#-and skill level. i can only improve and there's no shame in posting things that aren't perfect. or you know. bad

[honeytonedhottie]

the art of conversation (from a professional yapper)⋆.ೃ࿔*:･🍉

just wanted to preface this by saying that NOT everyone is extremely sociable and thats totally okay. this post is to help improve ur conversational skills and charisma ✨

WHY LEARNING TO BE SOCIAL IS IMPORTANT ;

social skills are literally the FOUNDATION of effective communication. its important bcuz it allows u to build meaningful relationships, express urself, collaborate with others etc.

when ur learn how to be an effective communicator u can connect more deeply with the people around u. being more social can also provide u with opportunities, and in general make ur life SO much easier. not to mention u have a lot more fun.

SUPERIORITY/INFERIORITY COMPLEX ;

an inferiority complex is the feeling of inadequacy, an insecurity that ur not on the same level as someone else. a superiority complex is the opposite, u can come off as smug or condescending. both are bad in their own right.

the way that u can combat this is by adopting the mindset that you are neither below or above anyone else, and no one else is above or below you.

doing so can kind of even the playing field of conversation in ur mind and make sure that ur not feeling some kind of way before going into a conversation bcuz when u let ur superiority/inferiority complex go by un-fixed it can sabotage communication and not give ppl the change to get to know u.

UNLEARN SHAME ;

first u gotta start off with thinking about ways that shame has influenced ur thoughts or actions. an example that im sure a lot of us could relate to is the whole cringe concept.

to help unlearn shame i recommend journalling, therapy, and mindfulness so that then u can let urself ENJOY things again, without having the looming fear of the judgement of others.

also no genuinely happy person is going to take time out of their day to shame u, only a loser would do that. and if ur the one shaming others for liking something bcuz of ur own insecurity, get that fixed and get a life.

PREPPING FOR CONVERSATION ;

when approaching someone or starting conversation with someone for the first time, a rly good way to start it is with a compliment. dont start it by saying hi cuz i think thats so awkward 😭

compliment them for something, their response can also tell u a lot about them also bcuz some ppl will take the compliment well and some ppl will serve u a dirty look and that alone can tell u if u rly wanna be conversing with that person.

LEARN TO LAUGH ;

since we've already talked about why learning to not feel embarrassed about every little thing is important, here's what to do when something like that comes up. literally laugh.

for example the other day someone whom i've never spoken to before came up to me and started talking to me so familiarly, like with their arm around me and everything and i just went with it 💀 until he noticed that he had mistaked me for someone else, but its okay cuz now i have a new friend. LAUGH ABOUT IT.

dont take everything so seriously, being able to enjoy and take a joke is what makes conversation so much fun. note, do NOT mistake taking a joke as taking disrespect bcuz u should not take that, there is a distinct difference.

the biggest advice i can give as a yapper is to be more lighthearted and not take everything seriously. bcuz i feel like when we take everything so seriously we become rigid and thats not hot, be a breath of fresh air instead ✨

[qqueenofhades]

thank you for your post i’m doing my best to stay informed on the conflict and i’m very young. i feel guilty being quiet as i understand to uplift voices helps prevent their silencing but this has lead me to not critically think about what i’m spreading

it’s been a long month. i’m only a kid and watching the world go to shit like this has been awful, I always wondered how millennials who lived through post nine eleven imperialism coped and god i’m still not sure how.

I am as a white gentile in a position of privilege and mostly my own person is unaffected by the uptick in violence and evil in the world right now. But my friends who i see every day are in more danger due to this conflict and i feel awful that i cannot ever fully understand or fix the deaths of people.

Right now I’m being a bit too reactionary. I’m doing my best but in the end I am not immune to fearmongering and propoganda, especially in these last couple sleepless weeks.

So thank you and everyone who is keeping level heads and desconstructing what’s happening. I’m sorry and i strive to be better. Thank you.

To anyone living in fear right now i’m so sorry. I will listen when you speak.

Once again I just want to say that I am a busy and uninformed student, and I wish that i had more teachers and authority figures that had objective facts to tell me. It’s suffocating to have fake news everywhere but feel powerless if you don’t know anything

it’s ok if you don’t respond to this

Thank you for your post

Thanks for this message and for taking the time to put it into words and to reflect on your own actions and rhetoric. It takes a lot of courage and self-awareness to admit that you were wrong and that you want to do better, and I'm not going to rip into you or blame you or otherwise shame you for it. So I hope this gives you the confidence to read on without feeling like you'll be raked over the coals for it, and open you to hear some ideas for doing things differently.

First, I do have a ton of sympathy for you as a young person who feels overwhelmed and exhausted by all the evil in the world, and is wondering how to get through it, react to it, or otherwise make some kind of moral response in the face of this soul-crushing trauma. I will say here that I am a little bit older than your average Tumblr user (the majority of this site is in their early-mid twenties), I do personally remember 9/11 and its aftermath when a lot of people here weren't even born yet, and I am an academic historian with a doctorate. That does not mean I am better or smarter or More Perfect or whatever at what I say, but it means that I do have a considerable amount of institutional, formal, and professional practice at analyzing a lot of complex information, putting it into words, breaking it down for less-specialist audiences, pointing out logical fallacies, and so forth.

That is not a skill that everyone has, and in the face of nonstop 24-hour news-cycle social media information overload, it can be incredibly difficult to parse it or understand how you're supposed to respond to it or what your moral obligation in response to this knowledge might be. I wrote this ask the other day in response to someone else asking how to improve their critical thinking skills and be more discerning about what they understood, shared, and analyzed. I strongly encourage you to read it, as it addresses a lot of what you're saying about feeling negative, depressed, panicked, angry, and all the other emotions that are naturally evoked in you from reading this stuff nonstop and feeling like the only thing you can (or should) do is immerse your brain in it at all times. In short, that is absolutely the worst environment to do actual substantial analysis or critical thinking, and it is designed so on purpose.

It has been said before, but it bears repeating: the human brain simply is not designed to be constantly aware of all the atrocities in the world and thus (thanks to social media) feeling as if the only way they can do anything about it is to then post the Correct Opinions on social media (regardless of whether these are informed or relevant or otherwise useful). Especially now, the rush to demonstrate Correct Thinking has warped a lot of otherwise well-meaning young people into becoming eager disinformation mouthpieces. There are a TON of explicitly bad-faith actors and far-right fascists who are posting pro-Palestine content (factual or uh, otherwise) because they know that's an instant way to get an audience of said young left-leaning people who will then be suckered into and exposed to their far more dangerous content and mindset, because that is how radicalization works. Even in the support of an obviously worthy cause, you and everyone else ARE NOT IMMUNE to fearmongering, disinformation, and virulently anti-Semitic propaganda, especially when it's being eagerly and constantly offered in a deliberate attempt to radicalize you further into violence and conspiracy theories, turn you against other vulnerable groups and people, and explicitly disengage you from the electoral/political process, which will harm the Democrats and other liberal establishment parties in favor of more far-right radical fascist theocrats and otherwise make everything, everywhere, many orders of magnitude worse.

I know the feeling that you need to do something, and since you're a long way from the conflict, it seems as if posting on social media is the best and/or the only way to go about it. In that environment, and especially right now, you will make mistakes. I know it is difficult in an online environment where popularity or acceptance by your peers often rests on never being wrong about anything (i.e. saying the same thing everyone else is saying), but it always helps to think about what you're doing, what you're saying, and if you actually need the approval of people who are conditioning you, implicitly or explicitly, into negative and violent ideological nihilism.

The hardest thing to understand is that yes, there is a lot of terrible shit going on in the world; no, you cannot personally fix it and you have to accept that as a limitation; yes, there are many multiple and complex causes and reasons for its existence and there is almost never a black-and-white simplistic moral solution that just hasn't been magically implemented yet; yes, it is always worth it to take the time to inform yourself and consider what you're saying, where it comes from, who it helps and who it hurts, and why you feel the need to say it in the first place. Of course you want to help. Of course you want to stop the needless suffering and death that has gone on in the world for millennia and unfortunately, as long as humans are humans, will continue to do so. But even so, take it away Gandalf:

[olderthannetfic]

I want to ask I noticed I get talked over a lot by my friends in our discord server I wonder is it because I am not assertive enough in what I say? Like I told them many time I feel like they don’t noticed what I say but they haven’t improved it’s still the same old I say something then everyone ignores me and keeps talking. So I stop bother saying anything because no one seems to care about what I have to say. So what am I doing wrong? Because this seems to happen in every group chat I am in everyone just talks over me.

--

It's impossible to diagnose from only your own impressions.

Here are some guesses for possibilities:

Your ask has grammar errors and is repetitive and poorly punctuated in a way that makes it un-fun to read. Perhaps your English skills are weaker than those of other people in the chat, and that makes your content less pleasant to engage with.

These people tolerate you, but you're not really friends. They're not intentionally shunning you: they're just paying more attention to people they're more interested in.

Your posts are all off-topic

That last one is the most likely to me based on years of observing nerds. If you're bad at social cues and context or you're swept away by a passion for your latest fixation, it's easy to be perpetually off-topic. Just because you said something doesn't mean it was a natural progression of the conversation, and if people were enjoying that conversation, they may not want to get sidetracked onto whatever you brought up.

I don't know if this applies to you, but common behaviors of this type include bringing up:

personal trauma, often with a lot of details when the conversation wasn't about personal stuff, much less such heavy and intimate personal stuff

your own problems and needs when the conversation is focusing on giving someone else support

your own fanworks when the focus was on praising another group member or on reccing things by strangers

your specific kinks, ships, favorite characters, favorite canons, etc. that no one else is into because you're desperate for fellow fans

stuff that actively grosses out the other chat members (e.g. repeatedly discussing piss kink when nobody else ever joins in)

your headcanons and OCs, especially if you don't show frequent, genuine interest in other people's headcanons and OCs

anything else that makes you sound like that bird rights tweet:

Basically, some people try to make chat All About Me repeatedly, and the only way to have a good conversation is to let these embarrassing faux pas slide without saying anything.

Or you might be on-topic but just pointlessly repeating something that someone else just said more eloquently. People might respond directly to that other person and not even realize they're ignoring you because what you said was essentially the same point.

It's possible these people are just jerks and you need better friends, but if this problem happens in every group chat, I think it's time to consider whether you are being boring or annoying in some way. Is there something you can do to change so your friends won't want to ignore your comments anymore?

One thing I am certain of is that assertiveness is not the answer.

Demanding more interaction can sometimes make people feel guilty, but it won't generally change their behavior. They're responding at an instinctive level to the cues you give off, and changing those cues is the only way to change their responses.

And look, as an aside, I'm not trying to shame the socially awkward. I've been that deeply annoying person who feels the need to bring up their fixations despite the fact that no one cares. Learning to gauge interest a little better did wonders for me even if I'm still that same person and I intentionally only associate with other obsessive nerds.

Is there someone with good social skills to whom you can show the actual chat transcripts, anon? I don't think you're going to get to the bottom of this without getting into the specifics. And while I'm perfectly happy to look at chat transcripts, it's not usually polite or kind to put private things like that on a public blog like this.

[how-to-do-it-better]

Deepthroating 101

Young Brittni shares tips and advice on the art of deepthroating.

By Brittni4u. Listen to the Podcast at How-to Sex.

On the internet in general, there are several stories and guides posted on the subject of giving blowjobs. Many of them are great and give various techniques and opinions on how to enhance oral sex on a guy. Once again, I'm not claiming to be an expert, especially at the young age of 22, but I do have skill, experience and above all, enthusiasm. In this post, I'm focusing on the deepthroating aspect because I feel over time I have gotten pretty good at it and want to pass my knowledge along so that I may help others.

Deep what?

First, what is the definition of deepthroating? If a girl goes all the way down on a cock, gags, chokes, then immediately rises back up, is that defined as a deepthroat? Should there be a time limit on how long you have to keep it in your throat before it actually qualifies as deepthroating? Should you be able to, not only swallow the cock, but bob all the way up and all the way down on it while performing, in order to count it as a true deepthroat?

I believe there are three levels of deepthroating, so the answer to all those questions are; yes!

·         A stage one deepthroat is the first type I mentioned which most girls can do.

·         A stage two deepthroat is more difficult and fewer can keep the cock in their throat for an extended period of time.

·         And finally, a stage three deepthroat is the most difficult to perform and a low percentage of people can continually suck a cock while deepthroating it continuously every time they go down.

If you are one of the lucky few that can give your guy a stage three deepthroat, he will be a very happy person. Deepthroating not only allows him to feel his entire cock into a warm, moist orifice, it also excites his mind seeing every inch disappear in your mouth.

My last serious boyfriend had a long cock. It wasn't freakish big, but was just over 8 inches. He couldn't believe how easily I could deepthroat it while I blew him. He became obsessed about it and together we would look up deepthroating porn on the internet.

 There are some amazing deepthroating videos out there but no one porn star that I had ever seen was better than a girl named Heather Brooke. Have any of you seen her work? Oh, my god, she is the deepthroat queen, with no peers. If you haven't seen her, I strongly advise looking her up on the internet.

Obstacles to overcome

The two factors that prevent someone from deepthroating are either physical or psychological. The physiological makeup of people is what determines the largest portion of their deepthroating skill. The physical barriers include the gag reflex in which we all hear the most about, throat length, cock thickness which is much more of a hindrance in deepthroating over cock length, among others.

Many times, our skill level is predetermined but I do believe we can improve it. I cannot walk up to Ariana Grande and ask her to teach me to sing as good as she can; no more that I can ask Heather Brooke, ‘Please teach me to deepthroat like you.’

 If you don't have the natural ability, you cannot be elite but you can get better and better with practice and it would be a shame to never realize your potential.

Even if you are great at deepthroating cock, it is a physiological certainty that those barriers, I mentioned, will still get in the way sometime. Even the elite will gag, cough, heave and eyes will water at some point during deepthroating. As you perfect your skill, those things will happen less often but they still will happen nonetheless. That is why you would not deepthroat a guy through an entire blowjob. It's physically impossible. I treat deepthroating like it's glitter on a poster. You add a little here and there but it makes the best statement at the end.

I think the psychological hurdle accounts for only a small portion but I wouldn't underestimate the effect it possesses. Girls, we all know when we have crossed over into extreme horniness; or what I call "lust mode." That may happen with alcohol, great foreplay, loving our partner, great lead up sex, or just a really hot guy who knows what he's doing. When you are in that state, that is the best time to attempt deepthroating. Lust mode may shed that "claustrophobic feeling" of having an object lodged in your throat if that is your psychological barrier. When you are uninhibited, you become more daring, experimental, and enthusiastic.

A good blowjob starts and ends with enthusiasm. You have to like sucking cock and you have to want to suck cock. I have questioned my girlfriends at length and some like doing it and some don't. The ones who don't, still will do it on occasion just to please the guy but he will sense this in your demeanor which will diminish his pleasure.

 I also hear that, on average, when a woman gets married or older in general, she performs fellatio a lot less; but I don't know many older women that I feel comfortable asking, so I cannot give a valid opinion.

I love sucking cock and hope the enthusiasm I have for it, never diminishes. If you sincerely want to please his cock, savor the taste, do all the little sexy non-verbal gestures, and truly swallow every inch of it, he will absolutely love it. Sometimes, I get so aroused and into it, I feel like I can't swallow enough of it, even if it is completely buried down my throat! I want even more! We can sense when a guy's attitude is lackadaisical in eating our cunts, and the guy knows when we are sucking his cock just because it's "his birthday."

Before you try to get your man's cock down your throat, be sure it's lubricated. Of course with all the sucking, there will be excessive saliva built up in your mouth but much of it will either stay in your mouth or ooze out as drool. There will be no doubt his cock will be lubricated but many forget to swallow to lubricate the throat. It is also good practice to have a drink handy when giving a blowjob; if it is possible. The wetter your throat, the better his cock will slide down. Your throat is no different than any other orifice in your body.

You cannot read anything on deepthroating without hearing about the gag reflex. It is very real and very different for everyone. My sister gags at everything and cannot stick anything in her throat.

My friend Kelly can slide a 10 inch dildo down her throat with no trouble. Those two girls have very different pharyngeal reflexes. I think my throat is much closer to Kelly's. Most of us girls have been so drunk or feeling so bad, we have had our fingers in our throat trying to throw up just to feel better. That is triggering our gag reflex.

When we have a cock lodged in our throat, we have to think the opposite. We are suppressing our body's natural instinct to reject the object. How can we do that? I think there are a couple of techniques that may help. The first one is practice. We cannot completely change our gag reflex but we can train it.

 When I was a teenager and learning the art of giving blowjobs, I got tired of gagging, so one day when I was at a friend's house, she was showing me her mom's dildo collection. She let me take one of them that looked old and not in good shape. I peeled the outer rubber or "skin" off, exposing only the core which was just a long, thin piece of rubber. I sterilized it with rubbing alcohol and used it as my practice tool. It was still very long and perfect for sucking.

I would push it to the back of my throat, heave and pull it out. I would try different positions and a variety of techniques before I would go to bed. Some of those included, shove it in very fast, very slowly, drive it back and forth very quickly, try to swallow it, and twist it around. I did get to where I found my own personal preferences that worked best for me.

The guy I was dating at the time could tell a big difference in a relatively short amount of time, as could I.

In a few weeks, I went from gagging and choking, to deepthroating his cock like a pro. The best advice I can give is to not think specific techniques work the same for everyone. Most information that I have read about deepthroating directs people to relax and straighten their throat because that provides a better "sword swallowing" angle and suppresses the gag reflex. Yes, that can work for some people but not for me, it is the exact opposite. I deepthroat better with my chin down and tightening my throat muscles.

To elaborate, I start out by locking or pressing my tongue down at the bottom of my jaw. I then open my throat while keeping the muscles contracted. Once the head of his cock touches the back of my throat, I push it down rather quickly without changing my throat position in any way.

Quicker works for me but sometimes slower is better and you will have to see what works best for you. When his cock reaches its destination and completely submerged down your esophagus, it is important to not pull it completely out when you start sucking. Give yourself some time to get used to it. Shallowly, bob up and down while barely moving the cock in your throat and keeping your tongue perfectly still. Moving your tongue transfers the feeling in your gag reflex which could cause you to gag.

When you get more comfortable, you can "slide" the cock further distances until you are deepthroat sucking. It's important to breathe when it slides out. Try not to change the throat angle or the pace of the sliding cock until you have mastered your gag reflex. Even if you go to great efforts to keep everything consistent, there will be times in the heat of passion you will choke or gag. There is nothing wrong with pulling it out, regrouping and starting over. That is why it's physically impossible to deepthroat someone throughout an entire blowjob.

Positions

Of course there are many positions to give a guy a blowjob and to deepthroat in particular. Whether you are experienced and comfortable or just starting out, I feel the best position for deepthroating is with both of you right side up. The first advantage is you keep your orientation because while on your knees or sitting down, being right side up tells your brain that everything is "normal" which allows you to focus on the task easier without gagging. Another advantage to this position, is it's easier to control the depth and thrusting speed of the cock.

Your mouth or his cock are not fighting or supporting gravity. If you feel yourself start to gag, a quick pull off is easy, plus, you can use your hands to press on his abdomen when direction is needed. In addition, this position allows you better access to his balls and ass. By fondling, rubbing, cupping, jostling, or just playing with his balls, you can add that extra sensation to make him cum quicker. If he likes ass play, he can spread his legs and allow you to slide a finger in his asshole to enjoy a prostate massage while you deepthroat him. That can also trigger him to cum quicker.

Another recommended position is, what I call, aligning to your lover's cock. If his cock curves upward, attack it from the top like you would do while on top during a 69 position. If it leans to the left, then get on his left side and swallow it that way. Properly aligning your throat to his natural curve can help reduce friction in your throat which in turn could help reduce gagging. It is ironic, if you have ever watched a nature show and see a snake swallow its prey, it aligns its jaws to help pull the prey down its throat and swallow it whole. Now we are the predator and our prey is the guy’s snake but we are trying to accomplish the same result.

Rules?

I don't recommend allowing your man to be on top if you are inexperienced at deepthroating. In other words, it is very difficult to allow him to "fuck your throat" without complications. He may get caught up in wanting to go faster or deeper than your comfort level allows. However, if you do get to the point where you can handle him doing that, it can be very exciting and erotic. Make sure he is aware of your "rules."

I will also tell you that if you upside down or lying with your head hanging over the bed while deepthroating, it can be a struggle to breathe with his balls covering your nostrils. That is why I always keep a hand free to tap or "rearrange" him if needed.

Once you have improved your deepthroating ability, then it is time to add some skills for his pleasure. One thing I like to do is lick his balls while his cock is totally submerged in my esophagus. I like to give a little smile, maybe even a wink, and rub my tongue back and forth on his nuts. Be careful not to stick your tongue out too far because that releases the tension of gag reflex and can cause you to gag. You will have to find your own tongue technique that works best for you.

Another skill I like to performance during a good deepthroat blowjob is clenching my mouth very tightly. Once I have him completely buried, I clamp and keep removing the air trapped between my cheeks and his cock. This provides a different type of a snugness sensation, almost like a vacuum effect. When you start to bob in this position, it will feel like he is fucking a virgin. It will be no time and he will be ready to cum.

Finishing

If you are willing to finish a guy while deepthroating, then you have decide how you will receive his cum. It can be a little trickier than it would be with just a standard blowjob. When a guy cums in your mouth during a blowjob, you can prepare by blocking off your throat with your tongue and let him empty without choking you. The second technique is when you suck it out like your drinking through a straw. Either way, it feels natural. Cumming in your throat is something completely different. It is more difficult but if you can master the technique, it also supplies a couple of advantages.

The first advantage to deepthroating an ejaculating cock is if you don't like the taste of cum. The cum shoots directly into your throat, bypassing the gag reflex and taste buds. So if you are one who hates the taste or even the slimy, thick consistency of semen, this is perfect and you are basically not swallowing until the end. Another advantage is that you have the entire cock trapped. Every inch is completely lodged and secured in your throat, therefore he cannot jam it down your throat any further which keeps you in control and gives you a better ability to take it without him doing something unexpected.

There are also disadvantages to deepthroating an ejaculating cock. The first would be the movement factor. This is the total opposite of what I just explained in the last paragraph. Yes; you would have better control when you have it completely swallowed, but as he is enjoying his orgasm, he may twitch, shake, or even buck and this could cause the slightest change in your throat, triggering your gag reflex.

I learned this the hard way with one of my boyfriends. He was a "hard cummer" which means he would completely shake and buck when he came. I would have to literally hold tight to his ass cheeks and keep him pressed firmly against my face when he shot because one time he bucked, causing me to gag, then shot a huge, thick wad that hit my air pipe instead of in my throat, causing me to cough up his load while he had to jack the rest of it on the floor. My eyes watered and there was a mess everywhere. So you have to be careful. It was the ultimate deepthroat gone wrong.

Pass the honey, please

I will tell you that once you have deepthroated a cock, your throat will be sore. With all the trauma, it feels like you are catching a cold, so don't be alarmed. Hot tea with honey is a great way to kick-start the recovery.

I hope my tips and ideas will help you deepthroat you man like a porn star. Just remember to find what works best for you because no one method is for everyone. That is the key.

By Brittni4u, for Literotica

Thanks for joining today’s how-to sex, lesson. Come back daily, and invite your friends and partners to do the same.

Enjoy putting your new insights and skills into practice, and become a greater master of the arts of sexual satisfaction.

[noficbyhalves]

Okay, this is something I've had percolating in my brain for a bit, and I've finally had the impetus to turn it into a post for some reason I blame finally trying to catch up on cards' podcast while running errands and also unemployment turning my brain into soup earlier this year. Rambly bullshit incoming.

So everyone and their mom has an opinion on first/third person perspective in fiction. Which is better, which is easier, which is more suited for different applications, etc etc. Especially in fandom spaces, where you often have a higher-than-average concentration of new writers feeling insecure about their skills (and genuinely looking for resources to improve, while also justifying their own choices with all the nuance that tumblr is known for /s).

(Second person isn't really relevant to this discussion, bc it only really works if 1. you're writing fic in a fandom where it's an established convention which is just a real pretentious way to say homestuck tbh or 2. you are deliberately playing with themes of dissociation from ones own identity or somesuch. Either way, no one stumbles ass-backwards into second person, nor is anyone willing to go to bat for it being the one singular correct perspective, which is actually a shame. Not because they'd be right, but because it would make for an interesting thread.)

Third person is a frosting, first person is a glaze

...Alright I'm gonna need you to bear with me here

So aside from the bit about people preferring different things everyones preferences are valid blah blah, I do mean this as an actual baking metaphor.

If you've ever seen those videos where they turn a cake into an intricately shaped... like a strawberry or a shoe or something? Usually they're using frosting (often topped with a layer of fondant but that's not relevant to the metaphor). Generally there's a crumb coat (smoothed base coating), topped with more intentional shaping like piping to make a specific shape or texture. As such, there's often a pretty thick layer when the cake is finished, which hides the shape of the original bake pretty thoroughly. If there are cracks, or the cake crumbled, or the top isn't perfectly level, the baker can just patch it over with frosting and no one will notice.

In contrast, glaze molds very closely to the shape of what you're pouring it over. Not to say that it can't also be gorgeous or intricate (look at galaxy mirror glaze cakes they're so pretty oh my god), but a glaze will not cover imperfections in your bake. You will see every lump and uneven surface, and that's just a fact of how glaze works.

Back to the writing metaphor, I hope you see where I'm going with this. Third person will - generally speaking - work to camouflage your weak points at least a little, because of the level of distance between the reader and your POV character(s), even in limited. First person will put your sins on full display. Which is not to say that first person is bad, or even that you shouldn't start out writing it (start by writing what makes you excited! Always!), but that pulling it off so that it hits with your intended audience is orders of magnitude harder, even for experienced writers. Because you are so entrenched in your POV character's head at all times, your conveyance of emotion and characterization and tone needs to be constantly on point, with no breathing room. Your POV character cannot take a backseat for part of a conversation, or to set a scene, or give exposition. We're trapped in their brain, and every sentence in your document needs to be colored by that. Also, if you end up with a "I can't stand the MC but I love the villain/snarky sidekick/love interest" situation your readers are wayyyy more likely to bail, for aforementioned "trapped in this asshole's head" reasons. (This is part of the reason that some people dismiss first-person fic out of hand, because fic is a medium with a lot of inexperienced writers, and first person can be like taking a highlighter to that inexperience. Personally I'm more of a "first person is a red flag but if you can pull off your first 100-odd words I'm still listening" kind of person, but I totally get where those people are coming from.)

To be clear, these are all problems that can show up in third person, but as the writer you have the option to pull the camera back when that emotional breathing room is needed. You can switch to a different POV character for pacing reasons, and your readers do not enter with the expectation of knowing every single thought in your MCs skull. Not that these flaws will never exist, you can just control where you put the frosting on a little thicker, and sometimes that really does make the difference.

[vriendenboekjes]

sweet teeth

[061890]

Asougi and Naruhodou’s speeches and localization

A while back when the Great Ace Attorney was first released, I made a post on my DGS Twitter on some… Not great localization changes made in the first Escapade in the game's DLC. Namely, the topic of Asougi's speech.

In the Dai Gyakuten Saiban subtitles channel's translation of the DLC, Asougi's speech excerpt is this:

"Now's the time to make a stand! All you young and elderly, gentlemen and ladyfolk of the downtrodden classes!"

In Japanese: 「さあ！ 今こそ立ち上がれ！ 低所得者層の老若男女よ!」

While the translation uses the phrase "downtrodden classes", the original text uses  「低所得者層」 specifically, referring to low-income working class people. This is relevant due to the fact that, in the late 1800s and early 1900s, rapid modernization and changes in Japanese labor relations led to the mistreatment of the working class. The emphasis on social harmony, along with censorship and restricting the right to assembly (which would later become criminalized in 1900), made it difficult to organize labor strikes.

And yes, while this DLC episode was very much a slice-of-life thing compared to the rest of the Great Ace Attorney, the original topics of both Asougi and Naruhodou's speeches are very informative of their characters and political views; Asougi especially, which makes the changes made in the localization even more confusing.

See, at the time, rapid industrialization was done in order to bolster the military, as the government believed back then that doing so was necessary at the threat of European imperialism; however, as real-life history shows, this directly led to Japan doing irreparable damage in its own imperialist conquest.

So, for Asougi to have given a speech explicitly in support of low-income working class people was not just him being anti-capitalist, it also very much had to do with him being anti-militarist and anti-imperialist as well. 

Him planning to say 「老若男女」 ("men and women of all ages")  —specifically, him mentioning women of low-income in the working class— also references how labor relations for female workers in the textile industry were mostly girls from poor families that worked in wealthy households in preparation for marriage. Similarly, Asougi acknowledging workers of all ages references how at the time, Japanese labor unions were more inclusive than that of the United States', as apprentices could join regardless of age and skill level. 

Kazuma Asougi is, to the surprise of few, an incredibly political person. In fact, his actions here and generally recalcitrant treatment of authority figures, parallel left-wing socialist views at the time:

"One ideological faction [of the early labor leaders] favored discussion and cooperation with management, avoided strikes and political issues, and tried to win higher wages through improved productivity. These were moderates who favored harmony between labor and capital. The other major faction favored confrontation with management, thrived on political issues, and embraced the strike weapon. These were the left-wing socialists." — The Birth of the Japanese Labor Movement by Stephen E. Marsland

Even the year wherein he gave his speech, namely, the summer of 1897 is relevant to Japan's labor movement and how Asougi's character is rooted in exploitation by Western powers. This is because in April of 1897, Takano Fusataro, a Japanese labor activist, wrote "A Summons to the Workers", calling for the workers of Japan to organize at the threat of being exploited by foreign capitalist powers. Asougi's speech even parallels some of it, but notably, advocates for confrontation now while Fusataro discouraged revolution and radicalization, instead advocating for gradual change.

From "A Summons to the Workers":

「立て職工諸君、立つて組合を組織し、以てその重大なる責務とそのの男子たる面目を保つを務めよ。」

"Stand up, you workers! Stand up and organize unions!"

Asougi's speech:

「さあ！ 今こそ立ち上がれ！ 低所得者層の老若男女よ!」

"Now's the time to make a stand! All you young and elderly, gentlemen and ladyfolk of the downtrodden classes!"

Note: Fusataro references men due to "Summons" being directed towards factory workers at the time, but Asougi's speech generally references workers of all ages due to having a different audience.

In sharp contrast, Naruhodou's speech is about filial piety:

"Let's all cherish our mothers and fathers!"

Asougi losing all support for what was considered a very gutsy and controversial speech when he made a single slip-up —that being the infamous tongue twister— where Naruhodou wins for a very simple, even boring, speech tells us a lot about how they're seen by society. 

Asougi in canon is considered arrogant and annoying by multiple authority figures —namely, Auchi— because he's outspoken about current events and politics; and while being 23 years old is very much an adult by our standards, in Meiji era Japan, one couldn't vote unless they were male, over the age of 25, and paid taxes of at least 15 yen per year. This was something that mainly landowners and ex-samurai could do.

Naruhodou, on the other hand, is initially a typical Japanese young man that conforms to the status quo. He dislikes going against his parents' wishes, and as his speech shows, advocates for an idea that's the standard in Japanese society. He's also notably apolitical, as originally, when he claims he and Asougi talked about politics over lunch, Asougi corrects him stating he only ever talked about comedy theatre.

Note: While Naruhodou uses the term 「愛国」 (あいこく, lit. love of one's country, basically patriotism) when talking about he and Asougi's "debates", from literally everything we know about Asougi's political views, I seriously doubt Asougi was being patriotic when he criticizes the government as often as he does. That, and the fact that Naruhodou is already a very unreliable narrator and doesn’t even remember what actually happened.

Similarly, in the Japan-only DLC episode for Dai Gyakuten Saiban 2, he chides Naruhodou for not keeping up with current events:

Asougi: "It sounds like you haven't been reading the papers, Naruhodou." 

Naruhodou: "N-No, not so much lately..."

Asougi: [...] "Defence attorneys didn't exist in our country until only recently. Our reputations are still as low as mud, being called shysters who make underhanded deals. It's stuff like this which makes us have to claw back the people's trust. You should read at least this much, Naruhodou."

Naruhodou: "Urghhh… Newspapers are too complicated…"

Now, to return to the topic of the Great Ace Attorney, Asougi in the localization instead gives this speech:

Asougi: "So arise, ladies and gentlemen, and applaud our forefathers' plight and the fight for filial piety!"

...Thus, making him losing to Naruhodou a matter of skill and verbal articulation rather than that of politics. While again, yes, the DLC episodes are very much just extra content, the fact of the localization changing this not only weakens Asougi's character due to him being a very political person, but goes directly against his character.

After all, his original speech was a call to action for laborers in a time where labor relations were based in a parent-child (oyataka and kokata) dynamic for employers and employees respectively. To have him say that when he originally challenged this authority is just plain wrong, especially when Japanese society expects one to defer to their elders and authority.

Not only that, but Asougi's motivations for traveling to London had to do with how he and his immediate family were killed or harmed because of the Professor ordeal. He makes no mention of being obligated by his family name, even when he tells Naruhodou and Susato about them, nor the idea of clearing Genshin's name of wrongdoing. After all, while Genshin supposedly being the Professor was concealed from the public, it still would have brought him and his family shame in the wider Asougi family as a result.

While the Great Ace Attorney being localized certainly brings many great things —accessibility, directors' commentary, etc.— to the Ace Attorney's audience, it has several flaws in its localization, and this speech thing is just one of them; one particularly egregious example being Megundal being made Irish in a time where they were racially discriminated against, not to mention the antisemitism in DGS1-3, but that's a post for another day. 

In the meantime, I can only wonder why this change was made to a character whose story is inherently rooted in questioning authority, and speaking out regarding Japanese politics and current events at the time.

[koolfrogz]

Misconceptions Regarding MCC14

Recently there have been a load of misconceptions regarding many of the controversies that happened this MCC, especially on Twitter and Tiktok, so I thought I would make a giant post detailing these and why they are wrong so I can scroll through my dash in peace.

1. Hbomb purposely abused a glitch in HITW that got Illumina and Mefs banned from MCC on the practice server. 

This one can easily be broken down into three components: 1. Misinformation about the glitch itself 2. Misinformation about the Mefs and Illumina incident 3. When does abusing a glitch count as cheating?

Firstly, the glitch Hbomb used is actually very common in HITW and has been around since the game was first introduced. The devs know about it and have not made any complaints about it because the usage of the glitch itself is heavily luck based (depending on the ping of the player) and does not guarantee a win to any player who does get it. Take for example PearlescentMoon who has used the glitch repeatedly throughout many competitions (i.e MCC 11), yet has not gained any significant advantage through it because, again, there is still an element of skill required to use it. This glitch is not only known by the devs, but has been used before in HITW. It is not something new that Hbomb exploited as a means of getting ahead.

Secondly, the Illumina and Mefs situation is not at all comparable to the Hbomb one. Illumina and Mefs were using a completely different glitch which did guarantee a win to the player because it allowed the player to afk on the platform and allow the blocks to pass through them. They were not banned for exploiting this glitch, but rather reprimanded by Scott and the devs for not reporting it to them sooner. Mefs and Illumina are still allowed in MCC and only didn’t compete this time because the teams had already been formed.

Finally, in regards to the idea of cheating itself when using such a glitch, the idea that what Hbomb did counts as cheating is absurd considering past MCCs and the various glitches which have been abused as well. I’ve seen a lot of people mention the infamous Wilbur Glitch and I think its a perfect example. The Wilbur Glitch is from the game Rocket Spleef which was not played this MCC but certainly will be in the future. The glitch involves the player becoming stuck in a block and seemingly floating in the air allowing them to basically secure a win without admin intervention. This glitch is much more OP than the glitch Hbomb used, and we have even seen admins purposefully try to kill players for using it (i.e Philza MCC11). However, even when players have purposefully attempted to get it (Wilbur, Phil, Quackity, etc.), I have never seen the fandom react so negatively as to accuse them of cheating. It is not fair to accuse Hbomb of cheating when he abuses a glitch which has been in the game for ages and not do the same with your favourite creators who do a much more busted glitch as well. Personally, I don’t consider either of these cheating, but that’s my opinion.

2. They removed Parkour Warrior because Dream was too good. That’s not fair.

Okay, this one is very simple as its just not true. This falls under the assumption that Dream was the only player to finish Parkour Warrior which is not true (PeteZahHutt completed the course twice and was the first to ever complete it in MCC 6). While the reason the Parkour Warrior map was destroyed in MCC 11 is said to be that EpicLandlord destroyed it because “he was annoyed at how good Dream was at it”, this is mainly a joke (think of the Ranboo being banned from MCC situation, while Ranboo isn’t in MCC there’s no actual beef and he’s not actually banned.) Secondly, if you weren’t around for Parkour Warrior when it was still in MCC, or have only ever seen Dream or Pete’s POV, you might not know, but Parkour Warrior was a miserable game mode (think Build Mart/Bingo but ten times worse because there was no chance to improve your placement other than just being good at Parkour). The game was 10 minutes of pure rage and frustration from competitors, which while entertaining at times, wasn’t the best for content when only two POVs in the entire competition were deemed watchable. This also wasn’t good for a competition because it meant that only two teams at most were progressing (and by a large amount) due to one player while the rest lagged behind. It gave the teams which had Pete and Dream a huge advantage and made the game unfun and unfair to everyone else, so they revamped the game (to Parkour Tag) to make it an even playing field where everyone had a chance to win (in the spirit of MCC). 

3. Scott had an unfair advantage in the competition and should be removed from the Dev Team or the Participants List.

This one is slightly more nuanced and may not have a definitive answer. Yes, Scott does have a slight advantage due to being a part of the dev team in every MCC. However, this MCC was definitely an outlier in that fact. Scott has been known to share info and tips with his teammates in past MCCs, but it has not truly impacted their performance on a significant level because the players knew a majority of the information anyways (the game rules, maps, etc). This MCC was unfair because Scott had a bigger advantage than originally assumed (it doesn’t mean he did it with malicious intent, it just means there was a severe oversight when designing the maps and explaining the rules to players). Also, the idea that Scott was guaranteed a win because he was part of the Dev Team is ridiculous and untrue. 

Scott has always been treated on the same level as any other player and has not been giving special privileges because he helped work on the tournament. Take for example MCC 8. Scott was teamed with Tommy, Philza, and Wilbur, and they were doing very well! Then came (wait for it), Ace Race. Scott experienced a glitch which allowed him to remain with his Elytra activated for half the course and allowed him to skip over multiple checkpoints and placed him in first. However, by skipping over these checkpoints the game corrected his placement and put him in last. This was seen as not fair at the time and the Red Rabbits did complain, to which Noxite responded that there was nothing they could do and Scott would just have to finish the round as normal. This glitch severely impacted the Red Rabbits standings and possibly led to them not being able to compete in Dodgebolt that MCC. Yet, Scott was never treated differently than any other player throughout the glitch despite being a part of the Dev Team.

For the next MCC, I certainly think that Scott should be allowed to play as normal. I truly believe this MCC was a fluke, and although I too felt a little salty seeing my favourite go from 2nd to 30th, I believe that it is not worth getting up in arms about it because at the end of the day there is a whole season of competitions where any team has a chance to win. 

4. They should have restarted the round and allowed the participants to retry the map.

While I too would have loved to see a rematch for Ace Rae, I would like to say that I, and probably many of the people playing, knew that it wasn’t going to happen. Noxcrew is very strict about the way MCC is run, it’s why I think it works so well. However, this means that they will not budge on these rules even in the face of something such as this competition’s Ace Race debacle. In the entire time of MCC, Noxcrew have only once ever restarted a round. This was in MCC 7 during Battle Box after there were server issues causing extreme lag for everyone (and Wilbur and Magistrex blew up their own teammates). It was unlikely that they were going to restart the round due to the mistake, and honestly, it might’ve caused more trouble than good to reset the points and the entire round of Ace Race. 

5. The Spirit of MCC

This last one is more of a general statement than a misconception, but I would like to say that I have seen a lot of newer fans confused and upset about this MCC’s outcome. However, I would like to remind everyone that at the end of the day MCC is a for-fun tournament which brings MCYTs of every background to compete and have fun. Yes, there is an element of competitiveness as it is a competition, but it goes against the very spirit of the competitions to be toxic and rude in spite of not winning or placing lower than you expected. At the end of the day, it is a MC tournament that has no monetary prize other than a golden coin. It is immature to slander, spread misinformation, or send death threats and harassment over such a tournament and I wish shame upon anyone who’s first reaction to not winning or their team not winning was to do such a thing. MCC is a brilliant tournament that has changed the game for how MC Competitions have been done, and it is disheartening to see the hard work Noxcrew and Scott have done be disrespected as such. I hope next MCC the fandom can come together and make this the lovely fandom event it once was. 

[hkblack]

Why YOU should USE a beta-reader!

Was this topic listed in last week’s post? Nope! Are we doing it anyway? Yup!

We're talking about the benefits of working with a beta-reader today in honor of the browsing period for @fandomtrumpshate starting!

Some fast facts. Of the 800+ auction offerings through FTH this year almost 100 are for fan labor services. According to FTH fan labor is the least bid on category historically, which is a shame especially knowing how many folks out there are offering this year.

I'm here to encourage you to use a beta reader to help your story grow better. And specifically for taking this wonderful opportunity of the Fandom Trumps Hate auction to work with someone who is excited enough to join a charity auction for the chance to work with you.

And I brought some friends to back me up. By friends, I mean I put out a call for anyone I have beta-read for to tell me what they got out of the process, either with me specifically or just in general with using any beta reader. Also, friends. They can be both.

Let’s start with this amazing quote from @aethelflaedladyofmercia:

"A good beta reader is the best friend a writer can have. They help you find ideas when you have no idea what to do next; they help you narrow down your choices when you have too many; they keep you going when you're ready to give up, and they stop you when the story is done but you just keep fiddling!"

Now if you’ve been following along with this blog, you know that the person with enough guts to beta read the beta reader is the fabulous and amazing @ambrasue. When we were talking about what she gains from the beta reading process, she had some very similar things to say to Aethelflaed. Here's a snippet of the conversation Ambra and I had:

Ambra: I’m now trying to write in a sentence or two about what I get out of you beta-reading my work, but all I come up with it “makes it soooo much better” Because it really does … It’s a lot of different things, but it’s also being able to “rest” in the fact that I have another set of eyes and so if I miss something it’s not the end of the world. Peace of mind and belief in my own work, maybe? HKBlack: No totally, that makes a lot of sense. I think you and I specifically also talk out a lot of major story beats and character journeys which helps flesh out the worlds we're both playing in Ambra: Yes! We absolutely do that! Character voice too. But you also make me believe in my work. Because if you like it, it can’t be that bad

In reading both Aethelflaed’s and Ambra’s responses to this prompt I realized that they basically nailed why I use beta-readers for my own work. Having someone else to cheerlead your ideas, to smack your hand away when something is already sparkling and doesn’t need any more work, to help not only pick a path, but also find a path when you’ve lost your map, these are things an excellent beta-reader does.

Personally, beta-readers have helped me identify my weaknesses so that each writing process has become smoother. My last completed work that I published had so few notes from my beta-reader compared to older works/longer WIPs. While I like to pretend that’s because I’m just a natural genius, that’s actually very unfair to the work I’ve put in as a writer, and how I’ve not just taken notes from my readers for that one story/paragraph/sentence, but how I’ve taken them with me to the next project so I can up my skill level. Writing becomes more fun for me the more I work with beta readers because it gives me a safe place to bounce ideas around, and also helps me see my improvement and growth. I don’t get lost in the mire of “am I a good writer?” when I’m having a bad writing day, and instead can focus more on things like “look at this amazing thing I just wrote! Isn’t it hysterical?”

There are so many things that are offered in the Fan-Labor category in the Fandom Trumps Hate Auction this year. The range of expertise on offer is out-standing (large farm animals? New York City living? Immunology? American Legal practice? Hockey!? This barely skims the surface) And the beta-reading offerings are fantastic, world building, brainstorming, people who actually like SPAG—I think my favorite I’ve seen so far is from a beta-reader who said they are a “professional spaghetti thrower” saying that “sometimes you’ve hit a writing wall and you don’t know where to go; I love being the one to unpick a complicated plot knot and get you on your way.” Yeah, I might ask if I can steal that excellent line.

If you’ve always been worried about what it means to use a beta-reader, I really think this year’s FTH Auction is a great opportunity for you to explore what it means. There are so many amazing folks with so many wildly different layers of expertise and willingness to jump into your sandbox and help you build sandcastles.

On that note, I’m going to finish with a little bit of hype for my own listings featured in the Auction this year. Here’s what hapax had to say about having a work beta-read by someone like me:

"A great beta like HKBlack will water your word-fields, straighten your furrows, fertilize your themes, weed your reduncies, cross-pollinate your metaphors, and reap you bushels of well-deserved kudos"

Excuse me while I go cry a little. (can I get this cross-stitched and hung on my wall while I'm at it?)

I hope you all take some time to browse the Fan-Labor listings on offer this year and bid bid bid! There's so many excellent people offering some really great stuff! (by the way, all three creators quoted here are also offering up their own auctions, writing for the Good Omens fandom, here's hapax , Aethelflaed, and ambra_sue)

[duckprintspress]

How can I write quickly?

I (hi, I’m @unforth) have been asked frequently over the years how I write a lot quickly. I’m a pretty fast writer - for example, I wrote the 5600 words of my May Trope Mayhem fill from yesterday in under 2.5 hours. 

First, a little of my personal history for context. I’ve always written, starting from when I was able to string letters into (very poorly spelled) words and (horrible un-grammatical) sentences. When I started trying my hand at serious, professional-level fiction writing, I joined a community called novel_in_90, which was founded by the author Elizabeth Bear. The purpose of novel_in_90 was “to be NaNoWriMo but more realistic.” Instead of 50,000 words in 31 days, it was 67,500 words in 90 days, or 750 words a day. I participated in multiple rounds of novel_in_90 starting in mid-2005, and in 2007 I completed my first (godawful) novel. When I started, even writing a couple hundred words of day took me forever, but it got easier with time. 

During those same years, I also got a job that required I do professional writing on a deadline: I was a grant writer, and I only got paid when the grants won. That often meant working fast under high pressure, culminating in the weekend I wrote and edited an entire 40 pages grant that was due on Monday. I think, if I hadn’t had a solid foundation of “regular daily plodding writing,” I’d not have been able to marathon when the moment came...and it came because I had to, not because I wanted to. However, I learned a valuable lesson: I could. Subsequently, I found that, when I had the time and space and was rested enough to use my brain, I could bust out a huge amount. Like, I wrote an entire 150,000 word novel in 17 days.

My personal record is about 200,000 words in one month (it was the month I wrote that novel; I wasn’t tracking when I did that so I don’t know exactly), 25,000 words in a day, and I’ve topped out around 3,000 words an hour. I do know people who can do more...but not many.

Not everyone will be able to do this. Flat out, I MUST preface the rest of this post by saying that. Some people will find that writing fast fits their brain, and for others, it just won’t, and that’s okay. Fast doesn’t equal better, and it isn’t inherently “good” to write fast. Furthermore, even for those who can write fast, not everyone will find the same strategies helpful. I can share what works for me. Try out one item, some items, or all of these - if writing faster is something you want to be able to do, which it certainly never has to be. Use what works for you, and discard the rest.

Sit in your chair, put your fingers on your keyboard or touch screen, and write. You can’t write 1,000 words in half an hour until you write one word, however long that one word takes. I know saying this is obvious, but I’ve been asked “how can I write fast” by people who struggle to write at all...fast can’t be your priority until you’ve got a foundation of just writing. (Honestly...fast should never be your priority, but it might be helpful to you regardless, which can make it worth learning.)

Start small. Set an achievable goal, and make yourself meet that goal (daily, weekly, whatever) come hell or high water, no matter how long it takes you. Keep the goal small at first; you’re not trying to torture yourself, you’re trying to build a skill. If you set the goal high enough that you consistently fail, you’re not teaching yourself anything. And, if you find the goal IS too high...lower it. There’s no shame in working within your limits. Think of it like starting a new work out regimen: you wouldn’t try to run a 10k at a record time if you can’t run a mile slow. Treat your fingers and your brain the same way you’d treat your legs and joints. Give them time to grow, learn, and improve before you try to push yourself.

Trying to write daily is worthwhile if you want to work on your writing speed, because you’ll be forced to try to fit it in as you’re able - that might be ten minutes in your morning, or an hour in your evening, and it might vary from day to day, but making it daily means you have to fit it in somewhere.

Building skills takes time and isn’t easy. For some people, it will come easier than for others, and even when you’re fast, going from “I can write words fast” to “I can write damn good words fast” takes practice and dedication and accepting constructive criticism - speed alone will never be worth more than writing well.

Having a community can help. Ya’ll will check in on each other, cheer each other on, remind each other that missing a day or a goal isn’t the end of the world, and keep each other’s spirits up. If you don’t know other writerly folks online, I recommend Weekend Writing Marathon ( @weekendwritingmarathon ) as a good place to start (I used to be a mod there). Once you’re trying to work up to larger word counts in a day, remember that even writing fast will take minutes or hours. You can’t write 2,500 words in an hour if you don’t set an hour aside. Make sure you’re giving yourself the room and time you need to succeed.

You will probably never be able to do high, rapid word counts every day, every week, every month. The best runners in the world don’t run marathons every day. Set realistic long term goals.

Work on projects where you have a clear idea of where you’re going. I’m not saying “pantsers” can’t write fast, because of course they can, but if you want to write fast, and well, and coherently, to create a first draft that’s in pretty good shape, you’ll do better if you have a good sense of what you’re trying to accomplish with your story. That doesn’t mean you need to do all your world building up front, or have a complete outline (I never have either). All you really need is what happens next. I tend to plan projects - and write them - one full scene at a time, with only a vague idea what’s going to come after. (I’m personally a “plantser,” and the strategies in this post will likely be most effective to other plantsers.)

Visualize ahead of time what you’d like to write...but don’t get too attached to what you visualize. When I go to bed, I plan the next scene I’m going to compose, often to the least detail. I then forget all of it overnight, at least all the specifics, and I’m left with a general sense and shape of what’s to come. You’ll never be able to replicate the “perfect” dialog you pre-conceive, so give up on trying to. Instead, play through the scene and think about the emotional beats you want to hit and plot points you want to forward. If you keep that in mind, you’ll be able to get the words out faster than if you’re agonizing over every word or regretting the “oh-so-great” idea that you’ve since forgotten. 

Practice different work styles. If writing every day doesn’t work for you, try instead saying, “this is my writing day each week,” and aim for a lot that specific day, and write little or nothing other days. Try writing at different times of day and on different days, fitting it into your schedule. If you’re beating yourself up for not writing when you “should,” it’ll be that much harder to succeed, so instead, as I said for point 2 - set a reasonable goal that fits your life and working style, fitting it around your other responsibilities, and push yourself within that framework, instead of trying to shoehorn into a style that you “think you should” use to succeed. 

Track your word counts, and take notes on how much you did and what project you were working on. If you’re also experimenting with different times of day and different days, make sure you note that too. I personally use a simple Excel sheet (well, Google Sheets, now) - column one is the date, column 2 is “starting word count,” column 3 is “ending word count,” column 4 is “=column 3 - column 2”, column 5 is notes. Pay attention to when you succeed at writing faster, and when you don’t, and consider what factors might have played into your success...and then try to replicate those factors next time you’re doing a sprint. Control as many variables as you can while you’re “training.”

If you find social media distracting, trying getting a web browser extension that prevents you from connecting to websites for a set period of time.

If you find you tend to dither before starting, I find it helpful to run through everything that I might do to procrastinate (check my social media! grab a snack! make some tea! set up my playlist! check my social media again! finish making the tea! check my social media for what I swear will be the last time!), and when I’m done, it’s like, well, I’ve done all those things, I’ve got no choice left, time to write, no excuses left.

If you find you struggle with picking up a WIP, try leaving off in the middle of a sentence at the end of a session, one where you know exactly how it ends - or, leave off mid-paragraph, or when you are positive you know what happens next (and I mean literally next, as in the very next sentence.) It’s much easier to “pick back up” when your first words are super clear. (Do not do this if you think there’s any chance you’ll forget or end up in a situation where you won’t return to your WIP for months!) 

If you find you struggle to maintain continuity across multiple writing sessions, try rereading what you wrote the previous day before you proceed. Resist the urge to edit it!

Avoid stopping when you get stuck, even to do research. Don’t know a fact? Add a comment to your manuscript flagging the relevant text, “LOOK THIS UP LATER.” Can’t think of a word? Put in something you can use the “find” function on easily (I personally use “XX” since there are no words that have a double x in them) and so you can come back later, search for your chosen placeholder, and fill in the blanks. Not sure how a scene ends but know the next scene? Jump ahead.

That said, if you really don’t know what happens next, you don’t do yourself any favors by pressing on. As I’ve said previously, speed alone should never be your writing object. It’s better to slow down, consider your plot, figure out where you’re going, and then write, than to just plow ahead - or at least, that’s better if you want a manuscript you’ll actually be able to use for something at a later point. If you’re truly just practicing, you can also say “screw it, who needs coherence?” and keep going. I’d personally never have finished my first novel if I’d spent a lot of time worrying about making the pieces fit together and yeah, it’s a mess, but it’s a mess I wrote instead of a mess I got stuck on and never completed.

Don’t move the finish line. If you’ve set the goal of 500 words a day, don’t beat yourself up if you get 550 because you think you think you could have done more. If you say you’ll write five days a week, don’t get mad because you DID have time the sixth day but chose to use it on something else. If you make yourself feel like shit when you succeed, what’ll happen when you fail? And when you’re comfortable and really think you’re ready, change the goal - reassess every month, say, and up your goals. While working for speed, trying upping your word count goal without changing the amount of time you allot for working.

Your need to adhere to the above suggestions will change over time. Once, I always had an outline; now I often don’t need one. Once, I wouldn’t let myself stop even to use a thesaurus; now, I find I can look up words without breaking my flow or significantly slowing myself down. This is not an “all or nothing” prospect, nor is it a “do things the same way forever once you’ve found one (1) thing that works” prospect - you’ll experiment, and find strategies that work for you, and then at some point, your needs will change, and you’ll experiment more, and find new strategies that work for you, on and on, as your skills grow. 

To reiterate: writing fast should never be your objective in and of itself! Greater writing speed will come with practice and as a general side effect of improving your craft. Simply being able to write fast is useless; being able to write fast and well will enable you to get more of your ideas out there, so if that’s something you’d like to accomplish, focus on building your general skills and training yourself to be able to use those skills rapidly and in tandem with each other to produce decent writing, in a first draft, at a decent speed.

Once you try, you may find none of this works for you! That’s okay. That’s good! You tried, which means you learned something about yourself and your own writing style, and that too will help you to improve. Keep experimenting, keep learning, and find what does work for you - and accept that no two writers will ever be the same, and one of those differences will be writing speed. Some writers will never write fast, and that’s doesn’t make them any less awesome or valid. And some writers will always write fast, and that doesn’t make them inherently awesome or valid. Only with a suite of skills that suit your individual life, personality, work style, writing capabilities, goals, etc., will you succeed as a writer (for various, personalized definitions of the word “success”); speed is only one of those potential skills, and not one that’s particularly important in my opinion...yet I still get asked about it fairly often, so here we are, these are my suggestions

Go forth, and write some words! <3

[betawooper]

rating every demon fight in kny bc i can

non-biased, completely objective rating (more or less) of every significant demon fight in kny based on a number of factors, including:

cleverness of fighting tactics

placement in the story’s timeline

integration of character backstories

cohesive themes between characters

etc

by non-biased and objective i mean i’m not skewing the rating if a death felt fair or whatever

everything past where the anime ended will be under a read more so anime onlys who havent watched mugen train, youre safe lol

oh and i reread the manga like 20+ times (reread the latter arcs at least 40 times, haha hyperfixations am i right?) so be rest assured im not pulling these ratings out of my ass

also ill randomly be bolding certain phrases just to improve readability

anyways let’s gooooo

VS NEZUKO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and Nezuko. Tanjirou is fending her off by putting the axe handle in her mouth, keeping her from eating him. End Image Description.]

10/10

i like how realistic it is, because yeah tanjirou would react the way to he did with zero fighting skills against a demon

very clear why tanjirou is fighting nezuko and shows a bit of worldbuilding on how normal people react to their family becoming demons

always nice to see worldbuilding

giyuu is the perfect example of a seasoned demon slayer who’s good at his job, and he juxtaposes tanjirou very well in that aspect

my only complaint is not directly in this fight itself but how nezuko is handled throughout the story as a whole

like bro, it is literally never explained why nezuko is different from demons

could have been easily explained if maybe her family’s ghosts like slapped her hand every time she wanted to eat a person but nope

she’s just built different lol

so yeah youll see future ratings get points docked off bc nezuko unlocks some secret power with no prior explanation other than she angy >:3

VS TEMPLE DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a demon. The demon has a sharp-nailed hand over his neck and there are four text bubbles around him saying “But a wound like this... will heal in no time! See? The bleeding already stopped!” End Image Description.]

10/10

may be more forgettable compared to like rui but still good

tanjirou did exceptionally well in this fight and his ability to think on his feet is once again beautifully illustrated here (trapping this dude’s head against the tree trunk with the axe)

very clever

again, establishes more demon worldbuilding regarding regeneration and still being able to move without their head

and the demons burning in the sunlight thing since nezuko wasn’t able to show that

the ending where tanjirou hesitates to kill the demon also serves to show his sympathetic nature towards demons that will last throughout the entirety of the first 60-ish chapters

:)

we’ll talk about what the hell happens to tanjirou after that

or not, it could honestly be its own post

VS HAND DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a many-handed demon. He has six hands around him, three of them covering his mouth while he chuckles, two of them grabbing his cheeks, and one holding on to the top of his head. There are two text bubbles saying “That’s how many of Urokodaki’s students I have eaten! I’ve decided to kill all of his students!” End Image Description.]

10/10

ooooh probably the first big fight against a demon in the series

oh yeah not doing the two random demons tanjirou one shot in a single blow bc eh

anyways hand demon’s pretty goddamn scary, considering the fact that this is the 5th demon or whatever tanjirou has had to face so far

very nice way to show us how much tanjirou’s innate intuition and all his other random abilities (sense of smell, hard forehead) can come together and help him decapitate this guy

i liked the mini history with urokodaki this dude had and why he had beef with our favorite mentor figure, it establishes that urokodaki was in fact a super good demon slayer and its cool to see that actually shown

i also liked that small moment of compassion tanjirou gave this demon, staying consistent with tanjirou’s established kindness

the demon’s sad tale with killing his own brother very much humanizes him when all the reader has seen up to this point is that this guy is a monster who eats people

sets up the theme of demons just being humans but being victims of circumstance that unfortunately doesn’t hold up as well in arcs past mugen train

VS SWAMP DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou fighting off three horned demons as they appear from below. There is a spiky text bubble saying “Three of them!!!” End Image Description.]

10/10

not my most favorite fight but it still portrays everything alright and im not allowed to let my personal opinions mess with the rating so

i like how tanjirou mentioned the fact that he trained in conditions similar to the bog and explains how he pulled off the whirlpool form

using past experiences to aid him in the present, nice nice

tanjirou and nezuko dont quite work together very well but its yknow the first mission so ill chalk it up to simple inexperience

also the way the muzan curse thingie was hinted at here? fantastic way of showing that little bit of demon worldbuilding

...

oh god, it mentions nezuko being stronger than normal demons

ok its not a problem here per say since i can still suspend my disbelief, but later on it just becomes a glaring problem that gets worse over time

VS SUSAMARU AND YAHABA

[Image Description: Manga panels of Susamaru and Yahaba. The first one is a joyful Susamaru about to throw a temari ball. There is floating text saying “Is she one of Kibutsuji’s minions?!” The second image is an annoyed Yahaba, holding one of his eye-hands to cover himself. There are two text bubbles around him saying “My kimono got all dusty. Tch!” End Image Description.]

9/10

why dont these bitches have a good looking panel together dammit

anyways amazing entrance, the way yahaba used his hand eyes to track down tanjirou is really neat

the synergy yahaba and susamaru have is incredible, its awesome dude, they work extremely well together and it shows

tanjirou actually mixing his water breathing forms together is a god tier move and i absolutely love how he can show off his ability to think on his feet once again

establishing how yushiro’s bda works early on is really well done

establishing tamayo as a fugitive this early on is also super well done

not to get into spoiler territory but both these things pay off

how tamayo ended up defeating susamaru is literally awesome in so many ways

shows off both how smart she is by exploiting the muzan curse

and speaking of the muzan curse, we actually get to see what happens to demons who even say his name, back when it was hinted with the swamp demon

tamayo is amazing dude, and we get some real evidence of the horrible suffering demons go through if they even accidentally attempt to betray muzan :D

...

now heres what keeps this fight from being perfect

nezuko somehow grew stronger against susamaru’s temari

with no explanation

which could have been easily explained if tamayo was like “oh yeah the drug also boosts a demon’s strength temporarily”

but nope

god, i just dont like how gotouge handles nezuko’s power boosts throughout the series bc like i said before

no explanation is given anywhere

this is a huge issue, this isnt a pokemon game, you cant just kill demons and get exp at the end of every battle, level up, get some sweet stat bonuses and move on

(actually if gotouge established that this is how nezuko grew in power, than all my complaints about this would be gone, im not even joking)

anyways i get that nezuko is supposed to be “special” but thats too vague of a descriptor

how the hell is she special? ya gotta be more specific and stick with that explanation or that suspension of disbelief is going to disappear

VS TONGUE DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a four-eyed demon with horns and a long tongue. He is crawling in an awkward position, one foot in front of his tilted head. There are two text bubbles around him saying “Heh, heh! I’ll slurpy slurp your brains out through you ear!” End Image Description.]

10/10

not much to say, showcases zenitsu’s true abilities really well

nicely done

VS HORNED DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of a big, single-horned demon. There are three text bubbles saying “You dodged! You’re awfully lively for a human! It’ll be a treat to carve away your flesh!” End Image Description.]

10/10

would have ignored this fight if not for the fact we havent seen inosuke fight before

it definitely shows how very fast-paced and wild inosuke is

no complaints here lol

VS KYOGAI

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kyogai, a demon with tsuzumi drums attached to his shoulders. There are four text bubbles around him saying “Why?! Why does everyone keep sneaking through my house? It’s so aggravating. It’s my prey! It’s my prey! Found in my territory!” End Image Description.]

10/10

establishes marechi blood pretty early on, once again expanding the worldbuilding of kny which is always cool

interesting terrain where it’s always shifting, tanjirou once again proves his ability to adapt really quickly by altering one of his forms to work with the turning room

(man, i wish the form mixing/form modification thing carried on throughout the rest of the story, but it really didnt which is just a shame)

the injuries tanjirou had prior to this mission actually affecting him was a nice touch

oh yeah, kyogai gives us more worldbuilding (which is always nice) regarding the 12 kizuki, and the aspect of him being cast out due to being weak shows a lot about muzan’s indifference towards his own demons if they arent strong

his backstory being a failed writer once again humanizes kyogai as a former human being and not just a monster

tanjirou shows his sympathy and compassion again by not stepping on his written work and complimenting his bda

well, tbh tanjirou’s actions kinda came out of nowhere but its a very minor thing and not enough to dock a point off, like it didnt affect the outcome of the fight that much if at all

(so if you see future battles where points are docked off for things not logically making sense, its bc whatever nonsensical concepts were integrated into the fight actually turned the tide of the battle and thats a big no-no)

very good fight and if you remember how kinda bad tanjirou was at accurately slicing the swamp demon, you can see that he’s already improved leaps and bounds

im so proud of him

VS MOTHER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and the Mother Spider Demon. There is a light shining down from the top right on to the demon as Tanjirou slices her head off, rain following in his wake. There is floating text saying “Water Breathing: Fifth Form - Blessed Rain After the Drought!” around them. End Image Description.]

10/10

i mean does anyone disagree?

all the demon slayers getting their necks snapped by her threads was pretty horrific, probably more horrifying than anything else we have seen in the entire series if im gonna be honest

the death scene is probably the most beautiful one in the series

it reveals a water breathing form that we havent seen before thats the 5th form

as far as i know, no other breathing style has this merciful sword stroke so it shows a lot about the original water breather and what they might have been like

but enough about them, really the focus is on tanjirou bc this is like the best example by far of how kind and sympathetic he is to demons

dunno what else to say, its perfect

VS SON SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Agatsuma Zenitsu performing Thunder Breathing 1st Form: Sixfold on a spider-like demon. Zenitsu is crashing through the roof of a shed, and a zig-zag path is left behind. There are sound effects all over the panel, saying “Bam!” in large font. End Image Description.]

10/10

chose a picture without a huge spider on it bc i would like to not scare myself half to death

anyways extremely amazing fight, showcases zenitsu’s immense talent and skill, adapting the 1st form of thunder breathing to be a more versatile move

theres a moment where his backstory with kuwajima and kaigaku were revealed and his hidden insecurities are out in the open which is super nice and further develops a character weve only considered as comedic relief until now

the anime made the backstory scenes and the killing scene so much cooler

while there is no thematic connection between zenitsu and the demon, it really isnt necessary to keep this fight interesting

anyways another pretty much perfect fight

VS FATHER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kamado Tanjirou and Inosuke slashing at the Father Spider Demon. The demon has blocked Tanjirou’s sword with his arm, and Inosuke is slamming both his blades down on the demon’s other hand. End Image Description.]

10/10

again, not my most favorite fight but it does everything right

i do have to say it was excellent how gotouge hyped up the father spider demon to be the big bad, only just so the plot twist later takes the readers by surprise

nicely done

VS DAUGHTER SPIDER DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kochou Shinobu and the Daughter Spider Demon. Shinobu’s back is seen and her haori looks like a butterfly’s wings keeping her afloat as she holds her stinger blade out to the side. The demon looks surprised as blood gushes from her side, arm, shoulder, chest, neck, and forehead. There is floating text on the panel, saying “Insect Breathing - Butterfly Dance - Caprice!” End Image Description.]

10/10

first time weve seen shinobu and her fighting style

what i love most about this is how much it shows her true character, appearing as a carefree and naive individual so she seems underwhelming

then bam, reveals exactly how dangerous and uncaring she is of demons, listing out the specific ways she would torture the daughter spider demon in grotesque detail

her using poison to take demons by surprise is also super clever and brings back the worldbuilding established way earlier about wisteria being poisonous to demons

amazing integration of that concept

anyways this fight really encapsulates who shinobu is as a character and thats why it gets a perfect score

VS RUI

[Image Description: Manga panel of Rui holding his hand out directly towards the viewer. There are two text bubbles around him, saying “Give me your sister. If you hand her over quietly, I’ll spare your life.” End Image Description.]

8/10

not only is it a super scary fight but there is a deeper conflict between rui and tanjirou, what it means to be family

they are opposites in the sense that while tanjirou believes love is what makes a family, rui’s subconscious desperation for an unbreakable bond drives him to use fear to keep his “family” together

excellent juxtaposition of their values, and this is only further emphasized when rui expresses out loud what he was going to do to nezuko

i also like the symbolism regarding rui’s bda, how he uses threads or the “familial” bonds to cut up his fake family with it if they act out of turn or annoy him

super neat detail

alright what i dont like about this fight is nezuko (again)

mostly her unlocking her bda to turn the tide of the battle bc her mom was like “yo, wake up, your brother is going to be killed”

feels... forced ig

her bda in general is confusing and not consistent

man, i wish i could make a stronger argument for this but i do believe the problem stems from the fact that we dont ever know what nezuko is thinking, and what she thinks of tanjirou specifically

if she even cares for him as a sibling or if shes only going along with what her family is saying to her, things like that which would have been fixed if gotouge actually gave her thoughts some screen time

so the action feels pretty shallow

im also conflicted over tanjirou somehow remembering how dance of the fire god works

on one hand, hes using past information and applying it in the current setting so he doesnt die, which is understandable

but on the other hand, this was a teeny bit random?

i think what could have fixed this is if there was a scene in the beginning of the series where tanjirou was performing it himself, like practicing before he actually had to do it for new years

so that when the rui fight rolls around, it would have felt less like throwing dry spaghetti at a wall

but yeah

overall super good fight, giyuu ending up having to kill rui instead of tanjirou was super good in that tanjirou didnt become a pillar this early in the series and to show how strong giyuu is

there are some odd bits regarding the ultimate “beheading” of rui using nezuko and tanjirous supposed bonds but it doesnt kill the fight entirely so it deserves its pretty high score

***under read more is manga-only fights so beware***

VS ENMU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Enmu holding his hand out directly at the viewer, with a mouth on the back of it. There is floating text to the top right of Enmu that says “Whispers of Forced Unconscious Hypnosis!” End Image Description.]

9/10

id say this fight is definitely overshadowed by the dream stuff prior to this but its pretty good in its own right

enmu fusing with the train was kinda confusing, like when was it established that demons could fuse with objects?

this worldbuilding element doesnt even appear again so yeah thats why it loses a point

how the kmbk gang end up defeating enmu is pretty sweet though, tanjirou using dance of the fire god to sever the neck bone was really nice and shows that him using the breathing style in the rui fight wasnt a one time thing

while kyojuro’s role was smaller in this part, the next part makes up for it so i cant complain

anyways ye, almost perfect score but its pretty good

VS AKAZA (MUGEN TRAIN)

[Image Description: Manga panel of Akaza holding his hand out to the viewer’s left. There is a text bubble saying “Why don’t you become a demon?” End Image Description.]

10/10

this encounter is literally amazing okay?

after the crew kills the big bad, it seems like everything is fine

but plot twist, upper moon 3 appears out of nowhere

this is the first time the reader has seen an upper moon, let alone the 3rd/4th strongest demon in existence and the way gotouge handled this twist is fucking amazing

kyojuro’s death scene really shows just how human even the strongest pillars are against demons with incredible power

its just

amazing

VS OBI DEMON

[Image Description: Manga panels of the obi-like demon. The first image shows the obi hung in the air and strung over each other like decorations, with women-shaped patterns in its folds. The second image is Hashibira Inosuke fighting the Obi demon which now has lips and eyes. There is floating text in that panel saying “Breath of the Beast: Sixth Fang - Jagged Gnaw!!” End Image Description.]

10/10

on to red light district

this fight is admittedly super forgettable and not very interesting at least compared to the main fight with daki and gyutaro

but it wraps up the sub plot of the women and uzui’s wives going missing so it gets a perfect score for not messing that up

oh and it establishes the stretchy neck thing daki has going on which is very good

VS DAKI AND GYUTARO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Daki and Gyutaro. Daki is sitting on Gyutaro’s shoulders. There is a text bubble on the top right that says “The two of us are one, after all.” as well as floating text that reads “The power of the irregular siblings...!? Next issue lead color and the fight reaches its climax!!” End Image Description.]

8/10

love how this battle challenges tanjirou’s sympathy and kindness towards demons, just simply bc daki and gyutaro are horrible people

(too bad nothing came of this, which ill explain in the hantengu portion)

daki and gyutaro are very good villains and kept this fight super interesting from start to finish

uzui acting as a foil to gyutaro is nicely integrated and properly shown with how jealous gyutaro gets over seeing uzui’s perfect form and stature

tanjirou not only mixes forms but mixes breathing styles as well, which is so fucking awesome

(too bad it was only used like once throughout the entire series, its quite unfortunate)

the super high tension right after inosuke gets stabbed and tanjirou wakes up was expertly portrayed and handled, it felt like the kmbk gang and uzui were actually going to lose

super awesome

the tanjirou and gyutaro parallels are expertly portrayed, with how gyutaro taunts tanjirou over failing to protect his little sister, and the more visual thing where tanjirou imagined his own neck underneath his blade, that was super duper nice

the ending is extremely tense and emotionally gripping, gotouge did a really good job with that artistically too

the demon mark acquisition scene was surprisingly not frustrating, considering that it wasnt really explained prior to the battle

i do think it has to do with how it was explained later just exactly how they worked so its not just some random thing gotouge pulled out of their ass

so pretty good

/

what i dont like is nezuko and her full power demon form

first of all where the fuck did that come from? she just got angry and suddenly shes as powerful as an upper moon

like

how?

that doesnt make sense???

her extremely quick regeneration makes no sense

her ability to manipulate her blood’s properties makes no sense

and it doesnt even appear again so what was the point of that existing

none of this is even explained later which annoys me

that one part where tanjirou sings a lullaby to her to calm her down was alright ig but nezuko in this fight makes me extremely irritated and frustrated

just ugh

VS HANTENGU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Hantengu opening a shoji door. He is crawling inside, his hand in a gnarled, unnatural position. There is a text bubble saying “Eeeeeeek.” End Image Description.]

1/10

swordsmith village

this fight can go fuck itself /j

no but seriously it has so many problems that it would be shorter to name its redeeming qualities (which ill do later)

first off, the nezuko full power form thing again

i hate it so much with a passion

again, where did her ability to regenerate instantly even come from???? this is never explained, ever

and why did she cut herself on tanjirou’s sword anyway

did she somehow know that it was going to turn red if she burned it?

gotouge what the fuck, there is literally no reason why nezuko would do that and we cant even read her mind to see her thought process

gotouge hates nezuko, i swear

/

remember when i said uzui is meant to be a foil to gyutaro in the rld fight? its pretty obvious that those two are opposites, it was nicely done

... what the hell does mitsuri’s insecurities about strength have to do with whatever the fuck hantengu has going on (which is basically nothing)?

so no meaningful connection between mitsuri and hantengu

theres no meaningful connection between tanjirou and hantengu other than tanjirou getting pissed off for like the second time

also tanjirou’s thing with being kind and sympathetic to demons was entirely dropped at this point

but instead of it leading up to a corruption arc of some sorts, it just doesnt

like honestly if something actually came of that anger he exhibited in this arc and from red light district from this point forward story-wise, i would have counted this as an amazing writing decision

but it literally doesnt so who cares

(god, i really start to hate what happened to his character after this )

and genya’s revealed motivation also doesnt fit at all with hantengu’s thing, he’s not a foil, not a parallel, nothing, there is nothing

/

tanjirou being the catharsis for development for mitsuri and muichirou, who he has only talked to like twice

theres definitely a better way to handle those two’s developments without his help

like gotouge, you have a big cast of characters, use them lol

/

i want to kick hantengu in the face for being boring as fuck (at least his clones have cool looking weapons)

doesnt even have a proper backstory, just a single spread of him being blamed for shit as a human

like... thats it? this is upper moon 4 what the hell

/

theres no clever form mixing here at all (regarding tanjirou) which probably would have helped with foreshadowing the 13th form for dance of the fire god/sun breathing better

also gotouge established that as tanjirou’s thing and now he doesnt do that stuff anymore which sucks

/

oh hey remember when tanjirou actually learned how to do zenitsu’s speed boost thing?

if you didnt, i dont blame you bc it literally doesnt appear again, ever

you could argue that he adapted it into his “waltz flash” technique or whatever the fuck that is but the way it was integrated into this fight was like throwing dry spaghetti at a wall

which is just a shame bc its meant to be representative of how tanjirou and zenitsu are good pals but the way it was utilized is forgettable as hell

/

i absolutely loathe the crimson blade concept as a whole and im mentioning this now bc its going to come into play why future instances where this goddamn thing comes up again causes points to be lost

its inconsistent as fuck ill tell you that

/

at least some yoriichi stuff appeared here and not shoved into the final battle with everything else

so the yoriichi stuff later didnt come out of absolute nowhere

genya and mitsuri’s unique fighting styles expand the kny worldbuilding just a little more which is always nice

tanjirou got a cool sword out of this which would have been cooler if him and yoriichi had a deeper connection that was actually explored

but we didnt get shit so whatever

other people getting demon marks being revealed here is also okay so that again, the final battle isnt filled with absolutely everyone getting their marks at once

demon marks have their own slew of problems but its not as bad as the fucking crimson sword shit

god i hate the crimson sword shit

...

dude this section needs a tldr, even i cant sit and read through my shit

TL;DR - this fight sucks and crimson swords are bullshit (more on this later)

VS GYOKKO

[Image Description: Manga panel of Tokitou Muichirou and Gyokko. Muichirou is looking to the left while Gyokko is looking to the right, both with their backs to each other. There are mist clouds billowing in the foreground and background, as well as a slash mark going across Gyokko’s neck. End Image Description.]

7/10

this fight suffers from the same lack of cohesive themes through characters like the hantengu battle bc the antagonist is given nothing

but its better

we havent actually seen mui fight before so theres no consistencies that the reader has to keep track of for now

and there arent like 10 characters in the fight so this fight gets a lot of points just for being a lot more coherent

i do like that this fight shows just how good mui is that he can defeat an upper moon by himself

mui’s backstory is neat

gyokko’s bda is very interesting too

... thats pretty much it lol

ye, anyways not the best fight but not the worst fight either

VS KAIGAKU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kaigaku holding the hilt of his blade with one hand. There is two text bubbles around him, saying “...As usual, you’re still shabby. It’s been a while, Zenitsu.” End Image Description.]

9/10

alright on to final battle arc

theres some good fights and then some really sucky ones, but this one was pretty incredible and very emotionally charged

theres a clear reason why zenitsu and kaigaku are battling each other (kai betrayed the corps and inadvertantly caused the only parental figure in zenitsu’s life to die, and zenitsu is rightfully pissed off about that)

the visual yin-yang symbolism is awesome too

zenitsu winning due to using the 7th form he created himself (which i have reason to believe was inspired by tanjirou) was the perfect ending to the fight, really couldnt ask for anything better and is a perfect example of how much of an effect tanjirou has had on zenitsu

the 7th form is what tanjirou’s waltz flash should have been lol

/

what keeps this fight from being absolutely perfect is lack of development prior to this conflict

(since the final battle arc is basically a culmination of all the hinted developments through the series, im going to actually factor in how much and how well these conflicts were foreshadowed)

anyways if we had actually seen zenitsu, kaigaku, and kuwajima actually interacting with each other and showing how they were essentially a family (not just through flashbacks), it would have made zenitsu placing the responsibility of killing kai onto himself a lot more tragic

but like, apart from brief flashbacks where zenitsu actually met kaigaku off screen and that one thing all the way back in natagumo where both kuwajima and kai were introduced, thats pretty much it in terms of thunder family development

so yeah its underdeveloped for sure

also one random thought, i personally think zenitsu should have gotten his demon mark in this fight, it would have been cool to see

VS AKAZA (INFINITY FORTRESS)

[Image Description: Manga panel of Akaza’s face. There are two text bubbles around him, saying “Okay, let’s get started. It’s time for the feast.” There is also floating text saying “The inspection of the strong has begun...” as well as a simple box on the lower left, denoting its the end of chapter 147. End Image Description.]

6/10

oh god please dont hate me for this

ill list the good things first how about that

this conflict was foreshadowed perfectly in mugen train, you bet the readers were expecting a tanjirou vs akaza battle after the death of kyojuro and gotouge delivered

akaza’s power is shown extremely well with how many close calls tanjirou and giyuu had while fighting him

akaza eventually giving up on his own volition was really nice and fit into the context of the battle very very well, like sure tanjirou and giyuu wouldnt understand why he gave up but us readers do know

akaza is a really good character and a good villain

/

now notice how im only mentioning akaza and not giyuu or tanjirou in the good aspects

bc those two are eh

no form mixing at all from either tanjirou and giyuu

i know i said form mixing was kind of tanjirou’s thing but you’d think giyuu would have gotten more creative with his moves once akaza said that he was getting predictable

(well he said he “ran out of water breathing forms” but same thing)

so its kinda bland lol

speaking of giyuu, his whole thing with his insecurities of being weak wasnt handled well (it was sort of immediately brushed off in pillar training, and its unclear what part of his character arc he was in)

like sure him announcing that he’s going to protect tanjirou is cool but it feels like he was haphazardly dropped into the tanjirou and akaza conflict

isnt he supposed to be both their foils? that wasnt really explored that well in this fight and theres no deep meaning behind him even being here just analyzing what he did in it

he could have been handled better or even given more focus is what im saying

the anatta state came out of nowhere, im sorry okay? just bc inosuke like barely hinted at not being able to sense grandma hisa bc she had no fighting spirit and tanjurou magically taught his son how to achieve this state doesnt mean it was properly integrated into the fight

if the anatta state was actually explored prior to this battle, i would have given it a pass but it just feels like a cheap and poorly developed trick to get around akaza’s technique development (which is overpowered as fuck might i add)

gotouge should have just given akaza a plausible weakness to his technique development instead, especially since they dont use or even mention the anatta state after this

the transparent world shit makes no sense but ill elaborate on that in the koku battle analysis

oh and this thing doesnt affect the score but why wasnt there a “yoriichi visage overlapping” moment when tanjirou was fighting akaza? hes an upper moon, he should have gotten those visions but he didnt

for some reason

anyways this battle was alright and has good set up but the middle and end parts didnt hold up as well bc random concepts were thrown at us without prior explanation or development

VS DOUMA

[Image Description: Manga panel of Douma licking Shinobu’s butterfly pin. There are two text bubbles around him saying “Anyway, tonight is a good night. Such fine feasts keep showing up one after another.” End Image Description.]

9/10

damn, such an amazing fight

the build up to this was properly foreshadowed

shinobu finally showing her true anger after hiding it for so long is amazing

douma is a super interesting character and fantastic villain

shinobu showing off her true power and determination against douma was sooooo nice

shinobu’s poisonous body plan is so clever and so interesting

if i was to rate the shinobu part of the fight alone, it would have gotten a 10/10 no question

the reason why its knocked down a point is because of the kanao and inosuke part

dont get me wrong, the way kanao is able to hold her own against douma by herself is pretty cool, how shes meant to parallel douma with their similar struggles surrounding human emotions and demonstrate how she has grown as a person, how she regains the ability to cry

that shit is cool, inosuke also getting in touch with his emotions after learning what happened to his mom was super neat as well

however

bc this battle takes place in the final arc with everything else, there wasnt proper build up regarding many things, the kotoha reveal especially

so inosuke feels kinda forced into the kanao shinobu and douma conflict, similar to how giyuu felt forced into the tanjirou and akaza conflict

its quite unfortunate bc if the kotoha stuff was actually explored prior to the confrontation, this “forced” feeling would have disappeared

i know some people have suggested that the douma fight should have just been its own arc, and i very much agree, it would have certainly helped fix this problem regarding inosuke and kotoha

last random thought, i wish shinobu, kanao, and inosuke got their demon marks

VS KOKUSHIBOU

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kokushibou looking directly at the viewer, holding the hilt of his blade as if he’s going to pull it out. There are text boxes around him saying “This... is Upper Moon One... He’s so different compared to the other Upper Moons. He looks so dignified and majestic.” The text boxes are narrated by Tokitou Muichirou. End Image Description.]

5/10

this fight is... mediocre

at least theres a more tangible connection between muichirou and kokushibou

even though that was handled kinda poorly

tbh there really was no point to revealing that mui is koku’s descendant like at all, it just had no significant bearing to the plot of the fight

sanemi’s backstory being here is... okay ig?

idk the whole shinazugawa conflict has fundamental problems that i just cant think of any other place to put it without changing the entirety of canon

the marechi blood concept coming back was nice though

genya is there

him getting his bda was cool and helped turn the tide of the battle in a satisfying way (before kicking the bucket but thats not the focus here)

gyomei is a hollow husk of a character who barely got anything at all

but his fighting style is extremely cool and conveys his immense power very well

oh and him and sanemi are amazing at working together, like better than giyuu and tanjirou, and better than kanao and inosuke

theyre that good yet pretty much nobody acknowledges it which is sad

koku himself is pretty interesting and pretty tragic, very nice villain

but everyone together?

gonna be honest but this is such a random collection of characters, there was basically no foreshadowing that these four were going to go up again kokushibou, they are not that connected very well

i know there was this one post that focused on the theme of family that was common in all 5 characters in the fight but its just not enough

it would have been more cohesive if gotouge emphasized gyomei, mui, sanemi, and genya being like different aspects of yoriichi coming together to kill kokushibou hundreds of years after yoriichi failed to kill him

lmao its not like the 4 of them defeated koku with the power of family or friendship, they just smacked him over and over with a flail, shot him with magical bullets, and stabbed a crimson sword into his abdomen

wouldnt have been too hard to switch over to koku’s pov and go “damn these bitches are like my stupid brother”

...

speaking of crimson swords

i fucking hate the crimson sword concept oh my god can i complain about it now? im gonna complain about it now

unlike demon marks, the crimson blades werent even given any proper conditions, you just hold the stupid thing hard enough and it somehow imbues it with magical properties with no logic behind those properties

what part of crimson swords completely destroys a demon’s body in an instant? even muzan didnt go through that process when he was almost killed by yoriichi so where in the goddamn fuck did it come from

it could be explained bc the sword was left in the same spot for a long time but this tactic doesnt even appear again in a meaningful way (didnt kill muzan when tanjirou and giyuu held the sword together) so what the fuck was the point of having this even exist

its so underdeveloped and confusing and i hate it

the transparent world stuff is also confusing as shit and its pretty much never explained how they work aside from the vague “close your mind” advice, like why did it exist, it did nothing to help the present day demon slayers

its just so... poorly integrated

yeah anyways this is around the same rating as the akaza fight but a little worse bc there wasnt that strong set up beforehand

VS KOKUSHIBOU (SENGOKU ERA)

[Image Description: Manga panel of a bag getting ripped open, pieces of a wooden flute tumbling out. End Image Description.]

10/10

easily 10/10

this fight shows the tragedy of kokushibou giving in to his envy and hatred, when yoriichi cries over seeing his own family commit terrible attrocities against the people he wanted to protect

and yoriichi dies, now carrying the fact that he couldnt even save his own brother from the influence of muzan on his conscious forever

what a sad ending for yoriichi

and after koku angrily slashes apart yoriichi’s corpse, having him find and keep the flute he gave to him when they were kids to the present day gives him a small shred of humanity in the midst of his monstrous anger

VS NAKIME

[Image Description: Manga panels of Nakime. The first one shows a low quality version of her playing her biwa. The second one is a close up of her eye. There are spiky text bubbles saying “It’s Upper Rank... 4!” End Image Description.]

0/10

no nakime backstory

not even a goddamn fight

forgettable

useless

VS MUZAN

[Image Description: Manga panel of Kibutsuji Muzan in his white-haired, mouth-covered form. There are text bubbles around him saying “Not a single one was of use to me. I will crush the demon hunters tonight. I’ll massacre them all right now.” End Image Description.]

1/10

._.

i have many complaints but ill try my best to not make this another hantengu rant section lol

first off, obanai deserved better

im serious, this poor dude was forgotten until pretty much the end when we finally get a backstory out of him

and then he died

what a waste of a potentially amazing character

mitsuri getting taken out early was ehhh

pretty sure someone else made a post about her supposedly being extremely strong but she was nerfed in this battle which i agree with

literally none of the pillars work together very well, like remember how i praised sanemi and gyomei for being super coordinated? lmao that doesnt exist anymore

you could say this is caused by desperation though and you wouldnt be wrong, its just boring to sit through

that causes issues bc this now basically requires the crimson sword and transparent world concepts to be there to spice things up

but in this fight, they do nothing in the long run (except for tanjirou using the crimson sword at the very very end)

youve already heard me talk about why those two things are super shittily integrated and i cant be bothered repeating myself so moving on

kanao, inosuke, and zenitsu

they... exist? they didnt do much tbh, which i guess is the point but like, now its boring again

nezuko could have been used as a potential way to raise the stakes and make things interesting again (like “ah shit, muzan might actually be unkillable if he gets nezuko but its okay bc shes not here- oh fuck shes here this is not good”)

but nothing came of her running off except confirmation that she became human again so whatever

uzui and shinjuro are useless, why werent they at the fight?

like they could have followed nezuko and contributed to the battle even a little but they just didnt and now theres literally no point to them appearing in this arc at all

wasted potential

tanjirou

i wish him going absolutely apeshit had actual substance behind it, like it being a part of his character arc or something

i remember having this one theory that he had a corruption arc (due to dropping his kindness thing towards demons) and i wanted this to be true so badly

but it doesnt exist

not with how the series ended

god

the only thing that saves this fight from being complete trash is tamayo’s poison thing being amazingly executed

and the part where everyone got blasted away, losing limbs and shit, that made things a little more interesting again

but thats it

VS MUZAN (SENGOKU ERA)

[Image Description: Manga panels of Kibutsuji Muzan, Tamayo, and Tsugikuni Yoriichi. The first one has Muzan and Tamayo, while the second one has Yoriichi pulling out his sword. There are text boxes saying “And the moment I met him, I understood that I was born into this world to defeat this man.” End Image Description.]

9/10

finally something good again

while short, that’s just the nature of all of yoriichi’s battles with demons

anyways pretty nice, theres a clear reason why this battle exists (shows the scenario that made the original breather get super close to defeating muzan in detail)

adding tamayo here was a nice touch

my only complaint is that it seemed extremely coincidental that yoriichi somehow developed a breathing style specifically countering muzan’s multiple organs without even knowing prior that he had all those brains and hearts floating around freely in his body

like thats kind of ridiculous, even for yoriichi whos supposed to be “blessed by the gods”

could just be me though

VS TANJIROU

[Image Description: Manga panels of Kamado Tanjirou in his demon form. The first image has his eyes closed. The second image has his eyes opened and the tumor on his face almost completely faded. There are text boxes around him saying “You will destroy the demon hunters in my stead.” End Image Description.]

1/10

hoo boy

ok first off, demon tanjirou lasted for 2 chapters

thats it

2 chapters

so thats already a problem

i am aware its meant to parallel the beginning of the series but also its ridiculous how completely vague and rushed this entire thing was

nezuko doesnt do shit through not just this battle but this entire arc which i already explained so not gonna go into it further

kanao magically having a demon cure on her made very little sense

the scene where tanjirou leaves muzan in purgatory is pretty but if you look at it in the context of everything else, its ambiguous and confusing

(if someone could explain it and see how it connects to the original theme of “demons just being victims of circumstance,” i would love to hear it)

/

actually you know what makes me so mad about this “fight” as a whole? there was so much potential to do more with this concept

and im not talking about him escaping and nezuko becoming a demon slayer roleswap au (even though its a pretty cool concept)

him becoming a demon could have been a metaphor for his lost kindness and sympathy towards demons halfway through the series

it could have been a punishment for letting his anger towards muzan cloud his judgement

it could have symbolized literally anything about him losing his humanity as he got stronger

but those three things are just scenarios from my head, they dont exist in this series just based off of what weve seen from these two chapters

its disappointing

the only thing keeping this from getting a 0 is the one part where inosuke couldnt chop off tanjirou’s head bc he cared about him too much

that at least shows inosuke had grown as a character

everything else is just meaningless and convoluted garbage and “convoluted” is not what you should be aiming for if this is supposed to be the ending of your series

IN SUMMARY

early kny is very good, later kny is questionable and the ending is just a mess of wasted potential and disappointment

i get why gotouge had to have the transparent world ability, crimson blade ability, and the demon marks appear before they all appeared on yoriichi but theyre all just so underdeveloped and terribly handled in the battles they are used, it makes me want to kick a wall

like lmao, i could literally think of so many ways they could have been properly integrated, hell, im even writing a whole goddamn rewrite using my ideas for these three things (link to that is in my pinned)

just, god

if you want to debate over these ratings, my ask box is open ig? idk

[apple-grass-and-smiles]

While everyone and their mother has commented on the scene from 2x10 where Dani and Malcolm talk about Gerald and his validity as a witness in the case, I have thoughts and decided I wanted to inflict them on you.

Basically, I come down on the side of neither of them really being in the wrong, but if pushed to choose someone who is most correct, it'd be Dani. I'll explain why below in the form of a list.

Some Things to Consider/Know About the Argument:

1. That I'm only calling it an argument for the sake of ease. I think a better term might be 'debate' or 'tense conversation' because while, at least from Bright's side of things, it may have the emotional weight of an argument, it likely wouldn't if a neutral third party saw it happen.

2. Both parties are entering the conversation in good faith. Dani has historically done nothing but be kind and try to be understanding of mental health as far as we've seen. There's no reason to think that anything she said was meant to be malicious. Same can be said of Bright, who is normally very happy to explain mental health issues if people aren't speaking as carefully as they should and has shown respect to Dani/Gil/JT when it came to expertise on police work.

3. Malcolm, bless his heart, is projecting SO HARD. It is a basic truth of Prodigal Son that Bright projects on people, but this is intense, even for him. It's clear from 2x09 that he is struggling not only with how his secrets are keeping him from people, but also how his mental health makes him feel like an outsider. Those emotions are heightened during this episode and then you add in Gerald who is basically Malcolm on the surface (both people who are exceptional experts in their field, who are kept from the life they want and the things they love by mental illness/shame/secrets, but desperately want to connect with the world, despite feeling they can never fit in). Therefore, when Dani talks about Gerald, Bright is assuming she thinks those things of him too and takes them personally even though we have no reason to think she means them that way or knows that that's how Bright is interpreting her words.

An edit after initial posting: I don’t blame Malcolm for projecting. It happens to everyone and he’s dealing with A Lot. However, my view of mental health is that while it limits your agency and choices, it does not relieve you of accountability. Just because Malcolm doesn’t choose the feel a connection to Gerald, doesn’t mean he’s not responsible to try and recognize that and then take a step back and remember that he and Gerald are separate people. It’s not fair that he has to do that, but it’d be equally unfair for him to expect everyone else to automatically compensate for his mental state, especially since he has not communicated to them how deeply he’s connecting with Gerald. It’s not fair or right, but sadly that’s how mental illness works in my eyes.

4. Dani and Malcolm are coming at this argument from two fundamentally different points of view. The biggest issue here is that Malcolm's background is in psychology, which is going to be more focused on health and improving the client's life, while Dani is in a police mindset, which deals with solving the case and helping people by getting the murderer off the street. Both of these views are necessary and they're why Bright is such a valuable addition to the team, but...

5. The conversation is fundamentally about Gerald in a POLICE/COURT CONTEXT. The start of this arguement is JT saying "I think we've got a problem. Let's say Clayton did murder Rosalie, could we even get Gerald to court?" and then Gil follows up with, "And if he did testify, what kind of witness would he be?" The argument stems from them needing to consider if their suspect would end up walking because their witness wouldn't be able to leave the house. Which is definitely something they should be concerned about because part of the job of law enforcement officers is making sure that your case is solid, which means your witnesses need to be as consistent as possible.

6. Context makes it clear that no one is making value judgements on Gerald's character; they're discussing if he'd be an unreliable witness. The first thing here is that being a witness, especially in a case where you'd be testifying as the sole witness of a murder, is a) stressful, b) pushes people out of their comfort zone, and c) a skill. My dad was a police officer for the first 18 years of my life, which meant he spent a lot of time in court and fundamentally, being a witness is something you get practice at. You learn how to answer questions, what lawyers are actually asking you when they say certain things, how far you can/should go in your testimony, all sorts of stuff. Gerald, to our knowledge, has never testified in court, is scared to so much as open his door, and deals with insane amounts of anxiety on a regular day where no one comes to his home. To ask him to leave his house for the first time in 14 years to go and testify at a murder trial where he would likely be brutally investigated by opposing counsel (you could very easily make a case that he's crazy/untrustworthy/unhinged because of his agoraphobia and it'd be hard to get a jury to forget those claims) would be fundamentally cruel. No one on the team, but especially Gil/Dani/JT, is in a position to give Gerald the proper emotional and legal help to make sure that he could hold up under questioning so using him as a witness would likely mean essentially throwing him to the wolves and, by extension, tossing their case. Their job is to catch the killer and if that means going in a different direction and looking for a witness who won't struggle as much in court, that's what they need to do.

7. "Agoraphobia does not make Gerald an unreliable witness." Bright is right when he says this, but Dani is also right when she indicates in the line before that Gerald does not qualify as a reliable witness. How can this be, you may be wondering? Bright is talking about being reliable as in being trustworthy. Dani is using it to mean consistent and able to hold up under pressure. Agoraphobia doesn't mean you can't trust Gerald's information or that he shouldn't be believed. However, it would make it difficult for him to meet Dani's definition of a reliable witness. That's not Gerald's fault or anyone's fault, but it is a reality of the legal system and Dani knows how to work within that system. (Bright likely does too to a certain extent, but as an FBI agent he would have been working on a federal level, while Dani would be used to state-level stuff and those are two VASTLY different arenas. Additionally, it's not entirely clear exactly how Bright's profiling cases worked out in terms of if and when he'd testify, but he mostly likely would have been testifying as an expert witness/leaning on his psychological training more than law enforcement training when he was in court.)

8. Dani calling Gerald 'messed up', 'strange', and 'cursed' is not the most tactful, but certainly not enough of an issue to throw her under the bus. First things first, 'strange' within context of what she's saying is referring to Gerald's situation, not Gerald, so I personally don't see a reason for that being an issue since it is a strange situation. Referring to someone as 'messed up' could definitely not be a great look, but I think it really comes down to personal preference. I wouldn't mind it because I know my mental illness does make me messed up at times so I don’t mind the term, but I also know people who would be hurt by that (granted, it's not exactly one of the worst things you can call someone). Really though, it’s dealer’s choice and if it hurts you, I totally get it; this is just my opinion/POV. Finally, Dani says Gerald is cursed to never leave his house and I could argue for a very long time that she's perfectly fine to say that because both in the context of the conversation and Dani's character as a whole, that comment is her trying to be empathetic and realizing that Gerald is not at fault for how he lives his life. It could be worded better, but she means well and the intention, as long as she's willing to improve her wording if it hurts people, is what matters here. She’s aware that sometimes mental illness feels like a curse and I think that wording makes it clear she doesn’t judge Gerald for his actions.

Final thoughts and TL;DR: I really don't think either party is at fault here. They both have very valid points and pretty clear reasons to think what they do. (Malcolm probably could have used a quick reminder that everyone was talking about Gerald and not him, but that's really it.) If I had to crown a "winner", Dani gets it because the conversation was always about the legal system and she's the most in the right about that issue. Malcolm had great points as well and might have “won” if this wasn’t a conversation specifically happening in the context of police work. She, like everyone, could definitely benefit from learning more about mental health and how to talk about it, but I think she has proven throughout the show that she tries to be as kind and accepting of others as she can. This was a point where she slipped up on wording, but her points were valid.

[justseveralowls]

Self-talk: The voice only you can hear

The way we think about or speak to ourselves it’s a key aspect in self exploration and the process of recovery. After all, we are around ourselves twenty four hours a day and three hundred and sixty five days a year. So, with this logic it makes sense that we can be our own worst enemies, but at the same time having a healthy relationship with how you view and discuss yourself can be one of the most powerful tools in anyone’s recovery journey. Self esteem for many in the mental health community, our system included is a huge and exhausting battle, But I am hoping that with this post getting a handle on at least one aspect will be at least a little less daunting. So now it’s self-love o’clock and if you want read along and we’ll figure some stuff out.

How do we talk to ourselves?

Internal monologue

Pay attention to your internal reactions to things like your mistakes, victories, and interactions with other people. Sometime this is obvious other times its more of subconscious things more like a general feeling of guilt shame or lack of self worth.

Examine these thoughts from a third party perspective. I find that these questions can be extremely helpful in this sort of examination.

What is the message in this thought? (What’s it saying)

Would this be something I would say outloud?

Is this something I would say to a stranger? How about a friend? Or even a pet or young child?

2. Taking a closer. Look at the true nature and severity of how you speak to yourself as opposed to how you interact with other is a crucial albeit painful step in shifting your views on yourself.

3. Reflect on what you have noticed I or observed

For example, if you noticed the messages were negative, meant envoke feelings of shame, or something you wouldn’t say to someone else. Think about why you came to those conclusions and what you might say instead, or even stop saying anything about it all.

How do we talk about ourselves?

1. Receiving compliments- pay attention to the way you respond to compliments.

Do you minimize your accomplishments?

Do you make self deprecating remarks in response?

Do genuine compliments make you uncomfortable?

Can you compliment yourself in a genuine way?

2. Humor

Do you make jokes that minimize your talent, worth, value or skills?

Would this be okay to say to someone else?

Why do you say this about yourself? What does it accomplish?

The effects of negative self-talk

In the moment

Minimizes you or what you are describing/ referring to?

Provides negative reinforcement, often without reason.

Implies that it is alright to talk to yourself or others that way.

Starts a pattern or habit (Difficult to stop, trust me)

Overall

Lowers your self esteem and confidence in yourself or in your abilities.

Makes you appear as if you are less competent or worthy (that is not true)

Can make advocating for yourself and setting boundaries much harder, as at some level you can convince yourself the self deprivation and negative thoughts are the truth or you somehow deserve to be treated or spoken to in that way.

How to work on this:

My first reaction when I learned this was something along the line of “well great yet another thing I have to work on”. But after sometime and working towards this goal for a while it really does make a very big difference in your self esteem, ability to make boundaries, and advocate for yourself. As annoying as these things may sound they are worth it, and these techniques overtime really do make a difference.

The ‘Five nice things” technique

This is one that I have my partner help my with and works best when you can have someone prompt or gently remind you to stay on top of this challenge.

Basically the general idea behind this is everytime you say something negative, mean or self deprecating about yourself, you outloud list five nice things about yourself.

Example

Uh I’m the worst parrot groomer ever

I am kind

I am funny

I am good at my job

I am worthy of appreciation

I am strong

The “gentle voice” technique

This is a more self coached way of approaching negative self talk. Effectively you speak to yourself, often out loud at first, they way you would a pet or youn child. (I know this sounds strange, but hopefully the example will help)

Example

Let’s say you forget to do something for your friend and have feelings of guilt and want to say something unkind to yourself Instead of a mean comment approach it as if you are speaking to someone you care about

Instead of “Oh I’m such a fish stick” try “Whoops, I made a mistake, but thats okay, I can bring Steven the muffins later on”

Effectively turn the statement from a harsh judgement on yourself to a more gentle and understanding response, that is encouraging and solution oriented rather than heart full and encouraging of shame.

Basic tips to improve self esteem and the way we talk to or about yourselves:

Try to eliminate self deprecating humor from your vocabulary, instead of these joke you can say something absurd in a none harmful way (Not “I’m so clumsy” but instead “That rug has wronged me”)

Try using gratitude statements instead of constant apologies (Thank you for listening to me, Thank you for waiting etc)

Accept compliments with gratitude instead of silence, minimization or deflection

Compliment yourself/Acknowledge when you have done well

Verbally forgive yourself for mistakes. (“I forgot about the bake sale but thats okay, people make mistakes. I am allowed to make mistakes.)

Surround yourself with positivity whether that be changing up social media, people around you, media consumed and the way you talk to and about yourself (I like putting post its everywhere with happy stuff, having something happy as my lock screen, changing music, and apps like motivate (sends inspirational quotes))

Be patient with yourself, this change wont happen overnight, and thats okay

AFFIRMATIONS ARE FREAKING GREAT (I literally say this every post but still, say it into being lovely humans)

I hope this helps on someone’s journey and that this post finds you all safe, and healing. YOu are strong, you are brave, I am proud of you and as always you are not alone.

[saevus-brutalis]

why start new projects or finish the old ones when you can just redraw your old art pieces because you start hating it lol

my social anxiety’s been acting up and i haven’t checked any tumblr notifications or asks for over 2 weeks so sorry if my lack of response came off as me ignoring you. i’m not - just too scared to check 🤡

nothing new with Vincent’s design just improved my art style i guess. added some new tattoos and yeah. currently working on a big detailed full-body reference sheet of him and some pictures of him and Kerry which i’m pretty excited to post once i finish them lol.

as always, more (updated?) info about him below the cut :^) now brb in two weeks again after i post this bc i’m too scared of people’s feedback (to see it and shit) even though it’s nothing but positive. y’know just mental illness tingz 🤪

Do not repost my artwork without permission.

NCPD CITIZEN FILE #NC08891148:

STATUS: Wanted | THREAT LEVEL: Red | REWARD: 8900€$

Full name; Vincent Elijah Vigo

Alias; V

Nicknames; Vince, Eli (if you wanna have your teeth knocked in)

Age/DOB; 28 / 31-11-2049 / 4:24AM, Wellsprings, Night City, North California

Zodiac sign; Scorpio ☼ / Capricorn ☾ / Scorpio ↑

Gender/Pronouns; Male [he/him]

Nationality/Ethnicity; American/White

Spoken languages; English (native), Spanish (C1, advanced)

Occupation/Affiliation; mercenary/Afterlife

Myers-Briggs personality type/Alignment; Logistician ISTJ-T/True Neutral

Sexual/Romantic orientation; Raging homosexual/demiromantic

Charges (to name a few);

Aggravated assault

Arson (duh, it’s his favorite pastime activity)

Battery

Drug possesion and manufacturing / MIP

DUI

Homicide

Kidnapping

First degree murder

Stalking

Vandalism (of corporate property)

Some trivia:

a) personality traits;

remember when i told you he’s super oblivious that he’s flirting with someone? nah man, now he’s just an unapologetic flirtatious bastard and a bold one at that. when drunk he’s super annoying and pushy but never steps over the line when someone says no. people in his life say he’s the biggest flirt in all of Night City that they know of. this man has absolutely no shame. he loves pushing people’s buttons wherever he goes - whether it be a work environment, a buzzing club, a rave or a party he wasn’t invited to.

only hsd two moods. a total party beast, the life of the party or a grumpy party pooper. and there’s no in-between.

he’s hot and he knows it. uses his looks to his advantage.

total asshole. the biggest jerk you’ll ever meet. especially at work. scoffs and rolls his eyes at people like here’s no tomorrow. undermines other people’s (mercenaries’) competence and doubts their skills. you won’t have his respect at the first meeting, not even at the second one. his respect is hard to earn and cannot be bought - unlike his services *wink, wink*. even though he acts like he has a god complex he’s pretty down to earth when it comes to his abilities. he will step down when a job is way beyond his skills but won’t say no to a challenge and a fat stack of cash.

he’s kind of unhinged

b) general things about him;

has over 40 piercings all over his body (including 4 genital piercings)

he is or was a serial heartbreaker and only a ‘one night stand’ kinda guy. a little bit of a sex addict too. definitely a sex freak - has some extreme kinks and fetishes and a plain vanilla sex just isn’t for him.

his hair is actually curly and sometimes sleeps with little hair rollers. normally he slicks them back with a hair gel but the baby hairs keep falling on his forehead.

absolutely adores his cat. has a big soft spot for her. spoils her rotten.

[yuzusorbet]

Continuing Kikuchi-san's book 'Strongly, beautifully,....'

If you have not read the earlier parts, please read them first.  See my previous posts in tumblr, OR the master post on FB.  

Chapter 2, part 6. The gold medal that the goddess smiled upon.

I was at the rink side, holding Yuzuru's luggage, watching his free skate performance.  He fell on his opening jump, the quad salchow.  Another jump also had a mistake.  In the 2nd half of the programme, he was running out of stamina and he finished a performance that was far from the original.

He returned looking very dejected and mumbled, "Gold medal is finished."   I myself could not say a word.  Waiting for the score at the Kiss&Cry, Yuzuru did not show much emotions. 

The confirmation of Yuzuru's gold medal happened later, during the interview with the media.  Both Yuzuru and I thought it would be a silver medal, but Patrick Chan who skated after Yuzuru, did not get a score that could take him ahead, and thus, the gold medal went into Yuzuru's hands.  Surely, it was a moment where a goddess smiled at Yuzuru.

"I am first...... I'm really surprised.  I'm not satisfied with my performance today....."

Yuzuru who was being interviewed by the media from various countries, looked a bit confused.  As for me, I was putting ice on his feet, doing icing, and my tears were falling.  Of course, this was because I was so happy that he had won the gold medal.  However, from the time the free skate ended, he had never looked satisfied with the title of Olympic champion.

To him, the gold medal that he won at 19, is only one of the checkpoints.  What he desires is to succeed in a technique that no one has done before, such as the quad axel jump.  And even more, to do a perfect performance with no mistakes. 

In that sense, it was a failure, the Sochi Olympics that he had envisioned in his mind.  He was not intoxicated by the euphoria of the gold medal;  the period when he was in Sochi, whenever he found some time, even if it was just a bit, he went to the rink to practise.

-------------------

For Parts 7 and 8 of Chapter 2,  I did a partial translation, some sentences are summarised or left out.

Chapter 2, Part 7: Start of new battles

During the Sochi Olympic period of about one month, my clinic was temporarily closed for business.  As such, it was tough financially.  Although before the Olympics, 'okachan' (wife) had said, "Going around the world is one of otosan's dreams, just go if you want to," and sent me off,  I think it was hard on the household budget.  After the Olympics is over, this role as Yuzuru's trainer will end and I will treasure the time I have with okachan, that was how I thought. (translator's note: Couples with kids often call their spouse 'mama' or 'papa' because of how their kids address them.  'Okachan' (okaasan) = mama/mum.  'Otosan' = dad.)

After Yuzuru became the Olympic champion, there was a great change in his environment.  Sponsors were flocking to him.  The attention he got was on a completely different level from what it was before.  Naturally, top-notch trainers active in the world would also be quickly going to him, I was thinking like that.

The difficulty level of Yuzuru's programmes continued to rise.  He continued to evolve.  To me, he was like a presence that was out of my reach.  So as not to cause any shame to him, I thought about what I could do, on this path of mine.

One of those things was to use my experiences to help the patients at my clinic.

Chapter 2, Part 8: Responding to the athlete's "izui"

If a patient said "the pain is gone", I would say "oh good, good!" and feel satisfied.  However, those who are aiming to be sports competitors and athletes have different demands.  They require something of a higher level.

For example, in the Sendai dialect, there is a word "izui" 「イズイ」.   It means "doesn't fit / doesn't feel right" or "a discomfort somewhere"  or "not smooth".  Sports competitors will not be satisfied with just having no pain;  they will say, "But it's still 'izui'."  And they leave my clinic with an 'izui face'.

But, through Yuzuru, I felt the earnest heart of the athlete.  "If it was him, what would I do?"  I had to become more serious and sincere.

In itself, doing treatment for others, one can learn many things.  2 years after I started my clinic, there was a patient who said, "I have not come here in a long time, but sensei, your treatment methods have not changed at all," and he left with a downcast expression on his face.

At that time, my methods were low frequency therapy, massage, stretch tape, compress (t/n. or poultice) and taping.  Is there anything wrong with these.......

From then on, if I hear that ancient Thai massage is good, I go to Thailand  to check it out.  If I hear that Ayurveda is good, I go to learn about it from an expert.  In the area of pain treatment, I saw information that spiral tape is good and I went to learn more.  Gradually, I was very much into the profound depths of Oriental medicine.

I want to be good at "taking away pain".  After being led by Yuzuru to experience the world's stage, the inquiring spirit welled up within me once again.

Because of my big failure as a trainer in Sochi, I also started to study and search for the most suitable ways of adjustment for athletes preparing for competition.  Is warming-up simply for relaxing the muscles and joints to warm up the  body?  Warm-up exercises should also be different for different sports. For figure skating, what would be good?  Many questions like these came into my mind.

I spent time researching warm-up suitable for top athletes and also improving my own skills.  However, the more I studied, the more I realised how extremely narrow my previous world was, and I felt like I would be crushed, and then I would crawl up from there;  and this kept repeating itself.

In all this, there was the apologetic feeling for having embarrassed the gold medalist.  Plus, there was a bit of the thought that, if one day Yuzuru calls for me again, this time I want to give proper support and be of good use.

After Sochi Olympics, I received many requests for interviews by various media groups.  Some even came to my clinic to ask me personally.  But when I thought of my failures at Sochi, I felt very ashamed and could not accept any interview.

Later, one section of the media started to call me names like "dubious therapist" and "chakra hermit/wizard".  There was also a rumour that "Hanyu-senshu has been brainwashed".  But I did not mind at all.  I really am a strange old uncle.  It's fine.

More importantly, I want to do something for patients who are bearing pain. Underlying it, are strong feelings of wanting to support Yuzuru. 

To solve their 'izui', not just for athletes but also for patients and for all people who are building up their bodies.  This became my new goal.

[end of Chapter 2]

Translated by me from this Japanese book by Akira Kikuchi: https://www.amazon.co.jp  (just doing partial translations for fellow Yuzu-fans)

Photo credit: getty images

[dreadnought-dear-captain]

A few comments on the ending of Baghdad Waltz (and story craft in general, I guess)

Perhaps it goes without saying, but SPOILERS ahead. I’ll be posting answers to asks on BW later today as well. 

A few readers, some of them very faithful long-haul readers, are understandably upset that BW did not end the way that I originally predicted - and intended - that it would.

In an Ao3 comment thread on the subject of my previously advertising a happy ending for BW (i.e., an ending where the characters end up together), an anon on Ao3 recently posted this:

First of all, if I had that kind of super long game strategic foresight to cook up and nurture this kind of devious bait-and-switch plan over the course of several years, I would have used that power for good to have every scene and every convolution of character fully developed from the very start. And although this slow burn “bait-and-switch” hypothesis is a perversely flattering one, I’m really not that clever. Or that mean-spirited. I came into this story with an idea of where I wanted it to go and sprinted off the starting blocks with it. This is most certainly “shame on me,” in hindsight, and a product of under-developed skill in story planning and character construction.

I’m not a professional writer by any stretch of imagination. This is a hobby (albeit an obsessive one) that I am constantly working to improve my abilities in. I started writing fanfic because I figured Ao3 is a pretty safe (??) place to do this, since people post works of fiction with wide ranging degrees of skill in an immense marketplace of readers. But I have zero formal training in fiction writing. I grudgingly took my two mandatory English classes in college and then fucked off to do other things I enjoyed more. So that means that I’ve had to learn fiction writing through trial and error in real time. BW is the second work of fiction I’ve written in my adult life (and I am not particularly young, at the moment). And so part of writing this has been learning about outlining and plotting and character development and yes, endings. Not learning to write the best “gotcha” ending but the best ending for the story that’s been written.

Upon deep reflection, I think my greatest fault here was one of skill, not a deficit in character as a human being. When I started planning this story in 2016, I did not have a well-evolved ability to develop my characters to the level that would later be required, nor to predict and plan for every twist of the plot based on the psychological, historical, and behavioral composition of these characters. My first fic, which was also my first novel-length work of fiction ever, went quite smoothly and almost entirely as originally planned, perhaps because it was canon-compliant/adjacent versus being a free-standing AU with no rules or bounds.

So, on one hand, I really am sorry for just not having the necessary skills at the time to wrangle a story of this magnitude from the start (not that I had any sense at all that it would grow to this magnitude). But also... this is just part of the process of learning how to write. In addition, I was simultaneously learning how to navigate the sometimes treacherous culture of fandom, which I was not expecting to be the challenge that it has been. Thus, I didn’t have the foresight to be protective of the possibility that my originally intended ending could change, resulting in assurances to readers in a good faith effort to assuage anxiety about the ultimate course of the story. (It’s also a notable failure of imagination on my part to not potentially envision an ending that breaks from a traditional Stucky “End of the Line” mould.)

On a similar note, when I say that I love and care about my readers, this is not lip service. It is sincerity. I have engaged in this entire endeavor with honest intentions every step of the way. I’m not a devious mastermind who orchestrates the emotional disruption of my readers for fun, particularly not through acts of deceit. I think I’m capable of creating emotionally powerful work without resorting to trickery. 

But I also approach my characters with the same sincerity and intent to do right by them, using a steadfast dedication to realism as my guide. This lead to a frankly horrible realization that the ending I first planned and wanted so badly for them was just not going to be plausible, given who they became and how this relationship evolved. If you’re not a writer, especially not a writer of the extreme long form WIP, maybe it’s difficult to appreciate how characters can take on a life of their own in their psychological construction and development, but this has been exactly my experience. That’s why, for a very long time, I had no idea that this particular ending would be where the story would ultimately go, despite my most sincere efforts at planning with the capabilities I had in each moment.

My compromise for these archival comments mentioning a traditional Stucky happy ending has been to add a note at the beginning warnings of BW to not invest too strongly in plot-related comments, since going back through 3,200+ comments (plus blog posts) and editing them is not only impossible (I actually cannot edit some of my old Ao3 comments, for some reason) but would also require erasing reader comments and entire conversations with people. This doesn’t feel right to me. And I’m not going to add spoiler ending tags. I personally won’t read a fic if the ending is tagged, because I don’t want to be spoiled, and I want to preserve this for other readers in the future.

I am opting to trust from here forward that my comprehensive first chapter warnings about intense realism in all respects (including relational) will be broad enough to cover the potential for this ending, which is also amply foreshadowed as a possibility within the text itself. If future readers specifically want a HEA in their stories, I trust them to seek out the countless fics like this within the “HEA” or “___ with a happy ending” tags on Ao3. 

EDIT: I’ve added the tag “Bittersweet ending,” in addition to creating some more expectation-adjusting language to my chapter one warnings about the story. I think this is a decent compromise to spoiling the ending specifically with something like a “breakup” tag.

So for those of you I hurt by not having a greater grasp of writing craft, I truly am sorry. My intention was never for one moment to be deceptive. I have taken these lessons to heart in the planning of my next story, which has almost every single scene already plotted until the very end. In fact, I’ve written backwards from the ending to ensure a smoother course. I have also done a tremendous amount of work on character development at the outset in an effort not have my characters run away from me and drag the story with them in unplanned ways.

Unfortunately, I can’t change what has already happened; I can only do my best to ensure that it doesn’t happen again. To those of you who have forgiven my immaturity as a writer and accepted where this living, breathing WIP ultimately ended up, I’m extremely grateful for your flexibility.