hirugaymi

[hirugaymi]

Revisting this post. Hirakagi 28: I was RIGHT this whole time??????

Spoilers, of course. For the entire chapter and its precursors.

OH. MY. GOD. OHMYGOD. IT'S BEEN YEARS, HASN'T IT?

Oh, Harusono-sensei, for as much as I criticize some of your writing decisions, I will be forever thankful for what this chapter and this whole 10 seconds touch arc has given to me. A sensible, empathetic and understading writing of a character that's not in the alloromantic and allosexual spectrum.

Hirano has always been very dear to me, but his relatability and complexity factors were handled so beautifully. I genuinely felt like crying as I read the chapter's translation for the first time.

So, let's go by numbered parts, ok?

Part 1: repulse and discomfort

Exhibit A: the subject is clearly displaying signs of discomfort.

Here's a summary of what Hirano feels about intimacy as of chapter 28:

Kagiura is someone he's comfortable initiating casual, intent-less touching: headpats, leaning against each other's shoulders, sharing a room.

He doesn't understand the whole "intent behind the touch" thing. Can't really comprehend why Kagiura is so adamant on making their interactions change from the status quo.

Emotional intimacy is a much more comfortable territory for Hirano to navigate. He instigates their dialogues about their complicated feelings once Kagiura attempts to hide himself, he wants to understand Kagi's whole relationship bullshit so goddamn bad. He twists and turns the situations in his head as if to deliver his perceptions honestly without hurting Kagi's feelings and making him feel rejected.

Exhibit B: the subject is thinking real hard. This is for all of you calling him an emotional wall.

And finally: Hirano HATES being touched with romantic intent right now.

Exhibit C: would you hug someone who's looking at you like he wants to LEAVE?

I've seen many people fall for Kagiura's rose-tint flowery perception of their interactions. I love Kagiura dearly, he's my baby and my dearest son but, my God, he is selfish. That's the whole point of their conflict. Kagi is NOT thinking about Hirano's limits or Hirano's comfort all throughout HiraKagi with a single exception, that being when he stepped so hard over the line that his own puny little puppy brain started blaring alarm signs that he was going to ruin their relationship forever (when he almost forced Hirano into a kiss).

Kagi does that because he doesn't understand Hirano's...not understading. You can fault him and he absolutely is at fault for being selfish about their relationship but it is complicated to put into his allonormative cute little head that Hirano can love him wholeheartedly without wanting to be held like a boyfriend.

At least, not right now.

Part 2: meeting in the middle

Exhibit D: let's understand out feelings. For the puppy's sake.

Hirano cares. HiraKagi's plot would've died in chapter 8 if he didn't. He's developed this capacity to adequate to Kagiura's advances by internalizing Kagi's desires and trying to make them meet his limits and testing his own boundaries for Kagiura's sake.

This is...incredibly relatable. I'm gonna be real with you. It's how most aro/ace spectrum people who still get into relationships with allos will end up thinking. SOmetimes you love someone to the point of adaptation. Of course, everyone has their hard limits and Hirano is looking for his here.

Hirano takes what he's learned about his perceptions of intimacy gathered from his own experiences and from other people (like asking Sasaki what it feels like to want to kiss someone) and crosses all that information to reach the conclusion:

Hirano wants to be in control.

I COULD make this into a post about how I think this translates into cliché BL sexual dynamics that Harusono-sensei likes to both subvert and play into. But this is a post about Hirano being a well written aro/ace character in a genre that barely has these so I won't. Next time maybe.

Hirano wants to reach out. Hirano wants to put himself out there outside of his hard steel boundaries and bend himself over and over again for Kagi's sake because he just loves Kagi so much. As the person and presence he is in his life. He love Kagi's existence and constance and that's why he's so fucking desperate to keep him here. Why he felt so guilty when it was gone (adults AU).

Hirano doesn't need a glorious, romantic realization. He just needs to know what he feels about Kagi is, too, deep and profound love.

Part 3: think puppy, think!!

Exhbit E: actual fucking dog Kagiura Akira (1 year old).

I get why people don't read HiraKagi because they don't vibe with Kagi's whole deal. I'm well aware he's Harusono's most flawed character and tbh he does get away with so much shit just because he's a cutie. I'm talking about you, people who look over Hirano's clear signs of NO.

I love him dearly, though. Endearing, sweet, huge boy who is so blinded by his own feelings that he fails to see beyond his flowery shoujo version of events. He's a little crazy. I like that about him. Hirano likes that about him.

Kagi's point of growth in the manga is very tied to the idea of "growing up". Finding out he likes a boy basically triggered his puberty all over again. His advances towards Hirano are fully intentional. Sensei doesn't really write about this part of it but I BET YOU this boy thought about researching how you do gay sex. He's so overeager and blindsided by his own determination that he fucks up his own chances.

In chapter 28...He doesn't do that.

Exhibit F for Feelings: this scene made me tear up. He can TELL.

Kagi said exactly what he needed to say. He can TELL. He sees it. He sees the effort, the attempts to understand him, the frustration in Hirano's own heart of noit being able to give all that affection back in a way where the two of them can be satisfied. This means so fucking much.

Kagi is selfish. Kagi overbearing and way too stubborn. Kagi's growth right now is about learning to appraoch Hirano with the same empathy Hirano has approached him. We'll see if he's able. I'm cheering you on, puppy...

so there’s a new hirakagi chapter...can I talk about it a little?

Keep reading

[hirugaymi]

Sasamiya's guide book rant: a bit upsetting

Sasaki to Miyano is a very casual read, a simple, cliche BL story with gorgeous art and interesting main characters that hooks out from beginning to the end of the romance and gets you to a satisfying conclusion.

But to a person who's been hooked in this silly story like I'm committing substance abuse, the real key of Sasaki to Miyano's storytelling are its side characters, and I am not happy about what I found.

The Slice of Life genre, and consequentely shoujo manga/BL manga tend to rely on the side cast for most of its lighter moments: jokes, exposition and expanding the story.

Harusono-sensei has a habit of discreetly releasing the lore of these side characters in contexts that extrapolate her main manga story unless said lore has influence over one of her MCs.

Merch products with little story snippets, captions for her birthday art posts, little comments over her Fanbox exclusive livestreams, artbooks, light novels and Volume Extras all paint this interesting landscape of characters much richers than you'd firstly assume when picking up SasaMiya or HiraKagi to read for the first time, and as an avid fan of this Manga Universe she's built, I was anxiously waiting for the SasaMiya guidebook in hopes of getting to know one of her most recent additions to her cast: Shirahama Kyouji.

Offically debuting in the manga by chapter 42, Shirahama was previously established as Tashiro's childhood friend from the basketball club in the First Year's Novel. In 2019, when Tashiro's birthday art was posted, his name was revealed to the readers for the first time through a quote-retweet from Harusono clarifying that no, she had not invented a character out of the blue, this guy's always been Tashiro's companion. In 2020, he made another appearance in his friend's birthday art, later then becoming an established member of Miyano's now group of four friends.

In the guidebook, like she does with all her side characters, Harusono establishes his gimmick: Shirahama is a boy who wants to be popular with girls and is upset at his state of perpetual loneliness.

His current function in the story is to be the one guy who's more aware of romantic social cues, considering Kuresawa's is constantly talking about his girlfriend, Miyano is the main character who's dating for the first time and Tashiro is...

What the fuck is Tashiro doing?

Being the guy with no girlfriend was Tashiro's thing at the start! He's the one whos compained about wanting to live some kind of high school romance even if he studied in an All Boy's School (ie: the Bazaar Drama CD), he's the guy who was afraid his friends would leave him for their S/O's.

By Shirahama's official debut I started noticing a process I could only call "straight man-fication" of Tashiro's character. The author quite literally transferred his gag to Shirahama.

I abhor this decision with my whole heart, not because I don't believe Tashiro can be anything but a funny character, on the contrary, he's proved in both his novel chapters that he can be interesting and funny, specially if he's interacting with his narrative foil.

Enter Hanzawa and the contradictions of his hinted romance storyline

Harusono has established pretty well who Hanzawa is by the latter half of SasaMiya, her most developed side character apart from Hirano, who has his own manga, his family issues and his overall aversion to romance when it came to his own life made for an interesting one-time side character beyond his gimmicks with the rest of the cast.

Hanzawa's role in Tashiro's chapter in the First Years LN is to guide him into believing he can and wants to be responsible for something for once. Tashiro's role in Hanzawa's later development is to show him there's need for balance in everything and that the man deserves to rest for a while instead of trying to work his brain into repressing his personal issues.

This is a fine dynamic on its own and that, in my honest opinion, never needed to be turned into the hinted romance the manga has been giving us in the newest appearances of these characters. In the guide book, these two characters gain a whole pages long fully colored extra about the two of them missing each other.

Tashiro doesn't feel like himself when he's nostagically reminiscing the departure of his upperclasmen, his internal monologue feels divorced from the guy we cam to associate with a carefree and lighter nature. But that's fine, isn't it? Giving the carefree guy a serious moment is a classic Anime Character Development move.

Tashiro's been serious before, in moments mostly associated with Hanzawa and with worrying about him (the Movie extra where he gives him a juice bottle).

What bothers me the most is what Hanzawa becomes here.

In this guide book comic, Hanzawa's attachment to his high school life is comically exaggerated as he repeatedly refuses to leave his classroom at the last day before the Third Year's graduation ceremony and has to be forcefully dragged by Hirano.

When these two out of pocket moments for these characters appear associated with each other by matching internal monologues, they feel OOC to me.

I do not think Hanzawa's story needs a romance. I absolutely do not think Tashiro's pair should be his overachiever upperclassman.

I think Harusono's haste is apparent when you look at what these two characters became and associate it with Shirahama's persistent appearances in the story. It feels contradictory to all these established characters, but specially unfair to Shirahama, since his role in the narrative as Tashiro's companion is lost and he becomes a flanderized mess of exposition dialogue and Miyano's personal tutorial to dating life.

Not the first time she does that to a character, don't get me started on my poor boy Ogasawara.

If the guide book's a guide to anything that's bound to happen in SasaMiya's last volume and the upcoming spin-off, I don't think Hanzawa and Tashiro (or poor Shirahama, he doesn't deserve this) are on a good path.

I love SasaMiya and this has not hindered my enjoyment of the series at all, but it does hurt a bit, specially considering their individual potential.

[hirugaymi]

From the blcd Boku wa subete wo shitteiru

AKA HARU-CHAN MASTURBATING AT THE BEGINNING

[hirugaymi]

Someday you guys will learn that brain does not work watching sports otherwise y'all would not fucking cheer for anyone. Just root for whoever you like the most you don't need to fucking go through the morality Olympics GEEZ. This is not about anyone talking about Racism in football and the WC btw, it's an important matter that should always be addressed. Please talk about it. Please expose how the dirt always gets buried, how Argentina and France act towards black players.

But to the righteous heroes who are choosing sides based on politics, colonialism, fucking geopolitics and thinking they did their progressiveness for today: calm down son, it's just football.

[hirugaymi]

I really don't think Mbappé knew what he was doing when he said this, he really does deserve an award, the only man strong enough to make brazilians root for argentina. Parabéns hermanos, foi lindo, europeu q q eu tenho a ver

[hirugaymi]

I have something to get off my chest that’s been plaguing my mind for the last hour. As a black person, it is very hard to find a safe place to enjoy whether in music, movies, or sports without being struck with a hard hit from reality. I rooted for Argentina during this final. I wanted Messi to be able to bring home a World Cup for himself and his country. I was happy for a Latin country to win. A so called “third world” country that some people might look down on. Then I was informed that Argentina has a very long racist history and that many of the fans were using slurs against the French players. Of course, this is not a reflection of the Argentinian players, but it does make you think. 

I like the France team and I admire Mbappe as a player. The team has some great players and it being majorly black also increases my fondness. They won last year and most of the players are young and will hopefully see another WC in their career.  Seeing people who look like me lose always made my heart hurt. On the other hand, it’s a European country so my fondness only goes so far. Then I remembered what Rashford and Saka experienced after the Euro Finals from fans. I hope the French team does not experience this.

It makes me think that no matter what, you’re never seen as truly one of them. In your victories, you brought glory to the country and in your losses, you’re an immigrant. Then I see all the people including black people who say that most of the French team aren’t really French and they should represent their parent’s African country instead. That kind of rhetoric breaks my heart. A lot of those players were born and raised in France, and as much as they are African, they are just as much French. There’s this divide where you feel is it even worth representing a country that doesn’t accept you even though you are one of them. I just feel unsettled.

[hirugaymi]

QUERÍAN FÚTBOL SUDAMERICANO ACÁ ESTÁ EL FÚTBOL SUDAMERICANO ACÁ ESTÁ

[hirugaymi]

penalty for argentina? groundbreaking

[hirugaymi]

and are the 2018 world cup champions in the match with us right now?

[hirugaymi]

“they rigged it for messi to win” and if they asked for donations i would have contributed

[hirugaymi]

Mto estranho a satisfação de ouvir o Galvão falando GOOOOOOL da Argentina 

[hirugaymi]

[hirugaymi]

We're entering an era where you go on Netflix and watch a cartoon toucan sing a song about nonbinary identity and then the autoplay puts on Dave Chappelle's Kill All Faggots Comedy Special. When you're done with that you can go to Target and buy a coffee mug that says "they/them" on it and if you go in the wrong bathroom the store manager is legally required to kill you. So like can we dispense with the notion that queer media representation has any correlation with how things are in the real world for anyone, or that it means literally anything at all?

[hirugaymi]

Argentina murdered Croatia.

Morocco, beloved, I need you to murder France.

No european team in the final. We want it, you want it. It will be beautiful.

[hirugaymi]

argentina bought the world cup? google argentinian peso to dollar conversion and tell me if that's the national currency of a country who can afford to buy a world cup

[hirugaymi]

do it for her

[hirugaymi]

so croatia really deprived us of a brazil argentina semi final for absolutely no reason