#this is such a selfish act

[aslyran]

Force the last page of our story

You're my favourite allegory

Hope to god that you'll forgive me

My mistakes will long outlive me

Mine, mine is the unkind, kindest cut of all.

#i always felt like 51% 49% was quite relatable bc like #we are all always choosing what part of ourselves we want the other to love #this is such a selfish act #even as i want to do it myself i want others to be able to show themselves fully to me #to know them complete #anyways #the song that goes w this is #turtles all the way down #by sammy copley #fanart #illustration #kim dokja #orv kdj #orv #orv fanart #orv spoilers #orv kim dokja #omniscent reader #omniscient reader spoilers #omniscient reader's viewpoint

[julijbee]

enki dies of smoke inhalation in his sleep because he's using his left lung as extra parasite storage to get a +1 on his needle worm damage. moonless is fine she will probably eat him when she wakes up. 👍

#secret fear and hunger fanart for my tumblr only. <3 #enki ankarian #moonless #fear and hunger #art #if you poked him with a pin he would deflate with a comical squealing balloon sound and a million bugs would tumble out. #normalize eating not to sustain the flesh (selfish) but to sustain the colony of tapeworms in your small intestine (selfless act of service

[sunglassesmish]

if you don’t stand with palestinian people literally just leave my blog. you can be israeli and you can be jewish and still recognise that palestinian people, not to mention that millions of those people are kids, are being killed and have been attacked for literally just living in their own country. the israeli defense minister is cutting off food, water, electricity to attack palestinians in gaza and calling them ‘human animals.’ they aren’t even treated as people anymore, yet half of them are innocent kids.

it’s like only a select few people care about palestinians and the rest of the world think of them as all being islamic extremists and terrorists for just living in their own country. it’s fucking disgusting how the world has turned a blind eye to innocent palestinians for decades.

if you want someone to blame, turn your heads to the people who allowed israel to take over palestine. to the israel government and hamas who are allowing innocent people, both israelis and palestinians alike, to be killed.

#palestine #i’m genuinely so sick of this world #i’m tired of muslims all being lumped in with the extremists who are acting in the name of God when their beliefs are completely against #what our religion teaches #and most of all #i’m tired of this all being about religion when it’s about people who want power and land and innocent people to die for their own selfish #wants

[utterdrip]

i have so many feelings about this conversation. the grief and guilt for the lives he took. how he’s able to sympathize with the gur and acknowledge what he’s done to them as well as what they did to him.

#frankie posts #bg3 spoilers #astarion #bg3 #astarion acunin #bg3: vid #baldurs gate astarion #baldurs gate 3 #i feel like i don’t see anyone talking about this. #like okay yes astarion is evil and selfish and amoral OBVIOUSLY #but when it comes to those that are disenfranchised #in acts one and two he hates them. bc he sees them as reflections of himself #but in act three there has been so much growth #like as long as it doesn’t have any effect on his own life (making it better or worse) he always approves of you helping kids #although he doesn’t approve of giving money to the refugees i think he approves of donating supplies?

[wilsonsmcgillsweatshirt]

"Deep inside, Wilson believes that if he cares enough, he'll never have to die."

What the fuck were the House writers on

#how am i supposed to live laugh love in these conditions #this quote is attempted murder #i cant live like this #This also puts the scene were Wilson tells House he wishes he was more of an asshole into perspective #“i wish i had been more a selfish jerk” “youd still have cancer” “atleast id feel like i deserved it” #because wilson spent his whole life helping people because some part of him genuinely believed that he would live a very long good life #as long as he was doing good and helping people #but in the end none of it mattered and in his mind he wasted his entire life being overly good when he couldve just lived how he wanted #because in the end it didnt make any difference #brb sobbing #thats why when people act like wilson is the devil for saying that to house i lose 5 years of my life #house md #house #greg house #james wilson #gregory house #hilson #hate crimes md #hatecrimes md #wilson #housemd

[comradekatara]

katara’s fatal flaw when it comes to politics and also just general communication is that she cannot fathom why anyone would wish to act in a cruel manner and knowingly harm others, whereas sokka’s is that he does not understand how people can be willfully ignorant or even just plain dumb. it’s why sokka is always having to point out to katara that someone is a malicious actor who is taking advantage of her compassion and idealism (jet, hama, aunt wu, etc) because he knows that not everyone has pure, altruistic intentions, but he also doesn’t understand that king kuei isn’t just sheltered, he is also straight up an idiot (or that hahn isn’t just arrogant, he is also incompetent, etc etc) until it’s too late.

#katara assumes that everyone knows they ought to conduct themselves compassionately #whereas sokka assumes that everyone knows they ought to conduct themselves rationally #like in their minds (respectively) that it what is in everyone’s best interest at all times #and sokka’s ‘rationality’ is compassionate in nature #but he also acknowledges that other people mind find it in their best interest to be selfish #and conduct themselves accordingly #while katara always just sees the best in people #and is pretty unforgiving if they ‘mess up’ despite herself not being a perfect beacon of compassion #(she can be selfish myopic etc) #same goes for sokka perceiving himself as rational but also just. having a huge blind spot when it comes to his self esteem & daddy issues #(family issues in general tbh) #which can cause him to act irrationally #and then zuko and azula have the same thing (where zuko believes in compassion and azula believes in reason) but also like. far more cynical #just because they were raised to believe in their natural superiority and it fucks with their perception of themselves and others #but zuko does have a very similar fundamental worldview to katara & azula to sokka #anyway. im off topic now #katara #sokka #katara&sokka #analysis #ish

[pencap]

the coward's way out

if the fates conspire that only one of us may live, then lover, it must be you.

i will save you the grand speeches about how you are good and deserving. you are. you are. you are, but in the end, that is not the reason why.

the world may call me brave or strong or selfless but lover, you know the truth don't you?

in the end, i am only more afraid of facing a world without you than i am of facing death of facing anything.

in the end, i am only too weak to be the one left behind to pick up the pieces of a broken life a broken promise a broken heart and keep on bleeding when the blood in your heart is already dry.

i'm sorry. i'm sorry. but will you let me be selfish one last time?

can i ask you to live for me? to face what i feared most so that i might find peace in my eternal sleep with a smile upon my face?

if it is cruel of me to ask, then i beg you to forgive me. or curse my name and hate me if you must, only live.

only live, my lover so that my life and my death and all that came in between may mean something. may mean everything.

#spilled ink #poets on tumblr #poems on tumblr #writeblr #writers on tumblr #poetics #sometimes i write like some kind of possession #i had a brief thought of 'sacrifice as a selfish act?' #and then i was just like. speaking this poem to myself #out of the blue #i fixed some things from the first spoken draft obviously but #the rhythm of this feels important to me #and i'm not convinced i did the best job of linebreaking it #but it will do #The coward’s way out #why yes I did update the title a week later #this feels much cleaner #not giving away the thesis in literally the first word #Technically before the poem even starts

[wowitslowki]

"I don't want a throne! I never wanted a throne!"

"I want my friends..."

And yet, in the end, all he got was a throne isolated at the end of time. Where no one he loved could ever go.

#lokius #loki #loki spoilers #mobius #marvel #loki series #loki season 2 #Loki finale #literally the most tragic part of this whole ending #Loki has spent so much time being cowardly and selfish #and in the end he commits one of the most brave and selfless acts #for literally the whole of existence #Im gonna throw up 😭

[thepoisonroom]

'I flirted with the idea that instead of being trans that I was just a cross-dresser (a quirk, I thought, that could be quietly folded into an otherwise average life) and that my dysphoria was sexual in nature, and sexual only. And if my feelings were only sexual, then, I wondered, perhaps I wasn’t actually trans.

I had read about a book called The Man Who Would Be Queen, by a Northwestern University professor who believed that transwomen who were attracted to women were really confused fetishists, they wanted to be women to satisfy an autogynephilia. And though I first read about this book in the context of its debunkment and disparagement, I thought about the electricity of slipping on those tights, zipping up those boots, and a stream of guilt followed. Maybe this professor was right, and maybe I was only a fetishist. Not trans, just a misguided boy.

About a year later, on the Internet, I come across a transwoman who added a unique message to the crowd refuting this professor. Oh, I wish I remember who this woman was, and I wish even more that I could do better than paraphrase her, but I remember her saying something like this: “Well, of course I feel sexy putting on women’s clothing and having a woman’s body. If you feel comfortable in your body for the first time, won’t that probably mean it’ll be the first time you feel comfortable, too, with delighting in your body as a sexual thing?”'

-Casey Plett, Consciousness

#this quote always moves me almost to tears when i remember it #i'm not a trans woman and i don't share the author's specific experiences with transition #but it really moves me that she frame transition as joyfully giving yourself permission to approach your body #not as something that has to be disciplined and deprived and made small in all these various ways #but as a means for experiencing pleasure and joy and delight and for insisting that our feelings and desires are worth #valuing and exploring and treasuring #i always used to think of prioritizing those things for myself as selfish and irresponsible #but who does it harm to want to experience pleasure in your own body? #it's such a beautifully simple and powerful switch to have flip in your head #and equally why are we forced to deny our own pleasure in transition and anything else related to our bodies in the name of moral rectitude #this is why i get so confused and pissed off when other trans people are fatphobic for example #like why are you so invested in politics of shame and disgust that never had any purpose other than #violently disciplining people as if they've violated moral codes by existing in a body #to say nothing of white people being racist in gay and trans communities #like again this system of violence is foundational to homophobia and transphobia #so why are you acting like it has nothing to do with you #even if you are unmoved by the urgency of other people's suffering which btw you should be moved by #what do you hope to gain by acting a collaborator and handmaiden to those systems #Casey Plett #she really is one of my favorite authors i wish more non-canadians read her #this quote is from a series of columns she did ont transition and every single one is a banger #i love when she talks about the people-pleasing elements of dysphoria and transition denial #she's so sharp about noting how many of us deny our own dysphoria on the grounds that others like and validate our bodies #that's how i always felt during my cis conventionally feminine era #it pleased other people so much and also that reception felt so hollow and joyless to me because i hated it #i get less of that positive feedback but that feels so unimportant next to the joy and pleasure i get to experience #said with the understanding that i'm very privileged in being able to prioritize those things without fear. but it was a switch flip #personal nonsense

[earlgodwin]

THE BORGIA BROTHERS + putting the family's interest above their sister's concerns

"Everything I do is for the family."

#okay but hear me out... #both of them are so obsessed with her and overprotective of her and have incestual feelings for her she's THEIR princess #but both brothers act differently towards her. ces chose to be selfless and made her meet up with paolo #while juan was mad at paolo bc he can't stand a man near lu and decided to kill him thinking he was protecting her honor #mind you juan Really does love lu but his impulsiveness and drunkinness never let him think through. never thought that she would Hate him #and for the ppl who act like ces is better than juan when it comes to that aspect. he was taking the same route but in a slow rate (see s3) #he became so petty and jealous and eventually planned to kill alfonso. those incestuous brothers are sooo unhinged about their sister lol #while we're at it...francois saying that ces makes excuses for himself to feel better about doing stuff for selfish reasons... #VS. david saying juan was good natured but was misguided. he thought he was doing the right thing. he was spiteful later bc lu resented him #juan borgia #cesare borgia #the borgias #theborgiasedit #david oakes #holliday grainger #lucrezia borgia #perioddramaedit #the borgia siblings #weloveperioddrama #by jen

[krashlite]

I p I promise I’m not trying to vilify c!Scott but so many problems keep leading back to him the more I analyze this goddamn series and I’m shaking him around like a goddamn ragdoll Sir why are you Like This

Edit: in trying to unpack why he’s like this I went down a very parasocial rabbit hole so I’m j I’m just gonna put that one back in the box actually

#the laundry list includes but isn’t limited to #jimmy’s issues with self worth #pearl perceiving herself as inherently cruel/dangerous #both Cleo and Pearl acting as protectors while rejecting their own personhood #didn’t cause but reinforced Cleo’s trust issues #also reinforced Martyn’s selfish habits #characters obviously #but holy shit why are you like this #also if you’re curious about the rabbit hole #I started analyzing his apathy which led to the whole Logic vs Emotion argument #which led to Societal Issues which led to issues with the MCC event #and that’s when I put it down

[sunsetsharkblog]

Another Caitlyn character bit I love is her friendship with Jayce and what that tells us about her. There’s a lot of plaintext and context clues that Caitlyn is pretty socially isolated, struggles finding common grounds with her peers because of her social status, and we see her trying really hard with forced smiles and “I don’t know how else to contribute to the conversation so I’ll divulge trivia” with the other enforcers. And with Vi and in the undercity we see the focused mission future-sheriff side of her, and the kind and thoughtful altruistic human that she is and one day I’ll write that essay about both of their How It Started How It’s Going arcs but original point:

With Jayce we get the glimpse of what Caitlyn is like when she’s affectionately relaxed, because she knows the other person well enough to act like this around them. There’s no caution or awkwardness, just the straight forward genuine. And what I love about what it shows of her character?

Like, yes, the twisting his arm because of the hat tap is textbook sibling teasing back and forth, but afterwards when Jayce tells her he gets to give the speech, something important to him, what’s her reaction?

“Lol. Lmao, even.”

This is how Caitlyn shows affection with someone she considers a close friend! She doesn’t say “congrats” upon hearing what for Jayce is big news, that she must certainly know is big news, she says “fr? are they nuts?”

And she does this again when he tells her he became a councillor, immediately laughs and insults the idea of it. Oh they made you a councillor? Of what, the Idiots With Hammers division?

And Jayce just brushes it off because that’s just their thing. He knows that Caitlyn doesn’t find joy in politics and that the big news happening to him sounds absolutely dreadful for her, and that she’s not actually insulting him or his news; this is just how Caitlyn shows her affection. Her love language is negging the shit out of you.

I’m certain season2 is gonna be a whole lot of tragedy, but I do hope we get to see this side of Caitlyn again.

#it also shows that she’s aware she’s a bit selfish and self centred and is trying not to be #but is comfortable enough with Jayce to know he’ll forgive her for it #I will die for their lesbian + himbo solidarity #caitlyn kiramman #arcane #arcane s2 #Caitvi #I mean this isn’t really a CaitVi post but I’m tagging it that because I want to see Caitlyn acting like this with Vi #I want her to roll her eyes and call Vi’s gauntlets stupid with an affectionate smile #maybe while tending to her wounds #in my ‘over-analyzing the show while I wait for more’ era

[pocketgalaxies]

"i've already said. i'm prepared to do whatever is necessary."

"i don't accept it, laudna, not from you."

#YESSSS YES! #when they had this conversation as a party and everyone acted like they reached the conclusion that sacrifice might be necessary #imogen didn't!! IMOGEN DIDN'T!!!!! they left that discussion with her telling laudna 'i want /you/' and never addressed it #and imogen has protected that little seed of selfishness this entire time. she'll give everything but she /won't/ give laudna #vs. laudna hearing imogen in these moments and breezing right past it. 'she said so herself - i've been dead.' #because imogen won't give laudna up but laudna will. laudna would easily die a hundred times over to save imogen #and imogen won't be able to do a damn thing about it. #1h54m c3e77 #text #critical role #cr3 #cr lb #cr spoilers #imogen temult #laudna cr #ship: imodna #delilah briarwood #cr meta #nova shh

[shorthaltsjester]

honestly as someone who has been in various fandoms for a long time now and who also watched campaigns 1 and 2 without really getting into cr fandom it isn’t Shocking but it is annoying how often people will look at the stories that cr tells and make absolute claims about the goodness of characters (goodness here meaning Moral goodness, not I Like This character and think it’s well made goodness, which is a separate post entirely). particularly regarding the gods and pc parents. and honestly like, typically in fandom i get annoyed by people bending over backwards to woobify characters who are active in their choice to be unkind and generally horrible but in the cr fandom it’s tended to be the opposite where like. a character is just. a human being (in the sense of being Average not in the sense of Fantasy Races) and huge swaths of the fandom act like that’s the most unforgivable thing someone can be. and maybe it is, but one of the most powerful things about fiction is that it tends to encourage people to expand their empathy and exercise their ability to forgive. because fictional characters, no matter how much people like to project onto them, tend not to cause anyone harm, so it’s easier to learn how to forgive and accept things you don’t understand without also villainizing them.

this is mostly prompted by the recent 4sd and the fact that matt’s response to what’s up with the dawnfather was a very insistent “He’s not bad!” and also seeing the online reaction to the mention that the matron would punish vax for saving keyleth that has taken the as usual completely bonkers tune that the raven queen (Who When Met With A Brother Asking A God To Kill Him In Favour Of His Sister, Gave Him A Job, and Later Extended His Natural Life To Help Protect The World And Have More Time With His Family And Allowed Him To Visit His Sister On Her Wedding Day) is a horrible evil abusive bitch of a god. like. can we grow up? can we understand the world and fiction that represents the multitudes of experiences found in it in shades of grey? is that too much to ask (i know it is).

but also specifically the like Extremely Adamant way that both matt and laura were like no no no no relvin isn’t Horirble he’s average. he’s not good he’s just. he’s A father, not a good or bad one. and on the surface it’s hilarious that they’re both so like. enthused to point out that he’s Average because typically when people respond to a claim of a characters badness with the level of immediacy they both did it’s a rebuttal of “no, this character is good actually.” but it was just to affirm that relvin did harm imogen, but not because there’s some aspect of his character that is inherently cruel or especially Bad. and like. yeah actually. yeah you should react like that to a claim that this average person who Has hurt someone, the way that nearly every single person has hurt someone in a way they cannot repair, with immediacy to say this person is a Person and thus imperfect and capable of great harm, but that isn’t some all encompassing judgment on their morality or capability to also do good or be fine.

anyway this is kinda just a rant post but also is just me saying i’m very grateful that when surrounded by a fandom that tends to paint characters as Good or Bad and even while using a game that can encourage that with its alignment system, cr has always told stories that see goodness as a persistent choice that might sometimes falter and that can be chosen even after a lifetime of Badness. i can’t remember exactly what the quote was so forgive me if it’s incorrect but when jester is talking to caleb after he claims he’s not a very good person and she says “good people do bad things sometimes. even bad people do good things.” that’s it! that’s one of the most consistent themes across campaigns. and yet.

#on fandom #cr tag #i just. maybe it’s the philosophy major in me but. good grief the shit some of y’all say about morality and then turn around and ignore #what you’ve just said. good grief #lately it’s specifically been the people who support liliana (i too love evil women) and act like she tripped and fell into her current #position. and then turn around and call relvin an abusive devil #like. sorry which one has been manipulating imogen. which one abonded her? #that’s besides the point. my point is. the words good and bad are meaningless. #the good placeism. is this character trying to be better today than they were yesterday #this is the imogen temult problem actually. like yes she Chooses to be good. but that is only a choice because we have Seen her be selfish #and cruel and manipulative. if i had to choose to call imogen good or bad i’d of course choose good. but that undermines so much of #what makes her ‘goodness’ actually compelling. #honestly same with fjord. like his character as a charismatic paladin who fights for Good™ is comtextualised by having seen his journey #like. otherwise he’d be boring. #like. if any cr main character was just Good or just Bad. i promise it would not be as popular as it is #critical role

[nogooddeetz]

so i just rewatched honey queen and in it, roman explains how linda is “the sweetest woman in hatchetfield” (the title that comes with winning the title of honey queen) because what she was willing to do in order to win (kill zoey, among other less than nice things) makes her taste the sweetest to nibbly.

now, in nerdy prudes must die, during the summoning, while blinky speaks to grace and tinky taunts pete, nibbly immediately looks to steph and says “stephanie, yum yum!” steph is nothing like linda of course, she’s not callous or selfish. but. she was, in the end, willing to kill pete to save the rest of the town. she would have done it with a heavy heart, but she would have done it nonetheless. so, is the reason nibbly expresses interest in steph above the others that she is capable of things the others aren’t? like linda, she’s willing to go to extreme lengths to achieve her goal (even though her goal is much more selfless than linda’s).

grace is certainly capable of doing crazy shit too but her deal is a whole separate issue of its own

#just something that popped into my head #and to be fair the whole show starts with steph being willing to use pete to pass a test #which is not a serious offense but it kind of goes with the whole ‘willing to take short cuts’ and ‘use other people to achieve goals’ thin #to be clear: i love steph and don’t think she’s selfish or anything like linda #but the lords in black tend to prey on people who they think they can manipulate into acting how they want them to #so perhaps nibbly thinks steph has the potential if things were desperate enough #nerdy prudes must die #stephanie lauter #nibbly #starkid #hatchetverse #nightmare time #honey queen #linda monroe #npmd #nibblenephim #team starkid #mariah rose faith casillas #lauren lopez #kim whalen #jon matteson #lautski #peter spankoffski

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

my greatest achievement in DA2 is maxing out Carver's friendship

and all it took was begrudgingly kissing a little templar ass in act 1 because Carver didn't want to plan a prison break if my Hawke got his ass arrested for being stupid.

#carver hawke #dragon age #dragon age 2 #da2 #well that and he didn't want leandra gamlen and himself to also get arrested for harboring an apostate but you get me #carver hawke loves his sibling and doesn't want them to get taken away that's why he's such an ass and approves of 'pro-templar' choices #in act 1 he's not pro-templar himself but kissing a little templar ass is how you avoid being arrested #'why yes cullen you are so right the templars are so cool and sexy' my hawke says through gritted teeth for that +5 friendship #look i love him okay he's my favorite and i will go the extra mile to make him happy and it's worth it for how much softer can be later on #honestly maxing out his friendship isn't hard if you're aware of what quests you're bringing him on and make him a grey warden #oh but you do need the legacy dlc otherwise you can't fully max friendship out... you can still get enough to change his dialogue/attitude #also like... we the player know hawke won't be arrested like they're not in any actual dangers from the templars as the playable character #but carver doesn't know that and neither does hawke so the templars *are* a real threat to them #and it's incredibly reckless to purposely piss off templars AND selfish because it's not just hawke that'll be arrested it's their family #for harboring them like we witness templars going after people hiding apostates soooo..... #i'm just saying that carver isn't irrational or just being an ass to personally annoy you okay he has cause #also once carver's a warden and ed has money and the estate THEN he's way more open about telling the templars to piss off #sigh one day i'll sit down and write an essay about carver.... one day