#louie discourse (serious)

[seasurfacefullofclouds1]

Perfect/History anon again - oh yes i am def following louis!!! lol

he was always my favorite from a very young age (2010 onwards - so i was around 9/10) and i supported his solo endeavors from the start. i heard JHO playing in an arena during summer camp in 2016/2017 and jumped up to sing along with my best friend at the time who had grown up loving one direction alongside me.

i’ve taken intermittent breaks because sometimes everything just felt… very bleak. to say the least. and having already dealt in real time with everything that happened while the band was together - i just couldn’t remain in fan spaces with the same repetitive discourse & hopeless, infectious cynicism. i remained a casual fan from afar, but since 2022, i’ve been very invested in louis (and louis only). and now that im in my early 20s i think i have a much easier time disregarding the shit that i dislike about fandom and enjoying the things that i do like, while still applying critical thinking that enables me to engage with the discourse that actually does matter and resist “turning my brain off” in an unhealthy, overly parasocial way.

side note, i rmbr joking with friends when i was around 13 (so this was about 2013/2014) that i only cared about louis - when it was still a very boyband fan thing to assign each friend in a friend group a favorite member - and didn’t find the rest nearly as attractive or interesting. they would scold me in a friendly manner, but in hindsight? i think i was being serious LMAO. am i the first solo louie? maybe… maybe not!!! who knows!

Omg what a great story. I love it.

I will call you the first solo louie in a very positive way. And you’ve navigated fandom in such a healthy, self-protective way from a young age. I’m very envious!

[faithinlouisfuture]

your last anon randomly reminded me of before afhf 2022 when louis had his hood up at the airport and people thought he got a dramatic haircut or did something crazy to his hair 😭

https://louisupdates.tumblr.com/post/693670389938880512/louis-today-2608

LOL PLEASE!

the meltdown that louie twitter had! 😂 i also remember how Lara’s epic manip went insanely viral and there was serious discourse regarding people being for or against this haircut on louis 😭 fun times

[bookclub4m]

Episode 206 - Cultural Studies

It’s episode 206 and time for us to talk about the genre of Cultural Studies! We discuss bureaucracy, affluenza, dinosaurs, Dungeons & Dragons, Batman, The Fast and the Furious, and more!

You can download the podcast directly, find it on Libsyn, or get it through Apple Podcasts or your favourite podcast delivery system.

In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray 🦇 | Jam Edwards

Things We Read (or tried to…)

Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Neil Postman

The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy by David Graeber

Clever Girl: Jurassic Park by Hannah McGregor

They Came to Slay: The Queer Culture of D&D by Thom James Carter

Affluenza: How Overconsumption Is Killing Us--and How to Fight Back, 3rd Edition Mutation by John De Graaf, David Wann, and Thomas Naylor

Second Language Learning and Identity: Cracking Metaphors in Ideological and Poetic Discourse in the Third Space by Mika Yoshimoto

On Freedom: Four Songs of Care and Constraint by Maggie Nelson

2 Trans 2 Furious: An Extremely Serious Journal of Transgender Street Racing Studies edited by Tuck Woodstock and Niko Stratis

Other Media We Mentioned

Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body by Susan Bordo

Bullshit Jobs: A Theory by David Graeber

The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson

The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning by Maggie Nelson

 Suicide Squad Isekai

Dimension 20: Never Stop Blowing Up

Links, Articles, and Things

Tartan Noir

Secret Feminist Agenda

Jurassic Park

Extreme Championship Wrestling

Pyotr Kropotkin

Chainmail

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game

Lambda Literary Awards

Girl Dad Press

30 Cultural Studies by BIPOC Authors

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcasts chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib

Aboriginal TM: The Cultural and Economic Politics of Recognition by Jennifer Adese

The Cultural Politics of Emotion by Sara Ahmed

Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza by Gloria E. Anzaldúa

The Location of Culture by Homi K. Bhabha

The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Producing Sovereignty: The Rise of Indigenous Media in Canada by Karrmen Crey

Log Off: Why Posting and Politics (almost) Never Mix by Katherine Cross

Aberrations in Black: Toward a Queer of Color Critique by Roderick A. Ferguson

Long Live Queer Nightlife: How the Closing of Gay Bars Sparked a Revolution by Amin Ghaziani

Impossible Desires: Queer Diasporas and South Asian Public Cultures by Gayatri Gopinath

White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color by Ruby Hamad

Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong

Crip Kinship: The Disability Justice & Art Activism of Sins Invalid by Shayda Kafai

Have You Eaten Yet? Stories from Chinese Restaurants Around the World by Cheuk Kwan

Immigrant Acts: On Asian American Cultural Politics by Lisa Lowe

Unassimilable: An Asian Diasporic Manifesto for the Twenty-First Century by Bianca Mabute-Louie

The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together by Heather McGhee

Disidentifications: Queers of Color and the Performance of Politics by José Esteban Muñoz

Decolonize Hipsters by Gregory Pierrot

Black Meme: A History of The Images That Make Us by Legacy Russell

Introducing Cultural Studies by Ziauddin Sardar

The Afterlife is Letting Go by Brandon Shimoda

Wînipêk: Visions of Canada from an Indigenous Centre by Niigaan Sinclair

Shine Bright: A Very Personal History of Black Women in Pop by Danyel Smith

Black on Both Sides: A Racial History of Trans Identity by C. Riley Snorton

Big Brands Are Watching You: Marketing Social Justice and Digital Culture by Francesca Sobande

Music Is History by Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson

In Open Contempt: Confronting White Supremacy in Art and Public Space by Irvin Weathersby Jr.

Gaza on Screen edited by Nadia G. Yaqub

Give us feedback!

Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

Check out our Tumblr, follow us on Instagram, join our Facebook Group or Discord Server, or send us an email!

Join us again on Tuesday, February 4th we’ll be talking about the genre of Monster Romance!

Then on Tuesday, February 18th we’ll be discussing our reading goals and resolutions for 2025!

[berlinini]

thinking about the confidence that Louis had on stage and, I have to assume, this is something that he had to work on from within, seeing as his solo stage experience was cut short months ago.

he owned the stage like someone who knows he deserves to be there, someone who's worked hard to create from the ground up the opportunity to perform, someone who sees the unbreakable support from his ever-growing fanbase and says: this is where I belong.

he didn't get to that point by performing night after night on his world tour, but he got there anyways. "faith in the future". "confidence and momentum". "chill, breathe, live, fuck it".

for all the messed up things that are (still) happening with the way his career is handled, Louis walked on that stage and very clearly expressed (once again) his desire to create and perform music as a solo artist.

he said it years ago with a t-shirt, but he said it again very loudly with the Away From Home Festival, in every aspect: "no matter how hard you try, you can't stop me now".

[berlinini]

I get where this is coming from, but why does it feel like some sort of back-handed compliment? Are we actually surprised that Louis has been...actively...working...on professional projects...?!

Louis has been in this business for 10 years+. He was a major driving force behind the creative process/orientation of 1D. He's shown many times that he has a strong creative vision for his work and big goals for his solo career. He has shown perseverance again and again, against all odds.

In what world would Louis have not been actively working on professional projects behind the scene to further his career for the last twelve to eighteen months???

What is the opposite scenario? Louis playing FIFA on his couch for a whole year? Louis patiently waiting for Harry to come back home from his Holivia stunts?

❗️BREAKING NEWS ❗️Louis Tomlinson wants a successful solo career ❗

❗️AFTER THE BREAK ❗️Louis Tomlinson wants to succeed as a solo artist in the music industry and works hard to make it happen ❗️

❗️LATER ON ❗️Incredible! Fans say Louis Tomlinson is MIA - yet sources tell us he is doing actual work. Is that possible? Tune in to find out! ❗️

Ok but the fact Louis said he’s been working on the idea of The Away From Home Festival for “the past 12 months at least” means he’s been working bts on this since July 2020, if not earlier (likely earlier). 

That means he already had this idea/was working on it when he announced he left Syco last year. And when 1D’s 10 years anniversary happened. 

The whole time he was MIA he was working on all of this - this festival, his plans to go independent, his 2nd album, his partnership with BMG, his December 2020 Livestream, rescheduling his world tour, his documentary with Charlie Lightening, his own management company, and probably other projects we haven’t heard about yet.

I love to see him moving forward and succeeding. So proud of him. He’s meant to keep shining bright and to keep conquering the music world while changing it for the better.

[twelvedaysinaugust]

Before this little blog goes any further. What is your stance on his sexuality. Please don't respond with, "I'm here for music" Or "talking about it is disrespectful". Give me a straight forward answer.

2.Do you Stan Louis or is this account more like the wellthatwasaletdown one where they unstanned but still discuss about him

3.Do you have other boys from 1D you like?

1. I think Louis is not straight and very much into men - beyond that, I don’t know. You do not have to agree. I am aware that it’s probably wrong for me to make that statement when Louis has labelled himself straight.

2. I have tickets to two of Louis’ shows, I still listen to his music, and I keep up with the Louie discourse. However, there are things I am interested in critically examining and discussing. Louis is not perfect or above criticism. I would not say that I’ve “unstanned,” but I am asking serious questions.

3. A lot of Louis discourse involves Harry, so I know about Harry and his solo career. I thought HS1 was a decent album, but I hate Fine Line and everything it represents. As for the other 1D members, I’m no more than a casual listener.

[mochuelovelli]

GAAAAHHH OKAY

Let's talk about the Timephoon Episodes

This is such an old topic of discourse but after reading many fanfics, videos, and some posts on the subject I have found little divergent takes on the whole subject.

While commentators are of the mind that, for the most part, the punishment and execution of said punishment for Louie's actions were partially if not fully justified but how she went about it was wrong.

Some fanfic writers and some subsects of the fandom but they are much more critical and often in a more black and white interpretation. Which is valid for vent art. However, I find both these portrayals to be lacking in some nuance.

Specifically when it it comes to who's to blame for the next 3 episodes, and to me, its more than just Della (and Louie but there really isn't much discourse here).

Let's start with Timephoon:

This pretty much solidifies their relationship throughout the episode[Also sorry for no captions]. Multiple times Della is shown to have a very laissez faire style of parenting as she primarily wants her kids to enjoy being kids and having fun. This is probably in part to her personality in general - which is probably what Beakley assumes here - however it is also her want to be loved by her children and even more critically, she doesn't ever want them to suffer like she did. Above all else, she wants them to be happy and feel confident in themselves. We see this in all the previous episode with her and her kids - From Dewey and reassuring him that he doesn't need to prove himself to her [notably in this episode she only shows concern when Dewey himself is in danger, she doesn't give a shit when he almost kills her] to Huey and helping him to have the most fun he possibly can, to even Webby and making sure that she also feels confident in herself regardless in how she goes about things.

Bringing up all these adventures does raise some pretty damning hypocrisy. Della encourage Dewey's reckless behavior in his episode. The lesson at the end wasn't, okay maybe we shouldn't be going on dangerous adventures, it was its okay to be afraid and you don't need to prove to me that you're great I already know you are. Huey's message was similar, albeit more low stakes. Webby's lesson wasn't even that she shouldn't be trying to take such risks to find adventure in the future, it was just a lesson in not being disappointed when things don't work the way you want.

So why wasn't Louie's adventure treated the same? Well... let's look at some more examples of Beakley V Della this episode before we answer that -

This is right before the kids find Bubba, Beakley's reaction is what most people would consider to be parental as she is concerned for the safety of the kids running out in a hurricane. Again we see Della acting casual.

Once Bubba is inside and Huey geeks out about him, Beakley actually smiles bc she knows that something like this means a lot to Huey [keep this in mind for l8r]. She only gets serious after Della says it's neat without much after thought so she gives the lesson of the episode - "Small problems become big problems later if not prevented early."

Next we have Della's faux attempt at being strict with her kids. Letting the irresponsible thing happen as long as they are "safe". While also harkening back to her previous episodes where she also is shown to have this attitude that "the kids can do anything as long as they are safe with ME or Scrooge or another SAFE adult", it is also good to note SCROOGE'S expression here to her patting herself on the back for her parenting. Now he could just be confused as to why Della is taking this "lesson" as a win, but he could be noticing that she really doesn't know what she is doing but unlike Beakley doesn't make any attempts to correct this.

Another scene that people often forget when reviewing this episode, just like with all her other kids she at first takes LOUIE'S side and decides they should just roll with the punches like always. Which honestly is sort if valid because that's kinda Scrooge's whole MO; though he also had others to there to keep him afloat but we all know someone like Scrooge, Della, and the kids hardly see that. I also want to hammer home that, just like with the other boys, she doesn't shy away from displaying that she loves them ALL. A few seconds later, it's subtle but she is shown smiling and patting Louie on the head because like the other kids she just wants him to feel supported. If I was to be critical, I would say this is possibly because she likes the IDEA of her boys more than them but I mean - this is pretty much everyone's attitude towards kids. It might be amplified bc of her trauma but it's not unusual. But even still I would argue that she mainly does love the boys for who they are as she is excited to get to know them.

After Della figures that they are looking for a "master thief", Scrooge and Beakley immediately know it's one of the kids. Shocking her since she later states she is of the belief that her kids are too "good" to do something like this. I also want to bring attention, again, to Beakley smiling (ik im putting a lot of stock into expressions but animation tends to do stuff like this for a reason). She is smiling at whom she expects is Dewey for messing with time and space. Bc even if she planned to scold him, she knows it's just their normal. Scrooge seems to also be of the same mind. Later Beakley gives a really good line about "Even good kids can do dumb things. We got to make sure those dumb things don't turn into bad things like destroying all of existence!".

Mrs. B exists stage right

All jokes aside, this must have been a nightmare for all of them but especially Della. She had just finally admitted that she was out of her depth and made another mistake in parenting. But now it seems like she lost her chance to rectify that. Because for all she knows, Mrs. B will never come back. This is import-ALLRIGHTWEGETIT

Della is then shown explicitly worried about her family. Emotions, insecurities and fear obviously getting the best of her. We don't know exactly what she is thinking but we know she is terrified of the possibility of losing one of her kids. When she asks about Louie, she probably thinks he must have disappeared without her knowing. That she might have already failed more than she could know, because she wasn't there to protect him. She doesn't know - she is "Della Duck" and she doesn't know how to fix this. She didn't expect everything to go so horribly wrong, but that's her theme isn't it?

She is both relieved and understandably PISSED when finding that Louie was responsible for almost destroying the fabric of reality (let me say this again, nearly destroying the fabric of reality). She goes scold both herself and her son about the danger he put them in. Later we see Della, the last one leave and seeing almost everyone she loves vanish. We don't know how long each of the characters who left were in the past but we can assume it was long enough to have to change clothes. Yeah this was probably more of a visual gag but like, the other past characters didn't change their outfits when they came to the present so - (also Launchpad was specific about knowing how the world ends so he had to be there enough for him to understand it). Side note someones gotta write fanfic of these characters time misadventures. I wonder if Dewey and Webby ran into Agent 22.

[Last picture of the infamous scene, side note did anyone notice Launchpad NODDING his head when Della mentioned his time schemes could've cost them their future? He's the only one who knows what happened so maybe Louie's misadventure has more impact than we think-]

Anyways, yeah we know what was said here. But I think it's important to see the reaction the other adults (sorry LP, and Gryo i GUESS) have here BC this is basically why I made this post. What Della decided to do was unquestionably the wrong decision, at least her way of going about it and I will not absolve her of her many MANY mistakes. However, let's remember she wasn't alone in any of this. She was with other parental figures who KNOW more about her kids than she does.

After Louie leaves, why did they think it was good to encourage this course of action? Why did they think giving full parental control to a PTSD, trauma survivor who barely got back less than a month ago was a good idea? Sure it's one thing to not want to overstep your boundaries but are you telling me they wouldn't want to guide her in the right direction at least? We KNOW both Beakley AND Scrooge have their grievences towards Della's parenting strategy or lack there of. Beakley so far doing the most to try and put her in the right direction (which speaks volumes to the problems Scrooge has).

So why wouldn't they explain that, hey, maybe taking away the one thing your kid thinks he is good at ISNT a great idea? Why didn't either say anything about their two day vacation? Something that came up presumingly on a whim and might of prevented (although i doubt it) Louie from trying to steal w/ time? He might have considered pushing back time schemes at least 3 days later. While Mrs. Beakley might be less aware of Louie's insecurities and ambitions, Scrooge definitely isn't. He should have talked to her, and hey we don't see what happens before they leave so maybe MAYBE they did. But again, I doubt it. Seeing as how they all agreed with her at the end, I don't see them trying to meddle with her.

But they should've. They are both experienced guardians and they have nothing to say to her? Plus Donald (goddamn it i almost finished a post w/o him) have THEM responsibility to take care of the kids NOT Della. So they are obligated to help her. Really, the other option other than just well negligence would be not thinking this punishment was a big deal. I wish this aspect was also scrutinized just as much as Della and Louies role in this arc.

Beakley and Scrooge (more so Scrooge) are just as much to blame in what happens as Della if not MORE since they know of her situation in only a way that an experience adult can. There is no excuse for their negligence.

[jlf23tumble]

Happy birthday to Lisa!!

I can’t believe we have two back-to-back Virgo birthdays to celebrate this weekend, but it’s also high-key wonderful that they’re both turning the same age, they both live in Europe, and they’re both HUGELY into their respective faves because it wasn’t all that difficult to whip up some fantastic (if I do say so myself) celebratory posts in their honor!!

Let’s start with @setsailtomorrow​, one of my very favorite Louie Larries because she’s definitely not the hand-wringer type, she’s wayyyyyy into his fashion (literally at or ahead of the archive), and she avoids nonsense drama in a way that’s honestly hashtag goals. Plus, she’s on my exact wavelength with fic recs, she has an amazing sense of style, and she’s my secret weapon when it comes to finding the perfect Virgo in a pile of zodiac pictures. All the birthday love to you, Lisa! 

Alas, I can’t write you the perfect fic, so my gift is 30 amazing pictures of Louis from this past year, and it was an ORDEAL, here’s a picture of me dealing with his intense beauty as I made the personal sacrifice required to edit down to 30 key photos and sort them in a way I hope you find mildly entertaining…sighhhhh:

It’s officially your birthday in Sweden, so I’m officially cleared for take off...more under the cut! My apologies to people on phones: either this won’t work, and you’ll need to go to desktop, or it won’t work, and you’ll be scrolling madly through 30 pictures of Louis (I sympathize with people who have scroll rage, blame the game, not the player). Don’t scream at me unless you have suggestions for better pics, lol!

Let’s start with someone we both admire—Helen Seamons, the genius who styled Louis throughout XFUK and a bit beyond (and I *just learned* she’s the menswear editor for the Guardian and the Observer??? NICE). I’m a big fan of her IG posts from the show:

This look? FIREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE:

The posh background alert! His Halloween costume! So subversive on about four levels! God, I love him:

Krystle should get a lot of credit here, too, tbh:

Next up, Jordan Green! Sandro, the studio, his notes, and a not-pictured cheap, light lager:

I still contend you can practically hear the hahahahahah:

The aperol spritz, which is SUPER BRITISH TRENDY yet gets a Louis pass probably because Americans aren’t going on about it, but the real star is these pants:

Week after week, Louis served up 28 (!!!) episodes’ worth of sheer gorgeousness and cutting-edge fashion as XFUK judge. My personal fave (beyond his expert pen salesmanship) was the subtle use of chevrons all over the damned place. I wonder if Liam gave him shit about it in Ibizia:

I wanna say this is Stella McCartney, but who cares, look at him:

A born model, the power spread, the only man I wouldn’t give shit to on public transport if he dared to pull this kind of move:

The category is…British Olympian (ski team?) circa 1965:

For some reason, Louis was willing to brave the cold and pose with fans outside the studio (??), serving up looks AND fingers:

Champion indeed!

I know the buzzword is Liam Gallagher for some reason, but I read straight-up Alex Turner, Damon Albarn, and all the other clever nods to recent takes on mod whenever Louis goes full button-up:

This button-up gives a low-key country music star vibe I’m sorta into:

I call this one “Frank Ocean at the Met Gala”:

Power squat, button up, AND quiff? Help:

This feels like some kind of sk8te tuff look, and I’m into it:

Soft layers and a special jacket, he had to be freezin’ his balls off:

He’s worn SO MUCH Burberry plaid, but this was the best one, just a peep of it out of a classic, well-fitting suit:

If XFUK was more about the buttoned/zipped up, this year has given us more of the “h” peep and open collars:

Prada! The blue! The soft fringe! All the discourse about Liam Gallagher’s premiere, lol!

Louis in turtlenecks (roll necks?) always gives me a low-key “hickey city” vibe, but he just looks so damned cozy:

I almost grouped this one with the fingers because I swear he did one in this shirt, but I’ll be damned if I can find it, wahhhhh:

Fringeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee:

STILL serving up that British Olympian (swim team), circa 1965:

So far, I feel like I have some fairly good broad categories, so forgive me for this last lumping…basically, it’s “Jen’s faves, somewhat undefined,” lmaoooo, starting with this, and mainly for the entire moment of it all bts with Ayda’s dog:

Everything about this just screams soft, like a giant fluffy pillow on a cold day when you’re cuddled up inside:

Anytime I see shots from this part of XFUK, I beam with happiness, because here’s Louis in his Escapade shorts, buttoned up shirt, chillin’ out and smokin’ cigs with Dermot at “his” house in Ibizia, and he’s so serious because he wants to WIN and still do right by his team, and god, I’ll shut up, but I could go on:

HANDS DOWN (UP) THE VERY BEST SHIRT HE’S EVER WORN, I’M SO HERE FOR EVERYTHING ABOUT IT (plus he wore it during that tattoo segment, swoon):

I hope I captured some of your faves, too, and that you have/had an amazing day—the best is yet to come!!! :D

[berlinini]

Live Nation actually tweeted from several of their Twitter accounts before the Festival. I guess the difference is that promotion before the event meant money for them, whereas they have no interest in getting Louis any recognition after the event itself, especially that this was an "unusual" "livestream".

I also don't think artist are signed to Veeps - it's more likely a one-time contract based on the event to be livestreamed.

And while Live Nation got involved with Veeps, their team remained the same, which could explain why AFHF was done with them as well (Louis had a working relationship with them).

Finally let's not forget that pre-LN Veeps never acknowledged the tickets sale for LTLFL either - this information was given out by Louis' team.

There is something holding off the release of AFHF tickets sale numbers... but I personally don't think LN would be to blame entirely (and it's not like I have any love for them).

In any case, there could have been promo and post-event coverage worthy of the success of the event and of Louis' status without the tickets numbers - but there wasn't. And that's on LTHQ.

According to that Guinness world record article live nation bought a majority share of veeps just after louis had his record breaking concert in London. The next livestream louis did with veeps under its new ownership (the festival) no streaming numbers were shared. Is there a possible link between live nation owning veeps and louis getting no numbers released? Just wanted to hear your thoughts on it. Live Nation does their own promotion for their concerts and louis got none. Isn't live nation also involved with artist management related to their events? It's hard to find info on this. Anyway now I'm thinking that louis signed up with veeps when it was the baby of the Good Charlotte twins and things started looking up for him. That company got sold to LN after he was already on the roster and now he seems back at square one. LN is majority owned by cronies in the same community with azoff (its also one third owned by the Saudi govt- the one that beheads journalists) and I'm thinking LN is behind the no promo/no media/no numbers blackout. Am I way off?

i haven't paid attention to how they have promoted other streaming events, so i can't confidently say what the norm is.

LN does have artist management but it's based on individual deals, not tied to the events unless its bundled.

that said, there may be multiple complicating factors. i can't seem to find info retroactively about how the tickets were aquired? what ticketing agent actually handled that? and if LN was in any way tied to the actual festival i can see them ignoring it bc it was free.

i'm not saying it isn't possible that they are involved, if nothing else i don't doubt they've been negligent if nothing else; i certainly don't think anyone should trust them as they have a history of coercive business practices. there seems to be a pending lawsuit over their monopoly, and bc of their long history of safety violations they likely will be taken to court for the astroworld tragedy.

simon jones tho. he gets louis headlines for such specific things, and never for others. the stark difference between his work for niall & louis alone is telling enough.

[larriefails]

seeing the eleanor post, Gigi and Camille (ex) still go about their business and continue posting. Gigi has health w hate since day one of being w zayn and yall turn a blind eye to her problems. is zayn not important to your tin hat discourse. is gemma and lottie not important. for whatever reason eleanor is the poster child for the cause against CT's which is crazy when women who's sm presence is actually crucial to their brand are being attacked daily by CT's.

What is your issue, dude?

Why are you comparing different women’s struggles when they’re all victims of the same? Where did I say Eleanor was the only one? What are you even trying to say here?

I don’t wanna get in that game because it’s not conductive to anything, but you make no sense. Gigi is one of the world’s biggest supermodels and she was dead famous before she ever dated Zayn. She’s more famous than Zayn. She has her own fans and her own brand, of course the hate she gets is not gonna affect her in the same way than Eleanor, who isn’t a celebrity and doesn’t have a core fanbase aside from Louis’.. Also, this blog is called “larriefails” so of course my focus is not gonna be on Zayn’s ex girlfriend, that’s just logic

This blog didn’t exist this time last year, otherwise, I would’ve talked about Camille as well. Do you want me to go back in time, sis? She moved on with her life and has a very serious boyfriend, why would I talk about her receiving abuse now?

Gemma and Lottie get a ton of CT comments, but they don’t get abuse, at least not consistently like the women linked to them do, so once again I just don’t get you. When Daisy and Phoebe got abuse for talking about Freddie, I posted about that. I’m just.. confused

What are you complaining about? Are you pissed that I talk about Eleanor’s constant abuse? About how she had to close her entire comment section? About how she can’t even share what her job is because people fill everything surrounding it with hate? Here’s the thing that I don’t think you get, Eleanor’s been the constant in Louis’ life for the past seven years, on and off. The hate that any of the other women have received? She got it non stop in all this time. She experienced it all... the death threats, the disparaging comments, the hateful rumors, the body shaming comments. Her entire group of friends got hounded. These people made up that she was the daughter of this music executive and that’s how she became “Louis’ beard” they said she was faking going to college (they still say that), they flooded Manchester University with emails about her. No one is saying the other women didn’t receive this treatment, but she got the blunt of it for the longest amount of time, and the intensity of it is only comparable to Briana

You reek of radical Louie, I’m gonna be honest. You bring up Camille and Gigi but not Danielle or Briana? You bring up Lottie and Gemma but not Daisy and Phoebe, who actually get hate for defending Eleanor and talking about Freddie? You’re very transparent

Let me make this clear: radical Louies are still conspiracy theorists, Eleanor is, according to Louis himself, the love of his life, Freddie is his son. Bye

[lestappenwdc]

currently studying medicine! hope to one day become a pharmacist and help people in thag field!

im sorry to hear about the pandemic in your country. it’s sad to say that here in the us it’s getting much much worse as the days go on. the severity of it isn’t reflected upon within the media and it’s sad because so many people are suffering.... but at least i can say im extremely grateful for the level of medicine we have access to.

enough about sad stuff haha.... what got you into 1D? who’s your fave? (im guessing harry haha) favorite album? favorite song? favorite lyric??

dying to know! -❄️⛄️💙

That's wonderful.. also I'm sorry haha. I have friends who study medicine and I am APPALED for the amount they have to study. I've always found it difficult to study such specifics and so many different terms. Like if someone told me to sit there and study these pages of terms and numbers I would break down crying 😂😂. I'm guessing it's the other way around for you. But I've always admired people who decide to dedicate their life to helping people. It's just so beautiful to me so thank you for that 💖

Ooh I love talking about 1d (wonder why). My relationship with them is a bit rocky. In the sense that I cant even tell you when I really got into them. I was here since the first album and wmyb and all. Every girl my age was obsessed with them at that time. I'm one of those people who watched music videos(and the behind the scenes) 6 times - one for each boy and once all of them together back in 2012. But with life happening I kinda was just.. half in the fandom. I followed what happened with them but never too closely. I had heard of Larry back then but didnt think it was serious. Until 2014 when I watched where we are videos and I saw that something was happening. I needed like.. a month? To start being legit obsessed. Where we are tour was still going on at that point. I was on Twitter and instagram for a long time before I switched to tumblr in 2016. And that is my story.

I dont really.. label who my favorite is. Its deffinetely between louis and harry tho. I've always hated this discourse in the fandom about harrie larries and louie larries and whatnot. I just really really like both of them the same amount. Maaybe harry I'm more drawn to for whatever reason but Louis is the only one whose merch I've bought and walls is the album I play every day like it's the most important meal of the day. So I really cant give you an answer on that.

My fav album is deffinetely made in the am. All my favorite songs are on there. Including my absolute favorite Love you goodbye.. As for favorite lyrics I'm gonna cheat and go with "it's a church of burnt romances and I'm too far gone to pray, it's a solo song and it's only for the brave". It just touches me in a way I cant explain.

Okay imma stop this before it get too long and ask you all these questions in return. I wanna know about your favorites as well ❤❤❤

[fashiontrendin-blog]

Go Ahead, Take This Opportunity To Say You Always Hated A Creep's Art

http://fashion-trendin.com/go-ahead-take-this-opportunity-to-say-you-always-hated-a-creeps-art/

Go Ahead, Take This Opportunity To Say You Always Hated A Creep's Art

Have you always believed that Quentin Tarantino makes dreadful movies? Have you always wondered how a director could be so celebrated for work that luridly depicts the abuse and degradation of women and black people, and that offers little more than exploitative ’70s pastiche?

Maybe your belief that Tarantino sucked spoke in a small, niggling voice, something you pushed down because you felt embarrassed that you couldn’t appreciate the auteur’s work. Or maybe it was louder. Maybe you even got into arguments with your film school classmates or your boyfriend about it.

Either way, this past week has likely brought a sense of grim vindication.

First, in an interview with The New York Times’s Maureen Dowd, Uma Thurman revealed details about Tarantino’s direction of “Kill Bill,” including his role in pressuring her to perform a car stunt that went awry and left her severely injured, as well as scenes in which he personally choked and spat on her in place of her acting partners.

With the spotlight now on Tarantino, news outlets are digging up other disturbing moments from his career. Thurman wasn’t the only actor he’d choked during filming ― he’d also choked Diane Kruger for a scene in “Inglourious Basterds.” Perhaps most damning, audio surfaced from a Howard Stern interview in 2003 in which Tarantino not only defended director Roman Polanski against his notorious rape charge, but insisted that his 13-year-old victim “wanted to have it.”

Though Tarantino defended his on-set behavior in a lengthy interview with Deadline’s Mike Fleming Jr., and both Thurman and Kruger went on to praise his direction on Instagram, the public reckoning with his oeuvre had already begun; plenty of naysayers jumped on the opportunity to admit that they’d always hated his movies. 

Like Louis C.K. and Woody Allen before him, Tarantino had become, almost instantly, the new cool entertainment dude to have always hated.

I’ve never understood the allure of Tarantino or his films. I’ve never seen Kill Bill (1 or 2), DJango, or the rest of them, except Pulp Fiction. Once. After reading that NYT article about Uma Thurman, I know I made the right call. He is unmitigated trash.

— April (@ReignOfApril) February 3, 2018

I’m glad that my once unpopular opinion that Tarantino films are rubbish because it’s like watching the worst thoughts of the annoying lad you don’t fancy but he bothers you anyway playing out in hypercolour, is finally getting it’s moment.

— Jess Phillips (@jessphillips) February 4, 2018

You know, I thought by this point there would be at least one of these Hollywood dudes where I’d be like, “that’s a shame, I want to like his work.”

But….all of them are of mediocre talent

— Kelly Ellis (@justkelly_ok) February 6, 2018

But is this … bad? Should we resist the urge to distance ourselves from the fandom surrounding a detestable creator, to declare to the masses, “I always hated that creep”?

This week, that declaration was met with the usual pushback, as critics accused Tarantino cynics of turning a serious conversation about misogyny and assault into a conversation about superior film taste:

Revelations that Tarantino is a piece of shit (not new) doesn’t suddenly require you to tell the world how much you have always hated his films (which suck incidentally).

— Richard Whittall (@RWhittall) February 3, 2018

Ah, we’re in the “I always knew he was shifty…” phase of Tarantino discourse, then.

It tends to overlap with the “I was always an outlier in the court of public opinion and now I’ve been vindicated!” phase.https://t.co/V7Xxt62pyo

— Darren Mooney (@Darren_Mooney) February 6, 2018

All the people that never liked Tarantino films are feeling somehow vindicated and that’s fucking awful. You’re profiting off the sadness and hurt of another human being to feel morally superior to the rest because you feel that your critical opinion feels somehow accurate??

— Jaime Grijalba (@jaimegrijalba) February 6, 2018

The initial urge does seem self-serving, a way to retroactively claim credit for knowing better than everyone else. The #MeToo moment should not be viewed primarily as a plum opportunity to hipsterize disliking Louis C.K., to smugly claim, “I hated him before it was cool.”

Nor should we reflexively vilify people who loved the work of people like Louis C.K. and Tarantino. We all have problematic faves; the hardest and most vital part of changing a toxic culture is holding those faves to the same standards as artists we dislike.

But you know what? Go ahead and take this moment to tell the world you always hated a creepy dude’s art. Feel extremely free to unload on all the troubling hints in his work that he thinks of women as objects. Why shouldn’t you? We should have that conversation, too.

The #MeToo movement emerged as an urgent reckoning around sexual abuse and harassment in the workplace, but it’s churned up discussions of issues beyond that ― not only sexual abuse outside the workplace, but also a broader culture of misogyny. Those discussions have revolved around the art of abusive and chauvinistic men, and how their visions have defined our culture, often in ways that harmed women. They’ve also included talk of how white critics have long taken up the air in the room; how they’ve been empowered to curate an artistic canon by and about them, while people of color, women and other marginalized groups have not.

We’re now grappling with how admiration of these problematic men became de rigueur, and how frustrating this enforced consensus was for the many people who felt exploited or forgotten by the canon. 

For years, when I’d balk at watching Tarantino films because the content made me uneasy, I was told I was being too sensitive. Between this and Uma Thurman’s devastating stories, it’s all coming together. https://t.co/X0G0kv9F4K

— marisa kabas (@MarisaKabas) February 6, 2018

Since I was around 12, the dudes in my life constantly told me I was being too sensitive when I questioned the misogyny and racism in Tarantino’s work. I was often told I “didn’t get it.” Well… I think maybe… YOU guys didn’t get it, actually? #quentintarantino https://t.co/K4dXjvEJxM

— Brigit Young (@BrigitYoung) February 6, 2018

This is not to say that only white dudes (or all white dudes) are fans of unsavory artists like Tarantino or Louis C.K. Plenty of men have been happy to note that they never liked Tarantino anyway, and plenty of women loved “Louie” and “Manhattan” and “Pulp Fiction” and have been struggling, in the aftermath of unsavory allegations, to resolve their admiration of the art with the personal crimes of the artists. (Personally, I never had the stomach for Tarantino films ― blood makes me queasy ― but I grew up on Allen’s daffy early films and liked a decent amount of Louis C.K.’s comedy.)

Still, it’s impossible to disregard the fact that an almost entirely white and male set of tastemakers (not to mention creators and investors) elevated certain male artists to the level of demigods, so above criticism that one’s dislike signaled one’s own inferior taste rather than the artists’ failings. Most critics with major platforms have long been white men; the lack of diversity in the ranks has not only stunted the breadth of conversation, but fostered the false sense that white men’s concerns are the most pressing, their opinions the most objective, and their viewpoints the most conducive to great art. Even when women or people of color dissented, their voices did little or nothing to alter the perceived consensus.

Take Allen: Pauline Kael and Joan Didion, both prominent female critics, savaged his opus “Manhattan,” which revolves around a 42-year-old man who is romancing a 17-year-old student, for, respectively, “pass[ing] off a predilection for teen-agers as a quest for true values” and telegraphing that “adolescence can now extend to middle age.”

Then-Columbia professor John Romano quickly rebutted Didion in a letter to the editor, describing her review as a result of “pique”; the letter twice describes Didion as “complaining.” Meanwhile, critic Roger Ebert had a startling take on the artistry surrounding Allen’s character’s sexual predation, writing, “It wouldn’t do, you see, for the love scenes between Woody and Mariel [Hemingway] to feel awkward or to hint at cradle-snatching or an unhealthy interest on Woody’s part in innocent young girls. But they don’t feel that way.” 

As the years passed, “Manhattan,” beloved by male critics who were unbothered by or eager to explain away the movie’s troubling sexual undertones, became cemented in film canon. If Kael and Didion couldn’t get us to openly acknowledge the flaws in Allen’s work, who could? At least now it seems right to go back and examine the catastrophic failures of some critics to tease out these threads. Many critics, including the New York Times’ A.O. Scott, are now openly reckoning with the insufficiency of their past criticism of Allen’s work, and they’re right to do so.

It’s also fair to point out that some people wanted to have this conversation before the #MeToo moment, but that a patriarchal hegemony of taste served as a bulwark against it. The cultural change didn’t just begin in October. For example, when Tarantino released “The Hateful Eight” in 2016, critics explicitly called out his dicey use of extreme violence toward women in the film, questioning whether it was artistically essential or even justifiable. 

#MeToo was possible in part because women in Hollywood, and elsewhere, have spent years advocating for more respect and representation.

This is exactly my problem with Tarantino. He glorifies violence against women and people of color, makes an industry out of movies centered on violence towards minority groups, and gets called a “genius” for it. That’s the kind of regressive junk we need to cut out. https://t.co/RDKt9rhBu9

— Heidi N Moore (@moorehn) February 4, 2018

The central connecting thread between all of the aforementioned morally ambiguous or nihilistic art and so much more in that vein: it was all primarily by and for white men and wistfully imagined worlds where white men were never held to account for anything.

— David Klion (@DavidKlion) February 6, 2018

But despite these rising questions, the classic films ― “Pulp Fiction,” “Kill Bill” ― seemed untouchable, and disliking them remained taboo. If you’ve ever told a date, a classmate, a mentor or a friend that you can’t watch Tarantino because you find his work to be exploitative of women, only to be informed that you simply don’t understand his art, the indisputable revelation this month that he’s a bona fide creep is, in a small but real way, liberating. It’s something solid to cling to, at last, evidence that you’re not overreacting or too obtuse to appreciate the aesthetic perfection of his tobacco-spit trajectories. Distaste for his work, often cast as a mental flaw or tragic unhipness, has become, in an instant, a mark of discernment.

In a tit-for-tat sense, it does seem just that artists like Louis C.K. and Tarantino ― whose reputations were long bolstered by the plaudits of critics and the reflexive hipster posturing of fans ― have now slid to the wrong end of the “my taste is better than yours” hierarchy. That’s not the point of this moment, nor should the goal of this reassessment be to simply unseat one set of white male icons, to turn the same smugly superior judgment on their fans that their detractors have experienced. It’s only human, though, to feel vindicated.

And yet, vindication isn’t the only feeling at play. There’s something about this sudden shift that’s wildly infuriating as well. Oh, NOW you’re listening? I thought recently when a writer I’d criticized as sexist ― only to have my critique neatly brushed aside by male colleagues and friends ― faced career consequences after being accused of personal misbehavior toward women. Why couldn’t you take me seriously when I broke down all the none-too-subtle misogyny in his writing?

Saying “I always hated his work” might be a cheap hipster pose, but it also might be bitterness born of long-suppressed, impotent anger. If you’ve grown used to being shamed or condescended to for caring about an ugly thread that everyone else seemed to be overlooking, the sudden shift is gratifying, but also exhausting. All the years of churn and self-doubt suddenly feel like a cruel, unnecessary burden forced on you by the people who insisted you were wrong.

So go ahead; vent your spleen. Give yourself the tiny shred of comfort that comes from claiming your long-simmering, now-validated disdain. Take the opportunity to try, once again, to have a real debate about the artistic merit of works like “Kill Bill” and “Manhattan.” It’s a first step to envisioning a world that isn’t just rid of monsters, but that actually offers everyone an equal place in constructing our culture.

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[berlinini]

I think the problem is that his team doesn’t believe in him.

I remember at the beginning of the last year, when walls was released, some fans said that they talked with his manager and he told them that they didn’t do a lot of promo because they thought walls wouldn’t do well on the charts.

Same in the documentary they didn’t believe this festival will happen and Louis was so so so sure that it will happen.

They don’t know what capable Louis is of and that is so frustrating.

Oh, that is FOR SURE what is happening. LTHQ is my villain origin story.

You can see it clearly in the documentary, when Louis is sitting down with Matt Vines to talk about the festival (the sequence where Louis wears his blue cap and white football jersey, after Mexico). The tension... Louis' body language is everything: he's not looking at Matt for one second, he seems super tense and sad, he's smoking in a nervous manner. I think it's very telling - he's far from being his carefree, chippy self like he is around others.

Then there's the interview bit, Louis says the following:

Early on I piled the pressure onto my manager, Matt, and I’m like ‘if nothing else happens this year, this is got to happen this year’ and I said 'I’m gonna be reminding you every single time I speak to you' and every time I did, I put the pressure on him because I could just feel how amazing it’s gonna be.

A bit later, we come back to footage of the meeting and this happens:

Cameraman: Is there a probably that it won’t happen?

L: Well fucking yeah (laughs)(...)

Matt: That it won’t happen? Yeah, there’s every possibility that it won’t happen...

L: When it happens, not if; it will happen, I just got a good feeling about it.. ugh…. It’s just gonna be a really special night (...)

I think there's a lot of things that Louis communicated through the documentary, either directly or indirectly. The quote above is direct - he's showing he was so enthusiastic with the idea of the festival that he told Matt he would gently harass him until they made it happen. Underlying, he is saying that Matt didn't jump on board the moment he heard the idea, didn't start moving water and earth to make it happen, which is what you should be doing if you're Louis Tomlinson's manager. Because Louis has a strong fanbase and it was clear that the event would be a success on its own (COVID permitting). Because if you're an artist's manager, your job is to make your client shine and give them as many opportunities as possible. So with that quote, Louis also said: my manager is shit and I have to harass him to make him do his fucking job.

Their interaction about whether it would happen is also very telling. Why would Louis, who is the most optimistic person there is, who always gets up after being put down, work with someone who has as little faith as Matt? If Louis says "not if, but when it happens", shouldn't the person who is in charge of his career be on the same wavelength? Shouldn't that person also say: no matter what comes up, we'll do everything we can so it happens. Why would Louis work with someone who doesn't believe in his full potential?

Why is it that Louis always says that his strength and determination comes from his fans? Like we're the only ones who believe in him? Why on earth does he feel like he doesn't deserve to be where he is and is always surprised by the support he receives from us? For me it's clear as day that people around him have worked very hard at undermining his career and his confidence, and I absolutely believe his team, including his useless manager, is part of that.

I think there's a reason why the last thing Louis says in the documentary is: "If I've got these lot behind me, who the fuck is gonna stop us?"

The fans have been here all along and the support he's received is the reason he never gave up. I think Louis is building back his confidence and the fact that everything that he does goes beyond his (and everyone's) expectations because of the fans is showing him that if he's got the mindset and the willpower, and our support, he can make it, no matter who in the industry is working so hard against him, or how little the people supposedly working for him actually work. There's a reasons he made this whole festival by himself...."Together we’re unstoppable!"

[berlinini]

Some Final Thoughts About Larries

I started drafting this as a big response to previous asks about Larries, which I have finally answered individually here and here and here (or simply peruse my larries tag for more discourse).

However there is one point that I would like to emphasize and that I did not have the opportunity to discuss in replying the asks, which I could title "My Main Beef With Larries" and it's the following: How Larries downplay Louis' musical ambitions and blindly ignore his career sabotage.

(putting a cut because this is proper ~discourse~)

Based on the obvious disparities between Louis and Harry's situations, and looking at the abnormalities of Louis' current professional situation, it's pretty clear that Louis' career has been sabotaged, but to come to that conclusion there is a big question mark as for why... why would there be only one member of 1D allowed to have a post-"hiatus" success (hello halo!!!), why was Louis the obvious competition to Harry (hello, Louis being the fans' favourite), why was Louis signed to Sony while Liam and Niall were let go, why was Larry still something that had to be controlled by Sony - to both shape the narrative to milk the fans' money while at the same time making sure that it does not threaten's Harry career -, why was Louis' "first" album scrapped, why did he agree to do the X-Factor, why was Walls' promo so different from Fine Line's, why is Louis still not allowed proper promo after having left Syco, why is there no press coverage of the Away From Home Festival...

All these questions kinda bring us to Harry Styles and so how does one reconcile these facts with the idea that H&L are in a relationship? Well pretty easy!!! You simply accept the "fact" that Louis doesn't actually want a solo career, that he's more comfortable working behind the scenes. That's why he's launching a management company! He's not interested in having his songs played on the radio! He just wants to stay home and watch Harry win a Grammy on television! He simply wants to travel the world for HSLOT mere days after his biggest professional event of the year!

All of this is so far from the truth... Louis was excited about the "first" album back in 2018, Louis has talked in details about the making off of Walls (album), Louis said many times he couldn't wait to go on tour, it had been years and performing live is one of his favourite part of being a musician... Louis crafted an amazing, coherent album, an MV trilogy, a fine-tuned livestream and an amazing festival. Louis has persisted ALL THIS TIME against all the roadblocks he's encountered, all these "high walls that never broke his soul". He literally said "Too many times in my career have I had to pick myself up and go “right let’s go again”" in the AFH doc. A documentary about how he created from the ground up a free festival for fans - because he loves live music so much. A Festival with 8,5K attendees, that he recorded so thousands of fans could watch his performance from all over the world.

Yet this idea that he doesn't want a solo career is SO INGRAINED in fandom and it's actually tragic because it's the complete opposite. And it makes me so mad. I would simply ask that Larries understand how, in adhering to this idea, they are doing Sony's job of burying Louis as a serious solo artist. How accepting the messed up situation of how of his career is handled without asking any questions and how focusing on Louis' personal life is doing him the greatest disservice.

Louis is here to be a solo artist, his love and commitment towards music is evident and he's been fighting for a fair chance at a solo career in less than ideals conditions. If you're not here to focus on that, if you're only "supporting" him for being half of Larry Stylinson, for being Harry Style's loving partner and secret stay-at-home-husband, then at least admit it - stop spreading false information about his lack of musical ambitions. Also kindly fuck off.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.

[berlinini]

Like you I refuse to believe that this latest round of stalker and lads night out pics is louis' preferred marketing strategy or image choice. It never has been and has always reeked of some kind of ultimatum that's put him in between a rock and a hard place. Does anyone actually believe that the same louis that came up with The Festival and spent a ton of money on it so that the fans could have something, is the same louis who would appear to be so tuned out of his fandom that he would decide "You know what let's give 'em some old tired shit!" The same louis that works his butt off and sings his heart out and stress cleans when he's talking about wanting to achieve something great is the same louis who we're all meant to believe doesn't pay any attention to what we want and has no clue how we would react to this. I don't believe he puts on THAT t-shirt (the one we were really loud about and the one that points to things not being okay) at the same moment this all goes down. He's said before that he notices how we find meaning in the symbols. Has anyone given any meaning to him pulling out all the vintage jackets? It's impossible for me to believe that he doesn't know that he's giving us recycled shit. And I also can't believe that after years of witnessing Things That Don't Make Sense there are still people out there who haven't connected the dots.

(In relation to this)

I wrote this 30 days ago, just after the live performance of AFHF:

Again, I refuse to believe that Louis has chosen anything when it comes to the current state of his promo/PR. He loves his fans and put the festival on mainly for us, but there is no way he worked so hard not get the recognition he deserves. And he must know he deserves it, because he shatters records with anything he does. He hasn’t given up and he’s still pushing the lid of the box to get it open, and he’s such a stubborn little shit that I hope he never stops pushing, faith in the future yady yady yada, but fuck if it isn’t frustrating for us, and so it must be x 1000 for him!!!

Fans who are unable to see the patterns aren't looking very far. As a reminder, AFHF didn't get any promo and almost 2 months after the global streaming event, we still have no ideas how many tickets Veeps sold for the event. That's even worse than the dodgy way the ticket numbers for the London Livestream were shared in 2020. When Louis' signing with BMG was announced in May, we had Jamie Nelson say Louis was already working on new music. Louis was spotted several times in the studio this summer. Now we know he's been in there for a week/ 10 days. We have no information about the state of LT2 coming from Louis himself or from LTHQ.

So please, don't go around pleading Louis for better promo options when there's no way in hell he's happy with the current situation.

If we, as fans, are able to sense that things are not normal, wouldn't you assume that Louis, being the main interested party in all of this, being the person who's said "Too many times in my career have I had to pick myself up and go ‘right let’s go again’.", being the one who - 2 years ago - announced that his debut album was "finally" coming, is aware of how things are abnormal for an artist of his status?

I'm always surprised at people in this fandom praising Louis' intelligence - his easter eggs, the 369 stuff, his lyrics, etc - on one hand, and then blaming him for the lack of promo with the other hand. Make it make sense, please...

[berlinini]

I’m sorry I’m really dumb but who is rob stringer and how is he connected to Louis? Is it his “manager” or something (I say manager in quotes cause lthq does close to nothing)

Rob Stringer is Chairman & CEO of Sony Music Entertainment and Sony Music Group. He's a big name in the music industry, to say the least.

Syco Entertainment (including Syco Music) was owned half by Simon Cowell and half by Sony Music UK. Stringer was working at Sony Music UK in the early 2010s. He then went to work at Columbia Records, which handled the US distribution/market of One Direction. While Stringer was at Columbia, he signed Solo Harry Styles. In 2017 Stringer became the CEO of Sony.

Harry was the first of OT4 to sign a solo contract. Liam and Niall went with different labels under different majors. Louis was the last to sign a solo deal, with Syco in 2017 and thus remained under Sony's umbrella. Zayn had previously signed with RCA (also under Sony), which is also interesting, for different reasons.

Sony retained both Harry and Louis, but at wildly different labels (one with prestige and one with... Simon Cowell), which can be explained by the fact that Harry was 'the star in the making' and Louis was the fans' favourite (and therefore had a lot of potential), and, unfortunately, by how Sony/1DHQ/HSHQ wanted to control the larry narrative, and with that, the fandom(s).

Since then, Harry got to release two albums and do one tour. Rob moved up the ladder and is now Harry's boss and they're very good friends. Harry is now a Star™️ and has Vogue covers and Grammys. Meanwhile, we know that 2017-2020 was complicated for Louis for many reasons, including personal, but several things point to the fact that his first album (LT0) was scrapped (tweets like "just some industry bullshit", the XF UK judge stint, him saying he's "finally" able to release Walls in January 2020) and that he was not backed by anyone in the industry to support his endeavour as a solo artist (his tweets following the London livestream, the lack of promo for AFHF, "too many times in my career I've had to pick myself up and say here we go again").

Now, if I say out loud that Louis' career wasn't handled normally and dare I say sabotaged, and if you look at who when what, well... who comes here but our dear friend Mr. Stringer... There are abnormalities that persist to this day with the way that Louis' career is going, including his promo, so we don't the extent of the contractual obligations he has to feu Syco/Sony.

Ever since Louis and Syco "agreed to part ways" and Louis signed with BMG, there is no longer an active connection between Louis and Stringer (to the exception of Louis' probable contractual obligation to tour Walls; and the fact that Sony handles the catalog of Syco Music, which includes 1D).

So, in conclusion, I wish Rob Stringer a very may your coffee always be cold and taste like burnt water <3.

Louis' manager is Matt Vines, and we don't like him either. Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of people in Louis' team that we like...