rubyvroom - Tumblr blog

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the rose that concrete grew by patrick alston, 2021, acrylic + enamel + gouache + oil + paper pulp on canvas, 30 × 30 inches

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If there's any character in this world who suffers from literary Ken-ification it's Patroclus. Especially in the zeitgeist of today (thanks tsoa), it's always Achilles AND Patroclus, never just Patroclus. Who is he? Why does he exist? He is Achilles' boyfriend! What's his job? Death! In the sense that he just. Dies. That's just his job now. Death. Death and Achilles' boyfriend. That's it.

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i'm sorry but this is the only submission to this trend that i'll consider giving any thought to

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*emerges from the other room covered in blood* you should see the word document

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People are getting really really fascist about peaceful protesters and it’s getting scary lol

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Good evening to my short kings

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my favorite customer service slip ups

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I believe this is the video you were thinking of, and it's really good.

Schrodinger's Sexuality is basically a strategy to make queer characters invisible unless you go looking specifically for queer content, so the game doesn't piss off the homophobes. It's deniability via never actually saying the words and locking the content away behind, essentially, a gaywall. So those Stardew Valley characters are all assumed straight, unless you try to same-sex romance them, in which case they are suddenly bi. Bioware games do this fairly frequently with their bi characters, whereas gay characters openly state that they are gay and it is clear to everyone.

This is the drawback to "show, not tell", in video games at least. For other media this plays as that "clandestine bi" thing where it's only if you catch a particular reference and viewers who won't catch that reference will assume they are straight. Plausible deniability. Which is why I will always prefer openly stating they are bisexual, in whatever way that can be organically introduced.

Hey you know what's super funny about the idea of "good bi rep"?

For a character to be canonically bi you have to make sure and establish that they're attracted to multiple genders. Not all mediums allow you to get inside every character's head or show what they're thinking. Flirting can be read ambiguously, and god forbid they flirt with a character who's not into them and be read as pushy or predatory. So it can be super handy to just mention an ex or two! But you better not mention too many exes because that would make them a slutty bisexual which is (checks notes) bad, and you definitely better be careful about making them poly, because that might make them, uh... greedy. Oh, and those exes? They better be perfectly amiable breakups with no conflict or drama, because it's bad to represent queer people in toxic or abusive relationships (especially queer women! very bad), and you definitely can't have them have lost a partner if the partner was queer because that's "bury your gays..." You should probably also eliminate all trauma from their backstory, just to be safe. You should probably also make sure they're not involved in crime, deception, or anything of the sort, because that would make them "deviant" and a stereotype.

But don't worry! Once you've carefully crafted your nice, monogamous, experienced-but-not-too-experienced Lawful Good bi character, you will be rewarded with your audience deeming them "boring" and quickly passing them over for other characters. :)

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Jenny Holzer, Survival Series, 1983

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I think people underestimate the appeal specifically to a teenage girl of Rogue's whole "I have to stay covered up at all times because if I don't someone might touch me and then something really bad will happen and it will be my fault" thing.

So she has this whole purity culture nightmare where she literally can't explore her sexuality without peril to herself and others, leaving her lonely and horny all the time? And then you also give her the power to punch people into the stratosphere?

Come on. How is a 14-year-old girl supposed to resist that.

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I have been quietly enjoying X-Men '97 in my little non-fandom corner, but I have to say. As a childhood Rogue fan I was so fed by this episode. Rogue goes on a grief-stricken rampage! You killed all the nice mutants, now you deal with me! Destroys a government facility! Beats up General Ross! Faces down Captain America and chucks his shield into the wilderness! Hunts down and terrorizes Henry Gyrick! Drops a genocidal maniac off a building! And looked great doing it! My skin is clear, crops are watered, etc.

You were spared witnessing that which Rogue and I saw in Genosha. What she battles is not mere grief. And our dear Jubilee is wise to be afraid.

Rogue + grief X-Men '97 | "Bright Eyes"

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Worst or...best?

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Congratulations to Marcille DungeonMeshi for achieving Pathetic Little Man status on tumblr, a hard glass ceiling for many female characters to break. I look forward to calling you my sopping wet beast and poor little meow meow for fandom days to come. Keep trucking babygirl, you'll bag Falin one day

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When I was a kid my family pretended to get raptured so I would think I was left behind on earth while they all went to heaven.

I was like 8 years old and my sister and mom had gotten really into the Left Behind novels (bible fan fic about the rapture). In the books when the rapture happened the clothes that people were wearing when they got raptured were left behind in neatly folded piles.

One day when I was getting home from school my family decided that they would leave piles of neatly folded clothes around the house, and then hide in the basement.

The intended effect was that I would get home and see the clothes then, think that my family had been raptured and that I wasn’t good enough to get into heaven… or something?

The problem was that I had never read these books, and didn’t really think about the rapture very often. There was no reason that I would see some laundry on the floor and think “The rapture happened and I’ve been abandoned by God! I’ll never see my family again!! Oh nooo!!!!”

I just sat down and watched cartoons and eventually my family got bored and revealed that they were all hiding in the basement.

It’s a good thing I didn’t understand the joke, otherwise that shit would have been traumatic.

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Twenty years later, model Leilani Bishop recreates her iconic Hole “Live Through This” cover, originally shot by the very talented Ellen Von Unwerth in 1993.

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