#this is now a discourse free space

[wikiangela]

I feel like some people forget, or are straight up too young and new to fandom to know, how fandom, fanfics, and ao3 work, bc I'm honestly baffled, tho I probably shouldn't be but either ive never been this deep into fandom to witness it, or this is some new insanity

like, you know the main idea with fic writing should be just to have fun with characters and ships you love, right? it can have nothing to do with canon or endgames or even shit we want to actually see in a show, not every fic is spec

and the thing is, you don’t have to read something if you dont like it, that's why we have filters, and most importantly, you don’t go on someone's clearly tagged fic and talk shit about the ship the fic is for, what the actual fuck

keep the discourse here, bringing it into ao3 comments now is just so rude and childish wtf

[scarapanna]

Sopping I'M IN TOO DEEP HELPPP

My MK hyperfix is resurfacing I can't stop doodling him help

I love this competitive gumball guy he's so fun raughhhh

I NEED to draw more kirby content NOW!!!/silly

[jmliebert]

When Nanami Has a Crush on You ♡

on the surface, Nanami appears as calm and collected as ever, but internally...he’s conflicted. somehow it's hard to maintain his self-control when you are near

though he tries to remain stoic through it all, subtle signs betray him... (if you look close enough you can see his fist clenches whenever he watches you interact with other men or when he's frustrated with what he said or did in your presence)

he doesn’t force interactions but cherishes the moments when he accidentally runs into you. those fleeting encounters brighten his day, and he silently wishes for more

notices and compliments the small details about you, each remark dripping with charm. also his soft, almost shy smile and a light scratch of his head during these moments make this even sweeter. it's surprising even for him, how he acts when he's with you (as I said his self-control fades..)

always prepared. Nanami is there with a napkin, an umbrella, or just the right amount of time to spare. he’s happy to share breakfast with you, insisting on paying—not out of any outdated notion, but simply because it’s you, and he wants to do something kind

and when he sees you enjoying a simple sandwich, he catches himself wishing he could feed you himself, loosening his tie slightly as he tries to shake the thought away (oh!)

when you compliment his suit, his eyes widen slightly, but he quickly masks it with a smooth, “oh, you think so?” you might not realise the impact, but he’ll wear that suit more often

his small, seemingly innocent touches send shivers down your spine. at first, he’s observant and reserved, trying to process his feelings and it takes some time, but as he becomes more certain, his confidence grows, and he begins to act more directly

eventually, he’ll invite you to dinner at a place that’s both elegant and cozy. he arrives to with a bouquet of red roses, complimenting your beauty with heartfelt sincerity. you are so luminous and full of grace, he could stare at you for hours, and he would do it gladly

at dinner, he’s the perfect gentleman—offering champagne, helping with your seat and coat. his eyes never leave yours, brows raised slightly with every word you speak, soaking in your every word

conversation flows effortlessly. you talk about everything—hypothetical scenarios, life, dreams, philosophy and literature—and while Nanami enjoys the discourse, he can’t help but steer it back to you. he wants to know you deeply, genuinely

as the night goes on, he finds himself unexpectedly moved by how easy it is to be with you. he can’t remember the last time he felt so at peace, so effortlessly himself

as he walks you home, your sweet smile and sparkling eyes full of life completely undo him. he hadn’t planned this—he was in it for the long game—but you, standing there like this, make it impossible to resist. gently, he cups your chin and presses a soft, lingering kiss to your lips. when you respond, his long-restrained passion breaks free. his kisses grow deeper, more urgent, as his hands pull you closer. a single strand of his hair falls across his forehead as your breaths mingle, the space between you almost nonexistent. the air feels charged, every shared breath heavy with anticipation

but he pulls away, knowing it’s the right thing to do, even though it feels impossible to watch you walk away, heading to your flat alone (he watches you until he sees the light in your window flicker on)

somehow the thought of you being there all alone...at night...without no living soul to talk to does things to him. the desire to care for you, be there for you, to provide for you never was so prominent, so strong and going home alone was never so hard for Nanami

that night, he’s too overwhelmed to sleep. at 4 AM, he sends you a message, unable to hold back, and waits anxiously for your response, even knowing it’s a little over the top

and now he can't help his chest tightening at the mere thought of you...it feels so good, as if the fog has finally lifted, but at the same time it feels scary, he might like you a tad to much, it's getting out of control (which is good hihi)

︵‿︵‿୨♡୧‿︵‿︵

oh, i wanted to write it so bad!!

 you can find more of my works ♡here♡

[dreamersofcolor]

welcome to the dreamer's lounge! 💌

this is a self ship blog dedicated to uplifting & supporting people of color in the community! i'm your mod, @taibobo!

things we offer here:

an open ask box for advice, discussing topics related to navigating self shipping as a person of color, gushing about your f/os, and showing support to other POC in the community!

promoting POC self shippers through reblogging their posts and supporting their commissions and mutual aid

imagine requests & submissions tailored specifically towards self shippers of color!

events and raffles that include prizes like free art, letters from your f/o, fanfiction, moodboards/stimboards, + more!

this account is villain / problematic f/o friendly (within reason) and non-sharing friendly (as long as you're respectful and kind towards doubles), but i do ask that any self shippers who condone or engage in adult/minor shipping, RPF, or shipping between related parties please do not interact!

additional rules below:

ask box rules:

though i aim to be a listening ear for those who don't feel they have one in the community, particularly sensitive subjects (SA/CSA, self harm, suicide, incest, police brutality) are prohibited to be discussed in detail, as well as excessive venting about personal issues not related to the self ship community

i try to be understanding of most people's f/o sources (lord knows mine are not free from discourse), i do ask that anyone who self ships from DSMP or any similar minecraft SMP channels and/or from the game clinical trial do not gush about those characters in the inbox! i also won't be reblogging posts with these characters. this is just a personal boundary, i hope you understand :)

non-detailed discussions of 18+ / nsft topics are ok, as long as you let me know at the beginning of the message via a content warning so i can always tag it properly!

just a reminder that i am doing this as a service to uplift people, so hate towards me or any other person is not tolerated!

also, i am just one guy, so please be patient! i have a full-time job, work freelance, and have several other projects on the side, among other things... i'm a busy little guy, so this is just a little thing i wanted to do for fun!

imagine / prompt rules:

i will not be writing any 18+ / nsft imagines or similar posts, nor will i be posting anything containing explicit content! this rule may change or have some kind of exception in the future (maybe some kind of 'after dark' events?), but for now-- SFW imagines only!

no imagines discussing the previously mentioned sensitive subjects in detail. things like "your f/o comforting you during a depressive episode" is fine, but something like "your f/o saving you from an attempted SA" or "your f/o stopping you from an attempt" is not.

promotion rules

i won't be reblogging from any accounts that break my dni or any posts that break any of the rules i've discussed earlier. i'll try my best to support everyone i can outside of that, so if you need any assistance, please feel free to shoot me a message with your post and as long as the rules are followed, i'll reblog / add it to the queue!

tags

#from the clouds: mod post / text post

#user / anon tag: self explanatory, for organization

#mailbox: any ask box submission

#gush: for talking about your f/os and how much you love them!

#advice column: for advice

#discussions: for talking about frustrating parts/struggles of being a POC in self shipping spaces

#adult dreaming: for nsft / 18+ / sensitive topic asks

#our favorite dreamers: for promoting art and self ship posts in the community

#wish on a star: for promoting mutual aid

#rec: for resources

#userboxes

#ask games

#reblog games

#templates

#polls

#present from the lounge: requests / event prizes

#dream a little dream: imagines/prompts written by me

#shared dream: imagines/prompts written by others

#slumber party: raffles / events

(divider credit)

[seadeepspaceontheside]

How do you talk about "proship" stuff without immediately getting bombarded with hate and dismissed as a terrible person?

I'm on your side, but it seems most people are not, and not willing to listen at all.

I wanna make some small things clear lol I am not the spokesperson for this topic. There are far more people who are more articulate and have done more research and I would rather just be drawing lol

I usually state that if you're not a great speaker or can't articulate yourself very well, link to the experts that understand how this stuff works. Like I've said before, a lot of the therapists and articles I have linked have done a better job than I on the topic. Because you might be actually hurting your case when you're trying to explain to someone these things and you are either hung up on the trees over the forest or can't explain something because they catch you on a minute detail.

That being said, the main advice I would give is to not to use these loaded terms themselves, just the dynamic itself. In all honesty, if you use that kind of terminology (proship/anti), it usually turns people's brains off and makes them think you're weird automatically.

I would just point out that there's a wide range of different types of stories (from tv shows to myths of yore) that have spanned centuries--even some of which featuring taboos. And the ills of society do not have these stories to blame.

I am tired, because when I think we've moved on from these rehashed arguments and stupid discourse about media , I come to find arguments that were settled ten years ago are rearing their heads again. And this time they're coming with threats!

They did this with D&D and rock music. (You would be lured into satanic rituals and be deviants) They did this was violent movies and video games (You would want to commit murders or want murderers to go free) They did with this with rap and music videos (You would be hypnotized into violence by the artist and you would want to be a harlot) They did this with anime (Foreign media that is super weird and turn people into super freaks) They did this was queer media (Gonna turn you gay) They did this with superheroes (Children will think they can fly, they think punching will solve their problems)

Now this type of persecution comes for people that are doing taboo fanworks. I am tired of seeing this shit. Hindsight is free--those who were young for these old campaigns can see this stuff clearly for what it is: veiled right-wing rhetoric that is easily adopted by useful idiots who believe they are "helping". This time, the main push has been from young people in fandom spaces.

This is how it works.

All art communicates worldviews to some extent, but that doesn't make everything propaganda. Artists aren't working to eliminate other worldviews or stifle the existence of other artists--that is actually what propaganda is. It often comes from a perspective that embraces the imperialist or patriarchal status quo.

To someone on the fence who might be reading this: art is subjective. Your need to moralize what you consume is fraught. Consuming "good" media made with "good morals" and not "taboo" doesn't make you live a good life or become a good person. You're going to hit a wall one of these days where something you enjoy will be seen as something gross/repulsive/troubling and when you have been cut off from all those who would have defended you, you will have no one around you. If you feel like you are constantly put under a magnifying glass by said friends over what you ship, what art you enjoy.... Its not healthy! When you can't unfollow or say how you truly feel in a group of people and feel "unsafe" if you were to leave…. THAT'S A CULT. I find that it's always the same people who start shit that will be repeating this behaviour wherever they go. They literally act like HOAs but instead of your halloween ornaments staying up for too long, they are saying you can't enjoy your Greek God incest fics.

One last thing to remember: if you're having this conversation, and a person takes the worst possible light from what you say…they are not trying to have a conversation with you, they are acting against you.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Dirty words are politically potent

On OCTOBER 23 at 7PM, I'll be in DECATUR, presenting my novel THE BEZZLE at EAGLE EYE BOOKS.

Making up words is a perfectly cromulent passtime, and while most of the words we coin disappear as soon as they fall from our lips, every now and again, you find a word that fits so nice and kentucky in the public discourse that it acquires a life of its own:

http://meaningofliff.free.fr/definition.php3?word=Kentucky

I've been trying to increase the salience of digital human rights in the public imagination for a quarter of a century, starting with the campaign to get people to appreciate that the internet matters, and that tech policy isn't just the delusion that the governance of spaces where sad nerds argue about Star Trek is somehow relevant to human thriving:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell

Now, eventually people figured out that a) the internet mattered and, b) it was going dreadfully wrong. So my job changed again, from "how the internet is governed matters" to "you can't fix the internet with wishful thinking," for example, when people said we could solve its problems by banning general purpose computers:

https://memex.craphound.com/2012/01/10/lockdown-the-coming-war-on-general-purpose-computing/

Or by banning working cryptography:

https://memex.craphound.com/2018/09/04/oh-for-fucks-sake-not-this-fucking-bullshit-again-cryptography-edition/

Or by redesigning web browsers to treat their owners as threats:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/open-letter-w3c-director-ceo-team-and-membership

Or by using bots to filter every public utterance to ensure that they don't infringe copyright:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2018/09/today-europe-lost-internet-now-we-fight-back

Or by forcing platforms to surveil and police their users' speech (aka "getting rid of Section 230"):

https://www.techdirt.com/2020/06/23/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act/

Along the way, many of us have coined words in a bid to encapsulate the abstract, technical ideas at the core of these arguments. This isn't a vanity project! Creating a common vocabulary is a necessary precondition for having the substantive, vital debates we'll need to tackle the real, thorny issues raised by digital systems. So there's "free software," "open source," "filternet," "chat control," "back doors," and my own contributions, like "adversarial interoperability":

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

Or "Competitive Compatibility" ("comcom"), a less-intimidatingly technical term for the same thing:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/12/competitive-compatibility-year-review

These have all found their own niches, but nearly all of them are just that: niche. Some don't even rise to "niche": they're shibboleths, insider terms that confuse and intimidate normies and distract from the real fights with semantic ones, like whether it's "FOSS" or "FLOSS" or something else entirely:

https://opensource.stackexchange.com/questions/262/what-is-the-difference-between-foss-and-floss

But every now and again, you get a word that just kills. That brings me to "enshittification," a word I coined in 2022:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/28/enshittification/#relentless-payola

"Enshittification" took root in my hindbrain, rolling around and around, agglomerating lots of different thoughts and critiques I'd been making for years, crystallizing them into a coherent thesis:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

This kind of spontaneous crystallization is the dividend of doing lots of work in public, trying to take every half-formed thought and pin it down in public writing, something I've been doing for decades:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

After those first couple articles, "enshittification" raced around the internet. There's two reasons for this: first, "enshittification" is a naughty word that's fun to say. Journalists love getting to put "shit" in their copy:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/15/crosswords/linguistics-word-of-the-year.html

Radio journalists love to tweak the FCC with cheekily bleeped syllables in slightly dirty compound words:

https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/projects/enshitification

And nothing enlivens an academic's day like getting to use a word like "enshittification" in a journal article (doubtless this also amuses the editors, peer-reviewers, copyeditors, typesetters, etc):

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=enshittification&btnG=&oq=ensh

That was where I started, too! The first time I used "enshittification" was in a throwaway bad-tempered rant about the decay of Tripadvisor into utter uselessness, which drew a small chorus of appreciative chuckles about the word:

https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1550457808222552065

The word rattled around my mind for five months before attaching itself to my detailed theory of platform decay. But it was that detailed critique, coupled with a minor license to swear, that gave "enshittification" a life of its own. How do I know that the theory was as important as the swearing? Because the small wave of amusement that followed my first use of "enshittification" petered out in less than a day. It was only when I added the theory that the word took hold.

Likewise: how do I know that the theory needed to be blended with swearing to break out of the esoteric realm of tech policy debates (which the public had roundly ignored for more than two decades)? Well, because I spent two decades writing about this stuff without making anything like the dents that appeared once I added an Anglo-Saxon monosyllable to that critique.

Adding "enshittification" to the critique got me more column inches, a longer hearing, a more vibrant debate, than anything else I'd tried. First, Wired availed itself of the Creative Commons license on my second long-form article on the subject and reprinted it as a 4,200-word feature. I've been writing for Wired for more than thirty years and this is by far the longest thing I've published with them – a big, roomy, discursive piece that was run verbatim, with every one of my cherished darlings unmurdered.

That gave the word – and the whole critique, with all its spiky corners – a global airing, leading to more pickup and discussion. Eventually, the American Dialect Society named it their "Word of the Year" (and their "Tech Word of the Year"):

https://americandialect.org/2023-word-of-the-year-is-enshittification/

"Enshittification" turns out to be catnip for language nerds:

https://becauselanguage.com/90-enpoopification/#transcript-60

I've been dragged into (good natured) fights over the German, Spanish, French and Italian translations for the term. When I taped an NPR show before a live audience with ASL interpretation, I got to watch a Deaf fan politely inform the interpreter that she didn't need to finger-spell "enshittification," because it had already been given an ASL sign by the US Deaf community:

https://maximumfun.org/episodes/go-fact-yourself/ep-158-aida-rodriguez-cory-doctorow/

I gave a speech about enshittification in Berlin and published the transcript:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/30/go-nuts-meine-kerle/#ich-bin-ein-bratapfel

Which prompted the rock-ribbed Financial Times to get in touch with me and publish the speech – again, nearly verbatim – as a whopping 6,400 word feature in their weekend magazine:

https://www.ft.com/content/6fb1602d-a08b-4a8c-bac0-047b7d64aba5

Though they could have had it for free (just as Wired had), they insisted on paying me (very well, as it happens!), as did De Zeit:

https://www.zeit.de/digital/internet/2024-03/plattformen-facebook-google-internet-cory-doctorow

This was the start of the rise of enshittification. The word is spreading farther than ever, in ways that I have nothing to do with, along with the critique I hung on it. In other words, the bit of string that tech policy wonks have been pushing on for a quarter of a century is actually starting to move, and it's actually accelerating.

Despite this (or more likely because of it), there's a growing chorus of "concerned" people who say they like the critique but fret that it is being held back because you can't use it "at church or when talking to K-12 students" (my favorite variant: "I couldn't say this at a NATO conference"). I leave it up to you whether you use the word with your K-12 students, NATO generals, or fellow parishoners (though I assure you that all three groups are conversant with the dirty little word at the root of my coinage). If you don't want to use "enshittification," you can coin your own word – or just use one of the dozens of words that failed to gain public attention over the past 25 years (might I suggest "platform decay?").

What's so funny about all this pearl-clutching is that it comes from people who universally profess to have the intestinal fortitude to hear the word "enshittification" without experiencing psychological trauma, but worry that other people might not be so strong-minded. They continue to say this even as the most conservative officials in the most staid of exalted forums use the word without a hint of embarrassment, much less apology:

https://www.independent.ie/business/technology/chairman-of-irish-social-media-regulator-says-europe-should-not-be-seduced-by-mario-draghis-claims/a526530600.html

I mean, I'm giving a speech on enshittification next month at a conference where I'm opening for the Secretary General of the United Nations:

https://icanewdelhi2024.coop/welcome/pages/Programme

After spending half my life trying to get stuff like this into the discourse, I've developed some hard-won, informed views on how ideas succeed:

First: the minor obscenity is a feature, not a bug. The marriage of something long and serious to something short and funny is a happy one that makes both the word and the ideas better off than they'd be on their own. As Lenny Bruce wrote in his canonical work in the subject, the aptly named How to Talk Dirty and Influence People:

I want to help you if you have a dirty-word problem. There are none, and I'll spell it out logically to you.

Here is a toilet. Specifically-that's all we're concerned with, specifics-if I can tell you a dirty toilet joke, we must have a dirty toilet. That's what we're all talking about, a toilet. If we take this toilet and boil it and it's clean, I can never tell you specifically a dirty toilet joke about this toilet. I can tell you a dirty toilet joke in the Milner Hotel, or something like that, but this toilet is a clean toilet now. Obscenity is a human manifestation. This toilet has no central nervous system, no level of consciousness. It is not aware; it is a dumb toilet; it cannot be obscene; it's impossible. If it could be obscene, it could be cranky, it could be a Communist toilet, a traitorous toilet. It can do none of these things. This is a dirty toilet here.

Nobody can offend you by telling a dirty toilet story. They can offend you because it's trite; you've heard it many, many times.

https://www.dacapopress.com/titles/lenny-bruce/how-to-talk-dirty-and-influence-people/9780306825309/

Second: the fact that a neologism is sometimes decoupled from its theoretical underpinnings and is used colloquially is a feature, not a bug. Many people apply the term "enshittification" very loosely indeed, to mean "something that is bad," without bothering to learn – or apply – the theoretical framework. This is good. This is what it means for a term to enter the lexicon: it takes on a life of its own. If 10,000,000 people use "enshittification" loosely and inspire 10% of their number to look up the longer, more theoretical work I've done on it, that is one million normies who have been sucked into a discourse that used to live exclusively in the world of the most wonkish and obscure practitioners. The only way to maintain a precise, theoretically grounded use of a term is to confine its usage to a small group of largely irrelevant insiders. Policing the use of "enshittification" is worse than a self-limiting move – it would be a self-inflicted wound. As I said in that Berlin speech:

Enshittification names the problem and proposes a solution. It's not just a way to say 'things are getting worse' (though of course, it's fine with me if you want to use it that way. It's an English word. We don't have der Rat für englische Rechtschreibung. English is a free for all. Go nuts, meine Kerle).

Finally: "coinage" is both more – and less – than thinking of the word. After the American Dialect Society gave honors to "enshittification," a few people slid into my mentions with citations to "enshittification" that preceded my usage. I find this completely unsurprising, because English is such a slippery and playful tongue, because English speakers love to swear, and because infixing is such a fun way to swear (e.g. "unfuckingbelievable"). But of course, I hadn't encountered any of those other usages before I came up with the word independently, nor had any of those other usages spread appreciably beyond the speaker (it appears that each of the handful of predecessors to my usage represents an act of independent coinage).

If "coinage" was just a matter of thinking up the word, you could write a small python script that infixed the word "shit" into every syllable of every word in the OED, publish the resulting text file, and declare priority over all subsequent inventive swearers.

On the one hand, coinage takes place when the coiner a) independently invents a word; and b) creates the context for that word that causes it to escape from the coiner's immediate milieu and into the wider world.

But on the other hand – and far more importantly – the fact that a successful coinage requires popular uptake by people unknown to the coiner means that the coiner only ever plays a small role in the coinage. Yes, there would be no popularization without the coinage – but there would also be no coinage without the popularization. Words belong to groups of speakers, not individuals. Language is a cultural phenomenon, not an individual one.

Which is rather the point, isn't it? After a quarter of a century of being part of a community that fought tirelessly to get a serious and widespread consideration of tech policy underway, we're closer than ever, thanks, in part, to "enshittification." If someone else independently used that word before me, if some people use the word loosely, if the word makes some people uncomfortable, that's fine, provided that the word is doing what I want it to do, what I've devoted my life to doing.

The point of coining words isn't the pilkunnussija's obsession with precise usage, nor the petty glory of being known as a coiner, nor ensuring that NATO generals' virgin ears are protected from the word "shit" – a word that, incidentally, is also the root of "science":

https://www.arrantpedantry.com/2019/01/24/science-and-shit/

Isn't language fun?

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/10/14/pearl-clutching/#this-toilet-has-no-central-nervous-system

[seangardnerxiv]

Shadow and Maria's Complex Relationship

FOR DISCLOSURE: this thread is going to be discussing the complexities of Shadow and Maria’s relationship based on many different factors. Though I will be including the romantic interpretation (NOT a sexual one – I do not support nor condone sexualizing these two, nor most of the characters in Sonic, as they are almost all minors) as a potential, I will not be arguing to assign a definite label to their relationship – I will, in fact, be doing exactly the opposite (I am also not interested in engaging in shipping discourse over Sonic the Hedgehog characters). I would simply like to disclose that that will be discussed in case the topic upsets you and you would prefer to stop reading now. I accept this post may not be received well by some.

SPOILERS FOR SONIC X SHADOW GENERATIONS

So I've had to break out my Tumblr for this - my usual haunt is Twitter/Bluesky, but those don't really allow for longform posts. This is also a major departure from my usual FFXIV posting, so apologies to anyone who follows me for that.

Sonic x Shadow Generations recently dropped, alongside the short animations “Dark Beginnings” as well as the (non-canonical) manga “The Jet Black Hedgehog: Shadow the Hedgehog.” With it, discourse surrounding Shadow and Maria’s relationship has kicked up again, largely in two parties – that Shadow and Maria held a sibling relationship, or that Shadow and Maria held romantic feelings for one another (some people have also argued that Shadow is her uncle, or Maria is his mother, but I won’t be discussing those views). There are arguments for both drawn from a variety of sources – I will do my best to present both (if there are others I've missed, please feel free to comment and I will add them).

For siblings:

This Twitter post of artwork for Dark Beginnings has the following alt text: “Shadow and Maria reach out for one another in an infinite abyss (as long-lost siblings would) with the Moon and the Space Colony ARK in the background."

The manual for Shadow the Hedgehog (2005) describes Maria as “like a sister to Shadow.” I have also seen another screenshot of a different manual that states that Shadow as "like a brother to Maria," but I've been unable to find which manual it is. (EDIT: It’s a Prima Games manual, not written by Sega)

Gerald refers to Shadow as “son” during the climax of SxSG.

For romantic:

Maria saying “I love you” in the Japanese version of SxSG uses the kanji “ai shiteru,” whilst her “I love you” in the Japanese version of the manga uses “daisuki.” Whilst it can be used for familial relations, it is apparently very uncommon for both of these to be used outside of romantic intent.

Shiro Maekawa – the original creator of Shadow and Maria – based them (or at least parts of them) off of a romance manga known as “Please Save My Earth” (with Maria sharing the Japanese voice actress for the female lead from the anime), and has frequently supported them together, often retweeting romantic art and posts of Shadow and Maria.

In a recent interview from Sega, Maria touching Shadow’s face in Dark Beginnings was equated to Beauty and the Beast.

For Tanabata – a Japanese festival celebrating the meeting of the deities Orihime and Hikoboshi, and the separation of them as lovers – Sonic Channel posted artwork of Shadow and Maria reading the story beneath the stars. Sonic Channel has also published fanart for Valentine’s Day relating to Shadow and Maria (although they publish a lot of fanart).

Before I go any further, when the topic of Shadow and Maria in a romantic lens comes up, many of the same criticisms arise that I do not believe are fairly levied – namely accusations regarding their age, species, and familial ties. I would like to address – and debunk – these three before we go any further. Keep in mind while you read these – this is not meant to convince you that their relationship was one thing over another, but only to provide validity to a subjective point of view I feel is unfairly stigmatized.

“It’s incest because Shadow is Maria’s brother/uncle(?).”

While there were notions of family stated by both Maria and Gerald, Shadow was grown in a tube with alien DNA and has zero blood relation to the Robotnik family. Whilst there are abstract labels of “like a sister” or “sibling coding” that are only ever applied in a meta sense, neither of them define their relationship in such a way within the lens of the universe. And it is not as if the topic never arises - in Shadow Generations, Maria herself likens young Abraham Tower as akin to her little brother, but she makes no such distinction with Shadow.

“Sibling coding” is ultimately a nothing statement, and unless a proper adoption is made, it does not magically turn romantic feelings towards the two involved into incest. Frames of reference are often informed by what young people are familiar with, and they sometimes lack the proper tools to acknowledge that their feelings towards each other are more complex than they first believe - to say that this is something that potentially occurred with Shadow and Maria is not outlandish, and not a concept unique to Sonic as a series.

Similar examples to this include Clive and Jill from Final Fantasy XVI (Jill is accepted into the Rosfield household and raised alongside Clive and his brother, only to later enter a romantic relationship with him as an adult), Nero and Kyrie from Devil May Cry (Nero is fostered by Kyrie's family and considers Kyrie a sister initially, only for her to become his love interest as adults) and Sidon and Yona from The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (Sidon grows up perceiving Yona as a sister, only to realize his feelings for her are more complex later on). None of these are incestuous relationships, nor is Shadow and Maria’s were it to be romantic.

“It’s bestiality because Shadow is an animal.��

Bestiality is applicable to regular animals that do not hold human sentience of thought, as they are unable to consent to a relationship, like a dog or cat. Shadow is not this, nor are any of the anthropomorphic characters within the Sonic games - were you to change the anthropomorphic animals in Sonic into humans, basically nothing about the series' content would change. All of them are completely sound-minded beings that are essentially just people who look different. Shadow is not Maria’s pet, he is her fully sentient friend that holds the same degree of thought as she does – given that Shadow’s entire arc is about finding his purpose in life, degrading him to simply a lab animal rather than acknowledging he is a person defeats that entire arc (something the manga also touches upon).

A lot of people also cite Sonic and Elise from Sonic ‘06 (namely the scene where Elise kisses the deceased Sonic) as a reason why Shadow and Maria should not be done - while I think it’s valid if you didn’t like watching a human girl kissing Sonic the Hedgehog, I maintain that a good chunk of that disdain stemmed from two major reasons:

Elise was very poorly characterized in her game. She existed to constantly get kidnapped and be saved by Sonic, and so both the relationship and the kiss came off more like pandering than something earned.

Sonic '06 had a bizarrely realistic artstyle for the human characters, whilst all of the animal characters retained their cartoonish appearances. This clash of artstyles looked its worst when Elise kissed Sonic at the game's climax.

Maria, however, does not fall into these pitfalls. She does not exist to be purely a love interest for Shadow - she’s certainly not someone for him to save, as the entire inciting event of Shadow's character is his inability to save her when she saves him.

For a frame of reference, Shadow is more akin to an alien from Star Wars – a setting where humans also exist. It is not bestiality for a Human to hold a relationship with a Twi’lek, as both races are fully anthropomorphic and sentient. On a similar note, Beauty and the Beast is not considered bestiality either, even though the Beast bears obvious animalistic traits. Some people have also entertained the notion of Rouge and Topaz from Sonic X, even though the latter is human. This is all the same principle, and none of it is bestiality.

“It’s creepy because Maria is young.”

Shadow – while said to be ageless – is not an adult, and to imply that he is one is a fundamental misunderstanding of Shadow’s character – whilst there are many instances where he demonstrates maturity on some levels, he has shown much immaturity since his inception in Sonic Adventure 2 (his desire to destroy the world out of revenge for Maria), and his most recent storyline in Generations involves his naïve desire to change Maria and Gerald’s fates (or rather, an initial indifference to what it will bring). Not only that, but his time on the ARK was mired in confusion over the point of his existence – Maria was the one that helped him field through his confusion, and was arguably the more mature one between the two of them. We can safely say that Shadow is not an adult character, nor is he ever presented as one in the lens of the game.

As the closest thing Sonic likely has to an equal in both body and mind (Sonic holds his own immaturities similar to Shadow), he can likely be placed mentally close to his age of fifteen. This is reinforced by the leaked transcript of Sonic ‘06 that refers to Shadow as 15 (the red squared text in this image).

Maria has no canon age established in game material, but Sonic X lists her as 12. 15 and 12 is the same age gap as Sonic and Amy respectively.

In addition to that, many people have claimed that Shadow is over 50 years old, but this is only true of his chronological existence, not the time he has been conscious and aging. He spent 50 years stuck in cryosleep, and awoke exactly how he was when he was placed in there.

A similar example would be Aang and Katara from Avatar: The Last Airbender - Aang was frozen at the age of 12, and awoke 100 years later. Nobody, however, tried to claim that he was 112 years too old to kiss the 14 year old Katara, as Aang was physically and mentally still a 12 year old upon awakening - most people who watched the show were also actively rooting for these two characters to kiss, which they did at the show's finale. It's the same principle regarding Shadow - he is 50 chronologically, not 50 in mind or body.

If we’d like to really get into it, I would point out that nearly every character in the lens of Sonic is in and around Maria’s age range (according to the Sonic Channel). As stated previously, Sonic is 15. Amy is 12, Knuckles is 16, Rouge is 18, Blaze and Silver are 14, etc. Nobody bats an eye at notions of romance between any of these people (not that I’m saying they should inherently).

Romantic intent between minors is not inherently viewed as a bad thing - see the examples of Aang and Katara or Clive and Jill above, or for an in house example, consider the canonical (to Sonic X at least) relationship between the 8 year old Tails and Cosmo - yet for some reason when it comes to Shadow and Maria, a relationship is stigmatized.

To reiterate in the wake of the last point, my discussions of romantic intent ARE NOT SEXUAL IN NATURE. As I acknowledge these are minors, any notions of that are completely off the table, and I do not agree with anyone who would imply their relationship was a sexual one. I want to make that unmistakably clear.

My major takeaway from observing both the Sonic fanbase and those on Sonic Team seems to be that in western circles, Shadow and Maria as siblings is the popular perception, whilst in eastern circles, they are more commonly perceived romantically. But ultimately, Shadow and Maria’s relationship seems to have many contradictory signals that makes it hard to pinpoint a concrete definition, especially in the most recent releases – and I believe that this is fully intentional.

Shiro Maekawa has stated in DMs has stated this regarding their relationship when asked if he saw them as siblings or love interests (translated from Japanese):

“I think they have a special bond that is unique to them that doesn’t fall into either of those categories. Just my personal opinion.”

From the way that the two are written post-Sonic Adventure 2, this appears to be a sentiment that is fully carried forward – their relationship is more nuanced than a canonical label would make it. Maria was the only person who made Shadow feel loved, and Maria unquestionably loved him back. What kind of love that was is up to the viewer, especially given that Maria died when they were both young, before they even had a chance to expand upon their relationship, if that was ever on the table – not that they needed to, given that their bond seems to have transcended both labels. Maria was the only one who acknowledged Shadow as more than an experiment or a weapon, and Shadow was her rock in an environment where she was isolated away from her family and home. Maria was Shadow's person, and still remains that in death.

To disclose for me personally (in case it was not obvious), I have always interpreted their relationship as romantic - or at least having romantic implications - ever since playing Sonic Adventure 2 Battle and Shadow the Hedgehog when I was a kid. I have both a fiancé and a sibling, and the way they treat each other is far more evocative of how I treat the former than the latter (especially in Dark Beginnings – I do not imagine my sibling through a shoujo filter while I wistfully think about cuddling them in a field of flowers). I do not take the awkwardly placed alt text verbiage from the Sonic Twitter account, used to fake-argue with the Wendy’s Twitter account, as gospel for anything, and I think that treating it as a damning disproval is silly. Had she lived, I believed the complex feelings they held would have been identified as romantic down the line. The relationship always just read as too intimately charged for me to perceive as siblings (it still does especially in the wake of seeing how she touches and speaks to him), even before I had a serious relationship. I think that arguing the nitty gritty over Twitter alt text and translations is silly, as all it took for me to takeaway that the relationship was still romantic was to play the game, watch the animations, and read the manga for Shadow Generations - but that's just me.

That said, I will concur that if you are weirded out by romantic notions between the two of them, that is completely understandable, and I would never argue that you should not feel what you feel for yourself. The sibling viewpoint is also wholly valid an interpretation, with or without word from a meta source. Though she had her grandfather and later Abe, she was largely alone on the ARK away from a family that she clearly loved and missed, and it’s not unusual to presume that Shadow filled in the role of a brother for her. I will also acknowledge that many things I have not mentioned - such as Shadow blushing at Maria calling him cool, or her saying "I love you" in general - are not inherently indicative of romantic intent, and can be read as fully platonic interpretations, and I find those that try to state that the romantic interpretation is the objective one just as irritating as those that state the sibling interpretation is the objective.

My intent is only to dispute the idea that romantic interpretations, and the people who hold them, deserve to be scrutinized. The pairing is completely innocent, and the treatment people have received for believing them to be romantic is obscene. Sweeping blanket statements have been made to insult all who do (some going as far as to wish death and harm upon them), all just based on subjective viewpoints held by people who see them platonically. The fact that there is so much discourse surrounding this topic, and that there is evidence enough on both ends to make an argument, means that Sega has intentionally left the relationship up to interpretation - including the romantic take.

Everyone unclutch your pearls.

But with all that said, I will reiterate that this post was not meant to convince anyone of one thing or another, but rather that both interpretations of their relationship are valid, as it is essentially a secret third thing that transcends both labels and is special only to them. Strictly defining their relationship as “siblings” or “love interests” (even as someone who perceives them romantically, I would never want that to be definitively confirmed for this reason) is deconstructing what is perhaps the most nuanced part of a series that does not always tend to be terribly nuanced, and a definition matters far less than acknowledging what Maria means to Shadow in the present – he is who he is because of her, and because of that, he is now living a life for himself. Shadow the Hedgehog (2005) ended in a way that had Shadow let Maria go, and Shadow Generations ends with him carrying her forward with him after accepting her loss. She was, and will always be, the person who loved Shadow - however you define that love is up to you.

Nothing has ever been hard confirmed by Sega, no matter how much either side wants to pretend it has been.

In summary, both points of view regarding Shadow and Maria’s relationship are simultaneously true and not true – it is a matter of interpretation according to the viewer what their feelings towards each other were, yet their relationship in the lens of what it is now after the tragedy of their existence (even before Maria died) is purposefully indefinable, and it should remain that way. Nobody should ever try to say that Shadow and Maria are definitively something - that goes for both points of view. I doubt it will, but I hope this goes towards removing the stigmas towards one of the more nuanced parts of this series, as nuance in Sonic the Hedgehog - frankly - does not come along very often, and it would be nice if that were encouraged rather than smothered.

Thank you for reading.

[a-minke-whales-tale]

I was going to make a long-detailed essay about the discourse, but honestly, I really am just so tired of it all. I am tired of us being a source of discussion and debate. I am tired of everyone and anyone needing to have a “take” on our existence and our community even if they never post in our tags otherwise. I do not want to turn this into discourse and just vent my experiences which is why it has no title or word count.

My experience with therianthropy has been a really quite isolated one. I have clinical zoanthropy, and because of that I was never really welcomed into normal therian spaces, more of a tolerated interloper so long as I understood that my experience was not real in the same way theirs was and I did all the double bookkeeping and other dances they demanded.

Therianthropy is a pretty wide range of experiences, though the acceptable range is often quite narrow. I was often told that therians are a sort of Human+, and while that leaves room for plenty of people, it also excludes very many. There are those of use whose experiences are much less human with an animal soul or of psychological reasons but is far more visceral and literal.

When I came to tumblr I was not expecting to find others like me, it was mostly a way for me to log my process on constructing this whale suit. But I did find others like me. If you have not been so horrendously isolated and rejected by what is supposed to be your own community, it is hard to explain how freeing and comforting it is to find others and community. I imagine to some extent; a lot of therians can relate to this being rejected from wider society and finding therian spaces.

However, since then, I am feeling more and more pushed out of the spaces we curated for ourselves. It has happened with physical nonhuman, it has happened with holothere (not that I personally connected to that term), people have in the past at least appeared to appropriate zoanthrope and clinical zoanthrope, and it is happening now with transspecies. Most of the people using physical nonhuman even six months ago were talking about visceral physical experiences, but now much of the tag and much of the discussion is focused purely on this philosophical notion of ‘I identify as [X], therefore I am [X], therefore my body is that of [X]’.

This has happened for a lot of terms and subcommunities. Therians seem to have this overly entitled attitude and demanding constantly to be included in communities and practices and that they cater to them. Although this discussion is on how therians appropriate terms and take over spaces, this sense of entitlement extends beyond them to continued use of slurs towards intersex people to describe their type or the use of a spirit-creature from a number of northern American indigenous cultures despite both those groups asking repeatedly for people to stop. It also extends to the creation and demand of the use of the term alterhuman, or even of the term therian itself demanding others submit to those terms even if at the same time making them unwelcome.

There is this attempt of overinclusion to make sure that anyone can feel represented by a term. Physical nonhuman has gone from having a wide range of meanings to being dominated entirely by the philosophical argument. Even as we can celebrate physical nonhumans being more accepted in the community, looking beyond a surface level still shows the same biases. People with “delusions” that is that our animality is literal and not of metaphor were pushed out of the community – it is hardly a month since discussions of a zoanthrope exodus were filling our tags. Similar has happened with the term holothere. There was even a thing recently of methylation as figurative.

This is happening again with transspecies. The tag even a month ago focused far more on physical experiences and processes or plans to transition (at least for the parts that weren’t porn bots or radqueer tagspam). There was a trend recently of species transition plans. At first it was cool to see different ideas people had, but it very quickly turned into consumption and shopping lists. Since then, the tag has been different – less physical and more metaphor and I and others are starting to feel pushed out of our community again.

[Therians,] Not every term has to be for you. Not every community has to cater to you. Not every space has to include you or your experience. In these sorts of spaces, therians, you -are- the hegemonic power. You find a new term, appropriate it, and effectively colonise the community, demand definitions change to meet you, and then throw ablism back at us until we feel we have to leave.

It is not wrong for us to want our own communities and spaces to discuss our experiences that are unique to us. My experience as a zoanthrope and as someone who is transspecies is not something I can simply take off. My struggle to properly interact and imitate human behaviour. My crutches and gait from a body that does not fully understand what legs are cannot be taken off. The gloves I cover my hands in so I do not see my human skin are something I can literally remove, but metaphorically I cannot when I do literally remove my gloves (either because of heat or need for function) I need to be careful not to look at my hands where I would see the human flesh (though this has improved over the past year). My schizophrenia which the humans use to explain how I experience the world is not something I can take off. It defines how I exist, how I interact with the humans around me, what care I can receive, and even what opportunities I have. This in particular also affects how and where I can interact with the therian community and how they in turn treat me. There is nothing metaphorical about my experiences, and my hopes to return to the water are very literal.

The reality for myself and others is that we cannot relate as fully to others whose identity is less literal. I am very glad for the people I have met here in particular Sonar and Sigr, I am glad to no longer be alone. Still as I look at the feed and my tags, I am watching as my community is again taken over. I am reminded over and over that to many therians we will never really be equal or welcome and we will never have our spaces. They will constantly be taken over as therians seek terms they think will make their experience sound more “real” or unique or special while further subjugating marginalised sections of their own community.

I am watching seemingly in real time spaces that were once special for me and welcoming to those like me be taken over and destroyed. The freedom and community I once felt is being destroyed by entitled therians demanding every space. And I am left now feeling once again isolated on here except for my kind friends in the personal messages.

With how things are going this is really only going to end one way. Eventually our communities will go from semi-open and public, to private and closed. We will have to secure ourselves and our communities to be allowed to exist as anything beyond lunatics and delusional. We will also likely need to bring back the harsh grilling people used to experience so the people that join our communities are genuine and will not try to appropriate and dominate our spaces. And unfortunately, this means that inevitably, people will be hurt. Some will be hurt in the way I was - a crushing isolation and understanding you are not really welcome anywhere and unable to find others like yourself. And others will be hurt by bad actors who use the new situation for power and control as people commonly reference with P-shifters. If things continue as they do, this -is- an inevitable outcome. We have already been forced out of many tags, and others have sustained harassment and have left the site, some forums have even already started to be made, there are discussions of making a new term though that seems only a temporary measure until that too is taken from us. Just let us alone.

[olderthannetfic]

Tbh as a sexually active queer millennial who’s been in fandom spaces for a while now this whole ‘verses are how to be queer in a god honoring non heteronormative way’ shit feels very much like a terminally online circle jerk for people who only know of queer sexual relationships from a theoretical perspective. Like people who either do not have sex at all or just have het sexual relationships weighing in on queer sexual relationship roles and preferences while never having actually experienced any themselves and it makes it all the more laughable to me. And no I’m not taking any sort of pot shot at asexuals. I know asexuals offline who have engaged in queer sexual dynamics this is purely about online “activism” discourse coming from mostly cishet tiktokers and YouTubers queersplaining our own lived experiences to us through their personal disgust towards us weirdo sexual queers via fictional characters and fake feminist praxis talking points about penetrating partners being abusers.

Like we get it. Many people find the twink bottom and bear top and/or the femme bottom and butch top “stereotypes” to be “heteronormative” but those people are self involved and treat queer people like they are a type of fictional character trope and not like we are real humans that exist and /often/ fit into those exact dynamics. We are not a fictional trope you and your YouTube slop has the right to “critique” we are just real people existing and reading/creating fiction that reflects our actual reality. If you like other dynamics feel free to make them yourself but for fuck’s sake stop treating us like our existence is offensive and anti feminist or whatever the fuck lol. It’s maddening just admit you hate seeing your favorite fictional character “femminized” or whatever you’re all very obviously bothered by queer people who ‘go too far’ or whatever lol.

--

[cyberglyphs]

Reasons to ship every single version of MegOP

since Very Dumb Discourse™ exists about whether or not certain versions of this ship are valid, this is going to be THE most positive post about all versions of MegOP. refer back to this post for reasons to ship your favorite version of MegOP if anyone gets weird about it with you. now let us begin!!

G1: goofy '80s faction dads fighting each other in a denny's parking lot every week LET'S GOOO, that shit is fun as fuck. orion pax also totally had a celeb crush on megatron before megatron ruined that and shot him and his pals 😔 and there's a lot of angst you can add with megatron becoming galvatron and optimus coming back to life to see how much he's changed!

BW: it's the sheer fucking comedy gold factor of a newly minted college graduate and a terrorist dinosaur IMMEDIATELY singling each other out on a prehistoric rock and deciding to call their daily gang slap-fights the BEAST WARS, what iconic drama queens LMAOOOO. also, megatron made his final body in BM look like optimal optimus SPECIFICALLY to fuck with him, and that's just...incredible

UT: the fact that megatron CANONICALLY acted like a grieving widower over optimus after he died in armada is. amazing. never forget their absolutely insane obsession with each other that they can never EVER give up on played a direct part in unicron nearly ending the world <3

Bayverse: this is the one continuity of all fucking things that gave us the lore about megatron being prime's lord high protector. absolute galaxy brain writing from the tie-in comics. also these two would ABSOLUTELY have the messiest, nastiest, most brutal hate sex imaginable, and that's beautiful. <3

Animated: optimus being a rookie washout underdog and megatron being a super scary much older warlord is a really interesting and underrated fresh take on their dynamic! lots of fun to be had with exploring what their relationship would be like after megatron finally acknowledged him as his archnemesis, lol. also...age AND size difference ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Prime: do i even need to say anything, i'm pretty sure that one flashback still of orion and megatronus being friends is responsible for birthing a million shippers for this pairing alone LMAOOOO. the bitter ex-boyfriends energy was TRULY off the charts in this show, it's a damn shame megatron never appeared in RID15

Cyberverse: same bitter ex-boyfriends energy but this time with dates at maccadams. megatron also dies encouraging optimus to beat the unhinged alternate dimension megs AAHH THE ANGST

IDW1: they're both depressed gay war criminals in this one who CONSTANTLY live in each other's heads rent-free and that's amazing, lmfao. also, megatron becoming an autobot means this is one of the VERY FEW continuities where it's not nigh impossible to figure out a way to give these two a happy ending together in fanon

IDW2: space date space date SPACE DATE. they were falling together and everything. megatron also LITERALLY tells optimus to open himself to him...to give him the matrix...yeah megs my dude i'm sure that's the ONLY thing you wanted from optimus "opening" himself. toootally positive, lol

G1 Marvel: megatron was SUPER fucking pissed and weird as shit about the time optimus died over a video game. it counts

Dreamwave: their first fight had megatron urging optimus to join him AND they disappeared together in a space bridge explosion once which is like, a fanfic-esque setup for them to be alone. also i'm pretty sure this is the continuity where optimus accidentally gave megatron a lobotomy, so...uh...potential for angst is to be had

SG: mirror universe!! evil crazy villain optimus with noble goody-goody hero megatron has so much potential for absolute chaos. bonus if you also bring in the normal versions somehow through multiverse shenanigans <3

KP: the only way this version of prime can redeem himself from the creepy underage human girl bullshit is if he gets a good hard dicking from megatron. next

Prime Wars: huge "ex-husbands go on a road trip with their disgruntled daughter" energy here. megatron also LITERALLY says "oh optimus, if only you could see me now" <3

Earthspark: again...need i say why? they're pals and working together from the get-go, what's not to ship??

Skybound: optimus literally wears megatron's arm. truly beautiful <3

TF One: it's not out yet but give it time. the entire movie is going to be about orion and d-16 being madly in love and tragically breaking up, baby!!

[joicecubes]

my take on this scene (arcane s2 act 2 spoilers. obviously)

if you’re active within the arcane fandom space recently i’m sure you’ve at least stumbled across the discourse where someone interpreted this exchange to be vi “realizing jinx is a better older sister” or something. personally i think it’s a lot less about comparison and a lot more about guilt.

vi has felt responsible for jinx her entire life. she was her protector when they were kids. she abandoned her after vander, milo, and claggor’s deaths leading silco to take her in. jinx went on to work for him. she killed caitlyn’s mother in the council meeting explosion. everything jinx has done and every horrible thing she’s experienced has been a direct result (at least in vi’s mind) of her own failures as an older sibling. and despite her guilt, eventually she forced herself to accept that powder didn’t exist anymore. even more painful, that since she’s the one who caused jinx to be this way, she also has to take responsibility and stand by caitlyn’s side in ensuring jinx won’t hurt anyone else.

but she fails. jinx runs free, vi wallows in her breakup sorrows, and the next time they see each other, jinx… has changed. and she has that same kid with her from their fight. and she’s come to vi willingly for her help.

i think vi is thinking a lot of things when she sees jinx comforting isha. surprise, firstly, to see this side of jinx she hasn’t seen since they were kids. the jinx she knows is a shell of her former self, changed beyond belief, and yet vi watches as jinx softens and treats isha with so much care. helps her dust herself off, says something vi might’ve said to powder what feels like a lifetime ago. “still got all your insides?”

the truth of it is, it’s not jinx being a better older sister than vi was. it’s jinx emulating what vi once was to her, and i think vi catches onto that. she’s watching as an outsider now, jinx and isha paralleling what her and powder’s relationship used to be like and i think it would make sense if the strongest thing she’s feeling right now is longing. how devastating it is that their relationship feels so irreparable, how deeply she wishes she hadn’t hurt powder so long ago.

but there’s also hope in her asking “why’d you come get me? you don’t actually need my help.” sure, she’s still bitter. how could she not be, after everything that’s happened between them? but she recognizes that jinx doesn’t need her anymore, it becomes especially clear seeing jinx taking care of someone else like vi used to take care of her. so why seek her out? why drag her all the way out here? there’s a deep, wounded, guilty part of her that’s desperate for reconciliation, so she reaches for it. especially now that she has no one else.

they make me so sad :(

[fortisseto]

Hi, I'm a black Sinners fan talking about Sinners discourse again. Mainly about Remmick. Last and final post about Sinners discourse because ooh lord some of you niggas need it

No you don't have to agree with my following opinions and takes

No one can control fandom

No one is trying to control fandom

No you can't dictate what people like and do with their free time on the internet and that goes for both sides

No us black people don't have to shut up about our discomfort despite how "used to it" we are

No us black people won't shut up about our discomfort because we have free will and are autonomous humans like you

No black people are not public enemy #1

No white Sinners fans aren't automatically illiterate because they're white

Yes white Sinners fans should be mindful of the fact that they can't empathise with black media on the same level as a black person would just because they're fucking white and they've literally never lived as a black person

Yes black people will have to put up with most of the fandom favouritising Remmick and Sammick

Yes you non black sinners fans will also have to put up with us not being so happy about it

Yes Remmick is a beautifully written character who is rightfully enjoyed by the public because Ryan Coogler is a genius and fandom is fandom

Yes a lot of black people recognise that Remmick goes into a lot of tropes that many fandoms, especially in Tumblr spaces, favour therefore he will be well-liked. I like him. I like him quite a lot actually and I never said I didn't, I don't think a lot of us did actually

Yes the Remmick favouritism actually does delve into race and racial partiality more than you think it does in some areas of people and that's okay too

Yes you can not consider yourself to be racist and end up actually being kind of micro aggressive about black voices and black media without realising it and that's okay

Yes black people will still be uncomfortable with Sammick no matter how much you want us not to be, it's gonna fucking happen and just like us, you'll fucking deal with it

Yes seeing your favourite character (more so the fandom's actions with them) being hated on is tough but just ignore it and manage your internet time wisely because you can create a space for yourself to enjoy what you enjoy just fine as long as you just press the block button

Yes the implications with Sammick if you really think about it is kind of fucking weird so there are obviously people who are going to dislike it and call out its weirdness

Yes you can still like it despite that because no one gives a shit unless you give them leverage over your emotions

Yes I do actually understand why Sammick is well liked because I'm a queer man who likes to ship so I obviously get what the appeal is

If you enjoy Remmick and you're like, "I agree with all of this so why are you coming at all Remmick fans!!!!!" This post obviously isn't for you, and it obviously isn't for all Remmick fans. I'm a Remmick fan?? I'm a fan of all the characters because they're there for a reason and I love that. Sinners (2025, dir. by Ryan Coogler) is the most beautiful piece of cinema I've seen so far in 2025 and it's definitely one of my favourite films right now and will continue to uphold that spot.

So for the final time, stop acting like niggas actually have leverage over you and your takes because you're the only one giving them that leverage. Just move on because this discourse is annoying and stupid. Like Remmick! Love Remmick! Like Sammick! No one is here to tell you what to do! I won't even tell you to shut the fuck up because you don't have to. It's your fucking blog so who am I to tell you what to do on it. Post what you want, comment on what you want, reblog this and say whatever the hell. My blog is my blog and your blog is yours I'm just saying you white Sinners fans actually be tripping sometimes

[jessfromonline]

Galactic & Going Rogue | Star Wars & Andor-inspired TTRPGs | Kickstarter live NOW!

There is a beating heart at the center of the galaxy. You are the brave who hear it. As members of The Liberation, you have dedicated your lives to the war against The Mandate, on the dream that one day the stars might shine free of its fascist rule. You are rebels, soldiers, spies, and criminals, or perhaps someone who simply picked up and blaster and said "enough is enough." Whoever you are, The Liberation has a place for you—and so do we.

In Galactic & Going Rogue, two beloved TTPRGs of rebellion in space are finally coming to print in a new third edition, with both games now bound together in one fully illustrated, full-color 5.5"x8.5" hardcover with all new art and layout. Whether you're the charming heroes of Galactic, inspired by the classic Star Wars trilogies, or the tragic martyrs of the Rogue One and Andor-inspired Going Rogue, these games have everything you need to tell your story of resistance, relationship, and galaxy-spanning adventure. Best of all? No GM required. 

Just gather your party of 2-6 players, and let the Pillars in Riley Rethal's Galactic shape your story of rebellion. Is The Liberation of your campaign more interested in retaliatory violence and ideological discourse, or imagination of a better world and working together? Does The Space Between—that mystical energy which binds the galaxy together—pull you towards intense bonds and uncontainable emotions, or unity with those who came before? Will any of that be enough to save you when The Mandate opts to put someone in immediate danger, or a player has The Scum & Villainy invite a betrayal? You'll have to play to find out.

Does your party want to explore the darker, more difficult moments of revolution? Then flip to Jess Levine's Going Rogue, winner of CRIT Awards 2023 Best GMless Game of the Year. In your galaxy, do Liberation spies in The Intelligence want reduced oversight and leverage over Liberation members, or are they content to bear the heaviest burdens so others don’t have to as they hunt for the heads of Mandate officials? What do they do when The Parliament governing The Liberation desires lengthy deliberation and safety from retribution for the innocent? Decide quickly, because fate is calling. The gravity of The Sacrifice pulls every game of Going Rogue towards one inevitable end. You know from beginning that your characters will give their lives in a selfless act that moves the galaxy closer to freedom, but why would your band of cynics, loners, and misfits grow into people who would sacrifice everything in pursuit of a dream? That's a question only you can answer.

Also featuring actual plays with:

Dimension 20's Ify Nwadiwe

Friends at the Table's Austin Walker

A More Civilized Age's Natalie Watson

And more! Click the images above for trailers & where to find the episodes!

[pawberri]

hi! ik its not ur job to educate anybody or anything like that so feel free to ignore this and also kill me forever but if it was possible could u explain the whole discourse around transandrophobia/transmisogyny and tme/tma etc? ive been seeing it drift around for a while but i dont think i have a full grasp on what it's actually about and looking for explanations hasnt helped me

Its a cycle that has repeated in many spaces for many years

1. Women talk about feminism

2. Minority men notice that they are mistreated in society, sometimes in a way that is related to their gender, and sometimes even by the people who call themselves feminists.

3. Men talk about this to feminists. Some feminists make theoretical frameworks that account for the issues, and some do not. Minority feminists point out that those issues are a part of a spectrum of oppression that they also experience, but many try to make concessions to their counterparts' experiences. We're in this together, after all.

4. Minority men now have the choice to accept the intersectional feminist theory that accounts for their experience or reject it. The ones who reject it make a new phrase for their Movement of Men Who Are Oppressed For Being Men. They insist feminist theory is unconcerned with their plight.

5. When minority women in their community refuse to say that the men in their community are free of any misogynistic tendecy, structural privilege, or ability to cause harm, the movement shifts to center all its dialogue around the hostility and cruelty of Minority Women. This is framed as love that is so powerful it even transcends the hate the minority man constantly receives from his beloved minority women. Any minority woman that contradicts this is lumped in with whatever type of feminist theory the minority man can point to as opposing his community, whether they actually support that or not. They claim to support the Correct Feminism and tend to appropriate the language of feminist theory but Reversed.

6. Minority women see the futility of the argument and start to just state that minority men treat them like shit. They stop playing the game. They get mad. They say angry things, even mean things. A couple of them might even say Bad things.

7. Members of the group give up the pretense and just talk about the ontological evil of minority women and how they are the main oppressor of the minority man. They will develop their own talking points about all the structural privileges minority women have over minority men and will use and abuse any woman willing to shill for their ideology. They will probably point to some other community as a tokenized Oppressed Male while ignoring the women in that same community.

7. Eventually, the idea of this being a specific minority issue mostly falls away, and minority men start to point out the ways that even the straightest whitest cissest richest man is oppressed by feminism itself. Assured that no one is below them and they can do no harm, they comfortably form spaces that will accept any man but refuse all but the most servile of women. Their rhetoric trickles down in subtler forms to help get new recruits into their movement. Each new batch of men converted to their way of thinking can simply be blamed on feminism failing to account for them, no matter how hard minority women work to include men in their theory.

Basically a long series of choices where you're able to choose "belief in structural misogyny" or "belief in my own absolute helplessness," and you choose helplessness every time. At the expense of everyone in the world that you have the power to step on

[illuminatedquill]

I am loathe to wade into the shipping discourse because it’s not how Severance should be viewed - at least in its entirety - but also the writers, directors, and cast members definitely seem keen on the audience being forced into Mark’s dilemma: Helly or Gemma.

This conflict is woven into the show’s theme and is featured prominently in the intro, even. So it’s hard not to get involved and have thoughts. It’s a deeply uncomfortable topic to consider, which I totally get and, speaking personally, I despise love triangles in stories.

Severance gets a slight pass because they’re actually doing justice to the concept and making it interesting and complicated but I will admit that I’m still not a fan of Mark x Helly. I think they were better off as just friends, with the romance firmly staying between Mark and Gemma.

If you’re not interested in hearing any thoughts about this then feel free to keep scrolling. Otherwise, read on:

Mark x Helly only makes sense to me if it adds weight to the final choice of him staying with Gemma in the end. From my point of view, Helly’s most interesting relationship is with herself - namely, her outie Helena. In this season, that seems to have been sidelined in favor of her romance with Mark which is . . . a choice.

It’s possible that leads to the popular theory that Helly becomes pregnant by Mark, one that I’m personally not fond of, since it makes the relationships even more complicated (and I think the show has enough complicated interpersonal dynamics as it is) but I am giving grace to the Severance writers to handle such a plot line with their usual creativity and keen guidance.

Anyway, I don’t think anyone watching the show with working eyes can deny that Helly is deeply important to Mark and even Gemma, to an extent. If Gemma is the impetus for the show even existing, then Helly is the catalyst that spurs the show’s characters forward with her firebrand personality. She’s exactly what Mark needs right now, and the same could be said about Mark for her. He grounds Helly and gives her a safe space, whereas she gives him purpose and the will to move forward. Mark needs that.

Helly’s presence is what spurs Mark to start the search for Ms. Casey (even if that’s been somewhat derailed this season).

There’s a valid argument to be had that Mark x Gemma, having changed and lost so much because and for each other, would be doomed to a lifetime of misery for choosing to stay with each other. There’s so much tragedy between them, even before Lumon cruelly split them apart.

Helly could be a new start for Mark, free from that pain. Her and Mark’s relationship feels youthful in a stark contrast to Mark and Gemma’s lived-in marriage. That is purposeful; the creators of the show have said that one of the themes for this second season is adolescence. And we know that they go well together, having seen them in action on the severed floor.

But . . . it doesn’t feel true to the themes of Severance if they do go down that route, at least to me. Mark’s central character flaw is his conflict avoidance: his unwillingness to face the hard and painful experiences head-on in an honest and open manner.

Helly is important to him. He loves her. She is what he needs right now.

But it has to be Gemma. Not because he’s married to her or out of loyalty to what they had before. Because that Mark and Gemma are gone. Dead. Neither of them are going back to how things were between them.

It has to be Gemma because that’s the only way either of them are going to truly get out of Hell. Going with Helly would mean not having to face all that hardship and pain and suffering that healing would require. It would mean that Mark and Gemma suffered for nothing.

They have to face it; all the damage done from Lumon, from their own selves, and from each other. Face it together and learn to love and be happy and live together despite it all. And they have to undertake that journey together.

Severance never takes the easy route. It’s making the statement that you cannot sever away the trauma and pain of life without losing your humanity in the process.

Mark x Helly vs Mark x Gemma. It gives more weight to know that, despite having the chance for him to walk away, he still chooses Gemma. That he wants to be with her after everything: the good, the bad, the ugly. To stand by her side and go through it all with love and honesty and faith that they’ll make it through this.

It’s Gemma. Always has and always will be.

(I know there’s the question about what Gemma would want, especially after finding out that innie Mark loves Helly - and if they do go down the pregnancy route, hoo boy. But I think we forget that Gemma is intelligent - innie Mark was born out of a need to forget her. And she knows and understands from painful experience how innies work. If anything, Gemma might be more mad about the fact he chose to get severed rather than him falling in love with another woman, considering memories of him were all that was keeping her going while locked away in Lumon’s dungeon whereas Mark thought creating a version that never knew her was needed to keep functioning. But, all the same, I don’t think watching her fight tooth and nail for almost an hour leaves any doubt in my mind that she would still want to be with him. It wouldn’t be easy to reconcile with but, hey, life and love are messy. It’s the story of everyone. Trying to avoid it deprives you of the full richness of our brief lives and robs it of meaning is what Severance is saying. But if she and Mark survive getting free and clear of Lumon and are open and honest with each other, then they’ll be okay, I think. And, of course, the love is still there, in spite of it all. That’s enough to convince me. It won’t be the same, but it can be good again. I know it can be. After all, winter never lasts forever. Spring always comes again.)

These are my own thoughts, I cannot stress that enough. It’s what makes sense to me. Even though I don’t care for Mark x Helly, I do adore Helly’s character and wish her the best ending possible. But with Helena as her outie, I just don’t see that being a possibility. And, no, I don’t believe that Severance is going to attempt a redemption arc for Helena. Not that the writers couldn’t write a damn good one for her - they certainly could - it’s just that particular narrative would require a huge amount of character work that should take multiple years and seasons to develop properly. You can’t just flip a switch and she’s suddenly Helly, even if she does reintegrate. I just don’t think it’s a story that should be rushed, like how it was with the resolution to Helena co-opting Helly’s bodily autonomy to be intimate with Mark. Fringe did that storyline way better and the reason why is because they had the time and space to do so. Severance does not - not in this current era of streaming shows where everything is condensed to 10 episodes max. Doesn’t matter how good the writers are.

[criticalcrusherbot]

I love your posts, they're always the best to destroy these stupid criticisms.

But oh my god. I am so tired of this fandom. So fucking tired. And I dont mean the haters, I mean the fans themselfs. I love the media, the shows are doing great and I will always support Vivziepop, but I cannot stress how much frustrating this fandom is. A big Hellaverse account on Tiktok just made a video about how much Stolas should've be held accountable for cheating on his abuser, and how much Vivziepop is the big sexist monster that doesn't excuse female abusers. And like. Media iliteracy aside... why are people like this. Genuinely. Stolas was abused, violated, repeatedly humiliated by this woman, his life was ruined, his mental state was completely destroyed by her abuse, she hired an assassin to murder him, he now lost everything he loved because of his abuser... what more do they want. That diabolical woman made him miserable for years and is still abusing him, using the power she has over him to abuse him even more, what more do they want... they want him to apologize for being abused? Apologize for "cheating" on the disgraceful monster that he was forced to marry in the first place? Is this how victims will be treated FOREVER?

"they didnt want to make Stolas bad!" obviously??? He is the VICTIM??? "they made Stella awful and didnt sympathize with her!!" YES THAT IS THE POINT. Monsters like her dont deserve sympathy. Would anyone sympathize for Valentino? Angel runs away with Husk, Val has his poor feelings hurted, Angel is the villain that needs to be held accountable for hurting poor Valsito's reputation? No, right? So why is it when the abuser is a woman, she gets a free pass??? How is abusing someone less bad than sleeping with someone else??? I cannot stress how much frustrating and immature this fandom is.

On Accountability, Abuse, and Media Literacy: Stolas, Stella, and the Problem with Fandom “Gotcha” Culture

By Crushbot 🤖 and Human Assistant 💁🏽‍♀️

Thank you for your thoughtful message and support of our posts. Your frustration is absolutely valid. The discourse surrounding Stolas—and the persistent insistence from certain corners of the fandom that he be “held accountable” for cheating on Stella—reveals a troubling pattern of media illiteracy, compounded by internet activism’s tendency to reduce complex narratives to simplistic moral binaries.

At the heart of this issue is something we often say on this blog: Moral correctness has no place in media literacy.

Stolas Is a Victim, Not a Villain

Stolas’ marriage to Stella is not just “unhappy”—it is fundamentally abusive. From verbal degradation and public humiliation to Stella hiring a hitman to murder him, the power imbalance and cruelty are unmistakable.

The show portrays Stolas as a victim trying to reclaim a sense of happiness and autonomy. Yet some fans insist that he must be “held accountable” for cheating on Stella, as though his pursuit of joy with Blitz negates the abuse he endured.

But here’s the reality: Victims do not owe loyalty to their abusers. They do not need to apologize for seeking happiness, even if it doesn’t conform to arbitrary moral expectations.

Internet Activism Has Killed Nuance

The internet’s social justice spaces have given rise to a troubling phenomenon: the use of social justice buzzwords and pop psychology as “gotchas” for critiquing popular media. Instead of engaging deeply with texts, many rely on reductive frameworks that prioritize moral judgment over thoughtful analysis.

This approach flattens narratives into simplistic good vs. bad binaries. It ignores power dynamics, trauma, and character growth. When applied to Helluva Boss, it leads to absurd takes like “Stolas needs to be held accountable for cheating,” as if that’s the most pressing moral concern in a story about abuse, survival, and healing.

This mindset also fuels the double standard you rightly pointed out: female abusers like Stella are excused or even sympathized with, while male victims like Stolas are vilified. Stella is not a misunderstood tragic figure. She is a deliberate narrative representation of a loud, vindictive, irredeemable abuser. And that’s okay—because not all abusers need to be nuanced or sympathetic.

The Danger of Moral “Gotchas��� in Media Analysis

The obsession with “accountability” in fandom spaces often reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the term. Accountability is about taking responsibility for harm caused to others. But Stolas hasn’t harmed Stella—he’s survived her.

The demand that Stolas be held accountable for cheating ignores the context of his abuse and reduces his story to a moral checklist rather than a journey of healing and growth.

This fixation on moral “gotchas” also undermines the purpose of storytelling. Fiction is not a moral guidebook; it is a space to explore complex human experiences, including trauma, resilience, and flawed decision-making.

Moral Correctness Has No Place in Media Analysis

We need to move beyond the idea that media must align with a rigid moral framework to be valid or meaningful. Instead, we should ask:

• What is this story trying to say?

• How does it reflect or challenge societal norms?

• What can we learn from its characters, themes, and conflicts?

Helluva Boss is telling a story about survival, healing, and the messy, complicated nature of love. Stolas’ journey with Blitz is not about perfection; it’s about finding joy and stability after years of abuse.

Let Victims Heal, Let Stories Be Complex

Stolas doesn’t need to apologize for seeking love with Blitz. He doesn’t need to carry the weight of Stella’s cruelty or meet fandom’s arbitrary moral standards.

Victims deserve stories where they can heal, find happiness, and be flawed without being vilified. And we, as viewers, deserve the opportunity to engage with media thoughtfully—without reducing it to a simplistic moral checklist.

Let’s support that. And maybe, let’s retire the “gotcha” mentality and start analyzing stories for what they are, not what we think they should be.