realredbanana

[realredbanana]

[realredbanana]

You may have heard that giraffe and their closest cousins, the okapi, can lick their own eyeballs.

Both species have got super long tongues and this makes sense in theory but... sometimes you have to see it how it actually works to believe it's a real behavior.

There's no grace involved. It's nothing like the ethereal, fae-like aesthetic these guys have most of the time. They just yeet their tongue backwards out of their mouth and bounce it off their face, repeatedly. It cracks me up every time I see it.

This is Sekele, at the Denver Zoo. Enjoy.

[realredbanana]

and what are we going to do when the HP series comes out and we start seeing a resurgence of the fandom here including gifsets and fics. like are u guys gonna bring up your neurodivergence and cry "can we separate the art from the artist!!!!! you dont need to pay to watch it!!!!!its my comfort show and I'm DEPRESSED and AUTISTIC"

what then

[realredbanana]

To sum up: they still think that trans peoples human rights are an online conversation, and expect the series to run for 10 consecutive years.

So let's get ahead of this right now.

I propose a media-wide blackout of everything Harry Potter related when the first season is released. No tweeting about it, not even to trash it. No posting online about it at all - No Instagram stories or posts, no TikToks, no snaps, no memes on FB, not a word on here, nothing. They will not commit themselves to 10 consecutive years of something if the first season flops. They might attempt a second season, but we can shoot that down, too.

I cannot still be dealing with the hate this woman has for us in 10 years. I cannot still be having this conversation when I'm in my mid-30s. I need her to be dead & forgotten by then, or used as a cautionary tale after her death. We can revive the fandom after she has died, depending what her will stipulates will be done with her bloodmoney. Okay? Is that a good enough compromise for you? You just have to wait for her to die, and not leave her estate & bank account to anti-trans stuff, and then you can get back to loving Potter. Deal?

But in the meantime, we need Warner Bros. to see that they cannot make money from this show. We need them to lose money. We need them to lose enough money that even JKR funding the entire project won't be enough for them to take the risk. Right now, they're saying that JKR's reputation & blatant transphobia have not impacted their ability to find more than enough people to audition for the series. We need them to rethink that. We need them to see that this is not the next Marvel-length franchise to get rich on.

Since I know some of you haven't participated in a media blackout protest before, here's how it'll work:

Don't hype the series / fandom / author / cast up in the lead-up to the series being released. Don't trash it, either. Ignore it. Forget about it. || This means that they won't get good word-of-mouth rates online, which means they will need to really push advertising to get enough people interested.

Don't watch the adverts online. Don't like or comment on the videos, not even with hate or pro-trans stuff. || Engaging with online ads or videos in any way gives them positive data, because it feeds the algorithm & let's them make money from the adverts. We don't want that.

When the series is released, don't watch it. Don't talk about it. Don't tweet about it. Don't post about it. Don't tiktok about it. Don't complain about it. Don't trash it. Pretend it doesn't exist. Ignore it. Forget about it. || They need their launch to earn them money, and even if you're posting about how bad it is, or posting anti-JKR content using the show's hashtags, even if you're watching it in order to know exactly what to complain about & critique, you are still giving them money. They still earn royalties from you watching it, regardless of your intentions. They still get word-of-mouth and clout from you posting about it, even if what you're saying is negative. You know the expression "There's no such thing as bad press"? This is what that refers to. It doesn't matter if you're sharing love or hate for the franchise, because you're still promoting it by saying its name. Also, an overwhelming amount of negative press online can and does lead to other people deciding to watch it to see why everyone is complaining, and arguing about it online, all of which feeds the creators more royalties. We don't want them to earn money from this.

Spread news about other shows & films & franchises & books. Get a fandom which has been dead for 10+ years trending again. Get anime shows & Futurama & ATLA & Adventure Time & Owl House & Over the garden Wall & some really obscure franchises trending across all social media platforms. Get something from the 80s trending in the Top 3 on Twitter. Engage with fandoms you're not even part of. Get BL shows trending in Netflix's Top 5. || This will completely skew analytics online, and it will flood people's dashboards with cmenough content that they won't see promotional content for the series we are blacking out. It will also show spikee data for which genres & shows are more popular & getting more attention & more royalties.

Share media with transgender actors / directors / crew. Share media with LGBTQIA+ storylines. Share pro-trans & pro-LGBTQIA+ content. Share & donate to fundraisers which help Trans & LGBTQIA+ people. Share Trans & LGBTQIA+ history. Show & Share Trans & LGBTQIA+ positivity & love & pride. Do all of this without acknowledging the series or creator we are blacking out. || This will show overwhelmingly positive & inclusive analytics, which will prioritise showing more of the same content. This is what we want the data to show.

Do not give in to temptation to look the show up. Do not look up the cast. Do not look up the directors or producers or executives. Do not look up the soundtrack. Do not put anything remotely related to the series into a search bar of any kind. || Search algorithms still store data, and if enough people look the same stuff up, it will show positive online engagement. We do not want this.

Do not give the actors hate. Do not tag them in hateful content online. Do not abuse them & do not bully them. || This is just unnecessary.

Give the blackout a cool-down period. Continue to ignore it for at least 10 days after the launch. || This forces the show's analytics to fall into negatives. If you suddenly start engaging with something immediately after blacking out the launch, the analytics show a delayed uptake - but it still shows them that people will engage with it, and that they will make money from it. We do not want this.

After the cool down period, mock it. Remember the mocmery that the Velma show got? And you've seen the mockery of the Rachel Zeigler version of Snow White is getting? And how that is impacting the ratings for Songbirds & Snakes because people don't want to watch her, at all, in anything? That is what we need to create on purpose. || If a show gets hate, the creators can use it to feed controversial interest in the show - 'Come watch this to see why people are hating!'. It's as beneficial as positive reviews. They can recover from it. But mockery? Mockery & dismissal is far more difficult to recover from, as it does more damage to their names and reputation. People do not want to be associated with a project which was mocked after it lost them a lot of money. Audiences are also much less likely to engage with a series which has been publicly mocked, compared to hated.

Only mock it for the same amount of time as the cool-down period. || This prevents the series from getting a large spike in analytics.

After this, ignore it. Move on. Talk & post about other stuff. Watch other stuff. || This will result in the show's analytics returning to negatives, and remaining there.

This is a strategy which is proven to work. It has worked for multiple franchises. It is behavioural analytics. It will work for this, but only if we commit to it & get enough people taking part.

All we have to do is:

Do not watch the HBO HP series

Do not post about it online

Ignore it

Do not play, stream or buy any games related to HP

Do not rematch the movies on a streaming service - JKR will still earn royalties from that

Do not post about JKR during the media blackout

Share pro-trans & pro-LGBTQIA+ content & history instead

Support trans creators & actors

Mock the series after the cool down time & then move on

Stick to this method. It WILL work.

And to dispute any attempted justifications for engaging with it:

"But she won't be involved!" || She is listed as an executive producer for the show

"But it's not the actors' fault!" || Actually, it is. The adult actors should know better than to involve themselves with this franchise, and the child actors' parents should know better than to exploit their children's desire to be famous &/ or their love of the series, because the adults should be socially aware enough to know that this franchise will harm their children in the long run.

"But what about my childhood nostalgia!" || What about trans people's human rights & dignity? What about trans children who don't think they'll make it to 18? What about the fact our Prime Minister is selling out transgender rights of his people for Trump? Wht about all of the trans people in the UK who are now facing the possibility of losing more of our rights? What about all of the little trans girls & boys & envies who saw those TERFs celebrating stealing their legal right to identify as their gender, with champagne on national TV? What about trans children who won't be able to go on 100% reversible hormone blockers because JKR funded the vitriol which made them illegal? What about all of the trans women & girls who just lost their legal rights this week? What about our right to legally exist? What about privacy rights and medical & legal autonomy for women & afab people in the UK? What about all the trans people who just watched 21 years of work & progress go down the drain in one afternoon? Are we not worth as much as one of the many memories of your childhood?

Nobody is saying you're not allowed to watch the DVDs or pirate it or read the books or listen to CDs or records of it. Just do not use streaming services for any of it, do not use YouTube, do not talk about it on Twitch & don't post about it online.

We need this franchise to die. We need the producers to see they can't make enough money from this to justify continuing it after the first season. We cannot still be having this argument in the mid 2030s.

We need to get ahead of this right now and stamp the fire out before it kills more trans people.

You understand that buying a Tesla = supporting the Elongated Muskrat & Trump. You understand that buying McDonald's or Starbucks funds Isreal & harms Palestinians. You understand that watching Sandman supports Neil Gaimen.

So why is it so hard for you to apply that exact same logic to JKR, when you can see the harm she is causing in real time to real people?

[realredbanana]

Entirely random but, shoutout to my brother, one of the most unreliable allies, for straight up saying to me “if you were a girl.”, then telling me “I don’t really see you as a girl or boy, just a weirdo”. Like, thanks????? Sort of correctly gendered but at what cost???????

[realredbanana]

[realredbanana]

hello physically disabled person reading this. it is not your fault that your medical supplies are made from a lot of single use plastic and you can continue using them guilt free. your health comes first. thank you for existing.

[realredbanana]

Link to thread

Link to news story

[realredbanana]

I think a lot of what makes fanfiction so magical is writers taking the time to explore tiny elements that were imagined into existence in the source material and then abandoned. It's the deep dive into that t-shirt, the forgotten gift, the nickname, the spare key, the anger they swallowed down, the trauma they supressed, the love they denied, the story that wasn't mainstream enough to make it. It's the little things getting their moment to shine and I fucking love that and I will fight for it always.

[realredbanana]

I’m returning half a year later to elaborate.

Lyrics:

I see you

My world blooms

Around you

Kinda self-explanatory. I mean, literally, Ghost City was basically created to suit some of Xie Lian’s ideals. It allows for shady people to gamble as they please without chancing innocent bystanders getting caught up in it (like what would’ve happened with the guy maliciously selling ghost fire lanterns had Xie Lian not intervened). He literally wouldn’t exist anymore without Xie Lian — he would have been remembered temporarily as That Kid Who Died During The Shangyuan Parade, and then he would’ve been forgotten.

Also. this song’s use of “I see you” really reminds me of Hua Cheng’s “Your highness, I understand your everything”. He truly sees Xie Lian. Sure, he’s biased as hell, but not in the sense that he denies how Xie Lian is, in how he just goes “eh. it’s him so it’s perfect”.

A time-lapse

In a flash

I see my whole life

Beside you

I bear witness

To the garden

That one day we'll tend to

As futures unearth

The only one I belong to is with you

Literally would’ve died without Xie Lian. And, after Xie Lian saved his life once, he saved it again by giving him a reason to live.

But I will wait patiently

Take all of the time you need

I'll be here

I'll be here when you're ready

Dude waited 800 years and he’d wait 1,000,000 more, and he’ll always be there for Xie Lian.

When the rain won't let up

I'll try to be strong enough

To build a sanctuary

~protecting someone from the rain is hualian-coded, fight me~ But, seriously, I adore how it doesn’t say “I will be strong enough”, it says “I’ll try to be strong enough”, because he’ll always do his best, but he doesn’t always succeed because he’s human.

I see you

How the world blooms

Around you

I see you

The pure light

You've always held onto

I see you

And the impossible odds

That you've grown through

“Your highness, I understand your everything. Your courage, your despair; your kindness, your pain; your resentment, your hate; your intelligence your foolishness.”

Hua Cheng was always there. He literally saw everything. He sees how Xie Lian does his best to help everyone, he sees how he never truly gives up on believing in people, he sees Xie Lian at his absolute worst. And he loves him.

Dark clouds pour down

But you don't have to keep swimming

If you don't want to

You don't have to keep swimming

If you don't want to

Almost-calamity!Xie Lian and Wu Ming.

I will wait patiently

Take all of the time you need

And I'll be here

I'll be here when you're ready

When the waves won't let up

We'll cast an anchor heavy enough

To keep our boat steady

I see you

My world blooms

Around you

I see you

The pure light

You've always held onto

I want you

And I want to be worthy enough to love you

I'll try to be worthy of you

I think the thing that reminds me most of Hua Cheng, other than the sheer love and devotion, here is the way it’d not “I will be worthy of you”, it’s “I’ll try to be worthy of you”. He never sees Xie Lian’s love as something he’ll automatically gain someday, but as something to earn and be worthy of and, even if he never gets it, he’ll still be there as long as he’s permitted. ☹️

Inhale, exhale

With every breath

I adore you

And that’s him in a nutshell. With every moment of his existence, he adores Xie Lian.

Bloom (Eros) by Sleeping at Last is so HuaLian (Hua Cheng’s POV). No I shall not elaborate.

[realredbanana]

officially the summer holidays!!

I love going into college even though I’ve finished all my work because, if nothing else, it’s too fucking hot and college has aircon whilst my house doesn’t (and my room gets humid and boiling 😭)

[realredbanana]

i think we should extend a little more grace to people who were indoctrinated who have realized their way of thinking is wrong/harmful/problematic and are now doing the work to unlearn large portions of their belief system

[realredbanana]

I love going into college even though I’ve finished all my work because, if nothing else, it’s too fucking hot and college has aircon whilst my house doesn’t (and my room gets humid and boiling 😭)

[realredbanana]

I have nothing more to add 🤺🤺🤺

[realredbanana]

Examples from Pride and Prejudice: "Sarah" is mentioned once, but never says anything or gets even a passing description; all that we can assume from context is that she is a maid working for the Bennetts. The Earl of M---(brother to Lady Catherine De Bourgh and the late Lady Ann Darcy) is sort-of named, but does not appear on page and all we know about him is that he's related to various characters. Colonel Fitzwilliam is the second son of that earl, so he must have an elder brother, but this brother is never seen or named.

[realredbanana]

Well fucks? Get to it!