my main idea was to shatter hearts with that Oneshot, ghost! Izuna always manages to get to everyone's core👻❣️

Regarding the Uchiha, I always do my best to make them realistic, they have very complicated personalities that are sometimes hard to deal with, but I do my best🤠

Coincidentally, Indra is the love of my life, and the most difficult of all!!!! There is not a single piece in which I don't find it hard to work with him, a pleasant effort of course, but complicated all the same👀💫 Love me a good ass challenge

He is unable to define what hurts more, the agony of having pushed her away or the grief of now missing her madly. Madara carries an ancestral struggle with his complicated feelings from the time he learned to stand on his feet, always confused and unsure of what is going on inside him.

The only thing he could always identify was anger, violence, dark sensations in his chest that compelled him to go out and kill, vent, yet he never learned to cope with those things considered good, healthy, beautiful.

(Y/N) brought for him a whirlwind of unknown experiences, a leap into an uncertain void, not knowing what awaits at the bottom, throwing himself into the possibilities she proposed. He didn't plan to fall in love, didn't plan to feel anything about her, but there was a magic around this woman that left him dumbfounded, entangled in his own lack of understanding.

Every time he came across her, his heart dropped to his stomach, his palms sweated, and he felt an enormous urge to run away. He feared he had been under powerful Genjutsus the first few times, but Izuna confirmed it was simply... love.

After recounting the symptoms over and over again, his younger brother explained that is the exact sensation everyone experiences when meeting someone they like, the body's way of confirming attraction, desire for that person. He refused to believe it at first, but the more the situation was repeated, the more he finally gave in to accepting what he never asked for.

Madara does not have time for affection and love, he does not have the need of a woman in his bed nor does the political context demand an heir, so he tries to fight against the loss of control he feels every time he sees her.

(Y/N), without any effort, manages to make his knees go weak, to make him feel conscious about his appearance, insecure about how he wears his hair or what clothes he chose that morning. He didn't ask for these sensations, he didn't ask for these thoughts, yet the woman managed to infiltrate his heart and ignore all the barriers he raised over the years.

He found himself entangled in her arms, consumed by her kisses, occupying nights he should use to plan war strategies on her, between her legs and caresses, devouring her body and soul. Her presence managed to monopolize his every focus of attention, growing fear deep within every time he pondered the possibility of losing her.

What would happen if the Senju found out about her? If the enemy manages to get information about the woman the Uchiha Leader loves, the one he intends to share his life with? (Y/N) became an easy target since she entered his world, always unintentionally walking on the edge of danger. Several times she has explained nothing matters to her, that she just wants to be with him, to dedicate her life to loving and protecting him.

Yet, protection is the only thing Madara could think about.

He can't expose her, can't give her away to the enemy, can't abandon her to war and the possibility of being used to get to him. Under these same pretexts, he decided to break her heart into a million pieces the night before his next battle against Hashirama.

With all the regret in the world and feigning a convincing coldness, he asked her to move to the most remote part of the Uchiha compound, never to see her again. All his efforts went into keeping a serious face, the same expression he would use to speak to the council, erasing any trace of affection in his eyes. He had to lie, tell her she was only seen as a method of physical release, a hole to spend the cold nights with, nothing more than an object.

(Y/N) couldn't help her tears, breaking down in front of him, perfectly buying the facade he set out to maintain, not seeing the truth behind his terrible words. From that day on she stayed away, not on his radar, removed from any area Madara was in, fulfilling his wish.

As time passed, he forced himself to concentrate on what really deserved his attention, to fill his days with even more business than was already present, avoid thinking or having free time, thus coping with pain. Months went by, his metaphorical wounds continued to fester, and nothing managed to erase from his mind and memory the wonderful memories (Y/N) planted.

No matter how hard he tried, she was always there whenever he closed his eyes.

Nothing prevented them from meeting again, by chance, outside the compound, and the emotions it brought him were uncontrollable. Seeing her back, after so much time and events in between, sunk in the pressure of winning a seemingly endless war and up to his neck with anger and rage against everything, felt like a blessing.

Without thinking about what happened he clung once more to the light (Y/N) always provided in his life, consuming every last drop of love she had for him. He never managed to put his feelings into words, to explain to her how much he loved her, how much he felt for her, believing only his kisses would be enough to make her understand.

He never said "I love you", but always voiced an "I don't like you" when needing to get away.

His bubble of happiness burst again after he received a letter from Hashirama, pleading for peace between the clans, deeply questioning him by saying, "We don't want our women to get hurt." Not only did he feel anger and helplessness, but also realized the Senju were already aware of (Y/N).

That night of pain and breakups repeated again, Madara retelling once more how he doesn't love her and that she needs to get away from him, internally dying to hug her and beg her to forgive him for everything, to confess the deep love he has for her.

Still, the woman respected his wishes, becoming invisible inside the compound and disappearing from his sight, but this was not enough. Having her inside the Uchiha territory implied a terrible danger, and he had no choice but to throw her out of the place, to demand her to leave if she didn't want to die under his hands.

"Should you not depart, you little nuisance, I'll ensure your new home is hell."

His soul, bleeding from the agony of having to watch her leave again, of having to use harsh words and unreal threats because he knows she wouldn't go otherwise, cracks even more, a constant ache in his chest that makes him feel like he's about to have a heart attack.

He witnessed her gather her things and walk out the front door, abandoning everyone and everything, until she became an indistinguishable stain in the distance.

That hurt, that grief, the suffering of losing her again, was the fuel he needed to face the Senju for the last time, fed up with having to sacrifice everything good in his life for a cause that didn't even belong to him.

The founder of the clan had reason to stand up to them, but the generations that followed him did not. Madara is ready to make a change in history, to stop the senseless killings, the baseless violence.

Before the usual confrontation begins, the two most important hands in the world came together in a peace agreement, a future project to improve the lives of the two families. Of course it was difficult, but no Uchiha ever perished in battle again, no Senju shed their blood in the face of the enemy, and all found a common ground of agreement and understanding to live together peacefully.

The village was formed, populating quickly with people from all over, and among all the administrative and agreement problems, Madara failed to notice the presence of the person he cares most about in the world.

He bumps into her one day, unexpectedly, as he walks by with hands full of papers for Hashirama to review and projects proposed by the people, motions to be dealt with. His head is so tangled in political affairs and formalities he fails to notice when he collides with her head-on.

The reunion is both terrible and wonderful, past wounds opening and buried loves resurrecting, everything he forced himself to forget, all the feelings he had to deny to survive and protect her, exploding inside him like the time bomb it always was.

"You can't kick me out of the village, you're not the leader here." Is all she says before running off in the opposite direction, countenance full of anger and resentment, without any interest in talking to him or entertaining him with formal pleasantries.

Madara does not react in time to stop her, to explain, to rectify all the damage he did to her, yet when he finds himself sitting at his office in the Hokage's tower, he reviews all the village documents, discovering where (Y/N) lives.

That same night he goes to her door and knocks on the wood with a timid, reluctant hand, actions uncharacteristic of the Uchiha leader. He is greeted by a thoroughly pissed-off woman, nearly slamming the door in his face, but Madara is quick enough to put a foot in the middle and beg for permission to explain himself.

"Why should I let you in? After everything you said to me? Everything you did..."

"I... I was trying to protect you, guard you from them, I-"

"Protect me? It was you I needed protection from. You said way too many horrible things for them all to have been lies."

"I didn't mean anything I said, (Y/N), none of it was true, I had to get you out of the fire line-"

"Fire line, you say? You kicked me out of the safest territory I could be in, without any assistance, where the "enemy" could find me. In fact, they did, and fucking Senju Hashirama saved me from starving to death!"

At the statement, Madara can only stare at her dumbfounded, oblivious to all these details, not knowing what became of her once she disappeared. Sure, both territories were close during the time of war, but he hoped she would avoid the place she knew as hostile.

"You destroyed the life I knew just because of what was internally happening to you. If you wanted to protect me so badly, if you truly wanted to shelter me from danger, you would never have broken my heart like that, never have given me away as you did to a cruel and uncertain fate."

Madara can only cast his eyes down, grieved, even more dismayed by the situation and the result of everything he himself caused, indignant with his own actions and the terrible way he handled everything.

"I would appreciate it if you stayed out of my business, and let me live, finally in peace." She slams the door in his face, the Uchiha powerless to keep strength in his leg and stop it from happening, defeated and desolate, furious, hurt, all at the same time. His enemy saved his woman's life, the very one he threw away by trying to take care of, and now he must deal with it.

#uchiha madara x reader #madara uchiha x reader #madara x reader #uchiha madara #madara uchiha #madara #naruto #naruto shippuden #naruto imagines #uchiha clan #naruto x reader

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Howdy, Sex Witch! I'm hoping you/your many lovely followers might be able to help me figure something out. I've realized recently that I may be demisexual, but I'm just not sure. I'm 25, have recently started dating, and I'm getting to know the way my sexuality responds in a relationship. I grew up in a very repressive culture, and I was on hormonal birth control for years; I thought I was either asexual or a Very Good Girl because there was just nothing going on for me sexually. But I ditched the bc and suddenly things changed. I now have a very healthy libido and act upon it frequently, but never with other people. I get hot very easily for fictional characters, but I do need to get attached to them first. They can't just be hot, they have to be compelling.

But I've started dating this guy who I think is a great fit for me, and the sparks just... aren't flying yet. It's been the same the last few people I went out with. I feel like, in theory, I should be getting hot for the guy (he's objectively good-looking, our values align, we have a lot to talk about), but all I have so far is a sense that there's potential, if that makes sense. I can think about being sexual with him without feeling repulsed, but it feels "too soon" and kind of weird. The good news is he feels the same way; he described it as being "romantically slow to warm up". So maybe we're both demi? We've decided to keep seeing each other and either wait for the heat to happen or, if it doesn't, to keep hanging out as friends (we have lots in common and friends are hard to make).

Does this sound like demisexuality? Or am I just not attracted to this one guy? Maybe I'm allosexual but kind of slow to warm up? It's weird to want to be attracted to someone but your hormones just won't kick into gear. Any advice is much appreciated. Thanks for all you do!

hi anon,

respectfully, you're going about this just. totally backwards. your sense of self isn't something that you can test into by exhibiting all the right symptoms; I can't diagnose you with demisexuality. labels are just words for you to use or discard as you see fit, and the only qualification necessary to call yourself demisexual is whether or not you want to do that.

does the idea of being identified as demisexual bring you any kind of sense of happiness, peace, relief, or better self-understanding? awesome, then maybe you should do that. congrats on learning something about yourself!

does it not spark any particular positive emotions for you? alrighty, maybe that one's not your thing. congrats on learning something about yourself!

ultimately, what you call your sexuality isn't nearly as important as what you actually do, especially when it comes to recognizing your wants and boundaries and actually honoring them.

#sex edventures 2024

[frecklystars]

i think im a lesbian and thats been making me cry in the middle of the night every night for the last umm i dont know. week. couple of weeks maybe. i dont want to be a lesbian bc ive been bi for so long and i dont want another sexuality crisis. but at the same time the idea of being with a man makes me feel so fucking repulsed and i dont know if thats bc ive just had multiple experiences of a male friend making inappropriate comments toward me when i used to trust him OR if its bc i am genuinely realizing i have never. never. never. never. never had strong feelings for a man the way i do with a woman. like i saw a cute customer today who was a guy but i wouldnt date him. i thought he was cute but i wouldnt do anything about it, like if he asked me out i'd feel uncomfortable. but then i saw a blonde woman walk in and i thought to myself, god she's gorgeous and if she asked me out right now i'd say yes when and where!!

i only feel "i'd kiss him i'd date him i'd hold his hand" with fictional male characters and male celebrities. not real/obtainable people. would i still feel that way if they were physically in front of me? i think i would, i think if ken were in front of me calling me sweet girl i'd never feel repulsed. i think if a guy who looked and acted exactly like ryan gosling was in front of me asking me out i'd consider it maybe? but i know i feel genuine love for my F/Os. my feelings for them are 100% real and pure. i hear that could possibly be an aromantic thing, to be genuinely attracted to your F/Os but not real people. but i feel genuinely attracted to real women!! sometimes!! half the time!!! not ALL the time and i don't know if i'd be willing to be in a relationship bc i'm so detached to the idea of a relationship but like... the attraction is absolutely there to some degree and it seems to be that way strongly for women

and then i thought, ok well, bisexual means being attracted to two or more genders, right? and i'm attracted to (probably) anyone who isn't a man, though my strongest feelings are for women. but then someone else told me that the lesbian label would still include people who aren't strictly women, so?? like?? i'm just confused i was hoping lesbian meant "just women" so then i can tell myself "oh i cant be a lesbian then because i've felt attraction to nonbinary/genderfluid ppl as well who don't identify as women at all" but if the lesbian label includes that, then uh, maybe i'm? a lesbian?

but god i have felt so uncomfortable around a man who's been making me feel unsafe lately, and it's just making me wake up and realize i've never been genuinely wholeheartedly attracted to men, period. not once. i've had small fleeting little crushes but if that crush asked me out i'd say No Get The Fuck Away From Me. there was actually an instance where i had a small "crush"(?) on a male coworker when i was 18 years old for a few weeks, but then he asked me out, and i felt so disgusted and uncomfortable that i went to my car and cried. and then i had a crush on a nonbinary person years later and that felt. so. fucking good. that felt so whole and so real to me. and then i had a crush on a woman years after that and i would lie awake at night with the most pure beautiful feeling in my chest. and when they asked me out i didn't feel grossed out at all, i felt wonderful, i felt amazing, i was shaking because i was so happy

but i have never ever ever once felt that way with a man. and it makes me sad bc i spent so long calling myself bisexual but i dont think that fits me anymore and i dont think some of my family members would really love me anymore if i came out as a lesbian and i just. dont want to think about it too hard but its all i can think about. i dont want to label myself right now but i dont feel good if i dont have a label. like, i can stick with bisexual just for the sake of a label making me feel comfortable but i dont feel bisexual if that HAS to include men. does bisexual HAVE to include men, if youre a cis woman identifying as bi??? can me being bisexual be attraction ANYONE EXCEPT a man??? with just a very very very very strong preference for women????

i just wish my F/Os were real, i would just be with them and forget labels entirely and just get tf outta here. i know if my male fictional others were to come to life, it wouldnt repulse me. i've asked other lesbians "if YOUR male F/O was real and in front of you with a bouquet of flowers asking you out, would you date him" they have all said "no not at all, bc he isn't a woman. i am only attracted to him fictionally but if he were real i'd feel nothing". so like. i dunno. because if ken or plankton were real i'd feel everything.

im so sick of being here im so sick of men making inappropriate comments about my body when theyre supposed to be ppl that i trust and im so sick of wanting a girlfriend but not wanting a relationship, yearning for women but not wanting anything to do with actually dating somebody. exhausting. all of this is exhausting. am i aro am i a lesbian can i be bisexual i dont feel bisexual anymore i'm dragging that label's dead weight on my shoulders and i want to replace it i WANT a label but i dont know what my label is and im tired. i dont think my family members would accept me being a lesbian and that hurts. i tried telling my dad yesterday and he was like "no you don't know what you are, you don't have enough experience to know if you like men or not. i think you'll marry a man one day" no the idea of marriage repulses me too actually. im indifferent to sex, i dont want to get married, i dont want a relationship. but god i want a woman in my life who i can kiss and come home to and hold and ask her about her day and slow dance with in the living room. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. can barbie be real i just want to date barbie. she's human isn't she. c'mon barbie where are you girl you gotta come and rollerblade to my place so we can forget everything and be aromantic lesbians together

#vent #delete later #SORRY it is 8am i need to sleep but i cant sleep and i am spiraling a little bit ;-; #nobody has to feel obligated to read/respond i just needed to dump this somewhere!

[yellowocaballero]

What are your tips on writing things that are both comedic and hard-hitting? Your style reminds me of Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams in that sense, and I was wondering if you had any specific ways of hitting that balance of wit and feeling

No pressure to answer btw :)

Hello! My good friend @lazuliquetzal made an excellent post on this, so check it out! I can't phrase it better than she did.

To say something additional: a part of it is not an actual tip and it is the fact that I am just like this. It is just the way I talk. I'm an extremely obnoxious person IRL whose dialogue is half jokes.

This is something I've talked about several times before but I can't find the posts on my Tumblr. But there is a difference between a comedy and jokes. A comedy is in the structure of a story - how it's paced, the sequence and type of action, the character dynamics, and the internal logic of the story. In a comedy you either have a more straightforward style or you figure out how to make the narration itself funny and phrase things in a funny way. A joke is a joke. I use jokes in dramatic stories to cut melodrama and give a palate cleanser, to provide rapport between two characters, to humanize and personalize the setting, and because life is inherently just a little funny. We laugh every day. Things don't feel realistic to me if people never do little funny things or crack dumb little jokes. But similarly, comedies don't feel real either if there's no pathos or genuine depth to the characters - if the characters don't feel like people we know, or if we can't identify them in real life.

The best tips are the one LazuliQuetzal gave tbh. There is a time and a place for humor, and if it's badly placed then it can be super awkward. Balancing wit and feeling is just a matter of figuring out the right pacing, story beats, and uhhh that 'up/down' feeling in a story outline? A comedy is a specific type of story, and learning how to write a comedy is just as much of a skill as learning how to write a drama. Pterry used comedy as social commentary and Adams followed an artistic style of absurdism that has its own social commentary in an extremely British and 1980s way. I think, if your characters in comedies are designed as actual people with coherent internal logic and depth and not just joke machines, then the pathos comes. The jokes come too.

Not a great answer :(. I get this Q a lot and it's always so hard to give a good answer. It's partly just your own natural sense. It's partly skill-building and learning how to write a comedy. It's partly having your finger on the pulse of pacing and story beats, which is an intuitive understanding which is only gained with experience. The drama is in the natural character pathos, not justifying the comedy. Also, I'm biased, but I don't think comedy needs to be in a story for a reason and you don't have to wax philosophical on Tumblr.edu about why comedy in fiction saves the universe. Fiction is entertainment and jokes entertain effectively. That's really it.

#by the up/down thing I mean #when i outline what i wrote looks like this: #1. X (up) 2. X (down) 3. X (up) 4. X (down) 5. X (up) 6. X (up) 7. X (lowest point) 8. Penultimate climax (up) 9. Climax (up) 10. End (down #it. makes sense to me.

[danpuff-ao3]

Fiction Works 1/2: Different Strokes for Different Folks

(Part 2 will be: Storytelling, Not Teaching/Preaching)

This has been on my mind lately with my fic Wasted for Love, which has brought me back to writing and posting The Best Kept Secrets in 2019 and 2020. Also, a recent bookmark comment on a fic called White Lies & Silver Bells.

What sort of boggles my mind is that even in this day and age, the concept that "everyone is different" is still so hard to grasp.

Right off the bat, I feel the need to clarify that I understand there are portrayals in fiction that can be troublesome, and sensitivity readers are a boon. However, even here there seems to be too firm a hold on what "should be." This does not take into account that everyone is different.

People accept this in a vague sort of way. "Dave likes football, and Carrie likes soccer." This goes beyond people having different favorite colors, or different skin tones. We are all born with different bodies, different genes. We are all born into different circumstances, and are raised differently. We are all molded into different people, and have different preferences, and choose different life paths.

What people also fail to take into account is: the world is a big, crazy place. All sorts of things are possible. How probable they are is another question, but "probable" matters less than "possible."

Recently, a YouTuber I'm subscribed to, Evie Lupine, posted a video about her experiences with polyamory. I've not yet watched it, but I know bits and pieces she's shared in the past about polyamory. After, on Twitter, she expressed what a mistake this was, which led to discussion in the comments about gatekeeping in the poly community.

Even I know, horribly monogamous person that I am, that there are all sorts of ways to be poly. (Maybe this is my early exposure to the internet and different people across the world, but I digress.) It's sad to me that people even in groups often scrutinized and judged can turn on each other, and claim there is a "right way" to be.

No person is a monolith. No poly person can speak on behalf of all poly people. No gay person can speak on behalf of all gay people. No disabled person can speak on behalf of all disabled people. Etcetera.

Specifically in my fic The Best Kept Secrets, both Harry and Severus identify as straight, and are each other's "exception." I knew this would be a sticking point for some people, and perhaps it was a blessing the fic didn't garner the engagement I'd originally (foolishly) hoped for. I only remember getting one comment on this point, where the person implied it was silly that Harry and Severus thought this and needed to accept they were gay/bi.

In real life I am friends with a gay man who had this experience. He fell in love with a woman, and while it didn't work out with them, he still maintains his gayness, and I dare anyone to try to tell him he's "bi, actually." He doesn't refute the experience he has. He maintains he'd fallen in love with her, but that he is and always has been gay.

We would all do well to remember that the human experience is vast and fluid. There are so many ways of being, and anyone might fall anywhere on a scale. Or what anyone might encounter or experience in life. It isn't up to you to decide what is real or not for someone else. And though Harry and Severus are fictional characters, it rubbed me the wrong way that someone would question how they personally identify. Identity belongs to the individual and is not up for debate. You don't have to personally understand each way of being to accept it.

In Wasted for Love, Harry is in a relationship with Ron and Hermione. My goal with this story is not to teach people about polyamory, or to definitively say "this is the way to do it." If anything, the opposite should be true. I'm never writing to teach lessons, I'm writing to tell stories. My stories are meant to showcase human experience. They are meant to convey emotion, and all the dirty and gritty aspects of people. I write stories about people going through rough times, and making the wrong choices.

One of my biggest fears with Wasted for Love is that people will look at it the wrong way. That it will be treated as a right or wrong way, when that's not the point. The point is to show you Harry's journey. What he feels and thinks and how his story unfolds. It is a story about human people who go through life without a handbook. They are people who live their lives based on their own choices, made backed by their own histories and knowledge and preferences.

(On that note, while I do have several poly friends, I did chat with a handful of fandom people specifically, since my IRL poly friends won't be the ones reading my fic. There was no unanimous consensus, but I'm pretty set on my path regardless. At the end of the day, I have my principles and I must abide them.)

There are all sorts of way to live one's life. All sorts of ways one might be. And to me, the worst you can do is to be so married to your own experience that you downplay or invalidate someone else's.

There are so many different connections to gender. Transpeople with body dysmorphia, and those without. People who have pronouns, or express gender in different ways. So many ways to "mix and match", so to speak. My nonbinary friend who uses she/her pronouns, but also likes being called "king" and "cowboy." People with different feelings towards their bodies, or gender expectation and expression. All unique.

There are so many ways of being asexual. A whole spectrum of asexuality! Those who are sex-repulsed, and some sex-favorable. Those who are also aromantic, and those who long for romance.

On that note: the difference between sexual attraction and sexual activity. The differences between sexual attraction and activity and even libido. Allosexual people with low libidos, and asexual people with high libidos! There's sexual attraction, and romantic attraction, and sensual attraction, and aesthetic attraction!

There are all sorts of ways to have relationships. Monogamous, or polyamorous. Romantic partners who are highly sexual, and those who are celibate. Friends with benefits. Queer platonic relationships. Marrying your best friend and sleeping with your longterm boyfriend. Who cares? If everyone is a consenting adult, who cares what your life looks like, as long as you're all content?

Perhaps this is a real world application as well as a fictional one, but it always grates on me when it comes to fiction. The world, the REAL world, is ripe with possibility, and fiction is a way to play with and expand upon that possibility. And seeing people's narrow-mindedness creep into a fictional space is such a disheartening thing.

There are all sorts of people in this world living all sorts of lives. How unique each person and their experience is is a great and beautiful thing! You miss out on so much by not reaching out to others and opening up and listening to them and learning from them.

Your way is not the only way. And what a sad world it would be if it was.

#danpuff stuff #danni is problematic and controversial and does not care #commentary #ranting #blah blah blah idk #this has been on my mind for so long okay?? #TL;DR people are different please accept it

[nyarlathotep-thecrawlingchaos]

Hey, Nyarla. I've been following you for a while and although this is a safe space and you seem extremely open minded and kind, I don't feel brave enough to say this off-anon due to past experiences.

You're one of the first authors who, without writing for it directly, has made me comfortable reading your headcanon sets and your fics and blurs, because they way you represent characters is comforting.

I am autistic, and it is extremely hard to have people not treat you like you're either mentally impaired (due to misinformation) or plain creepy (due to ableism), and it is disheartening to just exist sometimes. Often times, this kind of treatment gets applied from authors into their work. I don't think everyone has to know everything about every single condition in the world, but it seems there's a tendency to, most of the time, infantilize or demonize, or apply the aforementioned treatment, to neurodivergent people.

But to my very pleasant surprise, you had this set of headcanons for Mihawk, titled "Mood Swings", where you wrote the reader with some bipolar tendencies, and I couldn't help but bawl. I genuinely cried for a good while, in both relief and happiness. You didn't demonize bipolar tendencies, nor make him annoyed, nor anything of the sort. You were SO respectful about it, and so fucking mature in your writing, and it felt like a warm hug and a reassuring pat on the back.

You haven't even written anything for an autistic reader themselves, and you still helped me immensely with one single fic. Thank you so much for the way you write, and for the way you interact with your followers. You're wonderful, and I am eternally grateful to you for just one single set of headcanons like that. You reaffirmed the comfort within my comfort character. I hope you yourself find joy in the fact you, unknowingly, made a person so irremediably happy.

I can't thank you enough ❤️

I understand completely the desire to remain anonymous, but please know I still have the utmost respect for you for sending me this, and I really just wanna give you the biggest hug in the world, and I legitimately have tears in my eyes right now.

I'm going to come out and say right now, I'm schizophrenic. My official diagnoses is schizoaffective disorder depressive type, which essentially means that I experience symptoms of psychosis associated with schizophrenia (mostly auditory hallucinations in my case, occasionally visual, tends to worsen with lack of sleep) in tandem with symptoms characteristic of depression. I don't tend to tell people about it, because I know how schizophrenia is depicted in fiction and media in general. Typically as psychos that do bad things "because the voices said to."

I'm saying this because I want you to know that I understand how people tend to attach stigma to mental health conditions and neurodivergence, and I know how much it sucks and how much it hurts; and also that I respect you so, so much for talking about it. It's kind of skewed whether schizophrenia is considered neurodivergeant or not, but I tend toward identifying as neurodivergent. Experiencing the world differently, processing information differently, thinking differently is the general definition of ND, and I definitely identify with that.

I haven't specifically written autistic characters/readers largely because I don't feel like I would be able to accurately represent it, and I do not want to write it in a way that would make anyone uncomfortable or upset. I helped raise two of my nephews that were autistic, and they were both so different, in personality and quirks and "symptoms." They're also amazing and vibrant and intellient in ways that I can't even begin to describe.

Two of my favorite fictional characters that are generally accepted as being autistic are L and Near from Death Note. It's never explicitly stated in the manga or anime that they're autistic, but they're both written and depicted in a way that shows how they think and experience things differently without demeaning them for it; that other characters are a little nervous or intimidated around them at first, but grow to understand and form bonds with them over the course of the story; and they're also shown to be distinctly different from each other in personality, rather than carbon copies of each other. As such, if you haven't read/watched Death Note, I highly recommend it. Manga more than anime for personal reasons (there were some differences made in the ending of the anime that I don't agree with but I'm not going to get into that here)

ANYWAY

I'm also really beyond happy that you enjoyed Mood Swings. I wrote it with exactly the intention of representing Bi-Polar symptoms realistically and without any stigma. Knowing that you found it comforting makes me so, so happy. That was exactly what I wanted. I've seen "bi-polar" used synonymously with "psycho" so often, usually in tandem with a particular word rhyming with "witch," and I hate it so much.

Mental health isn't a joke. Some people are born with their brains wired differently. Some people are forced to live through trauma that rewires their brain. It makes day-to-day life exhausting beyond measure, particularly if it involves interacting with other people, and it's even more exhausting when others poke fun at it and don't take it seriously.

I know I'm repeating myself, but I really, sincerely want this blog to be a safe place for everyone. So it makes me so, so happy to recieve Asks like yours. So thank you again, and I hope you (and anyone else who needs it) continue to find this to be a safe place.

[bubblegum-blackwood]

🤲what do YOU get out of writing?

Ah good question. I feel like that's a complicated one that's not so straightforward to answer.

TL;DR - idk I like it :] and I like people

I've been writing fiction since I was nine years old. My teacher had us do some creative writing in class, and I fell head over fucking heels for the concept! It's crazy to see how much I've grown since then 😂 but I kid you not, I've known I wanted to write for a living since I was nine years old. I did it once and was like yeah . . . I like this. Funnily enough, I started out writing fanfiction, although at the time I hadn't heard of that word or that concept. My sibling and I had a game we called "Kid Wars" - essentially, we RPed being Star Wars OCs. My character was a female clone of Jango Fett (how did I come up with that as a small child and then The Bad Batch happened????????? will never get over that) who secretly joined the Jedi Order and fell in love with Obi-Wan 😂😂😂 ah, children. This origin story is never not funny to me. Anyway, over the years since then, it's slowly evolved into something nearly indistinguishable from Star Wars (I've mostly just kept something that vaguely looks like the Force and some OC names and arcs, but the worldbuilding is entirely original, and I had so much fun with it!)

But I digress.

It's ironic to me because even though my writing days largely started with terrible self-insert fanfiction I since then only wrote original works and even railed almost as vehemently against fanfiction as Anne Rice herself! 😂 But I spent some time on Tumblr and I caved and read Burden of my Days by @hekateinhell and have never been the same since. And now I have 36 fics and counting!

What originally drew me to writing as a kid is just the whole idea of making shit up. I've been making up silly lil stories in my head to keep my insomniac ass busy at night since I was in kindergarten, and when I realised I could write them down? When I realised I could get paid money for that shit??? Hell yeah! I can make a career out of doing something I genuinely love doing, and I'm so grateful that it's even an option for me because I have no clue what I would have told people I wanted to be when I grew up otherwise. As I've gotten older, I've understood more about what exactly I enjoy about writing (which allows me to take inspiration from the books and shows I like without copy-pasting every minute detail that I don't actually need) - it's people. I like people, I like knowing what makes them tick, I like watching them fuck up and I like watching them interact with others. It's part of what draws me to psychology and sociology, too. I just genuinely enjoy stories. I could eat a well-done character arc for breakfast, honestly. And that's what gets me about the writing. My books don't need big grand plots, the conflicts largely are not centered around big bads with large armies, it's all about people and the relationships they have with others within the narrative. (Don't get me wrong, though, I have fantastical elements - vampires and ghosts, especially, are quite abundant in my stories).

Plus, there's something about the actual process of writing that just gets me in a good mood. Sometimes the executive dysfunction or general life fatigue makes it hard for me to get myself to pick up the pencil, but when I feel motivated, DAMN, the juices be flowing! Sometimes I get in the zone and I just know what happens next and the words just come to me and it feels good, honestly good. I can agonize over it for hours sometimes, but crafting artful sentences to paint a picture with words is such a powerful feeling. I just can't imagine how my life would have turned out had I not discovered how fun it is to write.

And with fanfiction? To me, it's all about connection. To look deeper at the text, to identify what you like about events or characters or pairings and make it your own, to really know the book you love so much. But not only that, then also you get to connect with other fans! You get to get excited together, be proud together, maybe even make friends through it! You get to talk to people!!! And I think the value of that can never be understated enough.

Anyway. I've rambled plently now 😂 thanks for the ask!

#i probably talked for way too long but it's whatevs #ask game

[straight-to-the-pain]

Some thoughts on whump and how we enjoy it

I've spoken to a lot of people about why they enjoy whump and what they get out of it, and it made me think about my own enjoyment of whump and how I got into it, as well as how it intersects with things like kink and sexuality. The more I thought about this, the more I realised that a lot of the common discourse that I see in the community seems to stem from a mismatch in people's enjoyment and understanding of whump on a personal level, and I thought that it would be really fascinating to explore this further, which is why I'm making this post.

I'm not trying to start any arguments, but I would love to hear people's responses and views on the subject, so feel free to disagree or engage in respectful discussion in the notes. Under a cut for length and some discussion of kink and sexuality, in a non-sexual context.

To start off, I want to define whump as a very wide genre of fiction that encompasses any kind of mental or physical suffering inflicted on a character, whether for the explicit enjoyment of the writer or reader, or as a writing or plot device. While many many pieces of fiction and media contain aspects of whump, the thing that distinguishes us as whump writers and enjoyers is that we have a specific focus on that suffering, and often the comfort and recovery that can come after.

While many people think that kink/BDSM is something that is inherently sexual, this is also something that I disagree with. It tends to be considered nsfw as it deals with intimate interpersonal relationships and can often be sexual in nature, but nsfw does not have to mean sexual. In many contexts, violence, swearing, drugs and alcohol are all considered nsfw and can even make a film rating 18. I do think that it's important to draw certain lines between minors and adults when discussing sexuality and relationships, but what makes something inherently inappropriate for minors is often a contentious and highly debated topic.

When we've had these discussions previously, a lot of people took issue with the statement that whump could often be linked to sexuality. I definitely think that there is a category of whump enjoyers who are purely into suffering as a trope and fictional device, to explore character development or add intrigue to a plot, and that's completely fine, but I also think that for a lot of people it crosses over into a more personal interest.

I'm also aware that a lot of people in the whump community identify as asexual, and I don't want to discount that in any way, but I actually think that for people who aren't attracted in that way to other people, an interest in whump can almost fill the space that sexual attraction would otherwise take in their brain, and act as an expression of sexuality in its own right.

I personally do consider myself to be ace, because I've never felt sexual (or romantic, arguably, though that's harder to define) attraction to another person, but that doesn't mean that I don't find certain things sexy. I absolutely think that in the right context, violence can be incredibly sexy, even if it isn't sexual in nature. I've often found it hard to define my interest as either whump or kink, but for me that line is purely in what is fictional and inflicted on characters and what is something that I fantasise about personally or would be interested in doing irl.

When people ask me how and when I got into whump, I usually say that I found the community through gifs on tumblr, but I've been drawn to violence in a variety of contexts throughout my whole life, ever since I saw it in books and movies as a child. It's impossible for me to fully separate my enjoyment of the aesthetics of pain and my personal desires from what I like to inflict on my OCs in stories or see depicted on screen. And it is impossible to entirely separate that enjoyment from my sexuality either.

It often confuses me to see people who write very explicit nsfw content or reblog posts that are arguably about irl fantasies have 'kink blogs dni' notes in their bios. I understand that a lot of people want there to be a hard line between their whump and their kink, and while there are people whose kinks and whump interests are completely separate, it still seems futile to me to try to define your work in such a strict category when it is something that could be easily be read as kink.

Once you have written something, you do not have control over how someone else reads and enjoys it. You cannot know for sure that people won't read your entirely sfw piece of torture writing and not get off on it, or that people won't read your erotica for the plot and feel nothing about it sexually whatsoever. For a long time, I worried about trying to define my interest neatly and cleanly. Was whump something I enjoyed in fiction, or was I just into getting hurt irl as a kink? Did I find it sexual or was I into it for the character dynamics and the tropes?

The answer isn't a single thing for me. I love thinking about torture in an academic context, and I find the idea of being tortured for information sexy even if everyone keeps their clothes on, and on top of all of that, I find the dynamics between a torturer and a victim fascinating to explore in a piece of writing. Sometimes I search for things that are more explicitly sexual, and sometimes I read something and focus solely on the characters and not myself.

One thing that separates whump from other types of writing is the way we talk about our characters and our tropes in a meta sense. I often see people talking about finding characters hot or cute when they're in pain or covered in blood, or wanting to see them on their knees. Attraction is a very broad term and doesn't have to be sexual; it can be purely aesthetic in nature. But I still think that this signals a more personal involvement in whump than people might have with other genres.

We like to imagine ourselves as the characters getting hurt or as the ones doing the hurting, or maybe we like to see ourselves coming in at the end of it all to cradle our favourite characters in our arms and wash the blood from their faces. We wince when they get hurt and cheer for more, and we clap when they escape and when they get recaptured. And when you extend that to live action media with actors we find attractive, it adds a whole extra layer to the meaning of our interest.

A lot of the debates and arguments that I've seen arise over the years seem to come down to the nature of people's enjoyment of whump. I have seen people argue that whump should not be sexual, or that it's becoming too sexualised over time. I do think that there are sub genres of whump that are a lot more overtly sexual or kinky than others, but what differentiates whump from pure kink for me is that in whump the characters are not really consenting to something or enjoying it.

Of course this becomes even more complicated when you look at the growing popularity of 'pet whump', a genre that relies on the assumption that someone can be 'broken' and made to enjoy what is being done to them, even though it's still seen as a violation and an act of violence by the audience. In kink, someone might enjoy consensual non consent (which also doesn't have to be sexual), where an activity is pre negotiated but in the moment, the participants act as if it is a genuine unwanted attack while still maintaining consent and mutual enjoyment. I think that a line can be drawn between that as an irl fantasy, and the enjoyment of whump for some people, with 'pet whump' being a fantasy of being made to enjoy submitting against their will until they truly begin to want it.

And that isn't to say that this is why everyone enjoys the sub genre, or that it has to be sexual for anyone, but I do think that because of the overlap between 'pet whump' and D/s dynamics, there are people in the whump community who see it as more explicit and overtly kinky, and therefore want to distance themselves from it. This isn't a problem to me, as long as there isn't any personal or moral judgement attached to it, but I also don't think it's fair to tell people that they cannot call it whump, when their interest is primarily fictional in nature.

I have seen people argue that a specific trope isn't 'really whump' or shouldn't be considered part of the community, but I don't really think that this is a helpful perspective. I'm not a huge fan of 'pet whump' myself, because I really enjoy outright defiance and resistance (a huge part of my enjoyment of whump and kink in general is the idea of being able to win by enduring pain, defiance through bearing something difficult and keeping some part of yourself as your own throughout), but it's still a genre which sits snugly within the category of fictional suffering.

Trends change, tropes rise and fall in popularity, but at the end of the day there will always be people who like the things you do, for the reasons that you like them. Find those people, share each other's content, make your own groups within a large community, but don't tell other people that they aren't welcome because they have a different experience with whump to you.

Reflect on why you like something, consider whether it's something you enjoy in fiction or real life or both, and what draws you to certain tropes, for the sake of knowing yourself better if nothing else. Don't judge yourself too harshly and don't try to put people in boxes or draw hard lines in the sand. We're here because we are connected by a common interest, but we won't all like each other or enjoy the same things and that's okay. Happy whumping!

#whump meta #whump community #s talks #my stuff #I've just spent so much time thinking about this #my own reasons for being into whump could probably fill a whole other post #maybe we'll get to that some day #but genuinely just be nice to each other #and understand that experiences can be varied #but also don't shit on kink blogs when you create kink adjacent content #also obviously if you're a minor then yeah it makes sense that you don't want to talk about kink on main that's fine but like #minors have kinks and like they definitely do act on them and explore them in fiction and acknowleding that doesn't make me a criminal #thought crime doesn't exist #you can't tell someone that they're violating you by enjoying your work the wrong way in their head #or enjoying a trope in a sexy way if it's not a sexy trope and they're not talking about it being sexy to you

[throwawaydracula]

The reaction to Stoker transcribing accents/dialects is just so fascinating to me because it's really not that uncommon in older English language pop fiction. Here's a bit of The Pickwick Papers, by Charles Dickens.

‘Wery glad to hear it,’ said Mr. Weller. ‘Poetry’s unnat’ral; no man ever talked poetry ‘cept a beadle on boxin’-day, or Warren’s blackin’, or Rowland’s oil, or some of them low fellows; never you let yourself down to talk poetry, my boy. Begin agin, Sammy.’

If you're wondering what the hell kind of English accent does that v/w shift, the answer is 1830s Cockney, although apparently Dickens did miss the mark himself just a bit. George Bernard Shaw had this to say about it:

“When I came to London in 1876, the Sam Weller dialect had passed away so completely that I should have given it up as a literary fiction if I had not discovered it surviving in a Middlesex village, and heard of it from an Essex one.”

Shaw also cited James Elphinstone's translation of Martial into the phonetic Cockney of the late 1780s:

Ve have at length resoom’d our place, And can, vith doo distinction, set; Nor ve, the great and wulgar met. Ve dooly can behould the play, Sence ve in no confusion lay.

Note here Elphinstone's convention of rendering 'u' with a double 'o', which Stoker also uses. Going back to Shaw, one of the more amusing notes in the play Pygmalion is attached to Eliza Doolittle's opening line:

THE FLOWER GIRL. Ow, eez ye-ooa san, is e? Wal, fewd dan y’ de-ooty bawmz a mather should, eed now bettern to spawl a pore gel’s flahrzn than ran awy atbaht pyin. Will ye-oo py me f’them? [Here, with apologies, this desperate attempt to represent her dialect without a phonetic alphabet must be abandoned as unintelligible outside London.]

I concede that Stoker leans harder into this attempt at capturing Cockney than he needs to; yes, Thomas Bilder's accent comes across a bit cartoony. Dickens didn't lean quite as hard, and Shaw just gave up after giving an example. It just wasn't particularly beyond the pale. I mean, look at this bit of 17th century West Country dialect from Lorna Doone, published about ten years before Dracula:

“I wor over to Exeford in the morning,” John began from the chimney-corner, looking straight at Annie; “for to zee a little calve, Jan, as us cuddn't get thee to lave houze about. Meesus have got a quare vancy vor un, from wutt her have heer'd of the brade. Now zit quite, wull 'e Miss Luzzie, or a 'wunt goo on no vurder. Vaine little tayl I'll tull' ee, if so be thee zits quite. Wull, as I coom down the hill, I zeed a saight of volks astapping of the ro-udwai. Arl on 'em wi' girt goons, or two men out of dree wi' 'em. Rackon there wor dree score on 'em, tak smarl and beg togather laike; latt aloun the women and chillers; zum on em wi' matches blowing, tothers wi' flint-lacks. 'Wutt be up now?' I says to Bill Blacksmith, as had knowledge of me: 'be the King acoomin? If her be, do 'ee want to shutt 'un?'

Note that R. D. Blackmore was dead serious about capturing this dialect. He did intensive, painstaking research. The point was not to mock these characters, it was to try to capture, through language choices, a spirit and mood particular to a time and place. It matters who has this dialect and who doesn't in the narrative. While Stoker didn't have such lofty ambitions, don't think the point is to mock either. I think it's Stoker trying to do the old 'capturing local colour' thing. He wasn't alone in that. Off the top of my head, Sholem Aleichem transcribed a Jewish German's accent phonetically in some story whose title escapes me in order to differentiate him from the Eastern European Jewish characters with whom he identified. I've seen people hammer Brian Jacques (a much more modern writer) for the same thing Stoker's doing, and I guess it's just been normalized for me. Do know if you go on reading fiction from the place and period-- especially pop fiction not intended as high art, like Dracula-- you will encounter more of this kind of thing. It was a convention. Conventions come and go.

#dracula daily #comparative literature #dracula daily meta #long post #incidentally 'atbaht' seems to be a misrendering of 'athaht' #but i'm going with what's written on the project gutenberg version

[sapphire-weapon]

what are your thoughts on the horniness and thirst around leon since the remake came out? and all of the content that comes with it (reader inserts, actual animated p0rn etc)? i saw some teens complaining that it was weird and 'ruining the fandom' - but i didn't really think anything of it since, yk, fandoms are gonna fandom, it is what it is (and it's leon so, it's not surprising).

i remember you mentioning that back in 2005, it was very hard for RE fans to talk abt leon outside of his relationship to ada, so i was also wondering how the fandom dealt with general leon-induced horniness back in the day

oh, this might be my favorite ask I've gotten in a while.

/gleefully rubs hands together

First off, teenagers need to shut the fuck up about the fandom. There used to be a time when you'd go into the Resident Evil tag here on Tumblr and you'd get a bunch of weird model viewer porn of Chris banging Dante or someshit. Early RE fandom was filled with a bunch of zombie-on-Jill (and later, Claire) porn. Sometimes it was even zombie dog porn. I don't wanna hear shit about anything porn-related from some fuckin kids who don't know just how depraved this fandom has been. This fandom was built on fucked up porn.

So, in a similar vein, that Leon thirst has always been there. Always, always, always. Do you think that Leon almost overthrew Chris as the face of Resident Evil because fans just... "liked his character"? NO. IT'S BECAUSE WE WANTED TO FUCK HIM. We wanted him in every hole, in every position, and we didn't care what we had to do to get Capcom to give him to us. The only reason why Chris was never dethroned was because the gays circled the wagons around him with RE5's release.

However.

Reader fics and self-inserts are a very new and recent phenomenon in fandom spaces. Even as recently as the mid-2010s, this was something unheard of. Fandom OCs were not okay. If you had a fandom OC, or if the fandom even suspected that you were self-inserting in any way, you got publicly shamed and sometimes even exiled from fandom spaces.

But there was one big, hypocritical problem with that mindset.

If you can't already see where this is going, let me help.

This is the reason why Aeon vs Cleon got as toxic and volatile as it was, back in the day.

Oh, yes. Fans would pick which of the two women they identified with more, and that ship became their vehicle for Leon smut. So, now, it wasn't just a ship. Now, it was personal -- because fans were using Ada or Claire to self-insert in a socially acceptable way. So, if someone rejected Cleon, and you were Team Cleon, chances are, you took that as someone saying "You're not good enough for Leon. You don't deserve him." -- even if you didn't consciously realize that that's what you were doing or how you were perceiving things.

Back in the days of LiveJournal, you found so many fics of just blatant OOC shit, because it wasn't really about Claire or Ada as characters. It never really was. Ada and Claire were just a means to the end goal that was Leon's cock.

So, if nothing else, modern-day fandom is a lot more honest.

Personally? I'll never be interested in reader fics because of how taboo it was for literally my entire life -- I will always see it as cringe, and I will always question that person's grasp on the line between fiction and reality, even though I know consciously that that's not fair for me to do, and that author isn't doing anything that I wasn't thinking about at their age. But prejudices gonna prejudice.

But I'm fucking stoked that I can talk openly about Leon's cock these days, and I don't have to filter it through some fucking ship that I don't care about. I can just sit here and say to you guys -- hey. I think Leon's into edging, and he secretly wants someone to make him beg, but he's too much of a control freak to allow it, so he just makes his partner beg instead. And no one fucking gives a shit!

It's so freeing. I'm so happy.

#resident evil #leon kennedy #honestly i'd talk about leon's cock way more if y'all would just fuckin ask me about it more LMAO

[quipxotic]

A couple of thoughts about c3e78; spoilers below, obviously:

First of all, I loved it so much! Story is always the thing that hooks me, which is why, even though I like fights in D&D, it's RP that lights me up. 4 hours of professional actors leaning heavily into the angst? Yes please! Sign me up. (As an aside, this is also part of the reason I love Candela so much.)

So many people have said it, but I missed Orym. It'll be fine, Liam will slay us all when he comes back and in the meanwhile it's free space for fan fiction writers to dream up conversations as much as they want. Still, I wish he'd been able to be there.

I've always wondered why I identified so hard with Ashton because on the surface we are nothing alike. But this episode? It made it all clear. The low self-esteem, the intense love and care for other people without the ability to express it in a way that anyone could understand, the awkwardness, the being misunderstood by the people you love most and not even fighting it because of course it's what you deserve, the burning all-encompassing desire for a family who loves you coupled with the knowledge that you may never get it, the suicidal ideation - it's not an exact mirror of a younger version of me, but it's close enough. And it's so cathartic to see it outside of yourself in a fictional space.

And that is part of why some of the fandom's reactions to Ashton are so painful. Look, I don't care if people don't like Ashton - they're a complicated character and people can like or dislike whoever they want. I don't have a problem with characters I like experiencing the consequences of their actions, because that makes for interesting storytelling. I don't have a problem with the reactions of the characters in-world to Ashton's choices. I don't think they're all healthy reactions, but I also don't think they were meant to be. What I do have an issue with is folks being so gleeful about another person's pain, particularly given Ashton's background and mental health issues. And yes, Ashton is a fictional character, but so many of us in the fandom also share those feeling and qualities, if not the same choices, in our real, actual lives. It feels like people punching down, rather than punching up, if that makes sense.

I rarely cry at anything Critical Role, the notable exception being EXU: Calamity which makes me bawl no matter how many times I watch it. But that scene with Laudna giving Ashton the doll completely blindsided me. It was so well done.

So many juicy narrative choices in this episode, I can't wait to see how they cause ripples (or tidal waves) through the rest of the campaign. Laudna's conversations with Delilah. Imogen confessing to FCG (but no one else) that she and Fearne had seen Delilah manifest. Chet comforting people and challenging them in a mix of endearing uncle and manipulating asshole energy. Fearne's anger, at herself as well as Ashton, and her praying at the Raven Queen's temple. Gwen breaking windows! Ashton and Percy's talk. Just so many good moments.

Getting to visit Nana Morri again feels like a present just for me. I love her weirdness and her funky house, it's all just the right kind of creepy to delight me. And the fact Allura is there with Bell's Hells is a bonus.

I'm also thrilled because I think Ashton taking the shard, it rejecting them, and the aftermath has defused one of the potential time bombs that Taliesin's been hinting at for months, mainly Ashton trying to take down the gods as a means of finding someone to blame. I am not particularly attached to any of the gods of Exandria, but that wasn't a plotline that interested me at all.

I'm sure I'll have more useful, detailed thoughts later, but for now I am just so pleased.

#critical role #bells hells #c3e78 #critical role spoilers

[ace-exploring]

hi, do you mind my asking how you knew you were asexual?

I think I might be but I’m not sure if it’s that or I’m just nervous about having sex because it’ll hurt or I’ll be bad at it? I’m a virgin still so maybe I can’t know if I’m asexual or not?

I can tell if I find someone attractive but I don’t really have a desire for sex? But I’ve never even experienced it so maybe I would if I had?

It took me a LONG time to realise I was ace. I only realised when I was 35 years old (I turn 37 in 2023). I'd read about asexuality and I knew it existed, but I didn't know anyone that identified as ace. I thought I was traumatised due to sexual assault, or had a (disappointingly??) low libido, but was otherwise like everyone else.

(To confused things further, I identify as grey-ace, which means I do feel sexual desire on occasion. So not quite what people think when you say 'ace' but also not full hetero.)

A few things happened at roughly the same time that helped me realise I was asexual:

A married friend casually identified as asexual and I realised that not only did I know someone who was ace, but they were in a happy, loving marriage.

I read an #ownvoices fictional depiction of an ace character that said something like, "I enjoy touching, I don't like the expectations that come with it." And I realised that was the same way I felt.

I discovered a definition for 'grey-ace' that said some people only feel sexual desire occasionally, and a light went off in my brain that said, "Oh, does everyone else feel it more than just occasionally? MAYBE I'M DIFFERENT."

SIDE NOTE: THIS IS WHY AWARENESS IS SO IMPORTANT

One thing that also helped me figure out I was ace was figuring out the difference between aesthetic attraction and sexual attraction (and romantic attraction!). For me, a person can be aesthetically attractive, but if I don't actually want to smoosh my genitals with theirs, then I'm not sexually attracted to them. I absolutely admire Jason Momoa for his aesthetic attraction, but if he rocked up at my door tomorrow and said, "Wanna bang?" I'd still be like... "Can we cuddle instead?"

When I was a teen and young adult I definitely mixed up romantic attraction, aesthetic attraction, and sexual desire. They all meant the same thing and I was confused as fuck because I didn't want to have sex with some of the people that I wanted to hold hands with. It's only now, in my mid-thirties, that I've been able to untangle everything and figure out my own place in the world.

It's entirely OK to be nervous about having sex.

BUT

You don't have to have sex if you don't want to.

AND

Please don't assume you'll be bad at sex. My first time, with my long-term teenage boyfriend, he ended up giving up because he said I was too tight. Neither of us knew what we were doing. It's ok if your first time is kinda sucky, it doesn't mean you're bad at sex. Everyone that has had sex had a first time, and none of us were superstars, I can guarantee you that.

ALSO

There are PLENTY of ace people out there who have never had sex. I don't think you need to try it to figure out it's not for you. I've never been drunk either, or eaten an oyster, or gone bungee jumping, but I know I do not want to - and that's ok! I don't think you need to have sex to then figure out if you feel that desire or not.

Remember, sexuality can be fluid, and you can change your labels. This week you might feel that ace suits you best, but next week you might feel more demi or pan. You don't need to put pressure on yourself to find your own label. Going through life is hard enough!

#asexual #asexuality #ace #asexual pride #acepride #lgbtqia+ #greyace #grayace #exploring asexuality #asexual heteroromantic #married asexual #pride #asexual post #asexual positivity #ace exploring answers

[olderthannetfic]

Related to the difference in numbers between m/m and f/f. Recently I compared some kpop fandoms to others and found out there's a really big gap in bg and gg even though in non transformative spaces some of the gg are more popular than the bg.

I'm not trying to make any judgments but I'm interested in what makes bg fans more likely to write fic considering that female idols also have fun personalities and dynamics with other members that are shippable.

I don't really think it's related to fan's sexuality because a lot of bg fans (like me) identify as lesbian and there are also straight women in gg fandom.

--

Interesting question. I wonder how it varies by platform and space.

Wattpad has a metric fuckton of female self/Jungkook male idol. Boy groups are going to be more popular for that because self inserty het is more popular on Wattpad than self inserty f/f. The amount of fic that's idol/idol (or gen about idols interacting) seems a lot smaller. I do see some BTS/Blackpink ships along with the m/m for boy groups.

AO3 is slash central and was before kpop RPF got big there. I checked out BTS because there was a lot of m/m fic and then ended up liking their music. My second most listened to group is probably KARD, and I know next to nothing about them as people. I wouldn't say I have a particularly informed or broad knowledge of idol groups, which affects what fic I'll be into even if I like a lot of random songs I've run across on youtube. I think fic popularity can be self-feeding: people check out fictional canons because they have active fic fandoms too.

Last time I looked at AsianFanfics, I think I remember seeing male idol/OFC and male idol/female idol but not so much male idol/male idol. I've never been a regular there though.

The fact that it isn't about sexuality for everyone doesn't mean that sexuality doesn't have an influence on the big picture. I suspect the twin forces of more fic writers being attracted to men and more fic writers finding female bodies more contested are in play.

In my case, for me to care about shippy fanfic, I need to be attracted to the characters/celebrities. There's a massive disparity there for me.

Male idols are too scrawny for me to want to fuck in a lot of cases and have boring plastic surgery sameface, but some of them are pretty muscular, their clothing often covers up the full extent of their skinniness, and at least a few of them look different from each other. Their dances are also hot. Female idols go even more overboard on the plastic surgery sameface, are pre-selected to look even more similar, and have legs like twigs combined with tiny hotpants that show these off. Their dances just irritate me. It's what the industry forces on them, but it's a massive turn-off. KARD at least has kind of weird intermediate dances.

Yoon Mi-rae is smokin' hot. I like Hwasa. But a lot of women in SK entertainment are a hard no for me. I love Blackpink's music, but I'd never be attracted to them. Well... maybe when they're 50.

I have no idea what fic-writing Korean fans think, but for me as a Westerner, male idols are a pleasant change from male celebrities in the US. They're expected to dress up, look pretty, and wear makeup. They're normative in their own context but read differently for me, inaccurate as that is. Female idols are the same old ultra-femme looks on steroids. I certainly don't need more of that in my life.

Maybe if I gave a shit about Fanxy Red's music, I'd be in that fandom. They're the gg that presents like a bg. They're originally from China but relocated.

Hmm... Yeah, I could be into that.