#especially without see expressions

[markscherz]

It also means, every now and then, we should give ourselves a break. You are a primate wearing cloth. You were never meant to be here, because you were never meant to be anywhere. You are just as evolved as the sparrows in the trees and the mites on your face, and we are all just here because we're here because we're here.

I find it extremely helpful to remind myself sometimes that I am just a well-dressed ape.

No wonder computer screens have such an appeal—I am just a creature, and these lights are so nice and bright and they can give me feelings from the comfort of my chair.

No wonder it is hard to stay on task sometimes—I am just a creature, and there might be a nice bug under the next piece of bark.

No wonder it is hard to understand how other people think. I am trapped in here and they are trapped in there, and we have developed an incredibly complex means of conveying what's happening in our respective vessels, except that we evolved to do this face-to-face, and now are trying to make it work in this complex thing we developed called writing which does a fair but flawed job of conveying our actual thoughts, and has none of the subtlety, nor the efficiency, of language as we originally evolved it. And the times when it matters, where a great deal is at stake, are all new and crazy and awfully big for a society of well-dressed monkeys.

And because the world is big and we can only reach so far, we even developed different languages, which is all good and well, but then we went and made this thing called an internet where we are all together again, and a huge portion of the people using it aren't doing so in their first/best language, or at least, not all of the time. And that makes even more grounds for misunderstanding.

With all of this complexity, it is no wonder that we misunderstand each other; that we other the unfamiliar, and villainise those whose backgrounds, environments, and microcosms are different from our own, especially in beliefs we hold dear. But I find it brings compassion to keep it in mind, and reminds me to take it easy on myself, and not just others. Because, as a primate, I could also just…choose not to play by the constructions of the society we have created. Sometimes it is rewarding to indulge that feeling, but usually I think, actually, this thing called society that we have made is quite okay really. We are doing our best, and, globally, there has never been a better time to be alive than right now—at least, not for humans (I like to read We're Here to be reminded of this regularly). But we are still just animals, and we deserve a break.

The annoying thing about all that seemingly bullshit hippie nature connection shit is that it's absolutely true

there is no fundamental difference between you, me, a random person in a random country across the world, the fly that just landed on your house, the grass growing down the street, the fish you ate for dinner, and the bird that's sitting on my computer

everything on this planet is connected and everything influences everything else and we are all inheritors of this spherical-ish rock's collective 4.6 billion years of history

we are all the same, fundamentally, just with a few changes here and there over the course of countless millennia, and we all rely on each other. eating is just the flow of nutrients and energy through the biosphere. everything dies because the planet changes and before we figured out how to modify our behavior during our lifetimes genetic mutation was the only way to adapt to that change. everything evolves. everything feels. everything yearns.

there is no "us verus them" for anything - not man versus nature, not man versus man, not man versus deity

its just Us. Us and Us. There are some of us who insist there's a "them", and that's a problem. But ultimately, they are still part of the "Us"

so it sucks, but the minute you start seeing literally anything as "the enemy" instead of "someone who has been horrifyingly mislead, because the vast majority of beings on this planet just want to do what they think is the right thing" you've already lost the plot

there is no enemy

there is no evil

we made up evil to try and make sense of actions we couldn't understand

there is only our planet, and everything on it, and we are all connected, and we all have to work together

I know that goes against your deep primate instincts, because you have to have a little selfishness to survive and that's where that lives, and sometimes that selfishness requires hurting others or protecting yourself from hurt

but the burden of being the first species (probably) aware of all this means we have to try to ignore that monkey inside of our chests and remember that there is no enemy. there is no them.

there is only us.

[hinamie]

*catboys ur shounen protag*

[anghraine]

I know it's well-understood at this point that Kirk/Spock is much more of a nerd4nerd ship than a nerd/jock thing, but it's just been kind of percolating around my mind that both of them aren't just space nerds but space nerds who were personally bullied.

Like, 18-year-old Kirk was targeted by an older bully who combines "total asshole" with "the most grating man in existence":

MCCOY: Well, yeah, I'm beginning to feel a little bit picked-on, if that's what you mean. KIRK: I know the feeling very well. I had it at the Academy. An upperclassman there. One practical joke after another, and always on me. My own personal devil. A guy by the name of Finnegan. MCCOY: And you being the very serious young— KIRK: Serious? I'll make a confession, Bones. I was absolutely grim, which delighted Finnegan no end.

This was five years after Kirk survived a genocide, btw, and likely well before his stint as an Academy instructor known to be strict and demanding (which is the period the "stack of books with legs" description of him comes from). By the time he's 33, fifteen years after all this, it turns out one of his deepest fantasies is just beating the shit out of his bully, but only if he can do it According To The Rules (the replica of Finnegan sneers, "Always fight fair, don't you? True officer and gentleman, you").

Spock, meanwhile, is viciously targeted by his Vulcan peers for being biracial from at least age 5; he's described as being tormented by other boys by that age, and "at home nowhere except Starfleet." I think he'd have been 18 or 19 when he left for Starfleet and it's... the least bad of his options, but he seems to have spent his entire career among humans and being persistently subjected to raw racism and profound disrespect for his culture at every turn.

Like, their histories of being metaphorically shoved into lockers are not identical or anything, but I think it's interesting that they both have them.

[avnasace]

(mild spoilers: captain america brave new world)

"you can feed a million people with a phone call. but the question is, who is in the room with you when you're making those decisions? is it the people you're gonna impact? or is it just more people like you?".

for me this is the moment that probably led bucky to where he is now. "steve gave people something to believe in, you give people something to aspire to."

[mueritos]

a little strange to get dms from other trans people saying they agree with biden's dumb statemet that he doesnt want minors getting gender-affirming care. if you really think its such an epidemic that 13 year olds are getting their knockers blown off by surgeons every other day, then please point me in the direction of said 13 year olds that are somehow accessing gender-affirming care that literal trans adults can't even access.

like please be fr. we literally have privatized healthcare and insurance where not even people who go through the appropriate avenues can get approved for care they need to stay alive. what makes you think a trans minor is getting phallo or vaginalplasty. feel whatever you want about 13 year olds who want gender-affirming care, but dont parrot transphobic rhetoric that is based on no facts and a moral panic. they second they legitimize barriers to care for trans minors is the second they start finding ways to do the same for trans adults. dont be a buffoon.

[canisalbus]

cursed no tattoo machete (I'm sorry for doing this to him)

.

[winepresswrath]

Natori is desirable, has always been desirable, had "the looks and the grades," makes a living off of being beautiful and charming and good at provoking feeling in other people and is at the same time totally uninterested in pursuing any of that interest and seeing if it could develop into something deeper. he rejects the girls at school even more preemptively than he rejects matoba, who suggests he might be useful. he's deeply, profoundly lonely throughout all of this and tbh I think being wanted actually makes it worse in some ways, because the people closest to him who should love him best think he's a curse and that makes casual interest and affection feel cheap, unearned, and ultimately disposable. naturally his two careers are:

attractive man plays pretend

loner weirdo does rituals on outskirts of society

[clumsypuppy]

object permanence so bad I have to reread old messages for my brain to go ‘oh yeahhhh I care them’

[vultures-and-scavengers]

she has the coin but fuck me if i don't like the anxious dialogue option better. love that between the two of them, the soldier and the diplomat, she's the one headed to the final battle, but OF COURSE she's terrified. she's not a fighter, she avoided as much of the fighting as she could during inquisition, and she has to go fight a blighted dragon and a darkspawn magister?

and i like this dialogue option more just because like. then both of them are confessing their fears, both of them afraid of whats coming, and both seeking comfort from each other.

and cullen's like... he's the bystander. he's present for all the major events, but rarely has any influence on them, rarely has a role to play. and now when supposedly he would have the power to influence things, as the commander of the inquisition, he has no army. they're still in transit from the arbor wilds, and so once again, he's helpless.

[meowkusunoki]

ocgrammers reblog and tell me how your characters type

[windor-truffle]

research for 2hcb1 is like 30 percent revisiting canon lore and 70 percent watching therapy videos because *gestures vaguely at Lambda and Asbel* you've got a lot to unpack there, huh 😅

[novelconcepts]

The degree of RAGE I feel every time I listen to an interview with and/or about a nonbinary person/character, and the interviewer just is allergic to they/them pronouns. Like. My dude. My good bitch. My brother in Christ. The whole POINT of this conversation is the enby thing. How are you failing THIS badly?!

[son-of-avraham]

A thing about trying to dress more modestly is now I don't have to worry about my binder being visible because they seemingly don't make men's shirts that don't plunge. But I don't have to stress about that anymore, B"H!!!!!!!!

[sysig]

Deflections (Patreon)

Bonus:

Why not lead with that!

[oblako]

absolutely obsessed with the visual execution of this part like are we all seeing this...

also these two panels: