#you know media you consume at the exact perfect time when you didn't know you needed it

[biconickyoshi]

hey there!

this might be like a weird ask, but i've seen you post a lot about the legend of korra, so.

do you think it's worth watching the show? i've been avoiding it for a while now simply because i'm afraid it's gonna disappoint. i know it is a separate narrative with entirely new characters, but from the few scenes i've seen it just looks sooooo different from the gaang's story that i'm just afraid they've butchered the original universe. plus, my favorite character from atla is aang, and i do not know if any character from korra will have that same kind of charm.

on the other hand, i know it attracts a lot of fans. what do you think?:)

(btw, amazzzzzzing job on both your zukaang fanfic and the artwork for it !!)

Hi anon! :) This isn't a weird ask at all, I'd be happy to help!

So the short answer is: yes, I think it's worth watching! I know exactly how you feel - Aang is also my favorite AtLA character, so I was also very apprehensive when LoK was first announced way back in like 2011. But my apprehension didn't stop me from looking forward to and eventually enjoying it, mainly because AtLA was/still is my strongest and longest running hyperfixation to date, and I (especially at that time) was willing to consume any scrap of media related to it lol. We were very starved for content in the olden days :')

I'll go ahead and give you a spoiler-free breakdown of the four LoK seasons - this might help you decide:

Book 1: Air is definitely is quite a bit different from AtLA (which was done on purpose by the creators to differentiate it so it wouldn't just feel like the exact same show). Book 1 is still my least favorite of the LoK seasons for this reason (as well as for questionable writing decisions), but there are still some great moments. You may notice that Book 1 ends very "neatly" - this is because LoK was originally supposed to be a miniseries before Nickelodeon picked it up for 3 more seasons (which I think was a large part of why the writing suffers a lot in the first half of the show as a whole).

Book 2: Spirits also starts out pretty rough (with more questionable writing decisions), but it picks up about halfway through. Some people say this is their least favorite season, but I've always enjoyed it overall a ton more than Book 1. While some of the additions to the lore of the Avatar and the Spirit World are polarizing amongst the fandom (and there are some things I wish they'd done differently), I still ate that shit up when it first aired lol.

Book 3: Change is where, in my and many others' opinions, the show suddenly rises to the same level of quality as AtLA. There's a lot of traveling, we get to see some familiar faces and several classic AtLA locations from Book 2: Earth, the villains are the best villains in any Avatar media, and the plot and emotional core of the season are just so, so good. I can't say any more because I don't want to spoil even a little bit of it. I personally think LoK is worth watching just for this season alone.

Book 4: Balance is not as good as Book 3, but I enjoyed it a lot more than Book 1 and Book 2. It does a really good job of exploring trauma/PTSD and the relevance of the role of the Avatar in a modernizing world, and is a decent followup to Book 3. What happens at the end of Book 4 is also SO culturally impactful (not sure if you know why, but I won't say anything specific), especially for queer AtLA fans such as myself.

While LoK definitely isn't perfect, I still accept it as canon for the world of Avatar, and it's still a show I've rewatched several times (though I tend to skip a lot of Book 1 and the first half of Book 2 when I do lmao). If you decide to watch it, go in with an open mind knowing that it is not going to be exactly like AtLA. Even in the not-as-good seasons, there's still some gems to behold. And what's also nice about LoK is that each season is about 12ish episodes, so you'll get to the really good stuff (Book 3) pretty quickly if you binge lol.

Feel free to send me another ask if you have any more specific questions about LoK! :)

#asks #lok #legend of korra #avatar the last airbender #atla #tlok #the legend of korra

[attackedastoria]

In this rant essay I will be talking about entitlement in the new age of social media concerning the art fommunity and why It Is Bad

So. After witnessing an absolutely infuriating incident of a fellow artist being mocked, insulted, and generally dog-piled on for "gatekeeping", I really feel the need to address something becoming more and more prevalent in the artist community.

Artists are not here to hold your hand through learning their creative process. Full stop.

In this new, fast paced age of social media and everything being accesible at your fingertips, people want instant gratification for everything. Including art. I have witnessed, and personally experienced, time and time again, people asking artists for their exact process on how they created a piece of art. I'm not talking simple questions like, "Hi, what type of clay do you use?", or "What is your favorite brand of paint for this?"; I am seeing an increase of people demanding to know the EXACT process, step by step, and not only that, they expect the artist to give it to them freely, and hold their hand through it with a happy smile.

If an artist refuses, as is their right when it comes to the art they've likely spent a decade or more perfecting through means entirely self taught in most cases? Ah, I can hear the response now, like a screeching eagle upon the wind: "Stop gatekeeping! You're mean!"

We aren't "gatekeeping" anything. No one is entitled to an artists methods, time, or knowledge, *especially* for free. Thanks to social media, everyone seems to want to continuously consume content, from artists in particular, FOR FREE. People now feel entitled to *demand* artists for walk-throughs, how-to's, in depth videos or tutorials, and by God, if you refuse, you're gonna be sorry!

I've been creating art seriously since I was twenty. I'm nearly forty now. I am entirely self-taught. If I wanted to learn something new, I looked it up and researched it, or figured it out myself. No one held my hand through any of this. I never asked another artist for expliciy details on their methods besides maybe a, "Hey, do you like this clay or that clay better?", and even then, I never got upset if I didn't get a response, because I'm not entitled to their time. Everything I make, I figured out through trial and error until I was satisfied. Honestly, it's part of the fun for me, figuring something out and having it work the way I want it to.

Now, there are of course plenty of artists happy to share their methods. They are happy to be teachers, mentors, guides for other people. I applaud them for this, because it's very hard to be a teacher. I could never do it. Most people can't.

I dont have the time, setup, money, motivation, or frankly the personality to teach people anything. My art is also my *job*; it is how I make a living, pay bills, get through life. There's nothing wrong, at all, with an artist not wanting to share methods they've perfected in their art, which puts food on their table. Despite what so many people think, not all art is just a DIY hobby. ART CAN BE, AND IS, A REAL JOB THAT PEOPLE RELY ON TO SURVIVE. So why would an artist want just give away their hard earned methods that help put food on the table for free?

Anyway... I hate the term "gatekeeping", now. I'm sick of watching friends be attacked because they don't want to give away their time and knowledge to every person that asks for free. I'm tired of getting chewed out in DM'S or comments because I won't troubleshoot every single question someone who is trying to replicate my pieces has. Google is free. YouTube is free. Do your research and figure out like so, so many people before you have done. I promise it's more rewarding than badgering someone to do all the legwork for you.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my TED talk

#astoria gets mad about social media and the effect its had on her community: an essay #seriously im Tired #art rant

[kittycatpopprincess]

Apologies in advance for talking about like the terf wizard book on main but like there's just this one thing about it I have to get off my chest

Honestly taking a step back this entire situation with the books the movies the game and all that is not without precedent. This exact scenario has been played out before, multiple times. People are arguing to tell and back to keep enjoying their wizard book the same way people were openly just telling trans women to shut up when Ace Ventura started popping up on streaming services and criticism arose due to its transphobic jokes. Same as when Split was added to the Netflix catalogue and people with DID spoke up about how the representation in that movie was extremely stigmatising, completely detached from reality and had very real negative consequences for them, and they were, once again, told to shut up

Because honestly, this was never about the media in question. I'm not sure what it is about, maybe people are just that incapable of just admitting "this work that I used to enjoy taught me bad things that I didn't catch at the time. I am now trying to be more aware of those biases in the media I consume and do better" because we're all supposed to be innately perfect and having been a dumb kid in the past mean you are an evil person forever or smth. I really don't know on this one. But honestly, though the rhetoric is largely less overtly aggressive and more, Like, passive-aggressive, it's the same fucking thing again. It's just that people are more than happy to support marginalised communities as long as it is perfectly comfortable, but will always end up choosing whatever piece of media they like over the real, actual lives of other people

And I hate to agree with the author of the wizard book here, even for this one thing only, but anyone who still engages with body of work is every bit as transphobic as she is. No exceptions, no excuse. Get fucked

#ranting on main here #apologies once again #i've just seen it happen times and times again and i'm fucking tired

[smallestchurch]

PERCEPTION (HEARING) [Medium: Success] — There is a radio in the distance. A radio of the world. Playing sounds: Good morning, Elysium. Soon you will return to the world.

APRÈS LA VIE - MORT; APRÈS LA MORT - LA VIE DE NOUVEAU; APRÈS LE MONDE - LE GRIS; APRÈS LE GRIS - LE MONDE DE NOUVEAU.

#disco elysium #discoelysiumedit #gamingedit #harry du bois #kim kitsuragi #* #*games #tw hanging #tw lynching #just in case #i genuinely can't put into words how much this game means to me #or how much it's changed my life #you know media you consume at the exact perfect time when you didn't know you needed it #i really want to know what was going on in the writers' heads during their d&d sessions that inspired this game #for them to write so earnestly about human connections and our faith in one another

[alo-piss-trancy]

Ok hi, I didn't wanna say anything, but please don't write knifeplay/bloodplay for Yuri. I def don't wanna spoil anything, but it's learned on a certain route that Yuri has a s*lf h*rm problem (I'll leave it at that).

You honestly seem like you're not trying to be a jerk with this ask, so I'm going to do my best to answer this as politely as possible without compromising my personal beliefs on the matter. This is going to be long and a little serious, but please note I'm not attacking you or trying to start a debate. I'm just laying all my thoughts on this down at once so I make myself clear, because a short answer would leave a lot of nuance out.

I understand what you're trying to do here. For the record though, I also considered that a pretty massive spoiler and I did not appreciate that at all. Even if you all think you're 'helping', don't do that again. Y/uri was pretty much the only character I'd managed to avoid most spoilers on and you killed the surprise for me. This game is already so full of fluffy 'filler' in the beginning that I don't have a ton of big plot points to look forward to in each route.

Now, I realise this is a very delicate topic and incredibly triggering to some people, especially with those two things combined. I am 100% willing to tag it with just about any variation needed to ensure you or others affected can blacklist/block it and never have to see a word of it in the future. I'd also be happy to go back and tag that original text post I made if needed. I mean that. You all are welcome to ask me to tag things anytime, and so long as you're polite about it I'm perfectly willing to oblige to the best of my ability in future posts! If I occasionally forget, just toss me a light reminder and I'll jump into editing and add it in.

That said, I want to make it clear that I am very firmly against censorship. I'm willing to take all necessary precautions to ensure people can curate their experiences on this blog and AO3, but at the end of the day I can still post whatever fictional stuff I choose to. As can anyone else. Same goes for more formally published media.

Now, it's entirely possible I would have gotten to that part of the game and decided 'oh dang, I'm not so enthused about that fic idea anymore...'. My whims and ideas change frequently, and what you mentioned is a heavy topic with a lot to unpack and process. It's also entirely possible that future plot would only provide more fuel.

Fyi, when I originally mentioned the knifeplay I was actually thinking a lot more along the lines of her doing it to the protagonist, not the reverse. But for the record, if I did choose to write it with focus on Y/uri, I would still be well within my rights to.

This next part of my answer is going to address some heavy topics, this is your warning!!!

Sometimes people's kinks are a way to take a thing that is personally scary or upsetting to them and find a way to reverse it. To find pleasure or power or get used to the idea of the awful thing in a safe, controlled fashion. I'm not going to go into the full details on this because there's plenty of explanation and research elsewhere already written up, as well as an excellent book on the subject, and I'm not turning this blog into a discourse debate. But I needed to mention it for my point.

There are plenty of stories that could be explored with Y/uri in this context. Did she have this kink before the self harm events started and it was completely unrelated, or did she develop it afterwards? How did she discover it beforehand? If developed afterwards, did it start out as another way of harming mixed with pleasure in a self-destructive way, often done sloppily and without proper technique? Or was it strictly used as almost exposure therapy to deal with those urges and thoughts in a safer, more contained scenario, maybe even allowing the partner she trusted to wield the knife to prove their bond/reinforce that she can be loved without being hurt deeply, that she is worthy of affection and trust and loyalty. Maybe this finally helps give Y/uri a tool to embrace her 'weirdness' without harming herself and others. Or, what if she thinks it can be a useful tool and is sure she's ready, but partway through the scene she gets triggered or has flashbacks... how does she deal with it? How does her partner? Can it be overcome with effort, research, and taking things slowly, or does she realize this kink is actually completely off the table for her?

What if she has this kink and is excited to try it, but her partner isn't? How does she take that rejection? Or do her poor social skills mean she skipped negotiation to begin with and attempted it in the middle of a vanilla session? Would her partner freak out or even get mad, or try to swallow their fear and let her do it so they don't hurt/offend her, even at the cost of their own comfort?

This topic also opens a ton of potential plots for darkfic, but I'll refrain from discussing that out of respect for you and others.

So as you can see, there's much more to explore than 'Knife=Hot'. I believe those discussions and ideas are necessary and provide important fuel for thought when explored fictionally, especially since mainstream media doesn't cover a lot of them.

~~~

I feel I should take a second to clarify knifeplay for those who may be unaware. It doesn't always equate to actual cutting/drawing blood. That can be an aspect, but usually only by those far more experienced and, you know, actually into that. A lot of participants don't actually go that far. Mostly, it's either about the physical sensation of the knife touching you at all, or the adrenaline/controlled fear and intimate trust of a partner bringing an object like that so close/teasing you with it.

In fact, it's frequently advised in those circles (especially to newcomers) to use a dull butterknife instead, because it simulates the same feelings of metal on skin/can dig in a little without any real risk of cutting/drawing blood. Even if one chooses to use a different knife, it's still pretty common to dull the blade, or some people even substitute with a closed pair of scissors (combined with the partner blindfolded, you can't really tell it apart from the real thing).

These versions of knifeplay are well controlled and ultimately pretty harmless, so long as both parties know what they're doing and stay alert. And more experienced players with sharper knives are even more cautious/have studied extensively to know where/how deep to go without risking scarring/serious injury.

Remember the golden rules of kink: Safe. Sane. Consensual.

With those in place, it is not nearly the same as self harm. Just as controlled, consensual, well-negotiated BDSM with safewords, respected boundaries and a trusted partner is never in the same league as abuse.

~~~

Now that that's out of the way, back to my point:

There's no perfect representation or narrative for everyone, in any group (be that gender/sexuality/triggered by certain things, etc). Every human being is different, everyone interprets media differently, and everyone takes away different elements from stories.

What one person in a particular group may find cathartic, relateable, or painful but necessary food for thought, another may find completely repulsive, personally hurtful, offensive, something they can't stand to hear. And guess what? Both of those can be true at the same time. One side is not immediately right over the other.

There are queer characters or interpretations of them in fics that I vehemently despise, might even find hurtful or sickening and think 'how can anyone create this, it's insufferable! People in 'my group' aren't like that, it's a horrible representation. I can't relate to it at all!' But you know what? Other people can and do, may find comfort in those exact narratives and experiences, may heal their pain instead of inflicting more. And that's great. It's what they needed or wanted and if I don't like it, I click away and do my best to avoid it.

There are specific tropes and narrative themes I personally cannot get through without being triggered into anxiety attacks or dragged back to bad times and places in my life. Sometimes I see them tackled in ways that are hurtful or seem insensitive to me. But I recognise that for someone else, it's exactly what they needed to see to get through that or come to terms with it, or see a way they wish that thing could play out. I would never dream of telling those people they aren't allowed to enjoy it, OR telling the creator of that piece of media or a tv show 'Hey ummm please don't use this plot because it turns me into a human wreck for a week'. Because it's not remotely my place to do so. They can create whatever they want, they have no responsibility towards me or my well being. A few might be kind enough to include a warning at the beginning of that episode or in the description, but they are in no way required to. It's up to me to curate my experience and try to keep my guard up/research what might have those tropes, and in the rare occasions I get blindsided, yeah, it hurts like hell. I struggle, I might even backslide a bit. But I just have to try my best to deal with it and make a note to be more careful next time. Because you can't control the world around you, not even the online world, and you have absolutely no right to. The only right you have is to protect yourself without infringing on other people's boundaries/rights.

And there's also another important point. There doesn't have to be a big important point or explanation for why a creator creates something, or why consumers can enjoy that creation! If someone wants to create a plotline with all of my triggers used in the most 'insensitive', 'wrong', pointless ways possible, strictly for Entertainment or pure kink material instead of some deep dissection of the issues involved? They can go hog wild!!! They are 100% allowed to do so on this earth, and I can't (and wouldn't want to) do a thing to stop them.

One person can read a kink fic and it hits a very emotional theme for them/they think it explores a deep topic well. Another person can read that same fic and get nothing out of it except their rocks off. Both of those readers are completely equal and 'allowed' to enjoy that fic. Both reasons are completely valid reasons for why the creator was 'allowed' to post/create that fic in the first place. Nobody needs permission, nobody has to answer to anybody except themselves. Period. This extends to any topic, any type of fic.

Yes, even for things I find absolutely abhorrent and insensitive and don't understand/want to read ever. I may resent everything about its existence, but I will defend to death the creator's right to make it exist in the first place.

It only affects me if I let it affect me. If someone's making content I despise or am upset by and can't handle, I can choose to ignore or avoid them, blacklist those tags, I can block them and move on with my day. I can do anything within my own bubble, but the second I consider going into their bubble and saying they can't make that thing, I am in the wrong. Because I'm not respecting their space and rights.

If someone makes cookies with ingredients I'm highly allergic to, pastes the ingredient warnings all over the box where I read them, and I still eat one, would anyone cheer me on for blaming them when I have a reaction? Would anyone think it was remotely okay of me to start calling up every bakery in town and saying they weren't allowed to bake those cookies EVER, because some people somewhere might be allergic?

No. They'd tell me I was crossing the line, because I'm infringing on other people's boundaries and lives. I'm expecting everybody else to take responsibility for something that, while horrible and painful, was my fault for touching.

Now, if someone sets out unlabelled cookies not realizing I'm allergic to something in them, and I eat it and have a reaction, that sucks. It's an awful experience. But is it the baker's fault? As long as they didn't do it maliciously, not really. They can be advised politely to label it in the future, and I can do my best to remember to ask/be more cautious next time I come across something I'm unsure of, but they're still allowed to bake those cookies for themselves and others.

Now, if I deliberately baked cookies with an ingredient that people are very frequently allergic to (ex. peanuts) and set it out in a crowded buffet without a warning label, that's a jerk move. That's intentionally trying to cause harm to others. But simply baking that flavour of cookies still isn't a crime or harmful by itself.

~~~

I'll be honest, I'm running out of steam and I think I've said most of what I have to say, so I'll wrap it up. I want to reiterate that I'm not ripping into you with this long answer, anon! I understand why you sent me what you did and I'm trying not to come off as harsh. I'm happy to go back and tag things and will tag anything else similar in the future!!! But at the end of the day, regardless of whether I personally end up writing that fic or not, or even want to after I get to that plot, I don't agree with telling anyone they can't/shouldn't write it at all. I wanted to try and explain my viewpoint thoroughly, and I hope you can respect that, just as I'll respect and try to accommodate you and other followers. This is the only time I'll really get up on a soapbox like this, and I have no interest in debating these things on my blog further, but it is a topic I've been passionate about all my life so I'm afraid I'm not budging on it.

#bear gets a letter #not omo #tw knives #tw knifeplay #tw cutting #tw self harm #d/dlc spoilers

[mysticdragon3md3]

This reminds me of a YouTuber that noted that when a fandom has very little for their niche, they will defend it blindly and even react over-zealously about it, in hostile or irrationally malicious ways.

The example they gave was that at the time, the only generally well reviewed DCEU movie was Wonder Woman, so DC movie fans defended all the DCEU movies to the death, even becoming overly hostile towards other real life people over anything bad said about the few DCEU movies that were released at the time. Whereas, MCU fans could easily dismiss some disappointing MCU movies and roll with criticisms of Thor the Dark World or The Incredible Hulk, because they had so many more other movies with good reviews and gave good experiences. When you have less, you defend it more desperately.

It kind of echoed something I heard Crispin Freeman mention in an interview, where he explained that academics act in the same way. When a field is so varied and long-spanning, like Civil War history, scholars are much more willing to be tolerant of many different points of view on the topic. But in academic fields with very little source material to study, people defend their turf over-zealously.

When there is a lot of queer media, then people will be more forgiving of specific queer Intellectual Properties(IPs) that do not meet their every exacting standard. They will be able to admit that maybe a specific story isn't for them, and they'll just go consume some other queer media IP instead. But because we don't have that saturation in the market right now, there's too much pressure on the few queer media that emerges. Every single character has to be exemplary "good" representation, because there are so few queer voices allowed to speak up, you never know if this will be the IP that hits mainstream and influences general audiences' perceptions of queer people. Every single story theme or narrative discussion has to be safe and only represent all the good things in the subculture. Because you never know what single element will be taken out of context and used to perpetuate one misperception or another, rather than be taken as the idiosyncratic discussion it was meant to be.

I don't think it's safe for fans in such fandom either. I was a fan of a queer IP that I will not name. But to me, it wasn't a perfect story. I had problems with some of the storytelling techniques, leaning too much on cliches to represent a queer romance. I had generally avoided the heterosexual Hollywood Romance genre, for most of my life, for the same reason. And if I wasn't going to take it from hetero fictional couples, why was I going to take it from queer fictional couples? Because there's such a small pool of queer couples to become a fan of? Listen, I remember going through that phase where I grasped for any little scrap of queer storytelling that floated by. I stuck around with horribly annoying characters, just because they were queer and queer representation was a rare thing. But then I realized, I don't have to put up with this. I can---and did, find better. There are better characters and stories out there. We don't have to settle, even if the pool to draw from is small. It's better to wait for the next, better queer IP, than waste so much time in a fandom for characters I didn't even like, just because I was desperate for a genre(?) that marginally catered to me. So when I walked out on a newer queer fandom, explaining my criticisms, but still enjoying the characters, but believing the storytelling could have done them better justice, the whole rest of the fandom turned on me. How *dare* I even criticize that series! "If you're not on board this ship, then you're a homophobe!" I didn't matter that I was completely behind that ship and thought those characters deserved better. The fandom only heard that I had a critique that made me personally not want to settle. I was off to find another series that maybe better suited my personal tastes. I never said the series was trash or that no one else was valid for continuing to like it, or any other such nonsense. But the whole rest of the fandom was so busy over-zealously defending their small piece of turf out of the desperation of finally being catered to, that they were accusing a real life person of being something reprehensible. People get crazy, defending that tiny bit of turf. It's not pretty. And I don't know how to fix it, other than for the market share to catch up to satiating a niche audience until they stop being blindly over-zealous.

#toxic fandom #yoiventing #please ignore my idiocy #random thoughts #icedpigrice