It makes sense for them to include the pregnancy plot line but it doesn’t make it good or revolutionary and I think that’s such a shallow take on the situation. Her entire storyline has been the whole “if only she was a man” thing, where her main plot lines have been hating other woman, fighting with her husband, and now being pregnant. If the only thing we end up knowing about Shiv’s desires and life revolve around her child, that’s not revolutionary at all. Kendall has kids, but he is also a fully fleshed out character that can exist outside of that. Acting like “strong girlboss lead who has never accomplished anything in the show and is reminded of how her womanhood limits everything she does has to reconcile the way her body and ability to become pregnant can also be weaponized against her” is actually a fucked up storyline. It doesn’t make it bad, the entire show is a fucked up storyline, but it’s not some beautiful win for feminism
wooooah okay i was not at all saying her entire desires and life would revolve around her kid but rather that being pregnant forces her to self-reflect on the fact that she is not, in fact, a man, which would likely have important implications for her relationships with both the men and the women in her life, help us understand her interiority better (which right now we don't because she's always been very very dedicated to convincing herself she's something she isn't -- it would help HER understand her interiority better too), and overall just be kind of the catalyst for introspection in a way shiv hasn't been, like, provoked to do before. also i'm not saying it's inherently good or revolutionary just because they included a pregnancy plot! i'm saying that it has the POTENTIAL TO BE, which it does.
as always under the mf cut
'“strong girlboss lead who has never accomplished anything in the show and is reminded of how her womanhood limits everything she does has to reconcile the way her body and ability to become pregnant can also be weaponized against her” is actually a fucked up storyline' .....i don't understand. for one thing, i did not say jackshit about her pregnancy being weaponized against her. that is not at all what i was saying she had to reconcile with. i was saying she had to reconcile with the fact that she simply will not be seen as a man, and that maybe that's okay, and maybe she can still be a ~girlboss~ while still yknow being a girl. why are yall acting like pregnancy is this inherently agency-robbing thing that only exists to ruin the characterizations of strong women? you do know that it exists in real life, right? like, is this what you think about women who are pregnant in real life? because, like, everything you just described is just... i mean, that's not unique to this plot point. that's just part and parcel of being born with a womb. that's just fucking LIFE. that's just how shit IS sometimes. like YES you can be a strong girlboss and still not accomplish anything because a) you're a woman surrounded by men b) you're desperately attempting to act like a man and in reality are only performing a parody of 'masculinity' that's more harmful to you than it is helpful, but you feel it's the only way to survive, YES your womanhood limits everything you does (so long as 'everything' means 'success in your male-dominated career aspirations among your misogynistic family'), YES your body and ability to become pregnant can be weaponized. that's not inherently a fucked up sexist plotline? that's just how life is for a lot of women???? so why the fuck is it bad to show a woman struggling to reconcile with that FACT because it is a fucking FACT?! it is a FACT that women are judged for being pregnant!!! it is not a fucked up plotline to acknowledge that!!!!! what WOULD BE fucked up is centering her entire character around becoming a mother or something, which i just really fucking doubt they'll do. instead, i think it'll be used as a way to explore parts of shiv we haven't seen.
also, saying shiv's main plot lines have been "hating other women, fighting with her husband, and now being pregnant" .... like. i don't know man. did you kind of forget the part where she was a political consultant or fighting to become ceo of a major conglomerate or something? i would maybe argue that... well, that fighting to become ceo of waystar is her main plot line. not... hating other women? really, the only thing we know about shiv's life and desires is that she wants to be fucking ceo of waystar so she can get logan's approval. that is it. that is why i would like to know more about her PERSONAL life. about her PERSONAL wants and needs and desires -- maybe it's to have kids, maybe it's to never fucking have kids whatsoever and jetset around the world. i don't care!!! i just want to learn more about whatever is underneath her veneer of 'masculinity,' whatever is outside of her relationships with men. aaaaaaaaaaand i think having to deal with something as personal and body-focused and life-changing as a pregnancy will force her to ask questions about herself she's always been too afraid to ask, and i'm interested to see what the answers are!!!
it's not revolutionary to have a pregnancy plotline. fucking obviously. what WOULD be revolutionary is allowing a character who has defined herself by, as you said, wishing she was a man -- allowing her to still be her same ole manipulative masculine whatever self while still allowing her to consider a life involving a family or love. just consider!!!! because i don't think she even has. her focus is ONLY on career, on success, on being respected. like, actually, the only aspects of her 'desires' etc that we DONT know are those related to love and family. we know what she wants career wise! why are you acting like she hasn't been incredibly career-focused this entire time? i just want to know what shiv roy wants on a human level!!! because i don't think anyone is JUST SATISFIED with career!!!!! not saying you need kids, god no idek if i'll have kids fr, but that there is more to life outside of that. so i want to know what she wants from life, because frankly, i don't think she's had the time or energy to even focus on that with how desperately she's had to fight to stay in the room. but now she has to actually start considering herself as an individual with a life outside waystar -- something she really hasn't done since she worked for gil in season one. ever since, her life has been waystar waystar waystar. but pregnancy.... well. that's something that's her own, especailly given that no one else knows about it right now. so i want to know more about shiv. that's all. and that's what i think this arc can tell us, and that's why i'm excited for it.
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also i know it's a uni publication but the interviewer for that article really should have called out some of this shit but like later in the article they're like 'so what did you enjoy about the odyssey??' like she JUST told you she hasn't even read it lmaoooo "particularly the watered down version we give to kids" oh so the only version you've read ???? literally how does she have the GALL i would be so embarrassed
(cont) "it's a classic but also has bad aspects to it so it's fun to pick at" uh did you know classic does not equal morally pure honestly i hate to judge YA fans but like. why are they all like this? (also sorry to spam your inbox i'm just living for this minor drama that is never even heard of literally twenty minutes ago lol)
i mean, she has read parts of it at the very least (still somehow below the bare minimum) but i think the "watered down version we give to kids" is very funny in light of all the watered down versions published in the ya genre
i just don't understand why they're marketing it as a retelling in light of what we know about it. in all honesty, i get the feeling that this has is being fast tracked to published as quick as possible (for $$$) or however it works and as a result no one has actually sat down with the author to be like "listen..."
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this post is not gonna be well put together but i am having feelings
mean girls is trending right now because the musical movie just came out and i feel insane. idk why i do, it was stupid of me to think that most people Got It, no one ever gets it, it was always about the memes and the aesthetic.
the first mean girls movie was based on a nonfiction book called queen bees and wannabes. it interviewed and discussed the social hierarchy system in teen girl friendships. how they hold each other to these insane standards of heternormative femininity out of sheer terror that they won't meet those standards themselves. the way they leverage their relationships for some small degree of power in a world designed to strip them of it, even if it drags other girls down.
the "you can only wear your hair in a ponytail once a week and on wednesdays we wear pink" speech was not an original creation for the script. it's a QUOTE from a real teenage girl. those were REAL RULES.
then the musical came, and it was one step removed from the intended messaging of the film. OG mean girls was not perfect (and was extremely racist), but it said what needed said. the musical leaned on the comedy more, but still left a heartfelt undertone, and still critiqued the systems in place. of course no piece of media is going to be perfect, but it was about the conversation.
then this new movie comes out and it is washed over in the veneer of white hollywood feminism so thick you can't see anymore. the problematic aspects of the original movie are taken out to avoid "offending" when the offense was the point. it becomes toothless, it becomes some other thing entirely. they changed karen's line "i expect to run the world in shoes i cannot walk in" to "watch me as i run the world in shoes i cannot walk in." because choice feminism is in vogue, suddenly this character whose entire point is that she doesn't think deeply about WHY she does anything is suddenly hip to the fact that the world is against her.
i think of sokka losing his misogyny arc in the new atla. i think of the Heathers remake casting the bitchy, identical heathers as queer and hollywood-fat outcasts. as if the story, the meaning, the allegory is hidden in the sets and the jokes and the music. it's a whole new thing now, and it's a thing that means nothing in particular.
the plastics should not wear jeans. they should not have curves. their queerness should be suppressed, painful. their sexuality is not a slay, it's the only thing they think they have of value. the santa dance isn't sexy, it's shocking, it's mortifying - they are children.
they're not mean because "we are all mean." they are mean because they are girls in a world that brutalizes them and crushes them into a standardized shape. they are mean because the world is mean to them. they are mean because it gives them some power back. they are mean because it's the only weapon they have.
the landscape of femininity today has shifted to camera-ready makeup at the age of 10, stringent performative hygiene standards, and avoiding being caught on film while having a genuine emotion. the consumerism, the fatphobia, the racism, the classism, the homophobia remain. We could have had a conversation about that.
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i can't wait until i get enough clout in my job to be bitchy. not like, be a bitch, but be bitchy. i work in climate change and decarbonization. i need to be bitchy. like imagine
a company's emission disclosures and their sustainability goals are literally just a post on facebook
no i cannot 'move your emissions' so you 'don't need to disclose it'
bezos earth fund????
this american organization's website is somehow subtly hyper-american and i don't trust it. like it's not actually extremely american but it feels like only 1) an american who's 2) writing this for politicians could've made this website. the vibes are rancid.
bezos earth fund???
your company cares so much about sustainability that you're following all of these standards and certifications AND your company is on the board for/founded the organizations who publish them? so you're patting yourself on the back for meeting international standards that you set?
am I being overtly cynical about this? do they genuinely want to help? I genuinely want to help and yet I am doing so in a capitalist structure even though capitalism caused most of this. how can you dismantle something using the same structure that caused it? i don't know if you can. i don't know how else to do it? i can't be that special. how many people are like me in those companies? Do they genuinely want to help? Are these measures and standards that they set actually useful? are the sustainability reports actually good or does it just sound good?
morality crisis
bezos earth fund???
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especially on my post about trans women wanting kids but just on a lot of trans topics in general a lot of people really fucking put way too much emphasis on the fact that they "personally would never ever want that and it's terrifying and they can't understand it but like you should be nice to ppl who do". and It's just like idk...maybe I'm being bitchy but u can like....not do that?
like you don't need to go on about how you can't possibly understand why someone would want to be a woman and then add "but it's important to support them anyway" or something like it's just a lil bit insulting isn't it?
or like I'm glad ur supportive of guys who want bottom surgery but maybe you didn't need ¾ of your message to be in depth discussion of your brutal fear of it and how disgusting it seems to you? maybe? do you think that might actually be more discouraging than simply saying "yea i agree" perhaps? idk it just pisses me off and seems way too like....the classic thing of completely centering yourself while giving lip service to actually supporting the thing being talked about.
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Megatron's Opposite Day
"I free slaves"
This is Soundwave binding Ratbat but seeing as Megatron did the same thing to Pentius by putting his spark into Trypticon and reformatted Rumble and Frenzy into cassettes against their will I think he approves a lot of this practice
Megatron on Optimus and humans, after his defeat in All Hail Megatron ⬇️
he really salty
"I implant ideology" aka brainwashing
Decepticon cause = Megatron. nuff said.
"I liberate cities" says the person who let Nyon burn to make a point
Cities are too small, think bigger
Holding New York hostage.
"Like Autobots, they believe in the sanctity of life" which he doesn't. Kudos for being honest.
Allowing troops to do free-rein massacre is a reward for conquest. Nothing like some easy murder for de-stressing.
The Simanzi massacre which halved the Cybertronian population is off-screen so it doesn't deserve its own pic
"The revolution"
"We only feel good when we stand with a blade in one hand and a throat in another" "Let's make the entire face of the planet into our new gladiator arena"
What nice, confidence-inspiring revolutionaries. I'm sure they'll rule the population with benevolence after they've killed all the Necessary People with Necessary Violence. Final interpretation of what constitutes as Necessary is reserved for the sole discretion of Megatron, ofc.
Good goals.
Sentinel might be an absolute asshole but at least he's got one thing right: they're literally a gang of thugs who gets high off murder.
"The people are my utmost concern"
'The people': ................
"Battling for freedom"
Freedom of what? Function? Autonomy?
Religion?
the ability to choose whether to fight? on which side to fight?
Idk why they used the word "pogrom" for this, it's way too specific
Anyways it doesn't matter, they won't be missed.
Good for Bumblebee for calling him out. Screenshotted this just to appreciate Megatron's bitchy face ⬇️
Other urban legends:
"Megatron loves Cybertron" let's just burrrrn it
He did fight to save Cybertron in Chaos Theory but also made it pretty clear why he did it. It's not out of the goodness of his heart or any sentimental reasons like that. It's an ego/dominance thing.
Plus his wording when he's trying to convince Optimus to let him go with the Lost Light: "I broke the planet. And that, Optimus, is why I owe it to you - to everyone - to find a replacement."
Replacement.
In other words: I made a mess and can't be bothered to clean it up, so I want to get away from it and find somewhere new to start clean.
I don't think Optimus appreciates the favour.
"Megatron tore down a corrupt government" which is true, just too bad that he's worse
He's also, um, a closeted Zeta admirer?
"Megatron advocates equality" ???
Megatron x dictatorship is literally his OTP. They were inseparable for four million years. A lot of people died trying.
"Megatron cares about the Decepticons" no he doesn't. Not his troops nor its cause.
Like for one thing he treats them with complete scorn
Admits that the most useful thing about keeping Starscream around is that he can bully underlings into line
Wants to use the humans' nuke to get rid of his troops and reformat them into peaceful drones after they outlive their use because they were "too ruthless" for his perfect peaceful society
Has zero scruples about fighting Deceptigod, just affronted that his own soldiers are being used against him
And basically just drops the Decepticons like a bag of vermin after he surrenders. He never once mentions them of his own accord, other than to insist he has nothing to do with them. Even his surrender speech is something Optimus makes him do as exchange b/c he wants to go on parole. He wasn't planning on making a public address otherwise, he was just going to leave them hanging.
Looking at the publication timeline, Megatron started out as an established Evil McEvilson-type villain similar to how he is in G1 and it's not until Chaos Theory in 2011 that JRo really gave him a sympathetic backstory that drew his characterization away from the bloodthirsty pugno ergo sum warlord into someone who once held ideals about societal reform and remains convinced of his own moral supremacy throughout the 4 mill years of death and war, adding worldbuilding such as Functionism/oppression/government corruption as justification for the beginning of the Decepticon movement. But because the start of the Decepticons was already written in Megatron Origins and every evil thing he'd done up till Chaos Theory can't be retracted and they had to keep Megatron as a villain until his story was no longer central to the Autobot-Decepticon war line, and JRo didn't try to downplay the atrocities he'd committed (some of the most sadistically disturbing things Megatron did were exclusively in MTMTE flashbacks), but rather tried to distance him from them and placed the focus on the juxtapositions to emphasize change, this as a whole just resulted in Evil McEvilson getting turned into Hyper McHypocrite.
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