#Especially shows where the main audience is lgbt people and not straight people

[keirabisexual]

People are always complaining about lighthearted lgbt media being for straight people which is ridiculous. But when a historical lgbt show comes out with an lgbt cast playing the main characters it's slept on. All the people bitching about Red White and Royal blue or Love Simon yet when Fellow Travelers came out where were yall?

[wontbyers]

It’s weird (unsettling??) for me to see people who support every gay ship except for Byler, because it’s like...atp it’s obvious to everyone except the most hetero-normative/homophobic general audience members that Will and Mike actually have a chance at being canon (like to the point where we can reasonably say they’ve been queer-baiting us by entertaining & promoting the possibility, if it’s not actually canon next season), and none of the other gay ships on ST besides Robin/Vickie are in the same lane, like it or not.

I ship Elm*x, Ron*nce, Bycl*ir, Wheelcl*ir, too! St*ddie is fine. But none of those have a chance at being endgame, none of them have a canonically gay character with confirmed feelings for the other half in their ship. For example, yes Robin and Nancy might have had more time & development together in s4 than Robin and Vickie did, but they did not hint at them having mutual (or even one-sided) feelings for each other the way they clearly set up R*ckie. You can personally read/interpret that Robin has a potential crush on Nance (I obviously ship them too), but it’s nowhere near canon the way Robin’s directly stated crush on Vickie is, or Will’s love for Mike is.

And especially when I see people ship Steve with Billy and Eddie and then say they actively don’t want Byler to end up together in the show, it’s like....what are you actually here for? Just being able to ship conventionally attractive men of appropriate-ish enough age? (If you know what I’m implying.) Lmk. Cause it’s apparently not for the potentially real LGBT representation that will mean a lot to a lot of LGBT people, in a huge mainstream show where two of the MAIN characters are boys who would be portrayed as best friends to love. “I just think Will deserves so much better than Mike” Doesn’t matter!!! it will be GOOD for our community’s representation to get this win if they’re endgame, whether you think Mike is good enough for Will or not. (especially weird when they still ship Mike with other characters likeeee sooo, you believe Lucas doesn’t deserve as good a guy as Will does, or?? wym friend??)

And guess what? You don’t have to write fanfiction, or draw art, or make gif sets, or come up with headcanons for them or actually ship them, but you should absolutely support and hope for them to be canon along with us, because there is no other possible endgame in the show at this point besides Will falling into the unrequited sad gay boy in love with his straight friend trope (they’re not introducing another love interest for him in s5.) And even if they try to show that he just “gets over it” or something, you know it’s not gonna feel right.

Like honestly, it feels so over-dramatic to say this, but at this point I don’t trust people who don’t support Byler endgame, whether they’re LGBT+ themselves or not. Because their priorities are weird and it puts a bad feeling in my stomach. Even if you don’t love the ship as a ship, you fucking KNOW what it represents and what a big chance this is, and you should stand by us. When I say, there are M*leven shippers out there who admit they’ll be sad if/when their ship isn’t endgame but they do hope for our sake that Byler is, because we’ll have obviously been queerbaited otherwise. I respect these people more than those who openly ship every single gay ship in ST besides Byler.

Anyway....

[shadowfiredemonwolf]

on black sun and bb

its pretty clear to me that if everything about the ships remained the same but blake turned was a guy or  sun and yangs genders were swapped  a good amount of the people who shipped bb would be shipping blacksun  instead

for one of the main reasons they shipped bb is the lgbt rep angle ( which is a bad reasoning it doesnt matter if there are tons of shows where het ships become canon or if there arent that much lgbt representation  )

and to be frank all the times I see people claim anti bb people are homophobic or would have seen evidence if it was a het ship or going there are tons of shows where het ships become canon or there are other het ships in rwby implying we are mad about bb because its a same sex ship when its not  and it  comes off as projection

given how many times I have seen them try to use the fact bb is a same sex ship as a shield or specifying the genders involved when making the complaint 

going there are tons of feasible same sex ships but they didnt go that route ( just because a same sex ship is feasible to happen ( as in they didnt hint at it being romantic but they could have chosen to gone that route ) doesnt mean they need to do it just like with het ships just because its feasible to imagine going down that route doesnt mean they need to do it instead of a same sex ship) ( as said before as in they didnt hint at the ship romantically but you could imagine them feasibly going down that route  instead they chose to go down the route of the opposite ship)

“This though? Fuck this whole part. Many LGBTQ+ (wlw included) have been and are very vocal about their dislike and criticisms of Bumbleby, and neither you nor anyone else are in any place to assume that it’s mostly just straight dudes who are upset over Bumbleby.“

I think my initial disdain for the way Sun and Neptune are written came from how sick and tired I am of straight ships being forced on the audience when lots of us are in the lgbta community. Part of it was because my gay ships were sinking I’ll admit but honestly I’m just sick of forced straight ships especially in one of the only shows with enough well written female characters to /actually/ have believable gay ships. I don’t think I hate Sun and Neptune but I do hate how forced the ships are.

I think this is all the explanation needed(and all you need to dismiss people trying to take moral superiority over liking Bumblebee). Something the toxic side of the fandom loves to do is project and project hard. They cannot understand why someone would not think like them or like the things they do unless there's something wrong with them or they contextualize it through what they themselves would do.And that's one of them accidentally explaining how that relates to Bumblebee: wasps like it because it's a gay ship. They thought Black Sun was forced because it was not a gay ship. Therefore, since everyone must either think like them or be defective, clearly you think Bumblebee is forced because it's not a straight ship. You don't like it because it's gay.“

basically they are just calling blacksun forced because it was a straight ship if sun was a girl they wouldnt make that claim so I cant take anytime I hear someone try to pull the you would ship bb if it was a m/f pairing  or wouldnt be calling it forced if it was a m/f pairing for if sun was a woman and yang a man they wouldnt be shipping bb and would call bb forced

if whether you ship  a ship or not  is determined by genders involved  like say if two ships were paired against the other and what causes you to ship one over the other  the pairing  is genders involved  it is a shallow reason   representation isnt more important then good writing

basically you shouldnt ship a het ship over a same sex ship because its het  and you should not ship a same sex ship over a het one because its samesex 

I would still ship blacksun even if yang and suns genders had been swapped at the start

it doesnt matter that male yang x blake was feasible/believable  they gave femsun x blake teasing mutual attraction etc and the buildup given would have made me ship blacksun from the start just like male sun x blake and then proceeded to give it the v4-5 development

it doesnt matter that bb at the start would have been believable ship  since they didnt go that route they instead teased blacksun m/f route  if your basis for hating blacksun/sun is that there was a believable same sex ship that they could have went with ( believable as in there wasnt teasing but they could have chosen to do that) you are projecting when you claim people oppose bb because its a w/w ship

with blacksun it was given years of teasing mutual attraction and development since v1 to v6 goodbye scene which came off as romantic in how it was shownw

 while bb arguably began to be teased in v7 v6 finale at best though nothing was inherently romantic moment

(people who try to make the claim it was built or teased from the start are wearing shipping goggles to see the most minor moment as romantic because they want it to be true and ignoring framing and context like the v3 finale ignoring that adam said he would destroy everything blake loved which includes friends and family to try and claim it declared blake loved yang romantically when it didnt .

or act like blakes reaction to it had any romantic connotations

there was nothing for sun to see in that scene where blake held yangs hand  while feeling guilty that would cause him to think romance

“The way that this scene was framed means nothing. If you wanna talk about what “makes no sense”, it makes no sense for this one bit of handholding to signal to Sun that Blake had romantic feelings for Yang. Especially since he hasn’t been present for any other moments that could have potentially hinted to him that Blake had feelings for Yang. The very most he can learn from this is that Blake is worried for Yang, that she cares about her, that she’s sorry for what happened to her.“

also burning the candle isnt romantic  yang reached out and helped blake  they danced for a bit which we hardly saw and then yang gave blake to sun to dance with when yang didnt have any issue with that ) and ( blake chose to dance with sun she could have chosen not to 

there was nothing flirty there  ( yang winking at blake which she has done to other characters before even a wf grunt )  I have seen people try to use a renora or blacksun moment to argue we have to see the blake and yang moment as romantic because we saw the renora /blacksun moment as romantic ignoring the differences between them

with blacksun it was suns introduction moment

eight-of-pentacles . tumblr . com/post/651259837931569152/why-do-you-say-yang-winking-at-blake-in-burning

Because it’s about framing and context.

Sun’s wink is accompanied by a slow-mo pan of his expression, followed by the camera focusing on Blake’s slack-jawed attention, along with a literal choir singing in the background while she stares at him. This is his introduction— to Blake, but more importantly, to the audience. This is the first moment we properly meet him, and it’s through this very particular gaze.

Yang’s wink is precipitated by her trying to convince Blake to come to the dance for her own mental and physical well-being. There’s no attention given to any other motivation on Yang’s part during the exchange, or what Blake’s reaction was following.

One of these has clear romantic intent. The other does not. If I were to present these two scenes to a random bystander and remove the names from the samples, and if I asked them to tell me which scene they thought was meant to be a romantic one, my guess is that they would go with the Sun and Blake scene. Because again, it’s about the framing of the scene, and the context of the situation the characters are in.

I say that Yang’s wink is dubious evidence at best, because I acknowledge that it can technically be read as romantic— but a.) it’s extremely covert, and only noticeable if you’re looking at it to find romantic evidence in the first place, and b.) I’m highly doubtful that was the writers’ intent in the first place.

while with renora it was a plane moment where the way renora acted and bb acted with each other was different   not to mention the framing

renora was a private scene with the song about noras feelings playing nora did the lay head on shoulders scene  and moved to get closer. 

with blake and yang it was just part of a rwby moment and yang held blakes hand to comfort her reciprocating what blake did when yangs hand shook

(not to mention renora was teased since v1 ) 

[elcorhamletlive]

I am very critical of the Duffers choices when it comes to how they handle queer narratives, if i were the one writing the situation i probably would not choose an unrequited love storyline either but I get where some of the queer fans are coming from and how this storyline might seem relatable to them. But as you said, this storyline being relatable doesnt really mean it has to end there. I am not a fan of Will being given a love interest in the epilogue but I can see that there is a chance of that happening, and if ST was a longer story i'd prefer him to find a love interest in the college anyway. This ofc has to happen in a more expanded time frame rather than it being included in a 3 minutes screen time in the epilogue.... with that being said, I understand what the writers are going for and what theyre trying to achieve but the writing choices here create certain flawed writing, especially due to limited time.

I agree that Will getting over Mike is actually the best outcome for his character whether or not shippers want to admit it. A lot of talking points i keep seeing regarding Will's character seem to be focusing on the situation from shipper goggles rather than characters' storylines and arcs being portrayed in a logical and satisfying way, because I seriously do not know why someone would wish Will to be stuck in a unrequited love situation while being sad and pining over his sister's taken boyfriend. Especially considering there will be a time skip in the next season , one would think that it is healthier and much better for Will's character to move on instead of him being stuck in this sad pining for a long time since it doesnt contribute to any sort of character development. But i guess shippers like the idea of Will being stuck in an unrequited love for a long time as long as it keeps their shipping fantasy going. Because if Will moves on and finds a new LI for himself it pretty much kills the any chance of their ship sailing the moment that the writers get rid of the unrequited love storyline. And that is partly why i think most shippers are so against the idea of Will moving on and getting a valid development.

Yeah, I think at the end of the day, most shippers are still clinging to the idea that Mike will reciprocate his feelings. That's one of their main talking points - "why make Will be in love with Mike if nothing was going to happen between them? Just to make him suffer?" And it's like... I don't know how I can explain to you that the Duffers likely just view this character in a different way than you do. They probably thought it was an efficient way to reveal Will's sexuality to the audience and that it was the "realistic" way to go about it. From the way they treated Robin's storyline, I think it's pretty clear gay romance isn't something they are particularly interested in writing, and so it follows that they wouldn't realize this is something people would want to see in Will's journey.

I am also not a fan of Will getting a love interest in the epilogue. However, I think a long of young, LGBT+, extremely progressive fans expect these grown ass straight men who made Netflix's most popular show to think exactly like they do. To me, as a non-straight person well-versed in gay media, it seems crystal clear that Will exchanging a smile with a nameless dude is not satisfying representation; and that he should have gotten a multi-season romantic arc with another main character like all the straight kids did. But I'm not sure that the Duffers would understand that. I'm not trying to call them homophobic or anything of the sort - it's just that ST has extremely heteronormative writing, so it doesn't surprise me that they wouldn't grasp this kind of nuance. It is what it is.

I do think maybe they will see the strong reaction Will's plotline got from fans and attempt to make up for it somehow in S5, which is something I generally have mixed feelings about (fanservice has been dragging down the show's quality since season 3), but it might get Will a somewhat developed love interest, like a guy he starts dating during the timeskip and who we get to know in the latter half of the season. We'll see.

[alittletrolling]

thank you to whoever submitted this to me. now all of china knows-

You can always logout of tumblr and simply follow the link. Here I copy pasted the points

Now, I understand you’ll need further reasons to look into the show that was created by Monty Oum, Miles Luna, and Kerry Shawcross.

SO! Here is 100+ Reasons to give RWBY a shot, plus a resource list link at the end. ENJOY!

1) Sci-fi/fantasy show that balances the two aspects very well

2) Endearing characters

3) Deep underlying messages about the importance of human connection

4) Constantly improves on itself

5) Writers actually try to listen to what the fandom wants

6) Creative setting

7) Actually handles difficult topics, like communication, privilege, and the cycle of abuse in a way that is sensitive to the audience

8) Ending is already set, meaning the show is not at risk of selling out to corporate overlords

9) God-tier foreshadowing

10) Top notch fight choreography

11) EVERYTHING IS A GUN

12) RWBY unambiguously avoids Depraved Homosexual tropes - no evil LGBT characters

13) No surprise plot twists for the sake of shock value

14) The soundtrack

Not only does it slap, bits of lore and characterization can be found in the series music

15) Character design

16) Symbolism and metaphors and hidden meanings abound

Can make for an enriching experience if you have knowledge about color theory and fairy tales and historical/mythological figures

17) Nuanced portrayal of morality between heroes, villains, and those who are neither

18) Layered writing where not everything, especially conflict, is clear-cut and easily resolved

19) Portrays trauma without over-dramatization

20) Production values improve with each volume

21) Hopepunk

22) Female-Centric main cast

All the “Fix-it” fanfics and “Rewrites” involve Male-Centric Casts and/or taking time away from female main casts to focus on male characters, especially male side characters.

23) No surprise plot twists for the sake of shock value meets Thanos snap.

24) Good bits of humor sprinkled throughout without being overbearing

25) A few villians that while irredeemable, are interesting to watch in how they act.

26) Masterpiece of a comedy spinoff

27) You can legally watch the show for free

28) Subverts narrative tropes common to both “western” hero stories and anime

29) Gender dynamics and expectations are well-balanced

Gender  tropes subverted, and addressed directly at times

30) Comfortably addresses class warfare, alcoholism, and other “mature” topics in approachable ways

31) Corgi

32) Combat Skirt

33) Women get to have pockets and pouches…

34) Women not requiring a man to save them

35) Large number of POC portrayed positively

36) LGBT are neither creeps nor villains, instead the straight people are.

37) POC are neither creeps nor villains as a majority…instead the white people are.

38) The “White Male Savior” with the mask, trenchcoat, and katana is the villain, while the underdog protector of the lower-income is a POC woman who may or may not be lesbian.

39) Meaningful facial expressions (that is, the animators spend time creating mood and reaction to elevate the storytelling)

40) Main antagonist is a woman, as are several of the other antagonists and they are NOT ditzes or idiots, nor are they fanservice.

41) The women are as intelligent as the men, where most anime try to have men be superior than women for the sake of shounen, the women are equal to men in screentime, plot relevance, intelligence, strength, personality, etc….though RWBY tries to have the women take precedence.

42) Men are support characters with their powers, while Women have more protagonist superpowers.

43) Positive half-sibling and stepmother representation

44) Positive honorary family member representation

45) Gay shipping and Lesbian shipping is encouraged by the writers and voice actors/actresses

46) The Main female protagonist’s blood-based superpower is not broken or OP and has limits.

47) Well-executed humor (usually, ha).

Basically trying NOT to make it fanservice or toilet humor or cringe.

48) Creators at least try to fix its less than stellar/problematic parts, which is more that I can say than the majority of entertainment.

49) Female characters are complex and interesting, also for the most part don’t woobified female villains.

50) Terrifying Villains and Monsters

There is a difference. V1-V3 involved Monsters , V4-V8 involved Villains.

51) Every Character is based on a fairy tale/myth/legend/story and looking for those breadcrumbs just adds to the show

52) Already said, but emphasizing the fight choreography and the soundtrack. If you love over-the-top video game style fights this is for you. If you love epic metal playing over those fights this is for you.

53) Plays with tropes and story telling norms to subvert expectations in the best way

54) Not afraid to have tonal shifts to tell the story they want to tell

55) Not afraid to have the heroes lose sometimes

56) And plot points have consequences!!! None of this “bad thing happens and 1 episode later the status quo is restored”

57) Emphasizing foreshadowing again. Things that happened in season 8 were foreshadowed as far back as season 2.

58) The main characters are proactive. None of this waiting around for them to get up the courage to do something about the bad guys.

Don’t give me the “manor tea” stuff, they were trying to recover, Ironwood had it out for them and would have shot them for helping while refusing to obey him.

59) The Main characters are smart. They notice things (and come up with really cool strategies)

60) At least one villain does NOT underestimate the main characters

61) Everyone doesn’t let characters use false justification for their actions regardless who it is! Everyone gets a consequence that fits!

62) Soundtrack is LIT

63) Gay Gay Homosexual Gay

64) Because I’m still on this, two autistic-coded main characters whose traits aid in their heroism!

Ruby and Penny…possibly Marrow Amin

65) Kdin Jenzen, a Transgender VA, plays May Marigold, a transgender heroic side character who does not get killed off.

66) Chaotic teens saving the world with the power of stubborn optimism

67) Opposites Attract Tropes

68) Goth Uncle

69) Goth Milf

70) Himbo Dad

71) Non-sexualized Catgirl

72) Cat Cougar Milf with Tea Tray defeats Bat Assassin

73) Panther Dilf

74) Blonde Brawler Female who is also smart and can work mechanics

75) Female protag uses scythe and cape/cloak

76) It Portrays several different types of abuse ranging from romantic relationships to familial abuse along with accurately portraying them

77) Shows how harmful Alcoholism is

78) When/If a a character dies, it’s for a reason and isn’t for shock value

Penny cheated death once…she would not cheat death again.

Ozpin’s immortality is a curse, and he is truly dead, a ghost.

79) One of the the main-main characters is disabled and isn’t treated as/seen as lesser

80) Male/Female friendships are a thing and abundant

Normally if a man and a woman engage, its shipping, not friendships. But with Naruto and Sakura we have friendship. With Ichigo and Rukia its friendship….now that is abundant friendship in RWBY.

81) LGBT Voice Actresses Voice LGBT Characters.

Kdin Jenzen is Transgender, Arryn Zech is Bisexual, and so are their characters.

82) All Romantic relationships, heterosexual or not, are given attention and emphasis on their interpersonal relationships

83) Balances tragedy and comedy, there are SEVERAL episodes where you both end up laughing your ass off and crying

84) Never goes all out depressing, the message is clear, it takes it to heart, and it shouts it for all to hear. Sometimes bad things happen. But you have to keep moving forward.

85) Has a variety of characters, each with their own themes/allusions (e.g. Ruby = Red Riding Hood, Team RWBY = Fairy Tale Characters, Team JNPR = Crossdressing Historic Heroes)

86) Amazing Music that builds on the characters’ motives

87) You won’t suffer vision problems after watching an entire cast that’s blindingly white (shounen anime in general)

88) Gay doesn’t suddenly die to leave heartbroken love interest Straight and angstily going back to the white guy who killed Gay out of possessive jealousy, which is super romantic.

89) Partners of dead Gays, should a Gay die, will not obligatorily be paired with someone str8  

90) Character designs reference various fairy tales and stories, so you can get things like Mulan and Thor being a childhood friends romance, Beast and Beauty being one and the same and in love with Goldilocks, and Red Riding Hood maiming Cinderella, who is evil.

91) Everyone; good, bad, and the minor characters…are all hot.

92) You WILL get attached both to the good and bad characters.

93) All characters have very unique designs that fit their personalities and fighting styles.

94) Emotional/Physical Abusers get killed AFTER being humiliated

95) The Entire Show is full of metaphors and symbolism. The backgrounds, character clothing, the weapons they use… it’s fun to analyze!

96) Stresses the importance of just being a nice person above all other stereotypical morally gray anime tropes

97) The people who work the the show. Seriously not just the main people; I’m talking about all the unsung heroes who do amazing background and scenery to sound design, etc. RWBY has some of the nicest, most hard working, and supportive crews I’ve seen. And considering the amount of harassment the anti-fandom can throw at them, they take and handle it so remarkably well.

98) Every character looks amazing from main to one-off. How their outfits convey who they are so well and sometimes subtlety. Also how the creators and character designers make it so cosplayers can have pockets on their outfits.

99) No  stupid twists for shock value, the twists that do happen are foreseeable but executed in a way that is still shocking.

100) Enjoyable Comedic Spin-off far better written than Teen Titans Go.

101) Awesome weapon concepts

102) Awesome growth of story, plot, and transition of it.

103) People hate it when you have fun watching RWBY….is that not enough?

Need to come up with a list of good youtube channels next.

[mejomonster]

saw some thai actors mentioning wanting to branch out beyond bl genre, which i thoroughly get because of like - expansive genres options (whereas a lot of bl used to be romcom/romantic-drama) 

however like, i don’t think that necessarily means no more playing lgbt characters either. especially with some movement toward more shows with like General lgbt characters/plots that are part of the larger whole. Like, Manner of Death is a prime example of Murder Mystery Genre, with characters that happen to be queer as the main romance subplot. 3 Will Be Free is an ensemble show that includes primarily lgbt main characters and storylines, its a thriller/on the run plot main-genre wise. The Player has multiple lgbt characters central to the plot, but the show is Primarily Murder Mystery genre as far as ‘the kind of acting job you want to explore’. 55:15 Never Too Late has lgbt characters and again, the main plot is about exploring the main character’s lives/regrets not limited to romance. (i’m only going into thai dramas right now, but likewise in western media there’s a lot more of ‘lgbt main character’ in Main Genre sci fi/supernatural/horror/murder mystery shows than there used to be - u can now find lgbt characters and stories beyond just gay rom-com/romantic-drama genres, you can find lgbt characters and stories beyond just the ‘romance’ main genre stuff).

i just think like. i would love in general to continue seeing the trend of more lgbt characters and stories in general being a part of a wide range of genres, and in that sense i don’t think we’ll stop seeing actors take on such roles. 

(its complicated in that to me i generally see ‘bl genre’ as the same as ‘gay romance’ since to me there’s overlap, but at the same time i Do realize that bl genre normally means ‘ROMANCE main-genre.’ and in that sense, yes there is a distinct difference between lgbt characters/romances being a part of a plot versus The Main Plot going on in a story. I saw someone mention once that History 3: Trapped was so distinct because it brought a relatively-meaty mystery plot in alongside the romance, making it not strictly romance genre which made it stand out. Then Manner of Death took that idea and went further, making a mystery the Main Plot and visually leaning into that genre more, with romance just a part of it - whereas History 3 Trapped tone-wise with its visuals leaned closer into romance-genre presentation. I do agree there is that kind of distinction in a way - on whether romance is part of the plot or the central element of the Entire plot. Again though - there’s a grey area full of overlap. Guardian, Word of Honor, The Untamed are HEAVY on their non-romance plots too and not visually depicted like ‘romance’ genre. Not Me has been categorized as ‘bl genre’ yet I’d argue so far its presentation and storytelling lands in suspense-genre more like The Player, romance is not its primary plot driving force - characters and their personal struggles are. Not all ‘bl genre’ shows’ are actually primary-romance genre. I think the more these writing choices are made - choosing to simply write a wide range of plots/genres that include lgbt characters - there’s going to be less distinction. And the difference will turn more into ‘is this mainly Romance genre’ or more genres, instead of ‘does this have an lgbt romance or not’.)

as bl genre plots start stretching what kind of stories they tell beyond ‘just romance’ we get more into this grey zone of them being a variety of genres that happen to have queer romance. 

[iamafanofcartoons]

100+ REASONS TO WATCH AND ENJOY RWBY

Let’s put this as simply as we can.

Now, I understand you’ll need further reasons to look into the show that was created by Monty Oum, Miles Luna, and Kerry Shawcross.

SO! Here is 100+ Reasons to give RWBY a shot, plus a resource list link at the end. ENJOY!

1) Sci-fi/fantasy show that balances the two aspects very well 2) Endearing characters 3) Deep underlying messages about the importance of human connection 4) Constantly improves on itself 5) Writers actually try to listen to what the fandom wants 6) Creative setting 7) Actually handles difficult topics, like communication, privilege, and the cycle of abuse in a way that is sensitive to the audience 8) Ending is already set, meaning the show is not at risk of selling out to corporate overlords 9) God-tier foreshadowing 10) Top notch fight choreography 11) EVERYTHING IS A GUN 12) RWBY unambiguously avoids Depraved Homosexual tropes - no evil LGBT characters

13) No surprise plot twists for the sake of shock value 14) The soundtrack Not only does it slap, bits of lore and characterization can be found in the series music 15) Character design 16) Symbolism and metaphors and hidden meanings abound Can make for an enriching experience if you have knowledge about color theory and fairy tales and historical/mythological figures 17) Nuanced portrayal of morality between heroes, villains, and those who are neither 18) Layered writing where not everything, especially conflict, is clear-cut and easily resolved 19) Portrays trauma without over-dramatization 20) Production values improve with each volume 21) Hopepunk 22) Female-Centric main cast All the “Fix-it” fanfics and “Rewrites” involve Male-Centric Casts and/or taking time away from female main casts to focus on male characters, especially male side characters. 23) No surprise plot twists for the sake of shock value meets Thanos snap. 24) Good bits of humor sprinkled throughout without being overbearing 25) A few villians that while irredeemable, are interesting to watch in how they act. 26) Masterpiece of a comedy spinoff 27) You can legally watch the show for free 28) Subverts narrative tropes common to both "western" hero stories and anime 29) Gender dynamics and expectations are well-balanced Gender  tropes subverted, and addressed directly at times 30) Comfortably addresses class warfare, alcoholism, and other "mature" topics in approachable ways 31) Corgi 32) Combat Skirt 33) Women get to have pockets and pouches... 34) Women not requiring a man to save them 35) Large number of POC portrayed positively 36) LGBT are neither creeps nor villains, instead the straight people are. 37) POC are neither creeps nor villains as a majority...instead the white people are. 38) The “White Male Savior” with the mask, trenchcoat, and katana is the villain, while the underdog protector of the lower-income is a POC woman who may or may not be lesbian. 39) Meaningful facial expressions (that is, the animators spend time creating mood and reaction to elevate the storytelling) 40) Main antagonist is a woman, as are several of the other antagonists and they are NOT ditzes or idiots, nor are they fanservice. 41) The women are as intelligent as the men, where most anime try to have men be superior than women for the sake of shounen, the women are equal to men in screentime, plot relevance, intelligence, strength, personality, etc....though RWBY tries to have the women take precedence. 42) Men are support characters with their powers, while Women have more protagonist superpowers. 43) Positive half-sibling and stepmother representation 44) Positive honorary family member representation 45) Gay shipping and Lesbian shipping is encouraged by the writers and voice actors/actresses 46) The Main female protagonist's blood-based superpower is not broken or OP and has limits. 47) Well-executed humor (usually, ha). Basically trying NOT to make it fanservice or toilet humor or cringe. 48) Creators at least try to fix its less than stellar/problematic parts, which is more that I can say than the majority of entertainment. 49) Female characters are complex and interesting, also for the most part don’t woobified female villains. 50) Terrifying Villains and Monsters There is a difference. V1-V3 involved Monsters , V4-V8 involved Villains. 51) Every Character is based on a fairy tale/myth/legend/story and looking for those breadcrumbs just adds to the show 52) Already said, but emphasizing the fight choreography and the soundtrack. If you love over-the-top video game style fights this is for you. If you love epic metal playing over those fights this is for you. 53) Plays with tropes and story telling norms to subvert expectations in the best way 54) Not afraid to have tonal shifts to tell the story they want to tell 55) Not afraid to have the heroes lose sometimes 56) And plot points have consequences!!! None of this "bad thing happens and 1 episode later the status quo is restored" 57) Emphasizing foreshadowing again. Things that happened in season 8 were foreshadowed as far back as season 2. 58) The main characters are proactive. None of this waiting around for them to get up the courage to do something about the bad guys. Don't give me the “manor tea” stuff, they were trying to recover, Ironwood had it out for them and would have shot them for helping while refusing to obey him. 59) The Main characters are smart. They notice things (and come up with really cool strategies) 60) At least one villain does NOT underestimate the main characters 61) Everyone doesn't let characters use false justification for their actions regardless who it is! Everyone gets a consequence that fits! 62) Soundtrack is LIT 63) Gay Gay Homosexual Gay 64) Because I'm still on this, two autistic-coded main characters whose traits aid in their heroism! Ruby and Penny...possibly Marrow Amin 65) Kdin Jenzen, a Transgender VA, plays May Marigold, a transgender heroic side character who does not get killed off. 66) Chaotic teens saving the world with the power of stubborn optimism 67) Opposites Attract Tropes 68) Goth Uncle 69) Goth Milf 70) Himbo Dad 71) Non-sexualized Catgirl 72) Cat Cougar Milf with Tea Tray defeats Bat Assassin 73) Panther Dilf 74) Blonde Brawler Female who is also smart and can work mechanics 75) Female protag uses scythe and cape/cloak 76) It Portrays several different types of abuse ranging from romantic relationships to familial abuse along with accurately portraying them 77) Shows how harmful Alcoholism is 78) When/If a a character dies, it’s for a reason and isn’t for shock value Penny cheated death once...she would not cheat death again. Ozpin's immortality is a curse, and he is truly dead, a ghost. 79) One of the the main-main characters is disabled and isn’t treated as/seen as lesser 80) Male/Female friendships are a thing and abundant Normally if a man and a woman engage, its shipping, not friendships. But with Naruto and Sakura we have friendship. With Ichigo and Rukia its friendship....now that is abundant friendship in RWBY. 81) LGBT Voice Actresses Voice LGBT Characters. Kdin Jenzen is Transgender, Arryn Zech is Bisexual, and so are their characters. 82) All Romantic relationships, heterosexual or not, are given attention and emphasis on their interpersonal relationships 83) Balances tragedy and comedy, there are SEVERAL episodes where you both end up laughing your ass off and crying 84) Never goes all out depressing, the message is clear, it takes it to heart, and it shouts it for all to hear. Sometimes bad things happen. But you have to keep moving forward. 85) Has a variety of characters, each with their own themes/allusions (e.g. Ruby = Red Riding Hood, Team RWBY = Fairy Tale Characters, Team JNPR = Crossdressing Historic Heroes) 86) Amazing Music that builds on the characters' motives 87) You won't suffer vision problems after watching an entire cast that's blindingly white (shounen anime in general) 88) Gay doesn't suddenly die to leave heartbroken love interest Straight and angstily going back to the white guy who killed Gay out of possessive jealousy, which is super romantic. 89) Partners of dead Gays, should a Gay die, will not obligatorily be paired with someone str8   90) Character designs reference various fairy tales and stories, so you can get things like Mulan and Thor being a childhood friends romance, Beast and Beauty being one and the same and in love with Goldilocks, and Red Riding Hood maiming Cinderella, who is evil. 91) Everyone; good, bad, and the minor characters...are all hot. 92) You WILL get attached both to the good and bad characters. 93) All characters have very unique designs that fit their personalities and fighting styles. 94) Emotional/Physical Abusers get killed AFTER being humiliated 95) The Entire Show is full of metaphors and symbolism. The backgrounds, character clothing, the weapons they use... it's fun to analyze! 96) Stresses the importance of just being a nice person above all other stereotypical morally gray anime tropes 97) The people who work the the show. Seriously not just the main people; I'm talking about all the unsung heroes who do amazing background and scenery to sound design, etc. RWBY has some of the nicest, most hard working, and supportive crews I've seen. And considering the amount of harassment the anti-fandom can throw at them, they take and handle it so remarkably well. 98) Every character looks amazing from main to one-off. How their outfits convey who they are so well and sometimes subtlety. Also how the creators and character designers make it so cosplayers can have pockets on their outfits. 99) No  stupid twists for shock value, the twists that do happen are foreseeable but executed in a way that is still shocking. 100) Enjoyable Comedic Spin-off far better written than Teen Titans Go. 101) Awesome weapon concepts 102) Awesome growth of story, plot, and transition of it. 103) People hate it when you have fun watching RWBY....is that not enough?

Need to come up with a list of good youtube channels next.

[absolutebl]

So i have an online subject that tackles Gender and Development and one of the topics i shared is about Queerbaiting. I said that this topic is quite debatable and somehow polarizing? Idk if i put it right but i wanna know what is your thoughts about it.

And also this has been lingering to me but: my friend told me that a lot of Thai and even Korean BL movies/series are fit into the category of Queerbaiting especially the actors. What's your insight on this one? And do you have an actor or actors in mind that fits into that category?

Thanks for answering tho just wanna know what others have insights about this since my subject is tackling The Struggles of LGBT. :))

Debating Queerbaiting in BL

I talked about queer baiting when Devil Judge was airing:

Devil Judge... is it queerbaiting?

That pretty much sums up my feelings. It has to do with the intent of the studio, story structure, and target demographics (promotion).

I would say that you have to make sure you define the term queerbaiting (at least to your personal preference) before you analyze it. It's thrown about a lot these days because it's so catchy and I don't think many of the people using it realize it's intended to apply to marketing. (Which means you should understand marketing and how that's different from sales - which many people conflate).

Wikipedia says:

Queerbaiting is a marketing technique for fiction and entertainment in which creators hint at, but then do not actually depict, same-sex romance or other LGBTQ+ representation. They do so to attract (“bait”) a queer or straight ally audience with the suggestion of relationships or characters that appeal to them, while at the same time attempting to avoid alienating other consumers.

So my definition of queerbaiting includes specifically that it is a commercial strategy, targeted at the queer community with no actual intention of honest representation. So it is an explicitly corrupt tactic. They want to raise money off of us without acknowledging our existence. 

The term queerbaiting is older and used to have a different definition during haze code days, you can listen to a history of the linguistics of queer baiting here. 

But that means I have to decide what honest representation of queerness means to me. 

So, my personal feelings about it have to do with how much that marketing is collated to providing a happy (if not healthy) queer narrative to my community even as its being exploited. Thus I think BL that has a pro-normalization agenda can be forgiven. But not everyone is with me. Others want BL to be more queer than that. But for me, by the above definition, BL can't be queerbaiting, because the gay relationship is NOT a suggestion - it is actualized.

Here’s one way I approach it: if the narrative had featured a het main couple, would those characters have kissed as a natural progression of the story arc? If they are not allowed to kiss because they are the same gender (Untamed, Word of Honor) than it’s queerbaiting. 

The debate then becomes more:

is BL actually queer?

And that is very nuanced and on a case by case basis and has to do with

the director's lens,

the camera's gaze,

story structure,

acting style,

casting,

and a lot of other things.

Casting is where your friends "actor" comment comes in. There are certainly lots of rumors around Thai BL actors in particular who aren't supportive of the queer community, or even outright homophobic. (Ironically, less so around Korean actors because Korea is a much more homophobic society so on promo they aren’t required to performatively show support.)

I think Japan and Taiwan handle it best, but they are also the most westernized film industries. There everyone (actors, studios, fans) knows it's a job. The actors have fun during shooting (or not), becomes friends sometimes, then when the show ends, they move on with their lives. Now I should say I don't believe in outing anyone, least of all public figure. And I don't believe an actor has to be queer to act as a queer character. I also don't believe in fan-cancelling a show (requiring hundreds of participants) because one actor in it fucked up.

I think you might be able to make a case that some of the couple promo work that is, frankly, forced on these young actors is queerbaiting. But the agents and studios are behind this, not really the actors. Although some are better at it than others (some are also better actors). If you want me to name names you should look into some of the scandals of the industry: MewGulf, ZeeSaint, PerthSaint....

But: These are actors. They are acting. They are acting when they are on stage modeling pretty suits in sexy ways together. They are acting when they do variety shows. They are acting when they do fan meets. They are pretty much always acting when there is a camera on them. That's their job. Shipping a couple IRL is just another way you've become a victim of a marketing. Is is queerbaiting if you got suckered into believing the fantasy but are queer yourself? *shrug* maybe. But practice a little self-preservation for goodness sake. Don't clutch your pearls and be all victimized because you fell for a gay Nigerian Prince scam. Frankly, it's your dumb fault for falling for it. And yes, I do want to drink that weird purple drink with the chewy bits in it. Why do you ask?

Look I'm being factious, we all fall for marketing. That's its job. But it's probubly a good idea to learn not to. 

What I'm saying is, don't be baited.

I call MaxTul the Kings in part because that is what they are kings of... marketing and brand management.

Is this queerbaiting?

Maybe.

But I think it's more fantasy baiting. I really hate this part of the Thai BL industry. But I also think you're a touch unhinged from reality and possibly quite young and inexperienced if you fall for it. And I think within Thailand it's mostly the sasang demographic getting all up in arms about this IRL shipping nonsense, and I don't wanna with that crowd.

But I do think that explicitly censored BL/gay romances from Mainland China, for example, can be considered queerbaiting. And it's one of the reasons I get mad about this factor:

If, in a het drama the couple would have kissed at the end, but in a BL drama they don't? That's fucked up.

Then I think a case can be made for queerbaiting.

Now, I work in the entertainment industry so I understand how VERY superficial and exploitive it is. I also understand that BL is intended to make money, not social change.

I don't believe this impacts my enjoyment of these shows, but one of the reasons I run this blog is so I can both revel in BL and be critical it at the same time. Because I don't want to get complacent. 

(source)

[fandomele]

Want me to write an essay about entitled fans of fanon couples and how annoyed I am? Here I am. I don’t expect anyone to actually read it all or even respond, I just want to vent. I’ll use “mlw” for any ship that involves a man and a woman to avoid having to specify all possible orientations, wlw for two women and mlm for two men. And just to be clear, before anyone replies that there isn’t enough lgbt-ness in shows and it must be fought for, I agree. But this is not about them, it’s about entitled fans of all fanon ships who are now following a specific script to get what they want, harassing and hiding behind social justice issues.

The only reason I especially mention shippers who are into 2 famous fanon wlw couples (supercorp and swanqueen) is that it’s the same group of shippers moving from one big show to another, picking over and over the same type of female character to pair with the female hero, and projecting. But this behavior happens with mlw ships as well and mlm ships and it’s not about representation at all. We all know shippers who wanted the guy to get the girl even if she canonically dislikes him, and that meant wanting the good guy she actually loves dead, making up horrible accusations against the canon partner and the writers because the other guy should win. Or those shows were two men are shipped together and therefore the fans call for all the women in their lives to be gone, they are evil, they are badly written, whatever. I heard a mess happened in Star Wars, people shipping a mlw couple and getting the movie to change, and I have been told 99,99% of Supernatural female characters had to die because the fans hated anyone who took attention away from Dean/Sam and Dean/Castiel, but I don’t know if it’s true and I don’t know enough about those fandoms to speak about it, so I’ll only talk about what I’ve been a part of. I can’t anti-tag properly or it will appear in their ship tag. Again, I’m not talking about fans advocating for more representation in general, I’m talking about fans who are harassing real people because they want the couple they chose to be canon or to be treated as such no matter what the writers clearly mean to convey and how the show has been written up until then, or even if the show is already very pro-lgbt with non cis and non straight characters in the main cast since it’s all irrelevant to them, because what these fans really want is control over other people and their stories, and to make their fave couple (genders are irrelevant), the couple where they are obviously projecting their feelings and themselves, become canon, and they are using real life issues as a tool to get it because how can ‘silence’ someone fighting against sexism/racism/homophobia etc (and obviously it’s not what’s happening. I’m not talking about people who are right and denuncing racism, for example), because they know that mixing what they want with what is politically correct, even if it’s not true, will give them a platform, an audience of innocent people trying to find out what’s happening there, and may force a show in a different direction. Forget the fact that people who actually fight for social issues will lose credibility and the chance to make a change, the important thing is that they get what they want, how they want it, and because they want it.

If their ship is not made canon everybody will have to pay - and regardless of canon-ness these ships must be always be discussed by writers and cast as ‘equally important to the canon ships’, and these ‘fans’ are blatantly feeling good and cool about being able to harass the cast and other people because they are teaching them a lesson. I mean literally gloating about it in their posts.

And it’s scary that new, young, shippers are join fandoms and to groups where they can start feeling a sense of belonging, and these groups directly and indirectly teach them to be as extreme and rigid as possible in their beliefs, and they lead each member, step by step, into finding these behaviors normal, acceptable, and in fact also lead them to mix their own identity and beliefs with the group’s beliefs. These groups of ‘bad apple’s trajectory is towards becoming more and more extreme because each new person who joins in takes one more step away from what’s acceptable, because they feel that everything that has happened before their arrival is justified and righteous and to them the next step is very small, even if it’s a giant distance from where fandoms were at before.

*note: brief mention of rape/abuse because I mention non-canon accusations that happened in the ouat fandom + the fact that it did happen in the canon show. I mention other issues that are used against/to defend ships as well without getting descriptive, and a mention of suicidal thoughts brought up by antis once.

Honestly I feel like shippers who act entitled on social media became this way because, among other reasons, the writers and casts of tvshows were overly nice to them and not allowed to say ‘enough, I’ll block you if you insult me’ or even a simple ‘we are only celebrating canon couples, fanon combinations are infinite and we can’t address them all, so we won’t be talking about those’. Instead they had to be as nice as possible, whether it was because they didn’t want to alienate fans and lose money or because they genuinely cared doesn’t matter in this context. More often than not it’s just because they are being taught that if they don’t say yes they’ll be ‘cancelled’ by fans who are using real life issues and criminalizing actors, and they also know that nobody will dare backing them up to avoid getting in trouble with the network, or with whoever is telling them that the customer/fan is always right. You can’t tell a customer to go the hell if you are working at Starbucks and even less so in public, like on twitter, because good luck getting hired if you treat fans like ‘crap’. Doesn’t matter that they deserve it, people in charge want money and the money comes from all people watching the show, nobody should be pushed away by an actor who is trying to protect their mental health by standing up to bullies, the actor has to smile and wish them a nice day like a Starbucks cashier and allow more abuse, so that the customer will return. There are some exceptions, some people are allowed to respond, just like some cashiers can, but it’s not the norm. The norm is now writers walking on eggshells because how dare them say their story is their damn story. It’s actors not allowed to have an opinion or to explain what they are trying to portray because they will ruffle feathers. So this teaches these fans to keep going, and the more these fans gain approval the more the writers and cast bend. I remember Jennifer Morrison during ouat retweeting a fan who made, if I’m not wrong, tea-bags which were dedicated to the canon couple she was part of, and she, as a real person, was accused of supporting rape culture because antis had decided that her character’s canon boyfriend was a rapist, even if it wasn’t shown on screen (but he made references to sex! and is a pirate! so he had to be!) and therefore JMo showing that she liked her canon ship meant that she was pro-rape, not exactly a light accusation. Then they proceded to harass her so she’d say how much she liked the tea dedicated to their fanon couple - (involving a female canon rapist just to add irony). And to be clear given the nature of her job Jen wasn’t allowed to say she didn’t like that ship, because that would hurt their feelings, wasn’t allowed to say it’s a fanon ship and that she wanted to discuss canon things, wasn’t even allowed to ignore it, she’d be attacked even more than she already was. Hell, she was accused of homophobia (and of gay panic by people who clearly don’t know what that means) because she didn’t pose for photos with the other actress they shipped her with often enough (they shipped her character Emma with Regina, who was played by Lana Parilla, and shipped her with Lana), nor did enough offscreen things with her. It was clear that Jen and Lana weren’t close in real life and that the fans made it worse - but why would it matter how they feel as people, right? They had to dance like moneys for the fans. If Jen didn’t sit close to Lana it had to be because she hated that the fans would ship them or their fanon couple, not because as a human she has preferences. (Btw, if people are being weird about you and your coworker, it’s totally fine to feel uncomfortable and step away).

Sounds familiar, if you are from the Supergirl fandom? It’s the same people, yeah. The ones I mentioned at the beginning of this post. That’s why I said that it’s not ‘lgbt fans’ it’s literally the same people over and over, they just happen to project on wlw couples. But there are other fans like this as well and they have their own mlm and mlw couples to harass people for.   The Supergirl cast was literally harassed by fans who wanted Kara and Lena together. Eventually during a group interview they sang about how Kara and Lena were just friends and had a laugh, which btw is a great way to fight bullies, to let them know their words can’t hurt them and they will be laughed off, and, as far as I know, to this day people who don’t know the behind the scenes will only hear that the cast of Supergirl mocked a lesbian fanon couple and its lgbt fans, cruelly, laughing at them for daring to ship two women. Homophobic monsters. All except the actress who plays Lena who was visibly upset (in the story of course, in reality she laughed too). Several public apologies had to be made to make up for this evil act. They weren’t allowed to explain or defend themselves after (because of the new rule that if someone is hurt by your behavior, explaining yourself means you aren’t apologing and you are abusive). They had to take in more abuse and shut up. Real life consequences that started from abusive tweets going unpunished and made them risk reputation and jobs, as well as led to actually lgbt people who may have looked up to them being told what ‘they had done’ and be hurt by this. Context didn’t matter, even if it’s al that actually matters because it completely changes what you saw. People genuinely believed/believe the cast was that horrible and that was cruel out of nowhere, more people have joined the fandom and bought into it, confirming their own bias whenever they watched the show and saw only what they wanted to see.

So these fans got to demand attention and to have the writers change the show for the loudest fanon ships, and to insult anyone who doesn’t feel like doing so. Not only unpunished for this but sorta rewarded for it. Sure, some shows didn’t cave and didn’t make their ships canon, but the cast had to learn how to be submissive or accept online abusive behavior. OR leave social media in a world where you need it to work, like many were forced to do. And these fans got told over and over that their feelings were ‘valid’, their ships amazing, and got even angrier because if that’s the case why not make it canon? Or got told ‘not going to happen’ and started spreading the notion that there was queerbaiting and the show should be boicotted.   This is becoming a common way to react to all shows/movies with sequels, these shows are an example and in a way the place where it started and grew, but now it’s everywhere.

And I want to take the writers and say: just make a ship canon because you want to or tell them it’s not going to happen and stand by it, no more of that ‘equally valid, equally important, have to entertain all shippers’ crap. A fanon ship is not going to be equal to canon ones, it shouldn’t get equally talked about nor be included in every sentence about ships, and there is nothing to apologize for about that. It only exists in these small online places, you go talk to casual viewers and they won’t know of it, it’s not the same. And while we should all have more representation we don’t get to chose which characters get together, we don’t get to write the story. Shippers should learn to handle the truth if they haven’t yet, learn how to handle disappointment, like get a ‘you can ship who you want, it’s amazing you are so invested in our show! However x and y are the canon ship and we don’t plan on making the other one canon, I’m writing x and y together’ and leave it at that. And it should be more than possible to just say ‘this is not what I’m writing, I’m sorry’ if fans insist they are being baited because two characters look at each other. “You ship isn’t canon, it will never be canon, they told you this! So no, shippers of that fanon couple don’t matter now, they are talking about canon and your fanon ship shouldn’t be up there with the others’ “Telling me that I don’t matter because I demand to have my fanon ship constantly brought up is triggering me and making me suicidal, everybody matters all the time!’ is a take I actually read and people apologized for how ‘harsh’ they were being. The concept there was that you can never tell a person they don’t matter in a specific context, they have to matter, in all contexts. You don’t know how much of their identity and will to live a person has attached to a ship or a fandom, and you don’t get to say those words because they may be too fragile to take it (forget the fragility of those bullied every day by these people who can’t take consequences or the truth). Except that there are plenty situations in life in which you won’t matter, and that doesn’t mean that you don’t matter as a person in general. Your neighbor won’t have to think about your feelings on divorce before getting one, you don’t matter there. You still matter as a human being, in general, your life still has meaning, but you won’t and shouldn’t always be acknowledged in every situation that exists around you. And if you can’t understand this concept, if you think your opinion has to matter in all contexts and you have to be given some kind of shake of hand over it or your entire life won’t matter, because you must be important in every context ever, you shouldn’t be engaging in fandoms, you should be getting medical help asap, not making your ability to exist more fragile because it’s dependent on strangers validating you over a ship. You are putting your entire existence in the hands of a fandom, and that’s not only unhealthy but impossible to end well. Go to therapy and if you can’t afford that yet then don’t become a part of groups that require you to tie your identity to them.  

Your feelings matter in the sense that you can ship what you want, not that you have the right to demand a response or approval from other actual human beings. My feeling that Jemma and Fitz from AoS (super beloved couple by fans and writers) are terrible for each other means a lot to me, I’ve been super invested for years in that show, wrote essays on why I don’t like this couple (and tagged them properly to respect the shippers), but you know what? This means nothing to the writers and that’s okay. I’m not important to them, I should not expect to have my feelings catered to with tweets that mention fanon couples I like and that ‘acknowledge’ flaws I see. I didn’t harass anyone on twitter, and I certainly don’t think that if I had shipped Jemma with someone else I should have been mentioned in canon-related tweets because ‘every ship is valid’! I didn’t expect fanon couples like Will and Alice or Flynn and Lucy (OUATIW and Timeless) to be mentioned everywhere just because some people loved them and therefore we had to be catered to: I shipped it but I sure as hell didn’t expect to make it real or to change the entire creative process of the people behind the show because I was screaming about it. I don’t expect people to pat my head and tell me what a lovely ship it is and discuss it every time is brought up on twitter. But the majority of writers/casts is trying to be submissive now so they don’t get in trouble and you can literally see posts of fanon shippers laughing about how they are in the right and they will be able to break them. And personally I think these shippers deserve actual real life consequences. No attention to your ship, which wasn’t real anyway, less screentime for it, more direct responses with ‘nope not gonna happen’ and ‘I made it, they are not real people, you can read in that scene what you want but know that’s not what I’m making it and therefore it’s not real’. No actors trying to make these people feel better. They don’t need to apologize for ships not happening or for not shipping them or for wanting to talk about their actual work. People will survive even if the writers don’t tell them just how important and incredible their fanon ship is, even more so because you are not teaching them that this is a correct way to interact with the world and they’ll learn not to expect anything. They have to learn that they may not get what they want even if they ask nicely, and that regardless of that they cannot harass people. They also have to learn that crying wolf by using very real dramatic issues like homophobia and misoginy should have consequences, I’ll say it again: if you publicly accuse me of being pro-rape because I like something made for a fiction couple I get to take you to court.

Also the bullshit of ‘oh my god those mean adult men in the cast are ganging up against a teenager’ said about adult men responding without sugarcoating (but also without insulting) to the hundreth ‘teenager’ who is insulting them, part of a group of people who insults them daily. Teenagers learn how to be adults also by learning consequences to their actions and that they don’t get to say everything they want the way they want, shouldn’t we reinforce this? Or should we let bullies free to online-harass adults every hour of every day? In the end Supergirl the cast by the end was so blatantly pissed to the point that some of them started snapping again, possibly because a guest star kickstarted it (sometimes you need one person to speak up and then others can), and those shippers didn’t get their ship to be made canon, thankfully, because it was way too unreal, but they still got treated better than they deserved. They learned that they can get something if they behave like that, and have the hope that doing worse will get them more.

And I honestly want to go back to writers and cast interacting less with us, to less twitter, less socials, because even if it sucks to lose that privilege it’s better than to let it become a tool in the hands of abusive people. If people can’t, as a group, learn how to use something responsibly, and the people giving it to them are not allowed to react properly, then that something has to be taken away from them. It’s ruining shows, literally, because usually these people have misread, willingly or by accident, everything from story to characters, and to cater to them means that whatever you were doing following your instincts and making a linear story will get messed up, the story will get out of track, the characters will be weird.

I just wish that the networks and all people involved realized just how very few these people are, how their behavior pushes away actual viewers, how it’s not necessarity to take it with a smile so they don’t lose money, and instead all agreed that there can be consequences to their actions. Fans make threats or claim that someone is -racist/homophobic/sexist/pro rape-  without proof? they get sued for threats/diffamation. Fans gets graphic about their sex fantasies involving two coworkers? They get sued for sexual harassment. Fans bully? they get shut down. They are told the truth. I’d respect and watch a show more if that was an option.

[dragynkeep]

i WISH we didn't need an on-screen kiss for two gay characters to be considered canon. i WISH we didn't need them to explicitly say they are a couple for two gay characters to be considered canon. i WISH we could just show them doing romantic stuff and have people understand that that means the two are romantically together, but unfortunately, so much media has skirted around the idea of gay people in the past w/o ever explicitly confirming it (or playing it off as them being best bros) that we NEED a kiss, we NEED explicit confirmation to make sure that these two characters are together, or else we'll feel left in the dark.

I remember when SK8 the Infinity ended, and the two main characters (both male) skated off into the sunrise, people were debating whether or not they were canon. I mean, I personally see them as canon. With this ending, the official wedding art of them, and the drama CD where one plays Cinderella and the other plays Prince Charming, I think they're pretty canon. But, with how badly so many pieces of media have queerbaited their audiences, I don't really blame anyone for thinking they still aren't canon.

I've seen a similar problem with bees shippers, even within their community. Some think Blake and Yang officially became canon after that forehead touch after killing Adam, and some are still waiting for them to become CANON canon with a kiss. Even with Blake and Yang's toxic co-dependency, many fans still see them as non-canon.

Hell, even WITH canon kisses some ships don't get confirmed 😭. I remember when Yuri on Ice came out, and THE KISS happened, and THE RINGS were bought, and one character literally MENTIONED MARRIAGE...and I saw SO MANY FANS STILL HESITANT TO CALL THEM CANON. "The kiss could have been a hug!" "The rings could be friendship rings!" "The marriage thing could be a joke!" I hate that we constantly have to try to jump through these hoops all the time.

Idk where I'm going with this. I guess I just wish we could be a little more vague about LGBT rep instead of having to explicitly say things, because when things are explicitly said (ex.: randomly having a character explicitly say "I'm trans" if their arc isn't focused on their trans identity) it can feel weird and stilted. If a straight couple had official wedding art and a drama CD where they played Cinderella and Prince Charming, everyone would know they were canon. If a straight couple touched foreheads and held hands and acted all lovey-dovey, everyone would know they were canon. If a straight couple kissed and bought rings and talked about marriage, EVERYONE WOULD KNOW THEY WERE CANON. I hate queerbating. Fuck that.

absolutely agree. i wish that we didn’t have to depend on these majority straight writers to do the absolute most to confirm queer characters when non queer relationships can be confirmed with so little; & it’s very much a vicious circle. if we try to break out of it, it can basically feel like we’re rewarding non queer writers for barely acknowledging their queer characters just for some diversity as tokens instead of having them fleshed out like their non queer characters  /  relationships are.

especially if the creators themselves have a disparity between how they treat their queer & non queer characters. take rwby for example; the three non queer relationships were given far more depth & time dedicated to them than the one queer flagship we have. while arkos got three whole volumes of this will they, won’t they exploring the characters feelings & renora had a whole relationship arc complete with confession & kiss, bees have had to be reduced to the same stupid forehead touch for years & years. all while the crew behind rwby have marketed them to hell & back knowing that fans will buy any bees merch, while denying them any explicit on screen representation. the queer representation of rwby has been shoddy at best anyways but the issue of bees & how that has been handled is particularly egregious.

i too wish we didn’t have to beg & rummage for all these scraps to confirm & then still wonder if they truly are canon, if we are truly getting that representation. i hope that with more queer stories being told by queer creators like we have recently, that this can change & we can let go of some of that fear & doubt.

[hankwritten]

TFComics Rewrite

I am currently plotting an outline for a TFComics, and I want to get my thoughts about fixes to canon and possibly get feedback. Since this is a rewrite there’s really no *spoilers* or anything, so I’m willing to answer all questions about what I plan to do. Also some characters I’m not so sure about how I want to retool them, so if your have ideas for your fav let me know!

Disclaimer:

This rewrite is intended to critique the content/choices made in the construction and telling of the Team Fortress 2 comic series. It is not a personal attack on the artists/writers/directors or any of the creatives that made contributions to this series, nor is it meant to substitute or replace the official release. This work is transformative in nature, and relies on an understanding of the source material to be understood. TF2 and its characters belong to Valve.

TFCR is working on the assumption that the audience has read the original comic, and as such will skip over scenes and plot points that are unchanged from the original. I don’t think it needs to be said, but this fanfiction will not make sense if you are not familiar with the source.

I also recognize that there are strengths within the comic’s writing and weaknesses within my own. Namely, that Valve writers are gods in the realm of comedy, and I’d rather not try to match them in the regard. As such, I will state up front that these will not be as funny as the TFComics. That is not to say there won’t be jokes (either ones transplanted from the source or some of my own) or that the tone of this will be terribly grimdark, only that my focus will be on improving story structure and character development as those are what appeal to me.

 The Broad Strokes

The goal of TFCR is to give a more engaging story for all the mercenaries we know and love, as--let’s face it--the TF2 mercs are side characters in their own damn story. These are some of the planned improvements.

There will be reason for each of the mercs to actually be there. As it stands, the motivations for almost every character besides Pauling and Saxton Hale are vague and unsatisfying. We’d usually say something along the lines of “money” for hired killers, but clearly Scout doesn’t even know if they’re getting paid, and some of the other characters are even worse. The hunt for the Australium is, therefore, boring. MacGuffins usually are, but at the very least the characters should care about the item even if the audience doesn’t. This work aims to give each of the nine mercs a motive and a reason to be in the story instead of just replaceable joke dispensers.

Explain what “Team Fortress” means, and how it relates to RED and BLU. Long and short: the nine mercenaries we see on the team are not from either RED or BLU but rotate between the two, and were the individuals selected to fight the robots. That means all things do happen to all characters. As Valve pretty much goes with “whatever is funniest at the time”, it’s very hard to make a cohesive theory about “where the hell is BLU team?”, but I’ll do my damndest. We’ll also examine Team Fortress’s relationship with the other capital T Teams, and why they’re considered the “rejects” of the bunch.

Comics 1 & 2 will be removed from the timeline as they serve no purpose, only taking what needs to be known about the plot’s setup and jumping straight to A Cold Day in Hell.

We will introduce the Classic Mercs right away so they can generate threat and play against the TF mercs when they do actually meet head to head.

We will not be killing off Gray Mann. (Not preemptively anyway.) In fact, there will be more focus on him and Olivia as villains facing off against the Admin, providing her foil as the TF2 and TFC mercs provide foils for each other.

I considered waiting until the final comic was out to begin working on this, but that may never happen. Jay Pinkerton said he may reveal what plot they had in store eventually, but considering it took Half Life over a decade to get the “I was once a Valve writer but my NDA has expired and now I can go buck wild” treatment, I’m not holding my breath. The main reason I wanted to do this is that the Administrator’s motivations are not interestingly foreshadowed, to the point where there aren’t even any good fan theories out there. That said, WritingDispenser and Riddle of the Sphinx helped come up with a pretty fun one, which was actually the inspiration for me to get off my butt and start plotting this.

There will be no queerbaiting. This refers both to HeavyMedic (which has been simultaneously used as wink wink nudge nudge joke many times and as encouragement for fans to play their stupid hat game) as well as lesbian Pauling (since femme lesbians are the preferred method for front facing LGBT representation across almost all media, but video games especially). If you need to understand why lesbian Pauling is an issue, Sarah Z coined the term “queercatching” in order to describe word of god confirmations on characters sexualities that are not followed up on in the text. I recommend the full video on it.

Due to the importance of immortality in the theming of the comics, respawn will not be a thing. Deaths we think should have happened previously will be explained as close calls, or that Medic can heal a short time after death. Medic and Scout’s deaths will be cut in the story itself, as after Sniper died and came back, them doing the same thing kinda lost their punch.

Scout

There will be no ScoutPauling hints. It doesn’t make sense to give screentime to this relationship because Valve obviously doesn’t think it’s going to go anywhere so why make Scout turn down advances from other hot women? I mean I get Expiration Date was a Thing but it feels like Scout’s whole motivation shouldn’t be reduced down to chasing a girl who doesn’t like him back.

He’s here because he lost his life’s savings in bad investments and needs the money. That’s it. Which is still somehow more than his canon motive which is question mark question mark question mark

He, Soldier, Spy, Demo, and Pyro all start the adventure with Miss Pauling.

Engages with Heavy on a genuine level when they go to collect him, Heavy doesn’t blow him off when he tries to level about dead dads.

There will be no DadSpy reveal. The way Spy treats Scout has never been “deadbeat dad feels bad about abandoning his kid” but more “this is someone I would kill without a second thought if I felt like it” which makes his reveal in comic 5 feel very disingenuous. I don’t think Valve even had this plotline in mind until comic 3, as #2 still has Spy seeming only to care about Scout’s Ma and not Scout himself. It also makes “seduce me!” retroactively weird.

Uhhh hooks up with Zhanna. This one isn’t critical I just think it’s funny.

Soldier

Soldier is going to be the Ur example of the Admin not treating her people well, as we’re going to lean into the whole “Soldier was only mildly messed up until the whole lead poisoning” thing.

He’s here because he’s blindingly loyal to the cause. He’s actually going to very little from canon because of this actually.

Might be the reason Team Fortress has a reputation of being the lower tiers of the Teams, but that doesn’t mean he’s damn good at his job. Fatal flaw is that he’s unstable, and even though the courthouse plotline won’t be in this fic, it should be noted that he actually does cause problems for the other protagonists due to his short temper. He’s a risky asset, but still essential.

There will be a minor explanation for the WAR! Comic, but I think that’s better saved for Demo’s analysis.

Pyro

Pyro is the character you could cut entirely from the comics and have the least change. Now, they’re going to be Pauling’s right hand. Let me explain.

Engineer and Pyro are implied to live together, and Pyro doesn’t have anything better to do than go with Engie after Team Fortress is disbanded. Rather than having a reveal, we will see some of what is going on with the Admin and friends early on, and see what leads up to her sending Miss P the note that kicks off the whole plot. However, while Engie needs to stay and look after her, Pyro’s skills aren’t useful here, and they are sent as a direct messenger to help Pauling.

They’re loyal, and unlike Soldier rarely mess up orders. They’re also partially mute, making them ideal for handling sensitive info. Pauling trusts them to handle the burning of “Elizabeth’s” paper trail.

Will be using they/them in the narrative voice, but other characters will refer to them as he/him. I considered going with it/its because that’s bubbled up in popularity again, but ultimately I decided against it.

We’ll get glimpses to their train of thought, but like the comics they will remain virtually silent.

Demo

Demo’s role in the cast is going to be very similar to Spy’s. The events of WAR! involved him nearly dying and Soldier taking the win, and he’s very bitter that after all those events *apparently* mercs can just be switched around teams willy nilly and don’t have to kill each other anymore. (As the audience, we know this is because the Admin found out the “make them so angry they won’t ask questions” wasn’t a long-term viable solution, and instead brought TFI forward as a neutral third party that was pretending to mediate the gravel wars.) But Demo’s suspicious, and is only along because he really has been miserable since he lost his job.

This conflict will eventually come to a head, more on that in the Sniper section.

Is fairly forgiving with his teammates. Doesn’t like Sniper but I’m willing to drop a little angst during that submarine scene. Is glad to see Medic actually. Here to be some glue to hold this merry band together.

The Eyelander will not be forgotten after 2 comics because I love this character concept and I think it was underutilized.

Drunk jokes will be kept to a minimum. What I liked about WAR! and Bombinomicon was that it took Demo and showed that they knew how to make him funny without making him one note, which they sort of did in the early TFComics but stopped in the later ones in favor of him….being asleep for the whole plot. I promise 100% awake Demo in my rewrite.

Demo likes Pauling on a personal level, but has trouble reconciling her with his feelings on TFI.

Doesn’t get knocked out by moonshine because. Seriously? Poisoning the Demoman with alcohol? In what world does that work.

Heavy

Not too much to change. Scout doesn’t accompany him when he goes to look for the secret Australium cache, and he engages with Mags and Saxton (which will be when the audience finds out what they’ve been up to) and actually cares about what’s going on with them. He thinks Darling is up to something. Which he is, he’s attempting to unseat both Gray and Helen due to long family history.

Will at least mention Medic. Their reunion falls a little flat since it mostly relies on Meet the Medic for context, as they don’t really interact in the comic. There can be a bit of a flashback to what it was like as all these mercs broke up.

I know uhhh Valve seems to think found family is really dumb, and that these murderers could ever like each other is silly or something, but the mercs do? Like each other? For the most part anyways. 

Bronislava and Yana come alone for adventures, not just Zhanna. Again, no real reason, but sometimes I get to have tacky fanfic stuff in my own fanfic because I Wanna.

Engineer

Engie ruminates on his family history of allowing all this bullshit to happen and just kind of shrugging. Basically Moss’s analysis of the Conagher themes.

Has put a lot of time, sweat, and tears into BLU and now TFI, isn’t willing to let it fall now, even if Admin is basically living on borrowed time. He’s doing this because of the ‘ole sunk cost fallacy.

Also we get to see more of Pauling and Admin’s relationship through his eyes.

Medic

Congrats on being the one merc with an actual arc, Medic! As a reward, you will not be changed much.

I’m actually going to use Medic’s section to say that the Classic mercs will be referred to by their first names in order to differentiate them, and we’ll get little previews of what they’re like from Medic’s perspective before we actually see them fight Team fortress. The battle at the submarine will be more of a fight in this sense, working it out so it seems like surrender is the only option after Sniper is killed.

Final fight with Cheavy will be...not blocked so awkwardly. I mean this is now a textual medium so my work is already halfway done, but still the pacing is so weird. Shudder.

Sniper

These are the big guns. Most changes, even more than Demo. He’s been actually hunting for New Zealand/the Australium cache on his own, and doesn’t want Pauling interfering, saying for a he knows she could have been the ones to kill his adoptive parents.

(She hasn’t, but the Admin did actually order them killed in an attempt to stop Sniper because she thought she could prevent the exact thing that is going on right now which is that Sniper is considering trying to get at it.)

Sniper doesn’t know this, but Pauling, Demo, and Spy eventually convince him to share his findings and help them get to New Zealand.

Spy

Similar to Demo but is less conflicted about it. He knows just because he likes someone doesn’t mean he won’t have to kill them later. 

Spy knows about who killed Sniper’s parents, and tells Demo, sort of as a test to see where his loyalties lie. He also knows that Pyro is Pauling’s confidant for certain things.

Demo questions him about what he’s doing here, whose side he’s really on. But you know. Spy is Spy and he was never really on anyone’s side but his own. When it comes down to it, it might be exactly as Scout thinks: that he’s ditched them all and run off when he had the opportunity. But, big damn hero, comes back in the end.

He’s here mainly to “keep an eye on things.” Also maybe because his gf asked him to keep an eye on her son :)

[representativecharacters]

Characters: Castiel, Dean Winchester

From: Supernatural

Representation: mlm (*see “issues” section), abuse survivor (Dean) 

Their Importance: Dean and Cas are two characters that many in fandom viewed as LGBTQIA+, with the common belief being that Dean Winchester is bisexual. 

There’s a lot about Supernatural and Destiel, and Dean in general, which I’ll go over in the “issues” section, but I think many people in fandom didn’t expect for the show to actually go anywhere with them - until 15x18, when Cas confesses his love to Dean. It’s riddled with issues, yes, but just speaking as a bi girl who’s been watching Supernatural for a decade now, watching Cas confess his love for Dean was just so incredibly validating. It validated that I - and other fans - weren’t delusional when looking for representation from Cas (and Dean). Cas is a wonderful character and gave a new life to the show, and has been a fixture of the show for 10 years. While like with every character he has his ups and downs, he is a kind, loving character, and the only main character who actually survives the show. Despite the issues on the show, knowing that Cas is canonically LGBT+ is something that’s comforting and validating to me, and continues to be so even as Supernatural kind of trainwrecks around everything else. 

For myself, watching the show, I saw a lot of myself and my journey in Dean. Watching him grow and develop as a character, and try to experience happiness and find comfort in his found family was wonderful for me to see. I started this show when I was a young closeted kid, and I clung to Dean in a way that I didn’t fully understand until years later. I didn’t actually expect him to be explicitly mlm in the show, and for the most part, that didn’t happen - until the Spanish dub. There, we see the romantic reciprocation to Cas, and that’s something that is real and cannot be taken away. In fact, although it was said that it was a “rogue” translator, the episode will not be redubbed, so it is canon in a version of the show. Despite the fact that he didn’t get canonized in a way I expected or would have ever hoped, it still does give me some joy to know that he is canonically LGBT+ (and in my opinion, bi, although there is no actual label given to Dean). Even if it’s not in the version of the show I watched, I can go back and watch the Spanish dub of the episode and see that representation happen onscreen, and that means something to me. 

Issues: The issues list for this show is a mile long, so I’ve split it up into sections and put most of it under a read more:

Dean + Canon Rep: Trying to wade through if Dean is actually canonically LGBTQ+ was....a struggle, to say the least, and I almost didn’t put him into this submission. If you watch the show in English, Dean never once actually reciprocates feelings for Cas, states that he’s into men, or is even confirmed to be in a relationship with other men. Although for many, it is implied, the average audience member may not see Dean as canonically LGBTQ+. However, in the Spanish dub of the show, when Castiel confesses his love to Dean (which is an explicit romantic “I love you”), Dean says “y yo a ti”, which is a reciprocation of Cas’s romantic confession. This post is very long as it is, so I want to link to @destielintheimpala’s timeline of events that occurred for Supernatural and I think it best lays out all the issues about 15x18-20, why it’s been so difficult trying to figure out Dean’s sexuality in canon, why fandom is upset, and can clear up any misinformation. This situation also goes into queerbaiting quite a bit (something Supernatural is infamously known for), which you can read in this article from @thecoolestfreakyouknow. 

Reading Dean as a queer character as well - having a character who is queer (or queercoded) and an abuse survivor and then immediately killing him off is also a huge problem. As mentioned in the link above, Jensen Ackles himself felt uneasy about Dean’s ending, and many Dean fans felt the same way. To have a character suffer through abuse and traumas for 15 seasons, imply or straight out have him be LGBT+ (depending on the canon), and then immediately killing him off in the finale is needless to say, an odd choice. 

Also, with Dean being an abuse survivor - his father, John Winchester, is commonly shown to be neglectful throughout the show, and Dean has to raise his younger brother Sam by himself most times. He expresses trauma from the experiences he’s had growing up with their father and being forced to hunt at a young age. However, the show weirdly seems to flip flop on their portrayal of John, despite also specifically stating that what he put his children through was child abuse. They have Sam telling John that he did the best he could, they have characters excusing away John’s actions, etc. - it was like the writers themselves couldn’t figure out if they wanted John to have been an abusive parent or not. The show ends with John in Heaven with Mary - thus absolving John of his actions and putting him in the same Heaven with the children he abused. 

Castiel: Cas confesses his love for Dean in 15x18, but gets dragged away to a void called “The Empty” immediately afterwards, where he’s meant to be suffering for all of eternity. Cas does get out of The Empty, and even helps to rebuild Heaven - he’s actually one of the few characters to survive the finale - but he never appears onscreen again after 15x18, so fans’ last image of him is getting dragged away to The Empty. Dean never has a follow-up conversation, and there was only one line referencing Cas’s fate, so many fans believed he was still in The Empty suffering.

As the timeline linked above shows, the situation around Destiel is an odd one - the Spanish dub, cast’s overall silence, the lack of Misha Collins in the finale all led fans to believe that something was switched around last minute in terms of Dean’s sexuality and Destiel as a general ship. Obviously, this is speculation unless someone from the show explicitly comes out and says that fans are correct, but it’s included in the issues section because - regardless of it it turns out to be true or not - it’s such a big part of the issues currently surrounding Supernatural and canon representation. In any case, however, Castiel’s confession in 15x18 gave fans hope where they may not have had hope before, and then it was unceremoniously dropped with no real follow up - from a writing standpoint, it isn’t good writing to confirm a major character as queer via a love confession and then never go back to that plot point. While I’m happy that Cas is canonically queer and I’m not trying to say that I would rather not have more representation, I do look back on the show and wonder, with the story that made it to screen, what the actual point of writing that in was. 

As mentioned before, Castiel was a main character on the show for 10 years - while I’m glad that his character survives the series, to not have him show up in the final two episodes (particularly the finale, and especially after canonically making him LGBTQ+) felt like a slap in the face to both the character and the audience who loved him. 

Miscellaneous treatment of characters: In general, Supernatural has many problems in its treatment of female, characters of color, and LGBTQ+ characters. Alongside being incredibly underrepresented in the show, if they do show up, they are commonly tortured, treated poorly, and/or killed off (if not all of the above). Even thinking about their recurring characters who are also representative - Kevin, their only recurring Asian character, is killed off and appears as a ghost multiple times, Charlie, who is a lesbian, gets killed off and replaced in the show with an Alternate Universe version of herself, Eileen, a Deaf woman, gets killed off and then is brought back and is implied to survive the show, but like Cas, never actually shows up in the final two episodes even though she’s Sam’s girlfriend. I can think of very few minority characters in the show in general, much less those who got any type of happy ending. 

[flying-elliska]

Okay, I'm reading Chap18, and I really hope this comment won't hurt your feelings because I love your fic and I really just want to understand why you wrote it this way, but I have to tell you that for the first time I've been disapointed with Diamants AU. I already felt it was going this way with Daphné, Arthur, Vallès, Emma and Alexia being LGBT, but I kind of felt betrayed with the Yann/Alex thing, and now I'm sensing Manon and Daphné will be together at some point too and ...(1)

...I don't understand why you made all your characters LGBT. I get that they are under-represented in most of the books and shows, but with Diamants I'm kind of feeling like being staight is a bad thing, like it's either boring or you're juste an asshole. I've always loved Skam because it shows that very different people can be friends and help each other no matter their religion, sexuality... and this kind of felt like the only reason they stand together is they're all LGBT (2) and I guess this comes from personal experience but that would have been so much more powerful to have straight people being as much invested in this war as the others. Honestly I don't see the point of Yann, Alex, Emma, Manon or Arthur not being straight, for me it doesn't bring more to who they are. This really feels like they would be nothing if they were straight. So I juste wanted to ask you why you decided this? Again, really hope this won't hurt you... (3/3)

hey anon. So, I’m going to assume this comes from a place of good faith and a sincere desire to understand, and explain my choices. That said, I do have to say that even though it didn’t really hurt me (it mostly made me laugh), it did make me a little angry too, because there are a lot of harmful implications in your messages.

1) First of all, about you “not seeing the point” of making certain characters LGBT. This functions under the assumption that there needs to be a reason for people to be gay, bi, trans, etc - and that straight people are the default. That is...really not great. People are gay in real life, for no reason whatsoever. If you don’t go to writers asking why they made their characters straight if there is no reason in the story, you shouldn’t do this either. Characters can be queer without it being a big part of the story - it’s just a part of them, and the idea that they have to ‘deserve a place’ in the narrative through their gayness (often through a deeply tragic arc full of suffering to Educate Straight people) is deeply heteronormative, and fucked up. LGBT people are not in a story to make a point, they’re there because they exist. Yes, some of my characters have arcs that are deeply entangled with their sexuality and struggles with it. Some are not. When it comes to Yann and Alex, I didn’t think too much about it, I thought it would be funny and unexpected and give some good shenanigans. Sometimes that’s all you need.

2) As for turning a majority of the canon straight characters LGBT : listen, in the end, this is my fic, and I do it because I want to. I’m bi and my life is full of queer people. This is my normal, this is what comes naturally to me, and what I find interesting to write about. I set out to write a James Bond parody with some deep character exploration, it’s meant to be a very transformative fic. I have no obligation to stick to any Skam ‘guidelines’. I am also not aiming to write a particularly realistic story, if the secret mobster conspiracy didn’t tick you off already. The ethos of fic is to make canon your playground and to let your imagination go wild. That said, this trope you’re probably used to, of having one or maybe two queer characters and not more in any given story, I would say is the less realistic one. In real life, LGBT people often tend to cluster together, often before they even realize their sexuality, especially as they get older. But a lot of mainstream media is afraid of that because they don’t want to alienate their straight audience, so they don’t show it. I have no such compunctions. Your message seems to imply that there is a limit to how many gay people there should be in a story and I find that deeply offensive. There is incredible relief, peace and power to be found in community, especially after being struggling so much with your sexuality, like Lucas did for instance. I wanted to show that joy in this chapter, and how it plays a part in him slowly letting his walls down.

3) I notice you don’t mention Imane. She’s straight, she’s super invested in this war, she’s neither boring or an asshole, in fact she’s probably the most important character in the fic after Lucas and Eliott. She’s badass and amazing and complex and if you don’t feel she counts as ‘good straight representation’ I find that slightly odd. Is she too ‘other’ for you that you would dismiss her like that ? Also, Basile is straight lmao. There’s plenty of straight people in this fic. And plenty of people who have incredibly different life experiences ; sexuality not being the main one doesn’t change that.

4) I do find it sort of silly that you reduce the characters’ reasons for fighting to being LGBT after I spent like 400k words proving otherwise. Like - Lucas wants to avenge his mother, Eliott wants to take down his father, Imane wants to avenge her father, Daphné wants to steal jewels, Alex and Emma are bored, Alexia’s a good friend (and also bored lol), they’re trying to stop horrible people from doing horrible things, their trajectories are layered and complex and if you tell me that can all be boiled down to ‘they’re gay’ I kind of wonder if you’ve paid attention to what you’ve read at all.

5) All that said, a majority of my characters being LGBT does have a symbolic point. It’s an opposition to the world of the Shadow, which is deeply sexist, heteronormative, homophobic, and macho. It represents how questioning your sexuality can be deeply liberating and often put you at odds with the general structures of power and oppression in society and lead you to question a lot more and find people who want to fight with you. Being LGBT can (but not always) make you more politically conscious and that’s a beautiful thing that deserves to be celebrated. And in general, being a minority makes you more aware of inequality because it’s simply your daily life. So it makes perfect sense that most of these characters who fight against symbols of horrible systemic oppression would be marginalized in some way or other. Straight/cis/white/rich/abled/etc people simply have less reasons to question the status quo. I have sat through so many action movies where all-straight heroes save the day ; I’m sure you can sit through the opposite for once. If you can’t, maybe it’s a failure of empathy or imagination on your part.

6) Imagine growing up and never seeing, around you or on TV or in books or movies, someone who shares your sexuality. Or if you ever see somebody like you, they will be a joke, a punchline, deluded, instable, doomed, or worse, a predator. Imagine the sort of damage that does. Imagine that when you finally find some correct representation, you have to make do with crumbs for years. Imagine it gets slowly better, but it’s still overwhelmingly tragic, or incorrect, or stereotypes, or only told after the story is over, or you’re always the best friend, always the minority, the point of interest there to educate, always there to struggle, never the epic breathtaking romance, never centered, never allowed community and to see yourself as the norm. In the best of cases, your identity is more or less ignored. In the rare cases where you find good representation, shows get cancelled prematurely, or your faves never get as much screen time as the straight ones, or storylines get botched because somehow writers think showing queer characters happy has no value. Imagine then you decide to take matters in your own hands and write the sort of queer utopia that makes you truly happy - the one where you’re surrounded with people like you and you don’t have to constantly feel isolated and otherized and you’re badass and don’t have to take any shit and your love story is the epic one that gets centered and you have friends who understand and share your experience. And then imagine someone, instead of taking a deep breath and going back to like, 99% of all media ever made, randomly comes to you and tells you they feel ‘betrayed’ because in this one paltry little fic you wrote, their mainstream experience is not centered like usual. Tell me, how would that feel ?

Again, I don’t bear you any ill will, but your message comes across as ignorant and very entitled. I am open to feedback and criticism but writing a story full of LGBT people is one thing I will never feel sorry for. There are a shit ton of fics out of there where those characters are straight, not to mention canon. If you feel ‘betrayed’ by the amount of queer characters in my fic, then I’d say you have some biases you need to examine. It reminds me of all the times I’ve heard people say that they ‘like gay people but only if they’re not too in your face’ (lol that was my sister, so fun) - this implication that queer people should know their place, never show their difference too openly, accept being a minority in all spaces, need to ‘deserve’ their spot, center straight people’s needs, etc etc...is deeply harmful and toxic.

If you can’t understand all this, then my writing is probably not for you.

[myopinionhi]

The Importance of Privacy to Nico di Angelo's Character and the LGBT Community

One of the most relatable traits of Nico is how much of a private person he is. He likes to keep many thoughts and actions away from the public. Some may interpret this as a major flaw for Nico since his private personality may hide himself too much from others.

I guess to some extent that's true, but that's only if his desire for privacy is so extreme that he's isolating himself and ashamed of himself in an unhealthy way.

Nico can have a decent amount of privacy in his life in a healthy way. He can be open about certain things to a small number of individuals but then also keep a lot of things to himself. In fact, privacy for Nico is good for him. Having too many people knowing Nico's business would be needlessly stressful.

Nico's need and want for privacy is especially important since he's a gay. I know the typical (oftentimes stereotypical) LGBT coming-of-age story ends with the main character being loud, out, and proud. They'd showoff their identity and maybe their significant other out to everyone, sometimes with a microphone and a giant pride flag.

Now, this type of scenario may seem all happy and healthy. However, being out and proud can bring a lot of attention. This attention, even if it comes from people who mean well, can be overwhelming and invite an invasion of privacy. This occurs because when we LGBT individuals are out, we often stick out among the crowd. Our identities are unique and bring interest, questions, preconceived notions, and, worst of all, fetishizations. Furthermore, being out attaches a giant label to LGBT individuals that often overwhelms other aspects about us. This unwanted attention and invasion of privacy is a good reason why some stay in the closet, even if they're accepting of themselves and rational.

Not all LGBT individuals come out loudly and invite lots of people into their personal lives. Some coming out stories can be quiet or barely there. Some LGBT individuals may be out only in the sense where they won't deny who they are, but, at the same time, they won't share their identity without prompt. I imagine a private individual like Nico probably doesn't share his sexuality and his romantic relationship openly to a lot of people. His sexuality and relationship are personal matters that he frequently keeps to himself, not out of shame, but for the sake of comfort and privacy.

Too many fans have this notion that since Nico is out, he's going to talk about being gay with everyone and show off his new boyfriend. As a result, many characters are butting into his private life and invested in Nico's business. Even if he wants to keep some things private, others won't allow it. Suddenly, his personal life has an audience, and Nico should be okay with it since he's gay. It's as if LGBT individuals shouldn't have the same level of privacy as straight people do.

One of the most common ways I've seen fans disrespect Nico's sexuality is when they write about him in a way that violates his privacy, and it's treated as something acceptable. This issue is super common and can be easy to miss. I could list the many different ways people write Nico in such a way, but then this post would get too long. (Maybe I'll make such a list in the future if anyone's interested.)

[abanomath]

DC’s Tone Deafness

So I don’t really like ranting or being negative, but DC Universe recently released an article to celebrate pride month about the Top 5 canon and non-canon LGBTQA+ relationships in Young Justice.

And the tone deafness is just off the charts. Like most of the world, I’m not American so I needed someone to screen-cap the actual article for me. I’m going to organize my thoughts and go down below.

General

For one, its pretty obvious the writer didn’t look at the source material. This article sounds like it was written by someone filled in on the basics and told to write a good PR article for DC.

There are a lot of little details in the story, such as when the writer claims that they “showcased even more LGBTQA+ protagonists in season 3″ implying they had previously, which they hadn’t. One character was implied to be bisexual in the comics, never on screen, but more on that below. Season 3 was the first LGBTQA+ rep for the show.

Also its always a bit tone deaf when in an article celebrating LGBTQA+ and diversity in your show, that you have a list of 5 “ships”, of which only ONE is actually a couple in canon. Not only did they need to resort to non-canon ones, they included people that can’t be called a “ship” or couple.

1. Kaldur/Wyynde

This is the only actual LGBTQA+ couple on the list that is canon in the show, and I liked them. But I can’t deny that Kaldur who was a main cast member for the past two season’s had a vastly reduced role (compared to straight cis white characters like Dick and Conner). He was basically written out of the first half of the season, and then his relationship was really present for 1.5 - 2 episodes max. This in a season that was marked with excessive attention given to heterosexual relationships (like seriously, basically every character was in some form of relationship on-screen). The one healthy LGBTQA relationship got less attention than Black Lightning and Dr. Jace’s romance, something that ultimately went nowhere, Dick/Barbara, even Megan/Conner when Megan was also essentially written out of the season.

2. Marie Logan and Rita Farr

They really dug deep for this “ship”. Ironically, they start this by talking about the scene in Young Justice #25, when Queen B’s powers work on Garfield’s mother. This was the first implication her being bisexual. And of course, she also dies in this scene, so starting off with a “Bury your gays” trope where Marie’s queerness literally got her killed and orphaned her son.

There isn’t much more to say about this ship, because it literally doesn’t exist. The shipping community for this is so small you have to go digging deep into tags to find even hints of it. The article even basically says this, posing the ship as a question. As being interesting. (Does it count as Bury Your Gays when both woman are dead before their relationship is even hinted at?)

In other words this article about celebrating LGBTQA ships literally had to try and CREATE A SHIP to reach 5 ships. Despite the fact there are plenty of LGBTQ fanon ships (Birdflash being the most prominent one left off the list). It really hits at the thing I said above, this is a “write us a good PR article with the barest amount of effort put into it” situation.

3. Harper Row and Halo

Oh boy don’t get me started on this. There are so many problems with how they did Halo this season, she is basically tone deaf personified. (For the purpose of this rant, I’ll be using the “she” pronouns for Halo, because I have no choice but to assume they are her preference, unless the show purposely spent the entire season mis-gendering her, but I don’t think her characterization really supports that she prefers “her/she”).

I’ve had a problem with Halo from the start, because she is basically an attempt for the writers to shallowly include representation without having to actually deal with it. She is Muslim representation, but not actually Muslim (as she confirms on the show). She wears the Hijab because she feels like it. She is genderqueer, but they never once talk about her pronouns. She refers to herself as “not feeling like a boy or a girl” and constantly refers to herself in the third person, but everyone uses “she/her” pronouns without asking her. They even have a scene where she informs them she is genderqueer, and its never brought up again without asking any actual follow up questions or awareness. They also infantalize and treat her as a little girl.

Additionally, she falls into one of my greatest pet peeves - she is genderqueer but for fantasy-scifi reasons. For those that follow genderqueer or transgender characters in media, this is a very common trope. Essentially, the trope is when someones gender identity is caused by/determined from otherworldly experiences.

This trope bugs me because it completely undermines the point of representation. Representation in media is supposed to show the audience that these are natural human experiences and that people like this exist and are normal. But the trope ensures that the experiences are not normal human experiences.

(and don’t even get me started on the fact that this show has made New Genesis tech gendered before, with Sphere. And even gender the bioship in the same season they pull this for Halo).

Lastly, she also falls within the “promiscuous bisexual” trope, with the very kiss this article praises as THE FIRST LGBT KISS ON SCREEN for the show. This is a problematic trope that DC seems to love. Basically, this scene has Halo cheating on her boyfriend with another young classmate, engaging in two kisses with her.

Now I’m not going to say that all LGBTQA+ relationships need to be wholesome one true loves. Problematic behaviour like Halo and Harper’s is a story telling tool. But the fact that the LGBTQA+ was told going into the season there would be LGBT rep so they should watch, and this was the first rep we got 18 episodes into the season? It felt a bit like a slap in the face. They could’ve had her break up with Brion beforehand, or any number of different ways that would even keep the scene in tact.

And the relationship doesn’t really go anywhere anyways. Harper doesn’t really remain part of the season going forward, Halo and her boyfriend continue their relationship after it was revealed until the end of the season.

This is ultimately my problem with Halo. There are a few tropes that basically are summed up as “writers put all their diversity into one character” which is basically what Halo is. Each of these qualities, from faith to gender identity to sexual orientation could’ve been a fleshed out character arc (oh! I forgot to mention she also falls into the “My gender identity isn’t cis, so my sexual orientation is also bi/pan/gay” trope). Instead all the diverse qualities of Halo are addressed shallowly as the show-runners pat themselves on the back.

4. Bluepulse

I’ve ranted a lot so I’m not going to go crazy on this point. You can probably find tons of posts about the drama between Bluepulse Shippers and the show, which again makes their inclusion kind of tone-deaf. Bluepulse shippers have been called disgusting by the fandom for the three year age gap, an age gap that was never confirmed on screen and you had to go digging in Greg’s personal message board to know (resulting in many people shipping them not knowing their ages at all).

In addition, the showrunners made it clear they did not like this ship over the several years the show has been off the air. And in Season 3 they give Jaime a girlfriend….who is a lesbian in the comics. Now Traci and Jaime did date in the comics before she came out, and this is another Earth. But when the sole purpose of their relationship being on screen was to tell the audience that bluepulse wasn’t happening, choosing a lesbian character to play the cis straight girlfriend is a bit of a slap in the face. again.

5. Bart Allen and Eduardo

Queerbaiting, nuff said.

For those not in the know, Ed is a character introduced as a runaway in Season 2, but he doesn’t really interact with Bart until mid-season 3. There is an episode where a group of heroes go to a carnival, and Ed and Bart appear to be on a date. They are in a group with all couples, except for Virgil. Virgil laments being the only person there without a significant other, implying that Bart and Ed are together. Additionally, Bart and Ed do everything that the other couples do together. It was pretty heavy-handed that the couples were there on dates.

And fans liked this! Even if Bluepulse wasn’t happening, Bart may still be bisexual or gay. This was made worse by Greg retweeting and liking Ed/Bart content, and not giving a straight answer on whether they were dating.

Which obviously, creates the expectation among LGBTQA+ fans that they will get together. They don’t. And later at a convention, one of the main writers (not Greg) said something like “its funny how the fans see relationships between characters differently from our intent” when asked a question about them. Essentially confirming that yeah, they didn’t have any actual content for them planned anyway. Though they did have an addendum that they may build on the fan reception/view of the relationship in the future (basically saying, maybe they’ll be canon).

As much as I’d like to be optimistic that they actually will get together and we’ll get a LGBTQ relationship that is in the spotlight for once, I’m not. I’ll be happy to be proved wrong on this point.

And that was my TEDtalk about how tone-deaf DC patting themselves on the back for LGBTQA+ content in Young Justice is. Especially when other animated shows do so much better with fewer episodes and screen time.

[skamamoroma]

“I Told Sunset About You” - Review/Recap/Whole Bunch of Nonsense Rambling about my Love!

Every now and then a show comes along that I get absolutely knocked off my feet by and I can’t stop thinking about it until I write a whole bunch of nonsense because it’s THAT GOOD and this damn show. I’ve thought about it all week. Outside of the SCU and other longer running stuff, the last time a show sidetracked me like this was San Junipero and I dreamed about that episode for weeks! This show got to me so much that I knew I had to write that whole bunch of nonsense for real and I decided to write a bit of a review and then some specific posts about some of the themes, metaphors, ideas and shots etc that I adore. So if this is not your thing, I tag religiously!

So if you haven’t seen it, the show is about two young boys, Teh and Oh-aew, living in Phuket in Thailand about to take their entry exams/go through the Uni acceptance process. They were childhood best friends until they had an argument which caused them to stop speaking to one another for many years until they meet again at a Chinese class. The story is about friendship, identity, love, rivalry, family, authenticity, ambition and growing up. It’s sweet, funny, painful, warm, difficult, romantic, hopeful, honest and insightful. I hope you don’t fall asleep reading... !

My friend in Japan recommended this show to me. I watch a lot of movies/tv from different parts of the world but rarely from this part of the world not because I don’t want to - I DO! - I just don’t know what’s good and I tend to rely on recommendations from friends or coming across things by chance. If you’ve followed me for even a while, you know my JAM is character driven, nuanced, beautiful shows that go heavy on authentic emotion but use cinematography/music/sound/colour and other creative tricks to further the story. Nothing makes me go starry eyed more than a show SHOWING without a single moment of TELLING where it isn’t necessary and this show hit every single one of those things and more to the point that I was completely swooning at how much of a masterpiece it is. I swear some tiny moments in this show have me floored with how effective and meaningful they are. ARGH. 

As icing on the cake, it’s beautifully LGBT+ themed (written in part and, I believe, directed by LGBT+ folks - if I’ve got that wrong from translations, let me know). These themes are created with care and love, felt refreshing with characters I don’t feel I’ve really seen before. I know that there is info to suggest that they wanted to create this show much more FOR LGBT+ folks and to differentiate it from a style of show that is perhaps more popular for a mainstream audience or a certain audience that wants a certain thing from some Thai dramas (I’m personally not into BL - I think that’s what the genre is called as I kinda don’t know how to feel about that stuff being hella tropey and made for a specifically straight female audience)… and you can tell. They apparently didn’t promote this as that genre. Some of the other themes were so interesting and explored so beautifully. The idea of rivalry and competition was handled with so much insight and depth that it really did stun me at time’s how skilled the writing is. 

The acting… oh the acting. I know Billkin and PP have apparently been close friends for many years but even that sometimes doesn’t guarantee to equal this level of chemistry. They are stunning actors, genuinely nuanced, so charismatic and loveable. I love that even the sad anguished moments are messy as hell (and a couple so delightfully dramatic), the gentle sweeping romantic moments are swoon worthy and allowed to linger or exist in silence, the tension they create is often feels a little too intrusive to watch and the nuance - so much is said without saying anything at all. Some specific moments are handled with so much care when dealing with really complex emotion and I’m floored to see such young actors achieve some of the moments they do because some of the emotion is genuinely complex. There’s a lot of Teh who is terribly complex and to achieve that balance between difficult to work out and yet still feeling like you understand him is a very tricky thing and yet, that’s what I felt when I watched his character. I am in awe of their abilities to be honest and just found them completely mesmerising from start to finish. I love that a lot of their character traits are established so strongly through acting choices that by the end, when both have come kinda full circle and have learned from the other, you can see the OTHER in the OTHER, if that makes sense! Teh in the final few scenes takes on some of Oh’s characteristics. It’s so noticeable but never oversold. Perfect.I can’t overstate this enough! Some moments left me breathless for so many reasons. 

My mum lived in Thailand for a while and in Phuket where the show is set and I loved seeing stuff I recognised from a few of her photographs. I felt I learned a lot about Thai culture too, stuff my mum would have learned and I adored the world surrounding these characters! Btw, if I get anything incorrect re: the culture - come shout at me! :)

The music. Knowing that the soundtrack was written for the show and sung mostly by the two leads was such a surprise because they are beautiful songs. The score is, and I cannot emphasise this enough, bloody gorgeous. There are parts where they play the most gentle soft piano music that kinda breaks my heart and others when they perfectly place the most uplifting soaring sounds that enhance some simple scenes so much that they felt so impactful. There’s a song on the score called Skyline Minimal which is used in a specific scene and in the documentary the director talks about how just the sound of it, you don’t need the lyrics, it just makes you miss someone and makes you cry and he’s absolutely spot on so that when you hear it, what happens on screen just shatters your heart. The soundtrack is woven into the storyline so deeply that the lyrics are used, the melody is used to trigger Oh-aew’s memories at one point and the pretend source of the main song, Skyline, is directly linked to not only the idea of learning Chinese and what that means for them both as characters and as a pair but two of the main themes of the season, ambition and identity! 

The cinematography. Christ on a bike. I could write essays. I am a sucker for meaningful camera work, stuff that does half of the storytelling for you and I cannot praise this more highly other than to say it’s close to perfect. Some moments are so absolutely mesmerising and meaningful that a simple movement or a simple peek at something means a LOT. I’m going to have to write a whole damn post on some of my favourite moments because I can count on one hand the shows/movies of late that I’ve seen that achieve what this show does with camera work, directorial choices and general approach to non-verbal story telling. The level of thought and detail and using a camera in a creative and loving way... I found it so moving and so beautiful the way you could feel the level of consideration that went into the smallest moments, how entire moments of character development were done silently…

The use of metaphor. Anyone who knows me knows I am absolutely WEAK for this stuff. If a good complex emotion or concept can be developed in a way other than with words then I am yours… I will read into everything, enjoy every clever reference and revel in the use of colour or light or sound or motif. This show was a gift in that sense. I’m going to end up writing posts about stuff like the use of colour and the hibiscus flower and coconuts and the use of Chinese words. Again, some moments were so genuinely beautifully done and unexpected that I was like a kid in a sweetshop and was a little swoony over them. There are some moments when the Chinese phrases/words are used through their tutoring in a way to sum up the character’s feelings, moments are built up to by establishing motifs that, when used to their conclusion make for the most BEAUTIFUL or gut wrenching moments. The hibiscus flower scene/colouring in may  be one of my most favourite scenes in the whole show and I just smile thinking of how wonderfully it was developed.

Another thing I truly adored was how I genuinely loved every single character. There’s no demonisation, no discarding of characters at the expense of others (especially as I hate when women in movies are treated this way when there’s no reason to), no characters who are used as scapegoats. If anything, you come out adoring the characters who traditionally “get in the way” of a pairing because, well, they don’t. They don’t feel in the way or an annoyance. They feel genuine and lovely and you root for them. That’s a really really kind way to treat your characters but, above anything, it’s just lovely to see that much consideration given to characters to treat them all as humans. I get a little sick of seeing ‘bad guys’, you know? I like flawed, messy but human people. Hoon as a big brother is so understated but when he appears and when it matters, some of his moments are so genuinely emotional it’s amazing how they allow him to be a typical brother, kinda dismissive and teasing his younger sibling but then he’s THERE and really fully there for his brother in some truly significant moments. It felt so earned for me and goodness, one moment kills me when Teh is full on in the middle of a family fight, sobbing and confused and in a room of them all, Hoon goes directly to his brother and the simple way it happens had me in bits. Apparently, that was an improvised scene too so it makes it a little special.

The ending. Any LGBT+ soul out there knows the pain of watching another miserable ending and, don’t get me wrong, I’m ALL FOR endings where you don’t necessarily get what you WANT but only ones that make sense and are earned so they make you think or realise you don’t NEED what you want etc. BUT also want happiness and hope and love and watching LGBT+ characters thrive. Not to spoil, but they treat these two very well by the end… you just have to make your way through a box of tissues first!

So yeah, it was alright. Hahahaha. I genuinely think it’s a masterpiece. I feel the love and care that went into it, the time taken to consider and think and find ways to say a LOT by saying very LITTLE. I feel the commitment to LGBT+ media, little nods to other shows/moments… I feel their wish to be original and to try to make new characters feel fresh and unseen. I just adored it and I’m so grateful it exists because as a piece of art, when you finish it and can write legit essays (and I’ve seen posts other people have written and I’m in NO WAY the only one here) then you know you’ve done something kinda special! So that’s me, getting my whole bunch of nonsense down… and now I can make specific posts and ramble a whole bunch more! Mwahaha.