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bthump · 6 months

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What are your thoughts or analyses on the phallic imagery in berserk? Less so the more obvious ones like seen in Casca’s nightmares which are obviously pointing to her sexual trauma, but like we see with the vagina-esque monsters and how Guts’ sword is alluded to being like a penis in some cases. Sorry if it’s a weird question lol

Sorry for the wait on this lol, I was on vacation for a while, and it's also a topic I wanted to spend some time on because I love it and I wanted to be relatively thorough. Thanks for the ask!

So yeah, disclaimers out of the way, Freudian analytical theory is very silly, very gender essentialist in ways that can often be transphobic and misogynist, and as far as I'm aware pretty much wholly unrelated to real psychology. Back in the 70s and 80s you had film theorists who took it seriously as a genuine glimpse into the subconsciousness of humanity or whatever, but now it's pretty much just a readily available source of sex and gender related symbolism that's easy to understand.

And in Berserk I do genuinely think it's a valid lens to view the story through because Miura is often quite heavy handed in utilizing it as symbolism. I mean, Guts literally gives someone an orgasm by stabbing her at one point. Some of this can definitely be a stretch, taking established symbols and running with them, but some of it is also almost certainly purposeful. I'll leave it to you to decide what you see as legit and what you see as stretching believability here.

This is very long lol

So yeah, it starts off strong in Berserk with Guts' oversized sword. Swords are dicks, ie sources of masculine power, especially in Berserk

and in the context of the story the dragonslayer is Guts overcompensating imo. And it's not compensating for a small dick lol, which would be more the purview of comedy, but for a loss of masculinity, ie Guts' childhood abuse from Gambino, and rape trauma. It's about his need to prove himself because he was made to feel like he had to, imo.

And it's not just the size of his sword, his obsession with it is also a major factor. He has a grandiose speech about how his sword is like a part of his body (hmm) and that it's been at his side through everything and he's always relied on it. The dream he lands on is to be the best and strongest sword fighter ever. He's currently having a breakdown over not being able to hit someone with his sword. He has a recurring tendency to break other guy's swords lol. At one point Casca screams at him that he essentially cares about his sword more than her. etc etc.

In the story dreams are at odds with emotionally healing human relationships, and dreams are represented by swords (Guts' sword obviously, Casca becoming Griffith's sword, Griffith calling the throne a sword while taunting the king in the dungeon as well as his vision of himself throwing him a sword and pointing to the castle in chapter 72).

So through a Freudian lens, Guts' sword can also be said to represent emotional isolation, positioning masculinity as emotionally isolating. Which, yk, fits with Griffith also equating dreams and masculinity in his Promrose Hall speech (a man must achieve a dream before he can have a family or lover) and, I suppose lol, Casca getting "softer" and more feminine as she falls for Guts, as femininity is therefore the opposite: emotional reliance on and support of others.

So if swords are dicks, then it follows that wounds are vaginas, ie yonic symbols. Also pretty obvious when you read some of the lines during the Guts and Casca sex scene lol. "I too want a wound I can say you gave me." These can represent weakness and victimization (I did warn for misogyny lol) and/or (often sexual) relationships and emotional openness.

So you have the relationships - "licking wounds" with Casca; Guts letting Casca stab him when he thinks about abandoning Griffith; the Beast of Darkness calling Casca the wound Griffith left so Guts can keep feeling the pain Griffith caused; Griffith scratching his own shoulder where Guts' sword pointedly didn't wound him; Griffith being out of reach of Guts' sword post-Eclipse; "let's give him a heap of raw iron;" and Farnese grinding on Guts' sword while possessed and Slan directly treating being stabbed as sexual penetration for the most obvious examples...

Also I'd argue that any time Guts gets his ass kicked in a fight it functions as an echo of his rape trauma symbolically and subconsciously to Guts. Both kinda obviously at times, like eg when Slan overpowers him and tears off his shirt while wounding his chest, and kisses him after the stabbing, causing Guts to feel a burst of fear

or when Rosine stabs Guts through the mouth as another enemy who flirts with Guts mid-fight. And of course the first duel with Griffith in which Guts unilaterally sets the stakes to sex slavery because he's projecting.

But also a little more subtlely, such as when Zodd is given the same position as Nightmare Donovan in Guts' concussion nightmare after he kills Adonis, or all this consistent imagery that rapists and apostles tend to get.

Or, interestingly, the way the Berserk armour functions as self-harm as Guts fights by penetrating Guts to "heal" him.

Something that solidifies its hold over Guts and makes him lose more and more of his positive humanity to his urge to kill.

So yeah, from a Freudian angle I'd suggest that Guts is driven to fight to reclaim the sense of masculine power he was stripped of when he was raped, and every fight can be said to be a repetition of his rape trauma in which he (usually) successfully fights back, but also continuously retraumatizes himself rather than healing.

I'm going to delve a little deeper into how phallic and yonic symbols intersect with the characters' relationships now that we've outlined some of the preliminary symbolism, starting from the Golden Age.

The first duel between Guts and Griffith is rife with Freudian symbolism, very overtly. Griffith stabs Guts and then Guts proceeds to have a nightmare about his rape trauma. Then he projects that trauma onto Griffith when he assumes Griffith wants to fuck him and adds sexual stakes to their duel. Then, yk, he takes Griffith's sword into his mouth lol.

Griffith winning by dislocating Guts' arm can be easily taken as a symbolic unmanning/castration, nicely introducing us into Guts' three years of growth towards prioritizing relationships instead of aimless sword-swinging to prove himself. It's also suggestive of penetration when you're primed to look for sexual symbolism (and if Guts offering Griffith his ass and then biting a sword doesn't prime you for it, what does?):

And the two of them losing their swords in the course of the fight and resorting to unarmed combat can also be taken as a telling symbol of the conflict between dreams and their relationship with each other. They lose the symbols of their dreams and contend only with each other, in a more positive contrast to the second duel that ends their relationship, in which they fight only with swords and never touch each other.

Wounds come into it when Griffith nearly gets killed rushing in against Zodd to save Guts, leading to the most impactful moment of their relationship, where Griffith admits he did it solely for Guts' sake and had no other reason. Griffith also points out how wounded Guts is after that fight, in what I'd call a nearly flirtatious way:

And if you follow these symbols completely strictly this scene suggests Guts retreating into his defensive masculinity in his sword exercises after being defeated/emasculated by Zodd and accused of not valuing his personal relationships by Casca, and finally finding a new, more constructive purpose for his sword after Griffith essentially confesses his devotion to him.

Dedicating his sword to Griffith in return for the wounds Griffith suffered for his sake, with, it has to be noted when the topic is freudian symbolism, his sword held at exactly crotch level.

In the second duel Guts destroys Griffith's sword before leaving, a symbolic castration which is most likely intended to represent and foreshadow Griffith's subsequent loss of power when he throws his life away and ends up tortured in a dungeon for a year. More interestingly imo, is Griffith tracing scratch-markes on his shoulder after sleeping with Charlotte and while crying over Guts - the same shoulder Guts' sword didn't quite hit when he won the duel, drawing attention to the lack of a wound by Guts' hand, a wound he created himself and traces in his devastation.

You have a nice... I don't know what the comic terminology is lol so I'm just going to call it a match-cut here, with Griffith and Casca both getting penetrated by the same number of arrows/skewers, to signify Griffith and the Hawks' fall from power, in contrast to Guts' growing phallic power as he pursues his sword swinging. Power which he demonstrates when he returns and saves the Hawks and Casca and Griffith by swinging his sword a lot and defeating a lot of powerful enemies and, if I'm gonna be crass, healing Casca's suicidal despair with his dick lol.

Interestingly though, before he does that he lets Casca stab him while experiencing the guilt of having driven Griffith into a torture chamber by leaving. It's a wound that highlights his emotional connection to Griffith and vulnerability to those emotions, even as he tries to deny them. He then manages to successfully deny them for a little while longer after having sex with Casca.

In this Freudian context, Guts and Casca's sex scene is an affirmation of a relationship, but one which is emotionally uneven, with Casca ready and willing to emotionally rely on and support Guts, but Guts still dedicated to his sword-swinging dream, inviting Casca with him but only as long as she doesn't get in the way of what he wants to do. This does fit with phallic symbols being associated with emotional distance and yonic symbols being associated with emotional closeness lol. (Also fittingly, the one way he does open up to her is about his rape trauma after a flashback.)

It's worth noting that in this disconnect Casca erroneously assumes Guts fought the hundred men and "bled" for her, making her want "a wound" from him in return. Guts fighting those hundred men is much more reminiscent of his fights against apostles, the fights that revolve around replaying his rape trauma to make himself feel better. Casca assumes they already have an emotional bond due to Guts' wounds, but she's wrong - Guts specifically thinks to himself during the hundred man fight that he's not doing it for Casca.

This is reflected in the Wyald fight when Guts insists on fighting Wyald, again as part of the whole reaffirmation of masculinity thing I outlined at the start of this, when Casca just wants him to run away. The Wyald fight is pretty overt about being about Guts' rape trauma imo, moreso than most fights in the story. Wyald's rapiness is made a point of from Guts' point of view when he sees him wielding the torso of a woman sexually impaled on a pike and gets extra angry, and when he literally cuts off Wyald's dick when he's about to rape Casca, and then has his pointed line about needing to "settle the score with him... with them... by his own sword."

SO ESSENTIALLY to sum up this subsection, I think you can argue that what prevents Guts and Casca from being an equal relationship is Guts stlil being hung up over needing to prove his masculine power through sword-swinging, rather than embracing his emasculation (which, remember, tends to signify positive relationships in this context) and coming to terms with it ("immersing himself in sorrow" as Godo says much later.)

Like, to return to Griffith, it's fitting that after Guts destroys his sword and he goes through a year of torture and is thoroughly emasculated, he's able to recognize his feelings for Guts and understand that Guts is more important to him than the dream, the "sword called the throne."

But he doesn't quite come to terms with his emasculation either. This symbolism is one explanation for the wagon scene where he propositions Casca - a desperate bid for some form of power. Not the strongest explanation imo, but since we're currently in the business of actively looking for this symbolism, it definitely fits. Casca's rejection and pity reinforce Griffith's emasculation, and overhearing her tell Guts to leave again is the final straw. Relationships are a bust, swords are now his only recourse, as we see when he has a vision of himself throwing him a sword and pointing to the castle.

You could take the nightmarish vision he has of a life with Casca as Griffith rejecting emasculation, but an alternate way of taking it is Griffith regaining a form of phallic power, and the emotional isolation that goes with it. After all, it's implied that he has a child with Casca, while totally withdrawn and emotionally isolated.

I once said in a different silly essay that Griffith choosing the dream is, in a way, Griffith choosing another version that nightmare, and that take also fits here.

And hey, it's another reason for Femto to rape Casca lol, if we want to ascribe meaning there, and of course we must in this kind of analysis. In the wagon Griffith essentially offers sex to Casca for the faint vestige of masculine power it could give him (emotional isolation and a child); in his nightmare he imagines that life and it drives him to suicide; and after becoming Femto he forces sex onto Casca and then continues on to embody emotional distance and masculine power.

This power is painfully demonstrated through the rape of Casca, but also subsequently through his pure untouchability (often in pointedly sexualized contexts); through his phony relationship with Charlotte and ascending to the ultimate patriarchal role of king/emperor and taking that sword called the throne; and I guess also through his actual sword lol which he still uses.

An example of sexualized untouchability - check out the positioning of that third thought bubble, in this scene where Griffith lords his invulnerability over Ganishka.

And look at all those pillars, I'm js.

And I'd be remiss not to point out the most recent confrontation with Guts where Guts tries many times to hit his naked body with his giant sword, completely fails, and then Griffith kidnaps Casca. More very on-point emasculation symbolism, it might as well be Guts trying to fuck him but unable to get hard lol. His breakdown afterwards doesn't do much to disabuse you of that notion either.

Anyway, back to post-Eclipse Guts. There's not much else to add that I didn't cover at the start, but in brief:

Guts has lost his arm during the Eclipse, which is an emasculation - he loses it while watching Femto rape ~his woman~ so it's like the most traditional symbolic castration there is lol. And of course he replaces it with a bigger, better, and more overt phallic symbol: a canon. And like the first thing we see him do with it is shove it into the mouth of a monster he's banging and blow her head off. So yk, there's that.

And there's Puck, who exists to help bridge Guts' emotional distance and essentially serves as the feminine counterpart to Guts' masculinity for a while. From his magical empathy, to his tiny size, to his lack of genitalia (note that in Freudian theory the lack of a penis is an indicator of femininity rather than specifically the presence of a vagina), to his connections with female characters Theresia and Jill, even arguably to his introduction where Guts saves him from a bunch of men throwing phallic knives at him by skewering them with his own (bigger) projectiles, this is consistent during the Black Swordsman/Conviction arc era.

Chestnut Puck is a lot more boyish, with his particular humour, his cameraderie with an annoying teenage boy, and now having his own feminine counterpart in Ivalera, but that's fine because his thematic job as a feminine influence on Guts is over after Guts starts collecting more friends.

And as far as the RPG group goes, there are a few notable instances of phallic symbolism for them too. Farnese and Serpico are an obvious example, with Farnese sexualizing the wounds Serpico voluntarily suffers for her, when she demands he duel for her honour a bunch of times.

Farnese brandishing the end of her whip at him doesn't hurt the freudian power dynamic symbolism either lol.

In the Conviction arc Farnese wielded a sword she was incapable of using, suggestive of her true femininity under a brash masculine surface, and when she softens in the Millenium Falcon arc she becomes a caretaker with only a small dagger for self-defense. That said, she does get that epic moment of stabbing a tiger in the eye with a long silver pole (candlestick) when she rejoins Guts' crew rather than becoming a housewife, so she still gets some badass phallic weapon imagery lol.

Serpico wields a thin rapier in the Conviction Arc, which Guts easily grabs in his hand, and in the Millenium Falcon arc he switches to a... limp feather duster lol. Serpico is very feminized compared to Guts and his weapons fit as part of that, but they're still effective weapons. You could maybe argue, within this Freudian lens, that this is indicative of Serpico's healthier relationship with masculinity. He's not compensating for anything, he's at peace with himself.

And god I gotta say something about Guts and Serpico's duels. In the first one you have Serpico delaying Guts while Farnese steals Casca from him, and part of that delay is to force Guts into a fight where he can't wield his sword, a parallel emasculation to Casca being kidnapped.

Then you have their confrontation after Farnese's no good very bad night, which is just incredibly suggestive lol.

You cannot tell me this isn't Guts getting blueballed when Serpico leaves after one quick exchange. Particularly coming in the same chapter featuring possessed Farnese grinding on Guts' sword (which Guts was much less interested in, incidentally). Also: wounds as sexual imagery again. Guts licking the blood off his cheek? Come on.

And finally you have their fight in Farnese's basement, in which Serpico attempts to hinder Guts by surrounding him with giant pillars, which Guts smashes through as he dodges around them. Another neat illustration of Guts' pure phallic power and Serpico's much more effeminate style.

One final note to address part of your ask, which didn't naturally fit into the rest of this lol: I would interpret vaginal imagery in monsters as mainly castration anxiety, yk, vagina dentata vibes, the fear of sticking your dick in a hole you can't see into. There's actually a lot of interesting stuff to consider in terms of the feminine as the unknowable other when it comes to Freudian theory, but that's like, not something I would expect Miura to lean into first of all, and also it would take another essay of explanation. If you're interested in that kind of Freudian analysis though I'd recommend the books Men, Women, and Chainsaws by Carol J. Clover and The Dread of Difference, edited by Barry Keith Grant. I took a course on women and horror films ages ago and read chunks of those, and it was very fun, and iirc both address Freudian imagery in horror.

Okay! So that's the rundown of like, all the examples of Freudian imagery that interest me at least lol. This isn't exhaustive ofc, Berserk is long and not stingy with this stuff, but this response is already so long and meandering lol, so I'm going to wrap it up here.

To sum up, phallic imagery often represents masculine power as well as masculine flaws (like emotional isolation) in Berserk, while yonic/vaginal imagery tends to represent feminine weakness as well as feminine virtues (like emotional connection and vulnerability). As a general rule, the more phallic imagery someone violently swings around, the more fucked up they are. Phallic violence is used to compensate for past trauma, but it only continues the cycle of violence. The way to break that violence is to accept one's wounds and focus on them, to heal, rather than trying to distract from them.

I don't think this is always the best way to interpret Berserk lol, but it adds another dimension that very often complements the surface meaning and thematic resonance of the story, sometimes purposefully, sometimes likely incidental. And either way it's a lot of fun to read into!

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fivekrystalpetals · 1 year

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Seems like I was needlessly worried about Ada; who knew she had the power of god and witchcraft on her side (✿◡‿◡)

okay but the whole sequence was downright hilarious like—

they should be in a romantic comedy; the amount of misunderstanding between them *facepalm*

Vincent's thoughts, as always, are down the gutter, the sewer rat that he is,,, whereas poor Ada took his words in a literal sense and decided to lay bare 'the real her' lmaoo

again, second misunderstanding here: Vincent assumes she 'brings a lot of boys home' and thaaat's the reason Uncle got her a secondary residence...

whereas, the real reason probably is— both dad and uncle must have lost their sleep over all the occult stuff their teenage kid was obsessed with (yk how teenage girls are, once they are obsessed with something, they are simply unstoppable). I am guessing she must have brought home her friends from her school's Occult Fan Club, probs even done some hexing, black magic, voodoo stuff right inside one of the main rooms, one night—and the adult men got scared shit out of their pants hahaha

That's most probs the actual reason why she was forbidden to enter the main building, rather forbidden to bring that kind of stuff into the main building. Uncle got Ada her own little sanctuary for her occult collection, the kind of power she has ᕦ(ò_óˇ)

Third misunderstanding: after a long misogynist monologue courtesy Vincent-sama (all women are foolish, feeble, frivolous etc. etc.), we get to this scene. I had assumed it was Vincent who introduced himself to Ada to get at Uncle Oscar. Maybe, it is so.

But assuming it was Ada who introduced herself, I have a better explanation why she would do that rather than 'wanting to share his bed' as Vincent immediately assumes.

She just wanted to get close to him so she could 'passionately discuss' her obsession with him!! She assumed that he was a high-society closeted fanboy just like her ahfsjjshhaha

moral of the story: rather than saying Vincent should have been clearer with his intent, it's more like— Vincent should have clarified what he was getting into before entering a fangirl's cave;

in the end, it was not a hero or a villain, but a fangirl that KO'ed this piece of shit, serves him right

#pandora hearts #may-reads-ph #vincent nightray #ada vessalius #retrace xlvi #ada my baby <3 i am so proud of you TT_TT #i am cackling so hard ahfhsjjkgkl #i mean he asked for it right #man i relate so hard i pulled this shit when i was in my high school #every girl's teenage /is/ a phase #it's like-#sorry if you can't handle me at my fangirl mode you don't deserve me at my 'normal' mode (not that it exists)#(I made this post while i was reading that chapter i have overshot a lot and entered in completely </3 areas #in the meantime please enjoy these little fun moments as long as they last ;-;

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itsjaywalkers · 3 months

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hello, I binged through the two parts of oby and the three parts of nothing happens and all of them are just splendid, I love that you actually give the characters quite a complex personality, especially the women considering that this fandom is afraid of women being anything other than a “saint”

omg nonnie the fact that u went and read so many of my fics has me giggling and blushing like crazy I'M SO FLATTERED AND SO VERY GRATEFUL!!! i do try to write all my characters as human and as flawed as possible, they're obviously fictional but i want them to feel real, i want ppl to understand them and disagree with them and even hate them sometimes. bc that's how it is in real life yk!!

and honestly the issue with this fandom and female characters is just that everyone loves to claim to be woke and a feminist, and they think that writing women as this perfect, intelligent beings is the only option to showcase that bc anything else is inherently misogynistic which is . absurd . women are people too, they fuck up and make mistakes and can be horrible and very unlikable people . portraying them as 'saints' only makes them boring and unrealistic and it's one of the main reasons why a lot of ppl find them uninteresting

but also . and bc of this same shit . many ppl force themselves to include the female characters in their stories or write them, in fear of others accusing them of being women haters when in reality?? it has nothing to do with that?? this whole fandom was created bc of an obsession with a friend group made up ONLY by men, so ofc there's a lot of ppl who are only interested in the male characters (especially considering they're a lot more developed). and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that!! this is fandom, ppl should be allowed to write about whatever they want and only focus on what they actually care about or find interesting

sorry for the rant nonnie lmao, sending u a hug for making u read through all this + for being so very sweet MWAH <333

#asks #anons #on fandom

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asscrackcreed · 2 years

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breaking down this fic for no reason other than im bored - i stopped at chapter 24 i cant do this in one go so maybe a part 1

its such a white perspective clearly because malik doesnt come home from a party and after panicking that his mums gonna kill him she doesnt say anything and ??? idk the fact that they drink they’re not religious in any way shape or form despite the fact that religions especially islam have a heavy cultural impact so theres no excuse as to why hes a complete atheist. ik this fic was made in 2014 but damn these ppl hate muslims fr we never get rep in fics??? anyways altaïr is a complete homophobe and has a little flirty banter with des but thats his cousin ? uhm. des is like ‘no dont be homophobic’ and then says ‘nvm ur not relevant enough to be cancelled’ thats just chapter 1 btw

malik has a blog where he shits on altaïr and he made it after accidentally sleeping with him because uhm he has nothing better to do… this is so OOC even if altaïr is a complete homophobe and misogynist i cant see malik make an anonymous blog and everything to call out his immorality… PURELY for his immorality its not like a tumblr blog he made sassbadgers just to shit on altaïr… and then he has a moment where he responds to an altaïr stan, she says hey women are made for men and malik was like i dont believe in any religions so im not responding to that but thats an L for you anyways cuz wtf

ok but islam literally says that women are humans and shouldnt be treated like sexual objects wtf do u mean ? this is a basic principle? youre mum is muslim? hello.?

HE WAS BORN WHERE.

then he continues to laugh at said delusion fan for thinking shes married to altaïr… i know ppl like that are real… but this adds nothing to the story and given 2014 the whole ‘women getting involved in my gay ship’ drives me insane

this series does not have to be 75 chapters btw its full of fillers and irrelevant shit like why do i need to read about malik getting on the bus texting kadar for giggles idgaf

altaïr likes christmas but hes not religious my man ur dad was muslim and ur family did nothing to uphold that? huh? are they all islamophobes?

why does malik keep referring to altaïr as Mr Ibn-La’Ahad if he has no respect for him why is he addressing this guy appropriately just call him a bitch and get it over with

malik in this fic is a pretentious bitch. stop using big words just cuss him out and go taking so much time just to tell me kadar cant read big words - chapter 6 btw

leonardo and malik being roommates is cute tho i’ll give them that - at some point leo has a crush on malik i think to stir the tea but it doesnt work because… they’re too alike in this fic? they finish each other’s sentences type of alike not every gay man needs to date each other fuck sake

WHY IS MALIK TELLING KADAR ABOUT HIS SEX LIFE IS THAT NORMAL… I DONT TELL NAT ANYTHING ABOUT WHAT I DO EW and why does kadar keep asking ‘when are u gonna tell mum’ this really really really fucking annoys me as someone with a religious mum can kadar stfu shit like coming out to someone who doesnt seem alright with it is practically dangerous?????

yk how ppl said altaïr was aloof for not catching on al mualims evil plans - yeah they seemed to really fucking run with this trope good god hes so dumb its pissing me off this isnt altaïr - he says hes not bothered to take care of his stock shares or whatever ??? the source of their grandmas wealth HUH… tf do u mean ik its pre development altaïr but he wasnt neglecting responsibilities he was just a huge fucking asshole that fucked up cuz of his ego so what is going on here

im not reading this shit theres SOOOOOO many convos and NOOOOOOTTHIIINNGGG HAPPPEENNNIIIIINNGGGG

so altaïr thinks the writer behind sassbadger is a woman and is tryna flirt with ‘her’ its funny and i like it tbh but shit drags so slowly ffs

ig they’re falling in love but altaïr and malik message eachother about how maliks being nicer to him… but the reason is so dumb ‘because u purposefully make videos for ppl to laugh at u how can u be okay with that?’ what. isnt he homophobic and misogynistic what are u talking about. how is that a reason to be nicer either shit on him or stfu

also it doesnt make sense if u dont like someone esp because of their morals then… u wouldn’t interact with them on a happy social level i dont like that maliks already like bantering with him

Malik: Hey

Leo: Hey!

Malik: Sex?

Leo: Weren’t u meant to be studying

Malik: Well Im not

maybe im nitpicking rn but man the sex is so awkward like no foreplay? no setting the mood? the little convos dont make sense like if hes asking for sex hes clearly not… gonna study…? like what this author is so OOC with everyone

DES EZIO MALIK AND INTERNET PPL KEEP TELLING HIM TO STOP BEING AN ASSHOLE AND HIS RESPONSE IS ‘im not gay! i dont like gays! keep ur dick away from me!’ wheres the critical altaïr gone this isn’t fun to read the writing itself isnt bad its just like… so much and so little happening at the same time why dont you tell me how hes so afraid of being gay instead of telling me ezio is an ‘ally’

why did they make maria thorpe… posh? is it cuz shes british?

if altaïr and malik are falling in love in chapter 15 wtf is gonna happen for the other 60 chapters ???

altaïr slept with claudias friends ? that feels weird uhm

also i forgot to say malik ended up moving in with leo or smth and then he was like no im going home i didnt quite pick up why maybe i was scrolling too fast but do u see what i mean? so much stalling that adds nothing to the story

the world building was going well it was really interesting seeing how the family works idk why they villanised giovanni but yk whatever william miles was a shit dad and des ran away to his grandma who cut william out of the will and giovanni took williams side cuz des was ‘being a lazy boy’ so he got cut out too and despite the auditores being rich and having 4 production companies to their name they’re still assholes who treat des like shit except for ezio and claudia now altaïr wants justice

see? going well interesting story so why tf are they making altaïr exotic and saying he knows 10 languages ffs - ‘English, Arabic, Hebrew, Spanish, German, Italian, French, Russian, enough Finnish to ask directions and very little Korean.’ i wonder why they’re all (but two) european languages… what does he need to do with all those languages tf how exotic

ok so uhm altaïr fought ezio cuz of the whole des thing uhm very counterproductive but now they have matching lips scars. this is so silly thats the only word i can think ezio wasnt even involved with des’ situation even ezios like wtf are u attacking me for i… is this the only way altaïr could get a scar? tf

again kadar doesnt need to tell his brother hes gonna masturbate tf is wrong with this author

kadar liking a muslim girl is nice tho

??? ITS RAMADAN? YOU CANT HAVE SEX IT BREAKS THE FAST… if it was during the night it’d be fine just have a shower asap but i mean. COME ON.

ik altaïrs not religious but he eats ham…

how does the author know all these words… wdym ‘surah’ dont tell me the authors muslim

whys altaïr fighting ezio AGAIN weve established it doesnt help anything

#assassin's creed #ac #ac1 #altmal #altaïr ibn la’ahad #malik al sayf #idk what to tag this #fic review #text

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hajimesbestdefender · 1 year

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i saw this essay while i was trying to find kmhn and i have so many thoughts..

if you want to read my thoughts i recommend reading them as you read the sections because thats how i wrote it

okay i'll go chapter by chapter (there are 5 chapters)

chapter 1: faqs

faq #1: the blatant homophobia towards the women youre trying to "protect" in this is very ironic to me. your point here is just plainly incorrect. how on earth does wlw ships further the ideology that women only want men for sex? and what is with the shaming women for not being virgins? there is nothing inherently wrong with having sex, having a sexual past, or anything of the sort. you sexualized these women. miu & sonia have done nothing wrong, and deserve the equal opportunity to be in a relationship and be loved.

faq #2: it *is* simply a matter of preference. there is nothing wrong w preferring makoto/byakuya, hajime/nagito, or kokichi/suichi. yes, those characters (kyoko, chiaki, and kaede) were written to be the protagonists respective love intrest. however, when has a fandom *not* shipped a character with someone who wasnt their love intrest? i can give several examples. it is not down to gender. people can see themselves represented through these relationships, they can hold the belief that those ships work better for the characters, or they can plain like the dynamic better. it does not matter.

faq #3: ...what? that makes no sense. the whole question doesnt make sense. im just not gunna adress it, but it is there.

faq #4: those crushes could be arguable. however, there was a slight hesitation from nagito when he said it, leading many people to believe that. i dont know enough about v3 to speak on that other part.

chapter 2: nagami

once again, it comes down to preference. you cannot controls someones preference. if they like naegami? fine! if they like naegiri? fine! it does not *matter*. at the end of the day, these two ships are perfectly resonable, and do no harm. therefore, both should equally be resepcted. the reason why naegami has more fics on ao3 because people prefer it more. simple as that.

also, this exact senario has happened before in another fandom. in the hp fandom, hinny (harry/ginny, his current wife) is less popular than drarry (draco/harry, his rival). and yk what? they have damn near the same dynamic as naegami. the simple thing is: people prefer the dynamic more. it is not misogynistic to prefer a dynamic. (i could go into a whole ass tangent on how similiar draco and byakuya are, but i digress)

chapter 3: komahina

i could ramble day in and day out abt this ship, but i dont feel like retyping all of it so ima just ss my original ramble to my friends in discord.

(apologies for going off track for a little, PLS IGNORE THE PFP 😭)

moving on, you mentioned nagito lied about having cancer. he didnt. he said he had stage 4 malignant lymphoma and front mental dementia. both of which were never implied to be lies.

"chiaki died for him and the rest of the class"

oh, do you mean in the real world, where she was brutality murdered so class 77 could become brainwashed, and how hajime was already too far gone at that point? or do you mean in the simulation, where they had zero chance of getting out without leaving chiaki behind because she was ai and apart of the system? or the time she had to be executed to save the rest of the group? thats not an act of romance, it was quite literally life or death. in 2 of those situations, it makes no logical sense for chiaki to live and have the rest of the group die. shes a team player, through and through.

chapter 4: saiouma

it comes down to prefrence. there is no misogyny here. it is just people preferring one ship over the other. nothing more, nothing less. this is getting embarrassing atp.

chapter 5: stats

chiriho: ...you missed their entire story arc!! not suprising you dont actually pay attention to stuff. ALSO!! the transmisogny!! and, to top it all off: youre a terf. whos fucking suprised. chiriho hid under the cover as a woman because they were afraid. thats it. they wanted to become stronger and braver. thats their arc. you red far too into it to come to the conclusions you came to. (using they/them on chiriho bcs i felt like it)

sonia: youre promoting purity culture. women do not need so save their virginity for anyone. nor does anyone. virginity is something given up when that person is ready. sonia was ready. so she gave it up. shouldnt that be a symbol of women empowerment? (note: i hate the concept of virginity as a whole, literally just have sex nobody gives a fuck.)

miu: "she doesnt deserve to be called a woman because of how preverted she acts." you wrote this whole essay as a callout for what you precieve as misogyny. however, throughout the entire damn thing you promoted misogynistic take after take. you basically just said in fujisaki's section that women shouldnt be pushed into a box, and yet,,, youre here telling women they cant be sexual beings? that they have to be pure, clean, and submit to men? miu didnt do anything wrong. she expressed herself in the way she saw fit, and YOURE mad that the way she did so didnt fit your standards? get the fuck out of here, weirdo.

final thoughts:

op has been continuously misogynistic, homophobic, and transphobic throughout this entire read. it is disgusting. now, this can be a blatant troll, but at the same time this is still perpetuating a very disgusting view on women and what they should be. as an afab, i'm disgusted. this is appaling. you disregard so many women writing this. queer women, women who didnt save themselves for marriage (because god forbid women do what they want to do.), or any woman that doesnt fit in your little box. you say youre against misogyny, but this is the most apparent example ive ever seen of a woman with internalized misogyny. if youre being serious? i truly hope you recieve the help you need, and do some interal work trying to combat this. writing 2,643 words worth of fictional parings you dont like when you can simply ignore it and walk outside is just sad. if youre a troll? fuck you.

(also, before you question that "writing 2,643..." line, i wouldve, but i happened to see it whilst on a 2 hour car ride to thanksgiving and i was bored as shit. sue me.)

#yeah idk how the fuck to tag this #hajime hinata #chiaki nanami #nagito komaeda #makoto naegi #byakuya togami #kyoko kirigiri #shuichi saihara #kaede akamatsu #kokichi ouma

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rierice8 · 1 year

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My intro and dni list!!

A note: this blog contains explicit adult content along with sfw things too. If you are a minor, I’d prefer you to not even interact with my sfw posts, to keep yourself away from the nsfw. PLEASE DO NOT REBLOG THIS POST!!

About me!

I’m Rice, male, 19 years old, my birthday is February 1st 2004 and I’m a mainly dom switch with a thing for pretty lace lingerie (on me)

I’m bisexual and taken! Please don’t ask me about my boyfriend either, he's mine, hahahaha…I’m watching you..

My interests are:

classical literature, sketching and drawing, writing short classical inspired stories (and fanfiction on the side), men, mythical creatures, vintage things and renaissance furniture/clothes, vtubers (nijiEN mainly hehe) photography, classical music, vocaloid, anime, history, music theory and music history, composing music, musicals, video games and playing instruments

I’m an ex competitive figure skater and fencer! Talk to me about those sports, its really been a while, I only do them for fun now but it used to be my whole life along with marching band (im still in marching band though haha)

I’m in uni as of now and I’m quite busy so I won’t ever be posting on a set schedule! Just whenever I finish things!

My DNI list

-homophobic, transphobic, racist, anti semitic, misogynistic, just a general piece of shit kinda person

-Minors and people with no age in bio, female aligned/women, fujoshis/fudanshis, straight men

-people who sexualise minors, maps, pedophiles, people ok with pedophilia, pro shippers

-people who don’t understand that sex needs consent, people who don't know the difference between fanfiction and real life

-people over 35, I’m only 19, that's a bit weird

-people who sexualise being gay or a certain race

Do’s and don’ts with my request box and dms!

-Do: ask me to write something, I’m always waiting for new things, don’t hesitate!!

-Do: rant to me about your fantasies with a certain character in my asks box, I may even write something from it!

-Don’t:rant to me about fantasies you have with me, that’s weird, you don’t even know me and I’m happily taken! Just cuz I write about it with characters, doesn’t mean I want strangers to do it to me in writing randomly!

-Don’t: dm me unless we're mutuals (I forgot if you can still do that) and don’t dm me inappropriate/pornographic stuff.

Do: send requests! My requests are open, I can't stress it enough, I’m so bored in between work and school please make me write things

Don’t: send me an ask and talk about another blog, this is my blog and respectfully, I’m the main character here cuz of all the work I put in! Think of it like talking about another streamer in the twitch chat of a different streamer, respect them by not doing that yk

My hashtags:

#rice dying #rierhymes

#about me #blog intro #blog rules #dni list #rice dying #rierhymes

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shayneysides · 2 years

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BBC Ghosts for the fandom ask 🤸🏾‍♀️ or Ted Lasso if someone already sent Ghosts

No one already sent Ghosts, but I can't decide between fandoms, so I'm just going to do both lmao but keep the answers short for Ted Lasso bc I know that's not what people follow me for

Answers under the read more bc it turned out to be super long:

blorbo (favorite character, character I think about the most)

Ghosts: That's gotta be Humphrey. God I think about Humphrey so much!! Too much even!! His existence is just heartbreaking. He's a character that is so indescribably lonely. He's acknowledged so little that he's happy to be hit around like a ball. The only time he gets attention is when telling his death story, and even then he's interrupted constantly. His life is so tragic and his death even more so, and the worst part is he seems used to it. I want to pick Humphrey up and give him all the love and attention in the world. My boy my man!!

Ted Lasso: It's basic, I know, but Jamie. His character is just so interesting, and there's just so much to say about him. His redemption arc is so well executed, and thinking about him too much makes me cry.

scrunkly (my “baby”, character that gives me cuteness aggression, character that is So Shaped)

Ghosts: I don't think I really find any of them cute, to be honest? Almost all of them are grown ass adults, and the only one who isn't (Kitty) doesn't really feel cute to me, even though I really do love her as a character in other ways.

Ted Lasso: Will Kitman!! My boy!! My small little man!!! I just think he is so fun and little. Look at him. I also think it's so funny that they straight up made his last name his job title.

scrimblo bimblo (underrated/underappreciated fave)

Ghosts: Fanny! She's less underappreciated now that she has a backstory episode, but still, on other social media platforms I see people being such assholes to her. It's really, really irritating seeing people calling her shrill and annoying cause yk. it feels a little misogynistic!! And people also really don't think about why she is the way she is now. I just think Fanny deserves all the kindness and love in the world. Also she is so so smart and I easily fall in love with women in STEM!! I love her!!

Ted Lasso: Coach Beard. God I love Coach Beard. He's such an enigma, and he has so much unexplored depth. I know a lot of people hated Beard After Hours, but it's one of my favorite episodes. It just has the same feelings as Beard does as a character entirely, like everything is just a little shifted to the left. He's so interesting.

glup shitto (obscure fave, character that can appear in the background for 0.2 seconds and I won’t shut up about it for a week)

Ghosts: I guess Vin and Nev, the burgulars? I think they're very funny, and I would totally watch a spinoff show with them. I don't have much to say, I'm just really curious about their backstories and I think they're really fun characters.

Ted Lasso: Just more of the players!! I want to see more of the team than the main side characters!

poor little meow meow (“problematic”/unpopular/controversial/otherwise pathetic fave)

Ghosts: Julian! The only Tory I like! I just like characters that hate themselves, and he has SO many issues to dive into. If he were alive, I would honestly hate him because he would be having real negative effects on real people, but now that he's dead and he can neither create new harm nor change his old ones, he can be appreciated as just a shitty fun character developing dude! I'm gonna dump so many sad backstories on him!!

Ted Lasso: Oh my god Nate. Nate Nate Nate. Holy shit Nate forever. I genuinely love Nate. I think he's such a good character and a good person. He's just made a lot of mistakes and has been treated like shit for so long that he doesn't know how to act when that changes. The fandom is absolutely horrible to him (and I could go on a WHOLE thing about racism in the fandom) and he really doesn't deserve it. I've seen more hate directed toward Nate, a misguided and sympathetic and heartbreaking character who is definitely going to have a redemption arc, than Rupert, the literal piece of shit villain.

horse plinko (character I would torment for fun, for whatever reason)

Ghosts: Probably Francis Button. Like yeah he's a terrible person for killing Thomas then stealing the love of his life, but also his face is just so punchable. I want to break his dumb little glasses. He deserves it

Ted Lasso: James Tartt, big huge asshole, what more do I have to say

eeby deeby (character I would send to superhell)

Ghosts: Kitty's sister. I hate her, she's cruel and manipulative, she probably fucked Kitty's mind up (I feel like part of the in-universe reason Kitty is so innocent is bc she's blocking out bad memories with her sister, but as a result, still feels kind of stuck in her childhood? idk how to explain it sorry), and she's probably racist. I hate her and she gets to go to superhell

Ted Lasso: Rupert Mannion, big huge asshole, what more do I have to say

#bbc ghosts #ted lasso #tysm for sending this!!

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mattskeebah · 5 years

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PLEASE READ

I know how much y’all hate “your fave is problematic” posts...but it’s necessary.

Summary: Matt Skiba, singer of the band Alkaline Trio and member of Blink-182, has nazi tattoos, is a fan of nazi bands, made tasteless nazi related paintings, is best friends with Boyd Rice, and in fact, owns nazi insignia. Matt claims to be a feminist but likes countless scantily clad pics of young models and sex workers and follows actual porn actresses on IG. Also, he never distanced himself from Asia Argento and still sells t-shirts with her face on them in his webstore. Matt supports the police and the military and he has a weird gun fetish. He attacked fans who criticized his behavior and his problematic associations.

---

WHY I STOPPED BEING A FAN OF MATT SKIBA

He supports the police as an instutition, specifically Chicago PD. He made a post on Instagram in favor of CPD which ofc received backlash from fans but he ignored the negative comments and brushed it off as “there are bad people in every profession” and then he deleted the post. Thanks to a Tumblr user who screencapped it: [x] please notice the tiny blue (lives matters) heart. Also, here are some “cute” pics of him wearing police-related stuff [x] [x] and check out this post of him “repping” new CPD merch on his car [x] (he disabled the comments).

He supports the military, which might be because his parents served in the Vietnam war, but that doesn’t make it less shitty. Examples for his military-support can be found all over his Instagram. [x] [x] [x] [x] [x] and so on... and in this post he’s delighted that a soldier in Afghanistan is wearing an Alkaline Trio patch. [x]

He’s close friends with Asia Argento / or had possible romantic relationship with her and he still sells t-shirts with her face on them in his merch shop. For those of you who don’t know her, she was one of the leaders of the #metoo movement but then it was revealed that she herself had sex with an intoxicated 17-year-old (!) and her bf Anthony Bourdain gave the boy money so he would keep his mouth shut about the incident, ((later Bourdain committed suicide))

Story of a fan who gave Matt a letter criticizing him for being friends with Argento, and the same night he posted a picture of her on IG (I think it was this post)… which seems like a subtle F*CK YOU at the person who gave him the letter. (he can’t take criticism, can he?)

His IG activity is .. something else. Matt’s major interests are motorbikes, cars, and young, attractive, half-naked models and strippers. One of his recent likes (nudity and bruises cw) [x] [x] [x] [x]….that one is an actual porn actress he follows and thirsts over: (more nudity cw) [x] he commented ‘cool butt momma. miss you xoxo’ [x] [x] (liked)…and my “personal fave” a picture with a sex worker [x] he deleted the picture ofc

HE LOVES GUNS (+said that he would use them) he has quite a big gun collection: SIG SAUERs, a Morning Star, many knifes, a shotgun, a Desert Eagle gun, a samurai sword, a faux snakeskin baton, and more stuff I can’t remember, he posted his collection on November 5th 2018 on IG, but unfortunately I didn’t take a screenshot!! but he posted them individually on IG. [x] [x] [x] [x] etc. and a recently deleted pic at the shooting range [x] ……also this pic exists.. edgelord (tw gun to the head).

In the comments of the same post (I swear on my life it’s real, you have to trust me) a user commented that he’s a Trump supporter but he would still defend Matt, even if he’s “politically left”. Matt’s answer: “I would defend you too, my man!”. o k a y. then Matt said he identifies as “quite a bit left” o K AY. MATT. Just so btw. the user also had a name including “88″ ( is a code phrase commonly used in fascist circles for “Heil Hitler”) or he just meant the year 88. but I saw some racist “memes” on his IG too.

Matt has a weird obsession with WW2. He literally watched a holocaust docu on HIS FUCKING BDAY (or at least he posted about it) and he said he collects WW2 books. Theoretically, nothing wrong with being interested in history, but in the context of everything… bad vibes……….

He really loves Nordic/Scandinavian-related stuff, like jewelry of the Hammer of Thor etc and he even uses MS runes for his merch. Runes are popular among occultists but they also have a really problematic history concerning WW2 and the nazis. Considering one of his most favorite bands Death in June mentions runes in their lyrics and they are a REALLY REALLY questionable band flirting with nazi imagery and being openly affiliated with fascist and far-right satanists, I have every right to question Matt’s intentions.

He literally has a crutch cross tattoo on his chest (which was used as the symbol of Austro-Fascism, and is also the logo of the neo folk - nazi band Blood Axis) PHOTO 1, PHOTO 2 and an EDELWEISS tattoo [x], which is the national flower of Austria and is considered a magical flower in occult circles. Nothing wrong with having a flower tattoo but it was used a lot in the context of nationalsocialism and “traditional values”. To add, it was also used as a symbol of the 1st Mountain division “Gebirgsjäger” in WW2 (Hitler’s elite formation of the Wehrmacht who were involved in large scale war crimes).

Matt OWNS NAZI INSIGNIA. He is wearing a WW2 Edelweiss patch in this pic [x] and here [x] combined with a crutch cross patch (Alk3 used an iron cross backdrop at their concerts 2014ish and a crutch cross symbol on their guitar picks btw.)

He owns several Death In June patches, their merch [x] [x] [x] [x] etc. and other patches and buttons featuring nazi-related symbols. [DIJ WIKI]. He is also friends with their singer. Matt’s a huge DIJ fan, attended their concerts [x] and Douglas P. reads the intro of the Alkaline Trio song “I Found Away”. DIJ uses fascist symbols and “aesthetics” for the band, including an SS Totenkopf logo.

Matt painted the same logo and exhibited it at an art show [x]

HE LITERALLY DID PAINTINGS REFERENCING DOLLFUSS AND MUSSOLINI and another piece of “art” called “surf nazis” [x] what the actual f u c k .. and here he is with his painting of Mickey Mouse as Hitler [x]

HE IS BEST FRIENDS with Boyd Rice, (here’s a picture of them holding Wolfsangels, a nazi symbol) they are REALLY CLOSE. According to Rice’s IG they meet every week and hang out and Rice considers Matt “family”… the entire Boyd Rice shit can be read in this post (important please read). Matt even attacked fans that were calling him out and called them stupid.

The first liked video on his Youtube channel is a video about neo-nazi biker gangs in Germany....... [x]

He is friends with Kat von D, she did a few of his tattoos and she appeared in the Alk3 video “Help Me”.

He collabed with Jeffree Star on a violent song [x]

He was at an art show of a friend who used nazi symbols (!)

posts like these [x] [x]

In this interview [x] he’s pretty much romanticizing that people got stabbed back then at concerts and that there was a big skinhead scene (he wasn’t “stoked” about the violence happening BUT “the energy surrounding” was “very ATTRACTIVE” to him. Make of that what you will.)

When he was a sophomore in HS (and on acid) he beat up a classmate who threw a U.S. flag on the floor. [x]

Matt made a racist remark a few years ago about Chinese people [x] and according to him //or he’s joking// he has a tattoo on his dick that says “welcome to Jamaica” which can be interpreted as racist.

Many of the movies he praises blatantly depict violence against women, like Blue Velvet, Funny Games, A Clockwork Orange (it has almost 3 rape scenes in the first 15 minutes), lyrics like “Radio” can be seen as misogynist, he literally wishes that his ex-GF (/or someone’s ex-gf) should take a bath with a radio and get electrocuted.

A person on IG commented that his ex-girlfriend accused him of domestic violence, I have no proof for that but he deleted the comments ofc and then a few days later he donated money to a women’s shelter in LA… which seems like he’s trying to avoid a shitstorm…

He compared L.A. women to zoo animals in this interview [x].

He cheated on his ex-gf(s) which I think should go on this list too.

Matt used to be a member of the Church of Satan, just leaving this here. you can argue if it’s good or bad but there seems to be a connection between satanists and neo-nazis .. sadly.

He listed the song* “Los Angeles” by X among his faves in this interview [x] (*edit: Someone has reached out to me and explained that the song was not racist, antisemitic or anything but from the *perspective* of a racist. However, we don't know Matt's reason for liking the song and considering his WW2 fetish, it's sketchy that he would consider the song as one of his favorites. Maybe he likes it because the song openly says things out loud under the veil of "sarcasm" that would be criticized under different circumstances. See also: [Oscar Wild was right.] Matt still listened to the band in 2014 and was at a concert of them [x], even months after their singer spew right-wing conspiracy theories concerning (school) shootings.

THIS FUCKING PICTURE OF HIM WITH A CHARLES MANSON DOLL AND A SW*STIKA. He still had the doll in other pictures [x] [x].

This picture I found on a fansite. It’s supposed to be Matt as a child.. where does that even come from and why is he wearing a military hat with something that vaguely looks like an eagle (?)

I can’t be the only one who noticed that but Matt had a vaguely ~nazi haircut thoughout the years and even some sort of nazi / white power aesthetic~ going on, even fans recognized it as such [x] [x] [x] and in the context of him hanging out with Boyd Rice like this in this picture [x] it’s safe to say he was EXACTLY GOING FOR THAT LOOK.

When he was in Germany during the Blink-182 tour 2017 he proudly posed at a famous Third Reich location in the Alps. Yk. nothing wrong with visiting historical locations but in the context of everything mentioned in this post. IT LOOKS REALLY BAD.

…probably more.. this man is a walking disaster

- - -

In this post I listed a lot, there are probably some things you would consider “minor” because they happened years ago but I thought I’d mention them anyway. Also, I’m not saying he has those beliefs but he definitely doesn’t distance himself from nazi(-sympathizing) scum like Boyd Rice and keeps being BFFs with him. And what’s up with the problematic tattoos and WWII insignia? I can’t be the only one who thinks this is not okay!!!

Thanks for reading.

#I never thought I would write this... he meant so much to me.. he was my inspiration. wtf #RECEIPTS #PLEASE DONT IGNORE THIS!!!!!#matt skiba #alkaline trio #blink-182 #blink182

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bthump · 7 months

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i've seen some people argue that casca shouldn't have died during the eclipse because it would've been a waste of a death and that she plays an important role in the story post-eclipse.. while i can understand where people are coming from with that argument, it kind of rings hollow to me since i feel like she really gets reduced as a character a lot post-eclipse and while she gets the plot moving, idk. i just find it a disservice to her considerin how she was initially introduced

Yeah that argument doesn't hold water for me either. The role she plays post-eclipse could've been replaced with anything that motivates Guts to go on a quest, and frankly, anything could've motivated Guts after Hill of Swords because he was actively trying to move on from his "obsession with Griffith" after that resounding rejection.

Miura could've also written the Conviction arc differently so that two sacrifices aren't needed to hang out in the same place for a while to help bring Griffith back, that's just arbitrary worldbuilding that could've also been anything.

And most other potential options probably wouldn't be chock full of cringey ableist and misogynist comedy/fanservice/gratuitous sexualized assault scenes/etc lol. I'd be happy to make that trade-off.

Pretty much the only thing she does is be assaulted by Guts so he realizes he needs a babysitter and lets the rpg group hang out with him. But yk what, we already got that scene where he decided to invite Puck to move in without needing to nearly rape someone first, and it was a thousand times better, so again there's no real reason Guts couldn't have just had organic character development that led to more companions.

Even now he's more upset about not being able to fight Griffith than about her being kidnapped lol. And she's still not actively a character in her own right, because now she's just in a magical trance or whatever, so you can't even argue that she contributes to the narrative herself, outside of motivating others as an archetypal sexy lamp.

It's a mess. Casca dying with the rest of the cast in a badass way would've been cooler, less offensive, and made the rest of the story better by default imo. There's no reason we couldn't have had other women of colour in the cast either, for the sake of representation.

#ask #anonymous #a #b #theme: critique #theme: misogyny #character: casca

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bthump · 3 years

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ninjabelle said in response to this post: Not to shit on gtsca shippers but in what world would they ever actually get together for real? I mean it’s hardly a spoiler if he hints it won’t happen because it wasn’t ever promised it WOULD happen in the first place?? Or am I reading a different story? People are free to ship whatever but how was gtsca ever considered endgame plotwise? I just get heated because Casca can do so much better than a dude who’s obsessed w someone else lmaoo

this is coming out harsh but gtsca is a big ship and ppl really read into it but in my eyes miura wrote them just as doomed from the start as griffguts yet only one ship is considered ‘canon’ of the two and I guess I’m just curious what people see that I dont see?? If you have any thoughts about that I’d love to hear em!

Ofc I completely agree that Guts and Casca don’t make sense as a romantic end game ship and they read as doomed from the start to me too. Like I’d consider it a tragedy for Casca if they got together again lol.

Buuuuut that said they are The Het Ship, yk? I have seen so many terrible nonsensical misogynist het ships go canon in my life that like, the fact that it’s terrible and Miura clearly knows that it’s terrible in at least some ways only feels like a minor relief lol, like in my experience that is not necessarily, or even likely to be, a deathknell for a het ship.

I definitely think Miura is a good enough writer that I could see him doing something different and never putting Guts and Casca back together. But he’s also flawed enough that I could pretty easily see the opposite, and it’s not like I haven’t been burned before while reading Berserk lol.

And Miura has been... not pandering to fans of the ship exactly, but definitely acknowledging them and baiting them recently - like when Danann put Casca in a romantic dress and sent her out to meet Guts. That wouldn’t work if we’re all just meant to assume the ship is dead on the water. Neither would all the Moon Baby happy family motherly Casca hopeful bullshit lol, or Casca cooing at Guts and making him snap out of his rage a couple of times, etc. I still think it’s going to end in tragedy, but the way Miura’s writing the story, he knows that a big chunk of Berserk fans want Guts and Casca to live happily ever after and he’s writing at least partly with their expectations in mind.

tl;dr gtsca sucks and if they lived happily ever after - or even if they wanted to live happily ever after but were tragically doomed not to by outside forces - it would be bad writing, but sadly it would hardly be the first time a story I liked crammed in terrible badly written het romance. So it’s not really anything specific in Berserk itself that has me cautious, just past experience and me being cynical.

#replies #ninjabelle #a #ship: gtsca #b #if you expect the worst you get to be either pleasantly surprised or mentally prepared and smug lol #i censored the ship name in your reply so it doesn't show up in searches just fyi

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bthump · 4 years

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I am curious why you don't like het pairings across the board since I ship both het and same sex pairings . I understand LGBTQ+ peoples' desire to see themselves represented in media , but I think that when it comes to fandom people tend to fetish same sex pairings especially mlm pairings and bashing female characters that get in the way of their ship.

I’ve done my fair share of navel gazing about why I hate 99.9% of het in media since I was a teen and I could write a long list of reasons that probably influence my preferences, like gender essentialism, the vast vast vast majority of creators being men influencing how they write women + het relationships in ways that offend me, the fact that it’s the default and my interests are often influenced by spite, the rote way it’s usually written, i hate 99% of the tropes that are usually associated with it, the fact that irl I have 0 interest in engaging in a hetero relationship myself and therefore can’t relate...

but yeah ultimately I don’t know or care or think it matters lol, the vast majority of het ships just do not spark joy for me.

And now, The Discourse, which I would love to put under a cut but apparently that’s just not in the cards right now, thanks tumblr.

please don’t reblog I guess?

I just like, disagree with the rest of your ask lol, sorry. And I know this is a very standard take in fandom so I’ll try to explain why I disagree. I appreciate you asking politely Anon and I’m hoping this doesn’t come across as too annoyed or anything - like I’m annoyed by the discourse in general lol, not by you specifically.

In my experience in online fandom the most female character bashing I’ve seen, and the most vicious, has come from fans of rival het ships, and regardless I don’t particularly consider “bashing” fictional characters to be much of an issue. The problem is when people do so in offensive ways (eg “she’s a slut” or w/e lol), and then the issue is people believing and saying offensive shit, not people hating fictional characters, and the focus should be on general awareness of what misogyny (among other oppressions) is and how to avoid perpetuating it in all areas of life, and not on declaring groups of fans problematic depending on which fictional characters they do or don’t like.

And sure, some majority m/m fans do bash female characters, and some do it in offensive ways, but I don’t think it’s at a rate higher than other het fans, or even f/f fans in the few fandoms with rival f/f ships ime, so it bugs me that people act like it’s an m/m fangirl thing.

I also think fandom discourse wildly misuses the term “fetishizing.” Fetishizing, in yk oppressor/oppressed contexts, means to reduce someone down to a single aspect of their being in a way that dehumanizes them. And like 99% of fanfic does the opposite, shipping is all about being invested in and exploring characters as people (or trying to, bc lbr it’s amateur fiction and writing fully fleshed out 3 dimensional people is a skill that amateurs can’t necessarily be expected to have perfected, which is a big reason discourse focusing so hard on problematic fanfiction is a waste of time lol). Someone who isn’t a gay/bi man getting turned on by imagining 2 dudes fucking and writing a story about it isn’t automatically fetishizatizing gay men, even if it’s a straight woman doing it, even if it’s 2k words of sex written to turn readers on.

Fetishization doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with sex - it can, but it can also be sexless. For instance, a gay character showing up in one episode of a sitcom to make limp wrist jokes, or a gay character showing up in one episode of a drama to die of aids and make you sad, is fetishization. Conversely a pwp about say Guts and Griffith fucking after a battle or something is almost guaranteed to have more care and consideration for the emotions involved and characterization, because the people who are inclined to write that are already invested in the characters as characters rather than generic gay stereotypes.

Fic writers can write offensive/homophobic/fetishizing things just like anyone else can (and having het ships as well as gay ships doesn’t make someone less likely to write homophobic things either), but the way fandom discourse reduces everything to wide generalities is less than useless imo, the key is to address actual specific behaviours, like the aformentioned “I hate X female character” vs “X female character is a slut who doesn’t deserve Y.” The former is a non-issue, the latter is a symptom of ingrained misogynistic attitudes.

Anyway ultimately I think fanfic is like, the least useful thing for media oriented discourse and activism to focus on for various reasons including the lack of reach and impact fic has, the lack of systemic quality control, the fact that fic writers aren’t pros and aren’t getting paid, the fact that fic writers aren’t pros and shouldn’t be expected to have the talent required to convey difficult subjects in completely inoffensive ways even if their personal politics are beyond reproach - because it does take straight up writing skill as well as understanding, the fact that fic writers have no industry power or influence, the fact that the vast majority of fic writers are marginalized in some way themselves (and misogyny against real women should always take precedence over misogyny against fictional women), the fact that many are just teenagers, etc

tl;dr I don’t think women preferring to ship m/m is inherently problematic, and I don’t think the current state of online discourse is equipped to even address the cases when it can be problematic lol because nuance is virtually impossible in unmoderated spaces where reblogging/tweeting divorces something from context and twitter posts and tumblr asks have a character limit and vague non-specific hot takes always get more clout and notes than carefully considered nuanced discussions and essays - and amateur unpublished writing is so unimpactful in the grand scheme of things that it barely matters anyway.

#ask #b #Anonymous #theme: discourse

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