#the age old question

[blindbisexualgoose]

My favourite feminist

#the age old question #do i want to kiss him or be him #if you don’t let me suck your d- #that second photo tho #gay emo twink #rodrick rules #rodrick heffley #diary of a wimpy kid #rodrick heffley x reader #movie characters #emo boy #international women's month #he’s sorry women #international women's day

[berriicherry]

#the age old question #svsss #scumbag system #digital artist #inconsistent art style #danmei #digital art #fanart #shen qingqiu #shen yuan #doodle #shang qinghua #mxtx svsss #mxtx #mxtx fanart #my art #Their relationship in a nutshell

[glumby]

#poll #the age old question #i still like asking people this like a 4 year old does #no “other” option because i dont want everyone to just cop out. like if u like lavender choose purple

[strawberrygardenkisses]

#polls #the age old question

[stillebesat]

#forest fire #tortoise and the hare #race #the age old question #random idea

[f1-disaster-bi]

I have reached the age old question of fanfic writers: do I write the smut, skim over it with minim description, or end just before the smut?

#the age old question #to smut or not to smut #that is the question but what is the answer #yes this is about girl lando

[lostcauses-noregrets]

Lost, can you please clarify how old Erwin is when he dies? I've seen people say he's in his 40s. Others say he's in his 30s. I don't know who to believe. I like to think he's 35-37. But I could be wrong.

Isayama has never given either Erwin or Levi an exact age, however he has said that Levi is in his early thirties and Erwin is a few years older. Most readers take this to imply that Levi is somewhere between 30-33 when the main arc of the manga starts in the year 850, and Erwin is 35 - 38ish. Sadly Erwin didn't live to see his 40s.

#asks #the age old question #erwin smith #erwin meta #snk

[regentochter]

*Kinn smoking, Vegas cursing in English, Kim fighting, Pete smiling while being tortured*

#ready to risk it all for these men #kinnporsche #kinnporsche the series #someone might have done this before #but whatever #the age old question #is it theerapanyakul or theerapanyakun #kinn theerapanyakul #Kinn theerapanyakun #vegas theerapanyakul #vegas theerapanyakun #kim theerapanyakul #kim theerapanyakun #pete saengtham #still not sure if that is his name #kinnporsche pete #kinnporsche episode 10 #kinnporsche ep 10

[stupid-cissy]

#t4t nsft #trans supremacy #trans nsft #enby nsft #trans superiority #wlw nstf #the age old question

[northseas]

#the age old question #polls #tumblr polls #i wish i could bold letters inside a poll #to make clear what letter is apart of the abbreviation #but alas capital letters must do

[ozymoron]

why are his eyes so big and beautiful

#⚠️ #the age old question

[twinknote]

how do people even find the time and energy to write. like this shit takes Focus and Brain Power. am i just too disabled or are y’all superhuman

#the age old question #like i’m not even working rn and i barely have the energy to write even tho i Really want to #i can’t even imagine finding the time or energy to write when i’m working (hopefully soon) #is there like a cheat code or smth #someone pirate a functional brain and body for me so i can write them fucking nasty style pls and ty

[refabled]

the question is who is gonna eat her out until her knees are shaking

#the age old question #･ﾟ . 𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘦𝘳 𓆱 ooc. #nsft #WELL??

[mychemicalrachel]

I need y'all to settle something for me because my sister and I disagree.

#the age old question #polls #reblogs are appreciated

[sewerpeaches]

The Answer to the Age Old Question:

Who is older, Donatello or Raphael?

The long answer that you didn't come here for is: it depends on the continuity. So you can find my breakdowns for each continuity here (eventually).

The short answer:

Donatello

Why?

#1. "Word of God" #2. IDW Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2011), volume 5 #3. Character/family/team dynamics #4. Aesthetics

~ 1 ~

For those unfamiliar with the term, the Word of God is "A statement regarding some ambiguous or undefined aspect of a work, the Word of God comes from someone considered to be the ultimate authority, such as the creator, director, writer or producer of a TV show / video game / film / etc."

With that in mind, Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird co-created Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in 1984. Unlike a fair amount of co-created series, TMNT is actually an evenly split brain-child (ie neither Eastman nor Laird seems to be any more responsible for or involved in its creation/production/etc than the other).

On August 14, 2014, Kevin Eastman stated "I'm going to take a bold step and say Donatello is older" during a Reddit AMA .

I couldn't find so much as a whiff of Peter Laird's explicit opinion on the matter (for all my searching... and there was a lot), but that also means that I never found him contradicting Kevin Eastman's statement. (More subjectively, Laird seems to have essentially directed the 2k3 run and I'll post my take on why 2k3 has peak little-brother Raph energy here (eventually))

At any rate, if you're the type of person who accepts the "Word of God" at face value, then continue no further! I, however, don't do that—hence why this is only reason 1 of 3 (4).

~ 2 ~

If you're not familiar with IDW Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2011) then read it, because it's phenomenal, it's the franchise's longest running piece of media ever and up until volume 100, original co-creator Kevin Eastman co-wrote the series and collaborated on page layouts. The much acclaimed Last Ronin, the first thing written by both Eastman and Laird since the original Mirage run, is set in the IDW-verse as its own version of SAINW.

The premise of the IDW run is that Splinter's and the Turtles' souls are reincarnated from those of a human family that lived in feudal japan (yes it sounds stupid, but it's touched on very little and is executed surprisingly well). And that means that the Turtles' corresponding human-selves are all visibly different ages (because unlike turtles, it's not so common for humans to have quadruplets).

So when we see the Turtles' human selves in volume 5...

It's clear in both appearance and mannerisms that Don is older than Raph.

They're definitely the closest in age of the siblings, but still most assuredly different ages.

Besides Raph being smaller than Don with shorter and chubbier limbs, his hairstyle also strikes me as more baby-like (kinda like the ancient version of the ponytail parent's give their 1 year olds when they don't have enough hair yet to actually do anything with). His mannerisms also lend themselves to that of a younger child—more sleepy, much more oblivious to his surroundings, and more clingy. Don's also shown to be able to stand, while Raph seems like he might not be able to yet.

~ 3 ~

This reason is subjective, which is why I've listed it last and need more space to elaborate on it. You'll find the unabridged version on my blog at some point under this tag (eventually), because I simply have Too Many Thoughts™ to contain within a post not dedicated specifically to it.

The short of it is: Donatello's character has always seemed to be designed around being second-in-charge—both in team and family contexts.

I don't think anyone would argue against the fact that Don is the go-to turtle. Doesn't matter what continuity you look at, when Leo anyone runs into a problem, they turn to Don.

You could argue that Donnie's the smart one and "so it only makes sense to turn to him to fix a problem" (and that's a bit of a catch-22 that I'll talk about in more detail in the unabridged version!). However... he's not a real person and so him being the smart one that characters always turn to when Leo falters (including Leo!) is a deliberate choice by the creators. And in the context of the The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle's very traditional operating style—with heavy emphasis on hierarchy by age, blood, etc.—it's very telling.

Were they a real family, yes, they would have developed their personalities/aptitudes mostly independently of their birth order, but given that specifically assigning children roles/ideals based on birth order is a significant player in Japanese culture (especially ancient Japanese culture which pertains to ninjitsu on which TMNT is based)... well... (I mean just look at how Splinter treats Leo).

Anyway, looking at the TMNT franchise as a whole, the advancement of the plot, in 9/10 cases, hinges on Don coming up with a solution either (1) via Leo coming up with something, pointing him in a direction, and asking "Don can you make [insane thing] work?" or (2) when Leo stalls entirely and Don has to take over. And though it's a formula, it's a formula with a million different permutations so it stays interesting.

Raph's role is to go into a berserker rage and brute force a second-wind powerup when when fighting is the only option. He's as the one who makes the first option work when Leo & Don are stuck and he has to, not the one who comes up with the second option. And, narrative-wise, it would be boring and lazy for the Turtles to only ever brute force plan A. (Happy to say I wrote this before I saw Laird say the same thing about Raph (bottom of #55))

That very distinct chain-of-command is why we get things like this, which is much more interesting and satisfying than beat-the-thing-until-it-stops:

The same follows in terms of family dynamics. Leo & Raph are simply too similar for the family to feel "balanced" if they're the two eldest brothers. There's no functionality in a family where 1 & 2 are providing nothing different or, worse, butting heads. Don holds the emotional stability of the family in the palm of his hand, largely just by existing as the buffer between Leo & Raph (we all know what happens in SAINW).

And, just from a characterization perspective, it seems much more natural for Raph to turn to Don for comfort than vice versa.

(Again, I'm gonna just... aggressively point to IDW.)

I'll go into this much more in the unabridged version, but I wanted to touch upon it here: setting Don aside for a moment, I see so many people argue for Raph being the second son based entirely upon his attitude towards Leo and ignoring everything and everyone else. It sorta drives me insane, tbh. I think it's a wildly shallow interpretation of his character.

Raph's entire hang-up is not around being second best, it's around being denied authority/autonomy in general—you know, stemming from being a mutant and being banned from doing 9/10 things he'd like to? That's why we see him fighting with Leo; Leo is the only authority he can fight (putting aside crime syndicate-type authority which he also fights obv). But more importantly, we also see him exerting as much power as he can by playfully, not cruelly bullying Mikey //glares at 2k12 (and in more source-compliant adaptations, yes, it is only Mikey that he truly messes with //glares harder at 2k12) or going off solo.

As much as I love 2k7, specifically the Leo/Raph dynamic, it's not actually a good representation of their real relationship—more of a spin-off "what if" (which Laird has also said). And 2k12 is ok plot-wise, but as far as I'm concerned it mostly fails at creating any compelling character dynamics and it crashes and burns in terms of staying true to source material. C':

~ 4 ~

Finally, I will end this post with my strongest argument for Don being second-eldest...

Sunset Aesthetic

#tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #tmnt donatello #tmnt raphael #raphael tmnt #donatello tmnt #tmnt don #don tmnt #raph tmnt #tmnt raph #donatello #raphael #tmnt age discourse #the age old question #sewerpeach prose #Kevin Eastman

[toburnup]

hii can you tell more about the title of chp 10?

ahh panopticon!

a panopticon prison is when there's a single guard tower overlooking a large number of cells. if the windows are blacked out, there's no way to tell if you're being watched or not.

The authority changes from being a limited physical entity to being an internalized omniscience - the prisoners discipline themselves simply because someone might be watching, eliminating the need for more physical power to accomplish the same task. (x)

and then foucault, brilliant/annoying as he was, was like. HMMMM how can i intellectualize this! and he connected it to the idea that all citizens self-police our behaviour even when no one is watching. that we have strict ideas of socially expected (and acceptable) behaviour. and i'm a queer theory bitch and i wrote a paper on the panopticon in school, so ofc i have to bring it into my fics lmaoo.

panopticon theory has informed how i've written steve, who is overly aware of his behaviour and how it's perceived by people around him. and beyond that, he self-polices his behaviour (and his thoughts!) as if he's being constantly watched. his idea of acceptable behaviour is also closely linked to heteronormative standards — like what would a straight guy do or think in this situation? even though no one is really watching him that closely.

it comes up in a lot of ways in ch 10 especially. he sits on the bus and looks around him, trying to figure out if he can see gay men from sight alone. for steve, a big part of being in the closet is adhering to specific social standards that he holds himself to, and not necessarily ones that other people would be holding him to. it's coming from the Self 💙 which is painful to untangle, but he's getting there.

#cw prisons #cw police #the age old question #is it anxiety or the panopticon #is your light on #is this meta? it feels meta #vio answers #iylo meta