#include me in the discussion too i'm making an effort to socialize

[nimrism]

could you make this post? please, it's so fascinating i really want to hear your thoughts on it

"The Dark Tower" Morgwen Interactions Analysis

i've literally been waiting for someone to ask me this so i can go all out in answer, so you're literally my favorite- THANK YOU! i've tried to put all the thoughts swirling around in my head into one coherent post, so strap in and let's LOOK AT THE IMPLICATIONS (from my perspective)!

first and most importantly, i want to zero in on morgana's choice of kidnapee; she could've chosen anyone in camelot, any one of the knigts who were regularly privy to arthur's battle plans and schedule, but nope. if we're looking at it from the perspective of "she needs the closest person to arthur" wouldn't that be merlin? she could have kidnapped and brainwashed him; he would've made for a fabulous inconspicious mole in the court, and arthur literally goes to him for anything and everything. i actually think it would make for a really interesting au/fic if it were merlin who was kidnapped instead of gwen (love confession/magic reveal possibilities are ENDLESS), but maybe it's a little too close to the plot of "a servant of two masters" and the writers didn't want to be repetitive. i'm going to be biased and delusional in believing that morgana did choose gwen, in particular, for more personal reasons as well as for her nefarious ones.

the way i see it (and this is obviously very objective), by the time we get to this point in s5, morgana is LONELY, like, has-no-one-in-the-world-except-aithusa type of lonely, and her choice of allies has been lacking diversity as of late (why are they all men 💀), AND they all end up dying anyway. so, she needs a plan, and she needs a trusted ally (she also needs a bit of love and lip balm cause DAMN). BUT the thing is, why would anyone be loyal to her? she's never kept any allies (or friends) thanks to her wit and charm alone, she's only ever kept men loyal to her by striking fear in their hearts. it's the same for her friends and family, i think. she doesn't believe they even tolerate her existence, so she needs to be crowned queen to subdue them and FORCE them to respect her. the same goes for gwen. she was only morgana's friend when morgana was a naive and vulnerable girl, plagued by nightmares and unexplained fears, and the second morgana grew out of them (or learned to control them) gwen stopped being affectionate, stopped being open. that's how morgana sees it, and it only reinforces her belief that gwen would never understand the person she's become now, she wouldn't quite see what morgana was trying to do. unless morgana forced her to.

the whole kidnapping affair was to MAKE gwen understand, because she wouldn't do it of her own free will. gwen would never willingly be on morgana's side, so she had to jump through a few morally questionable hoops to bring her over. in the end, i do believe all morgana really wanted was a friend (maybe a little bit more, amirite ladies), though by this point her concept of friendship had become twisted beyond recognition, and in all the chaos, this was the only way she thought she could have one. throughout the episode, a lot of the old morgana shines through, even if it is portrayed as just manipulation, and i do think that was her either slipping back into old habits or forcing herself to, for the sake of the brainwashing and for the sake of their friendship that she's trying to rekindle.

a point that i've seen several people make is that between the niceties, the "real" morgana peeks through several times throughout the ep, but i kinda disagree. i don't necessarily think that just because her smile drops, it means that the niceties were a facade and her "evil" side pops back out. i read the sudden change in expression more as disappointment. gwen fights back with such vigour that it's probably painful for morgana to realize that her former friend sees her as nothing more than an evil witch who's hell-bent on hurting her, now. she's disappointed that gwen, who was supposed to know her best, believes what the others do, and doesn't believe that morgana is being sincere in her offer of friendship.

a small remark i also have is: why wasn't morgana one of the visions/hallucinations gwen had in the dark tower? it's interesting to see that the closest three people to gwen are her brother, arthur, and merlin, of all people. i feel like gwen's history with morgana has to have had a lasting effect on both of them, even if morgana is supposed to be "evil" now. you don't stop loving someone just because they've chosen (or BEEN chosen by) the dark side. morgana was one of the people gwen cared about most in seasons 1 through 3 (s3 is pushing it a little, but still), it doesn't really make sense for it all to be forgotten so completely like we see in this episode. i also think it would've been super interesting to see a hallucination of younger morgana in particular, partially as a reminder that part of gwen still cares about morgana and largely because i'd like to see how gwen would react to that vision... would it differ from the other three? what would morgana do? would she sneer and laugh like elyan and arthur? would she do a little rawr like merlin (😭)? i feel like a ficlet is in order for this concept cause i would like to see it but i have to imagine it first (but that's the hard part 😭)

NOW ONTO THE MOST DELICIOUS PART OF THIS ANALYSIS: THE QUOTES

M: "Would you prefer some chicken?"

i just found this one hilarious tbh like she's so out of pocket what are you doing offering your kidnapee some chicken and WHAT WAS THE OTHER OPTION, IF NOT CHICKEN?

M: "I know how lonely you must be, all by yourself in that room. At least you're not shackled, and there's daylight. You can move, you can see."

oof. she's obviously referring to her own capture and torture, pulling from her own experience. it's heartwrenching that morgana has been through all of this, traumatised beyond reason, but it's even more heartwrenching that she thinks she's doing gwen a service, like this. it might not seem like that to any sane person, but after everything she's been through, morgana's worldview is completely different. in her mind, however twisted and detached it has become, she's being merciful to gwen this way, giving her luxuries that she was never afforded when she was captured. (including a warm meal with chicken at miss havisham's table 🤩)

M: "I too have suffered, Gwen. I spent two years living in darkness. I spent two years chained to a wall at the bottom of a pit... You did not know."

goddddd this line... it's just so painful, so powerful, so indicative of SO MANY THINGS. it's EVERYTHING. every acting choice katie and angel made in this scene was brilliant but ESPECIALLY their facial expressions in this particular part WOAH. the way morgana's voice cracks on the word "pit" is DEVASTATING. i was floored. the way gwen's face falls as she processes her words and they properly set in... INCREDIBLE. the concern in gwen's eyes is palpable as she realizes the horrors inflicted on her friend. and the final "you did not know" was so, so powerful. morgana realizes that gwen didn't know about and clearly wasn't okay with what she went through. gwen had no part in it. morgana SMILES at gwen's reaction, but instead of it being a smile of malice or evil it's one of RELIEF, and one that she hides very promptly. she's reassured in the knowledge that gwen had no idea she had suffered so immensely, and that, more importantly, she wasn't involved in it. it's SO important to note that morgana has no idea whether arthur had a hand in her own torture or not. it's especially not a good look on him that he invites the sarrum as a friend of camelot so soon after the events of "the dark tower", so, as far as morgana knows, he could've been a "friend" when she was being tortured for years, too. i wonder what would've happened if morgana had kidnapped gwen AFTER the sarrum's visit to camelot... i feel like that would have complicated things with gwen much further, if morgana thought she was complicit in her imprisonment.

M: "I would have sold my soul for someone to show me kindness such as this."

only two points on this heartbreaking line: 1- FUCK the sarrum of amata. all my homies HATE the sarrum. s4 and s5 morgana might both be textbook cases of "evil", but they're two VERY different people with two very different worldviews and tactics. morgana's imprisonment turned her into the cold husk of a person she is by s5. and 2- this just further confirms that morgana thinks she's doing gwen a favor, dining with her and letting sunlight into her room and choosing not to tie her up etc.

M: "Your hands are cold... I have a warm fire going for you."

oh boy is this a MOMENT. the way morgana keeps her hand held out. the way gwen reluctantly puts her hand in hers (MORGWEN HAND-HOLD!) *ivy by taylor swift starts playing out of nowhere* {ohhhhh goddamn, my pain fits in the palm of your freezing hand, taking mine, but it's been promised to another, ohhh}

um anyway i digressed. then the way gwen wriggles her hand out of morgana's grasp, while morgana grips her fingers with unwavering determination... it's just delicious.

M: "Anything you want, you can have. I'll give it to you."

idk about you but personally i'm SOLD. take all my money. i read this as morgana trying her utmost best to sell gwen on joining her, but i can also see the manipulation laced in it.

G: "Why are you doing this?"

M: "Because we're friends. We always were."

to me, this reinforces the theory that morgana's just trying to get her friend back on her side. by stating that they've always been friends, morgana reaffirms their friendship as much to herself as to gwen. she was her friend once, and she can be again.

M: "I'm helping you. I'm looking after you."

this sort of feels like morgana is telling herself that, more than she's telling gwen. maybe it's just part of the manipulation process, but i do believe that this was morgana's conscience reassuring her that what she's doing is in gwen's favor and that she's being kind to her.

M: "It's alright, I'm here."

UGH this line. morgana is being the person she needed when she was imprisoned. this scene is also a parallel to all the times morgana woke up screaming in the middle of the night and gwen was there to comfort her in s1/2. this time the tables have turned and it's morgana comforting gwen. simply delicious.

M: "My darling, I was wrong to make you suffer."

TEA! to say that this line was spoken from the bottom of morgana's heart might just be a bit too delusional, but i like to think there's at least some truth to it. torturing gwen had a lot of paralells to morgana's own imprisonment and torture, and she did want to make her suffer, at least in the beginning. but it was also different from what morgana went through. this is NOT to justify torture, btw, torture is BAD, but her "manipulation" tactics got a bit too personal at some point, and i like to think at least a part of it was genuine.

G: "No. Whatever twisted game you're playing, I want no part in it. I would rather stay here and die."

ouch. gwen's resistance to the last possible minute shows such strength on her part (cause me? i would've given in before she even dragged me through the desert tbh) and it gave us such a delicious performance from angel; the reluctance? the uncertainty? the distrust? the relief that morgana is there but also the FEAR of what she's doing? the contradiction between the morgana that gwen once knew and the morgana that everyone KNOWS is evil? but the morgana that gwen once knew is shining through now, and she's saying everything gwen wants to hear... grade-A angst.

IN CONCLUSION they're gfs your honor, this was all just a plot to snatch gwen back from arthur cause morgana didn't think seducing her herself would work. (this phrase could be in reference to this ep or the "lancelot du lac" ep i'm cackling morgana really is hopeless) there are also SEVERAL psychological layers to it, but describing it this way is just easier.

SO... this is possibly the longest post i've ever made. it got a little more comprehensive than i originally thought it would be, but THERE YOU HAVE IT! that's my take on the morgwen interactions in the dark tower. if i seem a little biased, that's because i 100% am :) i hope that clears things up. this is an open invitation to keep sending me asks (even if it's about the most random things ever) cause i love them and i love every single person who sends in an ask, and a public apology for how long these answers get sometimes 😭

#the fuckass sarrum is public enemy number one #hate that guy #morgana defender til the day i die #yes she's done some questionable things but have you considered that she's baby #can you tell i'm biased #save me morgwen save me #morgwen will probably be my undoing at this point #they're so special to me #the dark tower #this episode was a whole rollercoaster #morgana's gf might've been stolen from her but she stole her BACK #and now she's dragging her across the desert #now they're having a lil heart to heart #back to torture #fruity #HAND HOLDING #torture again #bunch of other stuff happens #FRUITY AGAIN! #that's pretty much the summary #anyway i hope this is coherent enough to be read #feel free to discuss #include me in the discussion too i'm making an effort to socialize #bbc merlin #morgana pendragon #morgana #guinevere #morgwen #merlin theory

[ineffable-endearments]

Hello, everyone!

In light of Neil Gaiman's comment that Amazon is close to officially renewing Good Omens but hasn't done so yet, I think those of us who can should start sending physical postcards to Amazon Studios!

The TL;DR of this post is that you can easily send a postcard from MyPostcard.com for about $3 (USD, I'm sure other currencies can vary). The Web site will print and mail it for you, so you don't have to do any printing or mailing yourself. The postage is included in the $3.

If you don't already have an image or card you want to use, you can just use one of mine above. Some of them are small because of small source images, but the site seems to resize them appropriately for the card. There are bigger versions in a Google Drive folder that you shouldn't have to be logged in to see.

You can send the postcards asking for a third season of Good Omens addressed to Jennifer Salke and Vernon Sanders, co-heads of Amazon Studios, at:

AMAZON STUDIOS 1620 26TH STREET, SUITE 4000N SANTA MONICA, CA 90404 USA

@fuckyeahgoodomens was the first to post this contact information for Amazon, so thank you, Ixi.

If it's something you don't mind, I would very deeply appreciate reblogs on this, since it works better if lots of people see it! No pressure if you don't want to, though.

And if you have Questions, click through below for my reasoning on all this.

Why should we send postcards to Amazon Studios?

We've made lots of noise online about renewal, and we've done a lot of streaming Good Omens. But I haven't seen much discussion of sending physical mail or, specifically, postcards.

Mail takes up space in the real world. It's slightly harder to ignore than email. It's way more attention-grabbing than posts on X or Tumblr or any other social media site. Because postage is required, physical mail can also appear more "committed."

Postcards specifically are great because of their convenience for the recipient. No one has to open them to read them. All it takes is a quick glance to see what we're asking for, and realistically, a quick glance is the best we can ask for in a corporate office. That's why I'm emphasizing postcards over regular letters (although really, anything helps).

Is sending postcards really going to motivate Amazon to make more Good Omens?

Postcard and letter-writing campaigns have helped get shows renewed in the past. Star Trek: The Original Series is a good example of a series that got another season after a letter-writing campaign. This article has more examples.

We don't actually know what's going on in Good Omens's case. Maybe postcards would make a difference; maybe they wouldn't. We can only make our most determined effort at making sure we're heard, and sending mail is part of that.

The cost of sending a postcard is too much for me.

I understand that sending a postcard will not be an option for many of us. This post isn't intended to try to push you into spending money you don't have. If you still want to find a way to participate, you can also send an email to [email protected] with your comments about wanting Good Omens 3. It's not physical mail, but it is still a personal message from a customer.

In fact, people who are sending postcards might want to follow up with an email, too.

Do we have to use your postcard designs?

No! Not necessarily! You can use anything.

As long as the message you write includes how much you want Good Omens 3, your postcard's image doesn't necessarily have to relate. You could send a souvenir postcard that says "Greetings from Los Angeles, CA / Tadfield, England / etc" from your local post office and just write your message on the back.

Technically, even a plain index card should be thick enough to mail as a postcard, at least by USPS standards. Just write your desire for Good Omens 3 on it, put a stamp and Amazon's address on it, and make sure it's at least 90mm x 127mm (3.5in x 5in).

Isn't Amazon Studios going to notice a bunch of postcards being mailed from the same Web site?

I'm sure they will. But the messages will each be unique, and again, they'll know each card represents a person who had to order the card and postage themselves.

Speaking of unique messages, what should I write?

One sentence is enough. Definitely indicate that you want Season 3 of Good Omens. If you want to add more, you could also write a sentence or two about how much you love the series so far.

Above all, be polite and straightforward! Remember that sarcasm and jokes often do not come across well in print, so it may be best to stick with simple statements that can be taken at face value.

What address should the cards go to?

The co-heads of Amazon Studios appear to be Vernon Sanders and Jennifer Salke; you can address them by name, although I'm guessing it will be someone else who does the reading/glancing.

Amazon Studios's address is:

AMAZON STUDIOS 1620 26TH STREET, SUITE 4000N SANTA MONICA, CA 90404 USA

Where did you get these images?

The images for the nightingale postcard and the Crowley postcard are screencaps from directedbypiper.

The Please Do Not Lick the Walls and Fell the Marvelous posters were downloads from the Amazon X-Ray feature.

The Nice and Accurate Prophecies postcard was adapted from cover art I did for A Nice and Interpretive Fanzine. Most of it is my own, although the mottled background is an extremely blurred version of a free stock texture from Pixabay, users chrisfiedler and/or humusak.

The bookshop postcard is a promotional image from Amazon used in a Den of Geek article.

#good omens #good omens 2 #good omens 3 #renew good omens #ineffable husbands #crowley #aziraphale

[orkbutch]

So, I'm not really in the weeds of Transgender Discourse on the internet (I have a life and also care about my mental health) but I've seen something discussed here about trans masculinity and I wanna talk about it.

I'm very masculine. I'm butch, I'm trans masc, I've always wanted to be masculine and I feel most comfortable when I'm presenting as such. Without much effort or any intention on my part I am read as a cis man day to day. Because I don't present more fem, in queer spaces I am read and recieved as a man, maybe trans, probably into other men. People do not even consider if I'm a butch lesbian unless there's Significant context indicating it. Because of this I'm viewed through 'Man Lens'; It feels a different if I say 'bitch', if I talk about my attraction to women. I don't get smiled at, people put physical distance between me and them as much as possible.

This is familiar for a lot of trans masculine people and trans men that aren't androgynous/fem leaning in their style, and it is an upsetting change to happen. It makes us feel judged or misunderstood to suddenly be causing this wariness in others; it feels prejudiced. I've seen people putting words to this like transmisandry. This is something they want to lessen in their communities, so they don't have to experience this anymore.

Now, here's my opinion part: That's not going to happen. You cannot tackle the "problem" of people responding to your masculinity with wariness. They aren't controlling the wariness, they can't. More importantly, their wariness toward masculinity and what registers in their brain as "man-like" is well founded. It's based in lifetimes of experiences and trauma that has told them men can be very unsafe to be around, and that is true. Most men are cis, and cis men are the most threatening thing in this world to non-cis men. They are usually* socially privileged above others, more likely to inflict violence, more likely to abuse and murder others, are typically physically more powerful than others. Everyone thats not a cis man DEEPLY internalises a very rational wariness of men, and masculine presentation as an extension. Especially men that are strangers. (*This is of course different when we consider intersections of race, colonialism, classism, ect. But globally this generalisation is still pretty accurate.)

Honestly, I don't think this wariness towards masculine presentation is something thats useful or realistic to challenge. Like many internalised processes it's probably a good idea to examine it and consider its usefulness, but I think it'd be easy to conclude that it is a useful wariness for people to have. Women have lots of reasons to be wary around men, including the unique threats of transmisogyny. Queer and gender deviant men have lots of reasons to be wary around men. This is The Reality of patriarchy.

Personally, the place I've come to with how women and queer people react to my masculinity (which is not entirely negative btw, the wariness is just one aspect) is that... I understand their wariness. I have it too, toward those my brain assumes are cis men. I cannot control how they feel or what they think about me. I can only be respectful to others and to myself and live my life. I flag my butchness where I can, I make my gender clear to those it matters to, and the rest I accept as largely beyond my influence. All of us have to do this in some places in our lives.

Even though my masculinity makes other queers wary, I have lots of friends! I've had no real trouble dating or finding intimacy. Initial wariness is just that. Once you understand each other, break the barrier, its usually settled. For anyone who finds my masculinity so offputting that we can't break the barrier, I'm glad neither of us put each other through that discomfort. I understand where a fear like that comes from. I will still hold community with them because that's what solidarity entails.

Anyway thats my ramble about masculinity in queer community, good bye until another. who knows how long

#back on the tumblr diary #personal #edited the section about women having reasons to fear men and transmisogyny; poorly phrased lol.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Edward Schlosser

Published: Jun 3, 2015

I’m a professor at a midsize state school. I have been teaching college classes for nine years now. I have won (minor) teaching awards, studied pedagogy extensively, and almost always score highly on my student evaluations. I am not a world-class teacher by any means, but I am conscientious; I attempt to put teaching ahead of research, and I take a healthy emotional stake in the well-being and growth of my students.

Things have changed since I started teaching. The vibe is different. I wish there were a less blunt way to put this, but my students sometimes scare me — particularly the liberal ones.

Not, like, in a person-by-person sense, but students in general. The student-teacher dynamic has been reenvisioned along a line that’s simultaneously consumerist and hyper-protective, giving each and every student the ability to claim Grievous Harm in nearly any circumstance, after any affront, and a teacher’s formal ability to respond to these claims is limited at best.

What it was like before

In early 2009, I was an adjunct, teaching a freshman-level writing course at a community college. Discussing infographics and data visualization, we watched a flash animation describing how Wall Street’s recklessness had destroyed the economy.

The video stopped, and I asked whether the students thought it was effective. An older student raised his hand.

”What about Fannie and Freddie?” he asked. “Government kept giving homes to black people, to help out black people, white people didn’t get anything, and then they couldn’t pay for them. What about that?”

I gave a quick response about how most experts would disagree with that assumption, that it was actually an oversimplification, and pretty dishonest, and isn’t it good that someone made the video we just watched to try to clear things up? And, hey, let’s talk about whether that was effective, okay? If you don’t think it was, how could it have been?

The rest of the discussion went on as usual.

The next week, I got called into my director’s office. I was shown an email, sender name redacted, alleging that I “possessed communistical [sic] sympathies and refused to tell more than one side of the story.” The story in question wasn’t described, but I suspect it had do to with whether or not the economic collapse was caused by poor black people.

My director rolled her eyes. She knew the complaint was silly bullshit. I wrote up a short description of the past week’s class work, noting that we had looked at several examples of effective writing in various media and that I always made a good faith effort to include conservative narratives along with the liberal ones.

Along with a carbon-copy form, my description was placed into a file that may or may not have existed. Then ... nothing. It disappeared forever; no one cared about it beyond their contractual duties to document student concerns. I never heard another word of it again.

That was the first, and so far only, formal complaint a student has ever filed against me.

Now boat-rocking isn’t just dangerous — it’s suicidal

This isn’t an accident: I have intentionally adjusted my teaching materials as the political winds have shifted. (I also make sure all my remotely offensive or challenging opinions, such as this article, are expressed either anonymously or pseudonymously). Most of my colleagues who still have jobs have done the same. We’ve seen bad things happen to too many good teachers — adjuncts getting axed because their evaluations dipped below a 3.0, grad students being removed from classes after a single student complaint, and so on.

I once saw an adjunct not get his contract renewed after students complained that he exposed them to “offensive” texts written by Edward Said and Mark Twain. His response, that the texts were meant to be a little upsetting, only fueled the students’ ire and sealed his fate. That was enough to get me to comb through my syllabi and cut out anything I could see upsetting a coddled undergrad, texts ranging from Upton Sinclair to Maureen Tkacik — and I wasn’t the only one who made adjustments, either.

I am frightened sometimes by the thought that a student would complain again like he did in 2009. Only this time it would be a student accusing me not of saying something too ideologically extreme — be it communism or racism or whatever — but of not being sensitive enough toward his feelings, of some simple act of indelicacy that’s considered tantamount to physical assault. As Northwestern University professor Laura Kipnis writes, “Emotional discomfort is [now] regarded as equivalent to material injury, and all injuries have to be remediated.” Hurting a student’s feelings, even in the course of instruction that is absolutely appropriate and respectful, can now get a teacher into serious trouble.

In 2009, the subject of my student’s complaint was my supposed ideology. I was communistical, the student felt, and everyone knows that communisticism is wrong. That was, at best, a debatable assertion. And as I was allowed to rebut it, the complaint was dismissed with prejudice. I didn’t hesitate to reuse that same video in later semesters, and the student’s complaint had no impact on my performance evaluations.

In 2015, such a complaint would not be delivered in such a fashion. Instead of focusing on the rightness or wrongness (or even acceptability) of the materials we reviewed in class, the complaint would center solely on how my teaching affected the student’s emotional state. As I cannot speak to the emotions of my students, I could not mount a defense about the acceptability of my instruction. And if I responded in any way other than apologizing and changing the materials we reviewed in class, professional consequences would likely follow.

I wrote about this fear on my blog, and while the response was mostly positive, some liberals called me paranoid, or expressed doubt about why any teacher would nix the particular texts I listed. I guarantee you that these people do not work in higher education, or if they do they are at least two decades removed from the job search. The academic job market is brutal. Teachers who are not tenured or tenure-track faculty members have no right to due process before being dismissed, and there’s a mile-long line of applicants eager to take their place. And as writer and academic Freddie DeBoer writes, they don’t even have to be formally fired — they can just not get rehired. In this type of environment, boat-rocking isn’t just dangerous, it’s suicidal, and so teachers limit their lessons to things they know won’t upset anybody.

The real problem: a simplistic, unworkable, and ultimately stifling conception of social justice

This shift in student-teacher dynamic placed many of the traditional goals of higher education — such as having students challenge their beliefs — off limits. While I used to pride myself on getting students to question themselves and engage with difficult concepts and texts, I now hesitate. What if this hurts my evaluations and I don’t get tenure? How many complaints will it take before chairs and administrators begin to worry that I’m not giving our customers — er, students, pardon me — the positive experience they’re paying for? Ten? Half a dozen? Two or three?

This phenomenon has been widely discussed as of late, mostly as a means of deriding political, economic, or cultural forces writers don’t much care for. Commentators on the left and right have recently criticized the sensitivity and paranoia of today’s college students. They worry about the stifling of free speech, the implementation of unenforceable conduct codes, and a general hostility against opinions and viewpoints that could cause students so much as a hint of discomfort.

I agree with some of these analyses more than others, but they all tend to be too simplistic. The current student-teacher dynamic has been shaped by a large confluence of factors, and perhaps the most important of these is the manner in which cultural studies and social justice writers have comported themselves in popular media. I have a great deal of respect for both of these fields, but their manifestations online, their desire to democratize complex fields of study by making them as digestible as a TGIF sitcom, has led to adoption of a totalizing, simplistic, unworkable, and ultimately stifling conception of social justice. The simplicity and absolutism of this conception has combined with the precarity of academic jobs to create higher ed’s current climate of fear, a heavily policed discourse of semantic sensitivity in which safety and comfort have become the ends and the means of the college experience.

This new understanding of social justice politics resembles what University of Pennsylvania political science professor Adolph Reed Jr. calls a politics of personal testimony, in which the feelings of individuals are the primary or even exclusive means through which social issues are understood and discussed. Reed derides this sort of political approach as essentially being a non-politics, a discourse that “is focused much more on taxonomy than politics [which] emphasizes the names by which we should call some strains of inequality [ ... ] over specifying the mechanisms that produce them or even the steps that can be taken to combat them.” Under such a conception, people become more concerned with signaling goodness, usually through semantics and empty gestures, than with actually working to effect change.

Herein lies the folly of oversimplified identity politics: while identity concerns obviously warrant analysis, focusing on them too exclusively draws our attention so far inward that none of our analyses can lead to action. Rebecca Reilly Cooper, a political philosopher at the University of Warwick, worries about the effectiveness of a politics in which “particular experiences can never legitimately speak for any one other than ourselves, and personal narrative and testimony are elevated to such a degree that there can be no objective standpoint from which to examine their veracity.” Personal experience and feelings aren’t just a salient touchstone of contemporary identity politics; they are the entirety of these politics. In such an environment, it’s no wonder that students are so prone to elevate minor slights to protestable offenses.

(It’s also why seemingly piddling matters of cultural consumption warrant much more emotional outrage than concerns with larger material implications. Compare the number of web articles surrounding the supposed problematic aspects of the newest Avengers movie with those complaining about, say, the piecemeal dismantling of abortion rights. The former outnumber the latter considerably, and their rhetoric is typically much more impassioned and inflated. I’d discuss this in my classes — if I weren’t too scared to talk about abortion.)

The press for actionability, or even for comprehensive analyses that go beyond personal testimony, is hereby considered redundant, since all we need to do to fix the world’s problems is adjust the feelings attached to them and open up the floor for various identity groups to have their say. All the old, enlightened means of discussion and analysis —from due process to scientific method — are dismissed as being blind to emotional concerns and therefore unfairly skewed toward the interest of straight white males. All that matters is that people are allowed to speak, that their narratives are accepted without question, and that the bad feelings go away.

So it’s not just that students refuse to countenance uncomfortable ideas — they refuse to engage them, period. Engagement is considered unnecessary, as the immediate, emotional reactions of students contain all the analysis and judgment that sensitive issues demand. As Judith Shulevitz wrote in the New York Times, these refusals can shut down discussion in genuinely contentious areas, such as when Oxford canceled an abortion debate. More often, they affect surprisingly minor matters, as when Hampshire College disinvited an Afrobeat band because their lineup had too many white people in it.

When feelings become more important than issues

At the very least, there’s debate to be had in these areas. Ideally, pro-choice students would be comfortable enough in the strength of their arguments to subject them to discussion, and a conversation about a band’s supposed cultural appropriation could take place alongside a performance. But these cancellations and disinvitations are framed in terms of feelings, not issues. The abortion debate was canceled because it would have imperiled the “welfare and safety of our students.” The Afrofunk band’s presence would not have been “safe and healthy.” No one can rebut feelings, and so the only thing left to do is shut down the things that cause distress — no argument, no discussion, just hit the mute button and pretend eliminating discomfort is the same as effecting actual change.

In a New York Magazine piece, Jonathan Chait described the chilling effect this type of discourse has upon classrooms. Chait’s piece generated seismic backlash, and while I disagree with much of his diagnosis, I have to admit he does a decent job of describing the symptoms. He cites an anonymous professor who says that “she and her fellow faculty members are terrified of facing accusations of triggering trauma.” Internet liberals pooh-poohed this comment, likening the professor to one of Tom Friedman’s imaginary cab drivers. But I’ve seen what’s being described here. I’ve lived it. It’s real, and it affects liberal, socially conscious teachers much more than conservative ones.

If we wish to remove this fear, and to adopt a politics that can lead to more substantial change, we need to adjust our discourse. Ideally, we can have a conversation that is conscious of the role of identity issues and confident of the ideas that emanate from the people who embody those identities. It would call out and criticize unfair, arbitrary, or otherwise stifling discursive boundaries, but avoid falling into pettiness or nihilism. It wouldn’t be moderate, necessarily, but it would be deliberate. It would require effort.

In the start of his piece, Chait hypothetically asks if “the offensiveness of an idea [can] be determined objectively, or only by recourse to the identity of the person taking offense.” Here, he’s getting at the concerns addressed by Reed and Reilly-Cooper, the worry that we’ve turned our analysis so completely inward that our judgment of a person’s speech hinges more upon their identity signifiers than on their ideas.

A sensible response to Chait’s question would be that this is a false binary, and that ideas can and should be judged both by the strength of their logic and by the cultural weight afforded to their speaker’s identity. Chait appears to believe only the former, and that’s kind of ridiculous. Of course someone’s social standing affects whether their ideas are considered offensive, or righteous, or even worth listening to. How can you think otherwise?

We destroy ourselves when identity becomes our sole focus

Feminists and anti-racists recognize that identity does matter. This is indisputable. If we subscribe to the belief that ideas can be judged within a vacuum, uninfluenced by the social weight of their proponents, we perpetuate a system in which arbitrary markers like race and gender influence the perceived correctness of ideas. We can’t overcome prejudice by pretending it doesn’t exist. Focusing on identity allows us to interrogate the process through which white males have their opinions taken at face value, while women, people of color, and non-normatively gendered people struggle to have their voices heard.

But we also destroy ourselves when identity becomes our sole focus. Consider a tweet I linked to (which has since been removed. See editor’s note below.), from a critic and artist, in which she writes: “When ppl go off on evo psych, its always some shady colonizer white man theory that ignores nonwhite human history. but ‘science’. Ok ... Most ‘scientific thought’ as u know it isnt that scientific but shaped by white patriarchal bias of ppl who claimed authority on it.”

This critic is intelligent. Her voice is important. She realizes, correctly, that evolutionary psychology is flawed, and that science has often been misused to legitimize racist and sexist beliefs. But why draw that out to questioning most “scientific thought”? Can’t we see how distancing that is to people who don’t already agree with us? And tactically, can’t we see how shortsighted it is to be skeptical of a respected manner of inquiry just because it’s associated with white males?

This sort of perspective is not confined to Twitter and the comments sections of liberal blogs. It was born in the more nihilistic corners of academic theory, and its manifestations on social media have severe real-world implications. In another instance, two female professors of library science publicly outed and shamed a male colleague they accused of being creepy at conferences, going so far as to openly celebrate the prospect of ruining his career. I don’t doubt that some men are creepy at conferences — they are. And for all I know, this guy might be an A-level creep. But part of the female professors’ shtick was the strong insistence that harassment victims should never be asked for proof, that an enunciation of an accusation is all it should ever take to secure a guilty verdict. The identity of the victims overrides the identity of the harasser, and that’s all the proof they need.

This is terrifying. No one will ever accept that. And if that becomes a salient part of liberal politics, liberals are going to suffer tremendous electoral defeat.

Debate and discussion would ideally temper this identity-based discourse, make it more usable and less scary to outsiders. Teachers and academics are the best candidates to foster this discussion, but most of us are too scared and economically disempowered to say anything. Right now, there’s nothing much to do other than sit on our hands and wait for the ascension of conservative political backlash — hop into the echo chamber, pile invective upon the next person or company who says something vaguely insensitive, insulate ourselves further and further from any concerns that might resonate outside of our own little corner of Twitter.

--

==

This has been going on for over a decade. The correct response is to mock and laugh at the people complaining, and point out that they're not ready for the big wide world outside their kindergarten mindset, so they'd be better off going back home to mommy and daddy. Not validate and endorse their feelings. We need to get back to that.

#Edward Schlosser #trigger warnings #hypersensitivity #Christina Hoff Sommers #safe space #academic corruption #higher education #religion is a mental illness

[lastoreadoras]

Looking for people to interact with

I've been much more outgoing lately, I'm not sure why! Despite this, I am still very bad at picking and choosing people to reach out to and message, so, to save time for everyone involved, I've made this post.

This post is asking for people to message me that also describes what exactly I want from our interactions! You will have to message me, though if you're feeling too shy to reach out in our DMs, sending a non-anonymous ask or directly replying to this post letting me know that you'd like a DM is a good way to get my attention and potentially receive a DM from me. See also: making my notifications blow up with a sequence of chained likes and/or reblogs on my posts.

Reblogging and especially liking this post specifically will not do much for putting you on my radar, because it's very easy to just like or reblog a post and doesn't take much effort, as opposed to messaging me or doing any of the things described above. If you're interested in connecting with me, please read this whole post (or at least look at the TL;DR) before reaching out to me!

Thank you in advance.

I am ace and I love meeting new people

To begin, I do NOT want a relationship in which there is only hypnosis and only kinky things. I am asexual, and while I am romantically attracted to basically every gender, I do not want to be horny 24/7. If you're looking for a committed (or gods forbid temporary) dominant/submissive or hypnotist/subject relationship, specifically only a dedicated sexual/kinky relationship, this post does not include you.

I am very affectionate

I love people! I love people so much and am always looking to make more partners and friends. There is a good chance that I will flirt at least a little, and will generally try to be very positive and overtly friendly in our interactions.

We'll still do hypnosis stuff

This does not mean I will not want hypnosis to be a part of our relationship- hypnosis is a very big part of my life, and is the root of how I've made most of my friends and especially my partners. I will eventually want hypnosis to happen between us (whoever the hypnotist shall be) and at the very least will want to be able to discuss the topic freely without judgement.

Video games good

I won't sugarcoat this next point- I am a gamer, I play on PC, use Steam, and heavily enjoy a wide variety of games. Specifics can be gleaned by questioning me, but I tend to lean toward roguelikes and co-op multiplayer games, be they designed specifically for co-op or simply offer the ability to play cooperatively with your friends. PvP games can be fun, but I definitely lean towards PvE titles.

Inherent bias

I adore women. Trans women particularly have a special place in my heart. This does not mean I will dislike anyone who isn't a woman or trans, but if you are feminine and/or transgender you will automatically gain some of my trust without having to do anything.

To clarify: video games

Over the course of our interactions, I will want to play video games with you, and I will want to hypnotize you or be hypnotized by you. That much is clear. If you don't play video games, that's okay, but as we are unlikely to live near one another, our options for doing things may possibly be limited. I will say, however, I may want to read something with/to you or watch anime/tv shows/movies with you. Simply sharing space and receiving attention can be enough, but I'm not very good at filling empty conversations with words as my social skills are somewhat limited.

Friend Zone

If you're already partnered up or don't wish to get involved romantically, I'm perfectly fine being your friend! I will still want hypnosis to be involved, but hanging out with friends is something I simply don't do enough and would be open to doing much more.

I only have one body

I am not always available 24/7 and am sometimes too busy to reply to messages. This does not mean I don't want to talk to you- I will tell you if our relationship isn't working, and barring extreme circumstances, will attempt to make it work. I have a few friends and partners already and if this post garners enough attention, will likely have even more, which means that I will not be available all the time. If you expect me to be 100% available every moment for you, this is probably not the relationship for you.

Allow me to summarize and recount the major points. (TL;DR)

We will not have being horny or sexual as the focus of our relationship.

I may be an introvert but I am liable to flirt with you and try to pry attention and affection out of you whenever possible.

We will discuss / engage in hypnosis (I know it's antithetical to the first bullet but it's necessary)

We will probably play video games. (on pc) If not, we will want to find an alternative.

I love women/feminine types, though if you're not a woman, that's perfectly acceptable, and I will appreciate your attention all the same.

It's okay if we're just friends! There's no pressure to become one of my partners, even if it is always an option.

We will not be spending every second of every day together, as I have existing friends and multiple partners to divide my attention. I will still try to answer your messages when I'm busy, but there are no guarantees.

Thank you!

Regardless if you read the whole thing or not, I hope you are well informed enough to make the decision of whether or not you want to reach out to me about this. It's worth noting that even if we're already acquainted in some way, this post is still an invitation for you to reach out!

Cheers! <3

#rambles

[eenkleinleven]

Sth ive always wondered about a little life is how Jude was so extremely traumatised but still had good enough social skills to make so many lasting friendships. Like I know not all traumatized people are the same and it is possible for someone to be as severely traumatized as Jude was and still have some social skills, but I think it must be unusual, right? Like I'm just wondering where he learned social cues and how to interact with people his own age and how to behave in relationships and all that. And how he managed to be so different from the people around him - not revealing anything about his past, wearing long-sleeved shirts to the beach - and still got people to accept him easily and not question all these things a lot. It's something I've always wondered. What are your thoughts on this?

It's not something I ever thought about specifically, no. Or, rather, it wasn't something that struck me as particularly unusual or noteworthy. I'll do my best to articulate why.

Hanya discussed, in one interview, why she chose the narrative structure that she did for the book. She initially considered having the book in three parts, with the first two describing two alternative life paths for Jude—one where he was able to overcome his past, for the lack of a better word, and one where he wasn’t—and the third part describing what had happened to him. But she explained why she ultimately disposed of that format, saying:

“I think it establishes this binary that someone who cant function in society is somehow a failure and someone who can is a success, and that's simply not true. I think that's too reductive of a way of thinking about a person.”

I feel like that quote is important to keep in mind when talking about Jude as a character.

Regarding social skills:

I feel that it's worth noting that Jude wasn't unsocialized. I don't think his socialization through age 16 was normal by any means. There is no easy way to say this: people can be sexually abused as children and still be socially and professionally normal as adults. I personally know people who fall into that category, which is partly why it didn’t strike me as strange.

Going into greater detail, however, as to how he was able to learn social skills, there’s a few things that come to mind.

Ana seems to have given him a huge amount of support without which he may not have been able to really interact with others.

Plenty of passages in the book describe him having to learn how to interact with his peers, too.

My impression was that Jude made a concerted effort to learn about how to comport himself, an effort made easier by the fact that he kept quiet when it came to his personal life.

Regarding how he was able to maintain friendships while divulging so little about himself:

People did ask Jude about himself. Fairly often, actually, particularly in the earlier portions of the book. I mean, substantial portions of The Postman—including but not limited to this section touch on the matter outright.

But, really, I think it’s that his friends accepted him for who he was. So, for all of his differences, that was who they knew him to be, and they liked him.

I think, too, that after a certain point, his friends understood that Jude had some good reason for not sharing more about himself. It didn’t impact his ability to be a good friend otherwise, so it seems reasonable to me that they chose not to pry. If they had an issue with him being private, or different in any particular way, they could have simply remained acquaintances.

I hope this makes sense--I had some difficulty in organizing my thoughts here, so if you'd like me to clarify about anything, please feel free to ask.

#a little life

[blackautmedia]

Since there's more attention surrounding transmisogyny right now, also asking y'all to learn more about Black trans issues specifically. It's more than a little tiring right now when we're having the exact same discussion that needs to constantly be repeated about the use of the phrases "Rest in power" and "say their name."

Each and every time non-Black people direct their vitriol toward Black MaGes when they point out that both phrases aren't just hashtags for the sake of hashtags but serve very specific, strategic uses because social movements that are often pioneered with the help of Black people then get framed as "for everyone" and every single time has people specifically exclude and ignore the needs of Black individuals.

This exact issue ends up coming up every few months for years now and there's inevitably some non-Black person who knows this information and intentionally uses these phrases for Non-Black people anyway. They accuse Black trans people of "gatekeeping" call them psyops, cops, etc. and this includes non-Black trans people.

And this is just one instance--there's stuff like this that happens on a regular basis in the exclusion and erasure of Black trans people.

I'm not trying to take away from the current situation, but it does annoy me to no end how many people who will make an effort to be trans allies or are trans themselves will in the same breath dismiss everything relating to Black trans people.

So much of queer culture is stolen language and identity from Black trans people that don't get the same care and concern, but then people will be like "these issues affect everyone though" while taking the language, the aesthetic, the labor and don't listen.

And to all the Black transmasc individuals out there, I see you too and y'all also get done dirty by way too many communities.

[mbti-notes]

Hi. My spouse and I (both entj or so) both handle conflict terribly. We stonewall, work around each other, withdraw to sulk for hours/days when called out, or at worst lash out verbally. I already find it hard to understand and articulate my emotional needs. It doesn't help when he seems to want clear black and white rules that don't ever have to change according to what's going on with me or accommodate me when I'm struggling. Do you have any tips on how to get started addressing this pattern?

When both parties handle conflict terribly, it's like the blind leading the blind. Since there isn't someone skilled enough to steer things in the right direction, it might be necessary to get expert help from a neutral third party in couple's therapy. It sounds like you both have a lot to learn about relationships. While it's possible to get tips online or read books to make some improvements to the situation, it might not be enough to help you tackle the deeper issues. Therapy is often a more efficient option because the learning is tailored to your specific needs and you get real-time guidance and practice.

Relationship skill is actually a set of skills including things such as: emotional intelligence, stress management, assertiveness, communication, negotiation, conflict resolution, moral reasoning. While it may seem overwhelming to think of how much there is to learn, you can view it as an investment. After all, you spent many years of your life learning reading, writing, and arithmetic so that you could one day be able to support yourself financially. Isn't it just as important to be able to handle yourself well socially in order to live a truly fulfilling life? If you agree, then you should be more than willing to put in the time and effort to learn these skills.

From your description, it's not yet clear to me that your spouse is as up to the task of learning as you are, so this seems like the first major issue that needs to be addressed. Imagine that you're learning to drive and you believe you must follow every little rule of the road at all times, in exactly the way the driver's manual taught you. Would doing this make you a "good" driver? Actually, it could make you a terrible driver and even create dangerous situations. An important aspect of being a great driver is adjusting to the immediate conditions of the road. For instance, driving in a snowstorm requires you to slow down, drive defensively, and grant leeway for others to make mistakes on the ice.

Generally speaking, human beings have succeeded as a species not because of rules, but because they have evolved to be highly adaptable, which keeps them in touch with reality and able to confront the challenges of their ever changing circumstances. Adaptability is especially important in relationships because social interactions are very fluid situations, with lots of variables in motion, with lots of potential for unexpected events. The more you can take the whole social context into consideration, the more likely you are to speak effectively and make good social choices. Emotional intelligence is one important way to increase your mental flexibility and thereby your adaptability, which you can read about in the dedicated articles I've already provided.

Of course, human beings need some rules because life would get too chaotic and fall apart otherwise. However, when a person relies too heavily on rules, they become more and more mentally inflexible, and then rule following can easily become a mental health issue that creates more problems than it solves. (I have discussed before how an exacting rule-based approach to life can be a sign of psychological immaturity.)

Mental flexibility isn't a genetic trait, rather, it's largely learned through environmental influences. This is an important point because mentally inflexible people tend to claim "this is just how I am". This is true only to the extent that people can become more and more set in their habits as they get older. However, this decline into stasis is not inevitable and it does not preclude the possibility of change. In fact, one should actually nurture the ability to change periodically in order to keep the mind active and stave off cognitive decline in old age.

It's quite possible to improve mental flexibility, but, first, a person has to acknowledge that their mental inflexibility is a problem that produces self-sabotaging behavior. Once they can admit the problem, they can address the underlying causes. For example:

- Some people feel as though they need fixed rules because they are afraid of making mistakes, getting caught by the unexpected, or feeling unmoored in unfamiliar situations. The underlying issue is often insecurity, low self-confidence, or distrust of the world. They don't feel as though they can handle situations successfully without rules to guide them through the challenges. Unfortunately, they don't realize that their strict belief in the rules is precisely what prevents them from being able to perform well on their feet. They usually need to learn and practice acceptance, in order to relax and go with the flow better.

- Some people only know to follow rules because they suffer from an utter lack of imagination. The underlying issue is often a stubborn narrow-mindedness or short-sightedness. For them, everything in life exists within the confines of the rules, which means life easily becomes stagnant. They never accept new ideas and thus never encounter ways to improve or progress. Eventually, life moves on without them and they become a relic of the past. This kind of alienation is a painful state. However, if they can acknowledge that pain, it can be used to motivate change and rejoin the flow of life. They usually need to learn and practice open-mindedness, in order to take advantage of good opportunities to move forward.

- Some people rely too much on fixed rules because they use laziness as a defense mechanism. They don't want to deal with complexity, complications, ambiguity, or shades of gray. The underlying issue is often an unwillingness to commit. They simply don't care enough to put out time and effort, often because their efforts have been met with disappointment too many times in the past. They may use rules as easy mental shortcuts or hide behind the rules to avoid being held accountable for bad decisions. Eventually, they fall into deep existential boredom that infects their relationships and drives people away. Their relationships won't improve until they can finally confront and resolve their fear of commitment.

- Some people harp on the rules out of arrogance. They take too much pride in their ability to follow the rules and in having the willpower to resist straying from them. The underlying issue is often egotism or perfectionism. They use rule abidance as a way to define people's worth and cast moral judgment upon those they dislike, and they might even lord the rules over people in order to feel superior. Unfortunately, their perfectionist enforcement of the rules can lead to blowback that worsens aggression in a vicious cycle. Until they can step back, reflect, and become more aware of what's really driving the perfectionism, their relationships will remain extremely shallow and unfulfilling for everyone involved.

I don't know your spouse, so I can't tell you why he's mentally inflexible. Perhaps he's resistant because he doesn't want to face up to his own shortcomings. However, it's important to acknowledge that, in many cases, relationship problems are rooted in the unresolved psychological issues of the individual. Thus, it is necessary to do a certain amount of self-work in order to be a better partner.

Psychological issues shouldn't be viewed as "personal failings" to be ashamed of. It's better to view psychological issues as matters of ignorance - lack of knowledge and skill - that can be properly remedied through learning, study, and practice. Many people think they should go to therapy because there's something wrong with them. In my view, therapy isn't about "fixing" what's "wrong" with oneself in any moral sense. Rather, it's about learning the knowledge and skills you missed out on for whatever reason earlier in life. You aren't born knowing everything and you don't always have the opportunity to learn all the tools you need to tackle life's problems.

Relationships are the prime example. People learn their approach to relationships unconsciously as children, through observing their parents, authority figures, and peers (see: attachment theory). This can be a problem when those people weren't good role models or were bad at relationships, thus passing on unhealthy ways to the next generation. As an adult, it's important to realize your true power. You don't have to keep those unhealthy lessons you learned earlier in life. You can learn how to do better at any time as long as there is opportunity and access to the right learning resources. Your motivation to learn should come from deep within you, from a longing to make the most of your potential.

Is there enough willingness to learn and improve, though? Resistance to learning new things is a big obstacle in personal growth and relationship growth. In order to establish the right frame of mind for growth, both you and your spouse have to nurture as much openness to learning as possible. Once the both of you are equally motivated and committed to improving, the learning can begin in earnest.

My suggestion is usually to start at the surface and move your way down into deeper territory as necessary, which allows you to go gradually from easy to difficult in a logical fashion. The first thing you could learn is better ways of communicating, e.g.: choosing more appropriate words; using more constructive language; framing ideas in a way that is more palatable to the listener; listening more carefully to the real meaning; asking clarifying questions in a neutral manner; etc. A therapist can help you with this and you can also consult the communication books I've recommended on the resources page.

In the process of improving your communication skills, you're bound to meet some obstacles. For example, you may find it difficult to communicate when emotions are heightened. This obstacle points to a deeper issue beneath the surface of the communication of not being able to manage emotions well. Thus, the second layer to work on would be emotional intelligence. When you're working on that, another obstacle may arise, such as a past hurt that keeps triggering heightened emotions. Exploring and resolving that past experience would then be the third layer to work on. And so on and so forth.

In short, each obstacle you run into while learning a psychological skill might point you to a deeper problem. In this way, you gradually get deeper and deeper until you finally bump up against the heart of the matter. There is no timeline I can give you as to how long this learning process takes because there's no telling how deep the matter goes until you get there. It really depends on the individuals involved and how much work each of them needs to do. For some couples, improving communication might be enough to get the relationship back on track. For other couples, they might eventually realize that individual therapy is necessary for healing old psychological issues before they can recommence together.

It's important to be patient and take one step at a time rather than focus too much on the end result. There is always hope to mend and salvage a relationship as long as both parties are willing to make some necessary changes and meet up somewhere in the middle.

#relationships #development #mental flexibility #adaptability #communication #ask

[nabateaprodigy]

Why I Love Rosado

Notes: This will include a full discussion of Rosado as well as other characters such as Golfmary and Hortensia (although not as much.) So I do recommend playing Engage for Yourself and seeing Rosado's support. Or just watching a play-through and videos of his support on YouTube.

Of course, you don't have to do any of this and I will not include story spoilers. Just something I thought I'd let you know about before reading! :)

He's very friendly and easy to approach. I struggle with just being open with new people and making friends. But I feel like if I knew someone like Rosado I could just right up to them and start talking about what the both of us like.

He loves cute things as a male growing up people I would always get questions about why I liked "cute and girly things." I never had an honest answer other than I was drawn to them and they made me happy. However, their eyes and just the way they spoke would always make me sad and that something was wrong when of course it isn't.

Even though I had to deal with a lot of that when I was and even still to this day. I've tried not to let affect me as much and enjoy what I like just as Rosado does.

He's very cute! (♥´∀｀)／

As seen in his support with Goldmary Rosado doesn't want the stress of being bad at something. Almost gives up right away when he feels no good at it. However, get the motivation to keep going from Goldmary.

Myself and many others can probably relate to this I know I do a lot. I just feel useless and that I'm no good at what I'm attempting to do. If isn't something that doesn't need I give up after a while. However, if it's something I like or am passionate about I do keep on trying.

Again with his support in Goldmary, I feel like I can get too much into my hobbies or sometimes myself in general. Not that I'm a person of confidence or anything like that. But I do tend to ignore my studies and focus on my hobbies.

But recently I've been trying to change that to put more effort into my studies and more importantly myself.

Another thing I like about him is how he just lives his life doing what he wants and what makes me happy. Due to family and my personal life, I'm not fully there to live my desired life. However, for the future, I have a clear mindset of how I'll do and most importantly be happy while doing it.

It does hurt especially from family to not be able to do such things now. However, once I'm able to I'll live life how I want to be happy while doing so.

another thing I like about him is that he's an artist! For starters, I'm not an artist myself although I've always wanted to be. I've had the goal of becoming talented at art but never taken the steps to do so.

However, because of my love and appreciation for Rosado, I feel like it might give me the push I need to start becoming an artist! I'm sure others can similarly relate to this. Always wanting to become talented at something but getting that push from something or someone.

That's the feeling I get from Rosado and just hearing him and other characters discuss his art.

Another thing I love about Rosado is how feminine he is. It's obvious to see from just looking at him and it's often I see something discussed a lot. As I said before I like cute things and just feel judgement from people because of that.

I also feel this way in how I wish to present myself with things such as clothing and hairstyle.

I've known since I was very young just like the cute things I loved so much. Being more feminine was something I was just drawn to and made me happy. I just loved it and wanted to be that way however I'm not sure how I learned it.

Other than just well being male and growing up and seeing how other males dress, act, and what they like.

Being feminine as a male wasn't something I saw much if at all growing up and what I was exposed to. However, growing up and being exposed to the internet and social media I learned that were people who were just like I was. It just made me so happy to see that words can't describe it other than happiness.

However, I did of course find out it wasn't all that accepted. My mother was someone who was like that who didn't want or even to see me see that. It just felt very discouraging and made me feel rather sad.

I had something I liked something that made me feel happy but I couldn't have that happiness.

A part of me just wanted to drop everything and almost completely forget about dressing more feminine. But I always kept it at the back of my head and nerve truly forgot about it. Honestly, I'm glad I did as through the years I've seen more representation for it.

At least for now, I can't be that way myself it makes me happy to see other people like that and representation of it in media.

Another thing I should probably talk about is something that happened before the release and first appearance of Rosado. At first, people thought that Rosado might be a transgender character. This was due to his appearance and I believe his Japanese VA.

His Japanese VA from what I heard has voiced characters whose gender is not made so clear.

When it was revealed that Rosado was a man. All I saw was disappointment and to a certain extent, I can understand this. Having transgender presentations where have been would have been amazing for the Fire Emblem series.

However, it was all just speculation and hopes and I feel people just set themselves up for disappointment. You should never give yourself the hope of something if it's not made clear. Although I do understand the confusion because of his appearance and the fact we only heard his Japanese voice.

But I want to say I'm glad he isn't transgender as if he were it would have taken away what makes Rosado so special. He wouldn't have meant as much as he does now if he were transgender. As in one, I wouldn't be able to closely connect and relate to him.

I also don't like transgender head cannons for him either. As I have said it just takes a very important part of him away from what makes him so special to me. So I just prefer not to see those types of head cannons for him at all.

Now I just want to say I'm not transphobic Although I realise now that might not help my case. And I apologize if I have come across that way. But I just want you to understand people will not like or accept certain head cannons being applied to characters.

If you headcannon Rosado as transgender that's perfectly fine but I do not.

Anyway from the 2 previous things I have just discussed I felt like they have probably brought down the mood a little. So it's best to move into something more light-hearted!

Another thing I love about Rosado is his wanting to see others happy to be who they truly are and not hide themselves. It's something that just makes me happy and great to see. It's like he has a keen eye to see a person for who they truly are and wants to see this side of a person.

I'm just something like this is something all of us could greatly appreciate.

Although I know it mostly if ever happens in reality. It's nice to see the characters in Engage accept Rosado and not be judged for how he decides to present himself.

I'm guessing this has to do with how Rosado was raised. In the village he grew up in being male or female there were never any exceptions for you because of your gender. Everyone accepts you for who you are and how you choose to present yourself.

I'm sure if the entire world was like Rosado's village the world would be a happier place.

I'm sure many of us are happy with who we are and proud of that fact. Just no matter what and who is different we we're happy because of those differences. This is something Rosado wants everyone to know just because you're different from someone else doesn't mean you're less than him.

Your differences are what make you well you! That's something Rosado wants everyone to know and I admire him because of this.

Yet another thing I love about him is something similar to about character from another game Basil from Omori. He takes pictures of his friends when they least expect it to. So that in the photo it captures a beautiful and honest moment of them.

In the photo you can see the person for who they are and not for some act they put on.

This can be seen with Rosado and Hortensia in Engage. As a princess Hortensia will have to act and be a certain way even if she and others hate it but it's something that's expected from her. Rosado hates this most of all and draws pictures of Hortensia when she's just "Hortensia" and not "Princess Hortensia."

It relates to other things Rosado has said in the past and other things he has an opinion on. So it's just important to be whoever you and that's it's okay to be different as that makes you beautiful.

#fire emblem #fire emblem engage #fe engage #rosado #rosado fire emblem #fire emblem rosado

[objectivistnerd]

good blogs to follow for politics stuff?

I can't in good conscience give a recommendation without first telling you to try going outside (or failing that, trying video games) instead of developing an interest in politics.

This isn't total do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do because I used to be way, way more politically-engaged and can't say I got too much for it. The combination of circumstances that led me out of that darkness probably aren't easy to recreate, though I can say that reading The Sequences went a long way to helping me see through the fog of tribalism. More actionably, I basically quit Twiblr for a few months earlier this year because I was too busy bingeing fantasy novels and playing Civ VI. (Having good coworkers and meatspace friends probably helped.)

The best stuff probably isn't on Tumblr. If you want blogs, I recommend Scott Alexander's substack and the archives of his old blog, and usually appreciate the posts I read from Noah Smith and Matt Yglesias, though I wouldn't describe myself as a regular reader of either. Sadly, most of the Neoliberal Project crowd seems stuck on TwXitter, and I'm not going to tell you to spend time on a website where you gotta pay to longpost. A few notable blogs (which I don't read) from that cluster include Some Unpleasant Arithmetic and Word Rotator.

Tumblr is superior among the socials for enabling actually meaningful discussions. Often the best stuff comes from people you wouldn't expect. Posts are usually better than the blogs that produce them. I try to collect good posts more than I try to follow good blogs, because actually good blogs are few and far between.

If you must have recommendations of Tumblr blogs, though, a few accounts which are more likely to produce or surface good political, economic, and meta-political content while not spewing total garbage constantly or posting lots of non-politics content include: @centrally-unplanned @eightyonekilograms @iates @isaacsapphire @marginal-cost and @powermonger. Any omissions naturally represent direct personal insults and I expect all of you to name your seconds before the week is out.

In all seriousness, I do not necessarily endorse any particular view the above take (and in fact do not even follow several of them) so much as appreciate their commentary on particular subjects. You can, of course, follow @argumate to be exposed to more discourse bloggers than you could possibly ask for and sort at your own leisure. Due to his continued efforts many old posts from good bloggers no longer active still circulate; many of my favorite bloggers fall into that category, which I have not included. I will make an unprincipled exception to point out that @theunitofcaring wrote some excellent posts before getting a real job.

You'll notice I'm recommending a lot of people from the Less Wrong diaspora. That's because talking about politics with people who haven't read Politics is the Mind-killer, Meditations on Moloch, and I Can Tolerate Anything Except The Outgroup is generally a waste of time. You'll get so much mileage and insight out of Yudkowsky and Alexander's top posts that it's hard to put into words.

That's a long answer to a short question. Hope it helps.

#i think this is the first time i've been asked for blog recs since obama was president so i'm a bit out of practice #ambivalentright #ask

[isabellehemlock]

🔥 ask game: 4, 8, 16

Hi Sindi! Thanks for sending me an ask 😎

Since you're all things TOG I hope it's alright to assume these questions for that fandom, so that's through the lens I'll be answering with 🤗

4. What was the last straw that made you finally block that annoying person?

I have "I block liberally" in my bio for a reason lol.

I mean, I strive not to label anyone by adjectives as if that's all they are - and lol, plenty of people find me annoying, too! - but looking at my blocked list, the majority overall theme (keeping in mind there's individual circumstances too, so not a general commentary on every single person blocked) but yeah, the majority? People who stalk and harass people across platforms - over nothing more than what they ship, kinks, etc.

Like I'm not talking about someone who sends their friend a post and wants to discuss to process or something - but like coordinated campaigns, spite events, efforts of several people across platforms, not only against one person but anyone associates with them, and/or telling people what public spaces they're allowed to be in, what ship positions they should or should not write, events they engage in, who to talk to, etc etc.

It's one thing to write on your own personal blog what you're into, and would love to see more of (I do that, too!) - but once it slides into one on one hounding, name calling, harassment, yeah, bye.

8. Common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

Okrrr I'm hesitant to call it "wrong" because well, in life there's always exceptions, so maybe uh, let's reframe as ill-informed? And really, this isn't fandom's fault when the one effin piece of marketing Netflix did was string together a few random bullet points of "facts" for our Immortal Family and then a chunk of people have been dissecting the conflicting comic, movie, and now blink-and-you'll-miss-it marketing of said movie ever since (including, but certainly not limited to: where is Joe from, and why was he in Jerusalem?)

But as someone who's background and studies involve Church history, I'll admit I've been a bit 🫠 at some of the things stated as "facts" in regard to Nicky’s background. I'm not suggesting that someone should have to study up on any given subject in order to write fic (like, it's free fic, not a thesis), but I'm surprised how prevalent it is?

Just this narrative that Nicky *had* to be of noble birth, *and* automatically be more learned than Joe, *and* was a virgin *and* essentially wore his cassock right under the armor onto the battlefield (I'm having a little fun with that last one to lighten the mood lol).

Since I know I like to be informed when someone presents historical facts - I'll link a few articles and links below:

@qqueenofhades wrote an excellent post about the why a priest would not be wielding a weapon - and here's a book about how the Church forbade it, though (ironically, out of the Crusades) thoughts shifted about the Church being actively involved in the sense of authorizing and even directing military campaigns - but again, the average priest maybe had a weapon in the 1200s, and solely for the sake of self protection while traveling. But no, your average parish priest wasn't swinging a long sword onto the battlefield in his cassock.

Here's some information about how non nobles could become priests, or heck, even illegitimate children of priests could become priests.

And yes, 100% there was a social hierarchy within the Church and often to climb it you were likely educated and noble etc etc etc - and yet our Church history does include having illiterate popes, too (and really, just because someone is illiterate doesn't mean they are unlearned or stupid or incapable of learning it at any time. It doesn't have to be an either/or).

And though of course celibacy was encouraged from the beginning, the Church did not make an official decree about it until the 1100s. Priests had families and children - though not often - and yes, there were definitely clergy and religious who were not interested in making, much less, upholding vows of chastity around Nicky’s mortal timeline.

All that to say, that though it's not impossible that a random priest (perhaps a military chaplain ministering to soldiers?) found himself needing to grab a sword on the battlefield in the chaos around him (because perhaps he had a few years of training with a sword as a kid before being sent to a monastary?) - I don't think it was the given I've seen some people declare it as?

But here's the sad truth: Nicky is just a fictional character with conflicting canon sources. So, there will always be discourse. Sigh.

However, for anyone reading along and looking for more resources for their Crusades fic, I've written one up here, and linked not only other sources, but from @actualmermaid resource post as well as the old guard hub resource doc.

16. You can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

Hmmmm I'm not sure if I'm like deeply offended by any particular tropes/canon as much as I filter out certain tags due to personal reasons, etc - I mean even the whole Nicky priest discourse is (for some) potentially rooted in priest kink love lol, so I mean, to each his own?

I definitely filter out the noncon that has happened between Joe and Nicky, but again, that has more to do with personal reasons vs say, a judgment on content (though please pleaseeeee tag it properly).

If you've made it down to here, bless ~ I know this was potentially a heavier reply than what the game was looking for 👀

#answered ask #choose violence ask #discourse #fandom stuff #this isn't commentary about anyome enjoying priestNicky #i blame Netflix really #I'm just answering the ask in regards to historical context #kats catholic commentary

[sleepyowlwrites]

15 Questions for Copper

I have two tags from Breezy, so you get a Copper one and a Rune one, so all three of our mains will be taken care of. in honor of the efforts of my tagger, I'll try and make this one more creative than Jet's. tho. Jet's was always going to be straightforward. that's who he is. anyway. @blind-the-winds (sidenote: my playlist for you SLAPS)

Yarrow skips up to Copper, a notepad and pen clutched in his hands. "I have a request!"

Copper eyes Yarrow over the rim of his coffee-to-go cup. "Am I so favored that you're going to draw me?"

"No." Yarrow taps the pen on his arm. "I mean, sure. I can draw you, if you want. I like it to be spontaneous, and the vibes to be so bright they're sparking at me, you know? Right now I have a different request."

"Okay." Copper perches on the arm of Moss' couch. "What is it?"

"First of all, do not sit on the arm. Moss will make you clean the garage if you do that. Second, and more importantly," Yarrow continues as Copper moves down to the cushions with a disgruntled sigh, "I would like to interview you."

Copper frowns up at him. "Didn't you already interview Jet?"

"Yes," Yarrow says impatiently, "and he was terrible. I should've anticipated it. It was too boring to use. Please help me out!"

"Okay." Copper pulls his feet up and then stops to kick off his shoes when Yarrow gives him a look. He situates himself on the couch, cross-legged.

"Okay!" Yarrow sits beside him, pen poised to write down the answers.

1. Are you named after anyone?

"Not as far as I know. I think Jet and I were named after 'objects of middling value to keep us grounded' or that could just be the excuse my parents gave to people who asked."

Yarrow scribbles that down. "Jet didn't say anything about that."

"Are you surprised?"

"No."

2. When was the last time you cried?

Copper sips his latte. "Last week, I guess, when Jet and I had another discussion."

"About how he's allowed to feel things?"

"Yeah."

3. Do you have any kids?

Copper just raises a brow.

"It's in the questions! I didn't pick them, I just ask them."

"No."

Yarrow writes "NO" on his pad. "Would you?"

Copper scratches gently at the skin on his wrist. "Maybe."

4. Do you use sarcasm?

"Sure, you've heard me use it. Mostly with Jet and Jet 2.0."

Yarrow eyes Copper curiously. "Honestly I think she shares just as many similarities with you."

Copper chews on his cheek.

6. What’s your eye color?

"Golden-y brown, if I'm allowed to be specific."

"You are. I think they're a pretty dark gold, though."

"Let me have this."

7. Scary movies or happy endings?

"Happy endings, 100%. Real life has plenty of scares in it already."

"What scares have you faced?" Yarrow adds a checkmark for flair.

Copper looks at his latte. "Well. There was the whole being separated from my brother for no discernable reason."

Yarrow just nods slowly to that.

8. Any special talents?

"I like to think I have a knack for reading people, but it seems more like I'm just good at reading Jet." Copper looks at his latte again. "I'm pretty good at retaining what I read. And I can guess people's ages most of the time."

"You can get Hawk to socialize with the rest of us."

Copper chuckles without noise. "Is that a talent?"

"I'm counting it."

9. Where were you born?

"Here, but many, many streets away." Copper gulps at his rapidly cooling drink. "Haven't been back there in a while."

10. What are your hobbies?

"Do I even have any right now?"

Yarrow shrugs. "I thought it was the labor-intensive rehabilitation of Jet's emotional spectrum."

Copper exhales sharply. "You- really have a talent for hitting at situations, huh."

"I'm just observant." Yarrow half-smiles.

11. Have you any pets?

"No. Pets aren't my thing, anyway."

12. What sports do you play/have played?

Copper laughs for real this time. "Jet has tried everything with me. If it includes a ball or some kind of object in motion, he's attempted to teach it to me. I kinda took to basketball for a while, but it was only fun playing with Jet, since, you know, he's my height."

13. How tall are you?

"174cm."

"Is that how tall Jet is?"

Copper pouts. "He's 175 now, apparently. I thought it would bother me."

"It doesn't?"

"Only in the most superficial sense."

14. Favorite subject in school?

"History, which is ultimately why I studied anthropology. I just like looking at how humans dealt with being humans throughout the timeline. The things that changed. The things that never did. We're all still people, whatever time our stories happened, and we could never stop telling them."

Yarrow smiles as he writes. "You can be poetic when you want to be."

"Thanks, I guess."

15. Dream job?

"Honestly?" Copper leans against the couch, suddenly tired. "I don't know. All I think about these days is whatever Jet is up to, and that situation doesn't seem about to resolve swiftly. I can't think about long-term for me until I know what might happen in the short-term. The priority is not losing Jet again."

"That's not wrong, you know." Yarrow sets his notebook aside. "You don't have to have lofty dreams or super detailed goals. You can just live right now and treasure what you have. I mean. Time doesn't stop and you have to look forward sometime, but you're a forward looking person by nature. I think it's good for you to look at right now."

Copper turns his head into the couch. "And you're a person who always looks at right now."

"I look at the spectrum," Yarrow corrects. "I just always choose to look at right now because that's what I want to. I could learn from you."

"We can learn from each other, then," Copper says, just a little breathless.

Yarrow reaches out to hold Copper's hand. "We absolutely can."

I'm a little late to this, so if there's anybody who hasn't done this yet, OPEN TAG! and uh @enchanted-lightning-aes @nopoodles @mel-writes-with-her-dragons @sarahlizziewrites @rains-inky-mind ?

I guess I should also use the taglist: @zoya-writes @oh-no-another-idea @selene-stories @diphthongsfordays @wildswrites

#tag game #wip: city story

[spoonsforminutes]

I keep seeing posts of people hating on afab autistics (with the word white tacked onto it for people to sound progressive) accusing ‘low support/high functioning’ (put it in quotation marks because I know people don’t like functioning labels including me) afabs of ‘centring ourselves’ in the autism community especially on social media, accusing us of turning autism into a ‘quirk/superpower’ and saying we aren’t taking it seriously. What’s worse, a recent post I saw was by an autistic woman herself! When I called her a misogynist, she said I was ‘misunderstanding’ her post 😡

I understood perfectly well the ever ongoing debate on how there are ‘too many autistic afabs’ now. It was baffling to me that OP has a pretty large following for posting content on how she is constantly treated badly for being afab, then contributes to the stigma and responds to autism moms accusing afabs of ‘minimising’ our condition?!! I lost all my sympathy for them.

Idk, I’m just tired of afabs constantly being told we are taking resources, and now even ‘space’ online (can’t friggin win) when talking about health conditions/autism. We are always ‘taking from people who have it worse’ according to others. We are ‘taking high support needs people’s voices’. Exhausting.

I MEANT TO ANSWER THIS IN APRIL IM SO SORRY

With everything that's been going on in the sphere of gender issues, it's definitely made me realize that quite a few women or afab individuals have taken the misogynistic treatment they faced and then projected it onto others, perhaps as a way to process all the hurt and trauma. It's definitely not okay to do, but oftentimes projection is a way that people try to soothe themselves, but all it does is create more problems. As an afab individual myself who largely acts able-bodied despite the harm it does to my health, I've had a lot of people attempt to use my femininity to both praise my damaging work ethic while also sowing doubt into my own abilities, which is super fucking ableist to anyone regardless of their disability. Feminism should work to be more inclusive because whenever there are discussions around women's rights, a lot of it is rightfully on empowering women and balancing out gender inequality, but I don't think a lot of it can apply to those with disabilities. I think bout what happened to the term "girlboss": originally, it tries to empower women and womanhood to positions of power, but then the term became a meme and with it, all of its credibility was lost. Sexism turned it into a term where women in power can be ridiculed because "girlbossing" has shifted where the idea of afab individuals receiving authority is treated as a mockery due to undeserved effort, and that's ultimately what sexism is: anything outside of manhood and traditional masculinity is not given the same respect and thus allows anyone to degrade a whole person's effort based on their gender alone.

I hate functioning labels as well because by that logic, the fact that I'm college-educated and working makes it seem like I don't require support, but I do. EVERYONE needs support, but because the U.S. in particular is obsessed with individuality, community and mutual aid has been ridiculed by the capitalist mindset. Although I'm not autistic, I've had quite a few autistic friends, and genuinely I think autism is so cool. Like with my own disability, it can definitely suck ass, but everyone I've known with autism has strengths surrounding intelligence and humor. What's so wrong with considering it a superpower? It's literally your life and how you function, and especially since many able-bodied people want to make disability and neurodiversity a bad thing so that they can shame you, refusing to play into that and empowering yourself is huge. Plus, it's genuinely fun to upset people by being yourself. And since this particular autistic woman is complaining about both gender and autism, her projection just shows why ableism needs to be openly discussed and pointed out. I will probably struggle with internalized ableism all my life because neither culture nor disability awareness currently allow me to truly live life WITH a disability. Unfortunately, I feel that too much of the conversation is still about hiding or minimizing disability to appease the thoughts of others.

Sexism is also the reason for why people will complain about too many afab individuals with autism. I feel like the autistic community is well aware of the difficulties in being afab and getting a diagnosis because sexism is alive and well in our perspective of health. While getting my degree, I realized that gym bros are not actually wrong when they talk bout health and fitness; the actual issue again stems from how we view health and disability. Not only are gym bros operating on this assumption that everyone's health is fully able-bodied, but also they assume that every health issue can be fixed with a healthy lifestyle which isn't true? Ignoring the fact that research still uses white cisgender male data as the human physiological default, if you have an enzyme that doesn't function correctly in metabolism, intense exercise will definitely make you sicker, not better. It's the same with disability. With autism, the diagnostic criteria is supposed to help identify what possible supports you could need, but it still depends on what is actually helpful to you personally. With this economic crisis and the potential downfall of capitalism, disability is actually a great way to talk bout how capitalism isn't possible for anyone because productivity and the economy are talked about as if they are magical forces instead of behavior carried out by people. Capitalism pushes even able-bodied standards, so by supporting disability, we can also argue for better conditions for everyone, but that's the ideal scenario.

I ramble a lot when I write because writing is essentially how I think, but yeah, it's unfortunate that she's currently using her platform to push harmful ideas about gender, disability, and autism. No matter how severe your disability is, there is no such thing as taking away needed resources because those resources are for you. It's great if you don't need as much support as others, but if you need support, you should absolutely be allowed to do anything that makes your life easier. I'm largely going to be ignoring what society thinks bout disability and even about life in general because doing what society thinks has only ever hurt me. It's very funny to me when people try to complain about marginalized people as if we're the problem, not the people and the systems who reinforce the perspective that asking for help, asking for accommodations, is somehow a big ask. It's not, and I think we should be more mean about it because it's wild that we let people dictate what kind of support we can ask for.

To all of my autistic followers: hope you had a wonderful April, and please feel free to correct me on anything! I'm always learning, and your voice is incredibly important.

#disabled #disability #spoonie #mental health #neurodivergent #neurodiversity #autism spectrum disorder #autism #gender #cw ableism #i dont get why people try to dictate what others do #we aren't playing oppression Olympics #you dont have to suffer to prove you deserve help #wedding speaks

[opinated-user]

It utterly baffles me how racist LO can be on some subjects (see: Anything made in Japan that is not KH or Pokémon) and massively reverse racist on others (her hatred of "emo white boys, fetishism on POC, ect.)

Her latest bit where she said "Look for non-white authors" just rubbed me the wrong way just now. I get wanting to boost POC, but wouldn't recommending specific POC authors be a much better way to make that reccomendation than dismissing ALL white authors when that list likely has good ones too?

God I really hope I don't come off as racist by being upset by that comment. I'm a white author that writes white characters because that is what I know. I don't like my writing being automaticly dismissed over something I have no control over.

i think you're missing the point of her post. she wasn't just saying to look for non-white authors as some form of "reverse racism", she was saying that non white authors don't write tropey "abusive" romance and that's why you should choose them.

not because racism in fandom exist. not because non white author don't get in average any of the mainstream attention afforded to white authors. not because non white main characters don't get as much attention as they should. not because there are excelent, brilliant POC authors out there that you should check out because they make good art. she's right that a good literature diet should include author from different perspectives. she's right that social media around books make very little effort to be more diverse on their literature (if you have been around spaces for Booktok, booktube or similars you can't keep missing the videos/posts of people talking about this). but her reasoning is still being "POC would never write the crap nasty white women do", which is both untrue and also a massive misogyny stamp being passed off as progressive somehow. you should want to read POC authors because many of them are brilliant and you'll benefit from reading their works... not because you hate white women and what they do. not because you hate tropes. not because you think fandom and everything it does is gross. POC authors are worth reading without including any "white woman" in the discussion. on top of that, if the only reason you come out to read POC authors is because "they won't do this kind of romance" then you're bound to be miserably dissapointed. because POC are people at the end of the day, they aren't incapable of writing something bad too. at that point it's not really about POC at all. it's about primarily disparring "white women" (or people you assume are white women without any actual data, wich does result in misgendering or whitewashing people) more than anything else, a thing that LO just keeps doing about everything. she won't hear what SEA people have to say about their own culture and it's representations, because she hates a white woman more.

she won't hear what a black trans woman has to say, because she hates what a white woman does more.

she won't talk about real instances of fandom racism, because she wants to hate on a white boy more.

more than that... LO has no leg to stand when it comes to tropey and abusive romances, when she's the one who keeps creating weird power dynamics between characters that never are challenged except on the most uneffective ways possible on the narrative. on top of that... do you actually believe that LO actually tries to diversify her media intake? when all she talks about is disney and how much white girls and white women and white fictional boys ruin everything? again... you should look for POC authors, just like disabled authors, neurodivergent authors, because many out there are amazing and deserve praise. not because you're like LO and think braggin about never reading fiction outside of fanfiction for the last decade is some kind of win, instead of the reality of making you look fully inadequate to talk about literature at all.

#lily orchard

[olumine]

LET ME SAY IT ANOTHER WAY : i call myself wound, but i will answer to knife.

an independent roleplay blog for the traveler, lumine / ying from genshin impact, as written by kendall (21+, he/she). minors dni. exploring themes of war, violence, blinding light, gender, being an alien, dehumanizing the hero, adrift in a world not your own, and more.

this blog will stay low activity. minimal formatting. mostly minimal effort. i don't have the energy these days for extensive rpc aesthetics, though i'll spring for a funny little icon every once in awhile. extremely headcanon dependent + canon divergent -- i've completely overhauled everything, down to the character design. not involved in the genshin fandom at large on basically any grounds. please note that while i don't consider myself particularly "selective," i am very busy. heavily affiliated with @kunigutsu's scaramouche, @bezdnayaks childe, & @yanwangye's zhongli.

under heavy construction!

(more extensive pages are under construction, but between the wiki & the caveats i've written below, i'm happy to mess around with plot & answer any questions til then.)

interaction .

as it is, standard interaction rules apply. other than the usual (don't be pushy, don't be a bigot, don't be weird), i'm very chill, i like to plot, to discuss interesting dynamics, & i'm good with every format of writing short to long. i'm fairly new here in terms of genshin impact but have been rping on tumblr for way too long at this point, & i'm coming back after an extended break. one thing, i really prefer it when ideas are exchanged mutually rather than one-way, so if we're plotting, please feel free to hit me with whatever & i'll match that energy!

portrayal .

okay, here's the big thing. please take a moment to briefly read over my interpretation of the traveler! while i enjoy the core lore of the traveler, i'm interested in pushing the personality + characterization notions gestured at by the game and playing around with them, pushing them to different limits. as it stands, my idea of lumine is quite. quite overhauled, so i'd appreciate any double-checking before assumptions are made. i don't own anything beyond the concepts i personally came up with, obviously. as it stands, this is a work in progress always, i'm still making my way through the full plot to boot, so bear with me. also, i am comfortable with duplicates, being followed by and interacting with!

biggest notes .

— my lumine is genderless, and is socially read as on the masculine side of the presentation spectrum. while i'll use she/her for ease, this is NOT a girl. no gender in space, and all that. this definitely includes her canon design! while i might reblog or like art that is designed in alignment with canon, that's not actually how i see her at all. give her pants. bigger muscles. strong strong hands. i'll write notes up on it in the future at some point. — genshin impact's got some, huh, things going on in terms of weird age gesturing while still being plenty sexualized. don't know what that's about. don't like it. don't subscribe to it. lumine is, appearance wise, mid 20s, but much older than that in actuality, obviously. — vital here, i basically do not know about fanon, i just got here, but what i've seen scares me so so so bad. i do not jive with essentially any of the "blushy, soft, ultra-squishy" of lumine. again! dni! — she's a fighter, intense, a little adrenaline-fueled. rougher around the edges, a little angrier, a little pushier; a little bit rude and sharp and to the point at times. i portray her with the idea that while she is helpful, she can be a bit begrudging, a bit worn through and over it, and absolutely not liked by most people she comes into contact with. i'm very down to explore dynamics that are more fraught than friendly.

character thesis in the meanwhile! scroll to the bottom for a bonus picrew of the babygirl.

The Cosmic Terror Of Light and Light As A Destructive Force

taking the knight thing to its natural conclusion of a girl who is so so so mad all the time and also so so repressed about it, but like, barely.

I Am Asking You To Endure It coding

getting more impulsive and weird as time goes on. already was kind of not cool not normal but objectively getting worse WHILE getting stronger.

you can trust her with your keys and your personal quest but she might deadpan roast you for your problems in the process.

vibes include being Covered In Blood and clearly exhausted but letting paimon hold her hand when she's scared

This Is My Brother And I Need A Shovel To Love Him

the hero has been irrevocably changed by the journey and even if she could go home, home would no longer exist to her! she knows this and is choosing to ignore it.

emphasis on the feeling alien + isolated + not belonging to the world. you're a strange human-thing that doesnt follow any known laws and well, isn't that a bit sad.

#pinned .

[mercerislandbooks]

Thoughts On Summer Reading

As someone who's on social media—specifically the book part of Instagram—a fair amount, I hear a lot about how different people read. Some read the next book they plan to read, have five more books lined up after that, and for the most part they'll get them read in that order. Others read whatever strikes their fancy whenever it strikes their fancy. I am a mood reader at heart, but one who wedges in that library book that she's had checked out for months which she DID really want to read at the time so now she better stop in the middle of her other six current reads to rush through it in time to return it tomorrow... which is exactly what I'm going to resume doing once I finish this blog post. So maybe I'm a mood reader with "obligatory books" hanging over her head. 

Part of being a mood reader is the fluctuation of what I want to read each season. For the fall, witchy books like The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches, Spells for Forgetting, Wild Is the Witch, and The League of Gentlewomen Witches. In the winter it was mostly science fiction by Becky Chambers. But the most talked about season in the reading community has to be summer. Summer reads, beach reads, vacation reads. Light books that you fall into and out of like a summer fling. This fits the traditional idea of summer reads that we all know and love, but the genres included in summer reading lists have expanded over the past few years. We at Island Books put together a shelf full of summer books for every reader, surrounded by sticky notes with suns and right next to our Staff Picks shelf.

Last summer, all I read was romance. Intense feelings crammed into a book I could read in a day. The happy ending, the guarantee of peace and satisfaction. I picked up several fantasy books and put them down again immediately—any effort to learn about a made-up world felt like too much. This summer, rather than a specific genre, I've been catching up on my backlog. I finished the Anne of Green Gables series for the first time and found it delightful. I listened to The City of Brass and all of its sequels while traveling. I read the first two books of The Borrowers, finished the Seafire trilogy, and sped through books two and three of The Thursday Murder Club. I finally pulled out my two-year-old copy of Red, White & Royal Blue and devoured it in twenty-four hours (just in time for the release of the movie on August 11).  Although it's a completely different path than I took last summer, it's been so fun to discover these books for the first time and then discuss them with everyone who already loves them. I look forward to seeing where my mood reading takes me next summer.

Things that make a good summer read (one list does not fit all):

Not too heavy (physically); needs to be light enough to bring on vacation

Not too heavy (content-wise); needs to be light enough to read on a beach

Characters that draw you in

A plot that grips you

Romance

Intense action

...And the list goes on and on.

Bonus points for reading a book that's set on a beach...on a beach. The perfect summer read is so varied from person to person that the most important criteria is to pick up a book that interests you. I look forward to hearing about what you loved as we talk books over the counter.

—Becca

#island books #becca oman #summer reading #thursday murder club #red white and royal blue #becky chambers #anne of green gables #tbr #spells for forgetting #city of brass #the borrowers #wild is the witch #league of gentlewomen witches #very secret society of irregular witches