#or fail completely

[cassiebones]

Hi. Reading and Writing tutor here (as well as a school worker and a previous student of the American Public School System):

They didn't and still don't teach students how to use em-dashes in English classes. At least my high school didn't. Neither does my current school. It's not part of the typical curriculum.

I teach it at my tutoring center because it's part of the SAT. It's actually a pretty big part of the SAT.

The em-dash is used for nonessential elements, which means parts of a sentence that can be removed from said sentence without losing the cohesion or overall meaning of a sentence.

There are three pieces of punctuation (that I know of) that can do this:

The comma. The most versatile of punctuation can set off a nonessential phrase like an introductory phrase (In the Middles Ages, one might...), an interrupting phrase (Coco, my little sister, likes to....), etc. Commas are like the middle ground between parentheses and em-dash in terms of their usage.

Parentheses. This is when we're adding extra information to a sentence that's less important. Like when we're defining what a specific word means or giving a brief explanation of something. (ex. She died of defenestration (being thrown out of a window) when she was in her twenties. OR she yeeted (threw) the water bottle because it was empty). It's used often to have asides in playwriting.

Em-dash. This one is used to emphasize the information within them. It's information that we want to dramatize while also not being important to the overall meaning of the sentence. (I have the same dinner every single night -- chicken and yellow rice with a glass of wine -- to make things simple for myself). My example here isn't very dramatic or important really, but it's just an example of how it can be used.

I never learned how to use these things properly in school. I didn't learn how to use them in college, either (and I was a goddamned Creative Writing major) and instead learned how to use them on the job as a tutor, at the same time as my kids. Of course, I studied the material before I gave it to my students, but still. I should have known it before I started working there, I feel. I mean, it's part of an important test that so many of them take in high school -- why don't they learn it in high school????

Now, AI generators use em-dashes liberally in their generated essays because they are copying other papers that know how to properly use them. Teachers and school staff know this. They also know that they aren't teaching kids how to use em-dashes, so the assumption is that of course our kids don't know how to use these, so this must be AI. I've had kids come to me mad about being accused of using AI to write their essays because I taught them how to use em-dashes. I've written letters asking teachers to please talk to your student, who knows how to use this part of grammar trust me I'm their English tutor before they fail them for finding one in an essay and jumping to conclusions.

The fault doesn't lie completely on AI (which sucks balls) or the teachers (many of them cannot fit this lesson into their plans because of the other things they're literally required to teach and the little time they have to teach so many things) but I need teachers to still ask their students how to use them just to see if they actually know how before giving them a big fat ZERO for finding a single line in their essay.

My English teacher actually did this in 9th and 10th grade (I had her both years) I was not held back) whenever she found something that she didn't teach us in an essay we handed in.

If you could properly use the thing (could be an em-dash, colon, or semi-colon) the way it was used in your essay, she believed that you actually knew its function. If you couldn't, it was assumed that you copied at least part of the essay off the internet and you lost points.

I was stressed because I used a semi-colon once in an essay. I knew how to use them because my older cousin, who was a writer, had taught me, so I was able to prove that I knew how to use it, but I definitely have silver hairs from that day from 10th grade.

[sinkableruby]

tower unite's the sort of game that could reignite my old gmod obsession

[ruubesz-draws]

He's a little confused but he's got the spirit!

He doesn't know how to make a heart but he's trying😭

From this:

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

MDZS X Disco Elysium = Disco Guidao (Grandmaster of Detective Cultivation).

[myork]

anon said 'hobipalooza!!!!'

[battry-acid]

a sketch from a couple years ago of the boyfriends :]

[flowersforthemachines]

|| Companion skill animations (+ bonus Rook)

[l4tchk3y]

A messy page of Espio sketches. Many many Espios. Espio forever.<3

[petricorah]

felt like drawing something sweet [id in alt]

[greenglowinspooks]

The way that I’m brainrotting over a DCxDP crossover with a Danny who’s a vengeful villain rn

Like, let’s just say that the GiW finally get into contact with the JL. They need help neutralizing a threat, you see, and they’re on their last limb trying to keep civilians safe.

They have video evidence! They have studies to back their claims! The JL have to help them!

Unfortunately, the JL believe them. They join a fight against Danny, and defeat him due to being far more experienced than he is. Danny is locked away and experimented on by the GiW.

That would CHANGE a person. Your heroes turning against you and seeing you as a monster, being experimented on for who knows how long, not knowing if your friends and family are safe.

Danny gets out due to a simple mistake on the GiW’s part; having Blüdhaven as part of their transport route.

Of course the trucks were attacked, they’re government property!

So now, whoever decided to raid the government transport trucks (the Penguin or something) has a ton of experimental weapons with no idea how they work, and a heavily traumatized teenager.

Danny knows how they work. Danny can be useful! They won’t throw him out if he’s useful! And so, now Danny is working for the Penguin, altering the ectoplasm weapons to make them work on humans.

It’s a good deal for both parties. Danny gets to neurotically imprint on the Penguin like a small baby animal, and the Penguin gets a brilliant mind who will stop at nothing to achieve his goals.

But eventually, Danny finds out what happened to his family in his absence.

Jazz is in Arkham. Not as a psychologist, but as a “patient.” Apparently, she snapped and completely destroyed the house, leveled a few blocks of Amity Park, and conducted organized attacks on government bases (mostly GiW) for months.

Sam and Tucker helped her, eventually splitting once Jazz was captured. Sam travels to areas of extreme pollution, completely overgrowing them with her plant powers. Currently she’s in the Amazon rainforest, engaging in an ongoing feud with logging companies. Sam is winning.

Tucker faked his death, and Danny has no idea where he is. He only knows that the death wasn’t real because of a code that the three of them made together, just in case.

Ellie’s trapped in the Infinite Realms. Danny had a failsafe in place so that if she was ever cornered by the GiW, she would be sent to her haunt in the GZ. However, with the portal destroyed, she can’t come back. Danny just hopes she’s okay.

His parents are now top GiW scientists. They’re traveling the country giving speeches. They’re working on a battery powered by ectoplasm, but apparently started “having difficulties” around the same time that Danny escaped.

None of it is fair. None of it is right.

The Justice League destroyed his life, the lives of his friends, and they’re doing as good as ever. The GiW is respected, and his parents are happily working away for them.

Danny takes up some of his more experimental weapons and breaks Jazz out of Arkham. She’s a little different now, colder and more quiet, but she still loves him all the same. It’s an unimaginable comfort to him to see his sister again.

He can’t use his powers anymore. He’s so used to associating them with pain that even transforming into his ghost form is enough to take him down for hours.

However, he understands ectoplasm more than anyone else in the world. He knows how to use it in virtually everything; how it can become a weapon, how it can be used as a supplemental ingredient in poisons and nerve agents, how it can twist and distort the mind if applied correctly.

He doesn’t care what happens to him. He’s going to take down the GiW, and destroy the lives of the JL members who helped lock him away, just as they did to him.

No matter the cost.

[thebearme]

The Dogman movie in a nutshell

I just finished watching the movie!!

[nartothelar]

IChooChooseYouWeek - Day 1: Flirting

- melli and ingo have only recently started dating at this point

- melli still isn’t used to how ingo gives sincere compliments so easily

- Ingo knows how easily melli is affected by such words; he finds melli’s reactions endlessly endearing (and teases him for it when he’s feeling particularly cheeky)

[dapper-lil-arts]

I'm not the kind of person that's like "Here let me fix the canon" usually but like holy crap gen 5 implied a lot of messed up shit about our hero Twilight Sparkle lmao

[foldingfittedsheets]

In the VFX class I'm auditing the professor showed us all how to do a small spinning light effect in class, and then expected us to know how to create a dust devil with vertical spinning tunnel of particles based only on that. When we've never used the system.

Another alum is in the class and also has not managed to get a working effect.

Instantly lost respect for the professor when I asked in class if he'd be giving feedback or a demo and he said he wouldn't because it would be, "giving us all the answers."

[alukaforyou]

hes picking flowers for u & feeling so dumb abt it lol someone come hit me w a big rock if i dont finish this in 2 weeks

[vaguely-concerned]

I really really like that lucanis reaches the 'there must be some way through this' realization 'off camera', so to speak, while presumably looking at rook explaining the situation to spite. it just. hits right. he gets that moment to himself after 'this place is a nightmare, why would I want to stay here' to come back into focus, to gather himself and think it through in peace, outside of the demands of anyone’s gaze (including the player’s!), while rook takes care of spite’s confusion and urgency and distress as he can’t himself in this shattered state. they're inside his soul, but he still gets that moment of privacy, with rook and spite there and supporting but not intruding. idk there's just something so good and right-feeling about it. rook's presence in lucanis' mind at its most vulnerable and frozen could have felt SO invasive if the quest wasn't written as skillfully as it is, and I get skeeved out by that kind of thing incredibly easily so it's a testament to how well it's done that it always feels safe and supportive. lucanis has had both his bodily and psychological (slash spiritual/existential) integrity and autonomy violated so brutally and repeatedly, and having even the way the camera perceives him here grant him the dignity and respect and privacy of soul he hasn’t experienced in a long time… it’s a whole thing huh. No wonder it’s taken me a while to put it into words lol 

(also what a contrast to what solas and rook have got going on, and what a sly way to slide the point of comparison in there to build to the thematic whole. the solas version of this IS of course wildly invasive and skeeves me out but in the intended delighted horror movie way. solas, too, was let into someone’s soul through the cracks in the wake of a traumatic event, and he IMMEDIATELY sought to turn it to his own benefit and use that trauma as a weapon against them fhdsja I’m sorry but it’s just such a character-revealing instinct for him to act on without hesitation and I love how terrible he is, it’s all so unforgivably premeditated and consistent.

rook acting out of the desire to make sure lucanis is ok vs. solas going ‘well. When life gives you oops killed my friend, make dead friend poisoned lemonade and make his loved ones drink it. this sunk cost fallacy isn’t going to perpetuate itself’ is such a neat contrast and it’s not in your face about it but it’s still there, deep and solid down in the thematic narrative. rook doesn’t do anything to or in lucanis’ mind, really — they negotiate their way through the layers of defense and are let through, and they help him make the whole thing more explicable, but they never exert any force or go rooting around for anything that doesn’t present itself to them first. solas goes about gathering ammo for when he's going to nothing personel kid this person from like the first moment fhdskh doesn't waste a second before he's on that gaslight gatekeep girlboss grind. the fact that the game goes out of its way to show there IS a respectful, non-selfish and kind version of this process makes what solas is doing even more deliciously awful (glee) and rook and lucanis’ relationship (platonic, romantic, whatever it might be in any given playthrough) all the more moving to me)