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maniculum · 3 months

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Bestiaryposting Results: Blisheag

We've got another bird this week, but it looks like people are having fun with it, so let's see what came out of it.

As usual, if you're not sure what this is about, you can see previous material at https://maniculum.tumblr.com/bestiaryposting and follow stuff as it's posted at the tag maniculum bestiaryposting.

The entry our artists are working from this week can be seen here:

Roughly chronological order under the cut, &c. &c., you know how this works.

@silverhart-makes-art (link to post here) notes that the translation choosing to say "bill" instead of "beak" makes them think of ducks, and furthermore how that seems a bit odd that we have these two very similar terms, acknowledge that some birds have beaks and some have bills, and then don't really think about it. That's a pretty interesting point -- I'm tempted to take some time to look up whether there is a defined difference, but I have a post to write and other Tasks waiting in the wings, so please, if you know what that's about, let us know. The line that the Blisheag is an enemy to snakes naturally brought the secretary bird to mind, so here we see it trampling a snake with its talons. (Some of our other artists also made the connection to secretary birds and their practice of stomping snakes -- it's interesting to me that this is apparently a part of Tumblr's collective consciousness.) Also, the coloration is based on the American black duck, which Silverhart describes as "quite a handsome duck", and I have to say the color pattern is pretty nice.

@sweetlyfez (link to post here) has also gone for large talons for stomping snakes, and in the absence of any specific physical details, decided to have some fun with it. I like the choice to give it a turkey-like body and tail combined with a long neck like a flamingo. Sweetlyfez also included the detail in the entry that the Blisheag loses its feathers while diligently incubating its nest, giving it a bald neck and head. I think the effect is kind of charming -- it kind of evokes a flamingo, but since that's bald skin rather than pink feathers, it would probably look closer to a vulture in person.

@cheapsweets (link to post here) has given us a whole group (they helpfully inform us that the collective noun is a "lance") of Blisheags attentively listening to a crow who is perched on a stump. I really like this interpretation of them following crows as guides -- like it's not just an instinctive behavior but they're actively in collaboration with the crows somehow and take verbal direction from them. Something really clever here that's easy to miss if you don't know what you're looking for -- which is why you should make a practice of reading Cheapsweets's linked posts, as they tend to include detailed explanations -- is how they've interpreted the details that describe the Blisheags making creaking & clashing noises and following the crows like an army. Look at those varied head shapes on the different Blisheag subspecies: they're patterned after different styles of knights' helmets. Also, I'd like to thank Cheapsweets for providing their own alt text, and acknowledge that I of course noticed the Stylized Trees.

@coolest-capybara (link to post here) has as usual done some delightful medieval stylization in this week's art. (And provided their own alt text, thank you.) Something I think is really clever here is how she's interpreted "enemies of snakes" as combined with "fly across the sea" -- obviously, when they're migrating, they have to deal with being menaced by sea serpents. Brilliant. As for the actual birds, we see them following crows of course, and apparently in the absence of physical description, Coolest-capybara decided to pattern them after a depiction of a bird in an old church window; if you want to see the window, you should check out the linked post. It's a good bird design, I think.

@pomrania (link to post here) also thought "secretary bird" and decided to run with it. They mention going a bit Seussian in design, and I think it really works. (Also apparently the crow is patterned after the "Crow Time" comics, which Cheapsweets also namechecked, so I suppose I should go look at those at some point.) Aside from the delightfully whimsical look of the bird in general, I think the really clever part of the design is those little round bumps on the end of its beak. They also noted the description of the Blisheag making noise by clashing its bill, and decided to give it a bill that's adapted to making noise -- they describe it as a "roseate spoonbill crossed with a tambourine". I love it.

@strixcattus (link to post here) notes the lack of specific detail but has drawn this ibis-esque bird with a very good curved beak. The gold here is in the description Strixcattus provides to remedy the "lack of detail" problem, which includes more on the nesting practices alluded to in the entry and an explanation of how it hunts snakes -- since, of course, it is the enemy of snakes, as we know. Again, you need to go read all of the worldbuilding naturalist posts Strixcattus has done for this exercise; they're delightful and very well thought out. Also, I think this drawing is the closest to the real bird, so let's go ahead and transition to...

... the Aberdeen Bestiary version. (Note: this time around I straight-up forgot what bird this was supposed to be when I sat down to do this post, but luckily I made a spreadsheet back when I started this that I was able to reference.)

Yep, those are definitely storks. Pretty recognizable depiction, I'd say. Frog looks oddly happy with being caught here.

The migration habits of storks are actually something that comes up in other medieval texts. Pretty sure they're just guessing with "Asia" here; medieval Europeans didn't really know where storks went. The version I like best is in the tradition that includes the Old English Wonders of the East, wherein we are informed that storks are only birds when they summer in Europe -- when they're back home for the winter, they take humanoid form. Really. The text in the Wonders of the East is as follows (translation mine):

There are men born who are 15 feet tall, & they have white bodies & two noses on one head. Their knees are very red, their noses long, and their hair black. When they wish to give birth, they travel on ships to India, and there bring their kin into the world.

Doesn't sound like it's talking about storks? There's a reason for that. The Wonders of the East is actually a great example of Manuscript Telephone. Ann Elizabeth Knock, in her dissertation "Wonders of the East: a synoptic edition of the Letter of Pharasmanes and the Old English and Old Picard translations" (which you can get a PDF version of at this link here), gives us the following view of the original version:

Men are born there with long legs. They are very tall, 12 or 15 feet. They [or, in some versions, just their arms] are white. Their faces are divided. They have red feet. The head is round; they have long noses and black shoulders. At a certain time, they transform into birds. As birds, they breed in [an area familiar to the reader of the Letter]; you call them storks.

The Wonders of the East lost the stork aspect in transmission -- the next entry in the Wonders starts with "There is a land in Gaul called Ciconia", which is the end of the above version being accidentally attached to the next bit and reinterpreted. Ciconia is Latin for "stork", and the version the scribe was copying from probably named Gaul as the area where they went to breed.

(Similarly, traveling on ships in the Wonders of the East is probably a confusion of navis 'ship' and avis 'bird'.)

For more on the Wonders of the East, we did a three-part episode on it back in March 2021, and I later wrote up a summary of the differences between the text we used and Knock's reconstructions at this link here. (Very much summarized, Knock's work is lengthy & detailed & a surprisingly good read for an absolute doorstopper of a dissertation.)

#maniculum bestiaryposting #blisheag

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stardustanddaffodils · 2 years

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HI STARDUST!!!! huge huge apologies for not responding earlier or messaging u at all for the past couple of days, school has kicked up and i am giving myself headaches abt college and whether i want to move out and leave my siblings behind but then also pave a different path for them than that which was set for me and also like. check out what a vague amount of independence is like yk, etc etc it's AWFUL times why'd we decide as a society to do this thing to teenagers

[assuming i did this right, IDs should be in alt text!]

no worries ! i apologize for not answering these, i forgor and then... school >.<

ahhh that is. ye. life is A Lot those r some Big Decisions wishing u the best of luck <3 if u ever need a rubber duck you know where to find me :) oh and i can give u my discord if you want :0

i was thinkin abt a book i read a while back, i will always right back, abt two pen pals in two different continents and their relationship over the years up until they finally meet up n its like. huh. internet friends rly are just modern pen pals kinda. huh

anyways thing. ye. i may post the full thing someday but also im probably just gonna always add to it so. we'll see :)

if we ever meet up, you'd take me to your old home. if we ever meet up, i'd take you to a park long left behind as i grew and moved forward. something about you feels like nostalgia and childhood and home and i'd love to share those places with you, laugh and share memories from before each other that somehow feel shared. maybe you could bring a guitar and i'd borrow a ukulele and we could sing the songs you've showed me and some that you've written. i feel like i've known you forever.

:D <3

we did ask my grandmother & she said she didnt remember and it wasnt important so. erm. but yes you r very right i do not have much to add but you r based and very correct and have very cool thoughts i am nodding enthusiastically

aw yay !!! :DDD interpretation of music/art in general is something that can be so personal.... but as an artist you do not usually. hear your audience's interpretation of your stuff or have a personal relationship with them which. yeah. hopefully its cool. i love how art can mean so many different things and also sometimes it doesnt mean anything sometimes its just. beautiful <3

KSHSF i give them a hard time but. yeah. my family is pretty awesome we are Doing Our Best and i love them <3

GOOD LUCK WITH THE COLLEGING.... thank you for the chai i love chai :D my mom made some earlier which was awesome i stole and finished her cup ksfjfj i am also giving you chai love u ink beloved :D

#ink tag #asks #soryasongsaa #WHEW okay. gonna tackle the rest of The Unanswered Asks.... later i have work to do #the unanswered asks.... thats like a horror movie name or smth LOL

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taeyongdoyoung · 3 years

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summary: you have a crush on college student renjun so you make use of your best lamest flirting attempts and surprisingly they work?!

pairing: renjun x gn!reader

genre: college!au, romance, pure fluff

warnings: very lame jokes, mentions of a cruel prank in the past (someone asking out renjun as a joke, pls never do that to people!), lots of awkwardness & sweetness, a bit of swearing, reader has an obsession with renjun’s pretty hands

word count: 4.7k

It had been a while since you had a crush so strong you even had a hard time focusing in class. Usually, you were a very good student, diligently taking notes and participating when the professor asked questions. But that was until you saw Renjun for the first time.

It was like something possessed you and suddenly you couldn't think about anything else but his pretty, gentle face, his angelic voice and his lovely hands always drawing something in his notebook. It certainly didn't help much that you were seated right next to him during your shared lectures. It most certainly didn't help that you forgot all your vocabulary when you were in his immediate vicinity. Usually, your teachers and friends described you as well-spoken and eloquent, always knowing the right thing to say.

But that was, of course, until Renjun. All words disappeared from your poor brain whenever he was around. And it's not like you didn't want to talk to him, get to know him better. But you physically couldn't bring yourself to form a coherent sentence. You kept telling yourself it was just a silly crush and it would pass in time. But the more time passed, the stronger you felt the need to do something about your feelings. Naturally, you couldn't speak, but there was still something you could do. Something you probably did best. Write.

So one day, after what felt like an eternity of yearning, you finally gathered the courage to act on your emotions. Taking a small sheet of paper out of your notebook, you wrote a little something. It was probably super lame but apparently, even your writing skills were affected by your crush on him. As soon as your "masterpiece" was done, you slid it towards Renjun before you could chicken out and change your mind about this whole thing. The note had the following text:

Roses are red, Violets are blue, Your drawings are almost As pretty as you. P.S. Key word: almost ;)

The second he spotted the little note which was folded in a hurry, he opened it curiously. Once he read its insides, you could hear him snort under his breath. Was it that bad? You couldn't help but worry. Then, he took his own pen and started writing something under it. That was a good sign, right? You were feeling hopeful. Once he was done, he slid the paper towards you. You opened it in a rush. His response was:

Hey! Are you bullying my art?!?

You looked at him in confusion. How could he have possibly misunderstood? However, he was too focused on multitasking (drawing most of the time and occasionally taking notes based on the lecture) to spot your reaction. You decided you had no choice but to be as explicit as possible and wrote another note:

Nooo, I meant to compliment both you and your art, sorry if it came off wrong and lame :(

When he received it, you could swear you saw him smiling a little, which made your heart melt. How was he so beautiful? Soon enough, his reply came:

That's alright, I'm just teasing...Also, it worked.

You couldn't believe it. It worked? You'd successfully grabbed his attention by using this first-grade flirting method in college? You were suddenly feeling brave and kept writing. It was too late to turn back time.

I just think you're really pretty and cool especially when you draw but I was too hesitant to talk to you directly...

When he read your most recent note, he even gave you a look of disbelief, which you couldn't interpret until you saw his response:

Cool? Wow, that's a first...And it's ok, I don't bite.

You chuckled quietly and suddenly noticed that class was ending soon. You couldn't wait until tomorrow so you hurriedly wrote the content of your next note:

What do I have to do to get your number?

Renjun shook his head in amusement and this time, his reply came quicker than before:

*number enclosed* Here, that wasn't so hard, was it?

You could hear the lecturer saying his words of conclusion and you hurried to respond via another note, because you couldn't trust your voice to actually speak to Renjun. Not yet, at least. So, you wrote:

Thank you!!! Here is mine: *number enclosed*

And just as he received your final note, the students around you started gathering their things. You simply looked at Renjun and you still couldn't believe he'd actually replied to your silly flirting and even gave you his number! You waved him goodbye like a lovesick fool and practically ran outside of the lecture hall. Stage fright whomst? Try having a crush on the prettiest boy in the world.

After you went back home, you debated calling Renjun. Eventually, you talked yourself out of it. What if you said something stupid and embarrassing? With texting, you could at least have more time to think things through before sending them. Actually speaking to him seemed too terrifying a task to accomplish. So, you texted him excitedly and your heart did a back-flip when he replied. Was it strange that you already missed him, even though it had only been a couple of hours since you last saw him? Naturally, you couldn't tell him that, it would probably freak him out. So, you settled for texting (for the time being).

Renjun: Why did you run away after class?

You: I was too nervous to speak to you, I'm sorry!!!

Renjun: That's strange, I see you talking to your friends all the time...Am I so scary?!?

You: Nooo, you're not scary, I'm just being an idiot 😔

Renjun: Top of the class does not equal idiot but I'll let it slide this time

You: Thank you for your generosity!

Renjun: What are you up to?

You: Probably gonna work on that assignment for next week

You: Sorry, I'm so boring 😔

Renjun: First of all, you don't have to apologize so much, you did nothing wrong

Renjun: Second of all, saaame. We can brainstorm together if you want?

You: Sorry, I'll stop. Oops, I did it again. Pretend you didn't see it.

You: Also omg, yes pls, that would be great!

And that is how your friendship with Renjun started. Texting on your phones and exchanging notes during class lasted a week until you finally decided to ask him out. Again, via text, because you were feeling too shy to speak to him. The only other contact you'd had was waving at each other. And it's not like he spoke to you, either. There were two explanations for that: 1) he chose to respect your decision or 2) he was possibly just as shy as you were. Whatever the reason, you thought this could not go on forever so you managed to find the bravery to propose a date.

You: Do you wanna go out with me? 👉🥺👈

Renjun: Sure, where do you wanna go?

You: Oh, wow, I didn't think I'd get this far lol

You: Where do YOU wanna go?

Renjun: Hmm, there's this new art gallery I've been meaning to visit...if that's okay with you

You: Anything is good with me as long as I get to see your pretty face

Renjun: What

You: I said you're pretty

Renjun: Shut up, oh my God...

You: Do you want me to stop?

Renjun: Say that again

You: You're pretty

Renjun: 😳😳😳

Renjun: I can't wait to see you again

You: Same here

Once you got to the front of the art gallery, it struck you how strange it was that you would speak to Renjun for the first time ever. You mentally braced yourself as you awaited his arrival anxiously. Your nails were digging into the inside of your hands and you were terrified you'd pierce holes through your own skin. You told yourself this was silly, you had no reason to be so nervous. Renjun was a total sweetheart and he obviously liked talking...well, writing to you. You needn't worry that much, you kept repeating in your mind. You were too busy hyping yourself up to notice him approaching behind you. Too busy to be prepared for what came next.

"Hiii," Renjun greeted you with a surprise back hug.

"Oh dear," you jumped in shock as you turned around.

"Did I scare you, angel?"

Shit. Already with the pet names? How were you supposed to survive?

"No, it's fine," you waved him off, trying to play it cool. "Isn't it weird this is the first time we're actually speaking to each other?"

"Um...kinda," Renjun scratched the back of his head. "But I like it, it's what makes this so special."

"Wow, you sure do have a way with words," you chuckled.

"Shall we go inside?" he suggested.

"Yes, please."

As you looked around the art gallery, you kept pointing excitedly at the paintings, while Renjun was quietly evaluating them and telling you interesting stories about the artists. You couldn't help but be amazed by how attractive he was as he exhibited his knowledge. And of course, you couldn't help but wonder at how he was so much more beautiful than all the art you've ever seen. Naturally, you wouldn't tell him that. First of all, because it was too lame to speak aloud. Second of all, because your voice would undoubtedly betray you and crack or something even more embarrassing. As time passed, you were surprised at how easy it was to talk to him, despite your previous concerns. Renjun was very polite and soft-mannered and he made you feel comfortable, while the two of you looked at the paintings and discussed them. Once you'd seen everything, you were starting to feel a bit bummed out that your lovely date was coming to an end. When you were outside the art gallery, you impulsively asked:

"Can I walk you home?"

"I mean...sure. On one condition."

"Anything."

"I get to walk you home next time."

"There'll be a next time?" you whispered hopefully.

"I hope I don't sound presumptuous if I share my observation we both had a wonderful time."

"That's perfectly alright. Your observation is correct," you admitted.

"I live just around the corner, though. You really don't have to-"

"But I want to."

"So do I," Renjun said and the two of you began walking towards his home.

"I was wondering about something...You already know I didn't speak to you because I was feeling shy, but why didn't you? I have two theories, but I'm curious which one is more on point."

"Do tell and I'll try my best to enlighten you," he joked.

"Okay, so theory number one is you were being respectful of my wish not to talk yet. Theory number two is that you're just as shy as I am."

Renjun laughed and you could swear this was the sweetest sound in the entire universe.

"Am I so transparent? Honestly, it's a little bit of both. But there's another part you didn't guess. But it's too embarrassing."

"Come on, tell meee! It can't be more embarrassing than my lame attempts to flirt with you."

Renjun smiled gently.

"Well, to be honest, I couldn't believe you thought I was cool and pretty...I even feared this was some sort of prank. It wouldn't be the first time someone decided to mess with me like that."

"Renjun, are you serious? I don't understand why anyone would...Scratch that, whoever messed with you didn't deserve even a fraction of your attention. I meant every word I said. I really like you...and your paintings. And I'm sorry I couldn't say it aloud earlier. You genuinely deserve to hear nice things more."

"Thank you. I appreciate it," he blinked cutely. "But enough about me. I never told you...how beautiful you are. How kind and smart."

"I know," you waved him off teasingly. "But coming from you, this means a lot."

Renjun shook his head, amused by your words.

"We should go somewhere you like next time. Maybe a bookshop?" he suggested.

"Am I so transparent?" you repeated his words. "But sure, yeah. That sounds nice."

"Well, this is me," he said, pointing towards his home.

"Already? Aw, time sure flies by when you're having fun."

"I'll see you tomorrow in class, right?"

"Of course," you promised and before you could talk yourself out of it, gave him a quick but heartfelt hug. "Bye, Renjun."

"Bye, angel."

After your first date with Renjun, things were going quite smoothly. You finally got over your nervousness when it came to talking to him and the two of you would occasionally whisper things to each other during class. The first time he held your hand under the desk your cheeks filled with colour. Despite your embarrassment, you held his hand right back and granted him with a grateful smile. After that, holding hands in class (whenever you weren't busy taking notes) became like second nature to you two. It just felt so sweet and comfortable to be close to him. You couldn't wait till the next weekend for your second date. Even though you were just going to a bookshop and had nothing that special planned out, you enjoyed being around him so much that you were more than excited for spending time with him one-on-one. No professors or other students to distract you.

When the day finally arrived, you were surprised to find out your anxious self had made a comeback. Even though you were around him everyday and had grown accustomed to holding a conversation, it had been an entire week since your first date when it was just the two of you and you couldn't help but get cold feet as you were waiting in front of the bookshop. This time Renjun didn't surprise you from behind, you could see him approaching from a distance. Mentally bracing yourself for his inevitable arrival, you knew you'd be an awkward mess no matter how hard you tried.

"Hey, angel," he greeted you with the usual hug.

"It's nice to see you again, Renjun," you replied dumbly, briefly melting into his arms.

"You saw me yesterday, remember?" he teased you.

"Um, yeah, but still," you chuckled.

"Is everything okay? You don't seem like yourself," Renjun immediately noticed the change in your behaviour.

"Why wouldn't it be? Everything's peachy," you lied, but he didn't seem to believe you.

"Be honest with me, please," Renjun asked. You suddenly remembered what he'd confided in you during your first date. It was no wonder he had a hard time trusting you after someone in his past had had the nerve to pull such a cruel prank on a soul as sweet as his. You felt guilty for lying rightaway and began explaining yourself.

"I'm sorry, I'm just nervous. I don't want to fuck anything up. Like I just did by lying and swearing. Fuck. I did it again, didn't I? I'll shut up now," you were rambling anxiously.

"Relax, Y/N, I totally get it. I was just worried maybe you didn't want to be here...with me."

"What? Nonsense. There's nowhere else I'd rather be. No one else I'd rather be with."

"Well, the feeling's mutual so there's no need for concern. Let's look at those books, yeah?"

"Yeah, sounds good, Renjun."

As the two of you went inside and started exploring the hundreds of shelves together, you felt yourself relaxing a little. Being surrounded by so many familiar titles, so many gorgeous covers was comforting. And as you kept showing Renjun some of your favourite books and telling him about your most beloved characters, he realized you were back to your usual self in no time. Attentively listening and occasionally sharing his opinions on certain authors, you didn't notice how quickly time passed by and how much you had enjoyed yourself and each other's company. Once you had looked through the bookshop in its entirety, you felt like it was too early to put an end to your date, but you didn't want to come off as too clingy or something. So, you simply looked at Renjun, expecting him to say what he wanted to do next.

"I promised you I'll walk you home this time, didn't I?" he smoothly said.

"I believe you did," you giggled. It was so sweet of him to remember such a detail.

"I'm a man of my word so lead the way," Renjun replied, offering you his arm.

"It will be my pleasure," you eagerly took his arm and the two of you began walking. You were deliberately moving at a slow place, simply because you didn't want this to end and felt like prolonging the time around him.

"Your hands are so pretty," you blurted out at one point.

"You like my hands, huh?" Renjun smirked.

"Did I say that out loud?" you were undoubtedly blushing really hard.

"I'm afraid so."

You felt completely mortified as you covered your face with your own hands.

"Hey, hey, it's fine. You can tell me anything. Chances are I'll take it as a compliment."

"Really?" you sneaked a peak. "You don't think I'm weird?"

"Maybe a little bit, but it's one of the things I like about you."

"One?" you blinked curiously.

"You're really fun to be around and you've been nothing but sweet to me. And of course, you're stunning, but that goes without saying."

"Without saying? I don't mind hearing it, though."

"I'll have that in mind," Renjun smiled gently.

"Renjun?"

"Yes?"

"Can you hold my hand?" you almost begged.

"I don't know, can I?" he tormented you with a joke.

"Will you hold my hand?" you corrected yourself.

"All you had to do was ask," Renjun acquiesced and intertwined your fingers.

Walking hand in hand, you eventually reached your place. As you two stared at one another, you refusing to go inside, him refusing to go, both of you refusing to let go of the other's hand, you thought to yourself how badly you wanted to kiss him. You had no idea if it was too early for that but you knew that the longer you tried to postpone it, the more you'd crave him. And you were an impatient person. So you quickly kissed him without thinking much. It was a bit awkward and rushed but at least, you had finally done as you wanted. Renjun looked taken aback and blinked at you a couple of times.

"I'm sorry," you apologized again. "I just..."

He silenced you softly with another kiss, this time more slowly and putting your mind and heart at ease. You lost yourself in the feeling of his plush lips against yours, finally letting go of his hand so that you could wrap yours around his neck. Hesitant at first but growing bolder by the second, you could sense Renjun's tongue testing the waters. You slightly parted your lips, letting him in. As the kiss intensified, you could feel him becoming more eager to touch you, his arms wrapped around your lower back. When you were seconds away from losing your breath, you finally broke the kiss. Opening your eyes to look at him, you couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief. He'd kissed you back.

"I thought I told you to stop apologizing so much. Especially, when you haven't done anything wrong," Renjun scolded you politely.

You opened your mouth to argue, but when you realized your immediate response would have been another 'I'm sorry', you closed it. A second later, you came up with a different reply.

"I guess you'll have to discipline me, then," you huffed in a challenge.

"Dumbass," Renjun flicked your forehead.

"Hey!" you complained with a pout. "That hurts."

"What do you want me to do? Kiss it better?" Renjun gave an unamused look.

"That doesn't sound like such a bad idea," you mumbled, not expecting him to actually...kiss your forehead. But he did. And damn your knees for threatening to give out.

"Feel better yet?"

You nodded enthusiastically.

"Get inside already," Renjun tickled your sides, nudging you in the direction of your door.

"You want to get rid of me so badly?"

"No, but we can stand here forever if you don't," he rolled his eyes.

"Do you want me to invite you in?"

"Don't tempt me and go," he was impossible to sway.

"Okay, okay," you relented. "See you tomorrow, Renjun!"

For your third date Renjun suggested something different. While your first and second date had all taken place in public locations, this time he offered going to his place. And maybe the shock on your face was too obvious, because Renjun was quick to keep talking and almost take it back.

"We don't have to if you don't want to! We can just watch something at the cinema or whatever. Forget I mentioned it if you're uncomfortable."

You quickly shook your head.

"No, no, I do want to come over! I was just...not expecting it."

"Yeah? You sure?"

"A hundred per cent," you nodded excitedly.

"Sorry to break it to you, but I'm at two hundred per cent," Renjun teased.

"It's not a competition," you reminded him.

"It's not if I'm winning," he kept playing around.

You rolled your eyes.

"So what are we watching?" you asked.

"You can't go wrong with Harry Potter, am I right?"

"You are so right," you squealed. "Which house are you in?"

"Don't get me started. Sometimes I get Ravenclaw, sometimes Slytherin, it's a mess."

"That's pretty cool, though," you were practically staring at him with heart eyes at this point.

"You're a Hufflepuff, aren't you?"

"Am I so transparent?" you complained, this line becoming something of a running gag between the two of you.

"Cute," he mumbled under his breath and you blushed, not managing to maintain eye contact.

When the time arrived for you to go to Renjun's place, you were more excited rather than nervous. He was so easy to talk to and you were genuinely making so many wonderful memories that you had made it your mission to not waste any second worrying needlessly.

"I have arrived," you announced the obvious as you stood at his door.

"I can see that," Renjun chuckled. "Come on in."

"I wasn't sure if I should bring something so I bought some pizza on the way. It's still hot, so I hope you're hungry," you said as you followed him inside like a puppy.

"Oh, that's very thoughtful. And I always have enough space left for pizza."

You grinned and the minute you put the box on the table and your arms were free, you wrapped them around Renjun in a hug.

"You're so warm," you murmured against his skin.

He kissed the top of your head swiftly. Soon after, the two of you were too busy re-watching Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, eating pizza and holding hands to talk much. Once the movie was over, you realized how badly you didn't want to go home and how cozy leaning your head on Renjun's shoulder felt. And how much you liked him and couldn't stop thinking about his hands, his smile and his overall existence.

"Do you want to go home already?" Renjun asked the dreaded question.

"I mean, not really, but I don't wanna impose myself on you," you whispered.

"Don't be so formal," Renjun replied. "Just stay a little longer."

"Yayyy!" you were quite overjoyed and kissed his cheek. "What do you want to do?"

"Hm, I don't know. I could give you a tour around the place."

"Sure, that sounds fun," you immediately agreed.

"Don't get your hopes up, it's just a regular college guy's apartment."

"I'm sure I'll be amazed by every little detail."

"Even my socks?"

"Especially your socks," you joked.

As he showed you around his apartment, you couldn't help but be amazed by how Renjun-like everything was. From the snug kitchen to his art supplies scattered around. Every corner made the atmosphere feel extremely homey. Until you saw something that you hadn't expected, something that hadn't come up in conversation before. A stunning grand piano. You looked at the instrument and then at Renjun and finally, back at the piano.

"Do you play?"

"No, I just keep things like that as an accessory," he responded sarcastically. "Of course, I play."

"Can you...no, wait," you stopped yourself before making a similar mistake to the one you made a while ago. "Will you play something for me?"

"Right now?"

"If it's not too much trouble," you gave him the very best pleading look you were capable of.

Renjun sighed reluctantly and sat down on the bench in front of the piano.

"Don't just stand there awkwardly, sit next to me," he urged you courteously.

You followed his advice and took the free spot. However, nothing could have possibly prepared you for witnessing Renjun's skills up-close. Watching him play was like magic. You were simply in awe and couldn't help but stare at his pretty fingers hitting the keys in just the right ways. When he was finished performing the piece, you were too frozen to do anything. Couldn't even manage to clap, even though he deserved it so much. But you were too transfixed by his playing and those damn hands of his you couldn't possibly move.

"Earth to Y/N?" Renjun went as far as snapping his fingers right in front of your face.

"Huh?" you let out.

"Did I enchant you or what?"

"I think you did," you chuckled. "Just...wow. You're insanely good."

He looked away bashfully.

"Thanks. It just takes practice."

"Nah, I've heard people play before but what you have is different. So pure and genuine. Like a blessing. And I'm not just saying that because I think I'm falling in love with you. I really mean every word."

"Care to repeat that?"

"I really mean..." you started, still not registering what exactly you'd said. How far you'd gone. What you couldn't take back.

"Before that," Renjun reminded you gently. "You know. The part about falling in love with me."

"Shit. I was thinking out loud again, wasn't I?" you asked dumbly. "It's too early for that, I know. I'm really sorry. Let's just pretend I said nothing and forget about it, yeah?"

In your panic, you jumped up from the bench and were about to escape like a coward but Renjun grabbed your hand before you could take another step.

"I think I'm falling in love with you, too," he said.

"W-what?" you stammered.

"And I don't care about whether it's too early or not. And I'm not going to pretend I didn't hear it. So the question is...what are you going to do about that?"

"Me? What...am I supposed to do?"

"What you want to do," Renjun clarified.

"Um...I want to keep falling in love with you, Renjun. And holding your pretty hands. Spending time with you. Listening to your angelic voice. What I want...is for you to be my boyfriend."

"I thought I already was."

"You were?"

"We went on a couple of dates...we kissed...Haven't I made it obvious enough?"

"Oh, right," you chuckled. "Sorry."

"Say that word one more time, I dare you," Renjun slowly ran a finger down your lips.

"S-sorry?" you had to test his patience. Before you could argue, he kissed you fiercely, wrapping his palms around your cheeks. You were drowning beneath his touch, which was ridiculous, considering he was also setting your lips on fire. You figured if saying sorry too much was going to end up like this, you would be a fool not to take advantage of it.

"Pretty angel," Renjun whispered against your mouth. "My pretty angel."

You were practically melting and the only thing holding you together were Renjun's arms.

"For fear of sounding lame, I'm inclined to say your pretty angel's almost as pretty as you. Key word: almost," you giggled, recalling your earliest attempts at flirting with him.

"Lies," Renjun shook his head.

"Hey, it worked the first time!" you pouted.

"It only worked because you're the pretty one," Renjun ruffled your hair playfully.

"Oh my God, shut up," you covered your face to hide how red it was.

"Never."

The End

#nct #renjun #nct dream #renjun x reader #nct fluff #renjun fluff #hwang renjun #nct romance #hwang renjun x reader #college au #writing

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rigelmejo · 3 years

Text

I’ve read parts of this article on Pride and Prejudice translation three times now and so I suppose I should share it.

Misinterpreting Jane Austen? A Feminist Perspective on the Chinese Versions of Pride and Prejudice

http://jasna.org/publications-2/persuasions-online/vol38no1/yi/

It really makes me think about how easy it is to have huge themes in a work just lost or muddled intensely if they aren’t paid particular nuanced focus to during translation. How each line could have more nuance to it then a surface level “any synonym will get the point across” and how just lacking cultural context can cause big points in a sentence to be abandoned in translation (the use of “rational creatures” in Pride and Prejudice is a huge reference to bringing up feminist thoughts, but read literally could be translated as ‘i think’ or ‘i’m reasonable’ or ‘i’m regular’ and could miss a big chunk of meaning being conveyed). Meaning is usually lost somewhat in translation because its hard to maintain the nuance of the original words, even if you know all the context and are prioritizing themes in each sentence! So of course its a struggle.

I just think its something to be mindful when engaging with translations in general. And certainly webnovel ones where so often the translators are fan translators with various skill levels in language and/or translation and/or in meaning of the deeper themes of a text, and paid translators on big webnovel sites, often translating under time constraints to do a job Fast rather than ‘as close to accurate as possible’ which could take a lot more time. That’s not even getting into the machine translations (and cleaned up mtls) of webnovels, that some actual webnovel sites use (which can have very little if any editing done), and some fans do when its the best/fastest chance to ever read the novel (in which case even if its edited by people for improvements over time it will be constrained by the original mtl translator program’s failures in word choice and unawareness of story nuances). It’s already a mess to judge a work of art made in another culture, without being aware of that culture’s artistic goals and norms and expectations etc. Those values must be acknowledged, because to judge it as something outside its context removes so much. That applies to translations too - which can maybe be interpreted on their merit as localizations. When there is one - like maybe Drakengard 3 and if its localization changes were a good or bad thing for its story in the context of an english speaking market? or if Final Fantasy XV localization changes were? which i imagine the localization teams themselves had to judge its work on. On the case of like “how does this work as a localization” but still the questions of its original context in its original lanuage, intent, comes up. Do you get rid of ramen in favor of a different food? Do you get rid of San and say “Mr” - what is kept, why is it kept, does it require outside understanding of context, is that worth keeping even if it does?

Like perhaps the pride and prejudice translator changed “rational creature” to “ordinary person” because they wanted to abandon explaining the feminist idea of “rational creature” altogether, considering that context too far removed from a translation, and instead decided on making the line mean more broadly “like a normal person my rejection is serious - i’m not playing a silly game with you.” which is roughly fair in meaning, but has lost the concept of “i’m rational like Any Person, even though you consider women irrational that is incorrect.” I see why the translation could have made sense to do - and its what i’m sure localization translators deal with deciding every day - “what do we keep for overall story’s meaning understood by this new target audience?” versus “what details do we abandon at the cost of nuance, because it might make it harder for this target audience to connect to the overall story?” etc.

My point i suppose is just, sometimes I see arguments about webnovels and their meanings as understood BY the translation. And many people much better with words than me have made good points that one can’t judge a work based on english speaking culture standards when it wasn’t made in that context, was not aimed at that target audience, and has context surrounding it that in general an english audience will not be aware of. Just to add to that - the translations themselves.

The translations also are going to have context missing, or have changed some context and nuance to translators tastes. Like localizing to try and make it more comprehensible to the audience, or because the cultural reference needs some ‘equivalent’ the translator thinks the english audience will be more likely to know - i immediately think of Word of Honor choosing “chevalier” for “daxia” and “river of lethe” and greek myth metaphors, instead of the actual concept the dialogue refers to (and Word of Honor was professionally translated). Even among professional differences - just look at The Untamed that has different versions translating “zhiji” as bossom friend, good friend, soulmate, and gongzi as Childe, and names as just a whole range of weirdly varying ones different from what’s actually said. A lot of webnovels are not professionally translated (and of the ones that are, if they have speed deadlines they also might not get an ideal amount of time to decide how to ‘most accurately’ maintain the nuance, if that’s even a goal of a specific translator because different translators have different goals).

Not only is it not something created in the english audience culture (so why compare it on those specific cultural expectations it wasn’t made for), but also each translation is not going to be a fully accurate depiction of the original. Every translation will vary. Some translations will leave out cultural nuance, or even change it, or just not notice it was there to begin with. Word choice alone will change the meaning of some sentences and dialogue - and it can be as simple as one seemingly straightforward word change (like “rational creature” in Pride and Prejudice). Translation changes can affect the meaning you get from a story when its done professionally, when its been done and tried different ways multiple times for decades! Surely translations done for webnovels are going to have points where its like... to judge it is to at most interpret this translator’s work. Because there isn’t a full picture of the original work, a translation can’t give you that. Like others have said, its not great trying to expect works from different cultures to match up to a different culture’s expectations/aspects, but then also translations themselves will fail to retain aspects - or will all highlight such aspects in different ways and also in different ways for the reader to interpret (leaving more original context with footnotes, simplifying details and removing authors nuance, changing context to try and come up with an equivalent the reader might understand easier, etc). And that doesn’t even cover how any machine translator usage is going to also be destroying so much nuance, context, meaning, and even changing it in random ways - if its used for any of the steps, before the translator’s personal goals even start affecting the translation’s shape and meaning etc.

I have a huge newfound respect for the people translating Haruki Murakami... if Pride and Prejudice is this easy to change themes on/interpret differently even though its overall a very straightforward novel structure, I can only imagine how hard Haruki Murakami’s meanings and themes are to preserve...

#rant #april #translations #i just think about this a lot.#1 its a big reason i'm considering reading the mdzstranslations group's version of mdzs - i suspect #a number of complaints about mdzs come from translation choices. because that's been true with much of mxtx's writing #i saw the 'simple' svsss translation (which is fine and i like it) and a newer one ppl did and the newer one is WAY MORE NUANCED #and its like reading a trashy pulp novel to reading an Actual Novel with Depth and that could actually make me cry. All cause of translation #choices. Priest's writing too... i can thankfully read it in chinese (tho i still miss a ton of cultural nuance obviously)#and in english its translation is SO simplified it misses so much atmospherically and in mood. it makes priest feel like a 'less great write #' but then i read Mo Du/Silent Reading? And edanglarstranslations is one of my FAVORITE translators #i have the chinese novel and when i read? or listen to the chinese audiobook? it matches up wording wise and feeling wise so WELL with #EDanglar's translation of the novel. so translating work affects so MUCH how the story is interpreted. and nuance lost is like seeing a #masterpiece through blurry glasses and fog. u can make out the main impression and if its good then it will touch ppl even in translation.#but the style of translation/choices will effect how BLURRY the audience sees it - whether its black and white or blurry colors. whether its #50 ft away or a mile. it will always be blurry unless read in its original language AND by someone who gets its context/culture. but some #parts can be clearer depending on what translators choose to do. and Which parts are clearer depends on them.#its part of why i usually want to learn to read the languages i Do read? because i hate the blurry picture lol. i want to make it clearer to #myself what they originally intended. even tho its still blurry to me In the language. i at least get more of the original Feel even if #details still get lost on me.#just... whenever i think of this article it reminds me how MUCH translation is an art form with choice #and also how much a translator works - none will likely capture and retain everything in their goal even IF they want to cause #they're all bound to miss some things or have to sacrifice some things #perhaps i should say. we see a blurry image of the original IN a translation. but the translation itself is like an artist REDRAWING a #masterpiece FROM a blurry reference. the translators work IS crisp but details are off/changed/less nuanced/differently nuanced #to see a translators work as identical to the original is wrong because like. no its like an artistic rendition with creative liberties of #a reference image they cannot replicate (because they're using paint and paper and the original is clay with paint missing the translator #cant guess the exact colors of and the translator only has 3 photos of the sculpture. and the translator cant sculpt so they must draw #and a 2D painting just isnt the same u know.

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rataltouille · 4 years

Text

BONFIRE, BONFIRE!: A COLLECTION OF FLASH FICTION + POETRY

so i’ve decided to compile all twenty [these will be split into two so that the post isn’t super long] of the writing pieces i’ve done for my random celebration into one post so that it’s easier to read / access share!! you can also find it here, all put into one work, on wattpad, because i feel nostalgic about that website and decided to just post it!!

NOTE: i know that this shouldn't need to be said, but these 20 pieces belong to me so please don’t copy/repurpose it for your writing!! i plan on using these somewhere in my own writing and either way they’re stuff i’ve written so don’t use them!!

1. cooking + destructive + purple from @andiwriteunderthemoon [also i kind of cheated with this prompt and asked my sis @dreamscanbenightmarestoo for ideas and so the base idea’s from her!!]

I didn’t mean to set my house on fire, alright?

Let me set the scene: I’m sitting in my room, watching the infomercials that blur together, and suddenly there’s a bright purple flash on the glitching screen: /grapes/. They’re shiny, plump, and oh? A recipe for fine wine? Don’t mind if I do. So I pop into my kitchen and cut the grapes, dice them up, finally using the knife after years of not cooking— /mother, are you proud of me now?/— and stick the soft, luminescent fluid into a glass bottle. Following each step of the recipe.

The recipe didn’t mention an explosion.

Destruction rained around my house like a meteor shower. The bubbles from the fluid, frisking up at contact with metal, swam across my shoes and into the living room. It touched the TV, which still flashed the recipe, which I was still cursing at. And then, you know, it burnt up. The couch scorched first, I think. So that was fun. I later realised that I’d used my reserve of petroleum, which I’d put in my kitchen cabinet, instead of vinegar. I think I’ve got to move back in with my mother again.

2. running + quiet + sky blue from @kryskakikomi [i have no idea what this is i drafted this in a fever dream state]

Summer crawled up his skin like a worm. He was seated at his dining table, crosswording his way through the sticky morning, when it struck him that the humidity was new. He’d been caught in summer before, of course, but this year was different. His parents had whisked away to their hometown, and he still didn’t understand why he wasn’t allowed to go. He loved their home— he could have been running on beach sand and waves could have cruised over his feet, and his face would reflect sky blue under palm trees. Instead he sat doodling and scratching at cement walls in a quiet that nagged at his ears, grappling his flesh like a fishing hook, reeling him in. Boredom, him sister told him, before she also left for someone’s home. What would you know? he whispered once the door latched from the outside. Maybe /she’d/ like to sit on the same wooden chair, all the pink paint worn out, and scratch out squares of empty text until the pen poked through the other hand. He scoffed. At least he knew the number of scars on the wood; he could hold that over her when his parents returned.

3. hallucinate + hazy + violet from @chloeswords [i wanted to write something dreamy and ethereal but everytime i look at your url i’m reminded of church mud and indirectly my religious trauma so here we are 🤡]

We hold the book in our arms and chant for God. We don’t know what he looks like. They say that he’s sharp, never pixelating or blurring or showing through, like a hazy image would. No, children, our family says, he will come clothed in gold and velvet— the colour a deep and rich crimson, or chartreuse. And of course, he weaves a violet into his hair. Because he is just that humble. Just that gentle. Loving.

We’ve almost understood now. Pray, clasp our palms together into a transient equinox, and pray. Maybe he will shine down on us. Maybe we will speak so loud and chant so long that our lips will chap. Maybe we’ll simply hallucinate him to salve our bones. Our family says, he will bless you. And so he will.

4. halcyon + pluviophile + beige from anon [i was yearning for cats i am a cat person i love cats]

I remember my life before I moved to London,

Those halcyon days that I spent scooping up cat litter and brushing warm fur,

Being a mother to beige and white and black little felines.

They keep better company than humans.

Now I’m a self-proclaimed businesswoman, artist, influencer, pluviophile,

Even when I’ve barely stepped foot outside during the rain,

[But it needs to be said that when it rains in London, it pours].

I think I’d like to open a cat cafe;

I’m rich enough to pull it off.

5. sing + vulnerable + olive green from @occiidens [this was actually super fun to write because it’s a break from the typically unhinged stories i gravitate towards]

You watch from the highest hill of your town, hand wrapped around the serrated wood of a red oak tree. The bark pokes into your flesh, drawing blood that shouldn’t have been taken from you. You scowl. Just another thing that lives to cause you pain.

Three storeys down is a young man, short and smiling and lovely. He has dark skin and darker hair, walking with the stride of a deer, and he’s smiling; the joy reflects onto your face, even though you can’t hear him. He wears a cotton shirt, the olive green stark against the fire-blue sky. You call out, sing his name, three times in a row.

When he finally looks up, squinting as you silhouette under the sun, the smile widens. A wave. You’re suddenly overcome with embarrassment. Your palm digs into the bark until the wound is freshly dug again, the skin supple and vulnerable. You want to wave, but your hands would look so awkward, and the blood wouldn't help. So you turn on your heel and run— why are you so awkward?— and the grass around you is brighter. This is now a tomorrow issue, you conclude. You’re still smiling.

6. dislocate + ostentatious + blood red from @oasis-of-you [this got really unhinged really fast. TW: body horror]

If you take a turn at Finn Avenue,

Rogue your way down a blood red river,

[It’s not actual blood, do not worry. The colour’s a pigment and it’s saturated enough to give you the texture, the touch, the taste of blood, but I repeat, it isn’t true blood. You might think that it’s ostentatious of us to make you cross a river like that, but you’ll understand why.]

And if can stick your fingers inside the fluid,

You’ll find a bone.

Don’t pull it out fully! Only observe.

[This is a real bone, most likely animal. We may be ominous, but we don’t hurt humans. Not yet.]

So what do you do now? You want passage into a better world.

You came here because you saw the brochure, the flyer,

Radiant Idyll, home for love, but you also saw the jutting anatomy that leads to the city. The pictures were rather clear.

Why do you look so surprised? We’ve put this on the brochure— don’t you ever read the fine print?— to avoid this exact situation. That you would cross a body, a skeleton, pooled over in a fluid that we don’t name, but it’s probably alive.

It’s watching you right now.

So what do you do now?

Hurry up, unhinge your arm, dislocate the elbow, drop it into the blood, forgive me, false blood, and pay for your passage.

Oh! Excellent; that’s record time. We do hope you enjoy your stay!

1. @noteaboy [i’ve interpreted your url as ”note, a boy”]

There’s an orange tree. It’s spring, and there’s an orange tree, and it brims with fruit and citrus perfume. Point your lens flare downwards, and note, a boy. A young man, perhaps, because he combs his hair, uptight and firm, and he wears a tie. A long suit. He doesn’t look up, because his hand holds a book. /He/ holds the book, not the hands— tenderness doesn’t translate through anatomy, I’ve taught you this before. He’s waiting for someone. There’s only the rustle of leaves. He drops the book onto the lap of the tree, crushing the apple that had fallen down. Orange, not apple. Take note better. You only have one chance to get this right.

2. @eatingjupiter [your url is so beautiful omg]

The goddess had said this before she died: you need to watch over him. He needs your sentry to survive. The goddess’ words weren’t heeded. Little baby Jupiter tottered on lava as him parents small-talked with their kingdom. Well, it must have been small talk, because nothing seemed to happen afterwards other than his mother’s face collapsing in agony, anger, annoyance. He knew not to touch them then. He’d fly off into the sun one day, but if his hands were but and charred, he wouldn’t survive even a third of the journey.

The prophecy was simple: the firstborn to the kingdom will metamorph into a celestial, purify themselves so that only stardust remains. Live in the sky forever. The astrologers were baffled; you don’t just become a star. They should have heeded the goddess.

Jupiter was sixteen when he expanded and collapsed all at once. He still lives, they say, and the astrologers /were/ right, in a way: people just don’t become stars. They become almost empty space. Nobody knows if his hands were burnt when they left earth’s orbit forever.

3. @laughtracksonata [your name gave me slight horror vibes idk why!!]

Hahaha. The Horror Movie (don’t ask me for a name, I’m not good with those), with its cymbal crashing and plastic sounds, it’s so loud and scary that it hurts, father. Please turn it off.

Father doesn't listen. I shiver on the couch. The screen flickers like radio static and reflects off our wide eyes. What kind of a home is this anyway? I don’t want to fucking listen to a laugh track or a horror VHS tape or watch the bass crescendo as the serial killer jumpscares the watcher. I don’t think that having hour pupils glued to the same blood-splattered movie, with the same recording looping in his eardrums will help him. He laughs along, sometimes. It’s scary. Father needs a new hobby.

PART TWO COMING SOON!!

anyway this got REALLY long so i’m posting the third prompt group, the one based on songs, as a second part in some time. i hope you enjoy this, and PLEASE do boost!! i spent a lot of time writing these pieces and am pretty proud of them :’)

general taglist: @lovingyou-is @guulabjamuns @andiwriteunderthemoon @coffeeandcalligraphy @melonmilk @silentlylostwriter @charles-joseph-writes @eklavvya @eowynandfaramir @bitterwitchwrites @laughtracksonata @whatwordsdidnttouch @indeliblewrites @thenataliawrites @summersguilt @illimani-gibberish @sarahkelsiwrites @writing-in-delirium @shaelinwrites @sienna-writes @chewingthescenery @jennawritesstories @chloeswords @aelenko @keira-is-writing @cherylinanika @infinitely-empty-pages @jmtwrites @august-iswriting @freedelusionbanana @beetleblue88 @mistercaleb @iwannawritepls @hanwatchingmovies @mortallynuttyqueen @idratherliveinnarnia @maisulli @thegreyboywrites @ahowlinwolf @ravens-and-rivers @oasis-of-you @yanittawrites @chazza-writes-sometimes @skyfirewrites @lovebenders @treybriggsthewriter @themidnxghtwriter @ash-karter @queen-devasena @a-procrastination-addict @gaymityblight @beyondthebracken @madmaxst26 @adielwrites @moonpixxel @hollow-knight-dnd @keep-looking-here @overlap @ashleygarciawrites @ryns-ramblings @wordsbynathan @novaemlynlewis @sophiewritingstuff @howdy-writes @occiidens @nsanelyawkward @viawrites-andacts

#writeblr #am writing #flash fiction #poetry #wtwcommunity #ofcolourtracking #crabappletracking #anyway part two probably in a couple days #i still have to start writing them 🤡✌️#bonfire bonfire

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the-queer-observer · 3 years

Text

The TOXICITY of straight dating culture: Do you even realize what you teach?

A few months ago, a straight teenage girl explained her crush to me with the sentence “He’s so toxic.”

I know a 17-year-old girl with a little to no clue of how a non-toxic relationship should look like.

I started noticing a certain pattern online and in my real life too.

Now it’s a time for my first disclaimer: I am not straight myself. Nope. Not at all. Perhaps that’s why I see through it.

To this point, all I have done about this is that I have complained to some friends, got over it and went on with my life.

Today, a girl, no older than twelve, has told me about her crush on a “bad boy” and we talked about him for a second. He really did seem like what the definition of a bad boy is for tweens.

I snapped.

And here I am, writing my first tumblr post ever on this very topic.

I want to make clear, this is not an attack on those girls. This is an attack on the society, what it taught them and what it failed to teach.

The youngest girl and me, we talked about music. She said she liked “dramatic” songs and played me some of her favorites.

Disclaimer number two: I did know both the artists, but I don’t actually listen to them. The closest to mainstream music my playlists get is Take me to church by Hozier, the rest being a wide range of songs, interprets and genres from pop punk to death metal and everything in between.

I was actually surprised. One of the two artists she played for me was Billie Eilish. The beginning of the song went:

Don't be cautious, don't be kind

You committed, I'm your crime

Push my button anytime

You got your finger on the trigger

But your trigger finger's mine

The second song was by Maroon 5.

It was even worse:

So what you trying to do to me

It's like we can't stop, we're enemies

But we get along when I'm inside you, eh

You're like a drug that's killing me

I cut you out entirely

But I get so high when I'm inside you

Yeah you can start over you can run free

You can find other fish in the sea

You can pretend it's meant to be

But you can't stay away from me

I can still hear you making that sound

Taking me down rolling on the ground

You can pretend that it was me

But no, oh

I am not going to argue about whether it’s appropriate or whether she understands the lyrics the way I do. It doesn’t even matter. She understands the drama in the song. She understands it enough for me to be concerned.

There are other songs like that. There is a whole culture teaching pre-teen and teenage girls, that “they can’t get away”, romanticizing toxic people and toxic relationships, blurring the lines of consent and guess what? The girls believe it’s the way it’s supposed to be.

I texted my girlfriend and we spent some time looking for straight love-songs, celebrating healthy relationships. None of them were mainstream, but we found things like:

That the world is ugly

But you're beautiful to me

Are you thinking of me

Like I'm thinking of you

I would say I'm sorry, though

Though I really need to go

I just wanted you to know

I wanted you to know

I'm thinking of you every night, every day

(My Chemical romance)

And

Desperate for changing

Starving for truth

I'm closer to where I started

I'm chasing after you

I'm falling even more in love with you

Letting go of all I've held on to

I'm standing here until you make me move

I'm hanging by a moment here with you

Forgetting all I'm lacking

Completely incomplete

I'll take your invitation

You take all of me now

(Lifehouse)

First of all: Those are 4 extracts of songs, chosen by me to demonstrate my point and they may or may not reflect the reality, you (the reader) see: those two songs might be just an exception, but in that case this post is still not canceled, because there is enough of other correlations and causation for me to have a reason to write this.

Those songs are “dramatic”, but the drama shifts from the relationship itself and its toxicity to the circumstances and environment. My girlfriend even recommended a punk song called Ne touche pas moi (Do not touch me), which is entirely about consent.

I am not explicitly saying that the songs she played for me are bad. It’s not for me to decide.

But all Billie Eilish’ fans I ever met were in the age range between eleven and fourteen, so I am supposing that’s her target audience. As for Maroon 5, I have no idea. However, music influences us. The girl is old enough to know what kind of music she likes and wants to listen to and with the peer pressure going on there, her parents do not really have a say in what she listens to and they are not to be blamed for this.

It’s the culture.

Toxicity is not a positive trait to look for in a potential partner. Even if he is a good looking one.

Enough of music.

Do you know who the toxic crush was?

Draco Malfoy.

One of the most famous of all characters in media, famously portrayed by Tom Felton in the Harry Potter film series.

Disclaimer number four: I have a problem with the books and movies and I also have some issues with the author.

Still, I see a fandom celebrating the love of Severus Snape for Lilly Evans Potter. Except it’s not love and it’s not a crush either. It’s an obsession. One that has become so iconic, the word “Always” is one of the main symbols of Harry Potter.

It shouldn’t be.

It should have never happened.

Draco Malfoy is quite the same thing. He is a racist, a bully. He is raised to be one, sure... That’s not an excuse. He doesn’t actually have a canonical redemption arch (not counting the deleted scene from the last movie and the Cursed child). If he came up to Hermione, acknowledging his mistakes, apologizing for his behavior, then maybe. Perhaps... That’s another story though. My point is, Rowling fails to actually depict problematic characters as actually problematic, they are romanticized by her, the filmmakers, the fandom and the wider audience.

Girls are taught to be the ones to make the redemption arch happen, irl or in fiction. They are supposed to date whoever is into them, regardless of whether they like the person back, and it’s unbelievably often I see them crushing on villains and problematic people like Draco Malfoy, because they are taught, he would change for them or that they could change him.

Toxicity is not a positive trait to look for in a potential partner. Even if he is a good looking one.

Those together result in a complete lack of knowledge of how a healthy relationship should look like. That’s the case of the third girl I mentioned. Being best friends with both her and her current boyfriend, I had three points of view on their relationship. It’s only been the past few weeks, not more than two month it has shifted to a more positive, healthy relationship.

It’s not the girl’s fault. They learn what a healthy relationship is the hard way, mostly after going through a toxic one(s).

WHY?

The sentence: “I always fall for the bad guys.” lacks the essential: “because the society taught me to” part.

It’s so common.

It’s too common.

It’s not even that we wouldn’t talk about it: we do. But you celebrate it. And that is not okay and that is the reason I am typing this.

Disclaimer number 5: The gender roles in this post are based off of my observations. I do acknowledge the fact that girls can be and sometimes are the toxic person in the relationship and that the lesson boys are thought is no way better (more freeing perhaps, but not right either) . It might not be specific to the straight culture either, but again, my observations were.

I was about thirteen, when I figured out I was gay and I had to learn everything on my own. How the relationships should work out, what is healthy and what is not... I had to learn on my own because the society failed to teach me anything. I am yet to decide whether that’s better or worse than teaching the wrong one.

#lgbtq #spilled thoughts #punk #music #culture #society #feminist #teenagers #relationship #toxic is toxic #toxicity #gay girls #queer #random observations #harry potter #draco malfoy

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the-blue-fairie · 4 years

Text

An Extremely Personal Look at my Disconnect with Frozen 2

I’m trans and I’ve been closeted for so long that being in the closet has begun to feel like a futile routine, an inescapability born of my own weakness.

That’s... not how a post about a Disney film usually starts, is it?

But, like the title of my post says, this reflection is personal. I’m allowing myself to be vulnerable.

Because of my life experience, I’ve connected deeply with the character of Elsa over the years. I suppose that’s not a surprise. Elsa’s powers can serve as a broad metaphor for aspects of someone’s identity that others can stigmatize - whether that be read as gender, sexuality, anxiety, or depression. Part of the reason Elsa became so incredibly popular in the first film is because her struggle with her powers could reflect so many various people’s struggles with their own identities.

Frozen 2 actually leans into that broad metaphor of Elsa’s powers reflecting personal identity - a part of oneself that is unique but beautiful in its uniqueness. The lyrics of Show Yourself reinforce this, telling Elsa that “you are the one you’ve been waiting for all of your life.” So I should love Frozen 2. I want to love Frozen 2. There are things I absolutely do love about Frozen 2.

But I have a complicated disconnect with the way the film approaches the origin of Elsa’s powers.

The film makes Elsa’s powers a gift from the spirits - and also suggests that they are a gift for Iduna because she saved Agnarr’s life. By introducing the idea that Elsa’s powers originate not because of anything to do with Elsa herself but because of an event that happened before Elsa was even born, the film kind of undermines the metaphor of Elsa’s powers reflecting a key aspect of her identity.

Identity doesn’t work like that. I’m not trans because of other people’s actions. My trans-ness is a part of me. It comes from me. It wasn’t decided that I was trans so that my mother could have a “reward” for her own righteousness. If some divinity did bestow my trans-ness upon me, I would be disturbed to find out if they didn't do it for my sake - if they did it because my mother did something and I was only an aspect of the equation insomuch as I related to her...

To me, that thought isn’t empowering. And it still wouldn’t be empowering even if my mother were as loving as Iduna - because it would tell me that I’m only a vessel...

There’s a difference between saying, “Elsa is a gift because Iduna’s good deed was rewarded with her,” and saying, “Elsa is a gift simply because she is who she is, Elsa is a gift by simply existing.” One is conditional and one is unconditional. One uses Elsa to prop up Iduna’s actions and the other loves Elsa for herself.

(Also, I’d argue that a better gift for Iduna’s goodness would be to let her see her family again. Why cut the Northuldra off from the world when the fault was solely Arendelle’s? I’ve seen some people speculate that Arendelle could have wiped the Northuldra out after Runeard’s death and the mist protects them, but what does that reading make us think of Agnarr if we assume he could be complicit in genocide? Why “protect” the Northuldra in a way that will negatively psychologically impact a generation of them? Why let them suffer? No, that rationale doesn’t make sense to me. The whole mist scenario smacks of the “both-sides-ism” of white writers - but that’s a discussion for another time, a discussion I’m not really qualified to comment on in depth. I need to return to Elsa.)

The interesting thing is, after introducing the concept that the spirits gifted Elsa’s powers to celebrate Iduna’s nobility, the film doesn’t really bring up that angle again. Instead, it tries to frame “we made you a gift for someone else’s sake in a scenario where your individual identity is irrelevant because you did not even yet have a consciousness” and “you are a gift by being you” as being the same thing. But those two things are not the same.

Before F2, Elsa continually frames herself based on what she can do for the sake of others - even at the expense of herself. Clearly, with Frozen 2, the filmmakers wanted to have Elsa come into fuller self-acceptance and love herself for being herself - but that isn’t quite what they wrote. By making Elsa a reward for her mother and defining her powers based only on how Elsa relates to her, the film itself frames Elsa based on what she can be for the sake of others - while disregarding Elsa’s own selfhood and identity. Elsa’s self-identity is so immaterial to the decision to give her powers that it happens before she is even born.

I know the film may not have intended this, but it ends up validating Elsa’s negative thought processes in the act of nominally ‘refuting’ them. All because of those few lines trying to explain why Elsa has powers.

Show Yourself tries to fix this by basically brushing aside the “you were a gift from the spirits for Iduna’s actions” revelation and focusing on Iduna and Elsa’s familial connection and love. This is why Show Yourself is so much more amazing than the earlier revelation and an admittedly breathtaking scene. The focus becomes “you are the one you’ve been waiting for all of your life” - you are a gift to the world simply by being you - and that is so much better than the earlier revelation, but the damage of the earlier revelation has already been done.

Now, the film has two slightly different interpretations of the word “gift” that it tries to use interchangeably - in spite of the fact those two interpretations subtly contradict. The film never comes back to the “gift for Iduna’s good deed” element. It doesn’t establish that what happens in Ahtohallan is an expansion of that or an emendation to that. It doesn’t address the dubious implications of it. It just brushes it aside, never to explore it again.

Indeed, as I’ve said in other posts, if you take out those few lines from earlier, you lose the internal narrative contradiction and the film actually becomes stronger.

So why are they there at all?

I think they’re there because they give a seemingly simple, external explanation for why Elsa has powers. Show Yourself is more focused on what being at peace with yourself means to Elsa emotionally (that’s why it’s better, in my opinion), but the “the spirits gave her powers because of her mother” lines are there because the writers felt they needed to give a direct explanation of Elsa’s magic.

Here’s a hot take, though: Elsa’s powers work better without an explanation. The fact she was just “born with them” in the first film was part of what led to her broad appeal. It allowed countless people to latch onto her because - people who society deems “other?” We’re just people. We’re ordinary. We’re human. We just are. The first film understood this - and for all of Elsa’s magical abilities, she was allowed to just be. And the lack of any lore surrounding Elsa’s powers meant that scores of different people could identify with Elsa. Her powers were vague enough that they could stand in for any unique aspect of an individual’s identity. The point wasn’t where they came from; the point was what they meant.

But after the first film came out, I kept seeing the refrain: “Why do they never explain Elsa’s powers? That’s a plot hole.” it isn’t a plot hole. It isn’t a plot hole any more than not explaining how the Wicked Queen in Snow White got a magic mirror is a plot hole. Something being unexplained isn’t a plot hole. That’s not what “plot hole” means. But I can understand why the writers, after hearing things like that for years, felt like they had to address that explanation.

And in doing so, they tried admirably to connect that plot point to an internal journey for Elsa - and created some absolutely beautiful elements within the film - like Show Yourself. Although, in this post, I’m documenting flaws I see in Frozen 2 and my own disconnect with it, I want to stress that I respect the artists and creatives who brought the film into being and I value their work.

In the process of their efforts, however, they inadvertently opened up internal contradictions within their own narrative; opened up unfortunate implications when it came to their commentary on colonization; and opened up unfortunate implications when it came to their discussions of individuality and identity.

As I have said, there is much I admire about Frozen 2. And I know that my words here come from a very personal place. If Elsa’s arc in Frozen 2 works for you, you’re valid. This isn’t a takedown of Frozen 2. None of my more critical posts about Frozen 2 are. I don’t want to take anything away from you. You’re valid.

It’s just that my perspective is valid too. I know, there are scores of critiques of Frozen 2 and some of them are absolutely terrible or just plain racist, but I hope that as you read this, you’ll understand that my perspective comes from the heart and that I’ve done my best to support it with examples from the text of the film. I hope that you’ll read this. I’m writing it to be heard - because I feel like my perspective gets drowned out a lot, regardless of the posts I make. Flashier positive posts draw one part of the fandom’s attention and flashier and more toxic negative posts draw another part’s attention.

I’m just trying to express my thoughts in a cohesive way, trying to be heard and trying not to feel guilty. (Because I do feel guilty writing posts like these. I get scared that people resent them or that I’m spoiling other people’s fun - even though more toxic people make much more incoherent arguments and they don’t feel guilt, while I try to support all my claims.) I feel like I’m relentlessly apologetic to others, always begging, I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry, always... feeling guilty for even having a perspective like this. As though I feel there’s something wrong with me for simply having a perspective. As though I’m scared it somehow invalidates all the good things I’ve said about the film elsewhere or will make people hate me.

(Not to connect everything back to my being closeted, but I feel like that entrenches a guilt in me that manifests even as I talk about innocuous things like fandom opinions).

But I just... want to speak. I hope that’s not bad, is it? And I hope this post finds a receptive audience. I know it’s personal. I know it’s heavily informed by my own personal experience and perspective, but I hope it’s nuanced. And I hope people will read it and, even if they approach the film differently than me, understand.

Thank you.

#bigfrozensix #frozen #frozen 2 #elsa

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clair-void-ance · 4 years

Text

Lucky Love (1/3)

Pairing: Cedric the Sorcerer x Alchemist! Reader

Word Count: Roughly words

Warnings: Mental health mention

Notes: Oof, this took longer than I thought it would; sorry about that. I ended up making this into a three part series in order to pan out the story with a tad more detail, so more chapters will be posted soon! Hope you guys like it :) Feedback and requests are always welcomed <3 This ones for my boi @queen-of-british-tea !!!

“The secrets of alchemy exist to transform mortals from a state of suffering and ignorance to a state of enlightenment and bliss.”

― Deepak Chopra

“He wishes he were a skilled poet, it would fit his chosen image perfectly; the poor, tragic, tortured artiste. But he has no talent for words, neither for paints nor music; his uselessness is tremendously total.”

― Curtis Ackie

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Being born the daughter of Master Erwin, there was never a doubt that your destiny would be written in the stars. His blatant adoration for the universe beyond Earth’s doorstep had been clear to you from an early age and, given you were his only child, he desired nothing more than to pass all of his knowledge down to you.

The only issue that arose with that desire was that your focus wasn’t entirely directed towards space; your ambitions were more...Earth-based.

Completely unbothered by this fact though, your father set out on a journey to find the most fitting subject he could study with you. Because, in his eyes, your interests were his interests; and having a relationship with his daughter was far more important than any of the mysteries the vast and never-ending universe could hold.

The search didn’t take as long as he expected though, because your likes and dislikes fit surprisingly well with a subject he was very familiar with in his schoolboy years: Alchemy.

By interpretation, Alchemy is a “sort of terrestrial astronomy” that deals with all sorts of human and worldly aspects. Which fit both of your interests to a “T,” thankfully.

When that was decided, he began to introduce you to the magical world of alchemy and what it entailed. Each day he would offer new texts on Alchemy, Magic, and the universe as well as provide fresh insights on the universe’s effects on the human body. What filled you with the most intrigue though, was how you could use the items the world offered you in order to heal, change, and create other living organisms. So much so that you ended up working together to create a spell and potion that turns rocks into ravens.

Sadly, your passion for contributing to the world around you was so blinding that you completely forgot about how you would go about implementing that knowledge and passion.

That is, until you had been told you were to be sent off to a real academy by your mother. The one place you did not want to end up going.

That fact had left you slightly heartbroken since you could no longer spend your days endlessly pouring into Alchemical books and having passionate discussions with your father, but excited you with the prospect of a proper education…….One where you would have to attend a school that had none of your friends. One where you would have to spend all of your days and nights toiling over the assignments your teachers assigned to you. One at Hexley Hall.

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After two hours of travelling to the esteemed ‘Academy of Wizardry,’ you had begun to feel stiff and in dire need of a decent stretch. Even if it meant standing outside in the chill September wind.

At this point though, you were willing to do anything to rid your body of its mental and physical stress. Up until now, the only thing that kept you distracted from the bile your anxiety had been threatening to dispel from your body was reading the book your father gave you: “Distilling Nature’s Secrets: The Sacred Art of Alchemy.” But you had already finished that in the first hour of the ride and were now left with the gnawing feeling of dread that came with being thrown into an unfamiliar environment; one where you wouldn’t have the comforting words of your father to calm you down.

Before you could drive yourself further into a sense of dread, the sight of a tower looming over a hill stole all of your attention.

Pulling yourself to the carriage’s window, you saw the place that you would be spending the rest of your childhood at: Hexley Hall.

The school that would teach you everything you wanted to know about the ancient art of alchemy.

Its windows glistened with evening dew and its structure held a contrast you were not familiar with until now. Growing up in Enchancia’s castle, you had only known modern, sleek, and upbeat architecture. Hexley Hall though, defied all of those tropes. It possessed intricate designs, a soulfully picturesque look, and an eerie aesthetic. One that you felt you could get used to. Especially if the inside held a matching look.

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After making a swift landing, you thanked your coachman, acquired your luggage, and began to make your way towards the crowd of fellow newcomers.

The entire entrance to the school was bustling with excited new students, and their confused glances and demeanors were beginning to ease your anxious mind. Maybe everyone else was as 'in the dark' as you were...Maybe you weren’t alone in your strife.

That discombobulation you all possessed didn’t last long though, and soon enough you were all ushered in by what seemed to be one of the teachers. After being brought into the Great Hall for a brief rundown of how the school worked and who would be teaching you all, schedules were floated to their respective owners and maps of the school were provided to each student.

Looking down at the map, each child had a glowing mark on where their assigned dorm was located. Ironically enough, yours was in the area dedicated to potioneers, alchemists, and other magicians dedicated to the physical arts.

Dinner commenced shortly after introductions were made and, after a bout of awkward shuffling, you found a quiet location to eat and began your trek to your new dormitory.

By chanting a wandless spell to the map, an arrow led to your room where you began to unpack.

Given you didn’t bring many items besides books and clothes, you quickly laid yourself down on the comfortable mattress and ran through the events of the day. Although you still hadn't met any friends yet, you did gain insight into the place you'd be spending the rest of your teenage life at.

Putting aside those thoughts, you curled around your pillow and fell into a blissful sleep.

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Schedule: Year One- Semester One

Student: (y/n) Erwin

Study: Alchemy

Study Order

Breakfast

Class One: Potions

Class Two: Intro to Alchemy: The People, The Places, and The Items

Class Three: Intro to Magic: Wands and Guidelines

Class Four: Gnosticism, Occultism, and Esoteric Beliefs

Lunch

Class Five: Magical Creatures and The Human Spirit

Dinner

Looks about right, you thought to yourself as you made your way down to the Great Hall for breakfast. Although you would have preferred Alchemy as the starting class of your day, potions was definitely a good choice as well.

What bothered you more than the order or your classes though, was who would have to interact with during these assigned classes.

But that’s a problem for later, you thought to yourself as you devoured the first of many breakfasts at the Wizarding School of Enchancia.

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Being the first person to class, you had the advantage of picking the best seat in the classroom. At least, that was what you hoped to happen until a mop of multi colored hair caught your eye.

Although you didn’t mind the place he had sat in before you could choose, he was sitting in the spot next to the one you DID prefer.

that doesn’t matter you thought, maybe he could be my first friend….He couldn’t be that bad could he?

You decided to try your luck and hesitantly tapped the young boy's right shoulder. Whipping his head around he gave you a questioning look that you assumed meant: "??? Can I help you?"

"Do you mind if I sit next to you? I like the feel of this corner and you don't look half as bad as the rest of our class."

His startled, yet hopeful, look gave you the impression he didn't get approached much. Let alone get told that he looked welcoming.

Despite that though, his face softened and he said,

"Really?....I suppose I don't mind."

He cautiously lifted his palm to you and said, "My names Cedric. I'm coming here to become the next Royal Sorcerer. What about you?"

With a firm grip, you shook his hand and settled down into your seat. Taking out your schedule you replied, "(y/n) Erwin! I'm studying to become the Royal Alchemist!"

Gripping your chin with an inquisitive look, you added a quick, "You wouldn't happen to be related to Goodwyn the Great would you? I thought I recognized you at first, but I couldn't quite place from where…."

"Uhm….Yeah, I am. D-did you live at the castle as well?"

You fiddled with your papers until they were straightened properly and looked at him, saying, "Yep. My dad's the Royal Astronomer, so we get to live with him at the castle…..I've seen you around you know….I always meant to say hi, but your dad and sister seemed to take up most of your time."

He rubbed his wrists anxiously and let out a, "yeah, they tend to do that…...but I digress. Do wanna compare schedules? I don't have any friends either, and you don't seem that bad as well…."

Looking down at the schedule he gripped in his hand, you noticed that it didn't seem so far off from yours. You were both new to the school after all, so it made a tad bit of sense. Luckily you wouldn't have to split up very much for the next couple of years.

Schedule: Year One- Semester One

Student: Cedric Goodwyn

Study: Sorcery

Study Order

Breakfast

Class One: Potions

Class Two: Intro to Alchemy: The People, The Places, and The Items

Class Three: Intro to Magic: Wands and Guidelines

Class Four: Intro to Magic: Practice

Lunch

Class Five: Magical Creatures and The Human Spirit

Dinner

Surprisingly, it seemed as though you would be seeing a lot of each other. Which didn't seem to bother either of you that much. After confirming your new friendship and planning your day out together, you both set up your supplies and began your first class of the day.

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After cleaning up your respective area of the shared potions table, you reminisced on how well the class had actually gone. Despite both of you being new, you and Cedric seemed to work in a sort of synchronized state. Even your teacher pointed out how good you two were together. This had made you both proud, but you noticed that it had made Cedric especially happy.

Given the way that he had acted and responded to your questions, you inferred that his home life…..probably wasn't that great. Especially if the tiniest amount of praise made his day ten times brighter.

Which is why you had made a vow to yourself that you would do everything in your power to make him realize his self worth. After all, not everyone had a supportive father and family like you did.

Picking up the last of your mess, you threw your bag over your robbed shoulder and asked, “Would you mind if I sat with you in our other classes as well today? I’m not really…..friends with anyone else here yet and we seem to make a good team. Plus, you seem really sweet.”

“I’d love to!,” he said in an excitable raised voice. His face broke out in a flustered blush at how desperate he sounded and quickly let out a, “I mean, if that’s what you want to do…”

To that, you chuckled and lightly punched his shoulder saying, “Of course I would you dork. Now let's hurry up so we can get the best seats in our next class."

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After that day, the two of you were like two peas in a pod. Whenever you both had a class, were going somewhere, or ate, you were attached to the hip. Even teachers knew that, if they couldn’t find one of you, they wouldn’t find the other either as well.

For you two, there was never a subject left unstudied, never a prank left undone, and never a conversation left undiscussed.

It started off with you both teaming up in your shared classes, meeting for meals, and talking on the way to class, but soon branched off outside of school.

With coaching from you, and years of positive reinforcement on your end, Cedric had been coaxed out of his hesitant and neglected shell. All it took was one fond look and a caress of his hair from you and Cedric was turned into mush. The love you showed him through the years made him see that not everyone was out to get him. And not everyone was untrustworthy.

In summary, you brought hope in humanity back into his life. Something that he surely would have gone off the deep-end without.

To others, it seemed as though you had put him under a spell and transformed him into a new man; Cedric had never felt so confident in his life.

Especially since he never had anyone to support him. Until you, that is……

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(Year 7 at Hexley Hall)

Flicking your wand in a cursive “J” formation, you pointed your wand at the painted black stone and whispered, “Avifors.”

Within seconds, the rock morphed in size and began to take the shape of a sleek, black raven.

Pecking the tip of your index finger, it cocked its head at you and turned to inspect Cedric.

Cedric, gazing back at the bird, looked absolutely stunned at the sight of this seemingly never-heard-of spell and immediately began to shift his eyes to you and then raven. He wasn’t sure where you had learned that, since you were only taking alchemy classes, but he was beyond interested in knowing.

“Merlin’s Beard! Did you make that spell up all on your own?”

“Not exactly,” you chuckled, “My father and I worked for days to come up with the correct spell and paint concoction when I was a child. But it worked out, and now I have a way to create any type of bird to do my bidding!”

Setting his chin in his palm, he began to gaze fondly at the scene in front of him and think about all the things he has yet to learn about you.

“Would it be alright if you taught me that spell? I know it’s yours and everything….. but it’s too bloody brilliant to be left unpracticed.”

“Sure!.......I'll write it down for you by tomorrow.”

You blushed and stared down at your feet. Showing him you and your father’s spell had made you nervous at first, thinking he would find it childish compared to his studies. But his unwavering attention in it showed you that maybe it wasn’t that bad after all…..

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After that day, you knew that you were in love with Cedric. He had been with you at every step of the way through your years at Hexley Hall, and you knew that he would be there for you for days to come. Working at Enchancia’s castle wouldn’t stop the bond that you both had formed over the years. Especially since you two would be working close together.

With each other until the end, that’s what you both had promised one another.

‘If only it was in a romantic sense,’ you thought to yourself, gazing up at the great expanse in the night sky.

With a huff of a laugh, you kicked the rocks in front of you.

As if…………..

#sofia the first #cedric the sorcerer x reader #cedric the sorcerer #cedric the sensational #cedric x reader #stf #sofia the first imagine #sofia the first x reader #sofia the fandom #alchemy #enchancia #hexley hall #I hope you like it uwu!!#hope you all are doing fine as well!!!#will hopefully post the rest soon

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birb-tangleblog · 3 years

Text

Compiled these asks for readability!

Thanks for sharing and elaborating, anon!!

This is a super interesting concept to me b/c the vibe is... kinda more mundane, without Demanitus' insane magitech in the setting and no evil demon/sorceress running around, but it's also more keyed into the sun/moon lore and magic elements. And it's an intriguing blend/balance!

+ I think an AU like this would be unique b/c it'd make for a story that's really driven by Raps and Cass and their relationship- no true outside factors.

Aside from it being an AU concept tho, honestly I think:

" The twist was that the rocks weren't calling to raps but to cass, because they wanted the perfect person to merge with, raps' opposite."

would be a fantastic twist in any verse, and possibly even a viable interpretation of canon?? I think there's def a lot of value in Cass having no pre-determined grand role in the universe, and making her own destiny by choosing to take the moonstone, but I still dig that idea for a reveal as like... a play on that, maybe?

(Like guiding Cass to the moonstone was what was 'supposed' to happen, or what the greater magical forces in the universe intended, but the girls weren't there yet emotionally/ZT threw a wrench into the plan/something else happened so that Cass being drawn to the moonstone didn't initially pan out and got derailed- before getting rerailed later through hard work and communication. I might be totally off base here from your orig intention, so pardon the rambling lol, but I see potential there for the idea of destiny and soulmates actually being smth you have to actively work on, which is a fav theme of mine.)

Anyway, Raps having a diff relationship w/ the sundrop than Cass has w/ the moonstone b/c she was born bonded with it vs. merging with it later is a fun thought, and I def buy into that! Her needing to become more in tune w/ the sundrop's 'voice' paralleling her leaning to listen to and empathize with Cassandra (or other chars like Var, the Saporians, etc.) is tasty, along w/ the challenge for her of self-reflection and introspection/confronting her own feelings.

I just love the reconciliation/harmonization btwn the celestial forces mirroring their relationship- I wish canon had pushed in that direction more.

I wonder if Cass would be as confrontational/destructive in this AU? Since ZT was largely pushing for her to be more aggressive to unite the drops in canon. I can see her maybe going on the run instead, but if the moonstone is a big influence on her and has a lot of Ziti's personality/traits (or if Raps is being more proactive), perhaps not.

And ofc I think The Brotherhood coming back into play to help Raps w/ this diff sorta challenge would be cool! Like I'd have expected Raps to at least ask Edmund or Adira what they know abt the moonstone and pick their brains, so them helping her figure out sundrop magic based on their knowledge/exp and their kingdom's history w/ its counterpart would be interesting too.

It'd be cool if you decided to do more and develop the idea!! But I def feel you on having fun thinking up AUs and wanting to share them vs. the struggle of act... creating content to tell the story. Esp if you're a visual artist b/c comics esp take so long to draw relative to the amount of info you can convey LMAO. I think discussion and text posts are a happy medium for sure. :>

#also yea let the sundrop/moonstone have personalities of their own!#it's a fun spin on them in canon #there's so much room to expand more on their differing domains and elements #text post #ask #ty for the ask!#my post #discussion and theories #man I really wish I had an AU tag RIPPP

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akari-hope · 3 years

Note

So I’ve heard differing arguments relating to it, ranging from “Well, if we shun content created by this person and/or everyone who’s done anything problematic, that’s a slippery slope that’ll lead to us being unable to enjoy anything” to “It doesn’t matter if you can separate the author from their creation to an extent, there’s ultimately other content to be consumed, & shunning the work of the problematic author in order to deny them or their progeny traffic is more important than salvaging

2/4 said author’s work.” Pablo Neruda, Yukio Mishima, & JK Rowling are authors that come to mind in these discussions. (For example, I’ve seen several SPOP edits ft. Pablo Neruda’s love poetry, & when his problematic history was explained to one creator, they cited death of the author.) Another argument against the concept, or rather, against how the concept is often applied, that I see is that people cite it in order to uncritically consume whatever they want.

3/4 Yet others say that people who say this often take the concept too far, to the point where no one can enjoy anything, ever, unless they’re obsessively analyzing every last detail of something for potential problematic tropes or other problematic content. I just don’t know where I fall, because I both agree and disagree with various parts of these stances, but see how all could be taken too far and used poorly, if that’s a sensible way of wording it. But I don’t know what dictates “too

4/4 far”, so I’ve never voiced a definitive opinion on the matter. I hope this makes sense, it’s a bit more jumbled than I had intended.

total sense!

death of the author is such an interesting concept, purely bc how it was MEANT to be used and how it has come to be used are so different. for transparency, death of the author is a lens of examining a piece of work which states that the author’s original intent does not matter, that the metatextual elements of a work do not have any bearing on what is actually present in the text.

to use an example, fans of spop will likely know that adora and catra are at least somewhat inspired by noelle stevenson’s own relationship. since we know this, we can see this in the text. the more you know about noelle and molly, the more you can see what parts of their relationship influenced those characters. we don’t have to guess that catradora is meant to be viewed in a positive light - we’re told by the showrunner itself it should be. if we were to apply death of the author, though, we would ignore this. it is not written explicitly in the text, and is therefore metatextual. we can still come to the same conclusion based on information within the show itself, but we would not use that “word of god” type of information.

and you can do this with basically anything. an artist said their song is about romantic love, but you see it as platonic love? claim death of the author! once it’s out in the world, it’s up to the audience to decide what a piece means.

now, here’s where it gets tricky: you can’t just ignore bigotry in a piece, even if you are applying death of the author. let’s look at hp lovecraft for this one. anyone with even passing knowledge of lovecraftian horror will know that the main element of it is fear of the unknown. sure, there’s many ways you can interpret that within the text! but fact of the matter is that lovecraft was a horrible xenophobic racist. and knowing that, it becomes very hard to separate the “fear of the unknown” in lovecraft’s work from real world xenophobia. you can still claim that within the text you interpret it differently, sure. but you can’t go so far as to pretend the intent isn’t there. the author’s interpretation doesn’t have to be yours, but it’s impossible to separate the author’s worldview from the text - it’s baked in.

okay, so, interpret however you want, but acknowledge prejudice. easy enough. until we get to the elephant in the room, joanne rowling herself. now, we know she has horrible ideas baked into her text. but that doesn’t necessarily mean we throw it all away, right? after all, people still love lovecraft’s work, and he was horrible. there’s an entire horror genre coined after the man. if we don’t throw lovecraft away, why throw joanne away? and the big difference there is that...joanne is alive. and wealthy. with friends in high places. and a large public following. even when he was alive, lovecraft didn’t exactly have millions of followers on twitter. pablo neruda and yukio mishima were not good people, but again, also dead and not with the same level of power. meanwhile joanne is actively using her wealth and following to influence british lawmakers.

and here’s where people lose death of the author. bc yes, you can still examine harry potter however you want. you can still say the books were an influence or that they meant something to you. but you cannot use “death of the author” to substitute an answer to a moral dilemma. and the moral dilemma is simply that supporting joanne, be it by word of mouth or monetarily, is supporting her ability to spread transphobia. this is why we see a more active push than usual to stop consuming hp and related rowling works. the driving force is not just “thing bad”, but the active harm joanne is causing to trans people in the uk.

so, what does that all mean? basically, use death of the author responsibly. you don’t have to toss out every single problematic work ever penned. if we did that, we wouldn’t have much left, and the foundations upon which modern media were built would be gone. but, you also can’t say that you don’t have to acknowledge biases and prejudice in media. bc you still do. there’s not a filmmaker in hollywood who can claim they’re not using some amount of technique pioneered by alfred hitchcock, but we also can’t pretend like “psycho” didn’t have transphobic undertones. it’s possible to both appreciate “psycho” for its importance to film history AND acknowledge those problematic elements without beating them to death.

basically, if you’re thinking of applying death of the author, you need to ask yourself two questions:

-am i using this to analyze the work, or am i trying to make myself feel better? -is my consumption of this work allowing the creator to cause harm?

if you’re trying to make yourself feel better, you don’t need death of the author; being aware of the problems within the work is sufficient. and if your answer to the second question is “yes”, that’s when you need to wonder if your consumption of said work is really more important than the harm you may be inadvertently causing.

bc it feels wrong to not include them, lindsay ellis has two wonderful videos on death of the author, which i will link to below (as well as a video on transphobia in pop culture, which i sort of touched on here, that helps give a better sense of how you can consume and even admire problematic media while acknowledging its flaws)

Death of the Author

Death of the Author 2: Rowling Boogaloo

Tracing the Roots of Pop Culture Transphobia

tldr: death of the author is a great tool to analyze media, but all too often gets used as an answer to a moral dilemma when that was never its intended purpose. you can invoke death of the author without ignoring problematic elements of a work, you don’t have to self-flagellate over said problematic elements, but be aware of if your consumption of a work causes active harm to people.

#anon #long post #i was going to include a section on work where the author is not problematic but the content is but then that felt not related lol #but my same thoughts more or less apply! okay to consume provided said consumption doesn't cause active harm.

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maniculum · 5 months

Text

This one is from Bodleian MS 764, aka the "Bodley Bestiary". This is actually a pretty nice bestiary; it's one of the ones with a wide selection of animals and some fairly elaborate illustrations. Yes, this illustration looks silly, but it's relatively large, detailed, and technically well-executed. Also I think that background is gold leaf. According to the listing at the Bodleian Library, it was made sometime between 1226 and 1250.

I go on a bit in this post, so I'll go ahead and put a cut here.

I do actually have access to a print translation of this one, so I can tell you that the description reads:

The scorpion is a land worm: it belongs with worms rather than serpents; it is armed with a sting; and it gets its name from Greek, because it stings with its tail and spreads its poison in a gaping wound. The scorpion has this property, that it stings the palm of the hand.

And then there's like three times as much text describing the scorpion's religious symbolism.

So let's look at this critter. At base, this is a pretty regular quadruped, apparently about the size of a cat if the hand is meant to be proportional. The perspective is odd; I'm not sure if this is just a highly-stylized top-down view or if it's actually meant to be hanging off that plant like some sort of demented flag.

There are a couple unusual things to point out. First, that's a weird quasi-human face, which I'd like to credit to the whole "scorpions have faces like virgins" thing, but I'm pretty sure it's actually just the artistic style. To support that claim, gaze upon the face of the Bodley Bestiary lion:

Second, I think this is the only scorpion so far I've seen drawn actually in the process of stinging someone, which is great, but the artist has decided to show this as a rigid spine going clear through a person's hand. Wild.

Third, and probably most important, what is that body shape? Where did that come from? I kind of wonder if the artist somehow had a concept of the scorpion as being low to the ground with a body wider than it is tall but knew virtually nothing else about them. It's kind of hard to interpret what's going on -- like, the silhouette is reminiscent of a horseshoe crab, but it can't possibly be a shell, because the legs are on the wrong side. If we interpret it as a shell, or as just like a weirdly bulky ventral portion, we have to ask how the hell this animal is meant to walk, because it clearly is wide enough to impede its legs. Look at that picture... here, I'll put it in again so you don't have to scroll up.

The legs are posed sticking out perpendicular to the spine here. Imagine this critter putting them down to walk. If that's a solid mass of any kind, it means that in order to move, it would have to keep its... knees? ankles? leg joints bent at a ninety-degree angle the entire time so its own body wouldn't get in the way. Like a turtle whose legs stuck out the top of its shell for some reason. I just don't think it works. The only way I can make sense of it is the one I jokingly suggested in the original post, where those are skin flaps like a flying squirrel. (This is complicated by the fact that the artist is unlikely to have ever seen a flying squirrel any more than they would have seen a scorpion, since the only species in Europe doesn't seem to reach even close to England... but look, I don't know what they were thinking. Bats, maybe.)

anyway. Points!

Small Scuttling Beaſtie? not that small, and whatever method of locomotion is happening here, i hesitate to call it a "scuttle", ✘

Pincers? ✘

Exoskeleton or Shell? friggin... maybe? my official position is no, but benefit of the doubt, ½

Visible Stinger? visible and actively stinging, ✔

Limbs? 4

And I have to say something here. This is a quadruped. And the way it's colored makes it look like it might be furry. I was considering this. And then... let's zoom in.

Those little details on the head there... okay, the two on either end are clearly the ears, but the stuff between the ears? You tell me there's a more plausible explanation than tufts of hair. Which... you know what that means?

🎉🎉🎉

That's a mammal!

🎉🎉🎉

Sorry, buddy, it's probably in bad taste to celebrate you getting a penalty, but I genuinely thought I was never going to use that one.

I'm not penalizing the resemblance to a flying squirrel, though, because like. I think it's unlikely that's what the author was basing this on. Case of convergent evolution.

Anyhow, -1. I think this is our first penalty for a reason other than wings. (By which I mean it definitely is, but I'm leaving the possibility open that something else shows up in the period between when I'm writing this and when I'm scheduling it to post.)

As for the vibes of this week's critter, I think it's charming in a way, but unsettling in enough ways that I want to keep my distance even for non-stabbing-related reasons. I'll give it a 4/5, on the assumption that those are skin flaps and not something else. Because if this is doing the reverse-turtle thing, that's bad vibes and the score would go down.

Total:

4.4 / 10

Whoever is being stabbed on the left there seems real nonchalant about it.

#medieval scorpions

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lichenthrope9 · 3 years

Text

Artist’s statement: Ys, or, Borrowed from the Sea

A shortcut to mushrooms

My interest in alternate worlds was piqued when I first read The Hobbit, and the first two volumes of Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring. The maps, the histories, the biographical information and allusions to genealogies, the languages and cultures and very real, lived-in countries, the sense of geography in that the story took place as much between points of interest as it did within points of interest, simulating the time it took to travel between cities – all of these factors hooked me as much as the story had. It is from the world of Middle Earth and the history and accidents of its construction that I derived much of my inspiration for this project.

However, as we must with all our favorite creators, I returned to the Lord of the Rings with a more critical eye years later. After coming out as transgender, going through a long health crisis, beginning to critique my own whiteness, and reading a lot more about philosophy and social science theories, I had more tools and lenses through which to critique the premises on which Tolkien wrote the darling of English fantasy literature.

It seemed Middle Earth was a project born out of Tolkien’s devout Catholicism, and the cosmology of Middle Earth heavily reflected Tolkien’s own interpretation of Catholic teachings. There were angels and fallen angels, and a battle between them on the physical world that took it off track from the plans of the all-knowing Eru Ilúvatar (Tolkien‘s analogy for the Father). This would all be well and good in theory, if Tolkien hadn‘t taken a step further and made ”Good“ and ”Evil“ sentient races, created by individual angels with certain aesthetics and moral philosophies in mind that would irrevocably be tied to the bloodline of each of these races. This already has problematic implications for Tolkien‘s racial frame, but to make matters worse, he based certain fantasy races on certain groups of humans on Earth.

So, with these pitfalls in mind, I put my initial worldbuilding efforts not into creating languages and cultures, but rather creating a planet that they could live on, that could feasibly exist in our galaxy. I didn‘t include magic in its formation, I didn‘t use a mythic structure at first. I didn‘t even know if I wanted to populate my world until I had an entire solar system. I knew things like the luminosity, age, and mass of the star, the distance between the star and planet, the length of the year and day, the axial tilt of the habitable planet, how all of that would affect the seasons and climate, and how far away the moon was and what it would look like from sea level on my planet. I knew how deep the oceans were and I even had some speculative biology plotted out for how life would come to be on this planet. My idea was, I wanted to make a hard scifi world (within reason – I‘m not Andy Weir) and then drape a cloak of high fantasy on it, almost a bit more like Dune by Frank Herbert than Lord of the Rings.

My readiness to populate my planet with peoples and histories neatly coincided with the beginning of my Purchase career. I was no geologist, geographer, meteorologist or astronomer. Though I was certainly interested in how ores were distributed in my planet‘s crust, how coastlines and climates developed, and how the sky would appear from the surface from my world, the central focus had always been and would always be how these things would all affect my fictional societies and their growth. What would it be like to grow up on a world where the moon appears so much larger than the sun? A world where the solar year is just a bit over 639 Earth days? Would it be possible, given different historical circumstances, to achieve a Type 1 or 2 Kardashev civilization? How would such a civilization come about politically?

Worldbuilding as anthropological exploration

After learning of my passion for worldbuilding, a professor suggested I take a look at the 2015 presidential address to the AAA by Monica Heller, called ”Dr. Esperanto, or Anthropology as Alternative Worlds.“ In it, Heller outlines the history of perhaps the most famous constructed international auxiliary language, Esperanto, and maps its positionalities, along with those of its creator, L. L. Zamenhof, within the scope of highly anthropological inquiry. Zamenhof was situated at the precipice of many different identities; he was a Jew from Bialystok, a multilingual city which in his lifetime lived under Russian and Polish-Russian rule. His interest in creating an international auxiliary language was one of diplomacy and peacemaking in the years preceding World War I, a time where international tensions and the influences of global industrialization and capitalism were all growing ever stronger and more binding. Esperanto‘s goals have since changed slightly; on a sticker on the back of a Paris street sign in 2013, it was hailed as ”La langue internationale équitable,” marking Esperanto as the “equitable” opponent to the specifically capitalist problem of income inequality. One can only conclude that not only the language itself, but also the act of its creation by Zamenhof, was a highly political project. Heller then touches upon other forms of constructed language, ones whose purposes lie in artistic expression and exploration such as Dothraki and Sindarin. The article taught me that “the act of transportation [to an alternative world] might have unexpected consequences. But the whole endeavor will be transformative, teaching us things we would never have learned otherwise” (Heller 2015: 21).

Since finishing this article, I have embarked on a journey to ground my project in social theory. My goal began as less utopic and more experimental. It was not yet apparent to me how my politics would manifest in the work, but I still wanted to play the game: with a number of minor changes to a habitable world from Earth, and a number of restrictions in how I depict the cultures, can I keep my civilizations alive and, more importantly, ”breathing“ (that is, relatably and realistically complex enough to feel lived-in), until they reach Kardashev Type 2 status? (That is, until they can technologically harness as much energy from their home star for use as they like.) What would stories look like set in this universe, perhaps stories set in the same star system but separated by hundreds or thousands of years? And how do I responsibly depict these people without falling prey to the same ideological traps that Tolkien and Herbert did?

This new phase of my project also coincided with my renewed interest in the works of Ursula K. Le Guin and the Nickelodeon show Avatar: The Last Airbender. A:tLA stood out as a shining example of how to write a complex, colonially-charged political history between societies without directly making any one society analogous to Western Europe or Euro-American whiteness. I devoured Le Guin‘s The Left Hand of Darkness, which taught me that even tiny changes to human cultural frameworks (such as, what if there were no gender as such, and what if everybody on a planet were asexual except for a predictable period of sexual arousal and attraction?) can have vast implications for that society‘s history (Le Guin theorized that on such a planet, there would be no concept of war); and The Author of the Acacia Seeds and Other Extracts from the Journal of the Association of Therolinguistics (Le Guin‘s own term for the supposed study of animal language) which taught me that the lenses of imagination can be focused just as strongly on our nearest neighbors in the dirt as they can be on the distant stars.

I therefore decided to take a hybridized Tolkien / Le Guin – ian approach to writing the stories. I committed to ”translating“ every character‘s pronouns into the English feminine, and only gendering them at all as feminine when necessary. I also committed to writing a world history where no one ethnic group was directly analogous to Euro-American whiteness, à la AtLA. I would of course need to loosely base groups located in geoclimatic zones on similarly-located groups on Earth, or else have altogether too much work to do (deciding how much of the culture‘s development might be affected by the geography and climate; deciding on a model of anthropology on which to base my analysis of each culture, be it structural, evolutionist, structural-functional, etc.; building each cultural good, artifact, and practice in relation to every other; conducting a simulated ethnography of each of my major ethnic groups).

So, I decided to base some of my cultures on recent ethnographies and archaeological studies of geoclimatically analogous Earth ethnicities. The first of these was a master‘s thesis by Meghan Walley, ”Examining precontact Inuit gender complexity and its discursive potential for LGBTQ2S+ and decolonization movements.“ In it, Walley complicates the gendered narratives of pre-contact Inuit history by critically analyzing remains and gender-specific tool usage, and conducting interviews with living queer Inuit and their families. Walley found that Inuit-specific definitions of Two-spirit gender and sexual nonconformity had existed since long before contact with Europeans, and that queer archaeological practices were necessary if the living traditions of extant Two-spirit and queer Inuit were to be given their appropriate ontological priority over colonial narratives. I decided to use this thesis as a springboard for reading more current histories of the Inuit and other people of the far North, to embark on my project of constructing plausible cultures for the people living near my planet‘s South Pole.

The magic of semiotics

Then: a type of breakthough. Last summer I found myself reading book after book, including Tao Te Ching, the foundational text for Taoism, and How Forests Think: Toward an Anthropology Beyond the Human, Eduardo Kohn‘s posthuman ethnography of a Runa group located near Ávila in Ecuador. In it, Kohn tries to apply the semiotic theories of Charles Sanders Peirce to human groups living in rainforest settings to construct and analyze a broader, more current, postcolonial cosmology for this Runa group and its implications for other groups’ cosmologies. It was my first encounter with Peircean semiotics. Oddly, How Forests Think referred in passing to the very chapter of Tao Te Ching that had resonated with me strongest: Chapter 11, in which Laozi talks about constitutive absence, the anti-structures that permeate structure and make structure functional (the examples he gives include the empty hub of a wheel, the space inside a clay pot, and the emptiness enclosed by a room’s four walls). Kohn applies this anti-structure model to the semiotic, saying that Peirce’s types of signs can only signify when they represent things that are not present. A child buzzing their lips to imitate an airplane will only remind you of an airplane if you forget the differences between the child’s imitation and the sound it is meant to represent.

From How Forests Think and Tao Te Ching, I derived six major tenets that I would literally incorporate into my text’s lore as an ancient religion. But more than that, it got me thinking about how language and signification was a type of magic, in many ways. So, I re-incorporated magic into my story. I based the initial rules of my magic system on the postulate that this universe was not ours, in fact, but had grown out of a knowable Universal Field that could be at least partially described with a type of grammar. This Syntaxelium (designated as such both to distance it from concepts like Chomsky’s Universal Grammar and innateness hypothesis, and also to connect it more closely to ideas of networking and fungal semiosis) could be harnessed in languages that contained its features to “negotiate” with the universe. That is, if you speak a language that uses a lot of features of the Syntaxelium in a short amount of time, you are “persuading” the universe to change some of its rules, at least for enough time to grant you a wish. I decided to make this language too complex to be conservative; that is, it would evolve and diverge very quickly from any one set of rules as people used it and streamlined it. There was a constructed language I knew of that might serve perfectly: the language Ithkuil, completed by John Quijada in 2011 and so complex that nobody, not even Quijada himself, is yet fluent in it as of this writing.

Ithkuil is a philosophical-engineered language whose design goals are to be as semantically condensed and specific as possible. There is a single “formant,” or word, in Ithkuil that can be translated as “...being hard to believe, after allegedly trying to go back to repeatedly inspiring fear using rag-tag groups of suspicious-looking clowns, despite resistance” (the word itself is /qhûl-lyai’svukšei’arpîptó’ks). Quijada has offered that Ithkuil is too complex to be a natural spoken language – rather, that it is a useful tool to think about how quickly and reliably information can be condensed into linguistic frameworks. Its philosophy of meaning is (as the author himself admits) relatively Enlightenment-based – that is, there is a one-to-one correspondence of conceptual representation to some Platonic prototype of what an Ithkuil formant might mean, which is not exactly in line with the language’s design goals – but Quijada here threw up his hands: “A more careful and rigourous construction for Ithkuil’s lexico-semantics, given the author’s stated design goals…would not assume such a theory of meaning, but would rather incorporate more recent findings of cognitive science and cognitive linguistics to reflect embodied meaning and metaphor-based conceptualization. However, pursuing such a foundation for the lexico-semantics of the language would, in the author’s opinion, be extremely time-consuming (on the order of many additional years, perhaps decades, to construct)” (2011: 270-271).

I found this thoughtfully constructed masterpiece of a language perfect for my purposes and set about creating daughter languages that may have evolved from its natural use in my world. I imagined that a group of priests of the Moon Queen had created Ithkuil in-world as an attempt to access the power of the Syntaxelium and communicate with the Goddesses. These priests partially succeeded, in that their new language granted them magical powers. They did not become all-powerful, however. These new Wizard-Queens attempted to conquer the world with their magic, and largely succeeded – but once they had spread out, Ithkuil almost immediately diverged into daughter languages due to its complexity, each of these languages preserving different features of the Syntaxelium. After a few generations, the language with the most expansionist, imperial-minded speakers would conquer the world once again and spread their language into every corner of the globe. The language would diverge again, and the cycle of colonization and genocide would continue until a group of marginalized people led a revolution against their contemporary empire and broke the chain.

The politics of translation

But, at this point I was too invested in this project to continue in my experimental, non-utopic design philosophy. I needed to introduce my polemic into the work, or else it might carry messages contrary to my values (it may regardless, but at least I can try and make my intent as clear as possible). I needed my writing to reflect a strong opposition to, or at least complication of, Enlightenment ideals. I would also paint a picture of the post-revolutionary society I dreamed for my characters, which meant I needed to refine my anarchist sensibilities with a deep dive into ethics and anarchist theory.

I decided to illustrate the conflicts between more Enlightenment, classical logic-based arguments and more post-Enlightenment, posthuman arguments in a contest between two translators trying to render the same text into English. I therefore refined the six tenets of my constructed religion, translated them into Ithkuil, then rendered them back into English in two competing and slightly different ways:

1. tʼal-lrëikțatf orêtfiáss arkʼarț

[tʼal.lɾəɪkθatf ɔˌɾeːtfɪ.ˈas.s ˌaɾkʼˈaɾθ]

similarity.p1s3.IFL-MLT.N-MNF-HAB-EPI thought.p2s1.FML-MLT.N-v2ss/9-GEN source.p1s1.FML-AGG.N

“It is known: some reminder is the source of any thought.” – Eloquences

“So it is that all thought’s source is a likeness.” – Violet

2. okleomdh âkláʼdh tʼal-lriočʰaț atvufq oráʼtf

[ɔklɛ.ɔmð ˌakˈlăð tʼal.lɾɪ.ɔt͡ʃʰaθ atvʊfq ˌɔˈɾătf]

river.p2s1.IFL-COH.N.PRX-ASI river.p3s1.FML-N.PRX-MED organize.p3s3.IFL-DYN-HAB-EPI.N self.p1s1.IFL-MLT.A-IND thought.p2s1.FML-MLT.N-MED

“It is known: as a current from the channel, so selfhood organizes itself out of any thought.” – Eloquences

“So it is that as the whirlpool from the stream, selfhood knits itself from strands of thought.” – Violet

3. ôcneoț îcnêț atvațoaxiarň tʼal-lrëigadhoaqʼ

[ot͡snɛɔθ iːt͡sneːθ atvaθɔ.axɪ.aɾŋ tʼal.lɾəɪgaðɔ.aqʼ]

spore.p3s3.IFL-N-ASI fungus.p2s3.IFL-N-GEN self.p1s1-IFL-N-v2x/2-v2rň/9 component.p1s3.IFL.MNF-HAB-EPI-N-v2q’/2

“It is known: as the fruiting body of the fungus, the crucial, tiny self is the visible component.” – Eloquences

“So it is: the smallest self is the most crucial visible component, as the spore of the fungus.” – Violet

4. tʼal-lreijjaçoak ekraxiuk amvouț tʼal-lrükrațíukiss

[tʼal-lɾɛ.ɪʒ.ʒaçɔ.ak ɛkɾaxɪ.ʊk amvɔ.ʊθ tʼal.ˌlɾuːkraˈθɪ.ʊkɪs.s]

motion-in-situ.p1s3.IFL-v2k/2-ASO.N.PRX-DYN.EPI.HAB tool.p1s2.IFL-ASO.N-v2k/1 center.p11.IFL-N.NAV tool.p1s2.IFL-N-v2k/1-v2ss/1-MNF.HAB.EPI-framed

“It is known: a good wheel spins right about the hub, where there is no wheel.” – Eloquences

“So all wheels spin ever toward their wheel-less centers.” – Violet

5. öpatf uizát tʼal-lripšasúemzeoj ékëuʼady tʼal-lreisásiull

[øpatf ʊ.ˌɪˈzaθ tʼal.ˌlɾɪpʃaˈsʊ.ɛmzɛ.ɔʒ ˈɛkəʊ̆ʔadʲ tʼal.ˌlɾɛ.ɪˈsasɪ.ʊl.l]

carrier.p22.IFL-MLT.N mind.p1s1.FML-N-MNF happen.p1s1.FML.DYN.HAB.EPI-PRX-framed-v3mz/9-v2j/6 path.p1s2.FML-A.PRX.PRV-ABL-framed deviate.p1s3.IFL-DYN.HAB.EPI-framed-v2ll/1

“It is known: a ‘thing’ is a self which acts automatically as expected, and never deviates from its predetermined path.” – Eloquences

“So inanimate is the self which obeys only habit, and never strays from destiny.” – Violet

6. tʼal-lriokápps oratfiáss âkțîʼatf

[tʼal.ˌlɾɪ.ɔˈkap.ps ɔɾatfɪ.ˈas.s ɑkθiːʔatf]

path-oriented translative motion.p3s3.FML-A.TRM-DYN.HAB.EPI thought.p2s1.FML-N.MLT-v2ss/9 similarity.p1s3.IFL-ALL-MLT.N

“It is known: finishes, arrives, any and all thought at a type of reminder.” – Eloquences

“So the destination of a thought is a likeness.” – Violet

As I mentioned, these six tenets were adapted from the Tao Te Ching as interpreted through Charles Sanders Peirce’s semiotic philosophy. They have to do with the origins and ecologies of the self, the necessity and inevitability of communication, and the structure of thought. Why did I create two different translations of the same text in-world? I wanted to show how political of a project translation can be. For example, the less rigorous Violet Text translates the epistemic-habitual modal affixes of the main verbs as “so it is,” whereas Eloquences uses “it is known;” I did this because though they might not seem such different phrases, “so it is” distances the knowledge from a knower – it poses the knowledge as an immutable state of reality, rather than an interpretation derived by an observer. As I learned from readings of Victor Turner, Antonin Artaud and Roland Barthes, such mythologizations are processes of naturalizing the events of a narrative until they lose their historicity, and seem to follow simply from common sense. Mythology transmutes history into a string of isolated, politically vacuous events that could never have happened any other way.

Further examples of the differences between these hermeneutic exercises are in the translation of “similarity.p1s3” in Tenets 1 and 6. Eloquences renders this as “reminder;” the Violet Text, as “likeness.” Why is “reminder” any more nuanced? Why might “likeness” lead the reader astray? To me, “likeness” implies literal similarity; a sort of facsimile relationship between an “original” and “copy.” I took these tenets from Kohn and Peirce directly: Kohn says that all thought begins and ends with an “icon.” “…[A]ll semiosis ultimately relies on the transformation of more complex signs into icons” (Peirce CP 2.278 cited in Kohn 2013: 51). By an icon, Kohn and Peirce mean a type of sign that stands in representationally for another in a very literal sense, like an onomatopoeic sound-image or a drawing of a smiley face. These icons aren’t supposed to be technical, detailed imitations, but rather empty stand-ins to quickly communicate a desired connotation. Therefore, a “reminder” suffices as a translation of “similarity.p1s3,” because the relationship between the sign and the referent is not always one of literal similarity.

The limitations of magic

Or, other magics that do just as much

If we take from Mauss that magic is highly grammatical, that it follows closely to linguistic processes, then my equally linguistic magic system’s limitations must lie in the exclusive capabilities of non-linguistic systems, or perhaps even non-semiotic systems. We must turn to the affect theorists. Is the magical self truly nothing more than a set of interpretants, signaling to each other through eternity? What would the implications of this be for free will and the power of the individual vs. the community? This takes me to my current readings of Deleuze & Guattari’s A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism & Schizophrenia, translated by Brian Massumi, and Massumi’s own Movement, Affect, Sensation: Parables for the Virtual. These books challenge the idea that the self can be reduced to its linguistic processes, and posit that the “emptiness” at the hub of Laozi’s wheel, the constitutive absence at the heart of these semiotics, can actually be filled with direction, with velocity – a sort of perpetual growth into excess meaning that’s difficult to pin down in definition or interpretation.

Massumi takes from Bergson that any space, including the political geography upon which poststructuralism maps identities in their “positionalities,” is formed retrospectively from the completion or frustration of dynamic, unmediated processes of movement and sensation in the body. For Massumi, there is an incorporeal element of The Body – its movement through spacetime – that is ontologically privileged before the formation of The Discursive Subject. “Another way of putting it is that positionality is an emergent quality of movement,” says Massumi (2002: 8).

Emergence is another effect that I address in my Tenets; Tenet 2 deals with selfhood as an emergent property of interacting thoughts, as per Kohn and Peirce. Peirce’s semiotic often grapples with the problem of continuity vs. description, creating almost a Heisenberg paradox of its own wherein a thought can only be described precisely as a positional snapshot, or as a “nondecomposable…dynamic unity” (Massumi 2002: 6). Peirce formulated his three types of signs as emergent properties of each other; indices are emergent properties of the relationships between icons, and symbols are emergent from analogous interactions between indices, or indices and icons. So selfhood, language, and magic all organize themselves from the simplest signs, which is why Peirce and Kohn say all thought begins and ends with an icon. It seems there are parallels within these genealogies of thought, between the Deleuzian affect theorist Massumi and the semiotic of Peirce as it applies to posthumanism. Can the analogy be drawn further to say that if space is an emergent property of movement as selfhood is of thought, then movement and affect is its own kind of non-semiotic magic that must have an effect on spacetime?

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robin-blogs · 3 years

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03.02.2021 – Wednesday Lecture – MA Graduates Presentations

Shows to check out by current students and recent graduates:

https://www.ellietowers.com/walkies

https://cbsgallery.co.uk/NadiaKawafi-Home

https://artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/4442265/group-exhibition-solitary-combustion

Garry Finnegan

Gone from BA to MA. Collaborations, sound artist, installation, recently into performance, real life postman! The only piece Finnegan showed was a film// performative piece he had created. There were a handful of main scenes that were shown in black and white. The first was of someone holding up a cardboard sheet that had “I use to be a wooden boy” seemingly painted in black paint by looking at the texture and appearance of the image.

It was composed to be in the centre of the screen and took up the whole screen, making it the clear and only focal point of the frame. This made me pay more attention to the text of the piece as it was in bold black letters contrasted against the light brown of the background. I personally thought both instantly of Pinocchio and of lockdown// myself during lockdown. I have thought of myself as ‘wooden’ throughout the experience of the past year as I have been solid and still in the same environment, unable to move around because of the pandemic, which left me feeling stuck and ‘wooden’. The next series of frames to be shown throughout the roughly 10 minuite video was a large studio-like room that had two, large brown cylinders suspended from the ceiling from white fabric.

They were seen to move freely within the room by swinging from side to side gently as audio played in the background. Even when listening back to the audio and video with headphones in I still couldn’t clearly understand what the audio was trying to convey; so, I interpreted this as intentional. I couldn’t clearly understand the audio and the video seemed largely disjointed to me in how it was presented. The audio had what sounded like distorted voices playing over slowed down industrial-like music where tones and volumes would shift from high pitched to lo pitched without a balanced in-between; which resulted in it causing me mild headaches and made me lower and higher the volume of my speakers several times during the videos duration. This made me dislike the video as a result as I couldn’t fully concentrate on the content of the video itself and rather had to focus more on balancing the audio. Within the scene following this, the video showed an outside landscape of a large tree that had what seemed to be a paper cone within it.

The audio shifted within this scene from a pitch changing hum to a kind of distorted voice where I couldn’t make out what they were saying. I again, felt like this was intentional because even when listening to the audio with headphones it was still unclear what they were saying. I interpreted this scene as a way of the landscape or cone trying to talk, the whole video was black and white and as a result looked bleak and dystopian which further made me think of the audio relating to the landscape and scenery crying out and being distorted. In the last scenes of the film Finnegan showed a more ‘traditional’ piece of performance art in which two figures// people were dancing around and creating clear black silhouettes on the opposite wall to them. This made it look as if there were 4 people rather than 2.

Similarly, to the first part of the video that was shown, the two people were composed to clearly be the focal point within the middle of the space and took up a large portion of the screen// space. They were also wearing masks while stood next to two stools. They were at a distance and even the formatting of this section seemed to be mirrored from how perfectly cut on either side they were. This made me think about the current events of the pandemic and Covid-19. We are all mirroring one another in what we do, were all at a distance, wearing masks and for a lot of us, life feels very black and white now, without any life or colour. We are all scared for our families and ourselves and we want to keep as many people as we can safe. Finnegan didn’t decide to go into the meaning of the piece, and part of me is glad because as a result it made me think deeper into the perspective and presentation of the video where I would otherwise be largely disinterested if something as bizarre as this video had its meaning given to me so clearly. It feels like I’m in some fever dream, like a disjointed never-ending vision. The final section to this video was how the screen goes to black while there is still slight quiet audio playing in the background until it finally stops and comes to an end. Overall, I found Finnegan’s piece to be interesting but only after I started to think deeper into it and what I personally saw within it; as when I first saw this I felt largely disinterested and bored. I know I personally don’t avidly watch or interact with performance art; but I respect those who have a genuine love for it. I found it refreshing to have a piece of performance art that gave me a reason to engage with it and have a different perspective on an art form I don’t usually interact with.

Linda Jane James

After Finnegan had finished talking about his work on performance art, Linda Jane James started to talk about her work and experience with art throughout her life. James started to talk about how she’s a second year MA student and finished her BA in 2004. She then further explained how she used to be a child accountant before taking up artwork fully. Throughout her artwork she has been looking at exploring trade in business and reworking changes in transformation. James then talked about how she wants to try and bring two parts of her life together, that being her art and her experience in business// child accountancy. James then explained how she has an issue with artists not being included in conversations about changes during pandemic, industry and the environment. With the work she showed during the lecture she explained how she wants to challenge what a website is. Although I don’t have an interest in business or website creation, I found it interesting to see how another artist has interpreted all of the changes in environment and industry and used their artwork and experience in business and accounting to include more artists into the conversation. She doesn’t want a website that is stagnant and still, she wants a website that feels organic and natural to engage people in the conversation more. Overall, even though I feel like I didn’t have as strong of a connection with James’ work with my own practice, I still found it interesting to learn about another perspective an artist is working to create. I found it intriguing how she wants to mix her life as an artist and as a past children’s accountant into one to give more expression and power behind her work as a result. I feel like this is a part of her work I can relate to my own work and practice and use to enhance my work further when thinking about my practice. I feel this is something I already do within my own practice as I often mix my personal life with my artwork to give it more emphasis along with giving me a way of expressing my feelings towards a certain issue I’ve dealt with such as mental health and abuse. I would like to keep doing this more in the future of my work as I enjoy the emphasis it puts on my work along with giving me a way to express my feelings in a ay that helps me heal and recover from my personal issues. I also feel it incredibly empowering when it comes to things such as my gender identity in being a trans man. I have created a wide range of pieces around my own experiences and about the LGBTQ+ Community to help empower myself and to in a way, give myself more hope for the future.

Cos Ahmet

After James’ had finished talking about her work, the next to talk was Cos Ahmet; a second year MA student. He started off his segment of the lecture by showing parts of his website. With one of his images he explained how he uses materials as a layer of skin such as pipes, plaster, insulation and fleece. He wanted to distort the body to the point you couldn’t recognise it. Ahmet then went on to show a collaborative performance piece he did with Abbie exactly a year ago. When the video started to play it had a soft, almost breathing like pattern where it seemed to pulsate a rumbling noise over and over. Throughout the video’s whole duration both Ahmet and Bradshaw were composed within the frame of the shot. They were both stood on either side of the screen, and had plastic wrapped over them both while also being connected by the same strip of plastic. Within the video they both walked up to one another and started to lean into one another. When looking at the video, something about it felt oddly intimate to me. Especially considering it was made in 2020, it additionally reminded me of the pandemic and how we all feel disconnected from one another. It reminded me about my own personal life too, and how I haven’t been able to see my girlfriend for months on end. Overall, I enjoyed Ahmet’s work, although I don’t personally relate to his performative pieces when considering my own work.

In conclusion, I feel as if I enjoyed all of the artists within this lecture, even though they all seemingly did performative pieces which I don’t personally have an interest in both in my personal life and enjoyment of art and within my artistic practice. Although this lecture made me think about performance art a lot more and the different ways it can be shown and how I analyse them in different ways based upon how they’re presented. Although I’m still not interested in doing any performance art myself within my art practice, I have found more respect for the art from of performance art and the work artists put into their work.

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adventures-in-a-world-of-fiction · 4 years

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Practicalities of Censorship

Every so often I see a thread cross my dashboard arguing about censorship with relation to AO3 - in particular people claiming that AO3 is bad because it allows basically any story regardless of content, that people are bad for supporting it, or that AO3 should implement some method by which problematic fics get taken down. These complaints are usually met with explanations around the history or AO3, why it was implemented the way it was, and why thinking that AO3 is fine the way it is does not equal being a pedophile. I want to tackle this from another angle - practicality.

Let's assume for the sake of this post that the people making these arguments are correct and that there are some things which shouldn't be allowed on AO3 (or an an alternative fic platform set up to be a better version of AO3 without all the bad stuff - I'll mostly be taking about "fixing" AO3 in this post but the same problems would apply to setting up a new and "safer" fic site). There are a lot of arguments against censorship to do with quality of works produced and whether this results is less good art when people are scared to produce things that might get banned, or whether there is artistic merit to works that display despicable actions. Let's just imagine for the moment that the whole argument is settled and the "let's purify AO3 for the sake of the children" crowd are correct. What would need to happen next? This isn't something I've seen addressed in these posts.

There are a lot of problems with censorship. Skipping over the ethical discussion of whether censorship is good or bad and in what circumstances it should be accepted, let's focus on two practical aspects: deciding what should and shouldn't be banned, and how you would implement such a ban. Let's start with problem one: where do you draw the line?

Let's assume we have some scale of rating from absolutely sickeningly awful deserving of destruction to perfectly clean and innocent with not the slightest thing wrong with it. Somewhere between these two endpoints is a line and everything to one side of it is bad and should be banned/blocked/deleted from AO3, etc. Everything on the other side of the line is fine and should be left available for people to read. Some things may seem easy to define. Fic A is incest porn, where a child is graphically raped in a way that's cleanly meant to titillate rather than horrify and the abuse is glorified and justified in text, and it's full of poor writing, spelling and grammar mistakes, and has no artistic merit as a work (how you judge artistic merit would need a few thousand words to explore as a subject on its own right). Let's stick that on the bad side of the line since that's the sort of thing that people on Tumblr are crying out to be banned. Fic B is a fluff fic where a character makes another character soup because they're feeling ill and they watch movies together. Nothing remotely sexual, just two adult characters being sweet to each other. So we'll put that on the good side of the line, right?

But the problem comes in deciding where that dividing line should be and what should be done about the things that sit close to the line. You could come up with some simple rules. Let's say, "Everything involving underage incest is on the bad side of the line." Seems straight-forward. But what if you have a story dealing with someone's recovery from incest and CSA? The story has a character who was abused in the past and the narrative deals with them getting therapy and overcoming their trauma. None of the abuse is shown in the text of the story, it all happens off-screen as it were, and the story sends a message that incest and CSA are bad but offers hope to former victims. Surely that story would belong on the good side of the line? So maybe we amend the rule to, "Everything involving graphic incest is on the bad side of the line." That would let us keep the story about overcoming the trauma on the good side but block anything that uses incest as porn. But is consenting incest between grown adults treated the same as abusive incest?

And what if you get a story that's more about the trauma but that has a handful of flashbacks about the rape that would count as graphic. These flashbacks are meant to be horrifying not sexually exciting. Would that be okay? Is it the intent of the scene that matters? But in that case, what happens if the author writes a scene that's intended to be horrifying but a reader interprets it as arousing? Would it be okay if the author includes a disclaimer in the notes saying that this is a terrible thing and shouldn't be done in real life? Is it the intensity of the scenes shown directly in the story? In which case, where do you draw the line between something described explicitly and something merely eluded to? Is it the precise terms used? Which terms? Or how many times those terms are use? Is a subtle allusion to an event okay? In which case, what happens with a slightly less subtle allusion?

The stories that are far away from the line are easy to place, but the ones close to it become a challenge. Any attempt to define straight-forward rules starts to fall apart quickly and you get to the point where you have to argue on a case-by-case basis for each story, which would involve a massive amount of time invested to check each of these stories and decide whether or not they're allowed. Once again the practicalities of "how would you enforce something like this?" rear their ugly head but that's a question we'll address later.

We also have the problem that where I might draw the line between the bad and the good might be different from where you would draw the line, and would be different from where someone else would draw the line. Let's go back to Fic B as described above, our perfectly innocent fluff story. I might think that's perfectly acceptable, but if those two characters are both the same gender, there will be some homophobic people who will say that it's wrong and corrupting innocents because it sends the message that homosexual relationships are good. Or even if the characters are different genders, some highly religious people might think it sends a bad message if those characters are unmarried and living together in a relationship, even if nothing explicit happens within the story. Or what if the characters are married but it's an interracial marriage? A KKK member might say that sends a bad message. Different people have a different idea of what counts as bad content.

In the real world, there have been cases of books that address racism being banned because they use the n word. Harry Potter has been banned by religious groups. According to the website www.banned-books.org.uk a sweet children's book about two penguins hatching an egg was banned by a lot of schools and libraries in the US because the two penguins are both male - even though this story was actually based on a true story. The book Black Beauty, about the experiences of a horse, was banned during the Apartheid in South Africa simply for including the word "black" in the title. If you look at that site, a lot of books have been banned for a lot of different reasons and a lot of good literature has ended up caught up in the censorship usually because religious groups objected to in on moral grounds.

You could say "don't let the bigots and racists be in charge of the censorship," but historically, when censorship has come into play in the past, the people who tend to end up the worst for it are minorities. LGBTQ+ groups and people of colour tend to get censored more than straight, white men. Stories about their experiences often deal with problematic issues and therefore they get banned. The groups that generally end up making decisions about what is and isn't okay tend to be the groups that have the most power to begin with, and the end result is silencing of minority voices. This is one reason I'm very wary of anything to do with censorship, because the people who usually end up the worse for it are those who most need their voices heard.

But let's imagine all of these problems are magically overcome and we come up with a perfectly clear set of rules about what counts as good and bad fic and the dividing line is agreed by good, rational people who aren't remotely bigoted and who are able to define the criteria for what should be banned in a way that will only ever block the harmful stuff.

We still have to deal with the practicalities of enforcement we set aside earlier. We've built our perfect set of rules to define good and bad fics and now we want to put them into practice to ban any of the awful stuff. How would you go about doing it?

We could try and get machine filters to do censorship by looking for keywords and particular tags or using more complex algorithms to judge what a piece of content is about, but this ends up with chaos like Tumblr auto-flagging a lot of perfectly clean content, or YouTube blocking videos that just happened to be by/about LGBTQ+ people. Any software based implementation would struggle because someone talking about a thing as a problem contains the same words as someone glorifying that thing, and machines tend not to be great at picking up tone. You would get a massive amount of errors with things being falsely flagged as bad and things being falsely let through despite breaking the rules.

And people would be sneaky. Someone wanting to include their graphic story wouldn't tag it as for over 18s because tagging something as for over 18s would get it banned, so they would tag it as something else. The terms "lemon" and "lime" used to describe fics by older members of fandoms started from exactly this sort of thing. Websites decided to not allow adult content so people continued to post adult content but they used the citrus scale for tagging it so people would still be able to find it. Which works when people know the terms to look for or avoid, but which doesn't work for people not in the know. Is a "lemon" or a "lime" fic more explicit? Do you know what a fic being tagged as "grapefruit" would mean? By their nature, these tags are coded, which is not great for clarity.

Any sort of system that just blanket bans key words or tags would result in people just not using those keywords and tags but posting the stuff anyway. It would actually make the situation worse because there would still be incest porn and the like, only now it wouldn't be tagged. As it stands on AO3, people use the tagging system very well and people who don't want to see the incest porn can do things like exclude that tag from searches, or just not open fics they see that have the tag. If there were rules in place to not allow anything with that tag, then people would stop using the tag, which would actually mean more people would see incest porn they didn't want to because it would no longer be tagged properly, or it would be tagged using code words which only mean something to the inside group. It would be much harder to avoid the things you don't like.

So let's say we don't let a computer decide what's breaking the rules. Let's say there is a system by which readers can flag a fic as being inappropriate to get it banned. Human beings get to decide, but what's the threshold? Does a thing get banned as soon as someone reports it? Or does it need to be flagged by multiple people to be banned? In which case fics written in tiny fandoms might slip through the cracks because not enough people are reading it to them flag it. This is also open for exploitation. Someone who takes a dislike to a particular person might encourage others to flag their fics as inappropriate, regardless of whether or not they are. Someone might create fake accounts or log in anonymously over proxies to spam a fic with flags.

And even if no one acts maliciously to abuse the system, not everyone will be careful about checking the precise and perfect rules defined to mark the difference between acceptable and unacceptable work. People will flag things incorrectly, based on their own viewpoints of what should or shouldn't be allowed, which we've already said is a problem because everyone will draw the line in different places based on their own beliefs.

So what's the alternative to a community-driven method for managing content? You could have specific people whose job it is to go through content and decide whether it adheres to the rules. Maybe a computer system or community flagging could funnel fics into a review channel where human beings check every one carefully. These people would understand the rules and be certain to always judge fics accurately according to the magically perfect rules defined earlier, which are guaranteed to only ever block bad fics but never block a good fic.

So problem solved, right? We have our perfect rules perfectly implemented.

Except where humans are employed to check whether content is acceptable or not, it involves a large number of people checking through basically the worst content out there. Some social networking sites do this sort of thing now and it can be hugely traumatising for people who do that work. It's not good for them mentally to have to be exposed over and over to the worst content being put up online. There tends to be a high turnover in those jobs because they burn out fast, and that's where people are being paid for this stuff.

A site like AO3 relies on volunteers so it would require a large number of people to volunteer to look at the darkest most gruesome content and decide if it breaks the rules or not. Either you have people who hate those sort of fics doing this out of a sense of duty to maintain the purity of the content, in which case they will probably struggle with having to read a load of stuff they really, really don't enjoy. Or you will have people volunteer because they really like those fics and this is the way for them to read them. And that probably defeats the point of doing this, because it means that the people who would be seeking out those stories anyway would be the ones reading them to see if they break the rules.

There are a lot of problems with censorship, both ethically and practically. Even if you are fully on the side of censorship from a moral standpoint, you have to address the practical concerns if you want to propose an implementation.

As it stands, I think the current system works. There is stuff on AO3 that I would not in a million years want to read, but I don't have to. AO3 is brilliant for its tagging system and I can look at the tags and nope past fics that are full of my personal squicks or that I think endorse something terrible. Readers can exclude tags they want nothing to do with or just not click on ones that include elements you dislike. You can curate your own experience, which actually works with the whole idea of everyone drawing a line in a different place. You and I will have different stories we want to avoid, and we can both choose to avoid them based on author's tagging for them, rather than some other person decreeing what is acceptable for either of us to see.

If you still think that AO3 should be blocking or banning certain content, have a think about how this would work in reality. Because when ideas like that are implemented in the real world, all manner of problems happen.

I think the fact that this post is still a couple of thousand words long with me skipping over several parts of the debate is a sign that this is not a simple problem that can be easily fixed.

#censorship #long post

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thecorpulentbeagle · 4 years

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Okujima Week 2020: Pre/Post Game

Road trip! Today’s prompt is Pre/Post Game, and I decided to take Post, just because I think it’s a little bit easier to write a story after the characters already know each other pretty well. Although, I am curious to see people write/draw creations before the game starts!

As I warned in the beginning of this challenge, this will contain spoilers for the end of Persona 5, and this chapter is the main reason. If you have beaten the game, you could probably decipher what this will be about from the first thing I said, though!

Please enjoy this third part of the Okujima Week 2020 Challenge!

Here is the fanfiction.net link.

As always: THIS STORY WILL NOT CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR PERSONA 5 ROYAL, BUT WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR PERSONA 5.

Okujima Week 2020 Challenge:

Reminiscing:

Pre/Post Game

-Makoto-

This had been a crazy year, to say the least.

Makoto gave a quick turn of her head to look over her shoulder at the group of rowdy teenagers behind her. The bus that she was currently driving had three rows of seats, and each row was packed.

Ryuji was currently bickering with Ann about something or another, with an awkward-looking Akira sandwiched between them. Based on what Makoto had heard earlier, the two blondes had been fighting over whether meats or sweets would be the better option to, as they had phrased, “stuff their face with.” Akira had tried to mediate the two, but had given up after a few fruitless attempts and was now sitting there, waiting for them to eventually come to an understanding.

Akira noticed her looking back at him, giving her a defeated look with a shrug of his shoulders. Makoto gave him a jokingly-pitiful smile, which caused him to chuckle slightly.

Behind them sat Futaba and Yusuke, who were, surprisingly, not screaming at each other. This was probably because the two were engaged in two different activities. The artist was looking out the window at the scenery, using his fingers to frame different aspects, while the hacker was absorbed in her phone, no doubt playing a game of some sort.

That was all Makoto could observe before turning back to face the highway, as the last thing that she wanted was to go careening off the road. That would not be appropriate behavior coming from the group’s senpai.

Though in reality, none of them really gave a moment’s notice to titles, rankings, or things like that. Even though there were a mix of different school levels in the vehicle, as well people from different social standings or ‘cliques’, they all got along. It warmed Makoto’s heart to know that everyone in this bus cared for one another, as the girl had always struggled to make friends growing up.

However, if Makoto were honest, there was one person who shared an even deeper connection with her.

Makoto turned to look at the last occupant. Sitting next to her with a smile on her face was Haru, a person she had come to trust fully in the past few months. Even though the girl had joined the Phantom Thieves towards the end of their campaign, she was still able to endear herself to the entire group almost immediately.

The two were of the same year, but they had never really interacted in school before the Phantom Thieves. This wasn’t strange, though, as Makoto had no interest in forming relationships with others due to her rigorous schedule of studying and maintaining the student council. As she got to know Haru, however, she realized it wasn’t unusual on her end either. Haru would purposefully prevent herself from forming relationships, given that those who grew close to her would only ever use the girl for political reasons.

But these rules seemed to go out the window when it came to the two of them. Makoto’s defenses seemingly melted whenever she would interact with Haru. She would catch her off-guard in the most unusual of ways. Upon their first real-world interaction, Haru complimented Makoto on her Metaverse outfit, which, even now, made her heart beat a little bit faster in her chest. Her earnest compliment was stated so abruptly that it seemed like a statement that was just an apparent fact, rather than something to be used to flatter someone.

As their adventure progressed, so too did Haru’s advances. Makoto had let everyone know that she had no need for honorifics, and she assumed that Haru would abide by that casualness even more, given that they were both third years at the time.

What she hadn’t expected was for Haru to instead add an honorific that was infinitely more impactful. Makoto could never remember anyone calling her Mako-chan, and it had stunned her so much that she had been unable to reply via text for a few moments.

Again, Haru had almost effortlessly found a way to worm her way into Makoto’s heart. Truthfully, it sometimes made Makoto jealous that the other girl was able to navigate social situations such as these so easily. Makoto always struggled, and most of what she expressed was carefully crafted after painstakingly thinking everything through. Half the time, whatever she said wasn’t what she intended in the first place, and was slightly (or highly) awkward.

Haru, however, was not only adept at instigating social cues – she was also skilled at reading them. This was one of the reasons why Makoto liked her so much. Makoto knew that whatever she said, Haru would be able to interpret and respond accordingly.

Makoto had read about topics such as these, given that this was something she had struggled with her entire life. There were all different kinds of intelligence, and Makoto, however pridefully, knew that she excelled in the conventional form of intelligence.

However, when it came to emotional intelligence, she was sorely lacking. Sometimes, she knew someone would be upset, but wouldn’t quite know how to react. Other times, she would be unaware of someone else’s feelings entirely. It was frustrating to learn, but also helpful. It meant that she could take that into consideration when trying to determine the best course of action in a social situation.

When considering these things, Makoto realized that Haru had emotional intelligence in spades. She always seemed to know how others were thinking, how they were truly feeling. When Morgana had struggled to admit his feelings to the Phantom Thieves about the true reason for his departure, Haru had been able to coax it out of him, even though she barely knew the group or understood its dynamics at all.

Speaking of which, Makoto brought her focus back to the present Haru and saw that the reason for her smile was because the cat was in her lap, tilting his head this way and that as she scratched under his chin and behind his ears. The girl giggled slightly as Morgana began to purr. Makoto quickly looked back out at the road, not wanting Haru to catch her staring.

The trip was going to be another few hours, but she didn’t want to change this current set up. Originally, Ann had been sitting next to Makoto, and the two had talked about random things, one of which being that the younger girl would totally be bringing her senpai to one of her favorite sweets stands, since they had released a new flavor of crepe. Ann refused to let her know what the flavor was, but she insisted that Makoto would love it.

That was when Ryuji had overheard their conversation, which had started the current argument. Makoto could only stand to listen for so long before pulling the bus over to a gas station for a quick break to hopefully cool their heads. While that didn’t work, Makoto noticed with a smile that when everyone filed back into the bus, Haru had jumped up to the front with Morgana in her arms, stating that she wanted to move up from the back to be able to sit next to her.

Makoto continued to drive, attempting to tune out the two blondes, who had devolved into merely screeching at each other incoherently.

“Hey…”

Makoto jumped slightly at the quiet voice next to her, startled after hearing nothing but yelling for the past few hours.

She glanced at her side and saw Haru looking over at her with a calm smile. “How are you holding up, Mako-chan?” Her voice was soothing, and almost impossible to hear over the current noise.

Makoto smiled warmly. “I’m alright,” she answered honestly. She knew that Haru would be able to distinguish her current mood regardless. The question itself was a pleasantry more than anything.

Haru nodded. “I’m sorry that none of us know how to drive, let alone have a license.”

“Don’t worry about it, Haru.” Makoto glanced back at road before looking back at Haru. She noticed that her hands had stilled on Morgana, and decided to act.

Makoto reached out a hand and laid it over top of Haru’s own, gently peeling it away from Morgana’s torso. “It’s only a few more hours, after all.” She moved their hands to the middle of the bench, slowly stroking Haru’s with her thumb.

Makoto’s stomach fluttered at Haru’s giggle. “I suppose that’s true.” The girl turned her hand so that she could interlace their fingers. “I’m glad I can at least comfort you a little bit.” She squeezed her hand gently.

Makoto flushed and said nothing, merely turning back to face the road.

It felt nice to be able to hold hands with Haru like this, even while driving. Perhaps the next few hours wouldn’t be so bad.

Except.

“Oi, look at the two lovebirds up front!”

For that.

Makoto looked back to see that Ann and Ryuji had finally stopped arguing, but that they now had a new focus. Ryuji was currently grinning madly at the two senpai, and Ann was following suit. Akira looked relieved, but then soon looked at what was being discussed, and quickly grinned deviously.

“What are you talking about Ryuji? Oh? Oooooh,” Futaba had looked up from her phone to admonish the boy, only to look up front and see what was happening. She chuckled.

“Indeed. I had been observing for quite some time, wondering what to call a work of art based on this scene,” Yusuke mused, framing them with his fingers.

“G-guys!” Makoto choked. She looked back out front. “I-I have to look at the road. Stop distracting me!”

The rest of the group continued to tease the driver, making her face redden after every comment. She was torn between berating them and potentially crashing the vehicle, and focusing on the road but having to be the target of their attacks for the next few hours. Clearly, everyone was bored, and this situation was too good to pass up.

After a few more minutes, Makoto was seriously considering careening off the road, just to have them stop for one moment.

Instead, she decided to chance a glance at Haru, who had been surprisingly quiet this whole time. She saw that the other girl was in fact looking back at her, and her eyes sparkled when Makoto met them with her own.

Makoto wasn’t quite sure what to make of this quiet affection, so she merely smiled back before looking back out at the road.

“Pfft. This is boring! Neither of them are saying anything!” Futaba whined. Makoto glanced back to see that she was slouched in her seat with her arms crossed.

“I think we probably broke Makoto, and Haru doesn’t even mind it!” Makoto heard Ann reply.

“Eh, we’ve probably teased ‘em enough anyway,” Ryuji added.

After a few more exchanges, the topic of conversation drifted to something else entirely. Makoto was thankful for that.

“Well now, that didn’t take too long, did it?” Makoto inclined her head towards Haru, indicating that she was listening without taking her eyes off the road.

“What do you mean?”

“I knew that everyone would become bored eventually, but even I have to admit that was rather fast.” Haru giggled.

Makoto realized that Haru had read the situation again. Rather than react to the situation, she had pleasantly ignored it, knowing that with no reaction, the teasing friends would eventually switch their attention to something else.

It seemed so unfair. Makoto had barely been able to conceal her embarrassment, but Haru had been able to do that, as well as read the situation to figure out a solution.

“Well… thank you for that,” Makoto replied. She squeezed her hand, which (she realized with a start) she hadn’t let go of the entire time.

“Of course. Like I said before, I’m glad to be able to give you any sort of comfort.” Haru squeezed her hand back.

Makoto nodded.

Haru truly was a good friend.

And based on her friends teasing, maybe even something more.

Done! Hopefully you enjoyed. I’ve always been interested in characters who show great amounts of emotional intelligence, because it’s hard to put into writing. It can be so easy to write a character as… sort of bland.

For example, someone might not react in a strong way, but that’s because the person is restraining their emotions, knowing that freaking out won’t help the situation. But sometimes, that can come off as the character not having emotion/not being developed properly. It’s an intricate sort of balancing act, and when it’s done well, I really like it. That’s one reason that I appreciate Haru’s character so much.

I also think this is why I ship these two together. Makoto is a little socially awkward, but Haru helps her with that. Whereas Haru struggles to trust people, but Makoto is so earnest, that she helps show Haru that it’s okay to share her feelings with others. Since this was from Makoto’s POV, I didn’t talk about Makoto’s strengths as much, so I just wanted to mention it here. See you tomorrow!

#okujima #okujima week #okujima week 2020 #makoto niijima #haru okumura #makoto x haru #haru x makoto #p5 #persona 5

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