#Facts vs. Opinions

[zomb13s]

Unlocking Effective Cybersecurity Solutions: Safeguarding Your Venture from Social Engineering Threats

Social engineering is a multifaceted and pervasive concept that encompasses a wide array of techniques employed to manipulate individuals, groups, or organizations. At its core, social engineering is the art of exploiting human psychology and trust to achieve a specific goal, often through deceit or manipulation. This can take many forms, from simple deception to complex, orchestrated…

[xjackjackx]

An Analysis of Chosen and Dark's "Friendship" (And Why I Don't Like ChoDark)

This is frankly something I've felt and wanted to talk about for a long time, so here it is: my ramblings about Cho and Dark's relationship (based off pure canon on-screen) and why ChoDark is, in my opinion, a pretty bad and uncomfortable ship.

The biggest issue with ChoDark is that a lot of the foundation for their relationship is either outdated or straight-up false. Whether it be that they were friends rampaging for seven full years before Chosen got remorse halfway through, or that Dark wanted to impress Chosen or anything.

AVA 11 kinda threw that out of the window by revealing Newgrounds was in 2011. At most two months since they met.

The first thing to note is that Cho and Dark's friendship was formed strictly out of Chosen's sympathy and Dark's opportunism. Chosen has always held more mercy for stick figures (except AIM cause fuck that guy apparently), so when he saw Dark begging for mercy he gave him a chance at friendship. Dark - who, as we see later, is a coward prioritizing himself above others - immediately jumps at the opportunity without a second thought (which, in hindsight, should've warned Chosen about the man's loyalty to others). Their whole relationship began with Dark using Chosen's kindness for himself. The first thing they do together is to start destroying everything in their sight; whether it was Chosen or Dark who started it, it doesn't matter.

That's where most of us thought they spent all the seven years rampaging together with Cho taking a while before he grew a conscience. But then AVA 11 revealed that Newground was in 2011. In what was at most two months, Dark became a maniac focused on destruction while Cho began to feel sorry for what he was done and wanted to stop. It's implied he mostly stuck around and didn't stop Dark because he had poor social skills/was afraid of Dark, as he seems pretty uncomfortable around him (Flashback implies he tried to plead and reason with Dark, but that was most likely Cho twisting around his memories to make himself look better; not the first time he would've been selfish). Meaning it was seven years of Chosen alone with a guy he didn't actually like who, as we learn later, never knew the real Chosen.

Then comes S2, where Dark plans to destroy everything and everyone with the ViraBots. This is what finally gets Chosen to stand up to Dark and try to stop him. While he has to get physical, nothing seems to imply he wants to outright harm Dark until he gets an entire fireball thrown at him. Which is another thing I want to point out: I've seen many people accuse Chosen of "betraying" Dark, but... he tried to talk things down, used small physical action (when you take in the fact both of these guys are gods, being thrown on the ground is basically nothing) and didn't even seem to actively hurt Dark, just make him stop. Dark tried to fucking kill Chosen with that fireball, or at least heavily injure him. Dark was clearly the traitor between the two and I frankly won't be hearing otherwise, especially since this lines up with his earlier characterization of immediately selling out Alan and later info about his wristband, we get to that in a minute. Cho is a morally gray person but he's fully in the right and the victim in this specific moment.

But regardless, the two continue to throw hands. The big thing here is the Vira-Band. It's not just a generic power-up, it specifically grants Dark immunity to laser beams.

This is way too specific of an ability to be brushed off. Dark specifically created a weapon against Chosen. And unless we're arguing he made something so powerful in the 10-ish minutes that Chosen was gone, he had it made in advance. Combine that with Dark quickly turning on Alan and how he easily he decided Chosen needs to go, it becomes clear that Dark was actively planning to betray and kill Chosen. Or that, at the bare minimum, he was ready to kill Chosen if they ever turn on each other.

So, combining all their screentime and knowledge together, we get this:

Chosen spared Dark out of the genuine kindness in heart, but very quickly changed his mind upon calming down following his post-Alan rage and realising Dark's fucking demented. Despite this, he never made any attempts to stop Dark, the implication being that he either still saw good in Dark or was too afraid of him to stand up. And when he did, he put in all he had to stop him, and currently little implies he misses the guy.,

Dark first joined Chosen out of personal convenience, and thought of him as an ally he can destroy with... while apparently planning to betray and kill him. This is admittedly a bit contradictory, but given all the information we have, it's safe to say Dark saw Chosen as more of an extension of himself, someone who shares all his beliefs, and when Chosen proved independent he got angry and tried to remove him from the equation to continue uninterrupted.

And this is where my main issue with ChoDark lays (ignoring the possibility they're siblings since hollowhead relationships are confusing af). To clarify, I'm far from being against Foe Yay/shipping enemies together together. The issue is that a lot of what I heard about ChoDark just... isn't there. It's, for me, a ship built primarily out of outdated interpretations that are contradicted by the release of AVA 11, and fanon moreso than canon. They didn't spend seven years destroying as friends, Chosen spent seven years together with a man he was uncomfortable around and couldn't stand up to despite seemingly wanting to, to the point his likely-false memories show him pleading with an ignorant Dark. Dark didn't want what's best to Chosen/to help him, he wanted to spread personal destruction for himself and tried to kill Cho the moment he stepped out of line; hell, he was seemingly planning this for a while given the Viraband's existence. Chosen, at least from the very limited information of his post-Showdown, doesn't seem to miss Dark all that much. And why would he? It seems like he never liked the guy, at least not anymore. There is nothing to miss, at least from the actual canon content.

A lot of the content for ChoDark revolves around ignoring what's seemingly their canonical characterizations and dynamic for a fan-made one, which also involves frankly ignoring Dark's canon personality for a fan-made one... at which point are you shipping Chosen with Dark, or an OC with Dark's name and face? That's moving past the argument ChoDark is glorifying a toxic relationship, as there really is no other way to describe "Guy hangs around with friend he's uncomfortable around because he can't stand up/has no one else, and said friend is only using him".

So yeah. This is my personal analysis of Chosen and Dark's relationship/"friendship" and why I'm personally very uncomfortable with ChoDark as a pairing, platonic and especially romantic. Their canon friendship, based off what I see at least, was based off Chosen being too kind/submissive for his own good and Dark exploiting that while preparing for the moment Chosen stops being fun. Something that makes for an awful and fake friendship, let alone romance.

KingCho is superior anyway and deserves its own post btw

[incorrectr27quotes]

Tsuna: I don't need this right now, you guys. I'm under enough stress as it is. Especially with Dad showing up twice in as many months. Reborn's been in a mood.

Verde: Checker Face came back around?

Skull: Yeah, you should've seen this guy. Came in here looking like a catalog model. Was trying to flirt with me. Thinks I'm going to melt because he's got this mysterious air and broad shoulders.

Verde, grinning: Was he wearing his fancy suit?

Tsuna: What is this bizarre segue that's happening right now?

[satellitesunset]

my ideal stsg fanfic is either a rock/emo band au. or like a kpop adjacent idol group.

[aroaessidhe]

2025 reads / storygraph

We Were Restless Things

YA fantasy/paranormal

set in a small town where a boy drowned in the woods last summer - miles from any lakes or rivers

only his friend knows the truth, that he drowned in a magical lake that only appeared for them. and now she’s started getting strange texts from an unknown number claiming to be his spirit

meanwhile a new boy who’s moved in with her can’t help but be drawn into the mystery, as well as the boy who died’s sister

slow-paced and character focused

[necrotic-nephilim]

for the choose violence ask game: 3, 8, 16 :D

for the choose violence ask game!

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

i was going to be kind enough to not screenshot but i lied i'm choosing violence. this is less of a take and more of an incorrect quote i suppose but. every time i remember it exists i stare at a wall for like 20 minutes.

most posts under the "chaotic tim drake"/"unhinged tim drake" tags do. get to me. they are all liable to make me spontaneously combust but something about this one. the way Tim's fanon kill count magically gets higher every time it's brought up. the way it directly contradicts Tim's internal deep-seated fears about turning into Bruce and that's why he has always planned to retire after being Robin the *entire point* of Tim Drake of Tomorrow is to show how horrified Tim is and how future!evil!Tim will always go too far. like i genuinely do not know what character ppl are talking about with the "Tim is most likely to become a supervillain and somehow this a cutesy headcanon" sort of thing. it plagues me. consider me plagued. i could go on and on about it for hours and how deeply it contradicts Tim's character to his core. also just why does the fandom want to make him a villain so bad? i don't understand.

8. common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

i already gave one answer to this question here, but worry not i have endless answers to this one. a bit one for me is: the idea Cass should use ASL. it icks me out. i will close a fic if Cass is using ASL i will not lie. firstly, she does not canonically know ASL. secondly, it doesn't make *sense* for her to use it bc her disability has nothing to do with the ability to speak, it has to do with her language learning skills. and ASL is, *still a language*. and would be just as difficult to learn, if not more-so bc it could set back her learning of English and would not be as easily applicable as English to her daily life. it's a headcanon that ranges from well-meaning misunderstandings to just downright ableism that infantilizes Cass and infantilizes ASL. honestly i get touchy in general about fandom using ASL when not written by a Deaf writer/someone who knows ASL bc... you can tell. you can always tell. (hearing fans stop trying to come up with sign names for the Batfam i'm gently begging you.) there are many good posts breaking down why this headcanon doesn't really work but i'm just salty and feral about it.

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

the headcanon/fanon concept that Tim has lasting psychological trauma due to the Titans Tower incident, or that it has caused him to be afraid of Jason. (the same can be applied to Damian cutting Tim's line being something that Matters to Tim longterm or causes fear of Damian) like? beyond the "that is not canon, that event really didn't bother Tim and Tim was a cocky little shit the whole time", i'm unsure how this... fits into the fanon version of Tim? like i don't *understand* it. how it is that fandom likes "Tim has a super high kill count and is going to be a supervillain" but also... thinks one bad fight that roughed Tim up a bit has made him terrified of one person specifically? these feel contradictory. either he can Take The Heat or He Can't. this weird waffling where he's both the biggest badass around but also somehow a wilting traumatized kid confuses me. i don't necessarily mind the exploration of Tim being angry or pissed off about these events, or even him being more injured than he was in canon and dealing with that, but him being like. so afraid of Jason it influences their relationship has always eluded me. it contradicts everything else about fanon!Tim and makes him seem... sort of cowardly? like not that events like these can't be traumatizing but in his field of work they're not unique events. these are normal Tuesdays for him. why is it affecting him so much in fanon.

[2readiscworld]

Can we talk more about nonbinary moist. I want to hear the people's thoughts on monbinary noist. I don't disagree but I haven't seen the full story yet and I want to know everything. At what point in that incredibly busy career does the egg crack. Who knows something is up first. What's the deal with presentation.

[mod2amaryllis]

posts I've seen recently that i like and agree with but just don't have the balls to reblog because the potential of inviting a blog curse is too real:

1) Steven universe was a good show and the level of hate was weird

2) fuck astr*logy

[ananke-xiii]

I think the only thing I'll never change my mind about SPN is that I moderately enjoy Bobby (until he's alive at least, after that I wish they had just stopped but no, I was stuck with the ghost of Bobby past and the ghost of Bobby AU forever) but I'll never agree to see him as the "Good Father Figure" that fandom (heavily fuelled by canon, I have to admit, it's not a fanon thing or something like that) makes him out to be. And I say "fandom" because, while it makes sense for the characters to see Bobby as "Good Father", I'm very limited in my understanding as to why people usually don't question this view and take it at face value.

And I blame "Death's Door" for this because, on one hand, the "death is a door/ the door of death" concept is something that I deeply, deeply ADORE so this ep. is just SOOO enjoyable to watch. And, also, the implications that whatever you didn't deal with in life you'll have to deal with in death? This is my jam, LOooOOOoooVE this. Not only do we get to see Bobby's GIGANTIC trauma but we get to see it via him re-living it? Uhm, yes, more of this, thanks.

On the other hand, the bad: side characters' backstories that become really interesting only before they die is a meh for me. I can't make myself like this type of overly-emotional writing cop-out so this is a me-problem. Well, the other thing is also a me-problem, lol: Bobby's death reframes his life as "worthy" because he was "a good father to two heroes" or whatever he says in the episode and to me this is very boring. It shouldn't be, because it's a noble and wonderful thing, I just find it boring precisely because of what the episode has just showed me, i.e. Bobby's HUUUUGE trauma. As far as I see it, you can't explain trauma away like that. It's a very mediocre view of healing from trauma but still understandable from a writing pov because, well, Bobby is a side character and his death his functional to the main characters' story, sadly. But my point is that it could've been so without the resolution of his, I repeat, BIIIIG trauma thanks to him rejecting his own father's accusations by saying that, after all, he did something good with his life and this something was Sam and Dean. I think Bobby should have had his own moment there, face to face with the fictionalized version of his father but should've engaged with him differently. We had 6 seasons of implied parent-child relationship between Bobby and Sam and Dean, this extra glorification wasn't necessary, imo.

It's this over-explanation that bores me and it's also, I think, a huge factor in how lots of people seem to interpret Bobby as this "Good Father" type which he, let's just say it, isn't. And it's totally okay because that's the core of his character! Like, he was a deeply traumatized man who was aware enough of his own issues to decide that having children wasn't for him and this decision caused him (and Karen, his wife) some big problems. And then, and theeeeen, after tragedy hits him again, he finds out that, yk what? perhaps not only does he LIKE being a father, he'd also make, probably, a good father. But he's not. We think he's good because compared to John anything and anyone are better parents than him. The bar is in hell (lol) and all that. And because the show itself can't really imagine what being a good father actually means. Like, in SPN playing baseball and learning how to drive are portrayed as peak father-son moments but they're definitely not. They can be but, per se and without context, they're not, they're just conventionally accepted images of what a "good father" is supposed to do with his son.

It's, of course, way, waaaaaaaaay more complex than this but, essentially, a "good father" is "just" a parent who Loves his children. But, like, the very first STEP you need to take in order to be able to Love your children is to start working toward loving your inner child, which is another way of saying that you have to give yourself the Love you haven't received or, at least, some grace. Which is WEEEERK, loads and loads and loads of it. And this is impossible on Supernatural, duh, because it's the self-loathing people show where the "work" they have to do is something else entirely and it's more like a "job". But they went SOOOO close to get this in "Death's Door", all they had to do was for adult Bobby not to confront his own, imagined father but to hug himself as the scared little child he was. That was it. That would've been a huuuuuuge first step for the show as a whole.

So, to me, Bobby couldn't actually be a "good" father because he hadn't resolved his deep, deeeeeep, immeeense trauma that he brought to his DEATH. But the interesting thing about him is that he could have been a great father. It's the unexplored potentiality that makes him compelling and quite tragic, frankly. I mean, he's "The One Who Tried To Do The Very, Veeeery Minimum At Least" and that's actually already a lot in that show.

This, thiiiiiiiis I like. So this is the Bobby that I moderately enjoy.

[shitmycoworkerssay]

[quackity1999]

Favourite superhero?

Or, who do you idolize, mister high-and-mighty?

probably niki and charlie. but i wouldn't be so bold as to idolise anyone— i did that once before and earned zero respect in return. i'm happy to admit that i hold a fair amount of admiration for them both, just for fairly different reasons.

[aliusfrater]

Look, I'm kinda drunk right now, so maybe this is just the bourbon talking, but I maintain that Anna as a character would have made a hell of a lot more sense because Cas stopped making any sense after Sam went to the Cage and developed so many intense issues with possession. Cas, they just stopped acknowledging was occupying the body of a man he'd basically blackmailed into consenting, and then didn't explore the moral myopia involved in Sam and Dean happily hanging out with him.

there are a lot of moments where it becomes heavily apparent to me that anna's character was indeed misogynistically bullied off of the show (much like bela and katie's ruby) while cas took her narrative place and much of his character past moments in season five or if i'm being charitable, 7.01, were winged and the fact that anna quite literally had her own body while jimmy's character was essentially slowly nullified is one of them.

[windcarvedlyre]

Previous reblog goes just as much for competing takes on a single character or ship as it does different ones competing with each other, imo. I think berating people for getting your blorbo wrong is less likely to get you 'correct' fanworks or analyses and more likely to make people too nervous about messing up to engage with them. I keep running into people with those anxieties and it really sucks.

If a misunderstanding is common it can be frustrating, but unless someone's being bigoted or an ass about it there's nothing morally wrong with that. If you overlook something major you can always just... go over the source material again and handle them better in future works, and the former still might end up as someone's favourite! My own favourite fic makes an assumption that I'll die on a hill against and it still changed my brain chemistry.

This especially goes for more complex characters; the harder one is to understand, the likelier it is that you'll never find clear, indisputable answers to every question you have about them because they may not exist. Even people who post about them like it's a full-time job can't be omniscient.

So wanting to be meticulous is great, but don't let perfect be the enemy of good! I'm saying all of this as someone who struggles with perfectionism myself. If we can apply the 'two cakes' metaphor to everything else about art, why not characterisation too?

[marenwithanm]

I don't wanna come off as a jerk here, but I really dislike Quaver. Not her design, but her personality. I really hate it when people use Undertale Yellow's version of Integrity as their headcannon for the Integrity soul. Yes, Integrity did kill some monsters, but she only killed them in self-defense. Also, the monsters attacked Integrity first and she had every right to defend herself since they were after her soul. Like I said before, I don't hate Quaver, I just really hate how most people see the Integrity soul as a heartless and evil girl when that isn't the case at all.

Hey fair enough. And to be clear, Quaver's not evil. She killed a lot of monsters but they were trying to kill her so ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ I mean, she already had a standing hatred of monsters before she fell, but who knows, maybe if they didn't attack her first, she could've learned to overcome that and get along with them. Having the integrity soul be the most violent isn't what I would've initially chosen either, but like I said before, my human souls are all essentially a reaction to Clover, so I gotta work with what's there in undertale yellow canon. Still, I don't think that undertale yellow was trying to imply integrity as being evil either. The monsters definitely see her that way, with how they talk about the "snowdin incident", but it's a nuanced issue. To the monsters, humans are evil and they keep proving that by killing more monsters as they fall down. To the human souls, the monsters are evil as they keep attacking them just for existing. Our information about integrity in the world of undertale yellow is told to us entirely from the monsters point of view, therefore it's presented in a way that shows her in the worst possible light. That doesn't necessarily mean that the monsters are right about her.

So yeah I don't think integrity is meant to be evil in the world of undertale yellow, and she's definitely not evil in my interpretation of her as Quaver. She's a scared, angry kid who just had all her preconceived notions about monsters proven true when they attacked her after falling down. Of course she goes on the offensive. Whether or not she's right to do that is a matter of nuance and debate, but I digress

[unnecessarilygrandiose]

finished dark heir just now and googled if there's any updates from the author on the last book of the trilogy and clicked a reddit link to check... got gobsmacked with the worst possible opinion in human history... never talk to anyone about a piece of media you like Ever

[pluttskutt]

I've had this rant before but I think a lot of people confuse opinions and facts as well as circumstantial facts.

I'm sex repulsed. This includes fiction. I don't care what anyone else enjoys because I'm not touching it anyway. I do think that sex has been put on a pedestal, and violence has been normalised with girls being choked and afraid to say no because "everyone's doing it".

The last part of that text is a fact.

I have opinions on tropes, ships, and characters, but I don't bash what I don't like other than saying I don't like it. Maybe to some I have bashed it though.

There are things I find repulsive that are popular but I don't care. I can say what I don't like here on my blog, but I'm not gonna find writers who write those tropes/ships/etc and go at them for it.

"Sex is gross." Opinion that I'm totally in my right to have.

"People who write sex scenes are gross". Hold on there bud you're taking it a step too far.

"No one should enjoy sex that's gross." Not what I said, but what some people take away from my opinion on this.

Someone also said, in regards to my fact about girls being choked during sex against their will, that maybe they wanted it. That contributes to my opinion that sex has been put on a pedestal, and violence has been normalised because no, those girls did not want that.

I've read confessions from women as well where men choke them and do other violent acts during sex without discussing it first. The popular theory seems to be that porn has destroyed their thinking, in which I have no opinion because I never watched porn, but I still recognize the issue even though I am not the victim.

These stories are true as well.