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dandylovesturtles · 5 months

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havin' all these Splinter and Leo thoughts. augh.

this is partly the fault of @/turtleblogatlast's post about Leo just wanting to make Splinter proud.

post-movie

...

Seven days post-invasion, and Leo is feeling (relatively) pretty good. Sure, he's still on a truly ridiculous amount of painkillers and he can't walk two steps without collapsing, but he's able to stay awake and talk to his family and considering where he thought he would be right about now, well... that's everything.

So yeah, he's feeling pretty good. He just finished his lunch of soup and a protein shake, warm and a little drowsy while he listens to April talk about some of the more ridiculous conspiracy theories that have started spreading on the surface. Donnie's tinkering with one of his smaller inventions while he listens, Mikey is nestled in Raph's lap, and everything is calm and cozy in their makeshift medbay.

And then his dad walks in and says, "I would like to talk to Blue, please. Alone."

And suddenly Leo doesn't feel so good anymore.

"Aha, wait," he says quickly, reaching out and grabbing April's sleeve just before she rises from her chair. "Whatever it is, you can say it in front of everyone, right?"

Splinter shakes his head. "This is a conversation I think it is best we have in private." He makes a shooing motion at the others, and April pulls her sleeve from Leo's fingers with a helpless shrug.

"See ya in a few, Leo," she says, then walks out. The others look from Splinter, to him, then back to Splinter, and one by one they each get up and shuffle out, too, with their own hasty farewells.

Traitors, every single one of them.

The door closes, and Leo finds himself alone with Splinter for the first time since coming back from Staten Island. Or at least, the first time he can remember. He was pretty out of it the first few days; most of what he remembers is muddled and confused. And embarrassing. He cried a lot more than he'd care to admit.

Splinter hops into chair April was sitting in and pulls it closer; he has to stay standing to be anywhere near eye level with Leo. He wishes he could read Splinter's face, but his expression is giving nothing away. Sometimes it's easy to forget he spent a not-insignificant part of his life as an actor, until something like this happens.

Leo decides to speak before he can. Head him off at the pass, or something.

"If you're going to yell at me, just remember my eardrums are already damaged."

Which is true - turns out being 1, too close to an exploding alien spaceship and 2, getting punched in the head repeatedly by an alien very mad about said exploding spaceship is bad for the ears, even when you don't have outer ears like a human. So super loud noises are a bad idea right now, and thus Leo cannot be yelled at. Flawless logic; maybe he can keep using that every time he gets in trouble.

For the first time, his dad's expression shifts, just a little. A deeper frown, a heavier set to his brow.

"You think I came in here to yell at you?"

Leo feels his stomach twist. Does he have to spell it out? "I mean, didn't you? That's usually what kicking everyone else out is leading up to."

"I see..." Splinter is still unreadable, looking a little too intensely at Leo. "And what do you think I want to yell at you about?"

He really does want it spelled out. Leo suddenly realizes that there won't be any yelling because this is his punishment: to admit everything he's done, to speak all his sins for his dad's ears. Lay it all out in his own tongue and show that he understands, really and truly, the depths of his screwups.

Oh, he understands. He understands it so well he may choke on the words.

"...For losing the key," he says finally, and it stings on its way out. He hasn't talked about it since it happened; every time he tries to say anything to the others, they shush him, saying, "It's okay, Leo, everything is fine now."

It's not okay, and everything isn't fine, and this is when he finally hears about it.

Finally, an identifiable emotion on Splinter's face: horror, dawning clear and present. And Leo doesn't understand that, because doesn't Splinter know he lost the key? He was there for that conversation, wasn't he? Leo's memories of that day have grown a little hazy between the drugs and the recovery and the fact that thinking about it for too long makes him go fuzzy around the edges, but he's pretty sure he remembers Splinter being there. He flicked popcorn at Leo's head. He probably should have done more than that; maybe then Leo wouldn't have made such a mess of things.

Splinter doesn't say anything right away, just stares at Leo with that horrified expression, and the silence is so scary that Leo starts filling it without even thinking.

"I was kidding about the whole... not yelling at me thing. I know I deserve it. I mean, I was fooling around, doing what you and Raph told me not to do, and I doomed the whole world doing it! Some leader I am, right? And I know I'm not exactly your favorite son to begin with, and that's fair, because I keep letting you down, but this is definitely my worst screwup to date, and you yell at me when I don't close the fridge door all the way or throw balls around the TV room so why wouldn't you yell at me for destroying the planet, right...?"

His voice peters out at the end, too hoarse to continue. That's the most words he's strung together over the last week, and for the first time he's glad for his injuries, for stopping him from spewing any more embarrassing word vomit just to fill the air.

Splinter is still looking at him with that same horrified expression. If anything, he just looks more upset, which means that Leo at least accomplished his goal.

Leo's waiting for the yelling to start, but when Splinter finally says something, it's, "You think I have a favorite son?" throwing Leo for a loop once again.

"Uh, yeah?" he says, because that's all there is to say. He's always assumed it's Donnie - the "funny one", the one who fixes Splinter's TV when it's broken, and the only one of them likely to get a real job and move out of the house. But even if it's not Donnie, it's gotta be Mikey, or Raph. His brothers are amazing and talented, and all Leo has ever been good at is winning the Lair Games.

Splinter closes his eyes a moment, and when he opens them his face moves back to a more neutral expression. "I do not have a favorite son," he says, firm and serious. "I love all of you just the same."

Leo thinks that can't be true - if it is, he feels bad for the other guys. But he doesn't think he can just say that, so he says, "Yeah, Dad, of course," instead.

Splinter looks a bit crestfallen. "You don't believe me?" he asks, and shoot. Leo has no idea how to respond to that.

"...I know you love us," is what he says. And that's true, it is! He just doesn't know how his dad could like him as much as the others.

Splinter's expression turns sad. He reaches out and lays a furry hand on Leo's arm, careful of his bandages and all the many wires he's hooked to. "You think you doomed the world?"

"I lost the key," Leo repeats. "It was all my fault. It's why I had to..." His voice fumbles over the words, and he revises. "It's why it had to be me."

Splinter's mouth twists. He climbs out of the chair and onto the mattress, careful not to jostle Leo as he settles down on his knees.

"Blue," he says softly, gently palming Leo's face this time. "None of this was your fault."

Leo's stomach twists again. He thought he was being punished, but somehow this is worse.

"Yes it was," he argues. "I lost the key," for the third time, "and... and I ignored the order to retreat, and got Raph captured, and and and, I ignored the guys and tried to force our way into Metro Tower, and it was me who told Donnie to try to fly that stupid ship, and because of me Mikey had to-"

"Leonardo," says Splinter, sharp, and Leo goes silent. His dad looks devastated, but he keeps his hand on Leo's cheek, brushing with his thumb, and for the first time Leo realizes his skin is wet. Splinter sighs heavily, his entire frame seeming to droop with the weight of it.

"Leonardo," he repeats, softly this time. "You did not doom the world."

"But-"

A furry finger on his lip quiets him.

"You did not doom the world," Splinter repeats, once again firm and serious. "You did not take the theft of the key seriously, because you did not know what it was, the threat it represented. But it was the Foot Clan who chose to use that key, fully knowing what evil it would unleash. That is not on you, my son. The responsibility falls squarely on them."

Leo doesn't know how much he can believe that - isn't it their job to stop the Foot Clan? But Splinter looks so sure as he says it, and his hand is still tender on Leo's cheek, and for the first time a little bit of doubt seeps into Leo's heart, telling him that maybe, just maybe, this wasn't all his fault after all.

But still...

"Even if that's true," he says, with heavy emphasis on the if, "everything I did after that-"

"You are young," his dad interrupts. "You are inexperienced. You are learning. And the amount of growth you showed us all, even over just that one day... You shined as brightly as I know you can."

Again, Leo's stomach does a twist - but it's a happier one, this time. Splinter's voice is sincere, leaving no room for doubt, and Leo can almost, almost believe that this is true, that his dad has believed in him from the very beginning. Has seen something in him, whatever it was that led him to make Leo the leader, that lead to him putting trust in Leo.

He just wishes he felt like he'd done more to earn it.

"You did not doom the world," says his dad again. "You saved it. But, it never should have been like that to begin with. You should never have been facing down such a fierce foe so young, especially as alone as you boys were. And you-"

His voice becomes choked up, and Leo's heart lurches.

"You... sacrificed yourself to save us all. I... I am your father, and I... could not protect you."

He's crying. His dad is crying, and Leo feels panic, reaching out to try and stop this.

"Dad-"

"No." Splinter holds up a hand, giving his head a hard shake. "All I ever wanted for you boys was to save you from the sacrifices asked of our family. And yet I could not - and for that, you paid dearly. You almost paid the ultimate price, and we almost lost you forever."

A thick knot forms in Leo's throat, and he can barely get out, "I'm okay, Dad, I'm here."

"Yes you are." Splinter squeezes his shoulder desperately. "You are here. You are safe. But that doesn't change that it should not have been you to begin with."

Leo watches in dawning horror as Splinter steps back, then kneels over on the mattress.

"This is why I came in here, Blue. Not to yell at you. To apologize."

He presses his forehead against the sheets.

"I am so sorry that I could not protect you."

He's crying. So is Leo, openly now. He reaches out for his dad, fumbling for his shoulders and urging him to straighten up.

"No, Dad... This wasn't your fault!"

"But-"

"No! It was just... it was just a really, really shitty thing that happened, okay? It was the Foot Clan, and the Krang, but it wasn't- it wasn't..."

Splinter raises his face and looks at him, and suddenly the words he's been trying to get Leo to believe for the last several minutes barrel into him and Leo crumbles.

"...I didn't have to do it," he says.

"No." Splinter gets up, coming closer. "You had nothing to atone for. You did it because you are brave, and you are kind, but this was never yours to fix."

Leo sucks in one harsh breath, then another, and then he's sobbing harder than he ever has in his life, and his dad hugs him tight, his arms warm and his fur soft where Leo buries his face in his shoulder.

All the feelings he's pushed aside - the ones he didn't think he had the right to feel, because he'd had to do it, he had to make up for his mistakes - bubble over, gripping him with grief and despair but also relief, that he's still here to cry and be hugged by his dad.

"I was so scared."

"I know."

"I thought I wouldn't see you guys again."

"I know. We thought we had lost you, too."

"I just... I didn't know what else to do... I couldn't let him... I couldn't..."

"Shhh, it's alright. It's over now. We're all safe."

Leo hugs his dad back, as tightly as he can with his injuries, and sobs and sobs until he's all out of tears. And all along, his dad tells him he is safe, he is good, and he is loved.

Later, Leo feels even better than he had before.

#dandy fanfiction #rottmnt #rise leo #rise splinter #this is probably the most self-indulgent thing I've written in like #A WHILE #I hope this is coherent at least lol #as usual I have no idea how to end anything #god this is sappy but whatever #I AM CRINGE BUT I AM FREE

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radiance1 · 7 months

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Ahem.

So I remembered a very old post of mine that came to be in the form of an ask I sent someone, so I'm going to borrow an idea from that. Can't remember it accurately, nor can I find it so I'm just gonna take a few creative liberties here :)

So, Danny defeats Dark Danny, the Nasty Burger explosion happens, but Clockwork doesn't reverse time, leaving everything Danny held dear gone.

Danny obviously doesn't take this well and you know, breaks down as one does after losing both family and friends at once. He stays locked up in the Fenton house, moping around in a daze for most of it and trying not to become Dark Danny.

One day, when looking through his parents' old stuff he finds a few comic books, a world where superheroes and villains existed and they fought each other in the classic good and evil. Danny wasn't really all that interested at first, but after a while he sat down and started reading them.

Needless to say, he was instantly enthralled with the world, with its heroes and villains and everything going on with it that made it seem so much more fantastical than his own, bleak and miserable one.

He found himself a favorite rather quickly, a Superhero going by the identity of Batman, and his civilian name Bruce Wayne. He's read all of his adventures with bated breathes, hoping for him to succeed when he seemed unable to, sharing his misery when something truly terrible happened, and sharing his joy as well.

It made his life seem... brighter, than it did after the explosion.

Unfortunately, there was a limited supply of them, and he quickly had to take to rereading them over and over again. Until more mysteriously started to appear on his bed one day, and the young dragon (Yes I'm infecting him with the Eastern Dragon au. He has the horns, claws, scales, fangs and tail, everything is human.) was weary of them at first, before just sitting down and reading them anyways.

Introducing new characters, he watched as both Batman's allies and enemies grew. More being added to his family over time, experiencing the great loss that happened when Jason died and being just as surprised when he came back.

He could almost imagine himself there, if he really, really tried.

Then one day, when he was waiting and expecting for more of those comic books to appear, instead what he was greeted with some kind of circle that appeared on his floor, and Danny really shouldn't have done what he did, but there wasn't anyone there to stop him, nor any that would care if he was gone.

Not anymore.

So he just stepped inside of it. Whatever it was, was probably an aimless summoning that didn't have an intended target, probably, if the gasps of those who summoned him- who looked like the generic cultists- let out as well as one of them outright questioning that it worked.

He didn't really care about them though, he was just about ready to leave, step out of the circle and all to go explore wherever the hell he was when something, something utterly precious caught his attention.

Batman smashed through a window, landing with a roll onto the floor and quickly standing up to identify the threats in the room.

Danny paused, not blinking or even breathing he thinks.

That. That man.

That was his.

#dc x dp #dp x dc #dp x dc crossover #dpxdc #dcxdp #dc x dp crossover

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dreamlifebunny · 8 months

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it doesn't matter where you came from, what matters is that you're here now.

one thing that really bugs me about spiritual communities in general (reality shifting, law of assumption, non dualism, etc.) is that a lot of people shame others for not understanding things or for believing in things that are limiting when they first start out. i mean, i understand the frustration - anons can ask a thousand questions that could be answered if they read pinned posts, and we all just want everyone to abandon their limiting beliefs and just get it.

but the fact is that we were born in a society that teaches us that we are limited and that some things are impossible, from the time that we are small until we find these teachings, and we are slowly undoing them through exploration and self-inquiry. it's an overwhelming and tricky journey, filled with so many beautiful highs and a lot of devastating lows, and i feel like everyone deserves a whole lot of compassion when searching for answers. i know i needed love and compassion when i first started, because my ego was scared and sad and was searching for answers in order to feel loved and secure. being told i was dumb and having someone be frustrated with me for my questions was the last thing i needed to become self-actualized. i know that everyone is different, but this is just my experience, so i wanted to share it.

my beliefs are constantly evolving into what brings me more peace and understanding. in the beginning, i wouldn't have been able to believe that my assumptions create my reality (law of assumption) if i hadn't been introduced to the idea of reality shifting. i wouldn't have understood the fact that this life is just beautiful dream and that my true Self is the dreamer (non dualism) if i hadn't first been able to separate my "imagination" from my "real life" (3D and 4D from law of assumption). these were all stepping stones in my understanding of the greater ideas that i needed to get to, and i feel no shame in formerly having beliefs or practices that i don't identify with anymore. i don't believe that you should have shame, either, regardless of where you are at in your journey of self-discovery and creative power.

i get so sad when i see bloggers shaming others for not understanding things when all of this is so fucking difficult to grasp when one is first starting out. i mean, we come from societies that have beliefs as foolish and damaging as skin colour making you inferior, or that gender is binary and you can't express yourself the way you feel inside. with beliefs such as these, of course the beliefs of anything being possible and the fictional being real are going to sound impossible and profoundly false. in my personal opinion, the tough love approach has never helped me - compassion and patience has. i feel like so many people believe and understand that we are all one and have a great understanding of the truth of things, and yet go around and are rude to those seeking answers. it just feels so pathetic to me to see bullying of those seeking answers when they're literally just an extension of the answerer. anons are showing up with silly questions because bloggers expect them to have silly questions. and i realize that even this is hypocritical of me to say because i could just choose to see a spiritual community full of love and compassion instead of what i'm seeing, but i still wanted to share this while i unravel my own hypocrisy.

i feel like if you are wanting to be a teacher of others, you have to take on the responsibility that being a teacher holds, which includes patience, patience, and more patience. that's just my own perspective at least, and everyone is welcome to have their own, but my favourite teachers have been ones that guide me to my own answers with patience and compassion. i am also profoundly sensitive and feel wilty when others are cruel to me, so maybe i'm just trying to speak out to those who feel similarly, because this is a post i wish i could have read when i first started my journey. ultimately, everyone can do, be, and say whatever they like - it's their own blog after all - but i just want to be a voice of compassion to anyone who is in the beginning stages of learning about the law of assumption, non dualism, or reality shifting. it all comes down to the same profound teachings that we are, at our core, limitless.

all of this is to say that i am proud of you. you are doing a good, great, amazing job. you are worthy of love and goodness in your life no matter what others may make you feel. you are worthy of the absolute best and nothing less. it is a hard journey at times, but it is a worthwhile journey, and you are brave and creative and beautiful for taking the steps to expand and give yourself the best life. you deserve compassion and love and patience, and i am rooting for you every step of the way. i hope you are rooting for yourself, too.

ultimately, it doesn't matter where you got your beliefs. what matters is: does it feel right to you? does it make you feel connected to your true, unlimited Self? does it open up your world and your heart to the endless possibilities available to you? does it give you peace? if so, it doesn't matter what practice or teaching you believe in. you are your own greatest teacher.

it doesn't matter where you came from, what beliefs you once held, or who you've been in the past. what matters is that you are here, learning and growing, learning how to give yourself the most beautiful experiences that your creative power has to offer. be kind to yourself and remember that we're all just trying to expand and love and open ourselves up.

#not sure how to tag this one considering its just a loving rant. but yeah #law of assumption #non dualism #sensitive bb bunny strikes again #bunny's originals #even now i'm worried that someone is gonna be mean to me about this post LOL gjhsghjgf #sensitivity is a blessing and a curse #neville goddard #edward art

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thecagedsong · 2 years

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Look, book-Sophie's arc is dear and personal. Because she is an eldest sister, and so much of that is to her advantage in the story. She knows how to quell tantrums and knows how to run a shop and knows how to clean and make a home worth living in. The story would be infinitely sadder if Sophie was one of those "not like other girls" who couldn't cook or clean. Sophie knows that loneliness is the worst, leading her to talk to Calcifer enough that she knows how to break Howl's spell. Being bossy enough to get small children to stop fighting lets her deal with Howl and Calcifer's moods. Being unwilling to burden other people led her to talking to things, which is the essence of her magic! She acts like this because she's the oldest and knows how to take care of other people's hurts without them feeling like they have to take care of her. People can depend on her.

Sophie knows how to make a home from the start because she's the eldest and has been helping for ages. It's a great and wonderful thing that she knows all this!

What's terrible is when she think that it was all useless. She's cursed and her sisters are busy courting, her stepmom got married and sold the shop, no one in the town she grew up in recognizes her, the wizard she lives with can't stop whining about her cleaning to figure out she's bespelled and could really use some help, and she's right back at her father's shop a month after leaving.

But it wasn't useless! She and Howl just didn't have the communication skills to get her to know that. Her sisters are desperate with worry! They ask everyone, even Horrible Howl that eats young girl's hearts, for help in finding her! They have a reward posted for any information about her! Her step mother recognizes her almost on sight! Her sisters run to her the second they see her. They love her and their lives have been less without her. The skills she used to build up a home in the moving castle is one of the reasons Howl, Calcifer, and Michael love her and trust her with Howl's heart and Calcifer's life. Howl is actively returning the care she put into their home by consulting all his wizard friends about her curse to get to the bottom of it. (and is too busy to actually be courting anyone) Being nosy and bossy let Sophie see other worlds and get her the adventure she has never believed herself capable of.

That's what it actually means to be the eldest daughter.

Her manta "Of course I failed, I'm the eldest of three!" both pulls the reader to identify what is being constructed and deconstructed, the role of elder sisters and puts the reader in the odd position of thinking "what a self-aware fantasy character!" and "what a stupid thing to let stop you!"

One of Sophia's main internal struggles is about a fear of failure because the world tells her she's going to fail. Then she fails and immediately goes to the conclusion "the world was right, I am a failure for this arbitrary, uncontrollable trait."

Sophia escapes this mantra for the first time when she's old and is like "well, who cares what they have to say now. I'm old and earned the right to do as I please". The thoughts come back through, the way messages telling of hardship and failure always do, but she doesn't let it stop her anymore, not like it did the first months of the book. Why?

Because what being the eldest daughter actually means is cleaning up messes because no one else is going to clean yours and your siblings are too young to clean up theirs.

Sophie is pulled into plot points almost exclusively by the need to clean up her mess or help someone else. Gotta protect Lettie from Howl catching her heart and breaking it! Gotta help Michael with the spell! Gotta free Calcifer who can't break his own curse! Gotta help the poor dogman that hates Howl! Gotta help Miss Angorian, even though she's a beautiful lying manstealer! Gotta kick Howl out of his despressive spirals! Also gotta help Howl by blackening his name before the King (no one said helping couldn't be fun).

Ironically, the very trait the world told her would make her unsuccessful was crucial to her success. She's scared to fail like everyone has said she would, but she doesn't stop trying to help people anyway, in her eldest daughter way, and she succeeds in the end and rewrites fate. I love her.

#howl's moving castle #sophie hatter #howl jenkins #sisters #eldest daughter #eldest of three

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dinocanid · 4 months

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If you read Xem's post, you will see that she states you should know the basics about that animal before confirming it. You should know that a wolf is a canine that is a pack hunter that lives mostly in the northern hemisphere. That they howl and usually hunt deer or some deer relative. The have fur and are pursuit predators. Those are the basics. No one except you and your friends said you're only a real wolf therian if you can name top ten unusual facts about wolves. How can someone confirm a wolf if they do not know what a wolf is? You yourself said that you differ from wild wolf behaviours. So you know you're not a wild wolf because of that. But twist words and play the victim I guess.

The OP claimed, very blatantly, that if you make a mistake about some species fact that someone else considers "basic knowledge" then they shouldn't be allowed to identify as that species anymore and should be gatekept from the label. Said basic knowledge included very common and easy-to-make mistakes. Someone can identify as a hyena without knowing at first they are feliforms and not caniforms, the OP said that they can't. Someone can identify as a wolfdog or a leopard, and mistake a wolfdog for a husky mix or a jaguar for a leopard in a photo. That happens, they can look very similar to each other. Idk how to explain that a hyena looks like a dog(canine), just like a thylacine looks like a dog. You can go most of your life before finding out the former is related to cats and the latter is related to kangaroos. You can put a leopard and a jaguar next to each other and it is difficult as hell to tell the difference a lot of times. Not all wolfdogs look like wolves, some just look like dogs especially if they're low content. Some dogs just look like wolfdogs or wolves without being wolf hybrids. See: the pile of movies and shows with "wolves" in it (it's wolf-like dogs being casted as wolves, lots of people don't notice). It's not common knowledge, it's fun facts you might stumble across in a "10 Things You Didn't Know About These Strange Animals" YouTube compilation at 3am.

The OP was stating very clearly that your identity becomes invalid the moment you fail a game of spot-the-difference. The OP post is capped off with:

"So yeah. You should know a lot about the animal you claim to be. If not? Don’t claim it."

I'm gonna be blunt that the OP had one of the most rancid takes I'd seen in a while. Knowing the creature exists was not stated anywhere in the post to be enough, you have to "know a lot".

Someone might not know that animal's realistic behaviors, or where they all live geologically, or what all of their body language means. Someone can know their theriotype before they figure out that later stuff, it's happened all the time and continues to happen. This also isn't covering non-earthly animal identities and how you can't even do ecological research on those. Someone can't go on wikipedia and read up on the ecology of their specific dragon species that has zero record of ever existing. Plenty of those with non-earthly animal identities are not less real as a result, it is an absolute buckwild take that earthly animal identities are somehow different with a higher bar of entry. That's not even mentioning people that identify as earthly animals with unrealistic ecology, because that's also a thing.

For the second part of your ask, I'm guessing you're referring to this recent one. You missed this entire chunk of the post:

"...I do not know most things about wolves off the top of my head. Don't ask me anything about wolf ecology outside the bare basics, I couldn't tell you. When I was really young I thought my nonhuman identity was a dog until one day I had the epiphany that I was actually a wolf. I didn't have to bury my head in research to figure that out, I just knew for not much reason. Any information on wolves I know today is stuff I picked up here and there over the years, independent of my identity"

To condense all of that into something shorter: I just knew I was a wolf before I knew much of anything about wolves. I didn't know I wasn't a wild wolf because I know a lot about wild wolf behavior. I genuinely don't know how that conclusion was drawn after reading that.

"Wolves are canines that live in packs and eat deer" isn't research, that's "I watched a movie once that had wolves in it", which is honestly the extent of what a lot of people know about wolves unless they're invested or something. That's not enough according to the OP, and if that's not what was meant then the entirety of the post was worded extremely poorly.

And this last part isn't related to anon, but I've seen a lot of responses since yesterday about "but why is research bad"? No one has said that it was, and I scroll the alterhuman tags almost daily. That's not something people are arguing. The point isn't "research bad, grr learning about animals sucks", the point is that this discourse is old. Like, old as hell. We're not gatekeeping nonhuman identities based on if you "know a lot" going in. We're not going to claim someone isn't a "real therian" if they get one thing wrong about their theriotype.

Let's say that someone is a leopard therian and posts a picture of a jaguar in some moodboard or something. You know the decent thing to do? You might let them know one of the photos is actually a jaguar, which will usually get you a "oh huh, thanks. didn't catch that". At no point do you suddenly have imply they aren't a "real" leopard therian. You can ask if they've maybe considered jaguars, but they are fully able to respond "yeah but no, I'm a leopard". And that's fine. Someone can be a hyena therian, accidentally say that hyenas are canines. It is absolutely fine and possible to say that hyenas are feliforms without pointing fingers and going "you're not a real hyena, because real hyenas would've known that already".

It's not 2012 anymore, we've grown past this. It is the strangest thing ever to see in the year two-thousand-twenty-four.

#my patience on this is short today because this is the most petty discourse I've seen in a hot minute #dino answers

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edutainer2022 · 1 month

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I can't find the original post about 10 opening lines from 10 recent fics to see, if there's a pattern. But I need a viable reason to procrastinate, before going back to my conference presentation prep for tomorrow. So here goes.

1. Over the years, it has become a well-established and dearly welcome staple of his working hours at the desk - the soft paino music filling the lounge and soaring up to the library balcony, soothing and clearing his mind, usually, while he reviewed stockmarket numbers or filed IR reports for the GDF. (PIANO PRACTICE).

2. It was unbearable. (SEPARATION ANXIETY)

3. "Please, tell me he didn't do it!" (PERSON OF INTEREST)

4. Ouch! That hurt! (HURT LIKE THIS)

5. The surf splashed forcefully over bare feet, but Scott didn't step away, face tilted up to the sun. (SKETCHES)

6. It really isn't. (UNNAMED PROMPT FIC)

7. It was the thud of knees hitting the kitchen floor to follow the clank of broken ceramics that got Jeff out of the desk chair and moving immediately. (BROKEN)

8. There were two types of injuries or ailments in Scott's book in terms of preventing him from getting his duties done: coma and everything else. (VOICED)

9. "I barely know how to be him anymore, most of the time." (PORTRAITS, WIP)

10. His time was up. (GOOD PLACE, WIP).

Hmm... I can't identify a pattern, aside from the prevailing POV - Scott.

Please, anyone, feel free to join or follow up! Consistent patterns are jam and joy!

#methinks i have astronomy #thunderbirds are go #my fic

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mins-fins · 7 months

Text

HAUNTED (L.DH)

SUMMARY . . . it's difficult to.. grasp it, in a way, yeah, donghyuck is psychically there, but he doesn't remember anything, like his mind has been wiped clean. in the end, he's just a walking blank slate.

PAIRING . . . lee donghyuck x male!reader

GENRE . . . angst, somewhat fluffy

WARNINGS . . . passing mentions of car accidents, post-traumatic amnesia

WORD COUNT . . . 0.9k

NOTES . . . im going to admit, not my best work, i made this SUPER PRETTY HEADER and the writing cant even compare its so……… *sighs* mediocre 🙁, anyway i love haechan sorry if this doesn't live up to expectations

"do you know who i am?"

it's the same response as always, donghyuck's eyebrows knit together and he pauses whatever he's doing for a moment, staring at y/n like he's a complete stranger that he's never met anymore. y/n has to admit, it really feels like his heart is being ripped out of his body every time he asks this question and he gets this response.

"your.." donghyuck pauses once again, his mind going blank. y/n knows this is the result of the accident, that his condition will probably get better with time, but does it remove the pain of him not knowing him? no. "y/n, my boyfriend, my partner".

y/n blinks, staring at the male right in front of him. he tries his best not to cry. he doesn't sound sure of himself, he sounds like he's trying to convince himself that that was the right answer. donghyuck continues staring, his eyes holding nothing, just emptiness that y/n can identify.

he clears his throat, shaking his head. it's too early in the morning to get emotional like this. "yeah that's.. right, sorry, i—"

"i hope i didn't say anything wrong" donghyuck says, biting his inner cheek. "your not upset, are you?" he asks, his voice lowering to an astonishing way honestly, it makes y/n want to cry even more.

"no no, you didn't i'm just.. i thought about something sad that's all" he doesn't look convinced, which y/n finds ironic considering his current condition.

"oh i'm sorry".

it's difficult, living with someone who once remembered every single little thing about you, now not even remembering your facial features, or your favorite color, or your hobbies, or what your coffee order is. y/n didn't expect for him to live when it came to the accident, it would've hurt having to go to a funeral for someone he loves so dearly; but it also hurts knowing that because of the trauma from accident, everything is just.. a blur now.

it hurts, having to clarify who he is every few minutes because he doesn't remember, and it hurts even more because it's like living with a blank piece of paper. yeah maybe he's psychically there in a sense, but he's just.. there, he doesn't remember anything much, and when he does talk first, which is unlikely, all he talks about is stuff that's barely important.

when y/n does bring up stuff they did in the past, or shows him the pictures they used to take on their polaroid cameras together, all donghyuck can do is just stare, because he so badly wants to remember it, he wants for his memory to desperately come back and for everything to go back to how it was before he decided to get into that car on that saturday morning.

but it just can't.

life just isn't fair, and no matter how much y/n tries to act like it'll all be okay, it won't. it won't ever be okay, he can try to ignore it, he can try to act like he's doing well, dealing with it well, but.. he isn't, everyone can see through his stupid facade.

"you look very pretty in these pictures" donghyuck randomly comments, looking through the polaroids spread around the table. pictures the two of them had taken together with.. his camera. he gives y/n a small smile, focusing back on the pictures.

"yeah, you took them" he replied simply, and donghyuck blinks, he doesn't remember that, of course he doesn't, y/n can envision the words that are about to leave his mouth.

"i don't—"

"remember.. i know" y/n cuts, donghyuck looks sad for a moment, casting his eyes away from his partner. "hey it's okay" he runs a hand up and down his back. "i'm not upset, it isn't your fault".

donghyuck blinks, he wonders what it'd be like if he just.. did remember, he'd save y/n so much pain and despair if he could just remember. does the universe hate him so much that he's causing pain to the one person who loves him the most? why can't he just remember everything? he wishes y/n could be happy, because even with the smiles he showcases to donghyuck, he's not really happy.

it bothers him, like an itch, but no matter how much he tries, his mind can't conjure up anything, whenever he thinks he's about to get it, it's like his mind resets, and every memory he's ever had has ceased to exist.

it keeps him up at night, and he doesn't even know why, because usually he just.. sleeps, he usually never tosses and turns, he usually never zones out staring at the ceiling, he usually sleeps just like that.

but he can't help but think he's at fault..

he can't control other people's actions, he can't, but it just makes him feel so disappointed knowing that the reason y/n doesn't have peace.

donghyuck rolls over, staring at y/n's sleeping face, he looks peaceful, and it makes a smile come to his face. his mind always goes a little hazy when he thinks of y/n, and he knows that it makes y/n's mood go down.

he doesn't know why, but he reaches over and lightly brushes y/n's hair out of his face. he blinks, just staring at him. he stays asleep, only lightly shifting. in his unconsciousnesses, he reaches over and grabs donghyuck's hand, holding it.

donghyuck is a little taken aback, he looks down, staring at the sight. y/n's hand is warm, it feels nice.

he lightly smiles again.

he doesn't really remember much, but y/n's still by his side.

for now, he'll just live in the moment.

#lee donghyuck #haechan #lee haechan #nct #nct 127 #nct dream #nct imagines #nct scenarios #nct drabbles #haechan imagines #haechan scenarios #haechan drabbles #lee donghyuck x reader #nct x reader #𑁍 ࣪˖ 𓂃 isa's works!

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hozukitofu · 14 days

Text

not a ship post but how funny would it be for people to mix shino and kiba's names up? at some point people give up and call them by 'shiba' just because it's guaranteed to send both kids running (we are talking genin-age).

tsume at some point: shi - ki - argh whatever SHIBA!

shino and kiba tuning into a very old summoning technique - call your kids the wrong name jutsu: THAT'S NOT MY NAME!!

bonus fun facts

tsume and hana had genuinely mixed up shino, kiba and akamaru. shino by virtue of his association with kiba had been called akamaru more times than his name. he's used to it

kakashi has a ninken named shiba that runs loose and he doesn't genuinely want to summon kibashino but somehow they've been trained to react to the name so kakashi is walking the street calling for shiba (the dog) and two teenagers (shiba - shino and kiba - unholy duo) turn up like 'you called?'

people who haven't met shino or kiba before think shiba is their name

shino and kiba have called each other shiba completely on instincts and now they just sigh and move on

it was funny when they were 12 but now naruto can't tease kiba anymore because kiba hypes up shino like you wouldn't believe. every team needs a cool guy and kiba nominates shino for this title (he literally told everyone but shino and hinata)

actually convenient to summon all three of them (akamaru is now part of the shiba bundle). imagine you're out in a field then suddenly there's a dog, a dog ninja and a bug ninja summoned from thin air. i'd retire

easier to shift blame. kiba played this card well into adulthood. he's perfected 'did you mean to call for shino or kiba?' and when people try to deliberate this he would disappear

shino's kids at the academy call him 'shiba sensei' and it stuck. they think shino's legal name is shiba aburame

kakashi somehow worked out a deal with akamaru and occasionally takes the massive dog out for a walk with all his 8 dogs (sometimes even without kiba knowing). when asked, he makes sure to introduce akamaru as shiba 2.0 and akamaru would nod and shake (why does he have two dogs name shiba? why not?)

it's listed in bingo books under aliases and as someone who have to endure bureaucracy weekly, making changes is akin to hell so people leave 'shiba' where it is. the trouble is that both shibas get in a rotten mood if they hear 'are you shiba?' from an enemy because that should really never leave village gossip

kiba very seriously said one day that if they get married it would be mr shiba aburame or shiba inuzuka x2 (think mr and mrs taylor lautner) and shino gave him fleas

mirai doesn't know who is who but she does know shiba. shino will let her have that one up until the age of 3

a lot of people just assumed they got married somewhere along the way? anbu delivering messages for kiba sometimes would find shino who's dead on his feet and would receive the message like it's for him. ANBU: are you mr inuzuka? shino who is too tired to correct the joke at this point: yes i am. people call kiba mr aburame in the same vein except kiba takes it with more fanfare

tsume wasn't that happy they eloped without her knowledge but shibi also genuinely doesn't know what's going on and he's not going to ask shino, so they roll with it and have family dinners between the two clans every fortnight and the shiba trio don't register this as anything unusual

im southeast asian and my aunt was a teacher so the spouse of a teacher is also a teacher by association. what this means is that kids also call kiba sensei. inuzuka sensei. shiba sensei. kiba who had never taught in his life after a child incorrectly identified him as married to his best friend and also his first name: yes sensei is here. how can i help you my child

when they do get married they were threatened by the clan elders to actually say kiba (shiba) aburame (he is a second son and the aburames love akamaru) and shino likewise dutifully put (shiba) on his actual legal marriage certificate

#naruto #naruto shippuden #kiba inuzuka #shino aburame #kibashino #both a shitpost but also sincere minific #all my good memories are with kibashino!!

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theamityelf · 3 months

Note

You’re Undead Au has captivated me. Anymore to share?

Thank you!

Let's see. In the notes of that first post, @suitov brought up the idea of Makoto Skyping Matsuda while all this is happening, and I love that. Matsuda is part of the efforts to find a cure for the virus, and Makoto checks in with him (or vice versa) every now and then.

This also opens the door for him to just be regularly contacting his family, which I also find very funny. But I imagine Hope's Peak is trying to maintain the image of the Ultimates, so Makoto's communications are being heavily screened. He's allowed to email his family, but he has to be really vague about what's going on. Absolutely no Skyping them.

As for his classmates, Mukuro keeps having weapons! No matter how many he takes away from her (and she always lets him take them away without a fight), she somehow keeps having weapons. The students are fighting and Mukuro just pulls out a knife and Makoto runs over like "NO! Give me that!" She doesn't bite pretty much at all, but that might have something to do with all the knives she apparently has. Fortunately, no one has been stabbed yet.

Byakuya has a stash of food that is steadily growing. He saves some of his share of every meal, and it accumulates quickly. The only problem is that it's raw meat and there's no refrigeration and it's rancid but he won't let Makoto throw it out. Makoto has to trade him fresh meat for his rancid meat- at a loss, because of course Byakuya makes sure the exchange rate favors him, because of course he's identified that Makoto feels strongly about getting that smell out of the classroom and makes use of that desperation.

Also, Makoto has to sleep in Byakuya's section of the room. He isn't sure why (because of course he isn't), but Byakuya acts really posssessive towards him. The first night, he tried to pick his own corner of the room to sleep, but Byakuya dragged him over to his section and wrapped his arms around him so he couldn't escape. He genuinely thought he was going to eat him for a second.

When he brings this up to Nagito, Nagito just strokes his chin and goes, "Maybe it's because you're the one providing the food. The Ultimate Affluent Progeny must have a highly adept sense of resource management. Claiming you means controlling the market, as it were."

"Oh, yeah! That makes sense."

Sayaka can still sing. Well, she can still vocalize. Most of them can't say words (The Ultimate Imposter generally chooses not to speak, but he can imitate words perfectly when he wants. It's very eerie.), so she's not singing lyrics, but she still has perfect command of her voice and a great sense of what sounds good. She's singing or humming to herself almost constantly, almost as a kind of self-soothing technique, so if she ever sneaks out of the classroom, she's not hard to find.

#danganronpa #undead au #makoto naegi #yasuke matsuda #mukuro ikusaba #byakuya togami #naegami #sayaka maizono

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witheredoffherwitch · 2 months

Note

some hatred towards alysmond is coming from people with weird moral indignation i'm afraid. how do i know? cause in 9 out of 10 aemond×oc fics reader is soft, submissive, boring as hell and aemond is possessive, jealous and control freak. certain people will never like alys cause they can't relate to her. she is cunning, knows how to survive and make the best of it, and she is immediately labelled as dangerous seductive famme fatale. i don't care what they say, i knew for many years that really strong women don't put down those who clearly are confident and smart because they don't feel threatened by them. even if that's about the fictional character but you see those people can't tell a difference between real person and fictional character as they proved when telling olivia they hate her cause she plays a cunt and insulting gayle looks just because they expected eva green of katie mcgrath so they can get the confirmation she seduced him with her looks. sorry to disappoint you but even maesters noticed aemond in harrenhall didn't choose some younger ladies to bed but alys. they can't understand aemond fell in love because she was smart, witty, resourceful? maybe to him looks didn't matter but i dunno, something like personality? but they don't know what personality is so what to discuss here? now having oc with no personality bland as fuck is sign of genius. you know you can't write smart character with personality because then people won't self insert. they only can self insert into complete idiots. good to know they are impressed by someone nameless and faceless and personalityless. fools can only identify with fools.

not gonna lie helaemonds have a part of trashing alys cause they can't get over their disappointment she would be casted when they were sure alys would be cut cause her powers went to helaena. i have ss of their comments or posts so if they piss me off i would public it. they also can't comprehend why aemond would leave capital to begin with he was to fuck helaena during the war. huge bunch of helaemonds openly admitted they don't care about aemond, all they care about is helaena being with someone better than aegon. they don't understand aemond and his motives, they constantly trash aegon as worse than daemon and viserys combined so best to ignore them, their brains don't work anymore.

alys suffers from both teams cause both teams need a punching bag. tb does want every woman to uphold the patriarchy to just call them karens and they will be hugely disappointed because alys doesn't support the patriarchy so this argument works only with alicent and even helaena. tg is full of people with parasocial relationships with ewan and aemond as if any of them would ever have sex with them. they are jealous alys gets to have sex with him and they have to self insert into bland copy paste oc.

i feel really sorry for these writers who think writing alys as bad bitch will make their uninteresting self insert bland oc great or more shippable with aemond. how they are stuck in their black white thinking of the world when they write alys as smart, ambitious=bad bitch and oc naive, innocent, soft, submissive=great girlfriend material. it must be so boring to feel threatened by fictional character who isn't brainless like most of their ocs. so they need to cope by writing blushing virgin for aemond and that's how they convince themselves they'll find their aemond is real life. imagine how sad their life is!

Hi nonnie 🤗

This ask has been sitting in my inbox pile for ages; but fear not, I have finally unearthed it 😭

And honestly, there's not much to add - your words ring true and I couldn't agree more. Keep spilling that pipin' hot tea!

#anon asks #hotd fandom #aemond fanfiction #alys rivers #aemond targaryen #alysmond q #fandom bs

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beeceit · 7 months

Text

Leonardo, come down here, and put that back

You ever get too into the short character study you meant to leave in the tags of someone else's post and accidentally write a 1033 word one shot told in the second person about someone else's character meeting yours?

Haha me neither, anyways... here's my take on what I think it would be like for LDC Leo and POB Uncle Nardo to meet <3 Bonus points if you catch all the other peepaws referenced

@nani-nonny teehee

Out of all of the bizarre situations you’ve found yourself in over the course of your life, this ‘peepaw multiverse convention’ was certainly far up there.

Dozens of alternates of yourself and your former brothers, even some Aprils (though not many) stand around chatting, recounting stories, showing off their little selves.

Most of them seem to get on fairly well, splitting into little groups like a highschool cafeteria.

Well, what you imagine a highschool cafeteria looks like, you’ve never been.

There’s the smart ones, the cool ones, the tired ones. And, inevitably, the class clowns.

Some booty shorts wearing jackass covered in stickers keeps chucking empty waterbottles and paper airplanes at your head. You can't tell if he genuinely doesn’t realize that you could kill him easily if you wanted or if he just doesn't care.

He's wrapped around his own Mikey now, the weight that constantly dragged on his shoulders, on every Leonardo’s shoulders, almost vanished from that single touch. Lucky bastard.

You had your own Mikey once. You fucked that up, too. Pushed him away. Twisted yourself until you could scarcely be called brothers anymore. And still, after it all, in his desperate final act of life he tried to save you. Not only you, the stupid selfish blueprint that became you.

That useless arrogant child you once had been.

Everything you've been through, everything you've lost, it was all your own fault. It was his fault. You can see the cracks in the armor. The foundational flaws that will lead him down the path to becoming you. Distantly, you think maybe you could still save this world's version of your family if you just get rid of the common denominator.

You can't mistake this as justice, though. As a good deed. You don't want him dead as a precaution, you want him dead for revenge. You're selfish, self-righteous, focused. In him you can see the son you used to be. The part of you that was a brother, a friend, the part that has long since faded in your chest glows so brightly in him. But you must extinguish it. He deserves this. You both deserve this.

The new guy gives you a look that you don't understand.

Oh, right.

You shake yourself out of the memory. Out of the corner you find your own counterpart engaged in a very one sided conversation with another young Leo, a feral looking one legged creature with the conversational skills of a busted up talking tom. Some part of you is glad he seems to be making friends.

God, you felt old. And this place didn’t have nearly enough alcohol to even begin to process… that whole situation. You turn back to the new guy. It’s been a while since any of them got this close to you. Most of the other Leonardos herded their littler ones away from what had been deemed ‘naughty gay peepaw jail’, which is the stupidest name they could give your self-imposed little angsting corner, but maybe not inaccurate.

You finally identify the look the new one’s giving you. It’s pity.

Disgusting.

He's young. Too young to be here, you think, as if you could really be the judge of that. He's not even 30 yet, hasn't even reached 6 foot. Still has 2 arms. Ah well, for now, at least.

He's too happy.

Something in his scarf makes a chirping sound.

The new guy, Nardo you’ve heard him called (And god, you used to be Nardo once upon a time), reaches in and pulls out a small creature, hardly bigger than an oreo. You’d almost have thought it was a strange rock if you hadn’t seen the little tail emerging from under his shell thumping against Nardo’s hand. Nardo chuckles and kisses his head with such tenderness.

“Bitty, buddy, you weren’t supposed to wake up from your nap just yet.” The tiny thing babbles indignantly but is quickly quieted when Nardo rubs a finger against his cheek and under his chin.

It’s disgustingly cute.

And disgustingly familiar.

You’ve seen the family photo album, seen the pictures of your own father (former father) snuggling up against an incomprehensibly small version of yourself the exact same way. You’ve seen a handful of Leonardos with children of their own, amalgamations of turtles and rabbits (why so many rabbits?) and humans and different sorts of turtles.

That’s not just a Leonardo’s baby, that’s a baby Leonardo.

He was so helpless and small. Precious, fragile, innocent.

But he was still a Leonardo.

You had been like him once, before, you knew you had. How had such a sweet little creature become the murderer that ended the world? Nardo held Bitty out to you, cupping his hand to keep him securely held. You made eye contact with the child for less than an entire second before he chirped, frightened, and nuzzled back into Nardo’s palm, shaking.

Nardo frowned and pulled him back to his chest, stroking his shell with his thumb.

“I’m sorry, he’s never reacted to anyone like that before. I’m sure he’ll warm up to you eventually, he’s just still tired.” He was afraid of you. Terrified. You hadn’t so much as said a word to him and the child saw right through you. Even an infant was able to see the blood on your hands.

His wet afraid eyes matched your own counterpart’s scarily well. The chirps of fear and your own Leo’s screams overlapped. Would you have done the same thing if your counterpart were so small? You don’t think you would, but then again, at Nardo’s age you wouldn’t have thought you’d do a lot of the things you’ve done.

“Hey, uh, you okay? I gotta get the little guy somewhere a little quieter for a minute, but I can come back. I’m sure I won’t have any trouble finding someone to watch Bitty for me, I’ve already had to fend off at least eight kidnapping attempts this morning.” Nardo looked at you with concern, genuine concern, even after you scared his baby. He really was too young to be here. “Don’t worry about me, just go.”

“Oh, uh, alright. I’ll see you later?”

“Pray that you don’t.”

#peepaw multiverse #leonardo come down #lcd #put one back #pob #they're Miguel and Peter B your honor

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triflesandparsnips · 6 months

Text

Ways fans go 'splah'

I keep noodling about this thing where fandom gets weird after it receives new canon. And in the middle of writing a different post, I started wondering if it comes down to... cognitive dissonance.

Because to be a Fan means you love a Show (or Movie, or Book, etc.)-- right? Maybe because you felt the Show spoke to you and your experiences in particular, and helped you, and understood you. It's important to you. You form an idea of what the Show is, and who you are in relation both to the Show and to other fans of the Show.

So... what does it mean if, as you interact with new canon, you... don't love what the Show has done?

Suddenly the status quo that you've built for yourself has been upset; now you have to deal with change. With questions. Like: If you Don't Like an element of the Show, does that mean that you're... not a Fan anymore?

Does that mean that when you thought the Show spoke to you, you misunderstood it? That you were wrong?

Does that mean you were a Fan of a Show that doesn't actually exist, and now you've identified yourself (and your social interactions, and your recent history, and your own creative efforts, and and and) with this Other Show, and you feel trapped in that association?

Listen: I absolutely agree that it can hurt to find out that you've tied yourself tightly to a Show that has changed into something you Don't Like. And when it happens... sometimes fans react in one (or more) of the following ways to help resolve the cognitive dissonance of this change... to varying levels of healthy/socially acceptable, creating a lot of the absolute weirdness we see in fandom:

1. They deal with it.

That seems kind of easy to say, but... uh. Well, I can't think of a better way of saying it. Art changes; the fan changes with the art, or they do something else. They learn to say goodbye-- or maybe they learn to ride the metaphorical mechanical bull. Fans who have successfully incorporated this reaction have often diversified their fannishness across multiple fandoms.

It's a safe way to interact with a Show but it can, perhaps, lead to less of the vibrant immersive fannish joy that can come from being really invested in a fandom -- and then downplay or not engage with the real feelings of more invested fans. (Is this one of mine? Oh, definitely. I'm working on it.)

2. They decide the Don't Like element is due to a creative choice rather than personal opinion.

By which I mean, fans who go this route decide that the reason they Don't Like an element is not because they, uh, don't like it, but rather because there is a secret reason (that they've made up) that the Don't Like element exists. With this idea in mind, it's not that there's an actual change to the Show-- it's just that the fan must either wait to see it resolve back into the familiar or, alternately, put in effort to "figure out" what the Don't Like element is "really doing".

(This is where meta about "writing bad on purpose" and such may be familiar to some.)

By deciding that the Don't Like element is an intentional artistic choice that will eventually resolve back into the familiar Show, there's no reason to fear or question what the change means for the Show or the fan's sense of self. And like-- tbh, some of the best crack meta can come from visiting that mindset for a hot minute. But living there can lead to... significantly greater hurt later, particularly as more canon drops and the likelihood of the Show resolving back to its "original" form grows ever slimmer.

3. They decide that the element they Don't Like doesn't exist.

As in, didn't happen. Or did happen, but only by removing other elements to flip it from Don't Like to the more acceptable/palatable "creative choice" vibe from option 2. The cognitive dissonance is resolved by simply removing the element that would cause the fan to stop loving the Show.

And like-- I've certainly done this. There are episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that I've decided just didn't happen. Also the first season of Parks and Rec. And pretty much any Marvel movie that doesn't allow for the 2012 Avengers tower fanon to somehow magically exist.

I even think that fanfiction and other remediating fanworks are an important extension of this behavior-- fix-it fics are a thing, and I love them. But I think it's crucial that those of us who do this kind of canon excision don't make our choices anyone else's problem. I don't stop other fans from engaging with the things I've elected to ignore; I also don't harass the creators/actors, because jesus fucking christ why would I.

4. They decide the Show they love is not, in fact, the Show they love.

So let's say the fan acknowledges that the Show has changed. They might even acknowledge that the Show was never what they thought it was. And with those two things in mind, some fans choose option 1... but some land here, in option 4.

Because! They think the Show they're a fan of does exist-- just not... on the screen. They love a Platonic Ideal of the Show-- what it should have been. What, somewhere, it is, except that outside forces changed it from the Ideal to the Imperfect.

What kind of forces? The usual suspects: Capitalism. Racism. Heteronormativity. Hollywood bullshit. Actors/writers/creative teams leaving the Show for whatever reason. Hubris. Fallibility. Ad nauseum.

But the Ideal Show (that maybe exists only in the fan's own head... but sometimes appears to be shared and envisioned by other fans too)-- that Ideal Show isn't subject to outside forces. It's completely divorced from the context that the Imperfect Show is being created in. The fan doesn't experience cognitive dissonance because they have, as with option 3, decided something doesn't exist-- but that nonexistent thing is the Show itself. The fan instead exchanges the Imperfect Show for the Ideal Show, which does not have and will never have a Don't Like element.

And like-- sure! Entire careers have been built on the back of believing that an Ideal should exist and replace the Imperfect-- Ed Brubaker is right there. Reimaginings of source material can fall squarely into this as well, particularly when they hit the public domain. Like every other option, this is a thing fandom does that, in some of its forms, shows why fandom is super neat.

But... but the thing is, there's no such thing as art divorced from context. Even if the vision of an Ideal Show seems to be shared identically across oodles of fans, it's still subject to the personal context of every single one of those fans. Like, it goes riiiight back to why you become a Fan of the Show in the first place-- it spoke to you. It validated your experiences.

So there is no Ideal Show. There can't be. There's just the Show that we have-- or the Show that we create, in the real world (and then becomes subject again to all those pesky outside forces), to try and capture what our personal Ideal is.

Fans who go splah with the option 4 route mistake, I think, their Ideal Show for everyone's Ideal Show-- and then every criticism, every meta, every engagement with the Imperfect Show and its fans falls into piles of logical fallacies: that everyone is working from the same Ideal; that those who ignore the Ideal are doing so on purpose; that all Don't Like elements with the Show can be attributed to its failure to meet the Ideal rather than the fan's own preferences; that the Ideal is quantifiable, qualifiable, infallible and incontrovertible...

Maybe, at the end, option 4 is the one that really gets all of us. Because yeah-- I have an Ideal Show in my head. I bet you have one in yours, too. And it can be disappointing when the Ideal and the Imperfect don't align-- it can, in fact, create that cognitive dissonance I've been harping on this whole time.

But how we choose to deal with that disappointment... that's where the weirdness can come from. To both the benefit and ooooh yes, very much the detriment of a fandom that has survived long enough to start experiencing the cognitive dissonance of the Show fans imagine versus the Show fans have.

#are there more than four options?#probably #you should tell me them #fandom #why fandoms explode #maybe #but also why they sometimes go bananas amazing #cognitive dissonance #and suprise!#this is ALSO an essay about #art versus commerce #IT GETS US ALL IN THE END

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zgvlt · 2 years

Text

my theme / graphics / design F.A.Q. @ my anons and a few others who've been asking some questions + some help, i just compiled every question into one post 👍

disclaimer: i am very much an amateur in making graphics so i still don't know everything there is to know, but i think it's good to make graphic design and editing seem more accessible and less intimidating! so like don't go to me for actual professional advice

.001 | header templates if you don't really feel like reading and just want to experience everything for yourself, here's a bunch of templates i made today. play around with them if u want :> i used canva since it's available both on mobile and pc but if you prefer to use a different app you can just check the specs/see if your app has similar functions

TEMPLATE LINKS (I won't know who's made copies of the templates so it's fine if you're worried about being exposed): [1: SEBEK] [2: SAKUYA (PINK)] [3: FIRST YEARS] [4: TREY AND IDIA]

if someone is interested in using any of these as inspo or as a base i don't mind, and i don't need credit either 👍 but if you wanna let me know bc i'm a bit nosy go ahead

.002 | what apps would you recommend for editing? (mobile and desktop)

Desktop:

photopea , if you want a browser alternative to PS. i tried it out for maybe twenty minutes and a bunch of the basic features i need in PS are present there, it's definitely good if you want to experiment more as opposed to other apps. here's a tutorial for it

Mobile and Desktop:

picsart [desktop] [google play] [apple app store]: i think a lot of people start out with picsart and i totally get it! it's very easy to use, there's also a lot of tutorials for it on YouTube :> > list of tutorials from their blog > this playlist of tutorials by tutorial edits

canva [desktop] [google play] [apple app store]: so so elite i love canva. there are times where i do prefer the freedom that powerpoint gives me but canva is just convenient. anyway she's good both for ur powerpoints in class and pretty decent for editing. the templates i made above are my first time doing edits (not for school) with canva and i think they turned out alright! > official canva tutorials > this pinterest user's short-form canva tuts > canva search keywords lists: [one] [two] [three] [four]

Mobile Only:

phonto [google play] [apple app store]: ily phonto, here's a tutorial

apps like krita or autodesk or csp or medibang or procreate are likely usable as well, i just don't exactly have advice for them since i don't use them

Websites for Fonts:

dafont.com

Google Fonts

FontSpace

freejapanesefont.com

font identifiers [whatthefont] [fontsquirrel]

Websites for images/elements:

flaticon

blobmaker.app (saves as svg, use a svg to png/jpg converter if you don't use an app that allows svgs)

getwaves.io (saves as svg, use a svg to png/jpg converter if you don't use an app that allows svgs)

haikei.app (basically a combination of blobmaker, getwaves, and a few other apps)

Colors:

mycolor.space

colorable

colorhunt.co

0to255.com

colormind.io

color tool

css drive (upload image, generate palette)

SocMed AU purposes:

tweetgen

MeMi Message (google play and apple appstore)

TwiNote (google play and apple appstore)

Fake Call

i used to use social maker and social dummy but i can't find them anymore lol

.003 | squiggly? refer to blobmaker, getwaves, and haikei for squiggly :>

.004 | pretty themes for tumblr desktop you can search the following tumblr blogs

theme-hunter

magnusthemes

ricecodes

kosmique

.005 | how can i make my theme prettier? decorating your text posts:

coolsymbol.com

kaomoji

copy paste dividers

post dividers [making your own, tutorial using photopea] [masterlist of dividers by firefly-graphics]

how to get gradient text on tumblr posts + gradient recs

theme banners/headers:

specs of the tumblr header: 640 x 360 pixels on mobile, 3000 x 1055 pixels on desktop

premade headers: [headers by spidaerman] [headers by ridleey] [alt link] [headers by villanaelle]

.006 | how to add *that* thing to the tumblr header theme

for this part let's use canva again. the mobile theme header is 640x360px but you can totally adjust it to be bigger (but maintaining the same width to height ratio)

so let's say this is the picture you want as your header, how do we add the details at the bottom? you can pretty much get any shape you want, whether it be from canva elements or one of the sites i mentioned or any other source you have. for this tutorial let's just use the ones on canva

by scrolling through the elements portion, in this instance the lines & shapes portion, you can find a few that would work well

when you choose what you want, adjust it both size and color wise, and make sure there's a substantial enough amount of space for other details of your blog to fit (icon if you're not hiding it, blog name)

remember to save the color of the element! copy paste that hex code! or just have it somewhere where you can look back at it easily

when you're satisfied, save it! then go on tumblr -> settings -> select the blog that you want to edit

place the banner, and if you did it right it should be a perfect fit, but you can zoom in if you want! :> but wait we're not yet done! the colors don't create *that* effect yet

change the background color to match the bottom color of the header! (and the accent as and text colors as well, if you want!)

and we're done!

i think these are all the questions i've gotten so far? hopefully it helps!

#—nathchat #—nathyadvice #<- new tag lol i think i need it now #not twst related

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bettsfic · 9 months

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Hi betts! Ive been finding your posts really motivating, they make me want to write more and more. So id really appreciate if you could give me advice for this problem!

I just dont know how to revise! Or maybe the problem is that i dont know how to write drafts that need revising.

Basically what happens is that i write a draft as fast and messily as i can. And then i reread it, and i really like it! So when i get around to fixing it up, i end up chopping out things just based off of vibes. And then i read that version, and i hate it! It shows a lot more technical skill for sure, and it coheres a lot more, but i feel that its completely lost its voice and style. I tend to write in fits of emotion, and i feel like any revising outside of that mindset just sort of... strips the text of its sincerity?

Where do i go from here? Its not easy to practice revision when its so disheartening!

When i attempt to write badly, it either turns out good enough that im scared to change it, or bad enough that im not interested in it anymore.

How do i revise a draft without removing the things i like about it? Do i just need to get better at identifying what i like about my work?

that's an interesting situation, anon. i guess my immediate question is, if you like what you write, why do you even want to revise?

in the 50s, the beats popularized this idea of "first thought, best thought," which basically means what goes on the page is what belongs there, and the first words that come to us are the right ones, not because they're good, but because they're first.

for your own purposes, for the sake of discovery, i think this is a great mentality. the process of invention is the purest practice of creativity. you're putting things on a page that weren't there before, and if you're doing that in a way you find satisfying, and if you're pleased with the results, then i think you should keep doing it. it seems to me like your willingness to revise and your ability to say, "no, i liked it better before," will naturally develop into a more dedicated revision practice. eventually you'll write the thing that makes you go, "wait a minute, that's not right," or maybe, "i like this, but it doesn't quite honor the story i want to tell." and those are the seeds of revision.

don't get me wrong, i'm a firm believer in revision. but more than that, i'm a believer in letting your joy guide you in any creative process. revision should feel good. you should want to revise. you may not always be eager to revise, but you should feel strongly enough about the nature of what you're creating that making it better will make you feel better. but if you don't want to revise, then you shouldn't feel obligated to.

still, if you want to get a sense of what revision can do to your work so that you can experiment and grow, i would recommend writing something short, maybe a thousand words or fewer. then put it down for a week, and rewrite it without looking at it again. put that down for a week too. then rewrite it a third time without looking at either previous draft.

when you have all three drafts, try to look at them with a discerning eye. which one overall is best and why? or if you can't tell, go through and highlight all the sentences you like and count them. whichever story has the most highlights wins.

sometimes revision isn't always about making something better. sometimes it's about approaching your work so many different ways that you've conceived all possible angles and chosen the one that's best. sometimes the first thought really is the best thought. but sometimes it's the fifth thought, or the tenth, or one that someone else has to bring to your attention. i think if you broaden your definition of revision to be "considering every way this thing can be written," it'll help guide you toward a process that works for you.

#writing advice #revision #.

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chloe-wants-to-kill-herself · 3 months

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I'm still new to discovering I have a system (just got over that denial bridge a few weeks ago, and have been struggling mentally since (and before) then), and the system discourse online has been very... distressing? I want to lean into safe communities meant for learning about or exploring (my own) CDD, and find some sort of comraderie.

I don't understand what's happening really - I don't exactly understand endogenic systems, but I also don't understand why people would be anti-endogenic. It just seems... hateful. And purposeless.

I've seen tons of anti-endo posts (before I learned what endo meant) that made me terrified to lean too heavily into traumagen spaces (if they could say this about awful stuff about one group of people, what could they say about me? *it is very much a learned response from trauma, but it is what it is I guess*

I guess the point is to ask if you were ever anti-endo, and what has it been like since you started making pro-endo posts? I know it's silly, but I'm trying to figure all of this out and I'm terrified of receiving hate for refusing to hate someone because of how they identify

Thanks (and sorry for the book lol)

- Host

First I want to say it's not silly at all!! Being a newly discovered system is overwhelming and it's normal to want to have a community of those who understand you. It's also normal to want to avoid being harassed and fakeclaimed. I'm happy you reached out! This reply is going to be kinda long (sorry I tried to keep it short) but I did my best to address all your questions. I hope this helps! And I wish you the best on your new journey of self discovery!!

Second I would strongly recommend that you stay away from syscourse if you can. It's really draining and overwhelming even for us and we have a pretty good handle on our system. As a newly discovered system it's going to be even worse.

Unfortunately I don't have any specific recommendations for cdd focused spaces which accept endos (if anybody knows one put it in the replies!) but I will say that pro endo servers, even if they aren't focused on cdds can still be amazing for finding comradery. There will be other cdd systems there and you might find some endos who you relate to as well. Also if you want my dms are open! I'm just one person (well, not exactly) but I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have and suggest ways to help you figure out your system more!

As for why people are anti endo I think it mainly comes down to two things. First is that they think endos are saying they experience the same thing as cdd systems except without the trauma. Endos do not generally claim this*. Second is that people who've spent significant amounts of their lives under attack sometimes they start to see threats where there aren't any.

These systems have debilitating mental illnesses that are criminally misunderstood and romanticized. For them being a system is intrinsically linked with being deeply traumatized, they are not separate. So when they see a community of people claim to have systems but not trauma, they get upset. They feel like that's not possible, because it isn't possible to be a system like *theirs* without trauma. They get frustrated because they think people just want the "quirky" parts of their disorder without the painful ones. That's why they always say endos are faking did, because they can't imagine a system that doesn't have a cdd. They think endos are just people who want to feel special so they claim to have system. Once endos started becoming a part of the community, anti endos felt invaded because now there's a bunch of systems who don't have cdds in the space they thought was for them (keep in mind cdd focused spaces still exist, its just that the plural community as a whole isn't 100% focused on us anymore).

Once they feel invaded, they feel like they need to defend their community and they do that by harassing and fakeclaiming endos. Then they act like psychology is on their side (it isn't) and after that it's just increasing amounts of digging their heels in.

I think it mostly comes down to the misconception that endos claim to have did without the disorder part, and then in trying to defend themselves they turn off critical thinking and just do whatever they can to get rid of the perceived threat.

*There is a world of difference between the experiences of most endos and most cdd systems but it's not black and white. At this point the term "endo" just means anybody who is not completely traumagenic which includes mixed origin systems. Also, some endogenic systems develop cdds after being exposed to trauma, the only difference is that they were plural beforehand so they're still endogenic. There's others too. The main point is that the plural experience is incredibly personal and doesn't fit well into boxes, categorization is useful and it's important that people understand that in general there are real and big differences between endogenic plurality and cdds but there's no hard lines here.

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