#AND CONSENSUAL

[overleftdown]

saltburn and consent; an investigative tangent

felix, venetia, and farleigh all consider sex to be transaction rather than emotional. you can see this in the casual way felix approaches sexual intimacy. you can see this in the way farleigh is described to use sex as a tool. you can see this in the way venetia uses sex to fulfill her need for validation. i'd like to explore how this sort of... complicates consent, within these on-screen dynamics.

i'm going to start this off with venetia. in venetia and oliver's first one-on-one interaction, you can see that oliver doesn't yet understand what to do with venetia. he plays his normal, unimposing, nervous, slightly awkward but well-intentioned character. venetia is the one to lean forward, pushing and testing oliver's boundaries. you can infer from later scenes that venetia enjoys testing the boys felix brings back to saltburn. part of this is venetia's own neglectful upbringing; she's starved of attention and therefore validation. she needs to be appealing, and she needs people to want her. this dynamic tangibly twists once oliver has been handed venetia's vulnerability by elspeth.

what is important to understand about this film is that sex is more so about emotion than physicality. this is portrayed in the way that emerald fennell avoids any nudity or exposure in her sex scenes. this is portrayed in the way that oliver exhibits no real confidence until he knows where others are vulnerable. he's unable to exude any strictly sexual dominance; he can only step into his dominance when he knows why these people hate themselves. so, when oliver is given insight into venetia's psyche, he is being given her vulnerability. to me, the sex was merely oliver's way of stripping a wire raw so that a current could effectively travel, so to speak. this is where consent gets tricky. oliver was non-consensually given any real power he had over venetia prior to the actual sex. if oliver had simply slept with venetia without knowing her insecurities or mentioning them, he wouldn't have had any power of her.

now, farleigh. what's interesting is how this dynamic of power, vulnerability, and sex shifts even more with "quickstart." farleigh didn't want oliver's pity, or sympathy. in fact, he recognized that this vulnerability was taken from him by oliver. he might've thought that felix confided in oliver about farleigh's troubles, or maybe he knew that oliver had eavesdropped. either way, oliver entered that conversation believing that farleigh would be just as insecure and starved for validation as venetia (i'm sure farleigh is, but we all react to our misfortune differently). i think the difference between farleigh and venetia in this area is quite interesting. both of them use sex as a way of gaining something. venetia is using sex to fulfill her need for validation, while she grows more and more bored by the material world. she's not afraid of losing anything, she desperately needs to gain something. farleigh does everything to maintain what is tangible, accessible, and real. he sees the material world as an extension of his security, using it as both insurance and escapism. farleigh is constantly terrified, constantly weighing the positives and negatives of his actions.

so, here is oliver, who has yanked the sheet off of farleigh. this is the exposure. instead of biting oliver's proverbial carrot, farleigh does the same to oliver, and in front of everyone. farleigh, just like oliver, understands the power of vulnerability. this is the sort of nightmare where you're suddenly butt naked in front of the whole school. later that night, oliver wills up the confidence to attempt to dominate farleigh, to tame him. again, this isn't just sexual domination. this is "if there's anything i can say to them... if i can help in any way, just ask." this is "we both know i could ruin everything you've worked so hard for. we both know i can help or hurt you." or, at least, that's how farleigh understood it. oliver was planning to ruin farleigh's life no matter what farleigh agreed to. "are you going to behave?" was never just a kinky line to throw around, it's meant to be a threat. what's funny is that oliver already planned to follow through, regardless of whether farleigh decided to "behave." coercive, and painfully hopeless for farleigh.

of course, that isn't to say farleigh wasn't aroused by whatever power play oliver was leaning into. the same goes for venetia. i'm mostly explaining why it's not healthy, or safe, or sane, or consensual. is that not the point of the movie? to question what we find attractive? to stare it in the face and talk about it?

moving on to felix. i'm not really sure where to go with this. i talked about saltburn and its depiction of privilege on an earlier post. to sum it up, farleigh and venetia both have some privilege over oliver, while oliver has some privilege over both farleigh and venetia. oliver has absolutely nothing over felix. both of them are white, both of them are men, and felix happens to be richer than oliver. this is why oliver is... so pathetically desperate for felix. he's obsessed with what he cannot have, control, or dominate. oliver is the vulnerable one, oliver is the one that is eventually laid bare in front of felix. a liar, a manipulator, and pathetically desperate for felix's love. so desperate for someone so powerful to love someone like him.

and, once felix knows this, oliver kills him for it. he fucks the dirt felix is buried under, just to feel like he's taking something after felix took his secrets. oliver understands the power of vulnerability. oliver understands that sex is easy once you've already stolen what really matters from someone. oliver saw the connectivity of human nature and used it, twisted it, just to pull himself closer to felix. oliver's northern star, who he never truly got to have.

[peachfuzznygma]

what do you mean you guys don’t keep you bf’s hair and pieces of a broken tooth in small jar on your windowsill????

[stanperformanceunit]

Okay that VegasPete scene now lives rent free in my head

[guardianspirits13]

It's been 7 long years.

The final season of Percy Jackson and the Olympians has just begun to release.

The Ares and Apollo cabins are in a dispute over ownership for the flying chariot.

The counselors sit around a table in the Big House.

Percy has just learned that he's (probably) gonna die in the next month, when Clarisse and Michael begin to bicker. Percy has had it up to here.

He starts clapping rhythmically. There is a lull in the room as they stare at him.

He claps faster.

"Oh golly, the road's getting bumpy, cause I've got me some friends who just can't get along-"

[squarecloud73]

*I worship you Tumblr don’t remove it

…So about that leg pouch

[mo-mode]

This is all I got from episode 5 actually

[mumblesplash]

i know it’s like years old at this point but i love that one collab mumbo and grian did with tommyinnit bc it’s like the single most concentrated example i’ve seen of mumbo’s Chaos Nullification Powers

you get to see a bit of it on hermitcraft, mostly via his interactions with grian, but until seeing that collab it didn’t really hit me just how completely mumbo can no-sell other people’s attempts to control a situation. tommyinnit is possibly the single shoutiest, most chaotic minecraft youtuber out there, and in most videos i’ve seen he pretty much overwhelms everyone else and sets the tone for interactions because of this. but mumbo just. doesn’t let him. no matter how much tommy escalates in intensity, mumbo reacts with *exactly* the same energy he always does. grian largely comes across in the whole video as annoyed and reluctant to engage with the whole thing, but mumbo’s not even affected. he just rolls with anything he finds funny and basically ignores anything he disapproves of, only seeming more and more unflappable the harder anyone tries to get a rise out of him.

AND imo, this is the key to my favorite interpretation of him as a character

see, when the people around him are being more reasonable/calm, i think mumbo often comes across as anxious and a bit easily overwhelmed. the thing is, his nervous wet cat vibes do not scale. he has one setting. his responses to the last life ‘ah-ha!’ jokes and to hermitcraft 8 starting to crumble to pieces under a falling moon are almost identical.

mumbo jumbo is inexorably and eternally Just Some Guy, but that gets stranger and stranger the weirder his surroundings become. the giggly incredulousness that makes him an easy target for goofy puns looks Very different when it’s also his reaction to the impending end of the world.

[gumy-shark]

she’s cringe. she’s cooler than you. she’s so so smart. she’s the biggest dumbass you’ll ever meet. she’s got mental illnesses the dsm hasn’t even got a name for yet. she’s fine she’s fine she’s great actually she’s the normalest girl in the world. she’s hurt so many people. she regrets it so much. she wants to hurt people again. she’s the most neurotic loser you’ve ever seen. she’s the most confident composed competent member of the team. she lies until she doesn’t know what’s real. she’s even bisexual. i didn’t say her name but she popped into your head didn’t she

[fagtainsparklez]

“the writer’s strike will impact your favorite tv show!!!1!1!”

[tardis-technician]

Something about the way the doctors always argue when they meet themselves but all of them are always dunking on ten so specifically. Like yes they will all argue with each other but they take one look at that version of themselves and go yikes. You were my middle school cringe fail phase. You're shiny and dumb and easy to trick. There is so much wrong with you. Unlike me. I'm much more normal now (lying).

[asleepinawell]

me wearily opening twitter: please show me just one nice thing for once

twitter: baldur's gate 3 lets you fuck a bear

me: you know what? good enough

[ipledgeawaymysanity]

Grover represented all us dreamers who are always zoned out but occasionally zone back in to self-deprecate and give weird expressions while our friends talk...your honor i love him

[demigods-posts]

satyrs serve as demigod protectors, of which their job is to provide safe passage to camp half-blood. which could very well mean that every camper is at least aware of the 'consensus' song!! i really hope the shows takes the opportunity to make it an ongoing joke throughout the series. just anytime anyone refers to a disagreement, a nearby camper will start clapping and singing off-key lmao

[cemeterything]

the metatron is one of my favorite angels simply because the five year old in me is delighted by the fact that there's an actual real angel canonical to several religious texts with a name that makes it sound like a giant evil robot

[cryptidclownz]

@bamsara the crown is the least of their worries rn😓😓