#having multiple breakdowns over her rejection of them

[agalychnisspranneusroseus]

"Is Amphibia gay like The Owl House?" It is gay, but certainly not like The Owl House.

[eeriesilkworm]

There's a real possibility we get a Will Byers centric love triangle in ST5

We know the Duffers love a good love triangle.

So much so, they've given us one (or several) in every season of Stranger Things thus far—and I don’t think they’ll break that streak in Season 5.

One thing I’ve noticed is that while some love triangles stretch across multiple seasons (like Steve/Nancy/Jonathan), the writers also introduce at least one new triangle each season.

Here’s a quick breakdown:

S1: Steve / Nancy / Jonathan S2: Steve / Nancy / Jonathan + Joyce / Hopper / Bob + Lucas / Dustin / Max S3: Robin / Steve / Tammy + Joyce / Hopper / Alexei + Joyce / Hopper / Mr Clarke S4: Steve / Nancy / Jonathan + Mike / El / Will + Robin / Vickie / Vickie's ex-boyfriend S5: Steve / Nancy / Jonathan (likely resolved) + Mike / El / Will (will come to a head) + ???

Sometimes they’re played straight, but the writers also love to openly mock the love triangle trope, too—especially in Season 3:

For example, Hopper gets irrationally jealous over Joyce talking to Mr Clarke and even Alexei—prompting Joyce’s sarcastic line about how every man she talks to must be her boyfriend. And of course, there's Steve wrongly assuming Robin has a crush on him, then confessing to her, only to find out she actually liked Tammy Thompson.

Basically, there’s no one way the writers use this trope. They clearly enjoy it—but more importantly, they enjoy subverting it.

So, call me delusional but I think it's likely that we could be getting another Will Byers love triangle in Season 5:

He's the main character of the season and his arc will (partially), revolve around his "coming of age" and acceptance of his sexuality, after all.

Will has consistently been portrayed as someone who is considered attractive or desirable in-universe. In every season except Season 3, a girl shows interest in him despite his nerdiness and perceived queerness.

And now, it looks like the Duffer Brothers are visually rebranding him as a romantic lead:

His new hair and costume design feels both heroic and boyish. The flannel—once a staple of his wardrobe and a symbol of his innocence—is slowly being phased out, suggesting a gradual loss of that innocence. However, he’s still buttoned up. That tells me Will is stepping into his manhood (and by extension, his sexuality), but he's still holding something back. He's going to need to be pushed out of his comfort zone; both physically and emotionally.

Even narratively, there are established links which hint at a possible non-Mike love interest:

When we look back at Will’s comment about not falling in love, we often read it as foreshadowing his feelings for Mike—or hinting that he already is in love with him. But I also interpret it as something more: Will doesn’t believe he will ever inspire love (or romantic attraction). He sees himself as undesirable.

Think about the four original members of the Party. Yes, they’re all considered uncool nerds to some degree—yet three of them are affirmed through romantic connection: Lucas has Max. Dustin has Suzie. Mike has El. They each receive validation and the feeling of being wanted.

Will does not.

And yet, the writers have made a consistent effort to show us that Will is considered attractive—despite his belief that he isn’t, and despite the lack of romantic validation he receives. That creates a real disconnect. A kind of cognitive dissonance.

Having Will repeatedly receive attention from girls—only to reject them or appear disinterested—was an effective way to subtly hint at his queerness. But it’s happened so many times now, that there needs to be a payoff.

What is the long-term point of making the canonically gay kid, who already believes he’s undesirable, only receive interest from women?

Er, there isn’t one.

It makes sense, then, to give Will the opportunity to experience mutual same-sex attraction with someone who isn't Mike.

Because Will's arc about accepting his sexuality doesn't just have to culminate in the realization that Mike loves him too (as sweet as that is).

It should culminate with the knowledge that queerness is valid, that he is considered desirable and worthy of romantic interest, and that he isn't alone in experiencing queerness.

Additionally, as mentioned above, Will is already perceived as queer—he’s been bullied for it his entire life, despite never explicitly coming out. Hawkins is a small town where word travels fast. So if there is another young gay guy in town, chances are… they’ve already heard of “Zombie Boy” Will Byers.

He'd certainly be on their radar: he’s good-looking, he’s mysterious, and he’s still closeted, which means he’d likely be discreet.

And let’s not forget where Will was emotionally at the end of Season 4, especially regarding his feelings for Mike:

He’s starting from ground zero in Season 5. He has zero hope that Mike feels the same way, and he’s likely going to be making zero moves.

In fact, most Byler theorists agree—it makes sense that Mike will have to be the initiator in Season 5. Will is just too emotionally shut down to make the first move.

But… wait a minute.

If this season is supposed to be about Will coming into his own as a young gay man—about self-acceptance, confidence, and owning his identity—how does that make sense if Mike is the one initiating everything?!

Well… maybe Mike needs to make the first move when it comes to Byler. But that doesn’t mean Will has to stay passive the whole season.

It’s possible that Will could gain some much-needed confidence—maybe even a bit of romantic “practice”—by taking a more active role with someone else first.

Giving Will a (temporary) new love interest would also level-out the playing field between himself and Mike:

There's a real sense of karmic justice and ironic foreshadowing in Stranger Things.

Will's jealousy of Mike and El's relationship has been hinted at for two seasons now—and he even complained that Mike only called a couple times while El had a "book of letters" from him.

What’s interesting is that even after Mike takes accountability for their argument and they make up, that specific comment—about the phone calls and letters—is never addressed. It lingers.

That’s why I think we could see a similar conversation (or even a full-blown argument) between Mike and Will in Season 5. But this time, Will might be the one receiving phone calls or letters—from someone else.

And let’s not forget: it’s possible that the Byers are temporarily staying with the Wheelers in Season 5. If Will has a secret admirer, and he’s trying to keep it quiet, Mike is going to find out. (Excellent way to manufacture drama).

I also feel compelled to reiterate that the Duffers have shown time and time again: they can handle love triangles in many different ways.

They can play it for comedy. They can make it completely one-sided or delusional—like Mike projecting his own jealousy, much like Hopper did with Joyce in Season 3. A love triangle doesn’t have to be serious or long-lasting. It could span multiple episodes, or just one. It could involve a kiss—or zero physical contact at all.

And it doesn’t have to disrupt a Byler endgame—in fact, quite the opposite:

Seeing Will Byers receive romantic attention from another male character would serve as a reminder to the audience that Will is desirable and that he has options—this increases the stakes for Mike.

The GA will start wondering if this is really Will's endgame, and if he is truly ready to get over Mike. The GA, especially those who never shipped Byler before, may find themselves unexpectedly invested. They might even feel disappointed or sad at the thought of Will "moving on."

It also creates space for the writers to show us jealous Mike. Just as we've seen jealous, longing Will, a temporary love triangle allows us to explore Mike’s feelings through that same lens of romantic insecurity.

This brings the possibility of Byler to the forefront of the GA's subconscious. At the same time, it invites them to root for Mike, and therefore Byler.

[thecubspeaks]

I'd love to hear more of your interpretation re: Shadowheart and her parents.

sooo basically, while i think that living with her parents is obviously a superficially happier ending, I prefer Shadowheart letting her parents go for a lot of reasons.

My immediate thought the first time I played was that it's an obvious, if under-developed, parallel to the choice that Wyll has to make. Shadowheart's parents get to say the thing I'm always so frustrated that no one says to Wyll: a parent wouldn't choose for their child to suffer at the cost of their life. Sometimes you need to, bluntly, kill the idea that you can ever return to your childhood-- that you can ever have your parents back and be their safe, innocent kid again-- in order to grow up. Wyll gets to cheat a bit, of course, but it's thematically the same decision, and I think that both of them are equally right for choosing their souls over their pasts.

(It also parallels resist!Dark Urge, who can immediately lament, once they survive rejecting Bhaal, that their memories are forever lost. For good or ill, you can never return to the person you were. You have to, get to, begin again.)

Obviously, Shadowheart's parents frame it as her needing to live to be the future of Selûnite worship/their community, and I don't love that... but that's not then what Shadowheart actually goes on to do.

I think parentless Shadowheart is more free to choose her own destiny than Shadowheart with parents. The emphasis when that's the choice that's made is that she now gets a blank slate. For good and bad, she gets to start anew. She decides who she is, and what she will make of the memories that she has. Cottagecore Shadowheart is thrilled to get to rediscover a relationship with her parents, and unearth some memories-- but it feels like her trying to rebuild what's already lost. There are multiple conversations about how she does not want to and cannot be Jenevelle... but then she goes back to trying to recreate the daughter she was and the childhood she never had in all but name (plus occasionally sneaking out to sleep in a field because she misses adventuring so much, and saying that trying to be happy is a constant battle, but surely she can just ignore Shar forever and it'll be fine).

I think parentless Shadowheart is sadder in the epilogue. She is searching and struggling. But she's also healing, and rebuilding herself, and truly asking herself who she is and what she wants, which are questions I really feel Shadowheart-with-parents is only delaying (and I headcanon come in the form of a total breakdown when her mom dies). Her life is harder, but I think it's one where she's more genuinely coming to terms with everything that has happened to her, and learning who she really wants to be.

[pandaofsecrets]

It was fun to read over your ML opinions! Some I agree with others less but that's what makes a diverse fandom.

I did have one... Dispute isn't the right word. Something happened that l you might have forgotten: Re- Lesbian Chloé.

Keep in mind my own headcanon isn't lesbian either. It's more of an 'it's complicated' version of pan and I've written her shipped with all sorts. (Multi-shipping woo!)

But as of Oblivio we know she and Sabrina made out at least. 'Played Super Penguino' being the paper thin euphamism for the show used several times in different eps.

Totally valid to feel zero chemistry about it, but she has 'experimented' at least.

I know about that moment. 😄 There's also the fact that Chloé and Sabrina frequently cosplay as Ladybug and Cat Noir—you know, the show's main couple. The writers are not subtle at all.

It's not the headcanon I have a problem with, and even if I did I'm not going to act like I'm the headcanon police. I'm also not opposed to shipping Chloé with female characters, it's just that the type of female character that Chloé would have chemistry with flat out does not exist in the show. Frankly, most of the guys don't gave chemistry with her either—furthest I can stretch it is XY, Nathanaël, Kim, and maybe Adrien. Chloé can be a very tough character to ship.

What I do have a problem with is analysis that just ends up cherry-picking her interactions and mislabeling the cause of her behavior. For example, there's the argument that she tends to only express interest in "safe" guys. That analysis has a giant gap in it. Yeah, it's true that Chloé tends to go for guys who are unreachable (XY, Ali) or disinterested (Adrien), but like. That same description would also apply to Ladybug, the out of reach superhero who is adored by all of Paris, and who has made it abundantly clear on multiple occasions that she dislikes Chloé. So, if anything, this looks less like something Chloé only does with guys and more like something she does in general, and it makes total sense. This is a girl who has a self-image problem the size of the Sun. Of course she approaches guys while simultaneously trying to keep them at arm's length—she'd do anything to avoid being put in a position where being vulnerable is a real possibility. "The mortifying ordeal of being known" and all that. It's the same reason Marinette is so weird around Adrien.

By the way, this is why I said all subtext points to her being straight. Chloé lets her guard down way, way too easily with girls. Like in Queen Wasp, where she lets Marinette help her reconcile with her mother—even though they'd been enemies for the entire show, and Chloé just had a breakdown because her mother picked Marinette over her. If Chloé was into girls the risk of being hurt by them would be a lot more real to her. It would rank higher on her danger meter, even if she isn't aware of it, and she'd put way more effort into maintaining control. And this is exactly what she does with guys. With guys, Chloé always tries to dominate them. Making a giant spectacle of rejecting Kim is the big one, but there's also things like repeating what Ali said while trying to make it sound like it was her idea, maybe probably stringing Nathanaël along (depending on how you want to interpret Evillustrator), and my personal favorite, the fact that she couldn't even bring herself to give Luka a compliment without immediately following it up with an insult. You know, even though Luka was hella brainwashed at the time and therefore literally incapable of caring one way or the other. I especially want to highlight the last one, because in that moment there's no one to perform for and no reason to do so. She gains absolutely nothing from making this deeply confused pass at Luka, and even if she did she's already got him completely at her mercy anyway.

[jinksyweirdo]

Day 8; CGs/scenes that made you cry or affected you deeply.

I rambled about crying over a few OWs CGs however, I'll actually talk about the ones that either made me go through the five stages of grief or have an emotional breakdown.

The ending of Arc 1, brought back unpleasant memories. By that, I mean, the days I've spent in my room, the days I blamed myself for something I didn't even do and simply wishing that I never existed in the first place. Maybe everyone will be better off without me. Maybe.

In Arc 2, when it got to Gidgets scene in the bedroom. Even though Iggy tried to refuse/reject them, they continue on, harming Iggy, making him 'ugly' so that they can only have him. It really gave me the ick that I just saved the game before taking a breather.

It's hard to explain the emotions I felt in Arc 5, but Imma try anyways. :P

When Iggy confronted Bucks, making her remember. The flashbacks of the amount of times that people had called her a monster, even when she turned into an adult, I...I don't know why but I felt a hint of familiarity. I don't know if it's because of the fact that I've been labelled as a freak multiple times or maybe something that I can't really recall.

Although, when Iggy at the beginning of Arc 5 (not really), when he and Genzou were on the boat, he told Genzou that everything is his fault and how everyone is better off without him. It really tugged at my heartstrings that I literally had to take a moment to breathe AGAIN before continuing on.

At the end of Arc 5 though...Was honestly the best VN ending I have ever played/watched...Oh my fucking lord, the amount of times I cried when Iggy makes his own choices, how he finally chose for Himself! (I totally didn't get fooled by the fake choices-). I felt so much joy that tears were even flooding down my cheeks. I'm happy he chose for himself. It reminds me of how I finally freed myself from the prison I had created myself. The urge to please others and everyone.

Welp. That's all. -3-"

I'm going back to sleep.

[kindheart525]

unpopular opinions on the fim show?

I’m not entirely sure how many of these opinions are unpopular in the fandom as a whole, but they seem kind of uncommon compared to what shows up in my feed so here goes

Pinkie’s family is not abusive or toxic. I know they are portrayed as extremely old-fashioned and strict in their lifestyle, based on what is probably a surface-level understanding of Amish communities. This makes it easy to compare them to similar communities irl who engage in practices like shunning. But the Pies’ behavior in the show and especially Pinkie’s attitude towards them seems to make clear that they have not shunned or abused her despite her “leaving the community.” In other words, I think there are key differences between the Pies and some of the real-life people they were meant to emulate, so it’s inaccurate to say that abusive Pie headcanons have any real basis in the show. I wrote more on this opinion here.

Zephyr Breeze is not nearly as likely to be a deadbeat dad as some might think. He was shown to be on the road to being more responsible by the end of his own debut episode, so I highly doubt he’d be the same pony he was at the beginning of the episode by the time he would become a father. Not that I don’t think he could be at least a little bit irresponsible as a dad; I just don’t think he’d leave his child or not love them. I wrote more on this opinion here.

Amending Fences was a missed opportunity for a very important friendship lesson, one that the show never dared to touch. Which is that sometimes people are incompatible and sometimes your old friends won’t forgive you. Instead, Moondancer was written in an extremely exaggerated way (her whole life was ruined by one rejection??) yet this wasn’t regarded as an overreaction at all. It was weirdly handled at best. I wrote more on this opinion here.

Rarity gets a bad rap from the fandom. I don’t know if it’s her mediocre taste in stallions or if there’s something about her ultra-feminine nature that some people don’t care for, but I think her maturity and intelligence are severely underrated. Of course she can be a drama queen, but so can Twilight and Pinkie and pretty much every other member of the main cast. Rarity had a breakdown over getting a fashion piece critiqued, but Twilight blew up at her friends over having a late paper; the two scenarios really aren’t that different.

Just because Rarity has multiple crushes on mediocre stallions (Blueblood, Trenderhoof) doesn’t mean that she would sleep around or have a tumultuous love life. Haven’t most people had celebrity crushes? Multiple celebrity crushes, in fact, and also multiple crushes and relationships involving people they actually know before finding “the one”? I’m sure a lot of people have also been disappointed to find out the celebrity they fancied is actually a terrible person, like Rarity has. It’s part of the human experience for many, and Rarity’s TWO moments of poor judgment are not a reflection of her whole character or even her full palate of romantic taste.

Along with being a drama queen, Rarity can have moments where she’s materialistic and selfish, like the time she convinced Spike to give her his fire ruby. That was not a good moment for her. But on a bigger picture, materialistic and selfish is not her usual state. She is literally the element of generosity!!! She made Gala dresses for all of her friends FOR FREE! She has also shown herself to be a leader among her friends, at times taking charge and coming up with plans in Twilight’s absence much like Applejack does sometimes. One example is Castle Sweet Castle; the whole premise of the episode was Rarity’s idea! To help Twilight feel more at home! It’s clear that her generous spirit informs her actions through most of the show, unlike Rainbow Dash who’s only truly loyal when the plot needs her to be.

Yes Rarity is flawed, but all her friends are too. Her flaws are not objectively worse than the others. In fact, Rarity was literally under mind control once and still regarded Spike as a genuine friend, while Rainbow Dash sold one of her best friends into indentured servitude completely sober (among a long list of other things). Twilight yelled at her friends that she didn’t need them, also with an unaltered mind. Rarity has had her own hurtful blowups ofc but hers aren’t any worse than the others. Give her more credit y’all.

Speaking of Rainbow Dash, I’ve seen a number of opinion posts about how she and Applejack should switch their elements (so RD is honesty and AJ is loyalty), but as I started rewatching the show myself I’ve come to disagree. Rainbow Dash may be honest, but her brand of honesty is extremely rude. There’s no integrity behind it, not like AJ’s honesty. Rainbow Dash in general is extremely rude. There are a lot of points where I’ve wondered if she even likes her friends. There was also that Secrets and Pies episode which establishes that Rainbow Dash has lied prolifically to Pinkie over something that meant a lot to the latter, so RD really isn’t that honest either. I do agree that AJ would deserve the element of loyalty if she didn’t already have honesty. But you know who else is loyal? Spike. The elements of harmony would honestly make more sense if RD were just removed from the group entirely and Spike replaced her as loyalty /hj

I promise I don’t actually want to remove Rainbow Dash from the show, I just really wish she was written better. That’s what fan fiction is for I guess 😂

I have mixed feelings about AppleDash as a ship. I really like the fandom portrayals of it which is why I reblog quite a bit of AppleDash art, but canon alone doesn’t seem to show the good side of their dynamic very much. All they do is argue. Applejack is normally mature and levelheaded, but around Rainbow Dash she’s much less so. Dash really brings out the worst in her sometimes. It’s much different from the loving bickering that people write for them in fan works, which I think is a better spin on the dynamic. If I went off their canon interactions alone, I could see them being exes or on-and-off lovers at most, not a stable, long-term married couple.

This would only be unpopular in very specific circles, but I think it’s pretty stereotypical to insist that Rainbow Dash and Applejack are lesbians primarily based on their tomboy interests and the former’s rainbow mane. It’s one thing to headcanon them as such just because you want to, and that’s perfectly fine! I write Applejack as a lesbian too. It’s another to insist that it’s canon based on xyz evidence from the show or think it’s wrong for anyone to ship them with stallions. Even if you consider AppleDash canon, one or both of them could be bi or pan for all we know. Canon tells us very little about their sexualities so there’s a lot of room for different headcanons. I wrote more on this opinion here.

(More specific to the next gen community) Just because Fluttershy is good with animals does not automatically mean she would be a good mother. There was a whole episode (Stare Master) about how she couldn’t handle babysitting even though she thought her animal caretaking skills made her qualified. Obviously she was shown to be much better with kids later in the show (becoming very popular among the School of Friendship students), but again that’s teaching, not parenting. This isn’t to say that I think Fluttershy would definitely be a bad mom, just that her being good with animals is not a solid reason for her being a good mom.

I definitely have more opinions about the show, characters, and fandom of mlp, but I don’t think many of them are so unpopular. Like for example:

I don’t think the Apples would be queerphobic just because they value tradition and are coded as Southern US Americans. The word “tradition” doesn’t automatically equate to conservative politics, and even if it did, these ponies have been shown to learn new things all the time. But all the trans Big Mac positivity I’ve been seeing tells me that a lot of people agree with that sentiment.

I don’t think most of the popular/generic ships of the fandom (like FlutterCord, FlashLight, and SoarinDash) are necessarily bad or devoid of positive chemistry, they’re just way too often written in extremely boring and generic ways. But I’ve also seen such ships written in unique and interesting ways so I think there a lot of people who also understand that sometimes all they need is a more creative approach.

Episodes like Over A Barrel, Bridle Gossip, and She’s All Yak (among others) were horribly handled and should not have been written. I don’t even consider them canon. I don’t know about the larger fandom, but most of the next gen community that I interact with feels the same way.

I think Starlight’s backstory was stupid and contrived, but it seems like the whole fandom thinks so too. We’re all rewriting it lmao

[thegoodending-thelasttime]

my reaction to the resident lover lore drop: part two

access the doc yourself here

spoilers utc

DONNA CONTD

i have a lot to say about the the donna and daniela relationship section, none of which i feel capable of putting into words for the time being. i will, however, say this.

"Donna is watching what could've been in regards to her past self when it comes to Dani and MC"

"Just sometimes [Donna] really wants to hit [Cassandra] you know?" i think a lot of people in the fandom know after Cass' infamous neutral ending

"She grieves but she lets herself live too." all the muscles in my face are convulsing

"Donna struggles to stand up for herself for a long portion of her route and only through the aid of MC will she start to show a little more of her backbone." Donna. i can help you be brave Donna. pick me. choose me. love me. (delusional 3)

"There is a brief scene in which Miranda and Donna are having tea while Donna has a complete and utter breakdown about just how on the edge she is. Miranda of course encourages her to keep spiraling..." miranda i'm going to get you.

"Donna is mentally unstable at this point and can either be sent into the abyss or helped out of the low point toward a brighter future." I CAN HELP YOU TOWARD A BRIGHTER FUTURE DONNA I SWEAR PLEASE (delusional 4)

Depression being a theme is just. I'm going to write a hurt/comfort fic about this.

and, "Destiny [Soulmates]" don't think I'm normal about that either. cuz i'm not.

the nursery being an allegory for Donna. my brain feels like a backyard and you're mowing it with a tiny little lawnmower.

"Hades and Persephone" words. in my mind.

glad that Donna fans unknowingly cracked phantom of the opera though, that's fun

"...she is not unwilling to lunge towards Miranda herself and brandish a weapon in her direction." she's so real for this

"Miranda has had to trigger the loop several times in reaction to a violent outburst of Donna’s." WOOOO YOU GO BABE. FUCK UP MIRANDA'S LIVES HELL YEAH

"MC shows unconditional and unwavering love towards someone with severe abandonment issues and gets a very attached flower shop owner for their troubles." SHUT UP MY HEART.

"...a small part of her is pleased to know she got the upper hand on Miranda. Donna’s ability to make MC explicitly reject Miranda has left the goddess incredibly pissed..." FUCK YEAH

"Post Donna Miranda is particularly cruel about how she treats the toxicologist and parades MC near her but never in reach." top five sentences that make you want to kill a cult leader

"LIKES: Stuffed Animals..." help i love her so much my heart really can't take this

"LIKES: Pranks. I’m sorry she’s a menace" i'll prank her back (by kissing her on the face)

"DISLIKES: Those really sad adoption commercials where they play ‘I Will Remember You’ while a slideshow of really sad puppies plays. They make her cry" NO DONNA POOKIE BEAR DON'T CRY COME HER LET ME HUG YOU

"DISLIKES: Miranda" OMG SHE DISLIKES MIRANDA TOO (shocker) !?!?! WE'RE SO SIMILAR WE SHOULD MARRY ACTUALLY

MIRANDA

MC and miranda being burned alive the first time around. man wtf

love that they were both canonically sickly victiorian children at one point

"Death penalty for sodomy" that actually has me so fucked up. how could you do this to me

"[MC] Drowned, Miranda was nearby but chose not to save them" WHAT WHY

"Mia got mad and threw a stone at MC" i would get mad too if i saw someone repeatedly fall for miranda over the course of multiple timelines

"Miranda ran MC over in an accident" HELP 💀

miranda really fell for the unluckiest motherfucker goddamn. tom and jerry ass

"Yes + Mia" "No + Mia" best way to word this. i will be using these from now on. ask me a yes/no question i dare you.

"This life is when the very first iteration of Eva is born and it completely changes Miranda’s soul as a confounding variable in their soulmate-hood" oh my GOD. i'm a little scared miranda's section might be making me start to like her a little.. NO I REFUSE. THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING.

"Toxic Yuri + Loving" thank you Cinder. i appreciate you for your silliness.

really wish we got more eva content but oh well. maybe in the dlc content the team said would probably come out in a few years/maybe more

"Mia’s soul has slowly changed over time and has grown to naturally despise Miranda’s soul for its unwitting part in MCs death every life" nvm i like Mia infinitely more than miranda

"Mia acts as a foil to Miranda’s relationship in every life they meet because she is - without fail - naturally resistant to them being together and highly suspicious of the way Miranda behaves" FUCK MOTHER MIRANDA ALL MY HOMIES HATE MOTHER MIRANDA. MIA'S A REAL ONE.

"[Bela and Miranda] would be insane if they worked together, but unfortunately, they are narratively designed to be pitted against each other" i disagree i think it's very fortunate they're not on the same team

"Miranda is afraid of [Donna] because she remembers every single time loop... Donna is also handy with sharp objects and has been known to attempt a few murders at meetings when pushed..." fuck yeah. be afraid miranda.

"...views Donna as “cursed” due to her family history of deaths" can i say kys just this once (to miranda).

"Intrinsically offended when MC chose Donna during the loop" be offended. L + bozo + cry about it + Donna's better

"[Donna and Miranda have] used each other as crutches in moments of weakness... they used to have regular tea together in which they would act out their familial roles and encourage each other further down their spirals" i'm actually not okay rn thanks for asking!

...that legitimately has me so fucked up

"Miranda actively encourages Donna’s fears to keep her under control..." "She would kill Angie to both punish Donna and to relieve herself of the annoyance" hey miranda come here. what do you mean, i don't have anything in my pocket. don't worry about it just come here. so i can... hug you. SHANKS YOU MIA STYLE BUT IT ACTUALLY WORKS THIS TIME SHANKS YOU MIA STYLE BUT IT ACTUALLY WORKS THIS TIME SHANKS YOU MIA STYLE BUT IT ACTUALLY WORKS THIS TIME

"Miranda and MC are soulmates, all the way up to their 19th life this is 100% proven and true (even though they don't always get to meet) but the 20th life is different because Miranda is still in her 19th. It could be argued that MCs soulmate is who 20th Miranda was supposed to be. (Could've been if a coin had been flipped)." I'M ACTUALLY HYPERVENTILATING RIGHT NOW THANK YOU FOR FEEDING USTHANKYOU MY HEART OH MY FUCKIUNG GOD ASDFGUIHUADSDHLFKAJHSDFKLGJHDAFKJG. I BANGED ON MY DESK THAT'S NOT EVEN A JOKE WHAT THE ACTUASL FUCK

"MC would go into divorce arc which is salvageable but very long winded" need yall to elaborate on this, also it made me giggle

"The only exceptions are Mia (who told Miranda to fuck off), Bela (who still remembered), and Angie (who doesn’t listen to anybody)." that's so based of all of them. naming them the based squad for this.

"DISLIKES: Her height being mentioned" i don't care if it's a low blow and that she's actually one inch taller than me. i'll call her short. short ass. imagine being 5'6" lmao

part three coming up

[hoochy-coo]

Let us know what you think !!

Very early takes, just off the cuff:

- The album is confused about what it wants to be because she herself is confused. However, this is some of the most honest writing she’s ever done - like ICDIWABH is fucking unhinged but she is being HONEST about it

- Down Bad is a bop but the first 4 songs are Bleachers, Midnights, 1989 vault rejects

- Some of her career highs are on here (BDILH, Clara Bow, TSMWEL) but TTPD (the song) is a career low and should have never seen the light of day

- This is the closest she’s ever gotten to sequencing a track list that tells a linear story

- I do like So Long London and her feelings are hers and hers alone. However, is Joe’s MH struggle known information? I know she’s hinted at him being “blue” multiple times and over multiple body of works, but she seems to be very loud about it on SLL and how it contributed to their breakup

- Confused as to why a lot of the marketing/PR suggested most of this would be about the breakdown of her 6 year relationship only for a lot of it to be about the 6 month fling and how messy it was

- LOML made me cry

- Don’t love Florida!!! But love Florence’s feature on it

- She needs to break up with Jack. They keep doing the same thing as collaborators and it’s stunting both of them

- I will get dragged for this but she’s trying very hard to do what Lana does on a lot of this album???

- I’m like half shook and half laughing at how Taylor is basically telling us that she did not give a f about Matt’s ignorant behaviour and that she was ready to “die for [his] sins” but he ghosted her cause there was too much heat from all the media attention and fan fare

- In terms of bonus track, I’ve only heard Black Dog - which I love and think should have been track 5

Nvm she just dropped the anthology. BRB - more thoughts to come

[ambisweetiepie]

I want to talk about my dad for a little bit. There is a lot of triggering content here, read at your own risk.

My dad passed away on March 9th. My sisters, my mother, and I had all left my dad. For my Mom, it was the hardest thing she'd ever done.

I have been low contact with him.

When I was in high school, I was in a bad traffic accident while I was driving to school. I was put on a stretcher and taken via ambulance to the ER. They checked me over, and despite the severity of the wreck, I was okay. My mom came to get me and bring me home. I was of course in some shock, but she helped me calm down and got me laughing by the time I got home. Dad came out and saw us laughing, and yelled at me. He was pissed that I had wrecked his car. That morning when he had heard I was in an accident and taken to the ER, he just slept in and had mom take care of it.

I left kansas first and went to college.

One day my sister was watching tv, spending time with my mom, when my dad wanted to show her a video where something bad happened to a dog. He was torn up about the bad thing that happened to a dog. My sister didn't want to see the video. He insisted. But she didn't want to see a dog being hurt. So my dad attacked her, choking her. My mom had to pull him off of her.

My younger sister has a mental disability. He wanted her to mow the lawn, and she was trying to. She got overwhelmed and exhausted, so she stopped and went to sit on the porch for a second. He attacked her for that. I was so furious that I was so far away and unable to protect her.

He was on the board of child abuse prevention.

He taught Karate to children, and would hurt them. He would hurt them on purpose to teach them a lesson. Children were pulled out of his class.

He was a frightening person to live with. He would scream and argue with you. It didn't matter who was right and who was wrong. Your only choice is to either leave, or admit that you're wrong. It's the only way to protect yourself. In the morning he would be smiling and happy and pretend nothing happened. There would be no resolution.

The trauma response I have from growing up with him has cost me multiple jobs. I have severe rejection sensitive dysphoria. This makes sense because growing up, rejection meant I would be verbally attacked. So now when I am given negative feedback on a job, I can breakdown crying. If I am told I did something wrong, I will agree. I will not try and prove that I didn't do anything wrong, or that they were mistaken, or that it was someone else's fault. If I can't leave, admitting I am wrong is the only way to protect myself.

My dad was never happy. There was always something he could find to be angry about.

I got home after school at around 3:30. Dad would get home at 4. I shouldn't sit down and relax at all after getting home. I needed to go straight to doing the dishes. But sometimes I would sit down for a moment, and then I would hear him get home, and the garage door open, and I would panic.

Mom regrets not leaving him sooner. She feels like she failed us as a mother. But she was a victim too. He cheated on her 3 times. He complained about her constantly. He was every bit as abusive towards her as he was towards us. His family has fond memories of how we always had family get together at our house. But that was all my mom, he hated it. When she finally left him, I thought he would move on. But he just had a new thing to be angry and upset about. He never stopped trying to get my mom back. Mom has confided with me that she had to leave because it was either him or her. She was not clear on if she meant he would have killed her, or that she would have killed herself.

His family has had so much animosity for us. For leaving him. From his point of view, and his side of the story, we left him for nothing. What did he do wrong? If you try to explain something, he would say "that was one time!" and wouldn't believe that you left him for one thing he did once.

People had such nice things to say about him at his funeral.

I've had a hard time. Nowhere near as hard of a time as if I had lost my mom or one of my sisters. Not as hard as losing someone who was actually close to me.

How do you mourn someone like that? He was still my father. He will always be my dad. He loved his children. He would have killed us if we had stayed. He would have absolutely accidentally choked one of us to death. If mom wasn't there to pull him off of my sister, she may have died.

We had no proof, but we are all certain he sexually assaulted my older sister when she was a child. Memories rose up only a few years ago for her. Part of us could say that those aren't real memories. But none of us would. Of course we are going to believe her. It only makes sense that he would have done that. It lines up.

For the past 5-10 years I've been low contact with him. He was an old man in detererating health because he didn't take care of himself. He did drugs and ate unhealthy food. He is the kind of person who has always believed his own lies. So he fully believed we up and left him for no reason. That we kicked him out when he visited on Christmas for no reason.

Most of my family was no-contact with him.

Before my sister had those memories of him, a certain cycle happened multiple time. She would be no contact. She would be low contact. She would believe he was better. She would allow herself to have a relationship with him again, and open her heart to him. He would hurt her. She would go no contact. He would be outraged and not understand why suddenly she went no contact.

I talked to him rarely, and lied to him constantly. "No, I don't know why everyone stopped talking to you beginning a few years ago. No, I do not talk to my siblings. I talk to you rarely on the phone, because that's the way I am. I barely talk to anyone on the phone. My older sister? No, we had a falling out and so I do not know her address." I steered the conversations away from them and kept it surface level.

If I cut him off, if we had all cut him off. He would have come out in person. He had my address. He had my younger sister's address.

If I just talk to him lightly, low contact, here and there. It was a balancing act, but it kept me safe, and protected his old man emotions.

My older sister was upset when he died, because he never admited any fault. He never apologized.

Of course he didn't, he was never mentally well. He never understood he was at any fault. That was something she would have never gotten.

I don't have anywhere I was going with this. I just needed to write things down.

The day he died was my older sister's birthday. In a way, it was fitting.

[talkingpointsusa]

Jordan Peterson throws a massive temper tantrum over having to take social media training.

The thirteenth rule for life is throwing a tantrum on the internet when you don't get your way. (Source: The Jordan Peterson Podcast on Daily Wire)

Well, Jordan Peterson has decided to grace the world with a forty minute video about how oppressed he is because he's been ordered to take social media training and since apparently I'm secretly a masochist I decided to watch it.

In case you haven't heard of this story, The Ontario Court of Appeals recently rejected Jordan Petersons appeal regarding the Ontario College Of Psychologists ordering him to take social media training. Since Jordan is a well documented oppositionally defiant asshole who throws shitfits over stickers on paper towel dispensers, this hasn't gone over well.

Since I know a lot of people are whining on Jordan's behalf that his free speech is being taken away, I'd like to get that argument out of the way before we even start. Jordan Peterson has a right to his free speech but that doesn't mean that he's free from the consequences of said speech. Jordan's license is a privilege and the Ontario College Of Psychologists has every right to take that privilege away if they feel like Jordan's behavior has violated their professional standards. Think of it like taking a toy away from a six year old child for throwing a tantrum. That kid threw a tantrum and that was their right, but that action had a consequence. Jordan Peterson chose to be a conservative media grifter and that action had a consequence.

Jordan Peterson is fascinating to me because it's shocking how somebody so discredited still has so much of a following. Jordan Petersons arguments have been proven to be total bullshit time and time again yet people still take him seriously. Some More News did an excellent (and very short) breakdown of Jordan's arguments if you want to look into them further.

I myself intend to cover more Jordan Peterson at some point so watch this space.

Anyway, Jordan and his daughter want you to know that they are very oppressed. Lets get into it.

00:11, Mikhaila Peterson: "This might not be the most fun conversation but I thought before we delve into how awful this, I thought I could just read a brief background I wrote about what's been going on so people are caught up to speed. Is that OK?"

Jordan Peterson: "Yep."

Mikhaila Peterson: "The gist of it is, it looks like your license is getting taken away."

Or you could grow up and do the training.

One thing I truly don't understand about this is why does Jordan care so much if his license is taken away?! He's not a professor anymore and he isn't even a practicing psychologist anymore. He smelled the conservative grift money and went there.

If his fans have still stuck with Jordan through the absolute embarrassment that has been his career, they aren't gonna care if his license is taken away.

Mikhaila briefly recaps her fathers battle with the Ontario College of Psychologists.

03:28, Mikhaila Peterson: "So, are you OK?"

Jordan Peterson: "It's tiring, you know. I'm preparing for this tour, I have a--I'm finishing two books, they're very complicated, they take pretty much all my attention and having to fight this war, well it's tiring. I have to plot, strategize, write, watch my tongue, consider my next best move, and I also have to face the dismal reality that, as I wrote in the National Post, in some real fundamental sense Canada's Charter of Rights isn't worth the papers it's printed on."

Again, this isn't a charter issue. The profession of psychology in Ontario is self-regulated and follows the Standards Of Professional Conduct which Jordan violated multiple times. Jordan wants to have his cake (being able to say inflammatory stuff on the internet) and eat it too (face no consequences from the Ontario College of Psychologists).

This oppression and woe is me B.S that Jordan is pulling here is also deeply vomit inducing. Jordan has an estimated net worth of $10 million and a job with a media platform that pays him massive amounts of money to say literally anything he wants without consequences (at least from them). Jordan Peterson isn't this oppressed victim, he's a petulant child whining about being forced to face the consequences of his actions.

04:54, Jordan Peterson: "The tweets that I really got criticized for, particularly the one regarding Paige or--Paige or however he or she wants to be referred to. I also regarded that as a professional obligation because I think it's incumbent on psychologists with an ounce of integrity point out the danger of having self-deluded, narcissistic, self-destructive, celebrities parade their proclivity to self-sterilize and self-mutilate as a public good on their public forums."

The portrayal of being transgender as a "proclivity to self-sterilize and self-mutilate" is poorly informed and overly verbose bigoted drivel.

What happened with Elliot Page was that Jordan was being a transphobic dick and deadnaming him while also saying that he "got his breasts removed by a criminal physician." It was completely unnecessary behavior and if Jordan characterizes this as him practicing psychology he should get his license removed immediately because no psychologist in their right mind would behave in this fashion.

I am shocked at the absolute gall that Jordan has to portray a trollish and sophomoric tweet designed to provoke a negative reaction as his duty as a psychologist. You want to talk about narcissism? This is it right here.

05:37, Jordan Peterson: "So, I don't regret any of that and I certainly-- you know me Mikhaila, I can feel guilty at the drop of a hat, it's actually one of my outstanding features."

Jordan, who is accusing all transgender people of being narcissists, ranting about his "outstanding features".

05:58, Jordan Peterson: "This is so ridiculous. I mean, the fact that the college accepted a complaint that was the entire transcript of my 3 hour discussion with Joe Rogan pretty much says it all."

Absolutely no idea if this is true or not because there's no way to verify it and Jordan isn't a reliable source at all. I could find no record of that complaint but since Jordan would know about complaints against him more than I would I'll give this one a "maybe" instead of an "outright lie". If Jordan is willing to provide evidence of this complaint, I will gladly accept it in the name of fairness.

But since Jordan opened the door, lets talk about his appearance on Rogan. A part of me wants to do a full debunk on this at some point (let me know if you'd like to see that) but I figured we could go over the finer points.

First of all, Jordan introduced himself as a psychologist when the show started. The reason that this is important is that he brought his profession into the interview so all of his comments on the show were made as a representative of the profession. The Ontario College absolutely has a right to scrutinize his statements he made, as a psychologist representing their profession, on the show.

Jordan made multiple extremely inflammatory comments on the Joe Rogan Experience. He declared that there's "no such thing as climate" despite not having any expertise on the subject as well as declaring that certain people "aren't black".

Naturally, this was a complete embarrassment for the psychological community and if his Rogan appearance contributed to the courts decision, I can see why.

06:11, Jordan Peterson: "And by the way, on the climate front, just that everyone is crystal clear on this. I think the climate models that are used to justify the encroaching tyranny planned are 100 percent untrustworthy."

Note how Jordan doesn't have any evidence for this. Like fellow Daily Wire grifter Matt Walsh, most of Jordan's arguments boil down to "because I said so". Why is science fake? Because Jordan said so and something about WEF conspiracies. Jordan has no evidence for what he's saying besides his feelings.

06:26, Jordan Peterson: "And I think that the notion that we should let people terrify us to death with notions of an impending climate apocalypse so that we have to be locked down in every possible manner. Give up our automobiles, give up our flights private or otherwise, give up our right to buy clothing, give up our right to eat, give up our right to keep grandma warm or cool in the summer lets say. It's like, no. Sorry. No, wrong in every possible way."

Who is saying that we give up all of these things? Sure, we are making changes but notice how none of that stuff has been banned nor has anybody suggested that we ban any of it.

Lets us the example of flights that Jordan brought up. Lets say that "they" tried to ban flights. There's absolutely no way that the airline industry would let that fly, pun intended. In 2023 alone the airline industry sunk $26.11 million dollars into lobbying. This is concerning for multiple reasons that I'm not going to get into, at least not in this episode, but it displays a trend of the airlines having considerable sway in American politics.

Some of these make even less sense. "The right to eat?" What does that even mean? Is he talking about limiting beef consumption? Because that's different than just flat-out eating. The right to keep grandma warm or cool? Again, hard to know what he's talking about since nobody has banned heating in buildings.

07:18, Jordan Peterson: "And, you know, you ask me how I'm doing. It's like, this didn't really come as a surprise so I'd already prepared for it."

Oh yeah, I forgot that this is all a response to what is basically "how are you?" This has been a four minute answer to "how are you?" and he's still going.

Is this how he responds to every question?

"Hey Jordan, can you please pass the salad?"

"THE WOKE MOB IS AFTER ME AND CLIMATE ISN'T REAL!!!!"

07:34, Jordan Peterson: "To some degree, we're gonna see what good we can make arise from this. And if this my opportunity to expose the machinations of the radical-left narcissistic resentful woke mob then bring it on boys."

Here's the thing about Jordan Peterson, he is basically a walking talking point. He just threw out every single right-wing talking point against the left onto the table and sat back as if he said something profound.

Isn't this guy supposed to be the rights intellectual powerhouse or something? I mean, I will admit that this is the only full Jordan Peterson produced video I have watched so maybe I caught him on a bad day, but so far I'm not seeing it at all.

07:55, Jordan Peterson: "We saw what happened to Claudine Gay, we saw what happened to UPenn. If the good people at the Ontario College of Psychologists think they're immune to such things, they have another thing coming."

"You were mean to me so I'm gonna get my big strong friends to go after you. How does that sound, huh?!" What is Jordan? 7?!

The ironic thing is that Jordan is doing exactly what he just accused the left of doing. He's essentially threatened to send the right-wing mob after the governing body of the Ontario College of Psychologists because they're telling him that he's not allowed to have his license while also being an idiot on the internet. Yet apparently we are the mob. Hard to reconcile with that.

08:20, Jordan Peterson: "Now they are definitely planning to do that because the rule is I have to be educated by people of their choice, at my expense, for whatever length of time they deem suitable until, by their standards I've learned whatever the hell lesson I'm supposed to learn. I can't even imagine what that lesson would be. It's like, don't tweet, don't speak, don't think, don't tell my clients the truth."

I love how Jordan can't even comprehend not being an asshole on the internet. For him, tweeting and speaking are intertwined with being a bigoted moron.

Also, he hasn't had "clients" for years. Unless he considers everybody who follows him on Twitter and watches his show to be a client. Am I a client now because I watched this?

09:04, Jordan Peterson: "So I'm set up for failure and my detractors will say 'Well, Dr Peterson you set yourself up for failure.' You know, whatever. But um-"

Mikhaila Peterson: "Those are the beetles I was referring to" (Mikhaila made a joke early in the episode that Jordan's detractors have the IQ of a beetle)

I prefer scarab myself.

09:28, Jordan Peterson: "You know, so much of it's preposterous. One of the things I asked the college, they never answered, I asked them forty questions in a letter of this level of impossibility. So one of them was 'So, you go out about a dozen of complaints, maybe they go out to like seventeen complaints and decided to proceed to thirteen, something like that, from people from all over the world detailing my crimes as we discussed.' Many of those complainants claimed falsely in writing to be clients of mine by the way, which didn't invalidate their opinions. None of them, just to be clear about this, none of them were clients of mine or knew clients of mine or were anyone I commented about on Twitter or knew anyone I commented about on Twitter, so we wanna be clear about that."

I can see why this was an impossible question that the College couldn't answer. You know why? Because it wasn't a question! It was just Jordan rambling for one minute.

Also, lets zero in on Jordans definition of what a client is because it is deeply confusing. Just two minutes ago, Jordan was saying that he was telling his clients the truth by posting on Twitter. So are his clients only people on Twitter who like what he has to say? I guess I'm not a client after all. Shame.

Just a reminder that we're still on "how are you?"

10:35, Jordan Peterson: "What's the consequence of losing my license? Well it's annoying because those are hard licenses to get and I worked very hard to earn and deserve that license and to maintain it."

I love how his main argument is basically "this annoys me and I still waaaannnnnttt iiitttt."

Jordan Peterson, again the intellectual powerhouse of the Conservative Movement, is acting like a child who thinks he has a right to act like an asshole and have the entire world bend over backwards to serve him. Next thing you know he's gonna threaten to hold his breath until the Ontario College Of Psychologists tells him he doesn't have to take the social media training.

10:47, Jordan Peterson: "And also very hard at being a good therapist, which I was. There were no complaints taken against me by anyone until I became known in the public sphere, so that's a good thing to consider."

This is ridiculous. So because there were no complaints taken against Jordan during his time as a therapist years and years ago, we are just supposed to ignore everything he's done since then?

That's like saying "Oh, I know I have a degree in law, haven't practiced law in years, and have made a name for myself by making disgusting statements about minorities. But you shouldn't take away my license to practice law because none of my clients lodged complaints against me when I was working as a lawyer."

11:20, Jordan Peterson: "At some point I'm going to determine that being a member of their pathetic little, incestuous, ideologically addled, resentment ridden, bureaucratic, micro-souled club, is not worth the effort."

Translation: "Oh yeah? Well I didn't want to be in your stupid club anyway!"

Seriously, when people tell me that Jordan Peterson is this intellectual powerhouse are they talking about the same guy? Am I being punked or something?!

12:14, Jordan Peterson: "When you bring them your 13 year old daughter who's in major distress. Who is so concerned about her body that she's thinking about sterilizing herself and having her breasts removed and your psychologist isn't gonna be able to do anything except lie to you that it's alright. How's that gonna go for ya?"

13 year old girls aren't given surgeries and puberty blockers are FDA approved medications that are completely reversible, far from sterilization. These puberty blockers have been shown to reduce suicidal ideation in the youth who receive them. It's pretty disgraceful that Jordan, a psychologist, is either unaware or willfully ignorant of these facts.

13:08, Jordan Peterson: "We'll play out this farce to it's end and I'll do that in the faith that if I conduct myself with a certain degree of honor and care that the results won't be precisely what my would be enemies would intend."

Honor and care = throwing a hissy fit on the internet apparently.

13:27, Mikhaila Peterson: "Yeah, this is worse--luckily you're in a position where this isn't gonna crush you but if this happened to somebody who didn't have multiple streams of income, what would they do? They'd just be re-educated and lie I suppose. Or quit."

I guess we are done with "how are you" now. I almost forgot that this video was built on the pretense of Mikhaila "interviewing" Jordan.

The thing about this argument that I've heard from Jordan and his ilk time and time again is that it ignores the massive scale difference between Jordan and your average psychologist.

Jordan has a massive platform and as a result his opinions are amplified. Considering the fact that he refers to himself as a psychologist, those views as a result become representative of the psychological community. Keep in mind that Jordan is operating in a profession dedicated to mental health, naturally having a psychologist running around sprouting harmful misinformation about transgender people (among other things) reflects poorly on the profession. Your average psychologist doesn't have that platform and, more rudimentarily, doesn't share Jordan's disgusting and oft bizarre views. Jordan Peterson isn't like you or me, he's a millionaire who has made millions by being a conservative media grifter and is now facing the consequences of his actions.

And do you think Jordan Peterson cares about the free speech of transgender people? Women? Hell no he doesn't! It would be a mistake to get roped in by his free speech warrior schtick because those are rules for thee and not for me.

14:26, Jordan Peterson: "Amy Hamm, the nurse in British Columbia, they've tortured her to death and she was very afraid of them and she's come out swinging again. So, you know, she's got some spine, that girl."

I had never heard of this "Amy Hamm" person before. Jordan later says that she "got in trouble for insisting that there's a biological difference between men and women" which automatically got that transphobe alarm ringing. So, who is Amy Hamm and what happened?

Amy Hamm is a nurse in British Columbia who got into hot water for making bigoted comments on social media about transgender people. Some of these lovely statements include "we have eyeballs and we will continue to use them to misgender you." and that "trans women are men". Essentially, she's a bigoted troll attempting to gain attention by targeting a vulnerable minority group. Also, tortured her to death is so ridiculously melodramatic.

Outside of the fact that it's a profitable and trendy thing to go after in the griftosphere, I don't get why these people care so much about transgender people. They just want to live their lives like you and me and aren't hurting anybody. What's going on with the right and trans people is pure unabridged bigotry.

Jordan rambles a bit more and it's more of the same stuff he said previously. It's not great but that's why we have the time skip. He complains a little about the CBC and I have already delved a little into that when I first checked in on Ezra Levant.

19:19, Jordan Peterson: "I don't have anything to lose. The worst they can do, and this is what they'll do, is they'll take my license and then I'll be known by those who wish to foster enmity against me as now disgraced psychologist Jordan Peterson."

Oh, trust me, Jordan isn't just now disgraced. He got there when he became addicted to benzos (which by the way is another reason why he arguably shouldn't have a license) and then proceeded to go to Russia to do an extremely medically dubious treatment in order to overcome his addiction.

Also, this video really flies in the face of a lot of Jordan's rules for life. In this video he hasn't taken responsibility for his actions (rule #4 in Twelve More Rules For Life) and he has absolutely gone down the road of arrogance and resentment (rule #11 in Twelve More Rules For Life). Rules for thee, not for me.

19:59, Jordan Peterson: "There's a reason that people 11 million copies of my book. The reason they bought 11 million copies of 12 Rules For Life was that they found it helpful, like psychologically helpful, which was it's purpose."

I normally wouldn't include this kind of quote but I feel like I need to address the fact that Jordan probably has made a positive impact on some peoples lives.

If you are reading this and Jordan Peterson has made a positive impact on your life, I am not here to discredit you or call you a bigot or any of that, as a matter of fact I am happy that you managed to turn your life around for the better and I wish you the best going forward. What you've got to understand though is that there are far better sources of the same common sense advice that Jordan touts in his books and lectures. Jordan has ideas around females and LGBTQ+ people that are genuinely harmful and will only serve to harm you if you embrace them. If you still need Jordan Peterson, go ahead and continue to watch his lectures and whatnot but heed my warning. The alt-right pipeline is a genuinely dangerous thing that I am trying to combat on this blog and Jordan is an easy way to enter it. Tread carefully and please do your own research.

Jordan talks about how he's going to stay in Canada and then an ad is inserted into the middle of the video. Not by YouTube mind you, by the Daily Wire. Ben's still gotta get his cash out of this! There's not really any content in this video at all. It's just Jordan switching between complaining and gloating.

26:20, Jordan Peterson: "I don't have a university, but I'm building one. That's kind of interesting"

OK, so what he's talking about here is Peterson Academy. It seems like it's essentially PragerU only more expensive.

31:01, Jordan Peterson: "When reality comes knocking, you're a fool if you turn away regardless of what it is. And it's the same thing now, this looks like bad news and it's certainly bad news for other professionals and I think Canadian professionals who aren't woke themselves and don't have their heads in the sand and their nether regions fully exposed for exploitation, lets say!"

Gotta sneak the transphobia in. So, I guess Jordan Peterson doesn't like trans people having jobs, shocker.

You are entitled to your opinions but you aren't entitled to be a divisive troll about them on social media because your employer might see that. We've lived in that reality for years and I find it absolutely bizarre that conservatives seem to be just figuring this out now.

33:47, Jordan Peterson: "I have some of the abilities of Cassandra. Cassandra was a seer who was fated to be entirely accurate in her predictions, her torture was that no one ever listened to her. So I don't have that problem because people do listen to me but I do have some ability to see down the road to where things are going."

"Yeah, I'm like Cassandra but BETTER. By the way, don't be arrogant."

I feel like that's a fitting end for this episode. Nothing particularly interesting happens in the last couple minutes. Just more of Jordan and Mikhaila rambling about politics and how the "woke moralists" are coming to get you.

Conclusion:

Well, I started writing this before the border stuff exploded so that's next on the chopping block, but seeing Jordan Peterson throwing a shit fit on the internet is certainly a nice break from the more serious topics covered here, at least hopefully for you guys.

Cheers and I'll see you in the next one.

[amiriafm]

if you’re hearing OLD SELF by FELIX CARTAL & OFELIA K playing, you have to know AMIRIA HALL (SHE/HER; CIS WOMAN) is near by! the FORTY EIGHT year old ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF THE ELLIE CAULKINS OPERA HOUSE and OWNER OF FINDERS KEEPERS (FORMER STAGE ACTRESS) has been in denver for, like, TEN YEARS. they’re known to be quite SENSITIVE, but being NURTURING seems to balance that out. or maybe it’s the fact that they resemble S.IMONE KESSELL. personally, i’d love to know more about them seeing as how they’ve got those A CUP OF TEA AT 3.A.M, THE NEED TO FILL SILENCE WITH SPEECH, TEXTING SOMEONE MULTIPLE TIMES IF THEY HAVEN’T RESPONDED, STATEMENT JEWELRY and SOFT HUMMING vibes. and maybe i’ll get my chance if i hang out around the DOWNTOWN DISTRICT long enough!

mentions: mental illness, psychosis, mental breakdown, abuse

amiria, the second child of a woman that already had a daughter. her parents weren't the best of friends and it was a situation-ship that quickly fell apart. it was agreed that her father would take her and raise her. she wouldn't really feel rejected by her mother until much later on, when her sister would much later on. there would be a jealousy but admiration for her sister and that would be one that couldn't be tainted.

she was always a creative child, one described as having too much of an imagination. amiria always preferred fiction over fact, playing different people and would try to put on a show to her father but he never seemed to be bothered. if anything, it made him less interested in her because he saw her as someone who'd grow to like theatres and musicals - he hated those kind of people.

school was something she'd always wanted to do well in, she tried but was easily distracted by others. amiria was one to always be easily influenced by her peers. she was intelligent but as soon as she learnt that getting full marks on tests would leave to incessant teasing, she'd get things wrong on purpose to 'balance herself out'. despite her need to be in a creative environment, to stand out, she wanted to fit in.

that was no different when her father finally let her join an amateur dramatics group. if he were to be truthful, he loved her singing voice but anything else wasn't for his ears. she loved being on stage, the idea of it but when it came down to it, she'd bottle all of it. still, she stuck with it. leaning more towards theatre and plays was a challenge in itself, the very friends that she'd made my losing those marks on tests icing her out because she was 'odd' or a 'theatre kid'. her father was telling her to be one way and her peers another - it was extremely confusing for her sense of self. her sister, kora, didn't help with that.

amiria definitely wasn't kora. she was sensitive, unable to follow instructions properly and definitely not going down the same path as kora. if anything, it made everyone's job easier around her as they had less effort into hiding things because amiria would trust in the good in people. although they didn't understand her, she loved her family, loved her father and her sister. it was kora's decision to come into her life, that's what she believed - that it was meant to be... however, there was a plummeting feeling she got whenever her 'mother' would stop by the house. of course, there had been some of her father's friends that naturally stepped into a nurturing role with the girl, taught her kindness above all else and she every much appreciated them but seeing her mother, with kora, someone older than her made her feel less than.

kora would be the one to comfort her, to convince her that it was because she'd do better this way but she'd always have her. the other would quickly change when she started to spiral. the other made fun of her to no avail and then claimed to support her. amiria didn't know what to believe but she had to believe that kora loved her. as she got closer with kora, her activities dwindled and she met the stage with less passion but still couldn't just give up on it.

there would be many nights where she'd completely break, either going off on tangents about things she believed were happening or just uncontrollably crying. her family wasn't equipped to deal with it and frankly, they didn't want to. she wasn't 'strong' therefore she was an embarrassment. even kora stopped talking to her because people were beginning to talk. it didn't take much for amiria to highlight herself as the common denominator in these scenarios. she was begging kora to take her back, that she was sorry, that she'd do better but there was an extreme wedge between them. it became more apparent when kora became a mother and she didn't want her there because she didn't trust her...

her teachers were concerned about her as her grades were dropping considerably, she was distracted all of the time and she couldn't sleep. it was getting worse and her own family was just letting her implode. if it weren't for one of her father's friends, she would have imploded entirely. the woman tried to get her on track as much as possible, even encouraged her to apply to study abroad because she knew she was built for better things but in reality, her mental health was suffering and she needed an out.

that support would go leaps and bounds. amiria would audition and be accepted to drama school in the usa, the woman would also pay for her to do a business course at the same time in case it failed - she'd set her up for success as much as she could. for a few years she would make it and start building herself up as a stage actor. she'd made it and that made her elated. there was a lot of pressure, there was bound to be but she felt like she could handle it. she was having difficulty with the harsh criticism but most of it was all in her head.

the woman was always someone to take care of other cast and crew members but as she spiralled, she seemed to drop that role completely. it all came to a head on a night out when she'd not been making any sense, that she was suspicious of all of them plotting her downfall and the night ended up with her in the emergency room.

it was the night that highlighted she needed help after suffering with an undiagnosed mental illness for years. after a brief stint in inpatient care, she went to live with one of the crew members she'd become close to in colorado. her run in the production was over and her understudy took her place without a hitch. they helped her get back on her feet, even helped her with her application to become an artistic director - it was successful. then, she felt like a little was missing - finders keepers was bought on a whim, something that wasn't really thought out, perhaps an impulsive purchase but it was her own little project that made sure that she didn't lose touch with people, to keep her grounded and it worked for her. there was a worry that she was doing too much but she seemed to thrive on it.

she still lives with the other creative (will be a wc) only this time, they both live in a property of hers in the downtown district. her now best friend does feel some sort of responsibility to help her, to keep making sure she's okay and doesn't entirely trust her to live alone - if amiria is being honest, she wouldn't want to.

amiria tries to keep herself as busy as possible so frequently gets involved in the local theatre productions (a little too much but she hasn't learnt that less is more) and is the first to donate money and clothing from her store to help production. she did audition to act but bottled the audition as it brought up Some Feelings for her so isn't going to try that again. she loves theatre though and will always love it - she's just not built for acting and hasn't quite accepted it but is slowly getting there.

she wants to be liked and it's so obvious. she tries to be kind, to the point where she could be described as a door mat and also quickly attaches herself to people. she tries to be a good friend but can be Too Much sometimes.

[ink-man-sam]

Eventually, you will reach a point in your life where it turns out that the person you trusted and loved, who always listend to all your worries and made you feel seen, just wanted to fuck you the entire time. They just saw you as a fucking object to fulfill their needs with. And then you will reject them, because you thought they were your best friend and everything you gave them was enough. But it wasn't. And then they will leave you behind to rot. They will find the next object they want to use, perhaps someone they wouldn't even have known if you didn't introduce them to each other. And then they will hit it off and they will leave you behind. And they won't even look back. They will still know about all the abuse and suffering you're going through. They still know, but they won't care anymore. Because they won't get what they want from you. Because you didn't bend over and let them assault you in your sleep like they did to your other friend. They will put all the focus onto the classmate you introduced to them, because they are easier than you. Because they'll fulfill their disgusting desire. And you will just be another "mistake" in their eyes. They will leave you behind, they will forget you and even talk shit about you behind your back. Call you "just another fake friend" because you don't fuck every hole that crosses your path.

You guys don't even have tumblr and are never going to see this, but I just want you to know how fucking angry I am at you.

I trusted you. I loved you and I defended you as much as I could for way too long. I thought you actually cared about me. I thought you actually wanted to see me get better. I thought you were gonna stay my friend and support me. But you fuckig left me behind. You only ever saw me as a dumb little toy you could eventually fuck if it got desperate enough. I hate how badly you fucking used me and I hate how I almost caved in back then. When my best friend, our mutual friend, someone I thought you also cared about and someone I have now grown to love and trust more than you, told me about how pushy and gross you became, I doubted it. I thought you were just going through a weird phase, or that it was just a joke and that you were gonna snap back to reality eventually. But you didn't. After you got told to leave her the fuck alone so many times, you kept harassing her with your disgusting remarks. You purposefully separated us and made sure you were alone. You waited until she fell asleep and became vulnerable. And you fucking assaulted her. Multiple times. I don't care that "it was just a kiss" or that "you just couldn't help yourself". It's fucking disgusting. You are fucking disgusting. I'm wishing you the worst.

And don't even get me started on YOU. You have pissed me off and sent me into mental breakdowns on multiple occasions now. You are the only person in my class I could really talk to, and I would almost even call you a friend. But you keep hurting me. Over and over again. And now, after helping you get through your struggling with your gender, after introducing you to another person and offering you a space in my friend group, this is how you repay me? You purposefully trigger my dysphoria constantly (because it CANNOT be an accident anymore at this point), you go to therapy, you are starting hrt so much sooner than me and keep rubbing in my face how amazing your transition is going, knowing full well how much my transness makes me suffer. You use me as a fucking means of entertainment to flex your "psychology knowledge" on, and then you turn around and talk shit about me. Instead of actually talking to me if you've got an issue wih me how we promised, you went behind my fucking back and talked shit about me with the person you wouldn't even know without me. You turn around and spend more time with her than with me. You start fucking stealing her from me. You both fucking start excluding me even tho I'm the one who brought you together in the first place. You start fucking each other and stroke your sympathy-boners about how "bad you are doing, and how bad your attachment issues are and how no matter what happens, everyone betrays you".

Genuinely fuck both of you. You both know what you are doing to me. What you have done to me. What you have done to my friends. If I had the choice, I would never see any of you ever again, but I will have to see you every day for the next three years.

I hope your "fuck-buddy" relationship fails and you start hating each other. I hope you fuck each other up emotionally so that I can watch you suffer the same way you keep watching me suffer.

[edutainer2022]

Sooooooo... it didn't eventually end as badly as as I imagined (hoped)... But yeah, lots of distress all around.

John and Virgil's conversation is precious! Yeah, Johnny, you can't call dibs on every bagle in existence. And you can't lock your brother in a padded vault so that nothing ever hurts him again. Unfortunately. But John's fear is so real. He's freaking out, because she’s a "factor". John knows causation and correlation laws. They indeed just got him back from the brink of darkness, twice, and John CAN'T think they can loose him again. The image of Allie being so smitten by awesome big brother he wanted and autograph is golden. Scott was in such a good place... There's may be a tinge of lowkey jealousy on John's part - Scott shares with this woman what he still can't with his brothers, not really. An understanding they can never have. John doesn't do understandings he can't have. John doesn't do emotional overdrive well. John absolutely doesn't do a lost Scott or a hurt Scott. Ergo, John is freaking out. Virgil, bless him, is more grounded and realistic because Virgil knows human emotions better than John. And deals with them better. Nothing breaks like a heart, indeed, but it's also resilient. And they're all there for each other. There's no sure inoculation or quarantine against pain. John, having put 52 000 miles between himself and the world that hurt him, would disagree. Although... it's Scott. Scott gets intense and Scott spirals (as was evident through this conundrum too). Scott, probably, starts off with Tiffany and a 100 roses, not bagles, sent over. Scott takes rejection as his fault and a personal failure. So maybe John's concerns are not too off the mark. That Ruby conundrum needs a closer inspection!

The texts... oh my! That was... harsh. True to where Estera was coming from but still... on THAT side of the line. The way Scott explained in lengthy paragraphs. The way he apologized for a call out on the rescue. Multiple times. The way he paced, spiraled and screamed into a pillow. The way he "didn't want" anything from her. He did, in a way. He thought he found a kindred spirit and that kinship was welcome. Well, not as welcome as the fear and fight/flight resoonse. He probably relied on the default that people would know of his civilian persona, at least - billionaire tycoon - and reasonably assume he had a security department and access to vast deposits information. Not assume he's the worst of human scum right away. The way he snapped at Eos. A PA who takes things literally indeed, hehe.

Eos' breakdown is so raw. She's a kiddo. She upset her now favorite uncle, she broke John's directive not to upset Scott, she done messed up - and she's not adult enough to process it all accordingly. AI or not.

Estera is right about one thing - it is scary to be on the wrong side of the Tracies. They may not see it because they know they're good people. But if I were Scott, I wouldn't be so blanket statement about the vengefulness - there's John. His brother got triggered into a full flashback, then distressed and heartbroken, his daughter got into a meltdown in the crossfire, all because a school teacher doesn't read Page Six or watches the news. I don't think she's John's favorite person right now.

Scott's nervous obsession (and a baking spree) while checking the messages and waiting for "the verdict" was both endearing and more than a little sad. It still trumps jumping into One, of course, so that's progress. He saved her life twice, without thinking. Maybe he deserved the benefit of the doubt. He was also, of course, ready to back off from her life and not make her uncomfortable in any way. He will absolutely attribute that to his need for companionship over shared trauma, and not only issues of security. If not now, then later. Because Scott, certainly, needs another proof that when he actively seeks something for his own sake - it only makes matters worse and he should just hide better and not impose on people. I dunno... We're back to cute Dad jokes. Things with Eos are on the mend. So maybe it's fine, really. I feel like there's a shoe waiting to drop still. Maybe I'm paranoid.

Estera - Ch 17 - Haunted

Oops. It all went a bit pear shaped didn’t it?

John&Virgil discuss bagels, EOS goes loopy and Scott fails to enjoy his whisky.

Another long one, but a lot had to happen before I could tag @sofasurf back in for the next chapter so… buckle up ;)

(Previous… Prologue - Stars are Only Visible in Darkness, Estera - 1 - Colour, 2 - Dinosaur, 3 - Shoes, 4 - Thunderbird, 5 - Lesson, 6 - Safe, 7 - Gull, 8 - Deliver, 9 - Coffee, 10 - Flight, 11 - Run, 12 - Fall, 13 - Trying, 14 - Hide, 15 - Wait, 16 - Distraction)

(Sofasurf’s Recrudescence which is the foundation for all of this)

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“Hey Johnny what’s up?”

“Don’t call me Johnny.”

“Sure.” Virgil squinted as he rubbed out a middle C on the score he was drafting and replaced it with the Ab. Ah, perfect. He smiled to himself, he was nearly there with this one.

“Scott sent bagels to the girl.”

“He… bagels?”

“Yes. Bagels.”

Virgil frowned and scrubbed out 4 bars of the bass line. Too derivative.

“Bagels, Virgil.”

“You can’t have every bagel on the planet John, got to let us earthbound types have a few of them.”

“What? That’s not… Virgil! Pay attention this is important!”

Virgil sighed and closed the manuscript. “What are you concerned about John?”

“It’s HER. He’s… getting too… involved. What if…? Look what happened before.”

If he couldn’t already tell from the furrowed brow, John’s uncharacteristic incoherence would speak volumes about how worried he was. And Virgil sympathised, he really did. Worried-about-Scott was a fairly constant state of mind for him too. But this time… he just didn’t see it.

“John, he’s… happy. He’s on form, he’s fit, he’s enjoying himself - that rescue yesterday? He was on fire, honestly. I thought Allie might ask for his autograph at some point. He’s relaxed. He’s laughing again. I think he might actually be sleeping occasionally.” Virgil paused for a moment and experienced a rush of thankfulness as he processed exactly how relieved he was by how things had changed in recent weeks.

“EXACTLY Virgil. We’ve only just got him back! What if she… triggers something? Or… or breaks his heart? What if next time we don’t get him back?”

“I don’t think she’s any more likely to break his heart than anyone else. Remember the Ruby Summers debacle?”

John cringed. That had been a difficult month for anyone within a 2 mile radius of their eldest brother.

“If he’s interested in her romantically he’s moving unusually slowly for him. You know what he’s like. It’s entirely possible he’s just trying to be supportive - they clearly have something in common. He told me she understands things he can’t explain. Don’t you think it’s good for him to have a friend who does?”

“But…”

“Either something will come of it or it won’t, John. And if he gets hurt we’ll be here. Like we would for any of us.”

Holographic shoulders slumped.

“He won’t thank you for interfering, John.”

“I’m not going to!”

“Good.”

His brother’s image winked out while still muttering and Virgil turned back to his manuscript. He chuckled to himself

“Bagels eh? That’s a new one, Scotty.”

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Can I ask you something?

Of course!

Fire away

How do you know my address?

Scott?

Ok, I was hoping that wouldn’t be a complicated question.

Please answer the question.

You can’t, can you?

You see I’m ex-directory, always have been. I opted out.

To stop creepy people looking me up, actually.

My name and address isn’t anywhere public.

Have you had me followed?

Is it the young guy with the ridiculous beard and the labradoodle Bez has befriended on the beach?

It is isn’t it?

I knew there was something odd about him. He was too friendly.

I can’t believe this.

Please stop. I don’t know what kind of person you think I am, but I am not that kind of person.

Ok? I’m not interested in… whatever it is you want.

Please leave me alone.

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8 hours of mudslide hell and Scott was ready to drop. Debrief was postponed until they’d all got some sleep and he hastened to the privacy of his room, opening up the messages app on his comm as he did so. A notification popped up - 15 unread messages.

A little warm glow nestled at the base of his rib cage and he smiled, deciding to go and sit on the balcony under the stars to read them. Maybe with a small measure of whisky. As he poured it he remembered she’d been about to ask him something.

He sat back and toasted the moon then opened the chat as he took a sip.

His blood ran cold.

He put the glass down with a shaking hand and sank his teeth into his fist, desperately trying not to panic. He needed to react calmly and slowly and not like the psychopath she clearly thought he was.

He scanned the messages again and they were even worse on second reading.

Slow be damned. He’d already apparently ignored her for hours. He fired back a message.

Estera I promise this isn’t what you think it is.

I understand why you think it is but it isn’t.

Please let me explain.

He downed the whisky and started pacing the balcony.

I haven’t had you followed.

I don’t ‘want anything’ from you.

Please believe me.

The messages remained unread.

“EOS!!”

“Hello Scott”

“EOS which directory did you use to look up Estera’s address?”

“I didn’t use a directory, Scott. I already knew the address.”

Scott closed his eyes. The school staff records. Of course she didn’t need to look it up.

He hadn’t considered EOS would even need to do anything… EOS-ey. It hadn’t occurred to him Estera wouldn’t be in the public directory, most people were these days. Those who weren’t… there was usually a reason.

And now he’d scared her. Which was categorically the last thing on the planet he wanted to do.

He checked again and the messages were still unread. He resisted the urge to throw his comm into the pool and walked quietly back into his room to place it on the bedside table. And then very calmly sat on the side of the bed, picked up the fluffiest cushion in his arsenal and screamed a string of curses into it.

“Scott you are distressed? I am sorry I didn’t mean to upset you. What did I do wrong? Can I fix it please?”

She actually sounded upset. He’d somehow managed to upset the emotionless AI. At what point had John programmed ‘shaky tearful voice’ into his robot friend?

He placed the cushion carefully on his knees, pressed his lips together and shook his head. He opened the message app again. Still nothing.

“No, EOS, you can’t fix it. Please leave me alone now. I need to think.”

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Alan slid across the kitchen floor in his socked feet, cracking the seal on the instant noodles and popping the microwave door in one slick movement. Nice. He put them inside and set the timer before stretching with a loud yawn and a satisfied grin. It wasn’t gourmet but fast food was food and it was fast. 13 seconds later he leapt backwards in surprise as with a loud POOF the packet exploded into flames.

Huh. Maybe the microwaveable noodles weren’t microwaveable after all. He must have messed up and put the wrong kind in. Oops.

Ok, fine. He grabbed one of the slower, ‘just add boiling water’ type instead and flicked the switch on the kettle. The fuse blew immediately. He pouted. Why wouldn’t the universe let him have noodles tonight?

The cleaning bot whirred into life and threw itself down the stairs with a clatter.

Then all the lightbulbs went out one by one.

He stood in the dark, trying not to freak out when he heard a faint, almost childish sob from the lounge and did his best not to whimper as he backed into the corner.

He opened his comm and whispered in a definitely calm and not at all terrified way:

“John… John…? I think we got a haunting situation going on. Please help.”

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John answered his little brother’s call whilst dodging flying bagels and consequently he didn’t entirely understand Alan’s whispered SOS the first time.

Taking cover in the shower cubicle, he asked him to repeat it. The shower switched on at full power and minimum temperature.

“EOS! Please! Can we talk about this?”

There was silence and the lights flickered.

“Alan, I think I know what’s happened. There’s no ghost, I promise. I’ll call you back ok?”

There was a whimper from the other end of the line and an eerily similar one from out in the gravity ring. He poked his head around the door and hoped that this time around he wasn’t about to be crushed to death.

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Scott typed and deleted messages over and over.

What was the point if she wasn’t picking them up?

Why didn’t she have her phone? Had something happened?

She’d been ill… what if it had been more serious than she thought? What if… what if she needed help and nobody was there?

He itched to jump into One and to just go and CHECK. But that would obviously be a terrible idea in the current circumstances.

He glared at his comm, willing the ticks to turn green. And then startled as they did.

Nothing happened for what felt like hours but might have been only moments. Then

✨Estera✨ is typing…

He waited, hardly daring to breathe.

I’m listening.

Right. You’ve got one shot at this, Tracy.

Ok… first I’m so sorry for going quiet, we had a long rescue and there just wasn’t chance to check messages. I wasn’t deliberately ignoring you. I hadn’t actually read your question as it popped up just before we launched, if I had I would have answered it as it’s a good question.

Ok.

I messed up. A call came in yesterday as I was putting the order through and I had to launch One to rescue some climbers but I didn’t know how long it would take.

I just wanted to make sure you had something you could eat when you woke up. That’s all it was. I was worried I’d miss the delivery slot if I waited so

We have this new PA who is…

She’s great but she takes things very literally and I did not explain adequately. It was my fault.

I asked her to look up your address and add it to the order. She has access to non-public information for some of the stuff we have to do with work and I didn’t think to tell her to restrict her search when it was a personal matter.

I’m sorry, it was a breach of your privacy and I will have words with her on the topic.

I don’t know your address.

And I won’t ever know it unless you tell it to me.

I see.

And if anything else I’ve said or done has made you uncomfortable, I apologise.

Honestly I have no ulterior motive here.

I’d like to be friends if you wanted that and I’m here for you if you ever need anything but otherwise…

I just want you to be ok. But I understand if it’s too much

I know I can be too much

I can back off.

I’m rambling and will shut up now. 😏

Ok. Thank you for explaining.

I’m going to need to think for a while.

Sure, whatever you need. No rush from me.

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John’s hologram popped up looking concerned. Scott sighed and bit back an impatient comment.

“I’m fine, John.”

“EOS…”

“Is tattling on me again I assume?”

“No… she’s having some kind of breakdown about upsetting you.”

“Oh. Perfect.”

“What’s up?”

“Personal thing. It’s ok. Don’t worry about it.”

John looked like he was going to argue.

“Please? Just… let me deal with my own stuff ok? I will ask if I need anything. What’s up with EOS? Tell her it’s ok - the misunderstanding was my fault not hers.”

John looked over his shoulder and dropped his voice such that Scott had to stop pacing to hear properly.

“She had a small… tantrum, in the kitchen. I believe Alan is hiding in the cupboard under the sink, could you go and rescue him?”

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He’d like to say he hadn’t been checking for new messages on a 3 minutely basis but it wouldn’t be strictly accurate.

He’d achieved a lot in between the compulsive refreshing though. First he got his big brother face on and coaxed Alan out of the cupboard. Following a brief conversation with John about toning down the “Do Not Upset Scott” aspect of her programming, he reassured EOS she was still his favourite niece and set about replacing the fuse in the kettle. He powered through the GDF paperwork then made precisely 74 chocolate chip pancakes because pancakes were definitely an acceptable substitute for sleep.

3 hours and 26 minutes later there was a soft ping from his comm.

Hello Scott

A soft voice in the back of his mind that sounded a lot like Virgil murmured “wait…” so he bit his lip and sat on his hands. The “is typing” symbol pulsed at him maddeningly.

I don’t know what you meant by having “words” but please don’t sack your PA or anything.

Hi Estera

Oh, no, I wouldn’t do that. It’s a training issue and thus my responsibility to sort out.

Ok.

Another pause.

I’m sorry I overreacted.

I don’t know that you did - it was a reasonable reaction to what you thought had happened.

Hmm.

And I’m sorry you were left thinking it so long. I should have said I had to go.

I should have guessed really. With your job being what it is.

Maybe. But you were also understandably freaked out so…

You’re quite an intimidating family you know.

We are?

Err yes?!!!!

The thought of being on the wrong side of you guys is… worrying.

When I thought… well. I didn’t know how I could escape. I was scared.

I’m sorry. I don’t know what to say really except we aren’t exactly the vengeful type.

But I don’t want you to think you have to be on any side of us… or of me.

If you want I can just say it was good to meet you, I’m glad that we both survived and wish you well.

Hmm would be kind of sad though.

Why is that?

I guess I’d miss the awful jokes…

Well fortunately I have an almost infinite supply of them.

I suspect I will live to regret saying that

Ha! 🤣

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Why could nobody see the seagull?

Because it was in da skies!

I hereby award you Level 1 Dad Jokes.

Is there a badge?

I’ll look into it.

Scott grinned to himself and opened up a comm channel.

“EOS?”

“Yes Scott?”

“You’ll like this one…”

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[kataraslove]

I was just told a few days ago that they love momtara becauses it tragic that she has to do all the workd for people until of couse Zuko comes along to help out making it less tragic and that logic made zero sense. katara is not cinderella im not sure why her so called fans want her to be cinderella.. or a damsel in distress until zuko comes along its not very pro katara to me it feels the exact opposite.

there’s this really great thread made by my friend @rukihimehive on kataangthinker on twitter debunking momtara with evidence from the series. i highly suggest giving that a read if you’re as tired of the fandom adultifying katara as i am.

I’ve seen momtara enthusiasts say that anyone who is critical of the fandom trope is “taking away her maternal nature, which is associated with her trauma of having lost her mother from a young age.” in other words, “if you don’t support fandom’s insistence that katara is the gaang’s literal mother figure and interpret all her interactions with the gaang as motherly, you’re erasing her trauma.”

which is so ridiculous to me. in the episode the runaway, katara herself dislikes the label of motherly. she takes personal offence over the idea that the gaang would view her as their mother instead of their peer, and demands to know if it’s true that her behaviour comes across as too motherly, especially because “motherly” is associated with negative connotations such as “bossy,” and “overbearing.”

I’ve seen people state that the gaang’s treatment towards katara is unhealthy, that katara is forced to do all the emotional work and emotional labour and none of the gaang ever supports her in anything. which just isn’t even remotely true.

episodes like the desert - in which the gaang are under extenuating circumstances that forces katara to step up and take care of them - are the exception, not the standard. in bitter work, katara explains to toph on how they divide the chores amongst themselves. katara takes personal issue (and for good reason) when toph only wants to do her share.

there’s multiple episodes in which the gaang help pitch the tent and perform campsite duties. there’s a whole episode dedicated to how katara and sokka are both sick, resulting in aang having to run across the world to retrieve them medicine. there’s an entire episode dedicated to how the gaang cannot get anything done without sokka, who usually manages their schedules and itineraries and helps ensure that they’re on track. there’s plenty of moments in which aang and katara are goofing off, and sokka gets mad at them for not sticking to his carefully curated and meticulous schedule and for putting a wedge in their plans to save communities (see: imprisoned and the painted lady). there’s moments when toph assumes responsibility; there’s moments when aang assumes responsibility. and then there’s moments when none of them have any clue on what to do, when they literally act like children navigating a world that’s constantly trying to kill them.

and what about in katara-centric episodes? what about in the episodes dedicated to developing her character? surely the selfish gaang couldn’t possibly support and understand her goals and desires?

1. imprisoned - sokka and aang aide in katara’s plan to immediately get captured and free haru. aang takes her side when katara suggests to free the prisoners. aang and sokka aide katara in freeing the imprisoned earthbenders.

2. the waterbending master - aang rejects learning from a sexist because pakku refuses to teach katara. aang agrees to train katara everything he learns in the middle of the night. aang and sokka cheer katara on as she goes head-to-head with master pakku.

3. the puppetmaster - the gaang allows katara the opportunity to learn waterbending from hama, a southern water tribe bender, until they discover what hama’s been doing all along. sokka and aang rush to confront hama and to protect katara. later, they provide katara comfort after she breakdowns over learning how to bloodbend.

4. the painted lady - aang calls katara a secret hero for helping people in need, even though katara lied to the gaang and pretended that appa was sick. he later helps katara destroy the factory, and then aides in her plan to confront the fire nation soldiers as the painted lady.

sokka defends his sister’s actions:

“Maybe she is a waterbender, but she was just trying to help you. Because of her, that factory won't be polluting your river, and the army is gone. You should be down on your knees thanking her!”

the southern raiders - this episode is so misconstrued by fandom that every reading of it has become so far detached by canon. no, sokka and aang were not demonizing katara for believing that revenge was the suitable option for her (we find out in the episode that it wasn’t). yes, katara wanted far more than just confrontation (she said it herself - maybe revenge was what he deserved). no, aang was not demonizing katara for stating that her words reminded him of jet’s, who had died a noble death and who katara had personally mourned for. no, jet is not a terrorist and/or a psychopath - he was a child indoctrinated by propaganda and motivated by the death of his parents at the hands of the fire nation. aang and sokka do not interfere in katara’s decision to pursue the man who killed her mother, even if they felt that katara might end up killing that man. no, if katara had killed that man, aang and sokka would not shut her out or ignore her or make her feel subhuman. aang himself had several instances in which he would have taken several lives (sandbenders) if katara hadn’t stopped him. that’s why he says, “I’m proud of you,” because katara arrived at that moral decision on her own, without the influence of external sources (reminder that in the desert, katara had to physically stop aang). at the end of the episode, katara discusses with aang that forgiveness was not the approach she would take towards yon rha, but it was the approach that she would take towards zuko, who had earned her forgiveness.

in each of the above katara-centric episodes (with the sole exception of tsr, which I had described in great detail) the gaang understands katara’s goals and desires and helps her accomplish them, and protects and defends her. to me, that does not come across as a dynamic in which katara is overwhelmingly at risk and treated like absolute dirt. it’s actually quite telling on the quality of a fictional ship (or lack thereof) when fans must demonize katara’s friends and family in order to prop up her fanon love interest.

and when her fanon love interest DOES join the group, nothing… really changes in terms of the dynamics. he serves them tea occasionally? he tells sokka to get out of a bison’s mouth? katara still performs the cooking duties. katara still asks if zuko’s okay and makes sure that he’s included in group activities. the gaang turn to zuko because he is sufficient at hunting down aang, but they all formulate a plan for the comet together. one throwaway line informing someone to get out of the bison’s mouth and him being a strict teacher towards aang does not make him a dad. especially when none of the gaang truly see him as a dad and would probably die of laughing before even considering him as such.

that’s not to even mention the point of zuko’s arc when joining the gaang is not for him to assume an authority, paternal role over a group of kids younger than him (but around his age). it’s for him to finally realize that he belongs to a group of children as traumatized as him, to a family for once in his life. so why should fandom enforce him into a pseudo dad role that isn’t even canon nor would his character even want?

going back to katara, at her core katara is a young, fourteen year old child who has been forced to assume a motherly role to compensate for the loss of her mother. episodes like the runaway delve into how this trauma has forced her to grow up and act older than her age, but at the end of the day, she is still a child and does not wants to be viewed by her peers as some form of motherly figure. which is why it’s so important that characters like aang and toph remind her that she still is a kid, like them.

dark-skinned female characters like katara suffer from the phenomenon of adultification and hypersexualization in fandom spaces. their characters are treated as pseudo mother figures, irregardless of what the narrative could or could not outline for the audience. momtara is a problematic trope because it erases the nuanced dynamics in katara’s relationship with her friends and family, assuming that all interactions with the gaang are of her being their mother. and that canonically, that’s all katara can be towards them. especially in the interest of a ship.

[shsl-cringefail-tournament]

OK lemme once again present my mondo pitch BECAUSE WHILE I REALLY LIKE KOMAEDA AND I THINK HE IS ALSO VERY CRINGEFAIL, i still think mondo is more cringefail ummm (spoilers for thh and sdr2 btw) so just going into the specifics of their murder trials super quick since it provides a good contrast. KOMAEDA is like really really fucking smart. It can't be understated that komaeda, while he is very sopping wet, he is also INCREDIBLY cunning and knows EXACTLY how to milk his luck for all its worth when he wants to. His trial makes the characters flip flop between whether its not a suicide MULTIPLE times and it takes the group a WHILE to bust out of that accusation. his plan nearly succeeds multiple times before the truth comes out practically last second. And this isn't even mentioning trial one when we've only just begun to pull the thread, or fuck, the final dead room for that matter. Or how he's always like ten steps ahead of everyone in SOME regard. MONDO'S trial is like the complete polar opposite where aside from chiaki (and considering the circumstances of that i barely consider that a murder outside of the kg's rules), mondo is the only person in the series to my knowledge whose murder isn't premeditated. Absolutely NO plan until the moment He knew Chihiro was dead, and even then most of his coverup was to benefit her and not him, and this is made like. super duper clear. The only reason his trial becomes even remotely complicated is because a third party outside of him and Chihiro INTERFERES. Not to mention that one of the main catalysts for his entire story crumbling was a total slip of the tongue. He even just straight up admits it before the last piece of evidence can be presented. He doesn't even really have a BREAKDOWN, he just kinda. gives right up once he knows its all over. There are plenty other mondo traits that make him a sopping wet cat of a man but a lot of people have said them already so here's like. a list. this one's for you, mondoblr - has been rejected by ten girls because he shouts when he's nervous - can't hold a hamburger - toxic masculinity (very cringe) (I can fix him) - doesn't know that not every guy owns a motorcycle - likes both dogs and cats but is insecure about the cat part - one of his favorite gifts are the roller slippers hes so lame - can't win any poll ever i think that counts here - literally always overshadowed by Kiyotaka always - please watch a compilation of all his lines in the english dub of the anime he sure does say some words!! Anyway thats it thats my mondo propaganda heart smile.

Mondo Owada for SHSL Cringefail propaganda!

[miraculouscontent]

Not really directed at anything specifically, more just based on things I’ve heard from friends and what they say others are talking about. Just needed to get this off my chest.

So... “Syren” airs, and Chat Noir gets upset by a secret that is neither Plagg’s nor Ladybug’s to tell. Both the fandom and the show/writers think he is right for doing this, even as he threatens to quit while Paris drowns if not told the secret. He is ultimately rewarded in the end with the secret because, according to one of the writers, “Chat was correct and deserved to know.”

Later down the line, “Truth” gets a synopsis.

It hasn’t aired, it simply gets a synopsis (I must also add that a previous synopsis in the same season had been wrong).

Based on said synopsis, the fandom gets riled up about Luka supposedly being upset by a secret Marinette is keeping (her identity), going on about how he “doesn’t have a right to Marinette’s secret,” “is being extremely entitled,” and “doesn’t deserve to know Marinette’s identity,” as it is “Marinette’s right” to tell whoever she wants.

In truth, the actual episode features Luka struggling and fighting against the akuma, because he actually believes that he is not, in fact, entitled to Marinette’s secret, wanting her to share it rather than it being forced out of her. He is then “punished” for this when the show has the couple break up due to Marinette believing that she’s not allowed to have a boyfriend, all thanks to her secrets. Nevertheless, Luka maintains his previous stance and wants Marinette to tell him things whenever she’s ready to do so.

“Gang of Secrets” airs two episodes later, featuring the exact opposite philosophy. Over the phone, Marinette’s friends claim that they want her to talk with them when she’s ready, only to barrel into her room minutes later and insist that she talk to them. She refuses, kicking them out, and they get akumatized without resistance in order to force her to tell them her secret. After the fact, without so much as an on-screen apology from them, Marinette folds and talks about (some of) her problems. This also features another “whenever you’re ready” from Alix that may or may not be a simple joke given how the group laughs at it. Once all but Alya and Marinette are left in the room, Marinette has a mental breakdown and gives Alya her most precious secret: her identity as Ladybug.

Upon this episode airing, the fandom is upset at Marinette, not for telling her secret, but for not telling Chat Noir her secret instead of Alya, because Chat deserved her secret. This is also after “Chat Blanc,” where Marinette is aware that “her love with Chat” and Chat knowing her identity nearly led to the end of the world, and it is later confirmed in “Sentibubbler” that Marinette has actual trauma over the moment, never made aware of the specific mistake Chat made (i.e: keeping his knowledge of her identity a secret) that caused the issue in the first place, thus leaving her with all of the blame as the timeline is scrubbed away and Adrien is left with no actual lesson, even from Bunnix who could’ve chided him for his priority on love over safety. Chat received no consequences for this (not remembering his time as an akuma) and was even rewarded for his erased-from-time decisions as Ladybug laid her head on his shoulder, happy to have him back after the nightmare she’d lived where everyone was dead because her partner prioritized dating her over telling her that he knew her identity, despite her repeated stressing that no one must know.

(”Glaciator” also follows this formula, forcing Ladybug to apologize first and then having her blush when Chat kisses her cheek after he’d put up a huff mid-battle, while Marinette is blamed both for Andre’s akumatization and not going to a date that she didn’t promise to go to.)

Cut to some time later, when “Crocoduel” airs. Marinette, believing that she only causes problems for Luka and that he would rather be away from his own birthday party than be around the girl who “broke his heart” and “got him akumatized twice” (the first time being Silencer, something that apparently she, Alya, and the show blame her for), asks Juleka in private to make sure Luka isn’t present at the party. She later apologizes for this, admitting that she was unreasonable in her request.

The fandom proceeds to go off on Marinette, stating that she is selfish and that Luka “deserves better.” This is in direct contrast to episodes that feature Marinette/Ladybug apparently slighting Adrien/Chat (according to the fandom), where rejection is not wished on the ship itself, but rather a desire that Marinette/Ladybug apologize to Adrien/Chat and repent for her sins so that he can be happy and they can get together.

Interestingly enough, complete radio silence is given on the friends who had forced Marinette to go to the event in the first place (and also had supposed “whenever you’re ready” development in “Gang of Secrets”), not consulting with Luka on the matter nor considering what either would want, and only asking for Juleka’s permission in what is essentially an afterthought (having made plans without her input first). This is made doubly “interesting” by the fact that the action of said friends is what leads to the supposed “end of Lukanette,” with them officially confirming becoming friends.

Finally, cut to the most recent episode (at the time of writing this), “Wishmaker.” In this episode, through two different instances of Second Chance, Luka discovers the identities of both Ladybug and Chat Noir, shocked and later saddened by both revelations. When asked by Ladybug, he makes the decision to not tell her that he knows anything, though the current reason for this is unknown.

The fandom, once again, goes up in arms. They are upset by Luka’s lie (to a hero who he now knows is extremely stressed about her future and needs little else to worry about) regardless of whatever the reason may or may not be revealed to be. This is a far cry from the “golden boy” Adrien Agreste, who has not only lied (whether by omission or otherwise) on multiple occasions (”Copycat,” “Miraculous New York,” and “Chat Blanc”), but when Ladybug’s identity was put into his hands (the hands of a permanent hero who has one of the two exact miraculouses wanted by Hawk Moth), he chose not to say anything so he could date her.

Neither had a magical charm to protect them while one of them had a rabbit hero to erase his actions as if that removes what he would’ve done if given the chance, while Ladybug is left with the guilt and trauma. Both were told that identities are precious, and one lies for reasons riddled with ambiguity while the other lies in order to date the person who has already rejected one side of himself. One is a “threat” to the endgame ship and is either sympathized with or criticized depending on what will make his own ship look worse (and whose likeability seems to coincide by how “threatening” he is and what importance he receives in comparison to his “competition”), while the other is part of the endgame ship and is treated accordingly by the show and fanbase, his actions defended and validated while the blame falls on the other side of his ship.

In the end, Marinette and Luka are dealt an equally bad hand, and both are dealing with consequences of Adrien’s actions. Adrien had gotten to peacefully date “Ladybug” in a removed timeline because he selfishly kept a secret (and, again, was ultimately rewarded for it), while Marinette suffered dating Luka because she selflessly kept a secret (leading to him being akuamtized and her to nearly have a mental breakdown). Luka, meanwhile, who has had a track record of being incredibly selfless and having a history of always keeping Marinette’s feelings/best interests in mind, now knows both Ladybug and Chat Noir’s identities, and the latter being because Chat Noir let himself get hit by the akuma’s powers in the first place.

Yet it’s Luka who gets heat, and Marinette who gets heat, while Adrien isn’t even so much as on the back burner.

Isn’t history fun?