#20 million subscribers lets go

[chaos-ducks]

It’s nice to see creators maintaining their regular upload schedule ✨✨✨✌️

[lucinfernos]

CONTENT CREATOR ARCANE AU INTRODUCTIONS ⭐

finally put together this handy dandy info sheet for your ease of access!

Jayce a.k.a. ManOfProgress (benevolently referred to as MOP by his fans) — 31 years old, he/him, bisexual trans man, Mexican-Brazilian — Started content creation in 2020 as a hobby to battle the pandemic boredom but blew up and decided to make it his full-time gig — Streams games and goofballery on Twitch [623k followers] and posts & streams more personal and unrelated content on YouTube [102k subscribers] — Found Viktor’s channel ~6 months before they started talking and feels very comforted by his voice; sleeps to his videos every night and puts one on whenever he’s anxious or angry — Got into a bad car accident as a child that was fatal to his father and left him with chronic pain on his left leg; now wears a knee brace and a calf compress periodically

Viktor a.k.a. TheMachineHerald — 32 years old, he/him, gay trans man, Czech-Polish — Was unable to leave the house during the peak of the pandemic and found joy and inspiration from Jayce’s content, and chose to start dabbling in content creation in 2022 — Creates very technically advanced and meticulously crafted ASMR videos; usually fully focuses on the mechanical sounds and tech aesthetic but lately has been brancing out more [12,3k subscribers before he gets in kahoots with Jayce] — Started showing his face only around the time when Jayce started watching him and is a bit irritated over the boost in popularity it granted him — Has many health problems, including scoliosis and rheumatoid arthritis (which has caused lung scarring and severe cartilage damage to his right leg and spine from when he was younger and could not access the necessary care to get the inflammation in control)

Mel a.k.a. Melicious (to this day her fans argue whether this is a reference to delicious or malicious) — 33 years old, she/her, bisexual; Jayce’s ex-girlfriend, African-American w/ Algerian roots — Was with Jayce during her time in Piltover but they made the mutual decision to part ways when she was accepted into an art school in London; are still close friends — Made very high-quality weekly diary-style vlogs, often related to art [837k subscribers]. Went on a semi-hiatus after moving but is active on other social medias like Instagram [1,4 million followers]

Jinx a.k.a. GETJINXED — 19 years old, she/they, agender aroace; in a queerplatonic relationship with Ekko, American — Gained popularity on TikTok and later on Twitch when people realized she’s the sister Vi is always complaining about; has no niche and does literally anything she wants to do that day, which usually has to do with either art or engineering [166k followers on Twitch, 850k on TikTok] — Working on an independent music career on the side with their debut single Get Jinxed going viral on TikTok — Lost her finger ON STREAM when working on an art installation, the clip has millions of views

Ekko a.k.a. The_Boy_Savior — 20 years old, he/any, probably nonbinary but he has a job so he doesn’t care abt that rn, bi & asexual; in a queerplatonic relationship with Jinx, African-American — Creates well-researched and thought-provoking video essays about worldwide issues, especially dedicated to the health of the planet and its people [317k subscribers] — Surprised everyone by appearing in one of Jinx’s tiktoks because nobody knew they knew each other let alone that they were in a QPR — Frequently holds fundraisers and has done a lot of good for his community

Caitlyn a.k.a. KillshotKiramman — 23 years old, she/her, lesbian; Vi’s girlfriend and Jayce’s best friend, Chinese-British — Makes videos about weapons (mostly guns and shooting) [176k subscribers] and plays games on her Twitch [29k followers] — Moderates Jayce and Vi’s streams, and completely destroys both of them at FPS games — Had a gun misfiring accident which left her blind in her left eye

Violet a.k.a. vistandsforvideogames — 24 years old, any pronouns, gender-apathetic (call her whatever you like) lesbian; Caitlyn’s partner, American — Gamer on Twitch, but also shares about her side job as a boxer [212k followers] — Sometimes mods for Jayce but mainly just shows up to kick his ass in Mortal Kombat and exude chaotic energy

[baocean]

starting over - rafe cameron [end]

smau! rafecameron x youtuber!reader

summary: you’ve moved back to the obx after 4 years of growing your career in california. your friendships stayed afloat during your time away, you can’t say the same about your relationship. but rafe hears your back in town, and it set on not letting you go this time. 

authors note: guys!!!! thanks so much for reading along! i had so much fun writing this, i’ll definitely be writing another soon!!! 🩵

masterlist

liked by: jjmaybank, rafecam, sarahcam, ccccleo, and 600,041 others!

yourusername: i can finally rest bc I just hit 20 MILL ON YOUTUBE?????? ily every one of you thank you will never be enough but thank you

user: YOU DESERVE IT ILY

rafecam: Congratulations 🩵🩵🩵🩵

↳ yourusername: 🫶🏻🫶🏻

jjmaybank: FAMOUS HOMIE ALERT

kelcee: Congrats yn! Well deserved!

kiaracarrera: i love you im so proud omg i’m so happy let’s celebrate

sarahcam: crying in the club i won’t be as proud of my own children as much as im proud of you

↳ yourusername: sarah 😭😭😭

ccccleo: this deserves a feast bring it on home

↳ jbroutledge: PLEASE STOP USING THAT PHRASE BRUH 😭

↳ yourusername: never. love u cleo 💋💋

user: I LOVE U YN

things were amazing. it’d been almost two months of your relationship with rafe. you had just hit 20 million subscribers on youtube.

your friends and rafe were sitting around the kitchen counter. cleo had cooked so much food, even eight of you weren’t going to be able to finish all this.

“toast time.” sarah stood up, clicking her beer bottle with a fork, making everyone laugh.

“yn, i am extremely proud and lucky to be your best friend. i have watched you grow and become an inspiration to so many people. everything you have achieved, you have deserved, and you deserve so much more. i love you.” she spoke, smiling through every word, watching you from across the table.

you, teary eyed and laughing, got up and hugged your best friend.

“okay my turn, i have to outshine my sister.” rafe said, standing up too.

“i love you with all my heart. im so proud that you’ve accomplished all of this, and on your own too. sarah talked about inspiration, whatever, but you inspire us too. you walk into peoples lives and become their light. you change life for the better. i can’t believe im so lucky to get to experience life with you. congratulations, baby.” rafe raised his glass, opening his arms and wrapping you in a tight hug.

now, you were full on crying. you couldn’t believe you had such amazing friends and were able to reconnect with the only boy you’ve ever really loved.

you pulled your head from his chest, watched as he leaned down to kiss you. “thanks rafe,” you turned your head to sarah, “and thanks everyone. i love you guys so much.”

everyone cheered, grabbing their glasses in a chaos of ‘i love you too’ and ‘congratulations’’s and one ‘i think i’m crying’ from jj.

it had been hard work, producing so many youtube videos that ended up with no views, moving to la with only enough to pay rent. and while you were struggling, your friends were always there for you. when your career finally took off, they never treated you different. even during the break up with rafe, sarah supported you completely, despite you shit talking her brother for weeks.

you were so thankful.

three years later.

liked by: sarahcam, rafecam, jbroutledge, and 1.7 million others!

yourusername: happy as can be 🤍 i love you

sarahcam: AHAHJERKFJSNWF

sarahcam: pulling this off took 7 years off my life

kelcee: holy shit WHAT

jjmaybank: LETS GOOOOOOO YASSSS

jbroutledge: OH MY GOD CONGRATS

kiaracarrera: yay congrats! totally not sobbing right now!

↳ yourusername: no same let it out girl

rafecam: I love you!!!!! I love you btw!!!!! I love you!

↳ yourusername: LOVE YOU FIANCÉ

ccccleo: YES

ccccleo: if you told me 3 years ago this would happen i would have fallen over dead

↳ yourusername: LMAOOOOOOO thanks cleo

rafecam: sorry still here I love you can’t wait to marry you

↳ yourusername: cant wait to marry you too

taglist: @xoxo-ada @frankoceanluvr11 @rlalliehayes @yuckblushin @purplerose291

[toyourstations]

I need every nerd to get on the xbox boycott train with me because the more pressure we apply, the sooner microsoft takes action to address their complicity in the Palestinian Genocide and the sooner they do that the sooner i can not feel sick about wanting to play minecraft*

*obviously me playing minecraft is much much less important than the lives of Palestinians, which is why I'm not doing it right now. As part of the boycott. But damn if I don't wanna play minecraft.

But seriously. The more traction this builds, the more effective it'll be. I highly encourage you to bring it to the attention of your fave minecrafters, your friends you play with, whoever.

Some Minecraft influencers literally make a living off Minecraft. I'm not going to begrudge them, especially those who are disabled or otherwise disadvantaged, their money. However, if anyone is in a position to maybe stream other games or take a break from Minecraft content, that'll be a big deal. Imagine if Minecrafters with millions of subscribers joined this boycott. What impact could we have then?

Also explicitly called out in this boycott are Candy Crush and Call Of Duty, as well as subsidiary companies Blizzard, Bethesda, and Activision.

Many of the priority targets of BDS have been on big ticket items like computers or shoes. Not buying a Dell or HP computer isn't a big ask for a lot of people. If you felt like you couldn't really participate in those boycotts, here. You can do this one.

Actionable steps that don't cost money:

cancel game pass if you have it.

Don't use your xbox console if you have one.

Uninstall COD, Candy Crush, and/or Minecraft.

Let people know you're doing this, and give them the links to learn more.

Ask your favourite minecrafter if they're considering joining the boycott.

Sign this petition about the incident that kicked off this boycott and learn about the unjust firing of Abdo Mohamed and Hossam Nasr from Microsoft.

I've seen a lot of people talk about "well I already own Minecraft and have for years so it doesn't matter if I play because I'm not giving Microsoft money".

Player retention matters a lot in live service games. With the Minecraft movie just released they'll be expecting a spike in players, not a drop. Furthermore, if everyone I saw say "It won't make a difference if I don't take part" did take part, it might make a difference.

If you're a bedrock player (console, etc), there are microtransactions available in game. Not playing means not even seeing those, or the brand tie-ins they include. A drop in bedrock players will reduce the amount of brands paying to put their content in bedrock.

I personally was quite torn about joining this boycott because Minecraft is practically a part of my personality these days. It's a special interest for me, and it's something i spend probably 10-20 hours playing each week, without exaggerating. I've decided that therefore i'm going to do my damndest to make sure this boycott succeeds and can end. Because playing while the boycott is ongoing just isn't something I feel right doing, even though a part of me is genuinely itching to play.

[bomberqueen17]

home/writing

back in buffalo for the week. i am always so discombobulated when i first arrive. i did get a bunch of shit done yesterday but all of it was odd little discrete tasks, or i only worked on them for a little bit and didn't finish them. i have things to do today as well, and i'm trying to be coherent about it.

one of the things i did manage to do was publish another chapter of the solarpunk sequel to the beta doc. i'm like.... halfway through the sequel i think, and it's going slowly because i'm not sure how i'm going to get the plot climax to come together. and i'm paying the piper, as i foresaw: fanfiction has a level of engagement that original fic doesn't, and I really tried to cushion myself against that by trying to collect people who'd come along with me, but of the 20 or so people i gave access to the doc, only half have engaged with it at all, and of those, only about half made it all the way though the first one and into the sequel, and I know people are still plugging away and I did expect there to be some tapering-off-- it's so many words! it is and real life is so busy, etc-- but I had foolishly expected a few more people to actually follow through, since I'd made it so very very opt-in to start with. So I do treasure every comment but there just aren't very many, and I know the first novel needs some structural changes but I don't know how to identify or make them, and I know I need to slog through and finish the thing before I can decide how to revise the start of it. And as I had sort of expected, I'm really having trouble being alone with myself in it, and it doesn't help that the pace is so slow because I don't have very much time to work on it now-- when I do have time, I have to spend so much effort convincing myself that people will care and it is worth doing etc etc. Lack of momentum is a real bitch.

No shade to those who haven't been able to actually interact, but, I am struggling. Last week was really bad, for hormonal reasons I suspect, but having come out the other side of that, I am grimly aware that it wasn't just that, it is a real problem I'm dealing with. So, if you did request access to that doc and have been thinking about getting around to it, I'm still in need, maybe more than ever. And if you did request access and never saw the email where I granted it, do let me know. And if you didn't request access because you thought so many other people already had, or something like that, well. I never closed the form.

I keep trying to convince myself it's not a bad story. I did just get to the exciting bit, I think. It's got first draft problems but I swear there's good bits. But sometimes I feel like I'm just deluding myself that anybody's going to want to read this. Yeah I've published millions of words on AO3 and reasonable numbers of people seem to love them, but those were other people's characters; my own just aren't that compelling, is the unavoidable feeling it gives me. So I'm having a really hard time with that, but I knew I would.

In my weary despair last week I tabbed back over to my fanfic docs but you know, that's a sort of false comfort-- it's been so long since I updated most of those stories that I don't think I'd get a lot of engagement if I did finish the half-done chapters and get them up. I might try; I know there are a few rereaders, and some people subscribed who'd probably come back and look. But I'm really determined to finish this story with the solarpunk stuff and the mammoths and talking dolphins and so on, even if almost nobody wants to read it, because I never was going to be able to sell it anyway and sometimes you just really need to tell a story.

It's just lonely, and I'm tired.

Anyway. I just spent two hours trying and failing to make myself write more and am giving up to go do more unconnected home tasks because idk what else to do.

[divinityandfanfics]

“One in Millions”

NEBULA

a/n: this is part 1 :3

blurb: “streamer gojo has millions of fans, and fangirls. when he announced a meet-and-greet, he spotted you in the crowd. eventually, falling in love and approaching you after the event is over.”

PART 2

⋆｡ﾟ☁︎｡⋆｡ STARRING: GOJO SATORU

WARNINGS: simping , questionable fangirls , swearing

REMINDERS;

☆ super famous streamer gojo

☆ female pronouns used for reader

☆ reader is just an ordinary fan of gojo

☆ like the DSMP, gojo is part of a gamer team named Jujutsu Kaisen

☆ non-curse au

»»————-　♡　————-««

satoru didn’t have a clue on what streaming was,

before his bestfriend, suguru introduced him to it.

he thinks it was kind of smart.

recording without the need to edit it later,

with the only consequence being that you had to perform live.

suguru told satoru and their other friends (megumi, yuji, toge, and ryomen) about it too.

eventually, they all started a gaming group.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

satoru was a normal streamer.

play games, get paid.

and, it actually pays much more than he first expected.

so he continued.

he didn’t expect people to like watching a stranger play games in front of a camera live,

a very pretty stranger at that..

but if it pays well, it pays well.

at first, he got a couple hundred people watching his streams, due to him being part of the new gamer group.

satoru grew, both to appreciate his fans, and in popularity.

he was now the most popular in their group,

jujutsu kaisen.

the members,

suguru geto,

yuji itadori,

ryomen sukuna,

toge inumaki,

megumi fushiguro,

oh, and him, satoru gojo.

like suguru, satoru had many fans- and fangirls.

but his playful demeanor, and him not being very mature led to suguru getting more simps.

i guess personality does matter.

but, that’s not the point.

satoru still had fangirls, millions of them.

women flocked in his chat, going

--

“omg gojo marry me!!1!1!!1”

“one chance gojo”

“JUST THE TIP GOJO PLSS”

“i would oil up for gojo tbh”

“gojo expand my domain like u did in that one fighting game🙏🏻”

“gojo my glorious gorgeous blue-eyed king”

“GOJO I LOVE YOU SM”

--

he was used to it now.

he was a huge streamer, with a lot of simps.

the weird comments helped fuel his ego,

so he let them be.

he never did any of those boyfriend-experience type stuff, he thinks those are pointless.

suguru and ryomen did BFE, though.

as long as people simp for just his looks, voice or anything he does normally on stream,

he doesn’t need to respond with flirty messages.

so, he just played games that are popular or those that chat recommened him to play.

eventually, he hit 20 million subscribers.

he was filled with joy.

and suguru, catching up at 18.5 mil,

requested they start a meet-and-greet where the group would be up in a stage, answering random questions from fans.

satoru thought about it for a moment, before agreeing.

a meet-and-greet would be fine.

so, the jujutsu kaisen meet-and-greet begins next month.

satoru talked about it on stream, saying the other members will also be there.

everyone was hype,

and people can watch it at home.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

the time has come.

the time to meet fans in person has.

satoru and the other members went to the meet-and-greet.

the millions of fans were seated infront of the stage, and it filled the entire place.

the first up the stage was megumi, his fans screaming for him.

second, yuji, his fans cheering his name.

third, sukuna, his fans screaming his name.

next, toge, and his fans yelled for him.

then, suguru, and his fans started to yell weird shit at him.

--

1 - “suguru daddy!!”

2 - “babygirl!!”

3 - “SUGURU I LOVE YOUUU!!”

4 - “I WANT HIM!!”

5 - “he’s so hot in person what the fuck”

6 - “girl shut your ass up im tryna record”

7 - “OH MY DAYS SUGURU GETO PLEASE MARRY ME”

8 - “not the full name LMAOO”

9 - “i need him biblically bro”

10 - “what the actual fuck (9’s name)?”

9 - “listen, hear me o─”

11 - “WOO GETOO”

12 - “GETO I LOVE YOUR VOICE!!”

--

and all he does is wink at his audience.

and then, people started to squeal, waiting for satoru gojo himself.

the lights went out, replacing them with bright blue ones.

“whoever designed this wants to fuck gojo.” toge whispered to megumi.

megumi nodded at his comment, looking at satoru who was going to go up the stage.

the moment fans saw satoru’s feet land on the stage, they started making hella noise.

1 - “BITCH RECORD PROPERLY AND STOP SIMPING”

2 - “DADDY’S HOMEE!!”

3 - “gojo!!”

4 - “GOJO KEEP WALKING I’M SO CLOSE”

3 - “motherfucker what the fuck did you just say”

5 - “RAHHH GOJO I LOVE YOU SO MUCH”

6 - “SOMEONE PLAY HIS THEME SONG”

7 - “IS YOU SAY DADDY’S HOMEEE”

6 - “I SAID PLAY IT USHER SINGS IT BETTER”

7 - “FUCK YOU (6’s name)”

8 - “OH MY LORD GOJO I LOVE YOU!!”

9 - “GOJO COME HOME THE KIDS ARE WAITING”

10 - “SOMEONE RECORD THIS FOR ME”

and satoru started to chuckle, reaching the other group members as he strided across the stage.

11 - “OH MY LORD HE LOOKS SO SEXY”

12 - “bro shut the fuck up”

13 - “don’t worry (11’s name) i agree”

“wow satoru, you really got bitches, huh?” sukuna asks.

“well, i mean, you and suguru have more than me.” satoru scoffs, fixing his sunglasses.

“no worries, satoru. you’re still the most popular, remember?” suguru pats his bestfriend on the back.

satoru fakes a pout, avoiding suguru’s gaze.

just then, one of the staffs climb up the stage.

“alright, quiet down everyone!”

“today, we will ask the famous group; Jujutsu Kaisen, some questions!”

“we will give everyone 10 minutes to submit their questions in this box, which will be distributed to each fans!”

“the fellas in the navy blue chairs are megumi’s, in the orange chairs are yuji’s, white chairs are toge’s, red chairs are ryomen’s, black chairs are suguru’s, and lastly, baby blue chairs are satoru’s!”

and the staff start distrubuting the boxes, paper and pens.

and they all start to write down questions.

after the 10 minute timer went off, the staff went to pick up the boxes again.

~~~

“alright, let’s answer some of fushiguro’s!”

the staff with the mic signaled megumi to come closer to the center.

“so, fushiguro,”

“‘who was the man that walked in your room in one of your streams? he seems hot,’ by abby!”

...

“you mean my father?” megumi answered, mic in his hands.

the other group members laughed,

wait,

was his dad really that hot? (yes)

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

“alright, question to gojo!”

and satoru confidently walks over the center.

“‘are you single? you look very attractive’ by melanie!”

“yes, yes. i am very single, and ready to mingle!” satoru winks over at his audience, and they start going crazy.

1 - “REALLYY?? MARRY ME THEN”

2 - “OH MY GOD HE LOOKS SO SEXY”

3 - “oh my fucking god he looks so good”

“hm, next question,”

“‘do you have any specific type, gojo?’ by.. oh! it’s by yuki-senpai!”

“yuki tsukumo, the famous streamer?” satoru asks.

“yes.”

“well, i guess i like girls.. who are kind, and affectionate. those who can support me even if i’m being a quote unquote, ‘little goober.’”

“with a very pleasant face that won’t make me vomit everytime i look at them!” he smiles.

the fans started to cheer, finally knowing satoru’s ideal woman.

“you didn’t have to make it so deep,” suguru let out an airy chuckle as he said that when satoru returns to the group.

“it’s true though.” satoru smirks.

“wow, and i thought you only cared about looks. i’ve been lied to.” suguru fakes a pout.

“blegh, wouldn’t want a pretty woman who only wants me for my money,” satoru chides.

“ehh, fair.”

satoru sat on his comfortable chair, watching the next question, which he assumed was for ryomen.

as satoru was eyeing the audience,

everything was chill,

until

he spotted you.

you were wearing a white t-shirt with a big jacket ontop, with some comfortable leggings on, headphones sat on your shoulders.

your backpack was nuzzled on your back, and you were seated on a baby blue chair.

you looked heavenly.

your pretty, doe eyes focusing on the stage.

your pretty plump, kissable lips.

you were perfect.

it almost made satoru drool.

“whatcha lookin’ at?” suguru spoke, snapping satoru out of his thoughts.

“nothing.” satoru shrugs.

“are you looking at a pretty woman that will possibly use you for your money?” suguru mocks.

“shut up, we don’t even know her yet.”

“so you were looking!” suguru laughs.

“ughh..” satoru takes another glance at you, before facing his friends, attempting to forget about you.

you were just another one of his manic fangirls.

another one of those women that will not hesitate to say the freakiest shit to ever come out of a human mouth.

satoru sighs,

butterflies flying in his stomach as he pictures your appearance in his mind.

he eyes the crowd again, searching for your face.

bingo,

found you.

“who’s that?” he mutters,

unfortunately loud enough for the black-haired fella to hear.

“what’s that, satoruu?” he cheekily said.

satoru gives up, letting suguru lean on his shoulder.

“who are you looking at?” suguru said, his face basically squished with satoru’s.

“that pretty girl right there.” satoru points at you, quickly taking his hand back.

“ooh, she’s pretty.”

“no shit, suguru.”

“well, maybe you should ask for her number? she’s a fan of yours!”

satoru lightens up.

right, you’re a fan!

and you’re sitting on a baby blue chair.

meaning..

you’re a fan of his!

(he was so mesmerized, that he forgot about it.)

“i’ll ask for her number later i guess..” satoru mumbles, pink tinting his cheeks.

“never saw you fall this hard for someone. nor fall in love in general.”

“well then now you have.”

“update me on how it goes later, alright?”

“i hate you, suguru.”

“yeahh, but you weren’t going to ask her if i never told you.”

“shut up.”

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

“now’s your time, satoru.” suguru reminds his blue-eyed friend.

“i know.”

“what? because you were staring at her for the rest of the meet-and-greet?”

“what!? no! i’m not a creep!”

“uh-huhh..”

as the staff told everyone the event is over, but they can talk with their idols for the last time before going home if they want.

you stay seated in your chair, interacting with your phone.

satoru spots another girl seated next to you,

if he were to guess,

that’s probably your friend.

“(y/n)! did you see how gojo winked!? he was soo winking at me!”

“yeah, yeah. keep feeding your delusions, (f/n).”

“hey!” your friend scoffs.

“he’s a famous streamer, there’s a 90% chance he will never like you back.”

“10% is still big.”

“you’re insufferable.”

“c’mon (y/n)! you’re a fan of his too!”

“yeah, but i watch for the gameplay, not to get butterflies from his voice, or looks.”

ah, so you’re different.

you’re not one of those.. people.

you’re a normal fan, who watches for the gameplay.

finally.

satoru couldn’t say the same for your friend, though.

“c’mon (y/n)! let’s go talk to gojo!”

“ughh, fine.”

satoru shared a glance with his bestfriend, signaling you were coming.

suguru looked towards you, and told him to act normal.

satoru didn’t know how to do that, though.

the butterflies were starting to spawn in his stomach.

it almost hurt.

“hi! we’re fans!” he heard your friend speak.

“oh, hello.” he turned his head to the both of you.

he eyed you both, well, mostly you.

“greetings, my friend would like your autograph.” you handed out a notepad, with a pen.

“stop using deep words! it’s not needed!” your friend pointed at you.

“i’m talking to a famous streamer, of course i’m formal about it.”

“meh, i guess you’re right.”

satoru took the things you handed to him, writing his name on the cheap notepad.

“here you go.” he handed them back.

“thank you very much, my friend will definitely hug this all nigh─”

“thanks! thanks gojo!” your friend quickly put a hand on your mouth.

she took the notepad and pen, turning you around to leave.

“see, wasn’t so hard now, was it?” suguru smirked.

“suguru, my stomach hurts.” satoru confessed.

“that’s just the butterflies, ignore them.”

“when am i going to tell her?”

“shit, i completely forgot.”

“suguru!”

“chase after her, now!”

“alright alright─”

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

you and your friend were already outside, you were waiting for your friend as you scrolled on your phone.

you heard the doors open, and you took a glance.

you saw satoru leave, whipping his head left and right,

like he was looking for someone.

he looked at you,

“there you are!”

huh?

he was looking for you?

“oh, uhm, hello?” you said.

“hi─ haha-”

“what do you need?”

“i need to ask you for something!”

you tilted your head in a sign of confusion.

“you─”

...

“your number!”

your eyes widen, was the satoru gojo asking for your number?

“well, do you have your phone with you?” you ask, turning your head to him.

“i─ yeah!”

you opened your hand toward him, signaling for his phone.

he placed it on the palm of your hand.

you put in your number, giving it back to him.

“th─ thank you!”

you heard the bathroom door open, your friend squealing as she opened it.

you turned your head to glance at her, and satoru quickly went inside again.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

“so, how did it go?” suguru asks.

“good, i got her number.”

“congratulations! you won’t die alone now.”

“suguru! we’re not even together yet!”

“yet.”

“i hate that you’re right..” satoru’s head drops.

“i do want to make her mine. it would’ve been easier if she was one of those fangirls, but i don’t want them, they’re weird and freaky.”

“just shoot your shot, you’ll get there eventually.”

“sigh, you’re right.” satoru looks at his phone, planning to call you later tonight.

LETS GO 🫶🏻 finally done with part 1!!

hope you enjoyed, because part 2 is also done >:)

[chunkzdeluluwife]

𝘼 𝙡𝙞𝙩𝙩𝙡𝙚 𝙨𝙬𝙞𝙢 - 𝘼𝙅 𝙎𝙝𝙖𝙗𝙚𝙚𝙡

AJ and Y/n escape a party and go to the beach instead 

warnings: kissing, very light swearing ‼️

You were at a party for your friends, “The Sidemen.” It was a celebration of them hitting 20 million subscribers.

While walking around, you bump into AJ Shabeel.

“Oh hey, AJ.”

“Heh, never expected to bump into you,” he says, trying to keep a cool composure.

“Well, we do have the same friends, so…”

“Yeah, true… How’s it going for you?” he asks, fiddling with the rings on his fingers.

“I’m good, you?” she says, smiling.

“Yeah, I’m good, just bored,” he replies, his eyes briefly drifting down to her outfit before looking away.

“Yeah, I’m not the biggest fan of parties. Are you?”

He lets out a light chuckle. “Yeah, parties aren’t really my thing… I’m more of a stay-at-home guy, not really into this sort of thing.”

“Same, honestly,” she says, giggling.

He smiles, amused by her giggles. “So why’d you come then?”

“I wanted to come for support and to see my friends.”

He nods. “Yeah, I get that. But if you were anything like me, you’d rather be at home alone watching some dumb action movie.”

“You know I would, but we can’t, and that’s why we’re both here,” she says, amused.

He lets out another light chuckle. “Yeah… I guess you’re right.” He looks around at the rest of the people there. “Man, this place just gets lamer by the second.”

“Do you maybe wanna leave with me?”

He looks a bit surprised. “Oh, uh… You really sure about that? I mean, we probably shouldn’t, right?”

“Well, you decide and let me know, okay?” she says, moving away to get some snacks.

He stares at her as she walks away, dumbfounded and wondering what he should do. A few moments pass before he starts walking over to her. “Hey, uh… I think I’ve made up my mind.”

He puts a hand on her arm, gently getting her attention.

She was stuffing her face with snacks from the table. “Huh, what?”

He can’t help but smile at her stuffing her face, but he quickly composes himself. “Uh… I decided I wanna get out of this place with you… if that’s alright.”

She composes herself. “Yeah, okay, let’s go.” She grabs his hand and leads him out the door, yelling goodbyes to everyone.

He couldn’t help the blush spreading on his face as she grabbed his hand and led him out. He yells out a few goodbyes himself, though his main focus was her holding his hand.

She stops in front of all the cars. “Who’s driving?”

He’s too lost in her touch but snaps back to reality upon hearing the question. “Oh, uh… I’ll drive. My car’s right over there,” he says, pointing in the general direction of where it was parked.

“Okay,” she says, still holding his hand as they walk towards the car.

He gives a light smile, enjoying her still holding onto his hand more than he lets on. Once he reaches the car, he unlocks it and holds the passenger door open for her.

“Thank you,” she giggles.

He lets out a chuckle as he closes her door, walking to the other side to get in the car himself. After turning the car on, he lets out a small sigh. “So… where are we heading exactly?”

“Let’s go to the beach, watch the sunset,” she says.

He smiles as he hears that. “Sounds like a plan.” He starts driving in the direction of the beach, the car staying relatively silent aside from the low volume of the radio playing.

“What music are you playing?”

He turns to look at her for a second before focusing back on the road. “Oh, uh… it’s just one of my playlists. It’s basically just a mix of songs; I don’t really know how to describe the type of music it is. I just know I like it, but you can put on whatever you like,” he says with a smile.

“Really?”

He nods. “Yeah, really. Put on whatever you like.” He takes one of his hands off the wheel for a moment to gesture for her to scroll through the songs on his phone that’s connected to the aux.

She decides to play “Bad Religion” by Frank Ocean.

He starts bobbing his head to the beat of the song, enjoying it. “I like this. And I was expecting you to blast some kind of pop song in here.”

“I could go for some 2010s trashy pop, but Frank Ocean is my favorite.”

He smiles. “I gotta say, I like your taste in music.” They arrive at the beach as the sun is just starting to set, the sky turning a mix of gold and purple.

YN opens the door for herself and runs towards the sand, kicking off her slides somewhere into the sand.

He chuckles as he steps out of the car himself, watching her kick off her slides and run. “Hey, hey! Wait for me!” he shouts as he quickly follows her.

She finds a spot on the sand and sits down with a huff.

He catches up and catches his breath for a second before sitting down beside her. “I’m surprised you have the energy to just run around like that after shoving all those snacks down your mouth.”

“Good time to burn off the calories,” she says, laughing.

He laughs as well. “Fair point. Though you could have just not eaten all those damn snacks,” he says, playfully bumping his leg into hers.

She shoves his leg with her hands. “Okay, don’t judge my eating habits,” she says with a laugh.

“Why not? They deserve to be judged,” he says, letting out a chuckle and shoving her back gently.

But his shove wasn’t so gentle, and YN falls into the sand. “AJ!” She stands up to chase him.

He gets up and starts running away from her, a huge smile on his face as he laughs. “Hey, hey, hey! It wasn’t that hard a push!”

“You basically threw me into the sand!” she says, chasing after him. Soon, AJ stands in the water, the waves reaching the bottom of his jeans.

He stops running once he feels the water reaching his feet, letting out a small curse as he looks down. “Aww damn it, now my jeans are all wet,” he says with a slight grimace on his face, turning back around to look at her.

But she comes running straight into the water with her short dress. She grabs AJ’s hand and pulls him into the water.

He lets out a startled yell as she pulls him into the water with her. His shirt and jeans are now completely soaked. “What the hell! Are you trying to get me completely drenched?” he says, though he can’t hold back the laughter and goofy smile on his face.

She begins to laugh. “What’s so bad with a little swim?”

He splashes water at her. “It’s the fact that I didn’t bring a towel! I’ll be stuck in these soaking wet clothes for the entire night and the car ride back,” he says, his mood staying playful despite his complaints.

“Stop thinking about the consequences and just enjoy,” she says, grabbing both of his hands and leading him deeper into the water.

He lets out a sigh and gives in, following her further into the water before stopping and pulling her close to him. He wraps his arms around her waist. “God, you are so annoying sometimes, you know that?”

With the water just above her chest, “Me? Annoying? Never,” she says, wrapping her arms around his neck.

His ears are now tinted a slight red as she wraps her arms around his neck, his grip around her waist tightening slightly. “Cut the bullshit, you’re a real pain in the ass sometimes, you know that?” he says, though it’s clear he’s not serious, more so just amused by her.

“But I think you really like this pain in the ass, right?”

He rolls his eyes in a playful manner. “Oh, and how would you know if I like it or not?” he says, pulling her just a little bit closer. Their faces are almost touching.

“I’m a girl! I can just tell,” she giggles.

He lets out a scoff. “Oh yeah? And what does that big brain of yours say I’m thinking at this exact moment?” he asks, the corners of his mouth twitching up in a smirk as he looks into her eyes.

“It says, ‘Oh my gosh, YN, I think you’re the most beautiful girl,’” she says jokingly.

He lets out a laugh, clearly amused by her answer. “Nah, that’s not it. Try again,” he says, his face now inches away from hers. He’s enjoying this game more than he’d care to admit. All he wants to do right now is pull her close and kiss her senseless.

“Let’s see…” she says, tapping her chin. “Are you thinking, ‘Woah, I would just love to kiss YN right now because she is so pretty’?” She laughs in a mocking manner.

He laughs along with her, but he’s not laughing at her words—he’s actually thinking exactly what she said. God, is it tempting to follow up on his thoughts. “That’s… not exactly wrong,” he says, looking into her eyes for a moment before glancing at her lips.

He moves his hand up to her cheek, tracing his thumb along her soft skin. The thoughts in his head grow louder, telling him to do it. “Damn, you are way too beautiful, you know that?”

She blushes, leaning her face into his hand. “Thank you.”

He smiled as she leaned into his hand, his thumb caressing her cheek. Her skin was so soft, and all he could think of was how it would feel against his lips. It took a lot of restraint to hold back his actions at that moment.

“It’s a damn shame that I can’t just kiss you right now,” he mumbled, moving his face even closer to hers.

“And why can’t you?” she asked softly.

He looked into her eyes, a mix of confusion and slight disbelief in his own. It felt like an invitation. No, it definitely was an invitation. Yet, he still had to make sure before he made a mistake.

“Are… are you hinting that you want me to kiss you?” he asked, not wanting to come to the wrong conclusion and mess up his only chance.

“Don’t make me say it,” she said, leaning in.

He felt a wave of excitement and happiness as he realized she was giving him the go-ahead, and he wasn’t going to screw this up. He leaned in and closed the gap between them, their lips finally meeting. His hand moved from her cheek to the back of her head, gently holding her in place as his lips moved against hers, savoring every moment.

He deepened the kiss, wrapping his other arm around her waist and pulling her flush against him. The feeling of her body against his, the taste of her lips—it was all like a dream come true. He was so lost in the kiss that he didn’t care they were still standing in the water, soaked and shivering as the cold started to affect them.

After a few more moments, he reluctantly broke the kiss, the need for air becoming too strong to ignore. He rested his forehead against hers, both his hands now holding her waist as they stood there in the water, trying to catch their breaths.

He opened his eyes again, looking into hers. His brain was still trying to comprehend everything that had just happened. It felt like something out of a silly teenage movie, but here he was, enjoying the feeling of still having her in his arms.

“You… I can’t believe you made me wait that long to do that.”

She laughed. “Well, it was worth it.”

He chuckled in agreement, gently caressing her sides with his thumbs. “Definitely worth the wait.” His tone was playful, the usual smirk back on his face as his confidence returned.

Then she started shivering in the cold water.

He couldn’t help but laugh at her shivering. “Aww, what’s the matter, are you cold?” he teased, knowing full well that she definitely was.

“Yes, let’s go!” she laughed, running out of the water.

He laughed once again, reluctantly letting go of her and watching as she ran out onto the beach. “Hey, wait, don’t leave me behind!” he yelled as he got out of the water himself and started chasing after her.

She grabbed her slides and ran to the car, shivering and cold.

He caught up to her, just as cold and wet as she was. He chuckled and opened the door for her, motioning for her to get in the car, just as he had when they first arrived.

“It’s all your fault that I’m completely soaked now, you know that, right?” he teased.

“Whatever,” she said, shivering.

He gave her a slight smile as he saw her shaking from the cold. He reached into the backseat and grabbed an old hoodie that was lying there, wrapping it around her body.

“We can’t have you shivering to death now, can we?” he said, his tone still lighthearted and teasing, yet with a soft undertone she hadn’t really heard much before.

“Thank you,” she said, looking at him admiringly. He then grabbed a big blanket he had folded up in the backseat and draped it over both of them.

He smiled and chuckled lightly at the sight of the both of them now covered in the blanket. “We probably look ridiculous right now, you know that?” he said, holding her hand and starting the car.

“Maybe we do,” she said, laughing.

He chuckled along with her as he started driving, the car falling into a comfortable silence, both their clothes and hair still a bit damp from their little swim session.

As they continued to drive, AJ and YN holding hands was the start of a newfound love.

[hatefulbread]

today's the day... 1/20/25

it's inaugural day. i'm sure many of us are sitting on our phones, anxiously awaiting noon.

yesterday, i tried my best to ignore the articles flooding in about tr*mp's "victory rally", but there were so many that it was unavoidable. there are a million things i can talk about right now, things that disgusted me yesterday, things that disgust me today... but instead i want to chat about something more important.

us.

regardless of where you stand on the political tightrope, this upcoming administration is going to affect you. working class, lqbtqia+, woman, immigrant, bipoc, disabled. veteran, even. we're all going to face hardship unimaginable in our lifetimes. the oligarch is moving inside the white house today. there is no avoiding it when it has it's own office.

this isn't a time to nestle your fear, this is a time to feed your awareness. things are going to happen quickly and swiftly. this isn't the 1930's where people were tracked down solely by tip-off's and good luck. we're all immediately trackable. everything we say and do is coursing through the framework of our phones and laptops, even this blog.

we need to stay focused. study. don't believe everything you hear until you've researched it. conservative media, liberal media, moderate media. it's our job to digest it all and find the truth, because they will all be biased. they will all hide something.

this is one of my favorite books i own, especially this graphic version. it tells us step-by-step what to expect in the uprising of fascism in the government; what we can do to stay safe and present. my favorite chapter is 11.

investigate.

"figure things out for yourself. spend more time with long articles. subsidize investigative journalism by subscribing to print media. realize that some of what is on the internet is there to harm you. learn about sites that investigate propaganda campaigns (some of which come from abroad). take responsibility for what you communicate with others." pg. 64.

i am so thankful for the environment my parents raised me in. we didn't have much, but they were adamant about teaching their kids to use critical thinking before coming to a conclusion. they taught us to always trust a pattern, even when it looks like a wild card too-good-to-be-true enters the game. be skeptical. ask questions.

i won't drone on any further. but please, please, please- investigate everything you hear for yourself. do not take what you hear as fact until you've seen it peer reviewed, sourced, and/or fact-checked across several trustworthy news outlets. fox and cnn are not news sources i would ever categorize as trustworthy. go forth with that, as you will.

other incredible books that will help us during this time:

"how to be an antiracist" by ibram x. kendi

"gay berlin" by robert beachy

"strongmen: mussolini to the present" by ruth ben-ghiat

"who's afraid of gender?" by judith butler

"it can't happen here" by sinclair lewis

"how fascism works" by jason stanley

"white fragility" by robin diangelo

and many, many more, upon request.

stay safe. organize. be critical, and let your anger be your guide.

[reddanceragain]

Meidas has POWERFUL ANSWER to CBS…BYE BYE!!!

MeidasTouch Network Apr 24 By Ben Meiselas

Revenge is a dish best served cold…

CBS, let’s face it, your betrayal is unforgivable. The fact you compromised the independence of 60 Minutes and forced legendary Executive Producer Bill Owens to resign pissed me off.

Do you have any sense of the moment?!

Seriously, you are so damn greedy and want regulatory approval of the $8 billion merger between CBS parent company Paramount and Skydance that you’re willing to sell out our democracy? I hate to be crass, but you are pathetic.

Donald Trump is weaker than ever right now. His approval is plummeting. The recent Pew Research poll has Trump’s approval at 40 percent and his support among 18-29 year olds and Latinos in the 20 percent range. Even the Fox poll released yesterday has his approval at 44 percent, which is their lowest ranking by far of a president in modern history in the first 100 days. Now is the time to fight harder and not capitulate, CBS! Don’t you realize that Trump is an extortionist? The moment you give him an inch, he takes a foot, then an arm, and then your life.

You think he’ll stop at you settling some bogus lawsuit with him?

The moment he senses your weakness, he’s going to come back to the well and demand more from you until you look like some idiotic channel like Mike Lindell TV. How many times do I have to tell you?! You don’t obey in advance, and you don’t obey ever.

What does $8 billion mean if you lose your freedom and democracy—and eventually that $8 billion—to an authoritarian who takes and takes and takes?

CBS gave us all the middle finger, and we responded.

As I said at the outset of this post, revenge is a dish best served cold. I’m reminded of the ritzy event in Sun Valley, Idaho a few months back where Paramount head Shari Redstone and Warner Bros. head David Zaslav pranced around like giddy school kids reenacting a youth they never had, bragging about the “deregulatory environment” that would drench them in money under a Trump presidency.

Nope.

Now you’re drenched in your own vomit of greed, and independent media like us needs to stop you sickos from continuing to project that venomous slop on the rest of us.

Revenge is a dish best served cold.

So it’s fitting that as these oligarchs and agents of oligarchy like Redstone and Zaslav mock us all, laugh in our faces, and try to sell us out, we respond with force. And that we did!

After our post yesterday forcefully calling out CBS, we got some incredible news.

First, we found out from the top podcast data company Podscribe that The MeidasTouch Podcast came in first again in the charts for the third straight month in a row with 107.3 million downloads. This is more than Joe Rogan, Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro, and Charlie Kirk combined.

Second—and what’s more—we learned we get over 8 million more YouTube views per day than CBS News.

It’s a wipeout, CBS!

You gave us the middle finger. You cared so much about your $8 billion, and now you’ve been trounced by us with 8 million more views a day!

What CBS and Skydance can’t fathom is that the MeidasTouch Network crushes them—and we’ve grown thanks to our subscribers on this Substack.

They care so much about their $8 billion merger and their news assets that they’ve exposed themselves as gigantic orange-turd-enabling assholes. Excuse my language—I don’t like cursing—but I found that one funny and so true.

You’re supposed to be reporting on news. So report on it, damnit, or get out of the way!

Why don’t you sell Meidas 60 Minutes at this point since you apparently don’t care about the news?

By the way, we told Bill Owens in our post yesterday that he should join Meidas. We’ll see.

[lueurjun]

youtuber bf sunghoon

youtuber!sunghoon x reader! in which he is a world renowned youtube star with millions of subscribers but his favourite person will always steal the spotlight — requests are open officially now if you want something specific:)

honestly i see him being one of those youtubers that started posting when they were a kid and just grew a huge fan base from there

like hes been posting since he was like eleven and now hes 20 with over 15 million subs

yes. i’m giving him 15 million. he deserves more. subscribe to him rn

and you’re not on the youtube scene until the two of you start dating

but how you met is actually filmed

he was filming a vlog with his friends and they decided to film a basketball vid for heeseung’s channel

now sunghoon isn’t bad at basketball but he isn’t the best

so you can probably see where this is going

if not then… you were innocently passing by the court when the ball flung over the high gate and smacked you in the side of the head

you wanted death to welcome you

really you could’ve curled up in a ball

pain and embarrassment you didn’t know which was worse

“riki stop laughing- oh my god-”

you couldn’t really see that well but you managed to make out multiple figures on the court standing still just staring

one of them had their hands slapped over their mouth so you assumed that one was riki

someone was leaving the court but you couldn’t make out it it was one person or two because your vision was off

poor you just wanted a slushie to cool you down

you ended up walking away with bf tho so let’s be real… getting slapped in the head was worth it

“i’m so sorry- are you okay?”

“oh no. it’s fine. cant see but you know… it’s all good”

you little people pleaser you

the person takes your hand awkwardly to try and steady you

because that ball had knocked off your entire balance

thats so embarrassing for you im so sorry for doing this to you BUT ITS FOR THE PLOT! you’re gorgeous enough to get through it, your face card never declines bae just take it in stride

after a few moments your vision settled and you were finally able to focus on the boy

and boy was he fine

suddenly the embarrassment seemed worse than the pain

because a really hot guy just watched you get a ball to the head

“do i need to take you somewhere to get checked? you don’t have a concussion right? i didn’t kill you or anything?”

the only thing he killed was your ego

despite insisting that you’re fine, he convinces you to let him buy you a slushie as a makeup gift

cue the annoying wolf whistles when his friends see the two of you walking away together

sunghoon flips them off forgetting all about the video he was supposed to film for heeseung

and you best believe that long legged mf kept that part in the vid

anyways the two of you get a slushie together and he tells you all about his channel and eventually when it’s time for you to head home

he asks if he can see you again

and you’re just like *debby ryan meme* who me?

that was horrifyingly cringe i am so sorry

skipping past that, you are not about to turn this man down so you agree and a date is scheduled

moving on from how sunghoon was blessed with your existence, let’s get into your relationship — my favourite part;D

his fans absolutely adore you as they should

im your biggest fan tho don’t forget that pls

literally his stans beef with him asking if he can fight

no but fr can he because i’ll get my boxing gloves on rn

sorry sorry

videos with you always get a lot of views but there isn’t many of them since he does value privacy and is quite protective

theres like a video with you once every six months and then you’ll just make the odd appearance in the background

his friends LOVE having you in their videos tho bc you bring in them views bc everyone loves you so much

ultimately as much sunghoon would like to protect and shield you, he knows you are your own person and let’s you decide whether you want to be in their videos or not

most of the time you’re like sure because it’s fun

there’s definitely fan made compilations of sunghoon being an absolute simp for you

THE FAN EDITS!!! THE FAN EDITS!!!

you literally sit and watch them before you go to sleep

ngl id do that too i don’t blame u

the video of you being knocked out by the ball is an iconic moment in his fandom

his friends bring it up any chance they get

“remember when sunghoon knocked all of the brain cells out of their head?”

“what brain cells? they had none to begin with.”

cue you throwing a pillow at the youngest for that comment

“you’re like 6! go learn how to read.”

ni-ki definitely sees you as an older sibling and as much as he teases you, he adores you

the boy literally threatens sunghoon whenever you aren’t around

“i swear if you mess up this relationship and make me a child of divorce, i will roundhouse kick you”

sunghoon just snorts but he knows he will never ever hurt you

because the idea of breaking your precious heart genuinely fills him with dread and nausea

also because me and ni-ki have a y/n protection squad going. we’ve got your back ml don’t worry

sometimes he films for hours and then goes straight to editing with no breaks so you always supply him with some water and snacks

that definitely convinces him to take a break because he just needs to kiss all over your face for being so darn amazing

you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to him

isn’t sappy often but he has his moments where he’ll remind you of how much he genuinely loves and appreciates you

those little declarations always make you sob

and now i’m gonna sob because you’re both just so in love

definitely the internets favourite couple

now that’s over, excuse me whilst i go slide down a wall and cry of loneliness:)

small end note — had this in the drafts for a while and i’m not too keen on it but it took some time to do, so here we are. also thank you for all of your support recently! i’m very grateful and appreciate of you! much love! :)

[hardworkandguts]

Mayonaka Punch

真夜中ぱんチ

(Anime)

Comedy by PA Works

Era: 2020s

Rating: A

Plot: At the same time Masaki, a vlogger with self control problems assaults one of her friends and collaborators live on air (twice) and is excluded from the group, Live, a vampire wakes up from a 20 year slumber with one thing on her mind - find the girl she saw in her dreams, who just happens to look suspiciously like Masaki. After meeting by chance in an abandoned hospital where Masaki was desperately trying to recapture her old streamer magic and Live was searching for blood packs Fallout style, she proposes letting Live feed on her if she and her vampire friends help her reach 1 million subscribers.

Length: 12 episodes

Thoughts: The single cour, 12 episode show trend is creating many problems in killing the potential of many shows, as any writer is in a "pick 2" position with character development, story development and preparing for the ending. While many shows suffer from that dillemma, Mayonaka Punch proved it is perfectly manageable. While it doesn't exactly stand out from the many "girls do stuff" shows other than the twist! most of them are vampires and the chaotic energy Live and Tokage bring to the table, it paces the story evenly in two halves, the first where we are introduced to and establishes the characters (Tokage is the last to join on episode 3, and she presents herself with her trademark subtlety), and the second part leading to finale, evenly split between the back 6 and front 6 episodes. The ending is absolute perfection on how it subverts the heightened stakes "they split up" trope in the most ridiculous way and unveils the cute reason Live obsesses over Masaki in just the final minutes.

Moving away from the "12 episode rant", this is a show that is driven mostly through Masaki's insecurities - it's implied she was a bit too controlling even before throwing a fist on air, she's even going as far as allowing a vampire to feed on her to beat her former partners, is easily overwhelmed by negative online comments (while being a hate magnet at this point, I guess that's not a fun combo), and almost ruining their videos by over-editing and hiding the chemistry the Banpai Manor inhabitants have together. Over time she does some self-reflection, particularly during her homecoming episode (one of the best, in part because Live goes feral in this one) when she has being a kinda shitty older sister thrown at her face at every opportunity. She's not a person you'd probably like to be friends with - the show makes it clear her friends had good reasons to kick her out - but little by little seems to be grasping her drive to create content slop is a detriment on her relationships. As for the vampires, we have the two gremlins, Live who is completely obsessed with Masaki, to the point of, worth repeating, going feral with the prospect of being in the house she grew up in (it isn't, but try telling her that) when she visits her at her mother's home after a couple of days apart and Tokage, the loud, degenerate gambler (I don't know how well these characters - I love - will age as we're entering the age of people losing their paycheck to a "can't lose" 3 way bet) of the group who for all that matters is the one who started to unlock the potential their potential as NewTubers so that she has more money for pachinko. Ichiko is more or less Live's personal assistant and who ends up doing most housekeeping (if not all, considering the others) and is heavily in debt for bad stock investments likely because nobody was there to say to someone who can't read kanji to not get into stocks, driving her interest on having a successful channel and Fu is the quiet one, and we get a really sweet story of forbidden love and dreams out of her past. Appearing frequently due to their antics is Yuki, who's the primary foil as she's in charge of keeping those four from revealing they're vampires.

While it has wrapped up pretty nearly, It has a way forward to a new season, with Masaki and Yuki joining the on-camera madness, so I'm curious if it's getting a second season down the line.

Recommended to: do you like cute gremlins doing stuff?

Plus:

Perfectly paced.

On-par gremlin behaviour by everyone involved, even more when garlic is involved.

Looks quite good, very solid on the character design.

Minus:

Nothing to speak of unless we're really done with just 12 episodes.

[maggie-004]

(Un-) Lucky coincidence - 3

Jenna Ortega x Fem reader

Summary: After helping Jenna Ortega, Y/N invites her to stay at her apartment when Jenna's hotel reservation is canceled. Jenna accepts the offer, and they bond over music and their shared vegetarian lifestyle while enjoying Chinese food and planning Jenna's stay in Austria for another 1 and a half weeks.

Words: 2155

“Oh, cool cool, I’m here with my car soo uhm do you need a ride?” I asked Jenna, trying to not freak out. “Uh yeah that would be great. Where do you even live, like do you have a house or-“, “What a house, you’re funny, no I have an apartment nearby. Houses here in Innsbruck are very expensive, if you wanna buy a house, that’s not the size of an shoe box you’ll have to pay at least 5 Million euro. Even to buy an apartment is really expensive. Mine costed around 500.000 euro.” I nearly cried out of laughing “Come on let’s go to my Car, and maybe close your mouth on the way there, Innsbruck is a very expensive city” I laughed at how shocked she was, it really is normal around here. “Yeah let’s go, sorry. I am really shocked right now your apartment is just a little less worth than our house in Coachella and my apartment in LA is way, WAY cheaper than yours” Jenna explained while we went to my car. “Oh really I thought America is more expensive than Austria.” I said while unlocking my car.

“apparently not, I really thought Austria would be very cheap, well I thought wrong. Oh is that your own car or is it your parents?” “No it’s my own, I love this car” I proudly said while getting in to my Ford mustang Mach-e. “Wow I thought you were a nursing student, by the way how old are you?” Jenna glanced at me while I connected my phone to the car.  “I’m 19 (feel free to put in your age) how old are you?” I asked Jenna. “Woah how do you have an own apartment, a car like that and your job at the age of 19? Oh yeah I’m 20 but I’m turning 21 this year” she said and smiled at me. “Oh you’re not old yourself, you know for what you’ve reached so far. Well I started to study at 16, I skipped a few classes and I wanted to move out from my old home so I started to save money and I do make money besides school so yeah that’s pretty much it.” I just explained when we drove off, I played some music and I could see from a side eye that Jenna was enjoying it. “wow so you are the youngest in your class, at least I suppose? And how do you manage to make money, well enough money for all that while still going to school. I know that my sister, Mia she is 2 years older than me, is now nearly done with nursing school and she barley has time to work a part time job and make enough money for anything like this. Oh yeah before I forget to ask, where do you find those remixes we’re listening right now” She asked me and started to get into the music even more. “Oh she’s a nurse as well? That’s so cool, but it’s true. When you’re in nursing school you don’t have enough time to make some Money, except you are lucky enough, like me, to make your money doing something you love, for me it’s DJing. I have my YouTube channel and I have now nearly 5.5 Million subscribers, that’s where you can find those remixes by the way. That’s how I make my money. I’ve never shown my face though so I live a normal life. I collaborated with one of my best friends I met online her name is Antonia aka. RevedTV, I really got a lot of subs from her community. All in all I’m just lucky” I explained smiling because that really is just luck and it’s so cool to receive so much good karma. “Okay, wow yeah I don’t really know what to say here, I’m flabbergasted. Congrats on that and you got to tell me your artist name, I really want to listen to more of your remixes.” Jenna said, and to be honest that made me so proud of myself because everyone knows that Jenna is addicted to music and that she has a certain taste of music, I think she has a really good taste in music, but I got ripped out of because we were already pulling up to my garage.

“Thank you” I just realized that Jenna was talking to me earlier, I kind of zoned out, I still got to tell her about my ADHD otherwise she might thinks I’m rude. “Sorry for not talking to you sooner, I kind of zoned out, you know I have ADHD just wanted to clarify so I don’t come off rude. Sorry”. “Don’t be sorry, that’s ok you don’t seem rude, I know how it feels to zone out, happens way to often to me too” She just giggled at me. “Oh thank god you can relate to the zoning out, hey believe it or not some people don’t zone out at all. It really shocked me to learn about that” I explained living through the exact same feeling as I did when I first learned about that. “Yeah no way, you’re kidding right?” she asked me “Nope. I���m not kidding I swear”. “Wow second time you made me speechless today, just for your information, normally that doesn’t happen to me and certainly not twice”, “ Okay and what exactly does that mean?” I asked her while we got in the elevator I live on the 3rd and 4th. I jokingly started to tease her “Do I make you nervous … nahh just kidding” I laughed and I’m not sure but I think Jenna blushed a little but maybe it’s just my imagination. We arrived at third floor and I unlocked the door, holding it open for Jenna “Milady, after you” “Thank you”. “You can keep your shoes on or how ever you like, feel comfortable, do you want a little tour so you see how we Austrians live” I asked her. “Yeah sure I’d love to” she said while she took off her shoes. “ Okay first room to your right is my guests bath, next to it the guests  room and a little storage room” “Mhm oh the furniture is soo cool” Jenna said. “Then you should wait until you see my room, anyways around that corner is my kitchen and the eating era, come on.” “Woah I definitely wasn’t  expecting an all-black kitchen it’s so cool and so big. Y/N you have a really nice furnishing style, I love it here.” Jenna said. “Thank you so much yeah I really took my time because I want to feel at home here so no compromises with anyone, you won’t believe me how many people said ´oh no black kitchen… don’t do this… don’t do that- bla bla bla` but as already said no compromises. Okay come on we have another floor to look at” I just said. “Another one? Wow cool you really hyped me for your room.” “Okay then come on, soo here is my bathroom, I really needed that freestanding bathtub and again a lot of black elements I love it looks so  fancy. Next to my bathroom I have my laundry room nothing special in here. But now my second favorite room, my studio. Here happens all my ´Musical magic´” Jenna looked stunned at me and I just had to laugh at her face and about myself, calling myself magical. “Well I guess we make it a third time that I don’t know what to say wow, this is all so cool, amazing is that your DJing controller?” Jenna asked me. “Yeah it is if you want I can show you a few things on it later” I suggested. “I’d love to, maybe you can teach me a little bit” she smiled like a little child when I nodded at her request. “Okay now come ooonnn I am so hyped to show you my room, I really love it so let’s gooooo.” “Oh my god you’re hyping me up so much don’t hype me anymore I don’t think I could that you know… emotionally” Jenna laughed.

“Well then we’ll make it short and painless. Here take a look.” I said with the biggest grin on my face, because I know we can add another speechless Jenna moment to our list. My room is the biggest of all my rooms, it has 2 black Walls on which my Californian King sized Bed is, also it’s slightly higher than everything else because it’s build on this platform thing, where I have two huge drawers, I know I don’t need bed this big alone but I really fell in love with it, I think its needless to say that I wouldn’t spent so much money on a bed I don’t need, but I got it as a gift from one of my advertising partners. I also have a lot of plants and little decoration things, Pictures and a few fan gifts, a big ass aquarium, way too big tv, but again it was a gift, my beloved Book shelf, next to it a tiny two person couch and a desk for schoolwork and editing. But now my favorite part, my walk-in closet. “So Jenna what do you think” I grinned. “Wow this room is amazing, how long did you spent to make it look like that, and that bed oh my god can I sit on it, it looks sooo comfortable” Jenna said. “Yea you can also lay in it if you want, it was a gift from my advertising partners. I think I’ve spent one and a half months on this room, but only because I didn’t accept any help in this room, I really wanted it like I imagined. So I build that platform for my bed myself and lowered the ceiling for the LED’s.” I explained “How’s the bed?” I laughed at how tiny Jenna looked in it. “It’s amazing but I am a little scared that I’ll get lost in it.” We both started to laugh like crazy. My stomach started to hurt out of laughter I threw myself on my bed next to Jenna and tried to calm down. Needless to say we pushed each other even more and only after 10 minutes we started to calm down. “Uhg now my stomach hurts, Jenna do you still want to drink a coffee” I asked her still giggling. “Yeah sure, can you help me up” “sure her you go, we gotta go downstairs for coffee, or are you hungry?” I asked Jenna now. “Well yeah are you?” she asked. “I am so hungry right now, do you wanna order something or should I cook?”, “Uh we can order something and I pay for it you know as a thank you” Jenna suggested. “Oh Jenna you really don’t have to that’s fine you’re my guest so please let me- “ Jenna interrupted me “Yeah and you helped me when no one did so please I insist.” “Okay thank you” I gave up I didn’t stood a chance. “What should we order?” I asked Jenna. “Well I’m currently chancing my diet for Romania so something vegetarian, do you like Chinese?”, “Oh I love Chinese food and btw I’m vegetarian too, had to change from vegan to vegetarian because of the nutritious, kind of sucks” I explained to Jenna whom nodded at what I was saying. “oh my god same, I was so devastated when I found out I had to change that.” We both ordered some spring rolls and those lobster chips the white ones. “So should we look for places you could stay, or do you maybe wanna stay here, I mean only if you want to and feel safe and everything” I offered her, not really knowing what she’d say and hoping to not scare her away. We sat in my 2nd floor and before she could answer the doorbell rang. So I had to run down and get the food. “Hey Jenna do you wanna eat in the living room or down here?” I yelled up. “ Uhm however you want” she yelled back. So I got everything we need form the kitchen and got back up. “ I think it’s more comfortable if we stay here. Well about my offer-“ Jenn a cut right in “Uhm I’d love to but only if you’re really fine with that.” Oh my god, I think my heart is about to stop. Jenna really is going to stay at my place. “Yeah totally I can set up the guest room, you can stay as long as you want. I really mean it. How long are you staying in Austria anyways?” I asked her. “for another 1 and a half weeks, we are going to start promoting Wednesday, so the rest of the Wednesday cast comes here tomorrow, and thank you for everything”

A/N: Wow these are getting longer, fyi English is not my first language. Still hope you like it :)

[cagemasterfantasy]

3rd life Remastered Part 1 (Session 1)

Hello dear reader and welcome to 3rd life remastered a few things before you continue reading. First off it is highly recommended to read the prologue before this it will give you vital information about the rules of this book. Secondly the people portrayed in this story are real but are used in a fictional manner. None of what they say or deal is real this is all satire so do not go harrass the people in this book for it please. Third and this is the most important thing the main purpose of this story is to help raise awareness for those struggling with mental health and thus my warning. This story contains touchy topics of suicide and self-harm please do not read this if you are sensitive to that stuff if you aren't then please read with caution. This story is not for the faint of heart. With that said enjoy my first book

Grian says to everyone at spawn but me who is currently not there "Hello everyone and welcome to 3rd life remastered we have the whole crew here but where could our mystery player be?" I am currently running away from the group off of there camera as Grian says "That's right our mystery player is already in the server with us but he is hidden somewhere on this map stay tuned maybe you'll see who it is."

My name is TheFlyingSlime I run a Youtube channel by the same name and go by Slimer. I have been doing Youtube for the past 10 years and have 6.5 million subscribers and have no intentions of stopping anytime soon. I have collabed with everyone in the Life Series at least once (Mainly Grian as he lives 20 minutes away from me) and now I am finally a member of the Life Series. I am happy. I am fine. Nothing could go wrong..... at least that's what I want everyone to think but deep down there is a dark secret that I am hiding from everyone else. See I caught my wife Laura cheating on me 2 months ago and a few weeks later she divorced me right in front of Grian. What he doesn't know is that did a massive spike to my sanity. I lost almost everything. I am now stuck in a tiny apartment with not much but the one person (Grian aside) that I have left my 2 year old Golden Retriever Rylee. And I still got to keep my computer mic headphones and Camera. Aside from that. I am not not happy. I am not fine. Something could go wrong at any minute. I just don't want them finding out. Little did I know they were about to find out in the worst way possible. This is the day where it all began.

I find myself at the Cherry Blossom Biome after wandering a bit I find myself at an Ocean Biome. "Perfect" I say. "What's going on guys Slimer here and welcome to 3rd Life Remastered. That's right I'm the mystery player. And everyone who isn't subscribed doesn't know that yet. Now like always let's see how I unintentionally embarrass myself my slimelets (What I call my followers). And we found a Ocean Biome so-" "Hello is someone there?" "That better not be" I see Smajor1995 emerge from the Cherry Blossom with TangoTek behind him. "Eyyy my buddies" Scott: That's right guys our mystery player is none other than Slimer. The one I beat big time at Bedwars. TangoTek: And I lost miserably in that round. "Well you still beat me in TNT Run" TangoTek: I suppose that's true. So whatcha doin here? "I'm thinking of building a pirate ship here. Interested?" Scott: "Not a bad idea if you don't mind someone sneaking up and setting the whole thing on fire but I like it" I look happy "Great so let's set out for materials leave the trees close to the shore alone I have an idea for an alarm system" Tango: And what's that "I'm going to the Ancient City to set up Shulk Shriekers" Scott looks at me like I just turned into an Elephant Scott: Are you absolutely insane one mess up and you're dead "Look I just think that the Shriekers will alert us if someone approaches" A message then appears in everyone's chat saying the Boogeyman and partner are being chosen in 1 minute. "Hey if any of us get chosen can we make an agreement?" Tango: What is it? "If any of us is the Boogeyman or the Partner can we agree that we won't kill each other?" Scott: "Of course of course we won't- Hey there's a name coming from the trees." "Oh no it's Jimmy the loser" Jimmy: "HEY I am not a loser" The message 5....4.......3..........2...........1.............You are.......................................Not the Boogeyman or Partner

Everyone present breathes a sigh of relief simultaneously. "Anyway loser what are you doing here?" Jimmy: So our mystery player is Slimer eh btw I'm not the only one who's here. "Yeah Scott and Tango are with me too" Jimmy: And 2 other people. "Who?" I then hear 2 voices "Bdubs and Scar huh? HAHAHAHAHA WHAT'S GOOD" Scar: Hey there so you're our mystery player huh? Bdubs: What's going on Slimer? Hhahahahahah "My 2 favorite people" Scott and Tango simultaneously say "HEY WHAT ABOUT US?" "Hey I like you guys too hey everyone I was thinking of making a pirate ship called Pirate's Cove everyone in" Scar: Oooooh I like the sound of that Bdubs: I've always wanted to be a pirate I'm in Jimmy: Pirates eh? Can't say I haven't thought of that before. Eh why not? "Alright let's get our resources I meanwhile am heading to the Ancient City for Skulk Shriekers" Jimmy: Seems I'm not Jimmy the loser for long you're gonna die "No I won't I'm sneaky I'm stealthy and I know how to troll and use mods" Scar: "And unintentionally embarrass yourself I may add" Rylee lays down in my lap "Aww hi Ry Ry" Bdubs: Aww I wish I could have a fluffy puppy "Then go adopt a fluffy puppy" I say as I head to the ancient city after setting my spawn on the beach

I finally make it to the deep dark and water bucket clutch and sneak immediately whispering "ooooooh that was close look at how close I was to that" I then start to hear voices in my head "Your teamates don't care about you" They will just use your for your own gains" I put my hands on my head and grunt reaching for my inhaler as a panic attack starts and I'm breathing heavily "You should just give up you aren't fit for the Life Series" I put my inhaler in my mouth and see Etho's name Etho: "Hey Slimer *he says whispering* you ok? you sound out of breath" I don't respond right away Etho: "Slimer hey focus" I snap back into reality Me: Oh hey Etho *I accidentely trigger a Shrieker and whisper* Oh no that's strike 1 for me" Etho: Yeah be quiet less you want to get obliterated" Me: Ok ok *I say whispering* So why are you hear?" Etho: Trying to get some loot before everyone else you?" Me: Using the Shriekers as alarm systems for my base" Mumbo then suddenly falls from the ceiling and water bucket clutches Me: AHHHHHHHHHHHH *I activate another Shrieker* Etho: I told you to be quiet" Me: Excuse me for getting spooked by a falling mustache Mr.Ninja" Mumbo pulls out a spyglass and whispers Aha Me: NOOOOOOOOOOOOO" strike 3 the Warden is summoned as we all scatter Etho follows me and I get an uneasy feeling Etho: Don't worry I have your back" After a few minutes Etho pulls out a iron sword and hits me with it Me: NOOO" The Warden who's nearby hears me and fires a sonic blast at me dealing a huge chunk of damage to me although I do manage to get away Etho is hot on my tail as soon as he sees Mumbo he shouts Etho: He's getting away get him" Mumbo then charges at me and criticals me I try to fight back but I'm on my last heart and Etho gets the kill as the message "TheFlyingSlime was slain by Ethoslab" appears and everyone of the players in the chat go wild.

I am in utter disbelief as I respawn at the now complete ship everyone in utter disbelief but still laughing a bit. Scar: You didn't you died to the Bogey huh?" Jimmy: WHO'S THE LOSER NOW" I am not there I am hearing the voices again "You should just give up you aren't going to win" "You're pathetic you're a big fat letdown who'll never be good at anything" *I hear mocking laughing as I snapped back into reality* Bdubs: Hey Earth to Slimer what happened?" I shake my head Me: Er right Etho was the Boogeyman and I'm NOW THE FIRST YELLOW NAME" Scott: Calm down alright it's not that big of a deal what happened?

I take a deep breath and begin talking Me: I went down there and Etho was down there I forgot to whisper and accidentally activated a Shrieker that was strike 1. Strike 2 a mustache fell from the ceiling. and caused me to scream. Jimmy: MUMBO WAS THE PARTNER? Me: Yes but I didn't know right away but strike 3 he did that stupid AHA with the spyglass and he knows very well I hate that. So I shouted NOOOOOOOOO and that was strike 3. Got an uneasy feeling while Etho was following me he attacked me Warden sonic blasted me Mumbo criticaled me and you know what happens next. Scott: Well we sure aren't letting Etho or Mumbo near here we'll protect you until we turn Red that is our agreement" Bdubs: Yeah that wasn't cool what they did picking on the new guy. I could take both of them" Me: Honestly I could have taken them if Mumbo hadn't gotten a crit.

After some more building Pirates Cove is officially finished.

Tango: Hey since you are Yellow and you went through a lot down there you can be the captain" Bdubs: Hey why can't we be the captain?" I lean into my mic and do my best Bdubs impression Me: There's lava up here" Everyone but Bdubs bursts out laughing Bdubs: Stop bringing that up" Me: Then stop making your deaths so hilariously funny" Another death message appears "Bigbst4tz2 hit the ground too hard while trying to escape Grian" Scott: Are you kidding me not even an hour after this one dies you should stay in the captain's quarters and Not. Leave. The. Ship" "You don't need to tell me twice" Grian types in the chat No I am not the Bogey I was the Partner but I helped the Bogey get a kill and that Bogey was Tay. For the record it still counts if the Partner gets a kill so long as the Bogey also participated and gets a hit Me: I will keep that in mind"

I go into the Captains quarters and see Tnt Cannons as Tango comes back Tango: Got some more Redstone for the cannons." Scott: Our Captain Slimer is still holed up in there we aren't taking any chances losing our captain" Tango: Slimer you ok to talk? Me: Come on in Tango I trust you" Tango: Hey we made an agreement not to kill each other so long as we aren't red remember" Me: Enter then" Tango enters and goes to the cannons Tango: Made these myself ready to watch them fire off? Me: You know it" As Tango fires one off Cleo comes out from the treeline and narrowly avoids getting hit and everyone is laughing as Cleo storms over to the ship Cleo: WHICH ONE OF YOU BUFFOONS WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THAT" Me and Tango exit and see Cleo Cleo: Well well well Tango and Slimer what an absolute surprise Me: Tango was the one who fired the cannon" Tango: Nice going" Cleo: Are you absolutely mental? Me: To his credit we didn't expect you to be coming out of the treeline and almost get hit" Cleo: I actually came over to join you guys and see what you were up to and I almost get blown up and I see you have Jimmy with you that's a bad choice and Scar as well why am I not surprised" Scar: Hey back off we both lost pets this year and he feeds me with a ton of juicy Star Wars content and on top of that me and him are both medical buddies me having Neuromusclar disease and him having Asthma" Scott: Yeah he has Chronic Lung Cancer go a bit easy on him" Me: Scott thanks but please don't joke about that please it's not funny" Scott: I was being serious" I start to hear the voices again "Seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee? They don't care about you making jokes at your expense. They don't love you at all" Me: Not again Bdubs: What's wrong" Jimmy: Are you feeling ok?" Scar: Hey is your Asthma kicking in?" I start breathing little heavily "Just accept your fate you useless worm nobody will miss you" Bdubs: HEY EARTH TO SLIMER Cleo: Slimer why have you gone quiet?" I suddenly snap out of it Me: Oh uh sorry I was just thinking how funny it would have been if Cleo died and became yellow like me" Cleo: THAT IS NOT FUNNY" Jimmy: It is a little funny" Cleo: I'll show you funny" Me: Hey let's not fight on my ship please"

Grian then types in the chat end of session everyone to spawn

As we head to spawn Grian is there with Impulse and Pearl there

Grian: Explain to everyone why you're in the center and why" Impulse: I was the next Bogey and couldn't get a kill Pearl: I was the partner and couldn't help to get a kill Grian: So as punishment the server is going to be giving you a extremely hard task if you do not complete it by the end of next session you immediately become Red if you are not already. Me: Question? Grian: Yes? Me: What if you're Red and you don't complete the task Grian: Then you are immediately eliminated at the end of the session in front of everyone that still remains. Assuming you're still alive that is and believe me the Red tasks are brutal." Me: What about the Partner? Grian: The Partner doesn't get a task it's whoever the Bogey is. Oh and I know what you're going to ask and yes if you are a Red Name like in Secret Life you are allowed to sabotage the one with the task with one guess and immediately cause to fail should you guess right. However if someone that is yellow or green guesses it you are not counted as failing unless the task specifically says that you fail if someone calls you out. And finally yes you are only allowed to share what your task is to The Partner and nobody else unless the task says otherwise."

Purple swirls surround Impulse and a book appears in his hand Impulse: Oh NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO"

The voices begin again as I am about to join the Discord and chat with the rest of the players in a group call but first I send my footage to my editor @doodl3 and tell her "Here's your footage go on and laugh if you want I embarrassed myself yet again like I always do" Then the voices pick up "Liar" "Deceiver"

End of part 1 next is the Irl segment part 1

Prologue Next

[sweetorangepoptart]

20 Questions for Writers

Thanks to my hero and basically my fanfic mentor @pikapeppa for tagging me!!! I'm going to answer for ALL my fics, not just my Wuko ones, but there's definitely a 'before' time when I was writing Bioware stuff and then had a loooong hiatus before I was writing again, And I think my writing has improved markedly between the time skip.

Tagging @korrasamibottles @creampuffqueen @appalesbian @kjthenbee @starshinemaiden @mellyoraa @shippingondemand and I'm sure I missed some people

1). How many works do you have on AO3?

24

2). What’s your total AO3 word count? 453,053! I'm getting close to half a million, that's kind of exciting!!

3). What are your top five fics by kudos?

Secret (Legend of Korra, Mako x Wu) 445 kudos

Dance (Mass Effect 3, FemShep x Garrus) 353 kudos

Windswept (Legend of Korra, Mako x Wu) 195 kudos

Crawl to Me (Dragon Age Inquisiton, Female Trevelyan x The Iron Bull) 161 kudos

Unnatural (Legend of Korra, pre-relationship Mako x Wu) 159 kudos

4). What fandoms do you write for?

Pretty much just LoK these days, though I have been jotting down some things for a possible Ocarina of Time fic.

5). Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes!!!! I love replying to comments. They took the time to comment, so I'm going to take the time to reply and let them know how much it means to me to get a comment! One thing I do for my chaptered fics, though, is to wait to reply to comments until I post the next chapter. I feel like it helps let people know I've posted the next chapter in case they aren't subscribed

6). What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I think it's either Unnatural or My Empire of Dirt. On the one hand, Unnatural is, as a standalone, angsty all the way through and has a somber, melancholy ending. But immediately following it is Secret, which nullifies the unrequited love angst. On the other hand, My Empire of Dirt has angst throughout and ends on an ambiguous note, because I intentionally left it open ended for the reader to insert the outcome of High Noon quest. So it could be VERY angsty if you assume Sloane dies and Kaetus is thus imprisoned indefinitely, or it can be a happy ending for them if the reader saves Sloane's life.

7). What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Love, Asami for sure! I might as well have written "And then they lived happily ever after." (take that, Seven Havens!!!!)

8). Do you get hate on fics?

Not yet... I think I should be flattered if I ever do. It'll mean I've made it or something

9). Do you write smut?

So much smut. A lot. My earlier stuff is F/M BDSM and then I wrote Alien/Human sex, but now it's just a lot of vanilla M/M stuff

10). Do you write crossovers?

When I was like 12 I wrote a Sailor Moon/Ocarina of Time crossover. Not completed, obviously, but I wrote out the idea and characters and their roles. It involved Ocarina of Time taking place in the Silver Millennium, and all the OoT characters reincarnated in the modern sailor moon setting

11). Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

12). Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, but if anyone ever wants to they are more than welcome 🧡

13). Have you ever cowritten a fic before?

Yes! I was cowriting a Wuko fic with my friend but real life got in their way, so now I'm soloing it. But when I was in high school I collaborated with friends a lot on fics. Many of which we never published. Just writing in notebooks, old school.

14). What’s your all-time favorite ship?

ALL TIME? That's impossible to say, across fandoms I have so many favorites. You'd think it's Wuko because that's been my obsession for a while, but if we're saying all time I'm honestly going to have to say Seto Kaiba x Kisara from Yu-Gi-Oh

15). What’s the WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I've got a multichaptered DA fic set between 2 and inquisition that I'm super close to orphaning because I'm pretty sure I'll never finish it, but I can't bring myself to do it.

16). What are your writing strengths?

Korrasamibottles just told me I reimagine aspects of canon in 'such a thoughtful way that it feels like that's how things actually happened' and that my dialogue is very in character, and it's honestly such a wonderful compliment and I work really hard on it so I'll take her word for it and say those are my strengths!!

17). What are your writing weaknesses?

Sometimes I feel my writing is kind of bland. I don't evoke a lot of beautiful metaphors. I guess I'm working on that but generally I have to work hard to make my writing 'interesting' like by going through during the editing process and digging more into character's emotions and providing extra sensory details. My first drafts are usually pretty simple and boring.

18). Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in a fic?

Not sure! I think the fandoms I write for it's not really an issue. It feels like I'd only do a word here and there or if there's clearly a language barrier between two characters.

19). First fandom you wrote for?

Ever? I can't remember what was first. Probably Sailor Moon. Possibly Cardcaptor Sakura or Digimon? I was a little thing writing stories in notebooks. I just unlocked a memory of using a silver gel pen in a notebook with black pages to write a sailor moon fic

20). Favorite fic you’ve ever written?

Honestly it's You'll Be the Death of Me. It's not finished but I got really deeply invested in the story I created here. I outlined it after listening to some audiobooks on writing and I'm really happy with the story and how it's turning out. And it's maybe not as popular as my other fics because it's got triggering topics but the reception to it has been delightful and I'm having a blast taking everyone on this horrible torturous angsty ride.

[sonneillonv]

Just in case you want to be angry tonight! Transcript under the cut in case you hit a paywall.

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Reach Out Updated: April 30, 2024 6:27 PM EDT | Originally published: April 30, 2024 7:00 AM EDT

Former President Donald Trump sat down for a wide-ranging interview with TIME at his Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., on April 12, and a follow-up conversation by phone on April 27.

Over the course of the interviews, Trump discussed his agenda for a second term, which includes deporting millions of people, cutting the U.S. civil service, and intervening more directly in Justice Department prosecutions than his predecessors. He also discussed his thinking on other issues, including abortion, crime, trade, Ukraine, Israel, and the prospects for political violence in this election cycle.

Read More: How Far Trump Would Go

Below is a transcript, lightly edited for clarity, of the interviews between Trump and TIME National Politics Reporter Eric Cortellessa. Click here to read our fact-check.

Let’s start with Day One: January 20, 2025. You have said that you will take a suite of aggressive actions on the border and on immigration—

Donald Trump: Yes.

You have vowed to—

Trump: And on energy.

Yes, yes. And we'll come to that, certainly. You have vowed to launch the largest deportation operation in American history. Your advisors say that includes—

Trump: Because we have no choice. I don't believe this is sustainable for a country, what's happening to us, with probably 15 million and maybe as many as 20 million by the time Biden's out. Twenty million people, many of them from jails, many of them from prisons, many of them from mental institutions. I mean, you see what's going on in Venezuela and other countries. They're becoming a lot safer.

Well, let's just talk—so you have said you're gonna do this massive deportation operation. I want to know specifically how you plan to do that.

Trump: So if you look back into the 1950s, Dwight Eisenhower, he's not known for that, you know, you don't think of him that way. Because you see, Ike, but Dwight Eisenhower was very big on illegal immigration not coming into our country. And he did a massive deportation of people. He was doing it for a long time. He got very proficient at it. He was bringing them just to the other side of the border. And they would be back in the country within a matter of days. And then he started bringing them 3,000 miles away—

What’s your plan, sir?

Trump: We will be using local law enforcement. And we will absolutely start with the criminals that are coming in. And they're coming in in numbers that we've never seen before. And we do have a new category of crime. It's called migrant crime. It's, ugh, you see it all the time. You see it in New York City where they're having fistfights with police. And far worse than that. You see it all the time. And you're seeing it in all of the cities, especially the Democratic-run cities, which is a lot of the big ones, but you're seeing it in Chicago, you're seeing it in New York and L.A. and getting worse than in other places.

Does that include using the U.S. military?

Trump: It would. When we talk military, generally speaking, I talk National Guard. I've used the National Guard in Minneapolis. And if I didn't use it, I don't think you'd have Minneapolis standing right now, because it was really bad. But I think in terms of the National Guard. But if I thought things were getting out of control, I would have no problem using the military, per se. We have to have safety in our country. We have to have law and order in our country. And whichever gets us there, but I think the National Guard will do the job. You know, had Nancy Pelosi used the National Guard. You know, I offered them whatever they wanted, but I often—

You would use the military inland as well as at the border?

Trump: I don't think I'd have to do that. I think the National Guard would be able to do that. If they weren't able to, then I’d use the military. You know, we have a different situation. We have millions of people now that we didn't have two years ago.

Sir, the Posse Comitatus Act says that you can't deploy the U.S. military against civilians. Would you override that?

Trump: Well, these aren’t civilians. These are people that aren't legally in our country. This is an invasion of our country. An invasion like probably no country has ever seen before. They're coming in by the millions. I believe we have 15 million now. And I think you'll have 20 million by the time this ends. And that's bigger than almost every state.

So you can see yourself using the military to address this?

Trump: I can see myself using the National Guard and, if necessary, I'd have to go a step further. We have to do whatever we have to do to stop the problem we have. Again, we have a major force that’s forming in our country, when you see that over the last three weeks, 29,000 people came in from China, and they're all fighting age, and they're mostly males. Yeah, you have to do what you have to do to stop crime and to stop what's taking place at the border.

Would that include building new migrant detention camps?

Trump: We wouldn't have to do very much of that. Because we'll be bringing them out of the country. We're not leaving them in the country. We're bringing them out. It’s been done before.

Will you build new ones?

Trump: And it was done by Obama in a form of jails, you know, prisons. And I got blamed for that for four months. And then people realized that was done by him, not by me.

So are you ruling out that you would build new migrant detention camps?

Trump: No, I would not rule out anything. But there wouldn't be that much of a need for them, because of the fact that we're going to be moving them out. We're going to bring them back from where they came.

I ask because your close aide and adviser Stephen Miller said that part of what it would take to carry out this deportation operation would include new migrant detention camps.

Trump: It’s possible that we’ll do it to an extent but we shouldn't have to do very much of it, because we're going to be moving them out as soon as we get to it. And we'll be obviously starting with the criminal element. And we're going to be using local police because local police know them by name, by first name, second name, and third name. I mean, they know them very well.

How are you going to get state and local police departments to participate in this? Under what authority is the President able to do that?

Trump: Well, there's a possibility that some won't want to participate, and they won't partake in the riches, you know. We have to do this. This is not a sustainable problem for our country.

Does that mean you would create funding incentives from the federal government for state and local police departments?

Trump: It could very well be. I want to give police immunity from prosecution because the liberal groups or the progressive groups, depending on what they want to be called, somewhat liberal, somewhat progressive, but they are—they’re very strong on the fact that they want to leave everybody in, I guess, I don't know. You know, sanctuary cities are failing all over the place. And I really believe that there's a pent-up demand to end sanctuary cities by people that were in favor of sanctuary cities, because it's just not working out for the country.

So by your own telling, these are new, bold, and aggressive actions that you would take.

Trump: I don't think they're bold actions. I think they’re actions that are common sense. But I really believe, Eric, that they’re actions that—it's incredible that they've allowed so many people to come into our country, especially considering they were unchecked and unvetted, most of them. They're just pouring in. They're pouring in at levels that no country has ever seen before. It's an invasion of our country.

Well, let me put it this way: They’re new and they're certainly going to be tested in the courts. If the courts rule against you, do you commit to complying with all court orders upheld by the Supreme Court?

Trump: I will be complying with court orders. And I'll be doing everything on a very legal basis, just as I built the wall. You know, I built a tremendous wall, which gave us great numbers. I also was willing to do far more than I said I was going to do. I was also and am willing to—they should have completed the wall. I completed what I said I was going to do, much more than I said I was going to do. But as you do it, you realize you need more wall in different locations, locations that, at one point, people thought you wouldn't be able to—you wouldn't need.

But, and—the first glimpse I found that Biden, frankly, wanted open borders, because I never believed it. It just didn't make sense. The first time I really saw that was when he didn't want to install the wall that was already built and could have been thrown up, hundreds of miles of additional work could have been thrown up in a period of three weeks.

I want to talk about your plan to build the wall in just a second, but just to come back on that. So you commit to complying with all Supreme Court orders? All orders upheld by the Supreme Court?

Trump: Yeah, I would do that, sure. I have great respect for the Supreme Court.

So come back to the border wall for a second because in the last term, you tried to negotiate border funding with Democrats, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, and had an opportunity for $25 billion. Didn't work. Got the $1.4 billion—

Trump: But with the $25 billion things came that were unacceptable.

Codifying the DREAMER protections—

Trump: Well, a lot of other things besides that. There were a lot of bad things. Sure, they gave you money for the wall. I basically took the money from the military, as you know. I consider this an invasion of our country and I took the money from the—

So my question is, what do you plan to do in the second term? Are you going to move right away on day one to direct federal funds to continue building the wall? Are you going to aim for legislation? How do you plan to do?

Trump: I think what we will do is we will complete—and when you say and when I say complete the wall, I built much more wall than I ever thought necessary. But as you build it, you find out that you need it. And we built it, and there were certain areas then you find out that are leaking and they leak. Like a politician leaks, they leak. And we would get that and we would build that and then you build something else. And it was just a system, we had a great system going. And we could have added another 200 miles of wall and good territory for it. Because it really does work, you know, walls work. Walls and wheels. I would say, you know, a lot of, see what you have here, your tape recorder, everything else is going to be obsolete in about six months. You'll have something that's much better. But the two things that are never obsolete are walls and wheels.

Something you said a moment ago. You said, “We want to protect police from prosecution.” What do you mean by that?

Trump: Police have been—their authority has been taken away. If something happens with them, even if they're doing a very good job, they take away their house, they take away their pension, they take away their, I mean, essentially, they end up losing their families over it. They take away everything. They prosecute people. And we have to give the police back the power and respect that they deserve. Now, there will be some mistakes, and there are certain bad people and that's a terrible thing. But there are far more problems with what's happened now, where police are standing outside of a department store as it’s being robbed and 500 mostly young people are walking out carrying air conditioners and televisions and everything else. And the police would like to do something about it. But they're told to stand down. They said don't do it. And if you do anything about it, if you stop crime, we're going to go after your pension, your home, your family, your wife or your husband. And you know, police are being prosecuted all the time. And we want to give them immunity from prosecution if they're doing their job.

Would you try to pass a law for that through Congress?

Trump: Excuse me.

Would you push a bill through Congress to do that?

Trump: We’d have to take a look at that.

Let’s shift to the economy, sir. You have floated a 10% tariff on all imports, and a more than 60% tariff on Chinese imports. Can I just ask you now: Is that your plan?

Trump: It may be more than that. It may be a derivative of that. A derivative of that. But it will be somebody—look when they come in and they steal our jobs, and they steal our wealth, they steal our country.

When you say more than that, though: You mean maybe more than 10% on all imports?

Trump: More than 10%, yeah. I call it a ring around the country. We have a ring around the country. A reciprocal tax also, in addition to what we said. And if we do that, the numbers are staggering. I don't believe it will have much of an effect because they're making so much money off of us. I also don't believe that the costs will go up that much. And a lot of people say, “Oh, that's gonna be a tax on us.” I don't believe that. I think it's a tax on the country that's doing it. And I know. Look, I took in billions of dollars from China. Nobody else ever did anything on China. I also let people know what the threat of China was. China was going along making $500 to $600 billion a year and nobody was ever even mentioning it until I came along. What's happening in Detroit is very sad because electric cars with this EV mandate, which is ridiculous, because they don't go far. They cost too much and they're going to be made in China. They're all going to be made in China.

Mr. President, most economists—and I know not all, there isn't unanimity on this—but most economists say that tariffs increase prices.

Trump: Yeah.

Are you comfortable with additional inflation?

Trump: No, I've seen. I've seen—I don't believe it'll be inflation. I think it'll be lack of loss for our country. Because what will happen and what other countries do very successfully, China being a leader of it. India is very difficult to deal with. India—I get along great with Modi, but they're very difficult to deal with on trade. France is frankly very difficult on trade. Brazil is very difficult on trade. What they do is they charge you so much to go in. They say, we don't want you to send cars into Brazil or we don't want you to send cars into China or India. But if you want to build a plant inside of our country, that's okay and employ our people. And that's basically what I'm doing. And that’s—I was doing and I was doing it strongly, but it was ready to really start and then we got hit with COVID. We had to fix that problem. And we ended up handing over a higher stock market substantially than when COVID first came in. But if you look at the first few years of what we did, the numbers we had were breathtaking. There's never been an economy—

Sir, the economy was certainly humming during your first term. There's no question about it. But, you know, Moody's did say that your trade war with China cost the U.S. economy $316 billion and 300,000 jobs. [Editor’s note: The estimate of $316 billion was made by Bloomberg Economics, not Moody’s.]

Trump: Yeah. Moody’s doesn’t know what they’re talking about. We had the greatest economy in history. And Moody's acknowledges that. So how did it cost us if we had such a good economy? Everybody admits it. If we didn't do that, we would have no steel industry right now. They were dumping steel all over this country. And I put a 50% tariff on steel. It was gonna go higher. And the people that love me most are businesses, but in particular, the steel industry. They love me because I saved their industry. I've had owners of steel companies and executives of steel companies come up and start crying when they see me. They say, nobody, nobody helped us until you came along. China was dumping massive amounts of steel into our country. And we saved the steel industry.

Do you think that businesses pass along the cost of a tax to the consumer?

Trump: No, I don’t believe so. I believe that it cost the country that—I think they make less. I actually think that the country that is being taxed makes less. I don't believe—

You don't believe that businesses pass on the cost?

Trump: No, I think what happens is you build. What happens to get out of the whole situation is you end up building, instead of having your product brought in from China, because of that additional cost, you end up making the product in the United States. And that's been traditionally what happened. If you look at what goes on. If you look at China, they don't want our cars. They charge them tremendous numbers. You look at India. India is a very good example. I get along very well with the people, representatives of India. Modi is a great guy, and he's doing what he has to do. But we had a case with Harley Davidson, I had Harley Davidson on the White House. I said, “How are you doing? How's business? Very good? Everything's good?” I said, “Just out of curiosity, how do you deal with India?” “Not Well.” Now you’ve got to remember, this is five years ago, four years ago, they said, “Not well. We can't do business with India, because they charged us such a big tariff, it was over 100%.” And at that price, you know, there's a point at which the consumer breaks and can't buy. They said, “But they will do anything for us to build a Harley Davidson plant in India. They don't want us to give motorcycles to India, but they do want us to build a plant.” I said, “Well, I'm not going to be very happy with that.” But that's ultimately what happened. They built a plant in India. And now there's no tax, and I'm saying we're doing the same thing. We're gonna build plants here. Now something that's taking place that nobody's talking about, maybe don’t know, but I have a friend who builds auto plants. That's what he does. If you ask him to build a simple apartment someplace, he wouldn't know how to do it. But he can build the plant, millions of feet, the biggest plants in the world. He's incredible. And I said to him, “I want to see one of your plants.” And he said to me, “Well, are you ready to go to Mexico? Are you ready to go to China?” I said, “No, I want to see it here.” He said, “We're not really building them here, not the big ones, the big ones are being built right now in Mexico or China.” China now is building plants in Mexico to make cars to sell into the United States. And these are the biggest plants anywhere in the world. And that's not going to happen when I'm President, because I will tariff them at 100%. Because I'm not going to allow them to steal the rest of our business. You know, Mexico has taken 31% of our auto manufacturing, auto business. And China has taken a much bigger piece than that. We have a very small percentage of that business left and then you have a poor fool like the gentleman is at the United Auto Workers who is okay with the fact that we're going to do all electric cars and it's so sad to see because the all electric cars are just not what the consumer wants.

Sir, I understand your position—

Trump: And by the way, I have no problem with all electric. I think it's great. And you can buy electric, I think it's fine. They don't go far. They have problems. They don't work in the cold. They don't work in the heat. There's a lot of problems. When I was in Iowa where they were all over. They were all over the streets. It was 40 degrees below zero the night of the Iowa caucuses.

I was there with you.

Trump: Right. That’s right. I’ve never heard of cold weather like that.

Just to clarify something you said a moment ago: You're considering a 100% tariff on Chinese and Mexican imports?

Trump: I didn't say that. They charge us 100%. But they charge us much more than that. India charges us more than that. Brazil charges us what—Brazil's a very big, very big tariff country. I ask people, Who are the worst to deal with? I'm not going to give that to you because I don't want to insult the countries because I actually get along with them. But you'd be surprised. The E.U. is very tough with us. They don't take our foreign products. They don't take our cars. We take Mercedes Benz and Volkswagen and BMW. They don't take our cars. If we want to sell a Chevrolet, even if we want to sell a Cadillac, a beautiful Cadillac Escalade, if we want to sell our cars into Germany, as an example, they won't take them.

Let's come back to Europe later.

Trump: I said to Angela Merkel, “Angela, how many Chevrolets are in the middle of Berlin?” She said none. I said, “You're right about that. But we take your cars, including cars that aren't that expensive, like Volkswagen, relatively speaking.” I said, “Do you think that's fair?” She said, “Probably not, but until you came along, nobody ever mentioned it.”

Sir, you've been critical of how Israel has prosecuted its war against Hamas. In a recent interview, you said that it needed to “get it over with” and “get back to normalcy.”

Trump: Yeah.

So as President, would you consider withholding American military assistance to Israel to push it to winding down its war?

Trump: Okay. So let me, I have to start just as I did inside. [Asks an aide to turn down the air conditioner.] I don't have to go through the whole thing. But as you know, Iran was broke. Iran is the purveyor of—

No, I know that but would you—

Trump: No, but think of the great job I did. It would have never happened. It would have never happened. You wouldn't have had—Hamas had no money. Do you know that?

I do understand that, sir, I just want to know—

Trump: No, but I hope it can be pointed out. During my term, there were stories that Iran didn't have the money to give to any—there was very little terrorism. We had none. I had four years of—we had no terrorism. We didn't have a World Trade Center knocked down. You know, Bush used to say, “Well, we’ve been a safe country.” I said they knocked down the World Trade Center in the middle of your term. Do you remember that one during the debate? That was a good one. But it was true, very true. But we had no terror during our—and we got rid of ISIS 100%. Now they're starting to come back.

I want to know—you said you want to get Israel to wind down the war. You said it needs to “get it over with.” How are you going to make that happen? Would you consider withholding aid?

Trump: I think that Israel has done one thing very badly: public relations. I don't think that the Israel Defense Fund or any other group should be sending out pictures every night of buildings falling down and being bombed with possibly people in those buildings every single night, which is what they do.

So you won’t rule out withholding or conditioning aid?

Trump: No, I—we have to be. Look, there's been no president that's done what I've done for Israel. When you look at all of the things that I've done, and it starts with the Iran nuclear deal. You know, Bibi Netanyahu begged Obama not to do that deal. I ended that deal. And if they were smart and energetic, other than trying to get Trump, they would have made a deal because they were in bad shape. They should have made a deal with Iran. They didn't prosecute that. They didn't make that deal. But I did Golan Heights.

You did.

Trump: Nobody even thought of Golan Heights. I gave them Golan Heights. I did the embassy and in Jerusalem. Jerusalem became the capital. I built the embassy. I even built the embassy.

Right.

Trump: And it's a beautiful embassy for a lot less money than anybody ever thought possible. And you've heard that. But there's been no president that's done what I've done in Israel. And it's interesting. The people of Israel appreciate it. I have like a 98%—I have the highest approval numbers.

Do you know who doesn’t have a high approval rating right now in Israel, though?

Trump: Bibi.

Yeah. Do you think it's time for him to go?

Trump: Well, I had a bad experience with Bibi. And it had to do with Soleimani, because as you probably know by now, he dropped out just before the attack. And I said, “What's that all about?” Because that was going to be a joint and all of a sudden, we were told that Israel was not doing it. And I was not happy about that. That was something I never forgot. And it showed me something. I would say that what happened on—the October 7 should have never happened.

It happened on his watch.

Trump: No, it happened on his watch. And I think it's had a profound impact on him, despite everything. Because people said that shouldn't have happened. They have the most sophisticated equipment. They had—everything was there to stop that. And a lot of people knew about it, you know, thousands and thousands of people knew about it, but Israel didn't know about it, and I think he's being blamed for that very strongly, being blamed. And now you have the hostage situation—

Has his time passed?

Trump: And I happen to think that on the hostages, knowing something about the enemy, and knowing something about people, I think you have very few hostages left. You know, they talk about all of these hostages. I don't believe these people are able or even wanting to take care of people as negotiations. I don't—I think the hostages are going to be far fewer than people think, which is a very sad thing.

You think you could work better with Benny Gantz than Netanyahu in a second term?

Trump: I think Benny Gantz is good, but I'm not prepared to say that. I haven't spoken to him about it. But you have some very good people that I've gotten to know in Israel that could do a good job.

Do you think—

Trump: And I will say this, Bibi Netanyahu rightfully has been criticized for what took place on October 7.

Do you think an outcome of that war between Israel and Hamas should be a two state solution between Israelis and Palestinians?

Trump: Most people thought it was going to be a two-state solution. I'm not sure a two-state solution anymore is gonna work. Everybody was talking about two states, even when I was there. I was saying, “What do you like here? Do you like two states?” Now people are going back to—it depends where you are. Every day it changes now. If Israel’s making progress, they don't want two states. They want everything. And if Israel's not making progress, sometimes they talk about two-state solution. Two-state solution seemed to be the idea that people liked most, the policy or the idea that people liked above.

Do you like it?

Trump: It depends when. There was a time when I thought two states could work. Now I think two states is going to be very, very tough. I think it's going to be much tougher to get. I also think you have fewer people that liked the idea. You had a lot of people that liked the idea four years ago. Today, you have far fewer people that like that idea.

You said–

Trump; There may not be another idea. You know, there are people that say that that situation is one of the toughest, the toughest to settle.

Yeah, absolutely.

Trump: Because children grow up and they're taught to hate Jewish people at a level that nobody thought was possible. And I had a friend, a very good friend, Sheldon Adelson, who felt that it was impossible to make a deal because the level of hatred was so great. And I think it was much more so on one side than the other, but the level of hatred of Jewish people was so great, and taught from the time they were in kindergarten and before. He felt that—and he was a great dealmaker. He was a very rich man. He was a rich man because of his ability to make deals. And he loved Israel more than anything else. He loved Israel, and he wanted to protect Israel. And he felt that it was impossible to make a deal because of the level of hatred.

Do you feel that way now?

Trump: I disagreed with it. But so far, he hasn’t been wrong.

You said you're proud to be one of the first presidents in generations to have not gotten the United States into a war. You addressed this a little bit in the press conference. But if Iran and Israel got into a war, will you join in Israel side?

Trump: I have been very loyal to Israel, more loyal than any other president. I've done more for Israel than any other president. Yeah, I will protect Israel.

You came out this week and said that abortion should be left to the states and you said you won't sign a federal ban. So just to be clear: Will you veto any bill that imposes any federal restrictions on abortions?

Trump: You don’t need a federal ban. We just got out of the federal. You know, if you go back on Roe v. Wade, Roe v. Wade was all about—it wasn't about abortion so much as bringing it back to the states. So the states would negotiate deals. Florida is going to be different from Georgia and Georgia is going to be different from other places. But that's what's happening now. It's very interesting. But remember this, every legal scholar for 53 years has said that issue is a state issue from a legal standpoint. And it's starting to work that way. And what's happened is people started getting into the 15 weeks and the five weeks or the six weeks and they started getting into, you know, time periods. And they started all of a sudden deciding what abortion was going to be.

People want to know whether you would veto a bill, if it came to your desk, that would impose any federal restrictions. This is really important to a lot of voters.

Trump: But you have to remember this: There will never be that chance because it won't happen. You're never going to have 60 votes. You're not going to have it for many, many years, whether it be Democrat or Republican. Right now, it’s essentially 50-50. I think we have a chance to pick up a couple, but a couple means we're at 51 or 52. We have a long way to go. So it's not gonna happen, because you won't have that. Okay. But with all of that being said, it's all about the states, it's about state rights. States’ rights. States are going to make their own determination.

Do you think that—

Trump: And you know what? That’s taken tremendous pressure off everybody. But we—it was ill-defined. And to be honest, the Republicans, a lot of Republicans, didn't know how to talk about the issue. That issue never affected me.

So just to be clear, then: You won't commit to vetoing the bill if there's federal restrictions—federal abortion restrictions?

Trump : I won't have to commit to it because it’ll never—number one, it’ll never happen. Number two, it’s about states’ rights. You don't want to go back into the federal government. This was all about getting out of the federal government. And this was done, Eric, because of—this was done, this issue, has been simplified greatly over the last one week. This is about and was originally about getting out of the federal government. The last thing you want to do is go back into the federal government. And the states are just working their way through it. Look at Ohio. Ohio passed something that people were a little surprised at. Kansas, I mean, places that are conservative and big Trump states, I mean, Ohio and way up Kansas, all these states, but they passed what they want to pass. It's about states rights.

I understand, sir. Your allies in the Republican Study Committee, which makes up about 80% of the GOP caucus, have included the Life at Conception Act in their 2025 budget proposal. The measure would grant full legal rights to embryos. Is that your position as well?

Trump: Say it again. What?

The Life at Conception Act would grant full legal rights to embryos, included in their 2025 budget proposal. Is that your position?

Trump: I'm leaving everything up to the states. The states are going to be different. Some will say yes. Some will say no. Texas is different than Ohio.

Would you veto that bill?

Trump: I don't have to do anything about vetoes, because we now have it back in the states.

Okay.

Trump: They’re gonna make those determinations.

Do you think women should be able to get the abortion pill mifepristone?

Trump: Well, I have an opinion on that, but I'm not going to explain. I'm not gonna say it yet. But I have pretty strong views on that. And I'll be releasing it probably over the next week.

Well, this is a big question, Mr. President, because your allies have called for enforcement of the Comstock Act, which prohibits the mailing of drugs used for abortions by mail. The Biden Department of Justice has not enforced it. Would your Department of Justice enforce it?

Trump: I will be making a statement on that over the next 14 days.

You will?

Trump: Yeah, I have a big statement on that. I feel very strongly about it. I actually think it’s a very important issue.

Got it. You think this issue should be left to the states. You've made that perfectly clear. Are you comfortable if states decide to punish women who access abortions after the procedure is banned?

Trump: Are you talking about number of weeks?

Yeah. Let’s say there’s a 15-week ban—

Trump: Again, that’s going to be—I don't have to be comfortable or uncomfortable. The states are going to make that decision. The states are going to have to be comfortable or uncomfortable, not me.

Do you think states should monitor women's pregnancies so they can know if they've gotten an abortion after the ban?

Trump: I think they might do that. Again, you'll have to speak to the individual states. Look, Roe v. Wade was all about bringing it back to the states. And that was a legal, as well as possibly in the hearts of some, in the minds of some, a moral decision. But it was largely a legal decision. Every legal scholar, Democrat, Republican, and other wanted that issue back at the states. You know, Roe v. Wade was always considered very bad law. Very bad. It was a very bad issue from a legal standpoint. People were amazed it lasted as long as it did. And what I was able to do is through the choice of some very good people who frankly were very courageous, the justices it turned out to be you know, the Republican—

States will decide if they're comfortable or not—

Trump: Yeah the states—

Prosecuting women for getting abortions after the ban. But are you comfortable with it?

Trump: The states are going to say. It’s irrelevant whether I’m comfortable or not. It's totally irrelevant, because the states are going to make those decisions. And by the way, Texas is going to be different than Ohio. And Ohio is going to be different than Michigan. I see what's happening.

President Trump, we're here in Florida. You're a resident of Florida.

Trump: Yeah.

How do you plan to vote in the state’s abortion referendum this November that would overturn DeSantis’s six-week ban?

Trump: Well, I said I thought six weeks is too severe.

You did.

Trump: You know, I've said that previously.

Yes.

Trump: I think it was a semi-controversial statement when I made it, and it's become less and less controversial with time. I think Ron was hurt very badly when he did this because the people—even conservative women in Florida thought it was—

Well this referendum would undo that. Are you gonna vote for it in November?

Trump: Well, it'll give something else. I don't tell you what I'm gonna vote for. I only tell you the state's gonna make a determination.

Okay, sir. Violent crime is going down throughout the country. There was a 6% drop in—

Trump: I don't believe it.

You don’t believe that?

Trump: Yeah, they’re fake numbers.

You think so?

Trump: Well it came out last night. The FBI gave fake numbers.

I didn't see that, but the FBI said that there was a 13% drop in 2023. [Editor's note: This statistic refers specifically to homicides.]

Trump: I don’t believe it. No, it’s a lie. It’s fake news.

Sir, these numbers are collected by state and local police departments across the country. Most of them support you. Are they wrong?

Trump: Yeah. Last night. Well, maybe, maybe not. The FBI fudged the numbers and other people fudged numbers. There is no way that crime went down over the last year. There's no way because you have migrant crime. Are they adding migrant crime? Or do they consider that a different form of crime?

So these local police departments are wrong?

Trump: I don't believe it's from the local police. What I saw was the FBI was giving false numbers.

Okay. So if elected, going on to the Department of Justice. If elected, would you instruct your Attorney General to prosecute the state officials who are prosecuting you, like Alvin Bragg and Fani Willis?

Trump: Well, we're gonna look at a lot of things like they're looking. What they've done is a terrible thing. No, I don't want to do that. I was not happy looking at Clinton. I was not happy. I think it's a terrible thing. But unfortunately, what they've done is they've lifted up the lid and they've—what they've done to me is incredible. Over nothing.

Well you said Alvin Bragg should be prosecuted. Would you instruct your Attorney General to prosecute him?

Trump: When did I say Alvin Bragg should be prosecuted?

It was at a rally.

Trump: I don’t think I said that, no.

I can pull it up.

Trump: No.

So just to be clear: You wouldn’t instruct your Attorney General to prosecute Alvin Bragg?

Trump: We are going to have great retribution through success. We're going to make our country successful again. Our retribution is going to be through success of our country.

Would you fire a U.S. attorney who didn't prosecute someone you ordered him to? Him or her?

Trump: It depends on the situation, honestly.

So you might?

Trump: It would depend on the situation. Yeah.

Okay, so sir, you said that you would appoint a real special prosecutor to go after Biden and his family—

Trump: Well, it depends what happens with the Supreme Court. Look, a president should have immunity. That includes Biden. If they've ruled that they don't have immunity, Biden, probably nothing to do with me, he would be prosecuted for 20 different acts, because he's created such. You take a look at not only his criminal acts of taking a lot of money and being a Manchurian Candidate. Look at what happened in Afghanistan. Look at what happened throughout the world. Look at what happened with him allowing Russia to do that with Ukraine. That would have never happened with me, and it didn't happen. And I knew Putin very well.

President Trump, isn’t going after your political opponents what they do in a banana republic?

Trump: That’s what’s happening now. Yeah.

Well okay—

Trump: No, no, no, no. Eric, that’s what’s happening now. I’ve got to be on Monday—in fact, we’re doing this today because Monday was a little bit tougher, because I have to be in a criminal court on Monday.

That’s right.

Trump: Over a non-criminal case. It's not even a criminal case. And it's like I said, if you go to Andy McCarthy, or if you go to Jonathan Turley, two real experts, or if you go to all the legal scholars that wrote, they say, this isn't even a criminal case. And I have a judge who's more conflicted than any judge anyone's ever seen. And he's a mean guy who hates Trump. And you take a look at what's going on there. You just asked me, you know, you're talking about—you just asked me a question and they're doing that to me!

Well, sir, just to be clear—

Trump: Wait a minute, I haven't had a chance to do it to them. I would be inclined not to do it. I don't want to do it to them. But a lot of that's going to have to do with the Supreme Court. Look, we are going in another two weeks to the Supreme Court. And they're going to make a ruling on presidential immunity. If they said that a president doesn't get immunity, then Biden, I am sure, will be prosecuted for all of his crimes, because he's committed many crimes. If they say, on the other hand, that a president has immunity, and I happen to think a president has to have immunity, because otherwise it's going to be just a ceremonial position. But Biden has done so many things so badly. And I'm not even talking the overt crime. I'm talking about the border, allowing all of the death and destruction at the border—

Sir—

Trump: Allowing all of this stuff. If a president doesn't have immunity. So when you asked me that question, it depends on what the Supreme Court does.

Well on that question, your lawyer, John Sauer, argued in court recently that if you as President ordered a Navy SEAL team to assassinate a political rival, you shouldn’t be prosecuted. Do you agree with your lawyer?

Trump: Well, I understood it differently. I thought it was a political rival from another country. I think I understood it differently, and I'm not sure. And John Sauer also said that first you go through an impeachment and then you make that determination based on impeachment. But a president, if you don't don't have immunity from prosecution, fairly strong immunity from prosecution. Now, if you do something just overtly very bad and very stupid, that's a different situation. That may be one of those cases.

Gotcha. So just to come back to something you were saying a moment ago, I just want to say for the record, there's no evidence that President Biden directed this prosecution against you. But even if we—

Trump: Oh sure there is.

Well, even if we stipulated that—

Trump: I always hate the way a reporter will make those statements. They know it’s so wrong. It’s just sort of to protect yourself. But no, no. His head of the Justice Department, one of the top few people, was put into the DOJ. Fani, Mr. Wade, Fani’s lover, spent hours in Washington with the DOJ working on my case. The DOJ worked with Leticia James on my case. The DOJ worked with deranged Jack Smith. He's a deranged person on my case. No, no, this is all Biden—

But the question, though—

Trump: And by the way, let me go a step further.

Okay.

Trump: On my case with a woman that I never—that I have no idea who she is, until she made a phone call. “Do you know her?” And I said, “This is something that's a figment of her imagination.”

You’re talking about E. Jean Carroll?

Trump: Then I got sued. Until that, I had no idea who this woman was, I have no, I had nothing to do with this woman. That was done by a political lawyer in front of a highly, in my opinion, a totally inappropriate judge, who was conflicted for a lot of reasons, who wouldn't allow us to put in evidence, he was so bad, he was so evil. But I've had three of those judges in New York now, three of them. That's all I get. And it's a very unfair situation. They've gone after me, it's called election interference. But it's even beyond election interference, what they've done, and they've never seen, and I sort of, it's amazing when you say that Biden knew nothing. Biden knew everything. Just like, he knew nothing about Tucker's business and his business.

Even if we stipulate that, do two wrongs make a right?

Trump: No, I don't, I wouldn't want to, I wouldn't want to do anything having to do with. I wouldn't want to hurt Biden. I'm not looking to hurt Biden. I wouldn't want to hurt him. I have too much respect for the office. But he is willing to hurt a former President who is very popular, who got 75 million votes. I got more votes than any other sitting president in history. And I have probably eight cases right now that are all inspired by them, including my civil case.

Medicare—

Jason Miller: Eric, the President has his dinner in about 15 minutes. So he has a few more minutes here.

Trump: Are you staying? Are you going to have dinner with everybody?

Yeah, yeah. We only have 15 minutes left?

Trump: Yeah, his dinner is at 7:15.

In that case, let’s just do some rapid-fire questions.

Trump: All right. Do you think you could do this interview with Biden?

You know, he didn’t say yes. So I’m grateful that you’re giving me the opportunity.

Trump: He will never say yes, cause he’s off. He’s off, way off.

Let's take a second to talk about January 6. You have called the men and women who have been prosecuted for their actions on January 6 “hostages” and “political prisoners.” More than 800 of these people have been sentenced through our judicial system, most of whom pleaded guilty. Some of them have been convicted by juries. You've said you will pardon them. Are you calling into question the conclusions of the justice system in more than 800 cases?

Trump: It’s a two-tier system. Because when I look at Portland, when I look at Minneapolis, where they took over police precincts and everything else, and went after federal buildings, when I look at other situations that were violent, and where people were killed, nothing happened to them. Nothing happened to them. I think it's a two-tier system of justice. I think it's a very, very sad thing. And whether you like it or not, nobody died other than Ashli.

Will you consider pardoning every one of them?

Trump: I would consider that, yes.

You would?

Trump: Yes, absolutely.

All right, so—

Trump: If somebody was evil and bad, I would look at that differently. But many of those people went in, many of those people were ushered in. You see it on tape, the police are ushering them in. They’re walking with the police.

I want to ask you another question on this. There are some former allies and staff who don't support you in this election and have cited your attempts to overturn the 2020 election. What would you say to voters who like your policies, but who believe that someone who attacked a cornerstone of democracy—the peaceful transfer of power—cannot be entrusted to preserve it?

Trump: Well, actually, I did the opposite of attack. I'm the one that tried to stop it. I offered 10,000 soldiers and Nancy Pelosi turned me down. So did the mayor of Washington, she turned me down in writing.

What would you say to those voters, though?

Trump: That I offered. Number one, I made a speech that was peaceful and patriotic that nobody reports. Nobody talks about it: peacefully and patriotically. Nobody talks. You know, the committee never used those words. They refused to allow those words. Number two, I had like five tweets that were, go home, blah, blah. I got canceled because of those tweets.

No—

Trump: No, I got canceled because of those tweets. I didn't get canceled because of bad things I said. I got canceled because of good things I said. Because when you read my tweets, and when you see the speech that I made, and when you see the statement that I made in the Oval Office in the Rose Garden, during this very dramatic and horrible period, I'm a very innocent man. Nancy Pelosi is responsible, because she refused to take the 10,000 soldiers or National Guardsmen that I offered. She refused to take them. The mayor of Washington refused to take them too. And they're responsible, you know, for the Capital.

Speaking of this, looking forward—

Trump: One other thing they did that’s so horrible and the press refuses to talk about it. They destroyed all evidence.

Are you worried about political violence in connection with this November's election?

Trump: No. I don't think you’ll have political violence.

You don’t expect anything?

Trump: I think we're gonna have a big victory. And I think there will be no violence.

Mr. President, you've talked a lot about your plan to obliterate the deep state. What exactly does that mean?

Trump: It means we want to get rid of bad people, people that have not done a good job in government. And we look at people like a company would look at people. You know, when you buy a company, you go in and you look at, how do you like the job? Job performance. They have job performance standards. And yeah, we would like to get rid of people that haven't done a good job. And there are plenty of them.

How do you plan to do that? Your team is preparing to give you the power through Schedule F, which would allow you to fire civil servants.

Trump: We’re looking at a lot of different things. Civil service is both very good and very bad. You have some people that are protected that shouldn’t be protected. And you have some people you almost want to protect because they do such a good job. I know a lot of people that are in civil service and they’re outstanding people.

Would you hire anyone who believes Joe Biden won the 2020 election?

Trump: I have no doubt that what we said was fact. The press, the fake news media, doesn't want to talk about it. You know, I have a lawsuit against the Pulitzer Foundation over the Russia, Russia, Russia hoax, because they talked about it for two and a half years and it turned out to be a total scam. And then certain writers got Nobel Prizes—

The RNC is holding litmus tests on employees, asking if they believe the election was stolen or not. Would you do the same? [Editor's Note: While the RNC is reportedly asking job applicants this question, it has denied it is a litmus test for employment.]

Trump: I wouldn’t feel good about it, because I think anybody that doesn't see that that election was stolen. It just—you look at the proof. It's so vast, state legislatures where they didn't go through the legislature. They had to go through the legislature. You look at it, it’s so vast, all of the different things. I could give you report after report on state after state of all of the fraud that was committed in the election, and if you had a really open mind, you would say I was right.

I want to get to your policies on Russia and Ukraine in a second, but President Trump, we just passed the one year anniversary of Evan Gerskovich’s detainment in Russia. Why haven't you called for his release?

Trump: I guess because I have so many things I'm working on. I have hundreds of things. And I probably have said very good things about him. Maybe it wasn't reported. But I think he's a very brave young man.

Will you do it now?

Trump: You’re talking about Wall Street Journal?

Yeah.

Trump: Oh, I would certainly call. I’ll call for it right now in your story if you'd like.

Excellent.

Trump: But I do have. I do have many, many things. And here's a difference between me and Biden: I'll get him released. He'll be released. Putin is going to release him.

Can we talk about—

Trump: I think Biden has dealt with Putin very poorly. Putin should never have gone into Ukraine. And he didn't go in for four years with me. I get along very well with Putin, but the reporter should be released and he will be released. I don't know if he's going to be released under Biden.

But you would try to get him released as President?

Trump: Yeah, I would get him released. Yes.

You said that Russia—

Trump: I’m surprised that Biden. Well, I'm not surprised with anything with Biden. But I think it's a terrible precedent. And I'm very surprised that he hasn't been released, but I will get him released, if he's not released by the time we get to office.

Sir, you have said that you're willing to let Russia “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO countries that don't spend enough on their defense. If Putin attacked a NATO state that you believe was not spending enough on their defense, would the U.S. come to that country's assistance?

Trump: Yeah, when I said that, I said it with great meaning, because I want them to pay. I want them to pay up. That was said as a point of negotiation. I said, Look, if you're not going to pay, then you're on your own. And I mean that. And the question was asked to me: If we don't pay? It was asked to me long before this event. Do you know that, after I said that, do you know that billions of dollars poured into NATO? Do you know that?

I know that, sir. Secretary General Stoltenberg gave you credit for that. He said that your threat to pull out of NATO—

Trump: Correct.

Led to the allied countries giving $100 billion more on their defense.

Trump: Both then and three years before. Do you know that NATO—the cupboards were bare. They had no cash, they were dying, we were spending almost 100% of the money on NATO. We were protecting Europe. And they weren't even paying.

The question, though, is would you—

Trump: Eight. Only eight countries were paying. The rest of them were delinquent. And I said to them, if you don't pay, enjoy yourselves, but we're not going to protect you. I said it again a few weeks ago, two months ago, I said it again. And I said it, that if you don't pay. Look, that's the way you talk as a negotiator. I'm negotiating because I want them to pay. I want Europe to pay. I want nothing bad to happen to Europe, I love Europe, I love the people of Europe, I have a great relationship with Europe. But they've taken advantage of us, both on NATO and on Ukraine. We're in for billions of dollars more than they're in in Ukraine. It shouldn't be that way. It should be the opposite way. Because they're much more greatly affected. We have an ocean in between us. They don't. And when I say things like that, that’s said as a point of negotiation, and I did a very good job because billions of dollars came in recently.

You said in 2016 in an interview, you said “in order to get reform, you have to be willing to walk away.”

Trump: I said, for instance, the question was asked when we had a very big meeting, rather secret, but the press knew about it. We had 28 countries at that time. And a gentleman stood up who happened to be the head of a very important country. And he said, “Are you saying”— because I said to him, “You guys aren't paying your bills, we're paying your bills. It's not fair. You're hurting us on trade. And then on top of it, we're defending you. We're spending most of the money on NATO with the United States.” I said it's not fair. And the man stood up and said, “Are you saying that if we aren't paying our bills, if we don't pay our bills, and Russia attacks us, are you saying that you will not protect us?” I said that's exactly what I'm saying.

Now, after I said that, billions of dollars poured in. It was like magic. Obama never said that. Obama would go give a speech and he’d leave. Bush would go give his speech and he’d leave. I went, I looked at the numbers, and I said, wait a minute, the United States is paying for NATO. We're paying for close to 100% of NATO.

So the question, though, sir—

Trump: And not being treated right, because we're being treated very badly by most of the same countries on trade.

So you want to renegotiate the terms of the treaty, it sounds like. Do you want to—

Trump: No, I just want them to pay their bills. I don't have to renegotiate it. It's like Biden. Biden has the right to close up the border right now. He doesn't need anything from Congress. Same thing with NATO. I don't need to renegotiate the terms of the treaty. All I need to do is have them pay their bills. They don't pay their bills.

Do you want to maintain 80 years of American leadership in defending the West, especially Europe, or do you want to change the architecture of the post-war world that has kept us out of a World War for the last 80 years?

Trump: I want them to pay their bills. Very simple. NATO is fine. See, the problem I have with NATO is, I don't think that NATO would come to our defense if we had a problem.

You don't?

Trump: No, I don't believe that. I know them all. It's a one-way street, even if they paid. I want them to pay. But I believe if we were attacked, NATO wouldn't be there. Many of the countries in NATO would not be there.

Would you continue to provide military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine?

Trump: I’m going to try and help Ukraine but Europe has to get there also and do their job. They're not doing their job. Europe is not paying their fair share.

Orban says he came here and met with you, and said that you wouldn’t give a penny. Is he wrong?

Trump: No, I said I wouldn't give unless Europe starts equalizing. They have to come. Europe has to pay. We are in for so much more than the European nations. It's very unfair to us. And I said if Europe isn't going to pay, who are gravely more affected than we are. If Europe is not going to pay, why should we pay?

So you may not aid Ukraine?

Trump: Look, we get hurt on trade. We get hurt on trade. European Union is brutal to us on trade. We went over it, the cars, they don't want our agriculture. They don't want our cars. They don't want anything from us. It's like a one-way street. Well it’s the same thing with NATO. They treat us very badly. They don't pay their bills. Now, I came along and they start paying their bills. I'll tell you something, Secretary Stoltenberg said, and I hope he says it now, but he certainly said it then loud and clear, he has never seen any force like Trump. Because every president would come over, they'd make a speech and they'd leave. Trump came over and he got us billions and billions of dollars. I got them hundreds of billions of dollars from countries that were delinquent. And he was my biggest fan. I hope he still is, but I don't know that he is, you know, maybe he is, maybe he is. But even this recent go-round, right, because you're asking me a question. There are two parts of that question. One is, four years ago, and one is now. I did a hell of a job getting money for NATO because nobody else—NATO had no money. NATO couldn't have even prosecuted what they're doing right now. They had no money. All they were doing was building stupid office buildings. They built a $3 billion office building.

Taiwan—

Miller: Eric, Eric, I gotta wrap because his dinner is coming up.

Can we just do the rapid fire then, because—

Miller: Eric, I literally have three minutes until this dinner starts.

Okay, you said—

Trump: By the way, you understand what I just said?

Yeah, yeah.

Trump: He spent $3 billion by the same architect—

Let’s just go through this rapid fire because of the time.

Trump: But you understand?

I do. I do, Mr. President. You said you only want to be dictator for a day. What did you mean by that?

Trump: That was said sarcastically as a joke on Sean Hannity. He said, “Do you want to be a dictator?” I said, “Only for one day. I want to close up the border and I want to drill, baby, drill.” Then I said, “After that, then I never want to be a dictator.” That was done. That was said sarcastically. That was meant as a joke. Everybody knows that.

Do you see why—okay, you say you were joking, but do you see why—

Trump: No, no, wait. If you read it, it was a joke. I wanted to be for one day. You know why? Because we have an incompetent fool that’s allowing people to come into our country. We have an incompetent fool that drove energy prices so high over such a short period of time. And by the way, you know, he's gone to a lot of my policies now. But the day after the election, if they win, there won't be any more oil.

Do you see why so many Americans see language like that, you know, dictator for a day, suspending the Constitution—

Trump: I think a lot of people like it.

But you see why they see that as contrary to our most cherished democratic principles?

Trump: No. I think the press does. Not because they don’t understand it. They understand it as well as you do, as well as anybody does. That was said in fun, in jest, sarcastically.

Only four—

Trump: It’s like “Russia, if you’re listening.” Remember “Russia, if you’re listening”?

Yeah.

Trump: That was said in the exact same vein. “Russia, if you're listening.” Everybody knows that was said sarcastically. But they cut off the laughter. You know, they cut it off immediately. As soon as it was—immediately, it was cut off. But that was said, sarcastically, a joke, it was in jest. This is the same thing. I said, “I want to be dictator for one day, I want to close up the border. And I want to drill, baby, drill.” And then I said, “After that, I don't want to be a dictator.” Now—

You did.

Trump: I did. But nobody reports that.

Well, we have a chance to have a good conversation and get the full truth here, which is what I’m trying to do.

Trump: But you understand what I mean.

I know what you mean.

Trump: I hope you report it. Because that was said.

I’m giving you a chance to respond.

Trump: Good. That was also said, Eric, with a smile. I'm laughing. And Sean Hannity, it was a question that he asked me.

It scares people, though, sir. It scares people.

Trump: I don't understand why it would. Everybody. Anybody that saw it would say I was laughing. He was laughing. The whole place was laughing. You know, it was a town hall?

I saw it.

Trump: And the town hall, they were laughing like hell. That was said in jest.

Only four of the 44 people who served in your cabinet the last time are endorsing you in this election. [Editor’s note: Roughly half a dozen Trump cabinet members had endorsed him at the time of this interview.] A number, as you know, have come out and said they won't support you in this election.

Trump: I don’t know. Like who? I’ve gotten many. I got Mnuchin!

Your former chiefs of staff, your former secretary of defense—

Trump; Well, I don’t know. Look, I mean—

The question, though, is why should voters—

Trump: Well, wait. Even this week, Mnuchin endorsed me. Pompeo endorsed me. Who are the people that? I mean, some didn’t because I didn't think they were very good. Look, when people think you don't like them and you're not going to bring them back. I'm not going to bring many of those people back. I had some great people. I had some bad people. When they think they are not in favor and they're not coming back, they're not inclined to endorse.

Well, the question I have to ask you, sir, is why should voters trust you?

Trump: I’ve had a lot of people endorse me.

You’ve gotten a lot of—

Miller: I’ll send him the full list.

You’ve gotten a lot of endorsements. I don’t dispute that. But the question I have to ask—

Trump: No, I mean that. I’ve had a lot of people endorse me from cabinets. Now, I have to tell you this, I haven’t asked for a lot of endorsements.

They come to you know. I know, sir.

Trump: If I call up 95% of those people that you say, if I made one phone call, they’d be endorsing me in two minutes.

The question I have to ask you is: Why should voters trust you when so many of the people who watched you the most closely in the first term don't think you should serve a second?

Trump: Well, they don't because I didn't like them. Some of those people I fired. Bill Barr, I fired Bill Barr. I didn't want him. Other people. I thought he did a terrible job. As soon as he was going to be impeached, he was going to be impeached by the Democrats, he totally folded. Bolton was a fool. He was a stupid fool. But actually, he served a good purpose because he's a nutjob. And every time he walked into a room, people thought you were going to war. He's one of the people, one of the many people, that convinced Bush to go into the Middle East, blow the place up and end up with a whole destroyed world. And nothing. What did anybody get out of it? We blew up the Middle East. And nobody got anything out of it. That was one of the Bolton people. You could go past. You could give me every single person you're talking about. And I would tell you a reason why I wouldn't want their endorsement. Now I had great people like, you know, I rebuilt the military.

Miller: The president's late for his dinner.

Biden doesn’t have any cabinet members who have come out against him.

Trump: Because Biden’s a very different kind of a guy than me. He keeps bad people. For instance, when you had Afghanistan, he kept Milley. Milley should have been fired immediately. Milley should have been fired based on his statement to China. If he actually made those statements, that's a very serious thing. You know, the statement to China, if he actually made them, and I guess he did, because they're on tape. That is really a serious problem. But he should have been fired for that. Other people should have been. Many people should have been fired. I did fire people, I fired a lot of people. Now I let them quit because ,you know, I have a heart. I don't want to embarrass anybody. But almost every one of those people were fired by me.

You could look at the military people. I said, “Hand me a letter, general, hand me a letter,” every one of them. So they handed me a letter. I don't think I’ll do that again. I think, from now on, I’ll fire. You know why? Because they say that they quit. They didn't quit. I said, “Hand me a letter.” That's a gentleman's thing to do. “General, hand me a letter.” I took care of ISIS. I had people saying it would take five years. I did it in a very short period of time. We have a great military, if you look at our military, I have great support from our military, from the real people, from the real generals, not the television generals. But I could ask for endorsements from 90 to 95% of the people that you're telling me. Every one of them would give me an endorsement.

Would you—

Miller: Eric, Eric, I do have to get the president to his dinner. I’m sorry.

Both the Heritage Foundation's Project 25 and the American Conservative magazine, they're a big supporter of yours, have proposed abolishing the 22nd amendment that limits presidents to two terms. They say that, you know, if you come back into office, you will have served two non-consecutive terms, and that if the popular will is there for you, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to—[Editor's note: The proposal came from the American Conservative, not Project 25.]

Trump: I didn't know they did that.

Well, would you definitely retire after a second term, or would you consider challenging the 22nd amendment?

Trump: Well, I would, and I don't really have a choice, but I would.

You would consider it?

Trump: I’m at a point where I would, I think, you know, I would do that. Look, it’s two terms. I had two elections. I did much better on the second one than I did the first. I got millions more votes. I was treated very unfairly. They used COVID to cheat and lots of other things to cheat. But I was treated very unfairly. But no, I'm going to serve one term, I'm gonna do a great job. We're gonna have a very successful country again—

But you’d consider it?

Trump: And then I'm gonna leave.

You’d consider it, you said.

Trump: Consider what?

Challenging the 22nd amendment.

Trump: I don't know anything about it. I mean, you're telling me now that somebody's looking to terminate. I wouldn't be in favor of it. I wouldn't be in favor of a challenge. Not for me. I wouldn't be in favor of it at all. I intend to serve four years and do a great job. And I want to bring our country back. I want to put it back on the right track. Our country is going down. We're a failing nation right now. We're a nation in turmoil.

Miller: Eric, we’re way past—the President’s gotta get to his dinner. I’m sorry.

Is there anything we didn’t talk about that you wanna talk about before they—

Trump: No.

Any question that I didn’t ask you that I should have?

Trump: No, I thought it was a good interview, actually.

Well, I really appreciate—

Trump: I mean, if it’s written fairly, it’s a good interview.

I had so many more questions I’d love to ask you.

Trump: And I find them to be very interesting questions.

I just try to ask good, probing questions. I have a lot more I’d love to talk about.

Trump: All I ask is one thing: Treat it fairly.

I will, sir.

Trump: I will say this, let me just say this. Everybody wants to work for me. And a lot of people say, “Oh, would he work for me? Oh, would he be a Vice President? Would he accept?” Vice President? I’ve got everybody in the nation calling me begging me to be vice president. I have everybody calling me wanting to be in the cabinet. Everybody wants to work for me. Everybody. And the practice of saying, “General, give me a letter” or “somebody give me a letter,” that's a nice thing to do. I don't think I'll do it anymore. But that's a nice thing to do. But everybody wants to work for me. We're gonna have a very successful administration. And the advantage I have now is I know everybody. I know people. I know the good, the bad, the stupid, the smart. I know everybody. When I first got to Washington, I knew very few people. I had to rely on people. And some of those people gave me very good advice.

People close to you tell me you’re more skeptical now—

Trump: Of what?

Of people betraying you in Washington?

Trump: I'm not more skeptical. I know the way nature—that's the way nature works. And I run a tough operation and some people can't take it. You know, working for Biden is very easy. He never fires anybody. He should fire everybody having to do with Afghanistan. He should fire everybody having to do with the border. I would have fired everybody and it would have been a big story.

Miller: Eric, he’s 10 minutes late for his dinner.

All right, all right. I don’t mean to be rude.

Trump: No, I find it very interesting.

Thank you, sir.

Trump: Thank you very much. Follow-up Phone Interview With Trump

Two weeks after the Mar-a-Lago interview, TIME conducted a 20-minute phone interview with Trump on April 27. Below is a lightly edited transcript of that conversation.

Last time we spoke, you said you had an announcement coming over the next two weeks regarding your policy on the abortion pill mifepristone. You haven't made an announcement yet. Would you like to do so now?

Trump: No, I haven’t. I’ll be doing it over the next week or two. But I don't think it will be shocking, frankly. But I'll be doing it over the next week or two. We’re for helping women, Eric. I am for helping women. You probably saw that the IVF came out very well. And, you know, I set a policy on it, and the Republicans immediately adopted the policy.

That’s true.

Trump: And that was a good policy for women. You know, it's about helping women, not hurting women. And so IVF is now, I think, really part of what we do. And that was important. I think that might have been right around the time of our interview. But in terms of the finalization—and you saw that Alabama and other states have now passed legislation to approve that.

Right, right. And of course there was the law in Arizona that was passed since then too.

Trump: Right.

Mr. President, for the first time ever, Iran recently launched a massive attack against Israel from its own territory.

Trump: Right.

If Israel and Iran get into a war, should the US support Israel in striking Iran militarily?

Trump: Yes, if a situation like occurred. A lot of people say it was a ceremonial, it was a ceremonial attack. Because they allowed everybody to know what happened, et cetera, et cetera. If that’s the case, it would be a good thing, not a bad thing. But a lot of people say that that attack was, you know, I mean, everybody knew about it. I heard about it long before the attack was made, and so did many others. So it would depend, obviously, but the answer is yes. If they attack Israel, yes, we would be there.

Gotcha. Well, on that front, right now there are campus protests across the country, as you know, against Israel and against Israel's war in Gaza and against the United States’ posture there.

Trump: Right.

Your former Secretary of Defense says you once suggested shooting protesters in the leg during the Black Lives Matter—

Trump: Yeah, which Secretary of Defense was that?

That was Esper.

Trump: Well, he was my worst Secretary of Defense. He was a weak, ineffective person. He was recommended by some RINOs that I don't have too much respect for. But I was, you know, I was not there very long. So I had to rely on people. No, he was a very ineffective Secretary of Defense. No, but I would, are you talking about in the case of colleges, or what are you talking about?

I was just going to ask, would you use the American military against protesters as President?

Trump: Well, I would use certainly the National Guard, if the police were unable to stop. I would absolutely use the National Guard. It would be something, I mean, if you look at what happened in Washington with monuments, I passed the law. I took an old law, brought it into effect that you get a minimum of 10 years without any adjustment if you do anything to desecrate a monument and everything was immediately set up. I didn’t have to use very much. That was having to do with the monuments. That was the monument period, where they liked to rip down monuments.

And I signed into effect a law that gives you 10 years, not one day less than 10 years of prison if you desecrate a monument. You know, that was very effective. I don’t know, I think you saw it, everything stopped after that.

I remember that period, sir. So you would rule out using the military on protesters?

Trump: Well, I would use the National Guard. I don't think you'd ever have to use much more than that.

So you have spoken a lot about “woke-ism” on college campuses. Polls show a majority of your supporters have expressed the belief that anti-white racism now represents a greater problem in the country than anti-Black racism. Do you agree?

Trump: Oh, I think that there is a lot to be said about that. If you look at the Biden Administration, they're sort of against anybody depending on certain views. They're against Catholics. They're against a lot of different people. They actually don't even know what they're against, but they're against a lot. But no, I think there is a definite anti-white feeling in this country and that can't be allowed either.

How would you address that as President?

Trump: I don't think it would be a very tough thing to address, frankly. But I think the laws are very unfair right now. And education is being very unfair, and it's being stifled. But I don't think it's going to be a big problem at all. But if you look right now, there's absolutely a bias against white and that's a problem.

I want to get to your thoughts on China. Do you think the U.S. should defend Taiwan if China invades?

Trump: Well, I’ve been asked this question many times and I always refuse to answer it because I don't want to reveal my cards to a wonderful reporter like you. But no. China knows my answer very well. But they have to understand that things like that can’t come easy. But I will say that I have never publicly stated although I want to, because I wouldn’t want to give away any negotiating abilities by giving information like that to any reporter.

I understand your position there—

Trump: It puts you in a very bad position if you actually come out and make a statement one way or the other.

I understand, sir. Taiwan's foreign minister said U.S. aid for Ukraine was critical for deterring China from attacking Taiwan. Do you agree with that?

Trump: Well, I think they think the concept, because they have the same concept. Are we going to be helping them the same as we helped Ukraine? So they would want to think that, they think if you’re not helping Ukraine, you’re most likely not going to be helping them. So I think it’s difficult from their standpoint in terms of the policy. That’s a policy of the United States. It’s to help various countries that are in trouble.

You said you would back Israel if it goes to war with Iran. Do you think the U.S. can keep troops in the Middle East and contain the expansionist goals of Russia and China at the same time, or would we need to withdraw troops to realistically manage our obligations overseas?

Trump: I think we have a lot of options. And I think we’re in a lot of places where we shouldn't be, and we probably aren't in some places where we should be. We have a lot of options as to troops. And one of the things we have, we can manage our expectations, troops can be put in certain locations very quickly.

Would you withdraw troops from South Korea?

Trump: Well, I want South Korea to treat us properly. As you know, I got them to—I had negotiations, because they were paying virtually nothing for 40,000 troops that we had there. We have 40,000 troops, and in a somewhat precarious position, to put it mildly, because right next door happens to be a man I got along with very well, but a man who nevertheless, he’s got visions of things.

And we have 40,000 troops that are in a precarious position. And I told South Korea that it's time that you step up and pay. They’ve become a very wealthy country. We've essentially paid for much of their military, free of charge. And they agreed to pay billions of dollars. And now probably now that I’m gone, they're paying very little. I don't know if you know that they renegotiated the deal I made. And they're paying very little. But they paid us billions, many billions of dollars, for us having troops there. From what I’m hearing, they were able to renegotiate with the Biden Administration and bring that number way, way down to what it was before, which was almost nothing.

Gotcha. President Trump, you have been—

Trump: Which doesn’t make any sense, Eric. Why would we defend somebody? And we’re talking about a very wealthy country. But they're a very wealthy country and why wouldn't they want to pay? They were actually, they were a pleasure to deal with. Not easy initially, but ultimately, they became a pleasure to deal with. And they agreed to pay billions dollars to the United States for our military being there. Billions, many billions.

President Trump, you have been the leader of the world's most powerful democracy and you have dealt with the leaders of authoritarian countries. Why is democracy better than dictatorship?

Trump: Well, it's because the word freedom. You have freedom. And you have all of the advantages with none of the disadvantages. You have freedom if you have a real democracy. I think we’re becoming less of a democracy when I look at the weaponization of the Justice Department, the FBI. When you look at what happened with FISA. When you look at all the things that have happened, we’re becoming less and less of a democracy. But with democracy, if it's a properly-run democracy, which it will be, if and when I get back into office, it’ll be a very proper democracy, not like what we have right now. I don't even think what we have right now is, where a presidential candidate has to spend eight hours a day in court instead of campaigning over nothing. Over zero. Over nonsense. And all speared and all spread out and—and really done by the Biden administration. And I think that's no longer democracy. I think that's third-world country stuff.

I want to get you to respond to one other thing you said that stirred some controversy. You once wrote on Truth Social that you might have to terminate parts of the Constitution. What did you mean by that?

Trump: I never said that at all. I never said that at all. When I talk about certain things, we are, there is nothing more important than our Constitution. But the Democrats have violated our Constitution with crooked elections and many other things. They violated it by using the FBI and the DOJ to go after people very unfairly, very unconstitutionally. I have a judge that gave me a gag order, where I'm the leading candidate, I'm leading Biden. I'm the Republican candidate who's substantially leading Biden. I don't know if you've seen the recent polls, Eric. But in fact, if you would, we will send them to you. Jason, if you could send them to Eric, it would be great.

Jason Miller: Yes, sir.

Trump: But we're substantially leading in all of the swing states and overall, and you know, I’m in a court case. A Biden-inspired court case, where the judge has put a gag order on me where I'm not allowed to answer many very important questions. And so that's a violation of our Constitution. And I would end those violations of Constitution. So that's what I was referring to. They have broken the Constitution. They have gotten very far astray from our Constitution. I'm talking about the fascists and the people in our government right now, because I consider them, you know, we talk about the enemy from within. I think the enemy from within, in many cases, is much more dangerous for our country than the outside enemies of China, Russia, and various others that would be called enemies depending on who the president is, frankly.

President Trump—

Trump: Because if you have the proper president, you'll be able to handle them very smartly, and everybody will be very satisfied. But if you don't have the proper president, I agree they would be strong enemies. But the enemy from within is a bigger danger to this country than the outside enemy, on the basis of having a president that knows what he's doing. Because if a President is good, solid, the proper person, and you're not gonna have a big problem with China, Russia or others, but you still have a problem from the sick people inside our country.

Mr. President, in our last conversation you said you weren't worried about political violence in connection with the November election. You said, “I think we're going to win and there won't be violence.” What if you don't win, sir?

Trump: Well, I do think we're gonna win. We're way ahead. I don't think they'll be able to do the things that they did the last time, which were horrible. Absolutely horrible. So many, so many different things they did, which were in total violation of what was supposed to be happening. And you know that and everybody knows that. We can recite them, go down a list that would be an arm’s long. But I don't think we're going to have that. I think we're going to win. And if we don't win, you know, it depends. It always depends on the fairness of an election. I don't believe they'll be able to do the things that they did the last time. I don't think they'll be able to get away with it. And if that's the case, we're gonna win in record-setting fashion.

One last question, Mr. President, because I know that your time is limited, and I appreciate your generosity. We have just reached the four-year anniversary of the COVID pandemic. One of your historic accomplishments was Operation Warp Speed. If we were to have another pandemic, would you take the same actions to manufacture and distribute a vaccine and get it in the arms of Americans as quickly as possible?

Trump: I did a phenomenal job. I appreciate the way you worded that question. So I have a very important Democrat friend, who probably votes for me, but I'm not 100% sure, because he's a serious Democrat, and he asked me about it. He said Operation Warp Speed was one of the greatest achievements in the history of government. What you did was incredible, the speed of it, and the, you know, it was supposed to take anywhere from five to 12 years, the whole thing. Not only that: the ventilators, the therapeutics, Regeneron and other things. I mean Regeneron was incredible. But therapeutics—everything. The overall—Operation Warp Speed, and you never talk about it. Democrats talk about it as if it’s the greatest achievement. So I don’t talk about it. I let others talk about it.

You know, you have strong opinions both ways on the vaccines. It's interesting. The Democrats love the vaccine. The Democrats. Only reason I don’t take credit for it. The Republicans, in many cases, don’t, although many of them got it, I can tell you. It’s very interesting. Some of the ones who talk the most. I said, “Well, you didn’t have it did you?” Well, actually he did, but you know, et cetera.

But Democrats think it’s an incredible, incredible achievement, and they wish they could take credit for it, and Republicans don’t. I don't bring it up. All I do is just, I do the right thing. And we've gotten actually a lot of credit for Operation Warp Speed. And the power and the speed was incredible. And don’t forget, when I said, nobody had any idea what this was. You know, we’re two and a half years, almost three years, nobody ever. Everybody thought of a pandemic as an ancient problem. No longer a modern problem, right? You know, you don't think of that? You hear about 1917 in Europe and all. You didn’t think that could happen. You learned if you could. But nobody saw that coming and we took over, and I’m not blaming the past administrations at all, because again, nobody saw it coming. But the cupboards were bare.

We had no gowns, we had no masks. We had no goggles, we had no medicines. We had no ventilators. We had nothing. The cupboards were totally bare. And I energized the country like nobody’s ever energized our country. A lot of people give us credit for that. Unfortunately, they’re mostly Democrats that give me the credit.

Well, sir, would you do the same thing again to get vaccines in the arms of Americans as quickly as possible, if it happened again in the next four years?

Trump: Well, there are the variations of it. I mean, you know, we also learned when that first came out, nobody had any idea what this was, this was something that nobody heard of. At that time, they didn’t call it Covid. They called it various names. Somehow they settled on Covid. It was the China virus, various other names.

But when this came along, nobody had any idea. All they knew was dust coming in from China. And there were bad things happening in China around Wuhan. You know, I predicted. I think you'd know this, but I was very strong on saying that this came from Wuhan. And it came from the Wuhan labs. And I said that from day one. Because I saw things that led me to believe that, very strongly led me to believe that. But I was right on that. A lot of people say that now that Trump really did get it right. A lot of people said, “Oh, it came from caves, or it came from other countries.” China was trying to convince people that it came from Italy and France, you know, first Italy, then France. I said, “No, it came from China, and it came from the Wuhan labs.” And that's where it ended up coming from. So you know, and I said that very early. I never said anything else actually. But I've been given a lot of credit for Operation Warp Speed. But most of that credit has come from Democrats. And I think a big portion of Republicans agree with it, too. But a lot of them don't want to say it. They don't want to talk about it.

So last follow-up: The Biden Administration created the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy, a permanent office in the executive branch tasked with preparing for epidemics that have not yet emerged. You disbanded a similar office in 2018 that Obama had created. Would you disband Biden's office, too?

Trump: Well, he wants to spend a lot of money on something that you don't know if it's gonna be 100 years or 50 years or 25 years. And it's just a way of giving out pork. And, yeah, I probably would, because I think we've learned a lot and we can mobilize, you know, we can mobilize. A lot of the things that you do and a lot of the equipment that you buy is obsolete when you get hit with something. And as far as medicines, you know, these medicines are very different depending on what strains, depending on what type of flu or virus it may be. You know, things change so much. So, yeah, I think I would. It doesn't mean that we're not watching out for it all the time. But it's very hard to predict what's coming because there are a lot of variations of these pandemics. I mean, the variations are incredible, if you look at it. But we did a great job with the therapeutics. And, again, these therapeutics were specific to this, not for something else. So, no, I think it's just another—I think it sounds good politically, but I think it's a very expensive solution to something that won't work. You have to move quickly when you see it happening.

Well, Mr. President, you've been extremely generous with your time, both in Mar-a-Lago and today, so thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to ask you these questions.

Trump: Thank you, Eric. And it’s an honor getting to know you. And call me anytime you want, okay?

All right, I will, sir. Thank you.

Trump: Okay. Thank you very much.

Correction, April 30: The original version of this transcript mis-attributed a proposal to abolish the 22nd amendment. It was proposed by the American Conservative magazine, but not by the Heritage Foundation's Project 25.

[daubigny-stan]

i watch a lot of youtube because i do not like having nothing on in the background lest i consume myself with my own thoughts. one of my most watched genres is fashion youtube. i've been watching fashion youtube since highschool, back in 2016-2017. and from watching all those yearly trends, thrift flips, and hauls, i've come to the conclusion that if i ever want to do youtube, i would not start until ive got a dayjob and like... robust self-esteem. age 27 AT LEAST.

so let me take you through my thought process. the queen of fashion youtube at the time was Ashley bestdressed. she did thrift hauls, thrift flips, outift inspos, the whole shebang. i think she was college - fresh graduate age when her channel was at peak popularity? and in 2020 she just dipped. disappeared. she makes content for ig only now and is working for many major fashion houses (good for her!). she vanished for a variety of reasons, in her videos she has always talked about her mental health struggles, having a stalker so she had to move a couple times during covid nonetheless, and honestly having the worst fanbase. i was on bestdressed reddit and discord at the time, these fans were horrible.

now, the most popular girlies on fashion youtube are kathleen illustrated, beepworld, mina le, and steal the spotlight (although im sorry to say in numbers not doing nearly as well as ashley; give em a watch if you're into fashion!). many of them started around the same time citing Ashley as a big influence. here i want to compare these creators to Ashley, not to incite hate but to understand what makes a healthy and sustainable content creator career.

I think age and career are a big factor because although social media content creation is usually a young man's job (because young people can keep up with trends and what not), the social part of social media is grueling. the horror of being known times like. a million. in ashley's case she had 3 million subscribers. and when you're around 21-25 ish you are the most insecure you will ever be. at least for me, i hope (im 22 now). so not only was ashley most likely struggling (she was very open about it, she made a lot of self deprecating jokes) but her biggest demographic was people her age who's insecurities were probably fueled by her content. like i will stress, im NOT blaming ashley, but like. 20 year olds watching another 20 yr old live her best life? oh my god the jealousy. the insecurity. it didn't help that she was so relatable and humble about it, i think we get more jealous of other people's success the closer they are to us (why i dont look at my personal instagram anymore lol). badabing badaboom parasocial relationship and 3 million people watching your every move and critiquing every bit of it. her fanbase had THE most baseless critiques. disguising her rich background or whatever, hating on her for being privileged (which she recognized a lot btw), literally going incel mode and making comments about every inch of her body, the only critique that holds up is prob the amazon video which she deleted. also she was not white which i think people were very weird about. i cant deny that her white contemporaries got much less hate.

what works with the creators now is some of them have careers outside of youtube and are also less personal with their content. for example, kathleen illustrated has a career in the creative industry which means she mostly does youtube for fun. you can tell it's not a source of stress for her, from the way she is in her videos. they also don't really talk about their lives in a personable way which separates them from their audience. now i know this point in particular in contentious, authenticity and relatability are huge selling points on youtube. but i guess it's more of analyzing the costs and benefits of it? is it worth to put your whole life out there? showing your boyfriend, your girlfriend, your friends? what if you split up? you can have a personable aura without revealing private details. in mina le's videos, since most of them are video essays she has the opportunity to show off her personality without revealing private details.

i hope the creators i mentioned and others don't have to go through what ashley bestdressed has gone through. i know content creation is a very passion filled career and to end up in circumstances where you lose your love for it sounds awful