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talkfantasytome · 3 years

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In Defense of Misogyny?

NOPE!

Before I start, I will not be defending misogyny. There is no defense for misogyny. I'm just a bit of a bitch who couldn't resist a controversial title. *shrug*

I saw a conversation recently about how horrible it is that the fandom loves Eris and is quick to hate Mor. I was going to post my response in a reblog, but I realized that, on top of the post ending up very long, I wasn't fully responding to the conversation at hand. I was sharing my own thoughts that only semi-relate.

If you're interested in that convo, you can find it here.

However, I am not going to directly respond to this, because the conversation made good points. And I very much agree, in theory, that we should not be more forgiving of males than females in general.

Instead, I just want to share my own feelings on why it may not be misogyny to like Eris and dislike Mor, and the main questions to ask to understand that.

First and foremost - I would like to state that we can not and should not hold women to a higher standard than men. In this, I hands down agree.

I will also agree that it absolutely can be sexist/misogynistic to love Eris and hate Mor. However, as someone who, while in the throes of ACOSF, was upset with Mor and still liked Eris (or, enjoyed him? I love Eris, but I'm not always 100% sure I truly love him, or the character and the mystery behind him and my own hopes of who he might actually be), I don't consider myself or my reasons to have been sexist.

Also, I would like to point out that I did not end ACOSF still very upset with Mor. My current feelings are that I hope to see more of her to fall back in love with the character, as I did love her, for the most part, especially in ACOMAF. And I totes ship Mor/Emerie.

That being said, I think we have to take a moment to consider a multitude of factors around why one might currently be more forgiving of Eris than Mor, as well as other pieces, that may or may not show this as true misogyny.

1. Why are we mad at Mor?

Personally, for me, yes, I don't love that Mor hasn't said anything to Az, even in the vein of just telling him it's not going to happen. It's not that she must do this, or that Az deserves that, specifically. It's more that it would be the right thing to do. But, I'm not mad at Mor for this, because I understand why she doesn't. Similarly, there is no male character who I'm solely mad at because they kept a secret.

No, what hurt me the most about Mor - and yes, hurt me is the best way to describe it - was her complete disdain and hatred for Nesta. I am, generally speaking, biased toward Nesta, and I do recognize this. But it doesn't change where I came from. She was horrible to Nesta almost from the get go. Sure, she brought Nesta to the Night Court and then, the next time we see them together, Mor is snapping at Nesta. She basically ignores Nesta when Nesta decides to join them for the High Lord's meeting. She causes Cassian to pull his hand away from Nesta during the war - which, admittedly, was a Cass action I'm still waiting for an explanation on, but it still had to do with her. Cassian was doing that for her, which means that he believed him holding Nesta's hand might hurt Mor or something - why? What is it that makes Mor soooo against this compared to everyone else? It's either a selfish reason - i.e. the buffer thing - or it goes back to her just hating Nesta the most. She then basically yells at Nesta for waiting at Cassian's tent when he's injured - for caring for Cassian. And then, in SF, when we first see her she is insulting Nesta to Cassian, and then straight to Nesta's face.

Perhaps it is all about feeling like Nesta brings her friends pain. Perhaps it is a fear of how Nesta could change the inner circle. But, we are never given Mor's full reasons, and even other POVs don't really give us anything to go off of. So all we see is Mor hating Nesta.

We see Mor hating a woman who has just gone through some serious trauma. Multiple traumas, really. And she probably disliked Nesta even as a human, though again we didn't really see them interact, only Mor being shocked at Cassian's declaration to Nesta. Which can't help but make you wonder if that played any part, too.

So, in the end, what made me the most hurt by Mor's actions toward Nesta, and words about Nesta, was the fact that Mor seemed to not care at all about what Nesta was actually dealing with, she only cared that Nesta was being a bitch.

Mor - who has faced her own horrific traumas, yet can't see it in herself to give someone else who has faced trauma the benefit of the doubt. Mor - who was so kind to Feyre, and very forgiving of Feyre basically ignoring her that first time she was in the Night Court, understanding Feyre's trauma. Mor was holding Nesta to a double standard. Basically, my hurt and anger toward Mor stemmed from the same anger that went into that original post - anger at a double standard toward a female who is suffering from trauma. Because Mor, one who often seemed posed as a defender of woman, a representation of how one can heal and grow from trauma, but how that trauma will still always affect them, couldn't find it in herself to even understand that Nesta was dealing with her own trauma, and what she needed was healing and help. Not insults and being thrown into the Hewn City.

Is it not maybe understandable how it would actually be harder to forgive Mor for showing such a double standard? For showing such little care or sympathy toward someone who has faced her own trauma? How saying that Mor should be loved because she has gone through so much might be almost hypocritical, considering who Mor is showing hatred toward?

I do understand how Nesta could hit closer to home. She sees Nesta to be as bad as the people she was raised with. But, honestly, that doesn't make it better. It just reminds me that Mor is actually often blind to the truth when she doesn't want to believe it or face it. She runs from it, she fights it, and while she is in her right to do so, it is not okay to do so by hurting another person, another woman who has also been through more trauma than Mor even realizes.

I don't find that anger, or upset (which is really more how I felt about Mor) to be a form of misogyny, at least not on its own. Because my feelings for other characters, my interpretations of their actions, may be wholly different, and it's not that I'm holding Mor to a higher standard. It's that I hold certain issues above others, and to me, holding people to a double standard is at the top of the list on what will annoy me about someone else the most.

2. Who else are we mad at? Is it only Mor? Or are there others we are also mad at, and for what reasons?

We should also consider who else a person is mad at, if not Eris, to see are they really holding Mor/women to a higher standard.

Using myself, again - the person I came out of ACOSF the most mad with/upset about was, hands down, Rhys. Not Mor. In fact, by the end of the book, I'd lightened a lot toward Mor, because I did see how Mor was changing and adjusting. She saw Nesta healing, and her attitude toward Nesta shifted. And, to be perfectly honest, I am SERIOUSLY HOPING we will see them have a heart-to-heart, get to know each other, get to understand each other, apologize to each other (especially Mor for how she's treated Nesta, and the things she said to her when Nesta was literally depressed and dealing with PTSD - cause those things weren't okay) and come out the other side, if not as friends, than at least as two females who respect each other. Because I think we all, including Mor and Nesta, need that. But, despite that, we did at least see Mor be better with Nesta. It showed Mor's openness to possibly accepting a new truth about Nesta, which I was happy to see.

Now, back to who are we mad at. Like I said, even if we're considering the middle of ACOSF, when I was fully upset with Mor, my feelings toward her never got to where they still are with Rhys - I don't care about his gifts, until he proves to me he actually cares even a little bit about Nesta as her own person and not as Feyre's sister, I will struggle with him. So, again, can we argue that my feelings were misogynistic if, in the end, my greatest anger was actually toward a man?

On top of that, my anger toward Rhys is far more aligned to what I was feeling about Mor. Because, again, it was about his treatment of a character dealing with trauma. If anything, my double standard is toward Rhys. I don't think it's a double standard, because my expectations of Rhys were higher considering his previous actions, and how he supposedly cared about all of his people. Not because he was a man, but because of what we see from him vs. Mor, particularly in ACOWAR. And, also, you know - Rhys did other things that made me super mad. Mor never threatened Nesta's life, for example.

Conversely, any anger I've have toward Eris (and, I'll admit, there's still a bit), entirely surrounds what he did/didn't do 500 years ago. I'll go into more detail on why I may offer my forgiveness in the next section, but in regards to the anger - I don't see these aligned. My anger toward Rhys and Mor revolve mostly around double standards they seem to have and a lack of understanding or caring for someone who is clearly struggling with trauma. Something that, personally, I think they should both be on the side of truly understanding, considering their own experiences. Eris, on the other hand, it's an anger for leaving Mor to die. I'm not saying that this is a "better" thing to do, it's just that the two angers don't align. I'm not holding Mor to a higher standard, because I do not see the two as the same. Thus, their paths toward forgiveness may look very different, because I will be looking for different things in each of them.

3. What is the person now doing? Have they earned forgiveness?

I'm not saying Eris has earned forgiveness. I'm not saying Mor hasn't. That is up for all of us to interpret.

That being said, what we've seen from Mor does not include any signs of regret for her actions. We do not see her actively trying to make things better between her and Nesta, to understand Nesta, or that she has any sorrow for what she said to her. At best, we see Mor polite to Nesta, and maybe willing to get to know her better. The absolute best interaction was at Solstice, when Mor asked if she might be able to join. As I mentioned, I am hopeful for these two - in part cause my head canon is that they could actually be amazing friends, but that's for another day - and I really loved seeing Mor willing and interested to join in, despite it being with Nesta (and kinda Nesta's thing), as well as seeing Nesta being willing and interested to have Mor join, even if it's just solely for the priestesses. But, that is one interaction and, again, doesn't actually show any repentance from Mor for her own actions against Nesta.

I know some people will say "you mean just that one 'mean' thing Mor said?" - yes. Though it wasn't just that one time, was it? Because there have been multiple times Mor has shown a true disdain for Nesta, while also showing a true indifference to the fact that Nesta was struggling. The other best example of this was when Cassian was hurt in the war, and Nesta was waiting outside his tent, clearly terrified. Mor, also upset, by many things, took it almost entirely out on Nesta. She was either blind to Nesta's feelings for Cassian (doubtful), or she simply didn't care, and instead snapped at her, all while Nesta was probably terrified and fearing the worst in her mind.

The two never talked about this either. And we don't know if Mor regrets those things she's done and said, or even just feels bad, and we also don't have a full understanding of her reasons, or even if there are valid reasons. Because she doesn't talk about it - or, at least, we haven't see her talk about it. I truly hope we will get some answers to all of this. But, right now, we don't even really get hints - we simply assume she must have a reason, because she's Mor and she's great and so she must have a reason we can understand and accept. Still, we don't know, and we don't see her even be held accountable for those actions - admittedly, an issue with most of the Inner Circle and the lack of them being held accountable for how they've treated certain people.

Eris, on the other hand, while what he did was truly horrific, has admitted that he really regrets his actions - or inactions. And he has stated that he had his reasons - reasons that cost him. So we know that he has, in fact, paid for what he's done, at least to some extent. And, more so than that, his current actions seem, to me, to prove this. His constant attempts to ally with the Night Court, to try and do the right thing. Yes, when we saw him at the High Lord's meeting, he was wrong to say what he did to Mor. But we also cannot hold that at full face value and be mad at him for that one thing without remaining mad at Rhys for all he's done while wearing his High Lord of the Night Court mask. Again, that would be a double standard. We can be annoyed by it, but if we forgive Rhys for playing a part, we must also forgive Eris. (This statement, of course, is based on my interpretation that Eris is good at heart, but has made a number of mistakes and is essentially forced to be awful due to his place in life.)

However, despite that one thing, everything else we see from Eris, seems repentant. It is, of course, my interpretation of Eris. But considering all the things he's done, the little threads we get that show us he's not the awful monster we were told he is. He has been working to earn forgiveness, and is doing the right things now - just still often wearing that Autumn Court mask. And, if we're going to forgive Rhys for all the monstrous things he's done, because he has shown himself to be better than that, then it's okay to at least consider forgiving Eris.

So, why is it wrong to be willing to forgive someone for something that he has shown he is seeking forgiveness for? But to maybe not be forgiving another for something that she has not sought forgiveness for? Can we forgive someone for something if they don't realize what they did was wrong? In my opinion, no. Yes, people say that the only person you ever really need forgiveness from is yourself. And I don't fully disagree - I think we do need to forgive ourselves. But, again, only once we understand what we did, how and why it was wrong, and when we want forgiveness. Then we forgive ourselves, and at the least can hope that our actions show that we understand this truth, and others may forgive us even if we don't ask blatantly. In the end, though, we do need to ask for forgiveness. It's just a matter of whether we are vocalizing that request, or showing it in our actions.

Summary

Again, I'm not saying that there aren't times where this is a true double standard. Where people just love Eris and hate Mor, and maybe even blame Mor for what went down with Eris (and, if they do, I will fight them on that because Mor is blameless in that situation - idgaf if she slept with Cassian, I will not blame her for wanting out of that marriage).

I am also not trying to convince anyone that they should love Eris, or that they should dislike Mor - especially seeing as I don't fully dislike Mor, I'm just waiting for the best Mor to come back.

I'm only saying that we really can't make assumptions and say that loving Eris and hating Mor automatically means misogyny. Some things hit closer to home than others - as I mentioned as a possible reason why Nesta is such a struggle for Mor. It could very well be solely about what it is they do and don't forgive each person for. And, personally, I think finding out if a person who is angry with Mor was also angry with Rhys during ACOSF is a much better gauge than comparing Mor and Eris.

I don't believe that Mor owes anyone any explanations. Clearly, my own feelings around Mor have really not revolved around what she may or may not be hiding about Eris. Of course I want to know, I'm a nosy reader. But, if she's hiding something for her friends about that, she has her reasons and I'll accept them so long as they don't end up being, like "well, I just wanted you all to hate Eris forever". But, typically, Mor's reasons have to do with her own trauma and fears, and I accept that. It may, at times, be self-centered - but sometimes don't we all need to be a bit self-centered?

However, I think that we need to truly compare the anger, compare the reasons, to understand why some might like one character and dislike another. It is not feminist to automatically support a woman if she is in the wrong. It is not misogynistic to forgive a man and not a woman for two entirely different situations and reasons. We have to remember that feminism is supporting gender equality in every way - workplace, personal lives, laws, etc. Feminism is not supporting female superiority, which is exactly what happens when you compare two people for things that are not comparable, and then state that you must be more forgiving of the female.

After Thoughts on Mor

I am truly hopeful that we will see Mor and Nesta's relationship grow. And I would like to see more of the Mor we met in ACOMAF, tbh. I have felt, as has been observed by others, that Mor's character and journey has been incredibly chaotic and inconsistent. She was the bomb.com in ACOMAF with how she was with Feyre. Then, in ACOWAR, she was a bit moody, she was mean and harsh toward Nesta (and still has explaining to do on some of this and the Cassian stuff), and she just wasn't really who we met in ACOMAF. I don't really remember much about ACOFAS. But, in ACOSF, again, Mor was different. Except, instead of being just moody and harsh toward Nesta when pushed, now she's completely unforgiving and dismissive of Nesta. And, honestly, that wasn't the Mor I was expecting. I would have expected Mor to be one of the first to maybe realize that Nesta was dealing with trauma. I guess that expectation shouldn't have been held considering ACOWAR, but it was different. I still thought Mor might understand, to an extent - might be at least willing to help Nesta heal, or want to see her healed. Instead, we got someone who said Nesta should just be thrown into the Hewn City - to Cassian's face. So, on top of not giving a damn about Nesta at all (the female that saved Cassian's life, full stop), she also didn't show much caring or understanding of Cassian, one of her best friends. Not until after she saw what a comment like that did to him. And yes, Mor may be just dealing with her own trauma, I understand that. It's why I still have a hard time saying I was truly angry with Mor, but more hurt by/upset with her in ACOSF. Because it may be something deeper that caused her to be this way. Or just her own preoccupation with what's going on in her life. But, in the end, it was still targeted at one person, the one person who probably could handle it the least.

That's my long winded way of saying that I have a lot of hope for Mor's character in the future, and that I don't actually hate her. I just hope that we get to understand her better, understand the reasons she's had for what she's done, but I also hope we see her held accountable (and the rest of the IC).

As always, this is just my own personal opinion, and I accept that others' opinions may be different. I promise to respect yours, all I ask is that you respect mine. I'm not opposed to dissenting arguments, just asking for no attacks. :)

#acotar #acomaf #acowar #acosf #eris vanserra #morrigan

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astrognossienne · 3 years

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birthdays: 4 - the unabashed social climber

My dabbling in birthday numerology has resulted in a ridiculously viral and classic post on my tumblr that goes through all the birthdays. The total sum of all birthdays essentially adds up to a range of numbers 1-9. In that post, I provided snapshots of the personalities of these birthdays. Now, here, on my website, I shall expound further as to why I came to these conclusions. To continue this series, we'll get into my other least favourite birthday number: 4.

4, 13, 22, 31: humanitarians, romantic, penetrating, provocative, faithful, pragmatic, reserved, immature, nakedly ambitious, tries too hard to be omnipotent, controversy always seems to surround them, savage for no reason, prides themselves on being infallible but are utterly fallible, know-it-alls, critical, anxious, smart-mouthed yet very sensitive (almost too much so), proud, tries hard to be individualistic but in reality is just like everyone else, very shady, can be and is often very disrespectful, patronizing and egotistical, needs their ass kissed, due to their vast insecurity and inherent inadequacy they have a need to conquer others and if they can’t do so then they will try very hard to destroy them, wayyy too sensitive and resorts to being caustic and abusive when they’re hurt (which is all the time), tries too hard to act/look/talk hard, can be tough but sweet, can be quite judgmental, always working, likes to one-up people, needs control and is often very self-controlled, often fake, passive-aggressive, very opportunistic and savvy, great at making friends, very contradictory and hypocritical, often very talented and hardworking, competitive, inspires others, wants to be known as kind and great in everyone’s eyes, almost always supremely unlikable individuals, often downright repulsive, has low self-esteem and projects it on others, often has hidden motives, adroit in using people’s emotions for their own ends

I think I pretty much summed them up there. Those who have these birthdays (especially those born on the 4th and 22nd) are the ones who I'm the most indifferent towards and amused by, but in the interest of fairness, let's dive into the psyche of these people, because if nothing else, they're moderately interesting psychological case studies.

When I think of 4's, I think of the character Eve Harrington in the classic film All About Eve. They're hurt, bitter, broken, miserable insecure bitches and often have low self-esteem and inadequacies within themselves, but they cover it up with false "self-love" and "assertiveness" which is actually condescension, aggressiveness, cockiness, and arrogance. This is evidenced in their unabashed social climbing they do. All social climbing have one thing in common: they seek to increase the social climber status by attacking and taking status away from others. They revel in this, since in their mind it secures their power over others, which is very important to them. They're often sad cases with attitude problems. They can’t, or don’t know how to reconcile their pain in a healthy way, so they direct it back out in mean, cruel, and insensitive ways - hurting others just because they were hurt. This process works only briefly, and usually generates extreme guilt in the person, making them stop for awhile. But, the pain of their past hasn’t been healed, so once again they try to bleed off the pain by hurting someone by being mean or rude. It’s like draining the pressure in a boiler. They know they’re inferior and broken, so they take it out full force on the people they envy and those whose true authentic power that they want. They often say what they don't mean. They're also forces of nature, and they somehow always seem to draw deep emotions out of people, and a lot for people seem to be deeply drawn to them. Fours, in turn, are often drawn by those who know how to control their emotions and make them work for them as well as those who have a deeper well of emotion than they and aren't scared of displaying it.

They have the amusing paradox of being mean AND hypersensitive at the same time, but the key is if one feels that these people are actually worth the time you have to take to get to know them, ignore their natural walls, abnormal need for control, rudeness and meanness, and love them anyway. If one can get through to that hurting part and heal and love it, these individuals can be loyal and even amazing friends for life. (incidentally, it's for this reason that I always seem to see these individuals deeply connected to 2's, 5's and 9's because I think 4's sense in them a kindred spirit, or someone they can use this strange type of "love" on and still feel accepted. But I'll cover those numbers at a later date). It might seem crazy, but a common way these people try and pull their partner/friends close is by expressing anger (of which there is a lot of) and unneeded childish aggression, often ruthlessly attacking perceived weaknesses. It usually works in the opposite way (unfortunately), but often underneath the anger is a strong plea for connection and love. The anger is a mask of protest about not getting that love. They like to create conflict and are very restless. They’re whiny and their edginess is based on their M.O. that "people want to hurt me; I must hurt them first to be safe". They’re often very petty and very small and are too selfish to show any real compassion for those going through a tough time or a tragedy, often pouring salt on the wound (although strangely enough, they're often touted as paragons of compassion and virtue).

They're not satisfied with the ordinary, and more often than not they do tend to lead extraordinary lives. They have an accessibility and a mystery at the same time. They can be calm and insanely disciplined. But they are also very fiery and passionate, and often make rash and headstrong decisions and can be very immature and insecure about themselves because of the need for balance that the number 4 suggests. They can also (only when seriously evolved) be inspirational, using their talents to move masses of people in a way very few can, such as Barack Obama (August 4), and obnoxious personalities like Beyoncé (September 4), her husband Jay-Z (December 4), and their friend Justin Timberlake (January 31 [another classic case of the low-level 4]). They are victims masquerading as warriors and use their victimhood as a weapon and other opportunistic tactics to cement their power. However, there is a lot of fixed-sign-esque (especially that of a Leonine/Scorpionic nature) ego associated with the number 4, and this requires everyone to bow down and kiss their ass. If the 4 doesn't get this type of treatment, then they'll destroy everything and everyone in their wake to assuage their hurt feelings and damaged ego, such as it is in the case of Meghan Markle (also born on August 4) and what she and her husband Harry are currently doing to the Royal Family.

Meghan tried to gain unconditional and total acceptance from them/England/the world. Since she didn't get it, she and Harry took their ball and went home" by backing out of the Royal Family and the duties associated with it and moving with their children to America, effectively cutting themselves off from Harry's grandmother, brother, and ailing grandfather. Which brings me to another point about 4's: they like to do things on their own terms, often alienating others along the way to satisfy themselves. Now that Meghan has had time to think about the "abuse" that she feels that she has received, she's going to get her ultimate revenge by trying to destroy the Royal Family with allegations of racism and mental/emotional abuse. Note: it wasn't a problem when they were courting, and it wasn't a problem when they got married, but since she didn't get the "kid glove" treatment she wanted, now they're a "racist family". I often wonder, if the firm/tabloids/press went after Princess Diana so brutally, as blonde-haired, blue-eyed and pretty as she was, what did Markle honestly expect? This speaks to the 4s often shocking naivety. Also, Markle kept referring to Kate Middleton in her interview, so that means that she's fixated on Kate as a point of envy. This is how hate and negative emotions will cause things to change and often unnecessarily so.

On the positive side (only when evolved), 4's can be active, hard-working, systematic, diligent, careful, objective, firm, introverted, serious, patient, reserved, thoughtful, sensible, analytic, calm, orderly and loyal. For those born on the 4th, 13th, 22nd, and 31st, this describes them in a nutshell.

#a freebie from my website #enjoy!#4 #four #numerology #birthdays #mine

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deadlyglacier · 3 years

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20 Questions tag~

I was tagged by @mythicamagic thank you senpai~<3

How many works do you have on AO3?

40 right now, plus 1 that is still hidden because of the SOFA Exchange event. (I’m still a lil fish.)

What’s your total AO3 word count?

486,920! That’s so amazing to me!

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

InuYasha - A Feudal Fairytale (18)

FullMetal Alchemist (18)

Mass Effect Trilogy (3)

Let’s Play (Webtoon) (1)

Kingdom Hearts (1) But I hope to write for many more fandoms in the future! I have ideas for fics for Castlevania, Skyrim, Fallout 4, Last of Us Part II, and more!

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

#1. Stardust FemShep/Garrus, Mass Effect Trilogy, Rated Explicit. A retelling of the Shepard/Vakarian love story, with lots (and LOTS) of sexiness, from Garrus' point of view. Starts from before the Omega-4 and will end sometime after the end of ME3. Trying to stay as true to the game as possible, while adding some things happening off camera and a new ending.

#2. Flamingo Sess/Kag, Inuyasha, Rated Explicit Kagome's method of beating the summer heat attracts a certain demon lord...

#3. Hawk Sess/Kag, Inuyasha, Rated Explicit Kagome and Sesshomaru discover they have a mutual attraction for each other after a battle and a slight comedic incident brings them together. At first their relationship seems entirely sexual, but eventually evolves into something real. What will this romance mean for Naraku? Or even the future? *TRIGGER WARNING FOR CHAPTER 6! MAJOR VIOLENCE AND TRAGEDY* Very, very loosely based on "A Mere Digression" by elle6778

#4. Daisy Sam/Charles, Let’s Play, Rated Mature Sam wakes up somewhere unfamiliar with a splitting headache with no memory of the night before. Takes place right after the S2 finale. First chapter was my prediction for what would happen next, and then three other “wishful thinking” chapters happened, lol.

#5. Chemistry Ed/Winry, FullMetal Alchemist, Rated Mature A look at how the relationship between Ed and Winry developed after Brotherhood ended. Cute, sweet, funny, and hot (eventually—y'all that know me know I gotta have some NSFW in there).

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I try to respond to everyone, especially when a fic of mine has just been posted, but sometimes I just forget. If I haven’t responded to your comment, please know it’s just because I’m a big dumb and forgot! I love getting comments, and I reread them all the time! I just feel like there’s a time limit to when I can respond to them--if I let too much go by, it’s awkward if I reply. Gah, but that’s just me getting in my own head, I guess. I’ll do better!

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Oof, definitely Psychology, a fic I wrote for RoyEdOTPoly this year. The prompt I got was dark, and I didn’t see any way around an angsty ending. Read at your own risk!

What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

Well, aside from the last fic, I try to write happy endings for all my fics! But, if I have to name names, I’m torn between Zoology (another FullMetal Alchemist fic, RoyEd, for RoyEdOTPoly this year) and Stardust (my Mass Effect fic, which is long, but so worth it, in my opinion). Both are very fluffy in the end!

Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

Argh... I don’t really like crossovers, to be honest. I actively avoid them when looking for fics to read. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t thought of writing them myself. (I’m a total hypocrite, I know.) I had an idea for an Inuyasha x The Sims fic, years ago, that I never did anything with. The premise was basically Inuyasha and Kagome would get trapped in the game somehow (via the jewel or magic or something), and they’d be controlled by Souta, Kagome’s friends, Hojo--all sorts of different people who think the fact that Kagome and Inuyasha are in the game is just some kind of silly mod. I probably won’t write it, so if anyone is interested in that crazy idea, have at it! You have my blessing. <3 I also have a crazy crossover idea for what I call an “Ultimate OT3″ of mine that I’ve mentioned to my friends, but I haven’t actually written down yet: Sesshomaru/Alucard/Sebastian Michaelis. So be on the lookout for that!

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

I wouldn’t call it “hate” so much as “mansplaining,” but I have gotten a couple of comments that made my eyebrow twitch on Stardust--both on AO3 and FFN. Just dudes (and I’m fairly certain they were dudes, just from their tone) trying to explain why a certain plot twist wouldn’t work, or tell me how to save Sidonis in the actual game (which I already knew, that person just didn’t read what I wrote). I’ve also gotten a comment on one of my more controversial fics, Hippology, on FFN, where the person asked me if I thought my summary was K-Rated (which, admittedly, it does need to be for the site, and mine wasn’t--because of a single word). I changed it and messaged them saying it was fixed. Going to that commenter’s profile, however, proved to be fairly enlightening... They’re nuts. They have another profile, too. Read at your own risk. Yikes. There’s also a team of people on FFN who make it their life’s mission to report stories with rule violations. I’ve gotten a comment from one of them as well. These people are not mods, they just like to pretend they are--one of them even made their name look official! “CU Administration,” gtfo dude. I also recently got one of my fics removed from FFN. It wasn’t even one of my sexiest ones! They put me in timeout for 48 hours, and when I was finally able to publish something new on the site again, I posted Hippology (my centaur smut), and it’s still up as I type this. (Wonder how long it’ll take them to notice?) And since the fic that got taken down was a SessKag fic, I’m thinking it might have been a petty SessRinner who reported it to the “authorities” of FFN, because another friend of mine got hers taken down not long after mine, and it was also SessKag. Just my tinfoil theory, anyway!

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

Yes, yes, yes. It’s practically all I write. I do all sorts of smut, from romantic, sensual stuff, to specific kinks, to monsterfucking--all that good stuff. Can’t change me~<3

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

God, I hope not!

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don’t think so. No one has asked me if they can translate one, anyway.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Not yet! I’m open to the idea, and I’ve had little discussions with my fic-writing buddies about it, but nothing’s come out of it just yet. Keep your eyes peeled!

What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Oh, now come on! I can’t pick just one! But I’ll give you a top 3 (in no particular order, because they change places a lot, depending on how obsessed I am with them at the moment). Inuyasha: Sess/Kag FullMetal Alchemist: Roy/Ed Mass Effect: Garrus/FemShep

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

I have a couple of stories that I deleted from my original FFN account that I’d like to re-write and re-post on AO3, but I don’t think I’ll ever get around to it. There were a couple of Inu/Kag fics I had in-progress, and then a Koug/Kag fic. I recently rewrote and reposted my SessKag fic from years ago, Hawk, on FFN, AO3, and Dokuga! So maybe all hope isn’t lost. I’m even writing a sequel for Hawk! All the stories I have in-progress right now I plan on finishing. At some point, lol.

What are your writing strengths?

Dialogue, without a doubt. It’s my favorite thing to write, aside from smut, of course--which is another strength of mine.

What are your writing weaknesses?

Descriptions, ugh. I try to do them well, but I always feel like they get stale. So I keep them somewhat vague, because in my mind, I think readers will fill in the gaps themselves whether you describe something immaculately or not--they’ll see what they want to see, and that is totally fine in my book! Or maybe I’m just making excuses, lol. I’ll only describe something in a lot of detail if I want the reader to focus on that--usually an outfit, accessory, or weapon--otherwise, I leave it up to their imagination (I don’t want manipulate it too much, I suppose).

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Wildly unnecessary unless that author speaks the language as well, or if certain words already exist in the fandom’s translations (ex. “youkai,” “alkahestry,” etc).

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

Inuyasha, and the fic(s) I wrote in the beginning were terrible. I want to burn all traces of them off the face of the earth. I was in middle school. I was young and stupid.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

I gotta go with Stardust. It’s the longest fic I’ve ever completed at more than 160k words. I was so immensely proud when I typed “The End,” and I was able to say to myself “I did it.”

I tag: @glassesmcfancyhair @willowsrain

#SessKag #RoyEd #SamCharles #Shakarian #Inuyasha #FullMetal Alchemist #Let's Play #Mass Effect #fanfiction #writers supporting writers #q and a #I don't know what else to put so here

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delightfullyatomicfest · 3 years

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John and Yoko interview with Melody Maker pt 2

MELODY MAKER DECEMBER 13 1969-

JOHN LENNON’S “PEACE Crusade” inspires a variety of emotions in people. Sadly, few of those emotions are worthy ones. John and Yoko have been mercilessly lampooned and vilified by the public and the mass media, and a great proportion of this reaction has been thoughtless and hurtful.

It would surely have been enough to make any lesser man, whose heart was not in his cause, retire from the field to a more comfortable, less publicised existence. But not the Lennons.

They have kept up their output of peaceful propaganda in the face of a ceaseless barrage of insults, and the time will surely come when even their most jaundiced and gout-ridden detractors will realise their essential honesty, and their right to exercise it in the way they most see fit.

But like it or not, John Lennon and his lovely wife are in the process of becoming leaders in the public eye. They stand for a cause, and as public figures they can be held responsible for the failings and excesses of that cause.

This is not how they want it. Leadership in any form is the last cloak which Lennon wishes to put on, as he told me.

“I’m not falling for that one. Like Peter Seeger said, we don't have a leader but we have a song -‘Give Peace A Chance'. So I refuse to be leader, and I'll always showmy genitals or do something which prevents me from being Martin Luther King or Ghandi and getting killed. Because that’s what happens to leaders. Our whole mistake is having leaders and people we can rely on or point a finger at.”

Yoko, as always at John's side, chipped in: “For instance, many people say if you want to do that kind of thing, about peace, don't do anything that is misleading like showing your genitals. Always keep a clean image so that people can believe in your peace movement.

“But that's exactly what the establishment is doing (“And that's what the Beatles did too” - John) , taking their children to church on Sundays.

This is showing that, ‘I'm the President of the United States and I'm alright and I'm healthy and very moral et cetera.' You don't get anywhere that way-you become just another hypocrite, and you're playing the establishment game. We don’t want to do that. We try to be honest and the point is, if we are really honest, just to make it between us is a lifetime thing, and if we can't make it together and endure each other, the world is nowhere.

“If ordinary couples can make it together and make it with their children and so forth, love-wise (“She doesn't mean ‘make it' as you ‘lay"’ - John) , then you can look after the world.”

John continued, “One thing we've found out is that love is a great gift, like a precious flower or something. You have to feed it and look after it, and it has storms to go through and snow, but you have to protect it. It's like a pet cat. You know, people get a cat and they don't want to feed it, or they get a dog and they don't want to walk it. But love has to be nurtured like a very sensitive animal, because that's what it is.

“And you have to work at love; you don't just sit round with it and it doesn't just do it for you. You’ve got to be very careful with it; it’s the most delicate thingyou can be given. It's a very delicate situation.”

What will John and Yoko do about Vietnam and Biafra, which John mentioned in the letter that accompanied his MBE back to the Queen?

“We'll keep promoting peace in the way we do, which, whichever way you look at it, is our way, because we're artists and not politicians. We don't organise; we do itin the best way we know how, to make people aware that, if they want war to stop, only they can do it.

“The politicians can’t do it. I think our whole movement is successful, as shown by Nixon, who's having to wriggle around a bit now and make propaganda films about the Moratorium claiming that the ‘silent majority' is with him, with a highly polished Negro in an Italian suit

saying how great it is to be American. Nixon has been moved by the peace movement - that includes John and Yoko and all the people in the world who are doing it, and that’s how we're going to change it. We’re not going to Vietnam to die for it or going to Biafra to die for it. We’ve considered everything, not dying but going to the places.

“People prefer a dead saint to a living annoyance like John and Yoko. But we don’t intend to be dead saints for people’s convenience. They prefer Ghandi and Martin Luther King since they died, but you should see them in India now, celebrating Ghandi Year - anything less like Ghandi's principles going on in India you’ve never seen. It’s a hoax. And so we don't intend to be dead saints - or living saints either. People don't like saints.”

Their highly unusual Wedding Album has caused its share of controversy. Why did they make it?

Yoko: “It's like a diary, it reflects our love and peace ideas.”

John: “When people get married they usually make their own wedding albums. We're public personalities and I'd enjoy reading Jackie and Onassis' album. Our wedding was public, we were sharing our diaries and our feelings with the world. So one side shows our involvement with each other, and the other side shows what we do together outside of our involvement with each other, which is promote peace.”

Isn't there a danger that the diary of Yoko and John will become too public?

“We have nothing to hide. ‘ Everybody's got something to hide except for me and my monkey 9 , you know? We keep certain parts of our life private because we’re not as wild as people think. I doubt if we'll ever make love in public, or invite the TV cameras into our bedroom, and I doubt if I’ll ever go to the toilet in public. Just because I think some things, I don’t want to show that side of me.”

Yoko: “We’re from a certain generation, you can’t deny that, and for people in our generation it is so difficult, and maybe the next John and Yoko will...”

“Show all,” said John. “Maybe we will before we die. People hide themselves from each other all the time, and everybody’s frightened of saying something nice about somebody in case they don’t say anything nice back, or in case they get hurt, or of looking at somebody in case they say, ‘What are you looking at? ’

“Everybody’s so uptight and they’re always building these walls around themselves. All you can do is try and break the walls down and show that there’s nothing there but PEOPLE . It’s just like looking in the mirror, there’s nothing to worry about- it’s only people.”

Yoko : “And even we are not relaxed enough as people. We have many complexities and tensions. We try hard to be honest and expose ourselves, but there are certain things that we just can’t. . . Maybe in the next generation they can, good luck to them. We’re trying hard as we are”

John has always tried to carry out his philosophies and campaigns in a sense of fun. Are they, as some cynics suggest, in fact taking the mickey?

“That’s true, although we’re not taking the mickey. Everybody’s frightened of being conned, of being tricked. If you say something nice to somebody they ’re not sure if you mean it, so that rather than respond to your loving movement they’ll rej ect you, and that’s what the press do .

Because they’re frightened of what we did with the MBE about the Biafra thing, they’ll write about my Auntie Mimi’s reaction to me giving the MBE back, because they don’t want to fall for the con of ‘Is he joking? ’

“Of course we’re joking as well. We mustn’t take ourselves too seriously, otherwise it’s the end. We think the mistake of everyone - Ghandi and Martin Luther King AND the left wing AND the students and all society - is taking it too seriously. If you take it seriously, it IS serious. What we try and do is be non-serious about things, but we are very serious about being not serious.”

Yoko : “We maybe too serious, even. We try to have a sense of humour and we try to smile at everyone a really genuine smile from the bottom of our hearts. But it’s very difficult for our generation to really genuinely smile, but we’re trying.”

John: “It’s like when I sent the MBE back, and I wrote that it was against Britain’s involvement in Biafra and Vietnam and against ‘Cold Turkey’ slipping down the charts. When we thought of that we were screaming with laughter, and so a few snobs and hypocrites got very upset about mentioning ‘Cold Turkey’ with the problem of Biafra and Vietnam, but that saved it from being too serious and being another colonel protesting! You have to try and do every thing with humour, and keep smiling.”

Richard Williams

#john #Yoko #melody maker #December 1969

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mashounen2003 · 3 years

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Sonic opinions - 1

Honestly, I think it's time for me to give closure to the “Sonic fan phase” of my life. I’ll keep playing the games if they pique my interest, but in terms of the stories they tell and how their characters are portrayed, these games no longer appeal to me. The comic currently published by IDW isn’t complete garbage nor does it have so much drama and controversy surrounding it, in addition to having Whisper and Tangle, two characters I really like at least on a conceptual level, but the story and characterizations are leaving me deeply disappointed and sometimes fall even lower than the recent games written by Pontac & Graff, namely with regard to the characterization of Sonic himself.

The continuity of the TV series Sonic SatAM and the comics published by Archie was always the branch of the franchise that truly caught my attention and is my main source of inspiration for writing stories; in fact, SatAM was the way I found out about Sonic and became a fan in the first place. But this “North-American continuity” is already as dead as the Mega Man Legends saga, and it looks like the vast majority want to forget it as if each and every one of its elements and ideas inherently had just been a massive nightmare regardless of its execution by the writers. At best, the fandom currently sees this branch of Sonic as some silly “edgy” attempt to take the franchise seriously, something that may have been laudable but was always foolish and doomed to fail and is such a risky gamble that it's not worth trying again.

I'm also getting fed up with the Sonic fandom in general, despite sharing a lot of opinions with some individual fans. Yes, I know there are already many who have declared this for the most varied reasons, be it the “shipp wars”, something in Sonic or even the franchise as a whole suddenly becoming “cringe” due to a whim of a majority portion of the fandom, or the way Sonic reuses "hackneyed" tropes in an alleged demonstration of lack of originality; however, when someone gives Sonic the middle finger for this kind of reasons, they usually do it hypocritically.

No, what got me tired of the Sonic fandom is the way everyone becomes obsessed with picking one branch of the franchise, calling it "the true Sonic", claiming this is the only pure and genuine incarnation of the “soul of Sonic” (if there really is such a thing), marking as “foreigner” every character, concept or element from any other branch of the franchise, and demanding from the fans of those other branches to get on their knees and be thankful that the "True Fans (TM)" even allow them to stay in the fandom. Note that I’m not accusing fans of only one specific portion of the franchise: there are such people among fans of the videogames’ continuity, @skull001 being probably the worst offender, but there’s also that kind of people among the SatAM and Archie-Sonic fans, such as the “nostalgic” delusional pissbabies, blatantly homophobic and conservative, who are now supporting Twitter hashtags like “Rally4Sally” and “Udon4Sonic”. You may think this is actually something typical of all fandoms, but it’s not: this is truly something unique to the Sonic fandom; I don't see huge hordes of Mega Man fans bullying the Legends fandom or making fun of them for the way their favourite saga ended two decades ago; even in the Dragon Ball fandom, despite constant discussions about what is canon and what is not, there’s some kind of tacit consensus that GT and Super are two offshoots of the franchise, equally valid although not coexisting in one same fictional universe (although Shūeisha itself seems to officially support this view, which certainly helps prevent some discourse), while the only part of Dragon Ball universally despised (and rightly so) is Dragon Ball Evolution.

I'm sorry if this hurts some people’s sensibilities, but if I decide to write a story with any given set of characters, elements, concepts, setting, internal rules and whatnot, the only thing in my mind will be to write a mildly decent story. I'm not here to “honour” -let alone honour at all costs- some supposed legacy and traditions that some people say should be upheld by each and every Sonic content creator. And let’s be brutally frank: we’re talking about a franchise that started as platformer 16-bit videogames whose sole purpose was to show SEGA’s consoles were better and handled speed better than Nintendo's; SEGA never really intended to tell a story or portray its characters consistently, only later did the cast begin to receive more defined personalities and the games start telling stories because SEGA suddenly saw this would make them sell more, and even that varied wildly according to whatever seemed more convenient at the time; not to mention SEGA's unique habit of entering vicious cycles of failure and over-correction, where Sonic Team makes a few mistakes in a game that did everything else more or less well, SEGA throws away the entire game along with the foundations on which it was built and the story that was told by that game, Sonic Team makes a new game with absolutely everything replaced and makes mistakes again but those mistakes are different from those of the previous game, the process is repeated ad nauseam and no-one is ever satisfied with anything. A few Sonic fans trying to impose on every other fan a supposed single Sonic canon with some kind of official approval seal by SEGA & Sonic Team is something quite backward, because that single official canon almost never really existed, and if it does exist, it makes no sense and is internally inconsistent, dependent on the creation of new games, and very likely to be retconned, overwritten and modified at any time.

There are other "bad habits" of the Sonic fandom that have led me to break ties with them. One of them is the way many fans take one trait of a character, be it simply one of many facets of their personality or even a physical trait, and turn that into the entire personality of the character; many of those same fans are also massive hypocrites, complaining (albeit rightfully) about how SEGA oversimplifies Shadow into either “Sasuke the Hedgehog” or “Vegeta the Hedgehog”, but then they do the same as SEGA. One of the cases in which this is most evident is when they make Sonic's personality boil down to "gotta go fast" and "be a free spirit"; based on that, they denounce that Sonic saying "I would slow down for you" to one of his closest friends (even if Sonic and Sally weren’t a couple when he said that and/or you don’t support that shipp, it can be said she was at least one of his closest friends in the SatAM-Archie continuity) contradicts the very essence of the character, or they do something even worse: saying that "being a free spirit" means being away from your friends and not having "ties" (like... literal ties, made with ropes, the ones that are actually a bad thing) with anything or anyone. It's like when Goku is portrayed by Dragon Ball fans as far more insensitive than the actual way Akira Toriyama had conceived him and always wrote and portrayed him in his official work.

There are also the plainly disturbing ideas many fans seem to have about personal relationships, judging by the opinions they give about the relationships of Sonic and the rest of the cast. In addition to making everything revolve around vaguely defined words and concepts they throw right and left almost without thinking about their actual meaning, they also seem to believe that having friends and caring for them, or any kind of responsibility no matter what kind it is, is nothing but a drag, like rat-s*** stopping you on your way to "freedom" (this is just amazing: they say the entire Western canon is edgy and the British comic’s Sonic is a jerk, but if you think about this for a bit, these fans’ version of Sonic turns out to be even edgier and more of a jerk than Shadow in his spin-off videogame); in the case of Archie-Sonic, there are all the abuse apologists supporting Scourge and Fiona being a couple, even though you don’t need any “meta” analysis to see he’s (at the very least) verbally abusive towards her and had attracted her by posing as someone else in the first place.

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otomeramblings · 3 years

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My thoughts on Act 2, Episode 5

Yes, I’m incredibly late to the party. It took me longer than I thought to finally be able to finish reading Ep 5 BUT here it is! I’m gonna try to summarize my initial reactions and how I feel about the main plot points here both for myself and for anyone that wants to read them.

Long post under the cut!

One small thing I want to mention before delving into the big stuff: seeing all the boys starting new stages in their lives was honestly super heartwarming; they’ve grown so much both as individuals and together as a company (and as friends), and it was a delight to see it. As a fan of small details, I loved to see that the conversation Banri and Yuki had in “Into the Night!” (about him taking acting seriously and maybe going to college to bring back the knowledge to the company) was reflected in his choice of going to Veludo Arts University.

But anyway! There’s 3 main things I want to talk about in regards to this episode:

First up is Masumi’s arc:

Hooooo boy, I hadn’t been this angry about a fictional parent since we learned about Misumi’s family. I think the main thing that irked me a lot about his dad was how little regard he seemed to have for his son as an actual human being. Especially because of how hypocritical it sounded when his secretary said stuff like "Mr Usui is concerned about you living without a parental figure for so long" because we all know that Masumi has been living basically on his own for a long time and the excuse of "Masumi has only been living in Japan this long due to his parent's desire to keep his environment as stable as possible while they were married" felt super empty because yeah, right, coming back to an empty home every day is the healthiest way to raise a child, it surely can’t affect his well-being and his sense of worth in any way.

Masumi saying "I thought it might make them happy if i got good grades or did well in sports, so I tried my best, but...nothing ever changed" and the story about him begging his parents to come to the show and tell and his dad's response was just "Listen to your parents, that's all we want from you" was so heartbreaking. It made me incredibly angry but it also helped me understand Masumi as a character a lot more; no wonder he has attachment issues (which are mainly centred around Izumi/the MC) and his constant need for validation, he just wants people to be there for him and be proud of his accomplishments. He just wants a family but his parents were just too busy to even give a crap.

Also, in relation to Izumi: I think he still needs to learn that the obsession he has with her is not healthy (and hopefully one day he can grow out of it) but it's clear that he doesn't do it to purposely make her uncomfortable; he's misguided and he doesn't know how to deal and express the affection he feels towards one of the people that genuinely cares about him. Also I'm not saying that he doesn't have a crush on her, I think he does but he behaves this way because he never learned how to express his feelings in a healthy way and he's probably scared someone "could take her away" at any moment because boy hasn't he had to deal with people going again a lot already.

About Masumi’s grandma: love her, she’s a darling and she clearly cares for her grandson’s well being. One thing she mentions is that her son changed when his company found success, and like, I get that he needs to put time and effort to keep his company afloat but like. not even considering what your son wants and feels? Maybe talking to him every once in a while? Being busy it's not an excuse; your son shouldn't have to wonder if his parents love him. But this also ties to the end of Masumi’s arc when his father finally lets him stay in Japan: I'm glad that Masumi's father apologised and realised the error of his ways, it doesn't undo the years of loneliness Masumi had to endure because of it, but it's a start.

Final thoughts on Masumi’s arc: 10/10 would read it again for the feels. I really loved the depth they gave him and how they made him realise that Mankai (not just Izumi) are important to him because they’re his precious family and he wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. One little moment after that warmed my heart was when Izumi tells Masumi that she's glad that he's been taking care of Tsuzuru while he's busy writing and he answers with "I mean, he is...family",,,,,,,,,,,I’m not crying, you’re crying. I hope we can get more moments with him in the future that are centred around his personality, his likes and dislikes, and his relationships with the other boys.

In second place, Chikage’s introduction and arc.

Let's see. I knew coming in that Chikage was a controversial character within the fandom and I knew the main reason why because of spoilers, but I didn’t know all the details. Also, something you should know about me is that I found morally grey characters interesting, so that made it so I went into this with an open mind.

Overall, I liked the episode and I ended up linking Chikage as a character well enough. But I’m not gonna lie and say that everything was perfect. The biggest issue I had with his arc was the way they handled his relationship with Izumi/the MC, especially in regards to the kidnapping. I’m usually pretty good at putting a dividing line between fiction and real life, which is what allows me to enjoy villains and morally grey characters; but as a woman who grew up with my mom saying “never leave your drink/food unattended”, seeing it done here and then having it go unpunished really left a bad taste in my mouth; because every girl grows up hearing this (and i know this is a problem that affects all genders) and it’s horrible because it has happened to so many people. So my biggest gripe about this part of his arc is the consequences, or more so the lack of them.

The only things that made it a bit more acceptable *for me* were three things:

This line from Izumi: "What Chikage's done is unforgivable. But I can't just ignore August's dying wish and Hisoka's thoughts on the matter." I have some mixed feelings about it but It just aligns with Izumi’s personality; she’s always been portrayed as incredibly selfless and giving, someone who’s ridiculously kind (to a fault) and who always tries to see the best in people and puts others before herself (and also because ~plot~ demands it, but that’s a thing with a lot of media these days) Do I wish she had been angry and wary towards Chikage after having been drugged and kidnapped? Yes, I do, it would have been nice to have a portion of the story dedicated to Chikage having to earn her trust back because what he did really was not okay.

Sakuya’s conversation with Chikage when he tries to leave after opening night and in particular these two lines from Sakuya: "This isn't about the play....for some reason, I get the feeling we shouldn't leave you alone right now" [...] "You're different now. I can tell you're broken and hurting. I feel like you've lost your way." Regardless of personal feelings, I think Chikage showed that he really was shaken by the weight of his own actions after he found out the truth. He knows that what he did was wrong and that’s why his emotions and all his guilt were crushing him all at once. He was driven by revenge and anger for so long that once he learned and accepted the truth, he completely lost himself. And seeing him have to deal with all of that made me really glad, because even if he’s not gonna have to deal with external consequences (aka having to deal with the rest of the company’s distrust, even though I wish he did), he still had to find a way to not only forgive himself but also to atone in his own way for what he did (aka putting down his walls, fulfilling his promises and making it his mission to protect everyone at mankai from the organisation)

Now, as I’ve been saying, I really wish Chikage had been able to tell the others the whole story about what he did and why he did it but…..we didn’t get that. What I am glad about, though, is that at least he told them that he took her away on purpose (even if he didn’t tell them how or why); also both he and Hisoka pointed out that anyone who knows the full truth about their lives could be in serious danger and that having Izumi know was already risky enough. And yes, that is indeed very plot convenient but it’s the bare minimum and I’m willing to give it a pass this time.

tl;dr I think Chikage is an interesting character that has a lot of potential and I have hopes that he will get some more development in future events. BUT, I really think they could have handled his arc in this episode a lot better.

Now, all that said, if you still couldn’t bring yourself to forgive or look past what he did and you still don’t like him: no one can force you to like him after the things he did since it can be very triggering for a lot of people, so remember that your feelings are totally valid.

In third place and in relation to Chikage’s arc, I also have to mention Hisoka and the development he got as a result.

The only thing that bugged me in relation to Hisoka was that even though I knew he couldn't because of ~plot~ (and probably because part of him is still unsure about what he didn't remember and how it could affect the others even if he did say that the person he was before didn't matter anymore) but I really wished he had told anyone "hey so like......Chikage said some weird stuff to me just now and I might need help" because their first 1 to 1 confrontation was a threat if I've ever seen one.

But yeah, other than that I really love that we not only finally got to learn about his past, but also we got a good foundation for his development in the future regarding his interpersonal relationships with the winter troupe. The fact that he couldn’t remember who he was has been a point of conflict in the past and this brings that issue to a close in the sense that he is willing to tell them (part of) the truth once he sorts things out. And I loved loved how the trust Hisoka has in them is the direct result of all the ups and downs that the winter troupe has gone through so far in learning to open up to each other. I know they said during nocturnality that they’re not a family in the same sense the spring troupe is, but I honestly disagree; they way in which they’ve come to rely on each other shows how strong their bond is.

#a3!#a3! spoilers #act 2 spoilers #kinda since i'm really late to this

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randomnumbers751650 · 3 years

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Sometimes people ask a thing like “how did it get so big?” This is almost like any meme in the internet and sometimes even whatever is in the Top 10 bestselling books of any list. Due to being a historian of economic thought, I’m study the ascension of the idea of the entrepreneur as a hero, how it happened and its consequences, both good and bad. Therefore, I couldn’t avoid Ayn Rand and Atlas Shrugged. It wasn’t a good experience and I’ll talk more about it under the cut.

I think we all know how much of a controversial person Ayn Rand was. But it worked. She’s one of the most influential writers of the 20th century whether we like it or not. Like, a lot of people say she hates the poor and minorities. It’s even a meme, like there’s a joke SCP that makes everything it comes into contact unnecessarily verbose and one of the incidents was a sticky note written “I hate poor people” that becomes a copy of Atlas Shrugged.

After reading her work, I can safely say these are traps she set up in her own work. Not only that, these traps hide the true problems of her work.

In first place, we need to consider her demographic target. That wasn’t me, if I wasn’t researching, I wouldn’t even bother reading it. Like, I remember I saw in the internet a game called “The Jihad to Destroy Barney” and someone commenting: “because 20-years old thinking they’re funny were obviously the demographic target of Barney the Dinosaur”. Rand knew what her demographic target was, after working in Hollywood for so many years.

One might think that her demographic target was people like her, but it’s wider than that. Through all her book, producers (she doesn’t use the word ‘entrepreneur’, but it’s obviously the same) are the protagonists. Dagny shows her dedication to her railway, always looking for ways to improve it, to hire the best people to work with her, to deliver the best product she can, always treating others with respect. All the producers are people full of passion for what they do. They do not just for the money, they do it to express themselves (but still want/should be paid).

Meanwhile their enemies are the government organs that want to curb them, by introducing legislation to make everything equal, like people are forbidden to be fired, prices are controlled and so on. And they are evil, they are hypocrites who don’t really believe in the altruistic values they spouse or they are too dumb to realize they’re being hypocrites. They are always men in position of power, evil bureaucrats, quisling industrialists, hypocrite union leaders (though the union leader, Fred Kinnan, interestingly is the most sympathetic of the villains, and actually gets away scot free, to the point some think he’s a Galt agent undercover).

Rand aimed for the real life entrepreneur identify with the “heroes”. All the companies have names of their founders in their titles, Taggart Terminal, d’Anconia Copper, and so on. Their enemies show their true faces by naming themselves with abstract titles, like National Union and so on. She aimed the person who ever had to deal with the Health Department, with the Labor Department, who has to fills forms and more forms and say “Wouldn’t the world be a terrible place if it wasn’t for you? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if you didn’t have to do all of this? If you just had the opportunity to truly express yourself? Free from the prying eyes of government inspectors? Rejoice, because I have the answer!”

Rand answers this with the Galt’s Gulch – a utopia of freedom, where the word “give” is taboo, while leaving the outside world of looters and moochers to destroy itself. All the producers are gathered to escape the terrible collectivist world around her. Everyone has money and, since they’re all enlightened by the principles of greed and selfishness, the prices are small, even symbolic. Monopolies are good and rivals are always being taken down, and they rejoice with it, both winner and loser, because they contributed to the expansion of human spirit.

When John Galt says “I swear – by my life and my love of it – that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine”, he’s implying all men who belong to this valley. They are not ashamed of taking low jobs, because they know their true power is what they do with their minds and hands. Francisco is shown to be perfect in everything he does, makes one think he’s a Gary Stu, but it’s because, according to the book’s philosophy, if you’re a true man, anything you do you become the best. For this reason, Galt’s Gulch is quite diverse, because it has not only industrialists, but also factory workers and small businessmen who share their ideals. And not only workers, but also artists, intellectuals and others.

This is why I think the argument “this books hates poor people” might not be accurate. The low worker whom Eddie Willers meets in the beginning is actually John Galt in disguise. This I think it’s the most important part to understand why Atlas Shrugged was so influential with small businessmen when published: John Galt is where the Übermensch and the Everyman meet. “Who is John Galt?” Anyone can be John Galt – the same way anyone can be Bella Swan, anyone can be Ritsuka Fujimaru (at least before the 5th singularity), anyone can be Kirito Kirigaya – the idealized self of the entrepreneur.

Thus, one is not born a “man”, but becomes one. Dagny and Hank’s entire character development is to become “men”, to learn to love themselves more than what they create, no matter how passionate they are. This contrasts with Eddie Willers, Dagny’s right hand man, probably the most tragic character of the tale.

Eddie loved the railway just as Dagny. He’s been her friend for so long, and even developed feelings for her. But the book constantly observes that Eddy doesn’t have the capacity to lead something as important as a railway. But he does it nevertheless, dedicating all his resources and passion for the railway. But, unlike Dagny, he doesn’t learn to look for greater things. Thus, he ends the novel stuck in a railway, defeated and probably left to die.

This is controversial, so much everyone still discusses his fate. In the movie adaptation, they deviate from the novel by having the heroes making a point to rescue him from his fate. In Jennifer Burns’s biography, she mentions a letter Ayn Rand received asking about Eddie and she replies that in a collectivist society, Eddie would’ve perished, while in a free one he’d be living okay. Nevertheless, this reveals a truth about that world: not everyone will become a “man”. Eddie would never become a “man”.

Since pity is against Galt’s doctrine, Eddie cannot be pitied. He has to live under the mercy of his Galtian overlords. He has only two options: either worship the feet that trample him, expecting his breadcrumbs fall from their banquet table, or to question his place in the world, thus denying that A is A, and be trampled harder. It really doesn’t matter his kindness, his dedication, he’s not a “man”, and thus has more in common with the looters and moochers than the heroes. Thus, if Eddie ever becomes an obstacle to the productive forces, even if unintentionally, he has to be trampled.

While one might think that I’m being unfair, it should be reminded that Ayn Rand openly advocated the people who were killing Natives during the American expansion to the West were doing nothing wrong. The Natives were actually privileged for being trampled by the productive forces, thus creating the great nation. The same argument can be made for the colonized people and even to the “essential workers” of this pandemic – since apparently people who take this book seriously are one of the most resistant forces to lockdowns and mask mandates, you can guess why.

And this is why Rand hated the environmental movement, because it puts an obstacle to the productive process. Nature can only react with deaf indifference to Galt’s speech. For Rand, this is unforgivable. Would it be surprising if oil tycoons were fans of Rand’s work?

In the end, the producers execute their revenge against the world that rejected them. Galt’s speech caused a lot of disturbance and the last chapters deal with its consequences, with more villains being evil for no reason and more showing how awesome their heroes are. Galt becomes more and more like Jesus, even with a gnostic Judas in Dagny helping him. In fact, in the funniest part of the book, where it comes THIS close from being self-aware, he says to his tormenters, when they asked to cooperate with him: “It took me three hours on the radio to tell me why”. It gave me angry laughter.

In the end of the day, what matters? This is a work of fiction, where caricatures of men and women fight each other. The entrepreneurial process works nothing like described in the book. It takes a naïve view of selfishness, upon saying that if everyone was selfish the world would be a better place, when in reality, if you expect selfishness, it’s what you’ll get.

It’s never explained how they invented their inventions, only that they did it and it’s awesome. The One-Man Industrial Revolution trope is one that I loathe a lot, because it misrepresents the innovation process. It requires so many factors, including government funding – scratch that, it REQUIRES government funding because technologies like touch-screen used to be so risky that no private company would take seriously and government can fund because it doesn’t go bankrupt the same way. Even if we take it as a metaphor, it doesn’t work when you stop to think.

Rand belongs to the same class of writers as Stephenie Meyer and Christian Weston Chandler. But she wanted to influence the world, she wanted it to be more than entertainement, much more. Thanks to her publishing network and appeal to real problems, she did it. This is why the problems of her work require critique. And I hope anyone reading this try to understand better what “relatability” means, this is what relatability can do. Stop trying to look for relatability everywhere, let it just come naturally and if it doesn’t come enjoy the story!

#politics #i'm not revising this #i hope i don't have to think about this book #for a minimal time #it shows correcting a wrong interpretation about a harmful idea #can explain how worse the actual idea is

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matt0044 · 4 years

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The Anime Community has a FUNimation Problem. Full Stop.

In Prison School’s seventh episode, Anzu Yokoyama’s dialogue with Shingo Wakamoto has her calling out his attempt at talking to a woman and kicking starting a fairly obligatory romantic subplot. The English Dub, up to that point, had all the hallmarks of FUNimation’s script writers playing off the already existing comedic aspect of the title. Some disapproved while other embraced it.

However, the dub would go a step further by having Anzu’s emasculation of Shingo involve a reference to the then ongoing Gamergate controversy. If anybody knew of the movemen then, you’d know this wasn’t a good idea. Every geek and their mother took offense to it right out the gate, claiming that it was FUNimation “shoving politics” where they don’t belong and insulting their fans.

To play devil’s advocate, Prison School as a whole is all about young men being integrated into a formerly all-girl school with all the sleazy shenanigans that the title’s become infamous for. It’s already pretty provocative in terms of visuals and how it pushes the envelope on its fan-service element. Something the dub team were keen to embrace with all of the dialogue reflecting this tone.

Yet Tyson Rinehart was raked over the coals for what was suppose to be an edgy joke for the sake of it, not unlike a lot of Prison School’s humor. Bare in mind that it within was one scene in the seventh episode out of a twelve episode Anime. We don’t get any other references to Gamergate like Anita Sarkeesian or the like in any other scene of any other episode. It’s just... this.

Yet even now when the line was redubbed to remove the reference for the home release, you’d think that this one line is all the dub is. That it’s akin to Shin Chan or Ghost Stories where the dub team wrote their own story and made jokes out of every kind of current event controversy because that’s what gets the lulz. Yet, again, it was just one scene in one episodes out of the twelve.

Of course, the cycle seemed to begin again with Miss Kobayashi’s Dragon Maid which had a more... small scale kerfuffle in regards to the titlular human character claiming that, “I’m not into women or dragons.” Ironically, Jamie Marchi claimed she wrote that line since something like, “But I’m a woman,” came across as homophobic to her. However, I wrote my piece on all that.

What really got the wider community all up in arms was in regards to the character of Quetzalcoatl AKA Lucoa, specifically a single scene where she and Tohru exchange dialogue for less than ten seconds at most over her more conservative attire. Lucoa is pretty much THE fanservice character with breasts big enough to nearly suffocate a little boy in his sleep. Yes, that did happened.

Lucoa explains her more conservative attire as feeling uncomfortable with everybody looking at her in her other revealing outfits with the official subtitles by both Crunchyroll and FUNimation at the time. The dub would take it a step further so to speak by having her claim that she changed clothes because of “pesky patriarchal standards” getting on her nerves, something a tad different.

Well, I say, “different,” in the sense of what she’s referring to in regards to why she changed her clothes. The sub has it come out to “everybody” in a general sense like men, women and children alike while “patriarchal” is more specific in referring a societal phenomenon. However, that’s not what fans got in a tizzy over. The word, “patriarchal,” is the real focal point for this scene’s controversy.

It’s not secret that this word is thrown around most Feminist circles to the ire of geeks who “just wanna have fun” and hearing this word alone set off all the alarms. Like with Prison School, FUNimation was accused of trying to push a political agenda using Anime as Lucoa’s line was spread across the community.

By now, I’d like to be frank in how this all feels overblown. Using a word that’s common in the Social Justice lexicon can stick out but the idea that it turns the dub into political propaganda never made sense to me. I mean, it’s one thing the entire scene was rewritten to recite some kind of feminist manifesto but it only mentions the “patriarchy” and... that’s about it for this one scene alone. :/

I’d bring up “My First Girlfriend’s A Gal” but I feel like the points I made with Prison School largely apply here. However, I feel like some fans are hypocritical in how they claim that the dub’s dialogue is “inaccurate” when most enjoyed the dub for how it nearly went full Ghost Stories. Many felt that the dub was spicing up an otherwise by-the-numbers Ecch Fest that people would’ve written off. :P

Yet along came Episode 7 and the usage of the words of “SJWs millenials” among others was enough to make the dub “propaganda” in the eyes of many. Despite the fact that the script does convey the spirit of the original with the cafe manager trying to get the female cast into reading smut to nerd without their consent. What does that matter when the dub uses terms like “cuck?” :/

What about the voice acting? Doesn’t matter. Anzy referred “Gamergate.” That’s all that matters about Prison School’s English dub now and forever.

How well does the dialogue hold up on the whole? Doesn’t matter. Lucoa mentioned the “patriarchy.” That’s all that Maid Dragon’s dub amounts to.

Is it enjoyable in any way aside from said foibles? Doesn’t matter. The mention of “SJW millennials” in that one scene has now tainted the dub. Oh, the shame.

Starting to get the picture? I don’t want to be the guy who says dubs should go off doing as they please with not consideration for what the original’s narrative was trying to convey. Even if the occasional liberty can be intriguing, it’s always better for an English dub to keep the story in line with their source material. I, of course, type this for those who actually approach any dub in good faith at all. :/

The problem comes when the examples described above are weaponized by those who never had good faith in dubs and/or had it out for the likes of FUNimation to begin with. It’s not about discussion. It’s about propping up their bias of dubs being trash at best and trying to falsely villainize a company for making mistakes that ultimately amount to a handful of off-sounding dialogue.

By all means, discuss how those like FUNimation could improve on things such as where their streaming services are available region by region. Discuss how dubs like Danganronpa and Phoenix Wright recast the characters from the VAs in the games. Discuss how good or bad their script writing can be when it leans more loosely. All this fearmongering and vitriol does nothing but poison the well.

But weren’t these choices in adaptation politically motivated? Hell no? There’s a different between humor made in fairly poor taste and trying to brainwash your audience into believing, what, that women have problems? It’s not propaganda when you recognize it right away. And while Tyson Rinehart and Jamie Marchi responded rather rudely to the backlash... can you blame them with all of this?

I say this not to “kiss up” to FUNimation. Much as I admire their script adaptation process like the nerdy nerd I am, there can be times where I do feel they might’ve missed the mark. Particularly with their earlier dubs of the Dragon Ball franchise where they were borderline 4kids. However, dubs such as Fairy Tail and My Hero Academia are modern examples of how far they have come.

This mentality of holding grudges over fairly small potatoes that personally offend you gets us nowhere. I mean... isn’t it like the stereotypes SJWs are known for. A piece of media does something offensive, however big or small, and is deemed problematic forever by purity crusaders. Can’t we take a joke? It honestly gets to the point where I kind of have to quote Anzu Yokoyama here:

“Do you have a stick up your ass or are your one of those Gamergate creepshows?”

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queerpontmercy · 3 years

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pick four characters and then roll a d4 for each of these numbers to determine which char to answer for: 1 4 5 6 17 22 24 26 39 27 51 57 60

tumblr did me so dirty but I finally got all of these in one doc, thank you <3 I decided to alternate between my Beam Saber pilots for character #4, so we have Solace “Trash Panda“ Altiora the infiltrator, and Dr. Finch Tandem, the officer/cat herder. Put under a cut because fuck this is so long...

What does Solace typically keep in his pockets?

I rolled a 3 for Leucien, but I already described his pockets, so...Solace is messy and generally keeps a tube of lipstick within easy reach, which means inevitably he’s also got a few tissues stuffed in a pocket from the last time he had to apply blot it. Other than that, he always has at least one knife on him, and that could feasibly be in a pocket. No, he’s not just happy to see you.

Other than that, you know he’d never tell but honestly? I think he keeps his old prayer beads on his person, despite having left the Cenotaph both physically and spiritually. There’s something grounding about them: something organic in a world full of unforgiving machinery and vastly unknowable AIs, perhaps. It’s still soothing. Shut up.

4. If Tanith was a work of art, how would you describe her?

This is such an interesting question for Tanith-- the most important bit for her would be that it’s something functional and beautiful, made lovelier still by use. A well-loved sea shanty with lyrics that keep time out on the water, a handsome medicine chest with fanciful carvings of beasts on each wooden panel…oooooh maybe a set of three nesting clay pots/jars! The first one is big and solid, rough gray-green with a fitted lid and decorations like barnacles and limpets, and below that is one with blue and brown glazes, pooling and mixing into each other, and the last (smallest) one is delicate and porcelain, almost opalescent from within where the light hits it, with the most simple, graceful curved shape It’s meant to house something rare and precious.

5. How does Tanith express she’s comfortable?

She doesn’t like to sit in her emotions or thoughts, and spends a lot of time trying to transmute them into practical action. You’d know she’s comfortable if she let herself be still, taking in the world with quiet acceptance, and told you what was on her mind-- what she saw, or remembered, or was thinking about, without worry, just being.

6. How does Fen express that they’re uncomfortable?

Fenestra argues about stupid shit-- pedantry in particular is such a refuge. Having a hill to die on helps her feel slightly in control, since feeling powerless is definitely one of the things that makes her most uncomfortable. She’d never admit to it, but it’s also a way to knock Threats down a peg or two.

17. Does Leucien swear? What’s his favorite phrase/word?

For sure, but since Leu is 3 feet tall, he almost certainly got the “ohhhh i had no idea, you’re so iiiiinnocent~” treatment after saying one (1) fuck word. I was tonight years old when I learned he’s partial to “oh balls,” which is decidedly not one of my (Sketch’s) phrases, but I guess it makes sense intrinsically? Most swear words are either profane, sexual, or insulting/derogatory. Gnomes in this campaign aren’t religious, culturally speaking, and he’s not the kind to start a fight.

Now that means there’s actually a good chance that he has at least once, in a fit of extreme frustration, blurted out “Aerum’s b--” before very hastily correcting to “face, face, I was gonna say face.”

I’m shocked I have so much to say about this, but...he was an academic, and I also have a strong hunch that he had a terrible little pretentious phase where all his swear words came from Old Gnomish or Dwarvish or oooh, maybe languages his old friend Aza had picked up, but...at this point he reasons it’s better to say the things in Everendian/Common if you want people to know what you’re saying.

22. What kind of person would Finch never side with?

Finch would never side with a landlord cop bully. Well, definitely not a landlord or cop either. But man, the kind of leader who throws their weight around for the sake of it and intimidates innocent people into carrying out their orders? They really, truly despise ‘em. And leaders who treat the individuals under their wing as pieces of a calculated risk rather than full people. They’d honestly rather die than become that kind of leader.

24. What’s a controversial food opinion Leucien would have?

Pineapple on pizza is good actually you guys are just mean

Leu thinks the fact that there’s such a thing as “controversial food opinions” is fascinating. He’ll try anything once, so point-blank disregarding something as disgusting feels like snobbery to him. And even badly-cooked food can tell you so much about the people who make it, so and that learning’s a pleasure in and of itself.

26. What would Tanith want for her funeral?

In Tanith’s culture, dying orcs are dressed in burial clothes, shrouded, and left to make their “final voyage” on their own in quiet contemplation. She would uphold this tradition. Burial and scattering of ashes at sea are common, but I actually think Tanith might want to be buried at the “interfaith” shrine she established on the mainland post-campaign-- Ishka willing, to be its guardian and perhaps, in a way, guide the lost on their journeys after her death.

She would certainly want her dear friends and party members to speak in her memory at a ceremony, especially Cae and Avris, who saw her through so much. Nothing prepared. Just what comes from the heart in the moment. Perhaps she has also transcribed an old Orcish lullaby for her beloved Anya to play at the end, with the music drifting through the air and quietly dissipating, like sea foam as it hits the shore.

27. If they were a ghost, how would Solace haunt in the afterlife?

Solace would be such a chaotic asshole ghost but he’d have the time of his (after)life. He already has such a great time being a local cryptid as it is, convincing people that an abandoned amusement park or shopping mall might be haunted. It’d be even worse in death. The thing is, if he was a ghost and knew nothing could hurt him, he’d be even more unsubtle, he’d really want to see the impact of his tricks and shenanigans for once after a lifetime or lurking.

39. What does Finch believe their party lacks?

Finch knows that their squad has each other’s backs in the practical way-- they’ve seen teammates trauma out or take major damage protecting each other. But they think that what the Intrepid is missing is emotional vulnerability, and it’s important? If we’re not honest with ourselves, how can we be honest with each other? It keeps them up at night sometimes.

51. What makes Tanith a hypocrite?

She’ll forgive everyone except herself, obviously. Since she was able to get some closure with her ex Kleiya, who didn’t die but was transported to another plane, she hasn’t been nearly as consumed with guilt over who she used to be, but still? She’ll tell someone not to burn out all at once, she’ll tell someone they’re good just as they are, and never believe it herself. :/

57. How does the way Leucien acts seemingly contradict his ability scores?

FitD scores don’t translate as well, so...Leu it is!

He’s got +3 charisma, but he’s the most awkward man in all of existence and can’t be normal for even two seconds. I actually don’t think it’s that contradictory; charisma is a force of personality, after all, and Leu’s got that. He became an object of cult worship in a matter of months, after all...But also I do think he’s got an endearing, bookish, understated charm, and hey, that’s a kind of charisma. D&D often makes charisma out to be the smooth-talking seduction stat, but I really enjoy when it can be more than that.

He’s also got decently high wisdom, but I’ve been playing him with small dog energy. We’ll figure it out, I suppose.

60. Who does Fenestra go to when she needs to bounce ideas off of someone?

Fenestra has a littol greyromantic wtf-is-this crush on Eli, another of the Oracle’s apprentices. :3 They have honed different ways of seeing the future. Fen captures big fragmented portents that don’t make sense until later, whereas Eli is a lot more scrupulous, and tends to focus on details and possibilities, mapping out the pieces of a butterfly effect. They really respect his different way of thinking; it’s been incredibly helpful, and if she were feeling mentally stuck Fen would go to him, no question. He’d listen.

#dnd asks #tanith #fenestra #leucien #solace #finch

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inspired-by-the-music · 4 years

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For You: 4 O’Clock

Chapter 1: Comeback

Taglist: @jineunwootrash

“Dude! Lei!” Lucas cheered into my ear as he (again) combed his fingers through my recently chopped black hair. Independent from those who cried that I ruined my visuals, he boasted, “I love this!”

Lucas was too excited. About my haircut, about my still-secret impending debut in SuperM’s comeback, about getting to work together after years of being best friends. Even as I struggled to escape his reach, trying to smooth my hair before a stylist could scold me for wasting their hours of hard work, trying to force my smile into the hard line that would fail to convince Lucas to behave, I laughed. I was too excited too.

My laughter died with the ever-present realization that somebody is always watching. That curse of being an idol meant that we couldn’t feel this way— carelessly happy— or, rather, that we shouldn’t.

Before I could remind Lucas (he always needed to be reminded), Mom’s voice broke through the on set bustle. “Break’s over, kids! Hands to yourself Lucas— this is why we have dating rumors! You don’t want to end up like the idol who never debuted!” She spoke without glancing up from her clipboard, without faltering in her fast-paced course to who knows where to do who knows what, the fabric of her bright red pantsuit swishing in time each step.

Lucas finally stepped away, instinctively abandoning his assault on me to stare after Mom. As I dropped my phone into my backpack, satisfied that there was nothing worth a response in my inbox or on social media, he whistled. “Dude, Mom is hot.”

Were I not used to that— Lucas referring to my mother as if she were also his, calling her hot— I might have cringed. Indifferent, I forced my eyes to roll because that was the kind of reaction Lucas liked. “Do you ever think that’s why you can’t get a girlfriend? The fact that you lust after my mother— our manager?”

Lucas shook his head. “Nah. I can’t get a girlfriend because everyone things I’m dating you.” He poked my forehead accusingly as if his smothering affection weren’t the cause of those false rumors, and I swatted his hand away. “Plus, didn’t ya hear? We can’t even touch a person of the opposite sex or else we’ll end up like the idol who never debuted.” His breath huffed out of his forever-swollen lips.

The story about the idol who never debuted because of an unplanned pregnancy was some kind of fable, myth, or urban legend that pervaded every aspect of life as an S.M. idol. Maybe nobody ever really believed it. Maybe everyone thought it was some cleverly crafted tale to get us to focus on training. Maybe we thought we wouldn’t hear it after debut, but it was whispered in response to every dating scandal and mentioned by Mom still on the (frequent) occurrence that Lucas ignored my boundaries.

All I know is that Lucas and I hated that story, and we expressed our hatred differently. Lucas was determined to rebel against it not by getting a real girlfriend but by committing to being my best friend in every sense of the word, regardless of what the press said, regardless of how fans often misinterpreted, regardless of Mom’s plentiful scoldings. And I— well, Lucas said that I was the perfect idol because I was as obedient as I was talented, but the truth was that becoming the scandalized idol in the next cautionary tale was my biggest fear. That’s why I strictly observed a self-imposed total dating ban: fear of controversy. And maybe deeper down, a fear of intimacy, but more on that later.

I shied away from Lucas’s reference to the scandalized idol, rationalizing to his widening eyes, “I’m due on B set. I have to re-do my introduction because I kept getting distracted by Taemin’s laugh yesterday.” I wondered what could have been so funny to Taemin, but I never would have asked back then.

Lucas’s mouth fell open, I’m sure, to tease me about being incapable of functioning around Taemin, but his turn to speak was stolen by a boisterous trio of men I would recognize anywhere.

The faces of Donghae, Eunhyuk, and Shindong were among the most familiar of my childhood. I could remember vaguely when they debuted. I was six years old, sitting backstage where Mom could find me as soon as the first Super Junior Stage was completed. Being an unofficial trainee at the time, I was studying Mandarin.

Anyway, what matters is that I couldn’t escape once Super Junior fixed their gaze on me. If I did, they would tell Mom, and I would be in trouble not only for disrespecting my elders from work but also my elders in a familial sense.

“Where’s our manager?” Shindong barked at nobody in particular. Nobody responded because Super Junior’s demands for Mom had become too commonplace to garner any attention.

“Isn’t this a bit bold?” I smiled gratefully while accepting a strawberry milkshake offered by Donghae, who greeted me with a small closed-mouth grin. “You guys have stormed onto the SuperM set every day this week.” Which meant I had a strawberry milkshake every day that week. Oops. Another failed diet.

Donghae said, “We’ll cross improper lines for you mom every day of every week,” and Eunkhyuk added loudly, as if aspiring to arouse Baekhyun’s attention, “Yeah! She was our manager first! She loves Super Junior best!”

Baekhyun appeared out of nowhere. As always, his voice— a bright shout— preceded him. “Not a chance! She’s our manager now! I’ll never let you take her!”

And just as quickly as he had appeared by my side, Baekhyun dashed off in pursuit of Mom with Eunhyuk and Shindong following closely behind.

I shook my head. Goofball Baekhyun, running the wrong way.

“What is it?” Donghae tilted his head to meet my gaze. “She’s not that way?”

Donghae was so earnest, so intent on looking right into somebody’s soul, that these moments when I held his attention were blush-inducing. I squirmed, and Lucas snorted. “Oh, uh, I don’t know. I don’t know where Mom is. It’s been kinda hectic, and I haven’t seen her in a few hours—”

It was hard enough to lie to Donghae without Lucas butting in.

“What are you talking about?” Lucas had been quiet for too long, so he shouted through a mouthful of barbecue chips fished out of my backpack. Thief. “She just told us— ow!” He shrieked as I grabbed his hand and crushed it with all the force I could muster.

“Sorry, Donghae.” I bowed to my senior. “We really have to go! I hope you find my mother!” Guilty, my eyes flinched away from his frowning face.

Once we were out of Donghae’s earshot, and once I dropped Lucas’s hand, he stretched his digits and whined, “That hurt, Lei! Why did you do that? And why did you lie to Donghae about Mom?”

“Because,” I hissed, narrowly dodging an intern running with two tall cups of coffee, “they’re fighting.”

“They’re fighting?” Lucas gasped.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

Or, at least, I thought they were fighting. I didn’t know why Mom was avoiding Donghae, but I had overheard vague snippets of her conversations with Heechul when they were supposed to be watching some drama in the living room after dinner. I heard her sigh of relief when she learned that she would be responsible for organizing SuperM’s comeback and tour rather than assisting with the next Super Show. I didn’t need to know the specifics that Mom would never tell me. No matter how much I liked Donghae, if there was a fight, I was on Mom’s side.

“Here.” I passed my milkshake to Lucas after taking one long sip. “You can have this. I can’t take it onto set.”

“Ooooh!” Lucas’s eyes rounded in gratitude. He skipped off before turning back to shout, “Wait, Lei, what’s my schedule again?”

He needed to listen during briefings instead of playing around with my hair.

Having settled into the chair, sitting perfectly still so the audio technician could clip a microphone to the collar of my sheer black sweater, I responded (not loudly enough to disturb the tech), “You’re supposed to take pictures with Mark.”

“Okay! Thanks!” He grinned.

That time, my smile wasn’t forced for the camera; it was a reaction to Lucas.

Taemin and Kai were unapproachable, each for completely different reasons.

Lucas joked that I was the born and bred idol, and most people seemed to agree, but I always thought that if the perfect idol existed, his name was Lee Taemin. Like me, he debuted at 14. Unlike me, he proved himself worthy of fame and admiration with pure talent.

Hate comments didn’t need to remind me of the role Mom played in my success. I was grateful and, under my carefully crafted proud exterior, I was insecure. I was not talentless, and I worked hard almost in a vain attempt to distance myself from the poorly disguised mutters that I was only an idol because of Mom; Taemin was beyond talented, and he worked hard because he knew no other way to stride toward his goals.

“You need to stop being so weird,” Lucas told me after one of my first practices with the group. “You can’t just stare at Taemin when you pout about how everyone stares at you.”

Lucas was right. I hated being lumped in with the millions who failed to acknowledge Taemin’s humanity. But the truth— that I was some kind of hypocrite— was easy for Lucas to see; it was easy for him to say.

Lucas was the only person who didn’t seem to realize that Taemin was the center of every room. He was the only one who didn’t cling to Taemin’s every word. He was the only one who didn’t see Taemin’s other-worldly glow.

I think that’s why Lucas was my best friend: he didn’t see me or Taemin or anybody as idols. He saw us as people, liked us as people, and that was rare. From that first day at practice, I was torn between the desire to be like Lucas and the desire to be like Taemin.

Anyway, Kai didn’t like me. He didn’t hate me (at first) or anything, and he didn’t particularly dislike me, but he was the only member (aside from Taemin, who I admired too much to approach for fear of saying something stupid) who didn’t know me pre-SuperM.

Even once I was approved to debut with them, Kai hadn’t held eye contact with me for more than three seconds at a time. I wasn’t sensitive about it, and I wasn’t in the market for a new best friend— Lucas was more than enough— but Kai’s aversion to me was inconvenient, annoying, and frustrating considering that we were cast into a subunit together.

We recorded our songs (which were the most sensual of my career because they were meant to evolve my image from bubble gum pop Idol to something more “adult”) separately. Despite the quickly approaching tour dates, we hadn’t once practiced our choreography together. Kai was my senior, so I couldn’t approach him with my concerns about our lack of preparation. That’s why he was unapproachable; I had to wait patiently for him to address our tension.

I hoped that he would have taken the first step toward me before we had to shoot promotions, but Kai still couldn’t meet my eyes— despite the photographer’s repeated demands that were carefully phrased as requests— as our bodies were pressed flush together before a swarm of cameras.

Although I would rather forget, I think I can pinpoint the moment Kai decided to hate me. He flinched away from my touch again as I draped my arms over his shoulders and laced my fingers together behind his neck, per the photographer’s instructions.

“Come on, Kai!” I rolled my eyes, whining in unison with the rest of the members, who had gathered around the set nearly an hour ago after finishing their schedules. My face was hot not because of the close proximity to somebody as handsome as Kai, not because of the glare that hooded his dark eyes, but because my patience had run out. “Everybody is waiting for us! Can’t you just act professionally so we can get this done some time this year?”

His eyes widened as if I had slapped him across the face. Note: if you ever want to insult Kai— and I can’t imagine why you would— challenge his idea of professionalism.

Kai’s jaw tightened as he forced his eyes away from me to glance tiredly at Mom. “Manager, do we have to do this? I would really like to avoid a dating scandal.”

My next few words were kind of hypocritical since nobody feared dating scandals more than I did. “A dating scandal? These are pictures for our subunit— for our job. Stop making it weird.”

“It is weird!” Kai argued without looking away from Mom as she pinched at the bridge of her nose. He took two big steps backward, and my hands fell from around his neck to my sides. “And I don’t understand—”

“Just do it like this, Kai!” Baekhyun bounced onto the set, leading Lucas by the hand. After winking at the camera, encouraged by Lucas’s laughter (and Mark’s panicked, “Yo, man, what are they doing?”), Baekhyun threw his arms around Lucas’s shoulders and tossed his head back.

When everyone except me, Mom, and Kai laughed, Baekhyun leaped into Lucas. They toppled onto the hard ground, the only indication that they hadn’t broken their neck or any other bones being their ear-splitting laughter.

“Fine!” Mom was calm despite her sharp increase in volume that made me flinch. “If you don’t want to be in a subunit with Lei, Kai, then you won’t be.”

While Kai sighed in relief, I wheezed, dejected. My heart sank down to my ankles. It was bad enough to lose the opportunity to be in a subunit with one of the best dancers at S.M., it was worse to lose it at work where I couldn’t express disappointment, and it was worst to lose it in front of Taemin, who stood stiff and red at slack-jawed Taeyong’s side.

Embarrassed and eager to escape the stares, I bowed to Kai and set to scoop Lucas off the floor, where he still laid giggling with Baekhyun, because he would make me laugh hard enough to drive away this sinking sensation.

“Where are you going?” Mom’s voice stopped me in my tracks. “Stay where you are, Lei. Kai—”

She didn’t have to finish the order. I understood mainly from Kai’s wince that he was ejected from our subunit— not me.

“Wait,” Ten said slowly, in time with my realization, “Lei’s subunit is still a thing?” His eyes sparkled. He smiled because the choreography he created for me and Kai would still find an audience.

Lei’s subunit. My subunit. The title was exciting and terrifying all at the same time.

Who would replace Kai? I wondered, watching him sulk to Taemin’s side. As Taemin’s eyes flashed to meet mine for the briefest second before he muttered something to Kai— probably words of comfort, probably words to condemn my role in Kai’s semi-public disgrace— I could only think Please not Taemin. Don’t let it be Taemin. Anyone but Taemin.

And I looked at Mom pleadingly, as if she would be able to read those thoughts through my eyes. She blinked back at me.

“Oh my God!” Mark shot both hands up in the air and waved them excitedly. “I’ll be in Lei’s subunit! Let me do it, Momager! Please!”

Oh God. Please not Mark. Don’t let it be Mark. Anyone but Mark.

“Why should you get to do it?” Ten glared up at the standing Mark from his metallic folding chair. “I choreographed their dances, so I should be cast.”

“But I’m, like, the king of subunits!” Mark rose to his tiptoes and waved his arms again in an effort to secure my attention. “If you pick me, Lei, I’ll get you into NCT Dream!”

That was a bit of a running joke— my longtime aspiration to perform with Dream. Hearing it in that moment of high stress made me laugh out loud. One of those side-splitting laughs. Real. Mark smiled at having untangled the knot in my stomach with little effort. In moments like those, I thought it wasn’t so bad that he had a crush on me.

“First of all,” Taeyong interjected, ever the mediator in NCT conflicts, “Mark, you can’t get anyone into Dream—”

“Who do you think talked the agency into making Dream a fixed unit?” Mark’s face turned scarlet as he yelled, and Taeyong didn’t bat a single eyelash.

“— Second of all, Lei doesn’t get to pick who takes Kai’s place.” We all shifted at Taeyong’s casual acknowledgment of Kai’s ejection. “Ms. Kim does. So both of you—” Taeyong eyed Ten and Mark sternly, and I wondered how they didn’t fall apart under his gaze— “be quiet and let her make her decision.”

Mom nodded at Taeyong gratefully. “It’s not much of a decision to make; I’ll just employ the second choice—”

“It’s me, right?” Baekhyun finally jumped off of Lucas, stood upright, and brushed off his all-black suit while flicking his bleached bangs out of his eyes.

Baekhyun’s goofy smile faltered when Mom shook her head. “Lucas, get up. Your dream is coming true: I’m giving you permission to touch Lei.”

“Oh yeah!” Lucas flew to my side.

Before I could wrap my mind around the fact that I would be in a subunit with him— my best friend, my rumored boyfriend— Lucas grabbed me around my waist, which was exposed under a fitted white crop top— and pulled me flush against him into the pose Kai had struggled with for hours. “Leicas forever, suckers!”

As Mom ushered Baekhyun to stand with the others off set, and everybody groaned at Lucas’s ever-enthusiastic embrace of our rumors, I laughed.

The camera flashed at last. Finally relieved enough to breathe, I returned Lucas’s embrace and joked, “Is that going to be our subunit’s name? That silly ship name?”

Lucas laughed as he lowered to press his forehead to mine. That was how things should have been all along: me and Lucas free to smile at each other and express our friendship— as silly and affectionate and beautiful as it was— to the whole world without fearing backlash.

“Look at this.”

I slid my phone to Lucas across the glossy light wood floor as we sat, stretching in preparation for dance practice. I watched his eyebrows knit together as he scooped the phone into his hands; I watched his jaw fall open as he scrolled past the headline and through the fans’ comments.

“Hey.” Taeyong kicked at Lucas’s foot before joining us on the floor. Always the leader (even without the title in SuperM), he reminded, “Phones aren’t allowed in practice.”

Lowering effortlessly into a stretch that resembled the splits, Ten defended, “Momager isn’t here yet, so—”

“Look at this!” Lucas shoved my phone into Taeyong’s face. Then, as if Taeyong couldn’t read for himself, Lucas said, “Pop News is writing about the idol who never debuted!”

As Taeyong gripped the phone with his slender hands (and a curious Ten and slack-jawed, messy-haired Mark gathered around him to gawk at the screen), Taemin plopped onto the floor next to me. His knee brushed against mine, and I stiffened while he smiled despite the room’s tension, skin shimmering without the aid of makeup.

“We don’t have to worry if it’s Pop News,” Taemin said. “They aren’t exactly a credible source— remember how they covered that ‘Any Other Name’ scandal?”

Nobody could forget the chaos surrounding the Korean adaptation of a best-selling novel written by a young American woman. The love triangle between the author, a scandalized actor (Jungkook) and the author’s best friend/famous fashion designer (Jimin) was the biggest scandal in recent history. Everybody knew that gossip as if it were the plot of a classic blockbuster film or an almost distant, almost tangible high school memory, so I shouldn’t have been surprised by Taemin’s reference.

“You keep up with celebrity gossip?” I asked Taemin quietly, my eyes narrowing to see how this information fit with my conception of him.

Taemin’s face flushed pink. He mistook my interest for criticism as he often did in those days, and I didn’t know how to correct him.

While trying (and failing) to connect his phone to the Bluetooth speaker, Kai started, “Maybe Pop News isn’t credible—”

“They’re definitely not credible.” Ten crawled to the side of the room to tuck my phone into my bubble-gum pink backpack. Turning back to the group, he grinned, “Pop News is, like, if Mark was a news outlet: cringey, baseless—”

“Hey! I’m not baseless!”

“Anyway.” Kai puffed his cheeks full of air. “Pop News may be a scam, but they have a lot of followers. Sometimes if a lie is heard by enough people, it becomes like the truth.”

It would have been nice to be able to disagree, to believe that truth is truth, and lies are lies, and rumors are just rumors. I wanted to disagree. But I couldn’t.

Kai continued, “And obviously Pop News isn’t wrong about everything. Jungkook and that author were dating! They’re even engaged now!”

So Kai kept up with celebrity gossip too. Was that the kind of thing he and Taemin talked about over meals?

While my pulse quickened at the talk about dating scandals and I tried to ease my anxiety by resuming stretches, Baekhyun stirred from his nap in the corner of the room.

“Well!” Baekhyun yawned. “If you ask me, Momager is the idol who never debuted.”

“What?” The rest of us shrieked in unison, and Baekhyun laughed like a maniac at our identical wide-eyed open-mouthed expressions.

“Just think about it! When Taemin, the king of dance—” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Taemin stiffen at Baekhyun’s playful compliment despite the bashful smile pulling his lips taut— “kept screwing up that choreo, Momager demonstrated. And she was no amateur.”

Considering Baekhyun’s evidence, I gnawed on my cheek. Mom was a gifted dancer; her precision, like Baekhyun said, rivaled Taemin’s. No, her precision enabled her to find fault in Taemin— perfect Taemin.

Baekhyun wouldn’t mention this, but Mom was also a natural singer. She proved that on the first day in the studio when she coached Baekhyun through a challenging run. After he crossed his arms and whined, “What you want is impossible!” she stunned him silent by belting the notes in one attempt.

But Mom couldn’t be the idol who never debuted, I frowned, because that meant I was the reason—

“Look, Mom is totally hot enough to be an idol,” Lucas smirked before his eyebrows lowered skeptically. “But don’t you think Lei would know if her mom was a former trainee?”

At that remark, everybody turned to face me.

No, I wouldn’t know if Mom was a former trainee.

I knew very little about Mom’s past because I hadn’t asked many questions. I knew that I was born in Atlanta, Georgia, her hometown. I knew that I could not remember the last time we spoke to my father. I knew that life didn’t really begin until Mom started her career by managing Super Junior.

I didn’t remember anything before Donghae started bringing me milkshakes, and Heechul started making me laugh with funny faces, and Ryeowook (or Wookie, as I had always called him) started fitting our tea parties into his busy schedule, and Eunhyuk started unofficially training me to be an idol through dance lessons. I didn’t remember anything before Super Junior became my family.

As I crumbled under my members’ stares, as I drowned in the guilt of having neglected Mom’s pain if she was the idol who never debuted (in the guilt of knowing I had never asked about her because the spotlight had always been on me), Baekhyun repeated, “Momager is the idol who never debuted!” “What?”

We all turned to see Mom’s ghostly pale face in the doorway so quickly that we whimpered and rubbed at the backs of our necks. Whiplash. Great.

“Don’t say stupid things, Baekhyun,” Heechul scolded as he nudged Mom’s motionless body into the dance studio. “Of course Kimberly isn’t a failed trainee! That story about the idol who never debuted is just something we tell you kids—” he jabbed an accusatory finger at me and Lucas— “to keep you from dating!”

Lucas boasted, “I knew it!” And everyone laughed as he triumphantly pumped his fists into the air.

My laughter was forced, though.

A glance down at my watch confirmed that Mom was half an hour late; Mom was never late. Heechul never escorted her to her schedules. Heechul never called her by her full name; to him, she had always been Kimi. Heechul never pressed a comforting kiss to the top of her head.

Something was wrong, and I couldn’t ask what because we were at practice. And I wouldn’t have been brave enough to ask in the privacy of our home. And I wouldn’t have been strong enough to stomach the answer.

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prosshi · 3 years

Note

I see how my writing in terms of saying "you" when speaking generally is confusing so I'm sorry for that, i should've been clearer. like i said i don't know anything about you personally or if you were for tagging your stuff or not.

i deliberately did NOT mention suicide baiting because... i think encouraging someone to commit suicide is bad. i deliberately made a point not to defend anyone suicide baiting, even if i agree with them on some things. so im not sure how you interpreted that, considering i didn't mention harrassing people.

i simply said, there are always gonna be people that are uncomfortable by these types controversial content. i didn't think my ask would get such a response out of you considering i didn't even advocate for censoring that kind of content, much less suicide baiting the ppl who make it.

and i guess in that respect you can compare any type of porn consumption to lolishota content. you can use any other sexuality as an example. and yes you can say "well i hope you've never consumed any true crime media from the perspective of a criminal" or some other comparison and that lies in the difference that i dont get off on the thought of torturing and murdering someone, and if someone does, i don't think they should be encouraged to commit suicide, but don't victimize yourself when people are appalled by it lmao

I mean if you actually read my first response you'd understand the problem with that.

Also like... Sex isn't dirty or sinful or whatever, "getting off" to something doesn't make it worse than if you enjoy things in a nonsexual way. Fuck off with that conservative christian bullshit.

I'm gonna be honest, I didn't respond to this until now because you generally just suck as a person. You're hypocritical, you haven't bothered to read things before responding, you keep shifting goalposts, you think it's okay to shame people over things they have no control over, you think it's okay to shame people for mental illnesses... You just suck.

"Don't victimize yourself when people are appalled" just shut the fuck up. You don't know what you're talking about. This kind of shit made me blame myself for the sexual abuse I experienced for years. If you think something is gross then shut up. You're allowed to think whatever you want about kinks or whatever but stop victim blaming for five minutes.

#csa mention cw #harassment cw #suicide cw #long post

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goldenkamuyhunting · 4 years

Text

Ramblings and crazy theory time about GK chap 230 “Ienaga Kano”

So with the new chapter we get a split in the fandom on how to nickname Tsukishima. While the Japanese fandom goes for ‘Surekill-man’ a reference to a fanassigned nicknamed for a character in the ‘Jojo no kimyō na bōken’ universe, the western fandom went for something obviously more ‘western’…

…to be honest with various variations of the nick, from purely ‘The Terminator’ from the homonymous movie to ‘The Tsukishima’ or ‘Tsukishimator’ and so on (I went with the one that would fit better in the space in the image, that and Merdopseudo liked it, my apologies to the nicks not used, you’re all cool but ‘there can be only one’).

But let’s start with the chapter and with how Tsukishima gained this nick.

We left him having been injected a sedative by Ienaga and yet still managing to shoot her to death. It’s worth to point out Ienaga’s sedatives need some time to affect people and our Tsukinator is trying to take advantage of it to make a short work of Tanigaki.

Really, we knew Tsukishima, pardon, the Tsukinator was good at hand-to-hand combat but not really how much. Tanigaki is supposedly good as well, bigger than him and not drugged and our supposedly sedated Tsukinator is literally wiping the floor with him without even breaking a sweat and Tanigaki manages only narrowly to have him miss shooting his brain off.

Luckily for Tanigaki when it looks as if the Tsukinator will get better luck with his next shoot, the sedative kickes in (with the Tsukinator’s veins becoming rather visible as if they were some sort of monster crawling on his face)

and the Tsukinator’s falls, his face flat on Tanigaki’s ample chest.

Ienaga, still alive, tells Inkarmat, who’s naively trying to stop the blood pouring out of her, about how the Tsukinator wouldn’t SUPPOSEDLY be able to move for two hours.

Tanigaki, always the righteous, gives Ienaga a look that Ienaga correctly interpret with ‘why would a selfish, evil criminal like you do something like that?’.

Tanigaki represents that sort of naïve people that divide the world in two blocks, the purely evil ones and the purely good ones and misses how actually there’s a lot of middle ground in between the two groups and purely evil and purely good hardly exist if not in fairy tales.

As Ienaga did PLENTY of terrible deeds Tanigaki doesn’t care for her motivations nor expects her to feel also positive emotions like love or care and do something good like helping them. He put her in the box of the evil people and thinks there’s no way she would get out of it and do something good.

On the contrary side he perceives himself as being among the good guys, as proved by the previous chapter in which he said he wasn’t cold blooded enough to kill a friend, Sugimoto, conveniently forgetting he wanted to do the same to Kenkichi and that he did the same to Kiro (who saved his and Inkarmat’s life by the way) and doesn’t realize the ‘greyness’ in himself, feeling free to judge negatively Ogata and Nikaido for betraying Tsurumi but thinking instead that he is entitled to do the same.

This, of course, doesn't mean Tanigaki is evil, he’s merely human and therefore flawed.

I love this side of him as a character, I love how human Tanigaki is in his own good sides and in his own bad sides but, on the other hand it clearly makes me angry when he acts like a blind hypocrite. It’s human... but it’s no good at all.

Anyway Ienaga explains her own reasons which are… very simple.

Inkarmat, who’s about to give birth, is, for Ienaga, about to become ‘perfect’. Evidently the trauma of her mother’s abort, which twisted Ienaga and turned her into a bloody murderer and cannibal, rules her life not only pushing her to do heinous acts but also in a positive way. She wants to save this pregnant woman, she wants her to attain the ‘perfection’ neither her or her mother could attain. And it’s clear Ienaga is completely content with giving up her life for this, in fact she’s smiling and telling Tanigaki to not lose this moment.

Inkarmat is touched. Tanigaki just pulls Inkarmat up and tells her to leave without even a word of thank you for the person who gave her life so that they could escape. Inkarmat’s gaze instead is still on Ienaga and since she doesn’t seem to really try to get up I wonder if this is because she feels bad for Ienaga, for leaving her behind.

Not that she can be saved.

This, mind you, doesn’t mean Ienaga is now a good person or that she gets redeemed by this single heroic act. Ienaga is a terrible person who did terrible things and who’s helping Inkarmat only because, for her own reasons, she had come to care about her.

It’s entirely possible Ienaga doesn’t regret a single terrible thing she had done in life and, had she survived, she would have continued to try to chop people and eat them for their own purposes… except Inkarmat for whom she had grown fond.

On the other side the cover of the chapter, placed here and showing Ienaga’s body, depicts the sprays of blood that came out of her as forming a halo and wings, while the writing points out that Ienaga became perfect in that very moment, by giving her own life for someone else.

If this is Noda nodding to Christian faith again, the implication is that yes, Ienaga regretted what she did in the past and that she would be forgiven, not by men but by God.

After all, according to many, ‘Who saves a life saves the world’.

Yeah, yeah, among fans it’s a controversial topic.

The tropes of ‘death equals redemption’ and ‘redemption equals death’ are overused to the point they feel cheap and that’s due to fans themselves. As James Norrington said ‘The problem with a 'redemption' gig is, well, no one wants to see it. They all want to believe in it, sure, but to do it... it's as good as signing your own death warrant. Audiences don't want to see you redeemed, living a normal life. They'll never truly forgive you for your flaws as long as you're alive.’

Long story short, authors who decide to portray that EVERYONE can do a heel-face turn, that you can stop doing evil things, that is never too late to become a good person which is a great message really, also end up heroically killing off characters who decide to do something good for a change, so as to appease the fans who can’t forgive them and just want them to never realize the errors of their way and die a miserable death (or, when they feel merciful, spend their life being miserable).

Well, if that’s your kind of story, you’re free to roll with it.

De gustibus non disputandum est.

I’m personally not sure that, had Ienaga survived, after this heroic act of her, the trauma that pushed her into becoming the person she was, would be magically healed and she would become a morally perfect person... or at least as morally perfect as a human can be (not much really unless you’re in air of sainthood) and OF COURSE there’s no way she could ‘pay back’ all the people she killed as... well… they’re dead (I know there’s a lot of confusion about it but redemption isn’t about being forgiven, nor is about giving your life in a heroic way, redemption is about paying back the people you wronged... unless of course you use religion and have the character atone for his sins against God by redeeming himself to His eyes and not really by redeeming himself to his victims) but I like the idea Noda is hinting this could have helped her to change their ways.

A perfect world would be perfect if all the criminals just were to change their ways and become good people, not if the jails could contain them all or if they were to drop all dead in a ‘Death Note’ style (though, when we talk about fictional works, there’s a bit of Yagami Light in all the fans… :P ). We need good men more than we need jails filled and corpses.

But well, this of course is just an utopia, sinning is addictive and changing your life is hellish hard. It happens even in real life, but is sadly very rare.

Anyway Tanigaki and Ienaga leave Inkarmat’s room only to meet up with Koito, pointing his gun at them. Tanigaki, who was pushing ahear Inkarmat, now places her behind himself but Koito is clearly torn. He’s sweating and chewing his lower lip as he lower his gaze as well before lowering his gun too and telling them to leave.

The two run away, always without thanking him, but then Tanigaki wonders why Koito left them go.

Inkarmat points out that when Koito was bedridden she spent a lot of time telling fortunes to him but Tanigaki rejects the idea. The Second Lieutenant Koito he knows wouldn’t have shown mercy to a person who had shown kindness to him.

While this is partially true, as part of Koito’s actions are clearly motivated by how he had lost faith in Tsurumi and Tsukishima due to discovering how he was used by them, I still think him letting Inkarmat go is also part due to him growing fond of her.

She was with him and cheered him up when he was wounded and weak and, in a way, in enemy ground. I think this was precious to him and Inkarmat, who’s clearly not a naive person, probably realized it. Koito knows he can’t escape, he doesn’t take that chance to run away as well, but it’s worth to mention if Tsurumi were to realize he let them go, Koito could end up in troubles as well and maybe he’s afraid Tsukishima too could put him in troubles since he warned him if he were to betray he would kill him. Koito also is risking his own life to help them, and, I think, is something he’s not doing solely out of the kindness of his heart but out of genuine care for Inkarmat.

She won him over a little.

It’s also sad how Tanigaki thinks that Inkarmat’s kindness should have gone unrewarded on Koito. He doesn’t think the time she spent with him would affect Koito, that he would grow to care for her. He sees Koito as a lost cause, a man uncapable of showing thankfullness and apprecciation for the kindness he received.

Koito is in another box for bad guys from which Tanigaki didn’t think Koito should have been able to get off and instead he did. People don’t change to Tanigaki, he has no hope for them to get better, to improve themselves, to develop positive relations or to do good thing. Once evil, always evil.

It’s a sad, hopeless and cold view.

I think even Nihei would be hurt by it.

Meanwhile Tanigaki put in action his ‘bright plan’ of escaping with Inkarmat on a horse a mean of transportation surely perfectly comfortable for a pregnant woman who could give birth at any minute and whose speed wouldn’t resent at all of the fact it has to carry two people, one of which at the nth month of pregnancy plus whatever Tanigaki has in those bags he hung to the horse and his own backpack.

Now… remember when I said the Tsukinator was meant to be out of commission for supposedly two hours?

Well, we wished.

The Tsukinator, despite the sedative, manages to get up, grab a rifle, shoot in Tanigaki’s direction and recharge before… falling again. Honestly I’m not sure if he has fainted or he just slipped off the bed due to lack of coordination. Nothing stop the Tsukinator as we’ll see later on.... but after all we knew it.

‘Listen, and understand, Tanigaki. That Tsukinator is out there, it cant be bargained with, it cant be reasoned with, it doesn't feel pity or remorse or fear, and it absolutely will not stop... EVER, untill you are dead!’

Too bad Tanigaki can’t hear me lecturing him about the Tsukinator....

Meanwhile as Tanigaki and Inkarmat escape, as it was easy to predict, the rocking of the horse of course starts to affect Inkarmat. Tanigaki realizes he was going too fast and, since they managed to make to the edge of the Otaru he thinks they’re far enough and safe enough they can stop there in an abandoned building.

As Tanigaki lights a fire, Inkarmat notes there’s blood coming from his head so he uses the Matanpushi (the headband Huci gave him) to bandage it, claiming he’ll be fine.

Honestly I don’t really find respectful to use that headband as a makeshift bandage as the Matanpushi has a religious meaning among Ainu, in fact it tells Gods where they are and calls their protection on the wearer. I can understand Huci using it as such, to ask the Gods to protect Tanigaki, but, as I doubt Tanigaki is now an Ainu Gods believer, it just feels a bit inappropriate.

On the other side in desperate times people would beg at whatever altar they would find and I also wonder if, in a way, this makes Tanigaki feel as he felt when he was escaping from Ogata and Nikaido so in a way he is hoping Huci’s headband will give him protection not so much through the Gods in which Huci’s believes but just because it’s Huci’s headband... which again is very human and also rather sweet.

(Besides there are huge chances Tanigaki has no idea of the religious meaning tied to it...)

We can also see that Tanigaki’s irises recover their light colour now that he’s wearing it so yes, I think it has a good psychological effect on him and it’s not just something he picked up at random.

Anyway Tanigaki plans to have them rest only a little and then escape farther.

Inkarmat notes Tanigaki is losing blood from his leg also, which Tanigaki thinks is the result of Tsukishima shooting at them earlier and which he notices only now since he was so busy escaping he didn’t even felt the pain it should give him.

While this is kind of normal and points rather well to Tanigaki’s inner state, so completely focused on escaping he basically didn’t even felt pain, not checking on his own conditions is a huge mistake. Not only loss of blood makes him weaker and could have caused him to faint, making him useless and giving Inkarmat more troubles but his dripping blood left a convenient track the Tsukinator followed till there.

And that’s why I think Tsukishima didn’t faint, he only fell because, on his feet he basically reached Tanigaki and Inkarmat who escaped on a horse in no time as they only apparently had time to light the fire before being discovered. The Tsukinator is even faster than Jason Voorhees in tailing after his victims despite being on his feet and drugged… but Noda has already assigned the comparison with Jason to Sugimoto so I’ll stick with the Tsukinator…

Anyway the Tsukinator tries to shoot Tanigaki but he narrowly misses him.

Either Tanigaki is lucky, due to the Matanpushi the Gods are really protecting him or Tsukishima is still partially affected by the sedative. Anyway Tanigaki tells Inkarmat to escape from the back as he tries to shoot the Tsukinator and… miss him despite the Tsukinator being only few steps from him as the Tsukinator lowers himself, pushes Tanigaki on the ground and then punches him hard.

Tanigaki, taking advantage of his superior size and strength, grabs the Tsukinator up and tosses him against a wall so hard the Tsukinator crashes through it.

Think this signs a score for Tanigaki? Think twice.

The result of Tanigaki’s efforts is that when Tanigaki grabs his rifle and tries to shoot him, the Tsukinator had all the time to hide, protected by the walls.

Tanigaki looks out, and luckily for him the Tsukinator isn’t into position yet as Tanigaki’s head would have been a beautiful target right then.

Way to go, Tanigaki, really.

Inkarmat calls him so Tanigaki reaches her and again they escape on a horse. Again.

The Tsukinator shoots Tanigaki in the shoulder...

...before faithfully ‘hopping’ after them at a leisurely pace with a calm and a determination that betrays how he took lessons from Pepé Le Pew only, to Pepé and Tsurumi’s displeasure, what pushes him forward to chase and attempt to kill Tanigaki, is clearly not ‘love’.

Anyway morning as come and Inkarmat and Tanigaki are still escaping on a horse, conveniently leaving blood track on the snow that the Tsukinator can follow. They might as well leave direction signs.

Tanigaki though is optimist. Now he has a rifle so, he thinks, the Tsukinator will keep more at distance (he wishes) and besides since he’s more at home in the mountains than him they will easily lose him if he will hide there with a pregnant woman about to give birth and for whom all those emotions and the horse ride clearly aren’t good.

As on cue and strictly following Murphy’s law, Inkarmat’s water breaks and Tanigaki’s oh so perfect plan to slowly reach the mountains and lose the Tsukinator there crashes when facing the logistics of how to deal with an impending childbirth that Ienaga had warned him was about to happen. But no, do not listen to the amazing doctor when the latter is also a criminal who just died to save your ass.

So Tanigaki APOLOGIZES TO THE HORSE because he is leaving him behind and mind him, this is nice and everything but what about thanking Ienaga, who died for you and Koito who risked his ass for you?

Meanwhile the Tsukinator moves closer following the trail of blood he can notice also in a bamboo grove… to discover Tanigaki’s horse which now has a wound on his leg, likely made by Tanigaki as the horse before seemed perfectly fine.

The Tsukinator understands he was misleaded into chasing the horse and his brain computer analyze the situation to set on a new course… and soon it’ll become obvious it’s not really difficult to get which one.

Meanwhile Tanigaki, who’s about to become father, carries Inkarmat bridal stile running through the snow repeating the classic sentences Panicky Expectant Fathers says to their wives when they’re about to give birth to a baby: ‘you can do this, grit your teeth and bear it, it’s gonna be okay, I’m with you, you can do this, everything will work out… yadda, yadda’.

Mind you, it’s nice from them as it’s not like there’s something they can do except saying such things and being of moral support with their presence but it’s a trope so abused seeing it in this scene somehow made me laugh instead than feel the drama that’s obviously looming over him and Inkarmat due to them being in an obviously very dire situation.

And it’s worth to mention that Inkarmat, same as all the other pregnant women, appreciates a lot Tanigaki’s efforts to reassure her.

Moral support might seem nothing much but sometimes it can also do miracles and it’s great to know there’s someone with you that encourages you when you’re in such a desperate situation, a rock against which you can hold so as not to be dragged away by waves.

So she smiles and hugs Tanigaki tightly and tries to hold on.

It’s a good moment.

Yeah, Tanigaki went into this without the sliver of a decent plan but at least he decided to stick with the people that were important for him and not leave them alone at the first sign of trouble.

Tanigaki has plenty of faults and flaws but, despite this I think it’s so IMPORTANT how he decided to stay with Inkarmat through thick and thin when so many other men would have washed their hands clean of her and the baby.

Maybe Tanigaki can’t give us lessons about planning or about not being hypocrites but sure as hell he’s trying his hardest to be a good companion and a good father and this is GREAT, really.

He’s wounded, he has lost blood and yet he’s running in the snow with all their luggage and Inkarmat, who’s pregnant, in his arms.

The Tsukinator can be scary in the way he doesn’t stop his chase but Tanigaki, who’s instead moved by love, is amazing.

Sadly though, Tanigaki isn’t really good at planning things and this definitely plays against him.

So Tanigaki, running like a madman, reaches the most predictable destination in the neighbourhood of Otaru in which he could hope to get help, Huci’s house, where we can see next to her the son of Sakamoto, the Lighting Bandit and O-gin who now had grown enough he can sit on his own.

While yes, in this place they can find someone who’ll help Inkarmat, it’s not like The Tsukinator couldn’t guess Tanigaki would take this course, it was obvious enough that escaping with a woman who’s about to give birth they should find a place in which said woman could give birth and Huci’s house is close enough so I expect the Tsukinator to figure this out and reach them in no time. I honestly doubt Tanigaki will manage to repeat the same trick he used with Ogata as, first of all, at this point it wouldn’t be wise to move Inkarmat for a while and this includes also just after she gave birth and he can’t leave her behind or she and her child will become hostages Tsukishima and Tsurumi can use against him or kill off in retaliation for his escape and this now includes Huci as well since Tanigaki has ended up involving her.

Due to Tanigaki’s huge involvement in Kiro’s death (Kiro died of blood loss mainly caused by the wound Tanigaki gave him) he’ll likely be a victim of the tiger curse and condemned to live an unhappy life meaning there are chances he won’t be the one to die here but that he’ll lose everything here.

Tsukishima is in no better position as he also contributed to Kiro’s death albeit in a smaller manner (the wound Tsukishima inflicted him did negligible harm compared to Tanigaki’s although it clearly didn’t help, actually it only speeded up Kiro’s death) so let’s talk a bit about him.

Tsukishima didn’t need to become The Tsukinator, as I called him through this whole rambling.

He attempted to stop Tanigaki, he was drugged, they went away, he could have told Tsurumi he just passed out, Koito kept on sleeping and be done with the whole business.

Tanigaki is just a man who wants to go back home, he isn’t interested in the gold hunt nor in stopping Tsurumi, he wants to get the woman he loves and have a family with her. Inkarmat is a woman who due to her past with Wilk ended up becoming a pawn to him and now she apparently merely wants to have a family with Tanigaki. The incoming baby has no fault of his own and can’t prove to be a threat.

Why just not letting them go? Why do they need to be killed or captured at any cost?

Is the baby’s actually Tsurumi? Did they experimented on the fetus so as to create the perfect soldier or the antichrist himself? Does Inkarmat know earth shattering secrets that can’t be revealed to anyone?

Tsukishima was willing to let go Gansoku, a criminal. When Koito unveiled the truth Tsukishima let it slide as long as Koito played along with Tsurumi.

So why not letting go Tanigaki, Inkarmat and the baby?

Just because they aren’t okay with being used as a pawns like he is? Just because they want to have the ordinary happy life Tsukishima was denied? Or it’s because in this way it won’t come out Koito let them go?

I don’t know but I can’t say I like what Tsukishima is doing. He could turn the other way to save three lives, he could turn the other way as he does each time Tsurumi commits a crime and instead he decided to stick with Tsurumi against three people who, apparently, can’t really do Tsurumi harm. I’m really sad he chose to be that way.

On another note there’s something I wanted to remark in the past chapter but forgot about it so I’ll mention it here. I love how Noda handles Inkarmat’s pregnancy.

In many cases in manga a pregnant woman is often moving around like a not-pregnant woman, using her protruding belly like a hand rest and maybe being a little slow and fatigued but overall acting as she usually do.

Inkarmat moves exactly like a pregnant woman instead, not using her belly as a hand rest but protecting and holding it with her hands, taking it into consideration when she moves around and even when she’s in a seating position she clearly have to adjust it to make it comfortable for herself now that she’s in her 9th month. Noda really did his homework with her.

Anyway with this chapter we end volume 23, with Tanigaki coming back to Huci without Asirpa and with a woman about to give birth and a Tsukinator tailing after them in a situation that really sounds like it will become a déjà vu of volume 5.

Ogata back then didn’t want to shoot Tanigaki in Huci’s house so as not to have to kill her too and ended up allowing Tanigaki to get an advantage over him. We’ll see what the Tsukinator will do… and we’ll see what Tanigaki will do now as well, so as to ensure Inkarmat, his kid and Huci (as well as Sakamoto and O-gin’s baby) will get out of this safely.

Hopefully maybe, being back on the mountains will give him back his planning ability.

Using the horse to lead Tsukishima in the wrong direction wasn’t a bad idea even if the course he took afterward became then far too predictable. On a sidenote… in that circumstance Nikaido was there as well and Tsukishima watched as Tsurumi cut his ear. I do wonder… was Nikaido still at the hospital? Does he know what’s going on? Will he join them? And with whom he’ll side?

Tanigaki who caused him to be attacked by a bear or Tsukishima who stood by as Tsurumi cut his ear and would have let the latter kill him without blinking?

It would really be interesting to have Nikaido join the party with a ‘personal’ position instead than just the one of the soldier who has to obey to Tsurumi’s orders.

As the tiger curse said they’re supposed to live an unhappy life, unless I’m misinterpreting something, the curse won’t attempt to their lives, just at making them miserable. Still, we’ll see. I don’t want Inkarmat, the baby and Huci to die but I get this could be appropriate karmic retribution for Tanigaki. We’ll see.

In a way, while the previous chapter pushed forward a comparison between Tanigaki’s escape plan (or lack thereoff) and Ogata’s escape plan, this chapter is all a comparison in strenght and endurance between Tsukishima and Tanigaki. They fight, they keep on going even when other men would just give up, with a desperation and a determination that makes me think of Kiro in his last moments and that might be done on purpose in case the tiger curse is looming on them.

Kiroranke is looking down on them from above, seeing them as they struggle like he did, seeing them, who in the past had a good relation, fight without mercy like Tanigaki did with him.

We’ll see how it’ll end for both of them but sure thing the irony in all this is big.

Last but not least a question that’s going to stay unanswered for now. Who between the Tsukinator, the killer rabbit of Caerbannog, the 6 million yen man and Jasonmoto would win should they come to a hand-to-hand fight? We’ll probably discover this in the future.

#Golden Kamuy #Tanigaki Genjirou #Inkarmat #Tsukishima Hajime #Ienaga Kano #Koito Otonoshin #Golden Kamuy Ramblings and Theories #Susupo

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