#I suspect if you've been reading my blog for a while you can guess which two are the 'official' projects

[f0point5]

I think after reading through these asks you've had I just realised how strong my sense of justice is, which is a trait of autism which I've been suspecting for a while now that I may have? Like I can't decide if Lando or Oscar's side is fairer, because both arguments have points and it's stressing me the fuck out that there's not a simple "yes this should have happened, it's what would've been fair"

I didn't come to your blog to have a self realization but thanks anyways I guess 😂😂

Also, don't wanna rush you but any plans on when we can have a new chapter in the Lando fic?🥺

That’s interesting. Because my sense of fairness is only for really petty stuff like where I sit at the dinner table. But when it comes to big stuff, I’m a Machiavellian bitch who can’t understand what empathy is 😂

I’m hoping the new Lando part will be out in the next few days. Now the wedding ceremony is over I’m hoping I’ll have more time this week!

[parlerenfleurs]

Hi!

I'm the anon with the Xue Yang&Wei Wuxian ask from a while ago.

Thank you for answering. I am a big Wei Wuxian fan too and I don't like it when he is misunderstood on purpose,to raise up the moral quality of other characters.

But about screenshotting. You've opened my mind!!

So,to me,screenshotting is the worst that you can do. Take someone's words out of context and criticize without ever interacting with the person. Rude anon asks are way above that,in terms of ethics. And angry reblogs would be preferable,instead.

BUT. apparently this is normal practice? So I really want to know now,is it a me thing or a cultural thing?

If you are also from the US I guess it would be a cultural thing. But if you are not,then it could be strictly a me thing,possibly?👀🤯🥸

(about finding your post: it was just in one of the common tags,so it was easy to find)

Well, for starters, no country/culture is a monolith, so don't worry about that anon, but no I'm not from the US, I'm French.

I have no idea if it's a me-thing, but I suspect I've been on the internet longer than you, and it's very simply that I value my tranquillity above drama. What I can tell you is that if you do want to talk about what someone said but you disagree with, if you put their name with it, then it's rude because it paints a target on their back while they may never know where it came from and don't have a chance to respond, or simply block. That's where the angry anons can come from.

On the other hand, cropping out the name is considered the polite and decent thing to do, yes. Same principle as making your own post instead of derailing someone else's.

We can never all agree and sometimes it's cathartic to just... Have a good laugh/sarcasm-fest about something we read that someone said.

But life is too short to care about a few words taken out of context if none of the angry feelings are making their way to me, you know? Social media is largely designed to maximise engagement, and to do that it chiefly exploits anger. It's profitable for sites if users get angry and just... respond.

Anger is paralyzing in the long term, very bad for the body and the brain, and reacting without thought is how useless drama happens. Especially if it's about a fictional character! There are more worthwhile causes to put energy into.

That's why I largely don't follow mdzs blogs. There is too much drama, and I just want to enjoy a good book that brings me joy. An angry reblog would not bring me joy. It would be useless to both parties AND put drama on people's dash. But venting about some words might be a relief, and it has nothing to do with me because they had the decency not to come and bother me about their opinion, that is irreconcilable with mine, so I don't care.

I would advise you to reconsider why you feel it's more ethical to confront someone than to just have your own emotion in your own personal space. When you think about it, this is the difference between shit-talking something you overheard with your friends and going in a stranger's face to start a fight. Which is more ethical? Which is a better use of one's energy and time? Of course a constant state of criticism is toxic and disagreeable, but the baseline is not to make it someone else's problem.

Seems to me you feel like your words, written thoughts, are a part of you, and thus if they are "taken" in this way, and you don't know what they become or how people react to them, then you lose then and thus a part of yourself. Your ego feels threatened, and I mean that in the most neutral way. We all have an ego that feels threatened all the time. The key is to recognise when it's a real threat to our well-being, or just an eternal immature, attention-seeking part of your psyche with irrational views about how the world functions. You'll have an easier time in life, and on the internet, if you take a page out of Budfhism's philosophy, and detach your sense of self from such fickle things as words.

Yes, words have power, and that's why I vastly prefer not to receive angry anons or reblogs, but words are not "me". So it doesn't matter what someone says about them, with no name attached, in my back.

People will react to your existence and your actions. We all can't help doing that. Commenting on a stranger's appearance/behaviour in public, out of earshot, is okay - loudly telling them what you think about it is not. (Talking about harmless behaviour here, of course you can speak up if someone does something dangerous or rude.) Creating a blog dedicated to making fun of an appearance/behaviour with faces or names displayed is even worse.

In this metaphor, what these people did was the first option, and you're saying that you would find it the moral thing to do to do the second one instead, while I'm just happy they didn't do the third.

People will always react, and as long as they don't make their reaction to you your problem, and you don't in return, then the world is a kinder place.

[victorluvsalice]

The WIP Tag Game

Was tagged by @dont-offend-the-bees a little bit ago, figured it might make a fun Thursday post!

Rules: Post the names of all the files in your WIP   folder regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it! Tag as many people as you feel like tagging because you haven't had breakfast yet and your brain is oatmeal.

Now, I don’t have a specific WIP folder (though perhaps I should), and I only have two proper “story” WIPs that I’m currently working on, but I’ll throw a few other things that are either currently sitting unfinished due to a lack of inspiration or aren’t really “stories” in the traditional sense but are scenes and whatnot I dabble in when I’m not feeling the other stuff (or, in one case, after I’ve finished playing my weekly session of a certain video game):

An Introductory Guide To Magic

As Long As You Love Me (The Full Version)

Blades In The Dark Valicer

First Time

Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland

Learn To Love Again

Tell Me Where To Find Shelter

The HypnoSnippet Archive

So, uh, yeah, have at, if you’re curious! Even if you just want an update on the One Known Project (it HAS been a while since I updated anyone on Londerland Bloodlines, hasn’t it?)

Tagging: I don’t have a lot of people I follow on here, but I know two people who are writing -- @nebbychan and @anonymoose-au! No pressure, but if you’re interested! :)

[furiousgoldfish]

Hello! I’d just like to start by saying thank you! You and your system have helped me through so so much. It was thanks to this tumblr that I managed to realize my parents were abusive, and that what I was going through wasn’t normal. An online friend brought me to this blog after I had complained about my mother one too many times, and I’ve since shared this blog with all of my friends in the hopes I can help them, too. We’ve started a group chat for all my friends with abusive families (which is way too many people, sadly) and I try to send your posts often there.

I still have trouble thinking I don’t have it better than others, despite everything I’ve read about trauma not being a competition. My parents seem so much better in comparison to what other people have gone through. Even now, I’m struggling to think of the worst thing they’ve done (which is probably thanks to dissociation, but still). I’m trying to get better at it, though. If you have any advice for that, I’d love to hear it.

I have one more question, though. I’ve been trying to learn more about alters, since I believe I have one, but online resources are scarce. What’s your experience with yours, if you’re comfortable sharing (mostly how you knew you had one, I guess)? My particular suspected-alter is a voice that mostly speaks to me in “yes” or “no” and I’ve taught them to also say “heads” or “tails,” and and sometimes they front (I think, I’m not really sure what fronting feels like) and make me feel suddenly on edge and suspicious. One particular time at a café, I refused to eat a cookie a friend gave me because my instincts told me it was poisoned.

Sorry if this ask is a mess. Thank you again for having this blog, despite everyone who fights against it. I hope you guys have nothing but brighter days ahead of you!

— anon ♫

It makes me so happy that you found my blog a resource worth sharing, and that it helped you! Having an abusive-family support chat is something I've never heard about before, but it's an incredible idea! If there were a lot of local oriented groups like that, abused children could help support each other and help each other get thru it and understand, that is a great way to keep a clear head and have support on your side.

I think it's really normal to feel like things are a competition when you're an abused child, you've forced to pit against everyone all the time, you're told your worth is so bad you're always negatively compared to others, that does make it seem like the only way you'd be allowed to feel good, is to win in a competition of something, and it's okay if you feel that way. That will go away as you get older, and you realize competition brings nothing to you, it's a system with one winner and the prize is hollow. It's mutual kindness, helping others, creating something together, participating and making an environment where everyone is rewarded, that's really important in life. But it's also, impossible to get there with abusers surrounding you, and while you're in a toxic environment, everything just has to be  a competition, and it sucks.

I don't have an advice for it really, I know it's really important for us to be able to prove to ourselves that we were put thru a lot of pain, and that it is really bad, especially when the environment keeps dimissing us and shutting us down. I completely understand where you're coming from. You're just trying to prove that it's real, that it matters, that it's really bad, that you do belong in the group of survivors, and there's nothing bad about that, it's just that when it's put in that toxic context of 'but did others have it worse so you're invalid' that ends up making you feel like you didn't have it bad enough. Everyone had it bad enough. There's not a single abused person who was able to feel safe and fulfilled with their toxic parent. So of course you had it bad enough. Of course you're a part of the community. You're already struggling so bad not to see everything as a competition, that alone is a sign that you've had to compete for everything, and that's not normal or healthy way to be brought up.

Okay, so I'm still just figuring out alters, and from what I know, they can be vastly different for every person, and the experiences are massively different too, there's not just one way to have them, and also I'm not someone capable of confirming it to you. But I can share my experience. I knew I had a 'person in my head' because we talked a lot, in my head, since when I was 15, and they also switched and took control of my body sometimes, which was upsetting at first, but as we got along, it was helpful. I could tell it was another person and not just a stream of thoughts, because this person disagreed with me on almost everything, had a will of their own, had their own thought processes that were unavailable to me, knew things I didn't, and said things I would never ever say. I didn't know it was a sign of a dissociative disorder until years later, I found that information somewhere on tumblr, and started doing research. By that time, two more alters appeared.

What you're describing could be an alter experience, because the voice does seem to have a will of their own, they do want to weigh in on your decisions, and they're capable of answering questions. I can't tell if the 'instincts' are also from the alter, or just your own hunch, but I had experiences where I was sitting in a place and my alter told me 'leave now' and it was for a good reason (I didn't listen and regretted it).

It's interesting you're able to teach this voice to speak, but it's not something that can't be an alter experience, sometimes they keep quiet and don't speak, sometimes they just show images or give you inklings of their moods, it's different for everyone. If any system is reading this and can give a better insight into what the anon is dealing with, please reply to this post! I know precious little, and there's a lot of misinformation about alters out there.

Thank you for your kind words, and I sincerely hope you figure it out! Good luck.

[ailuronymy]

seriously, you've been warning the world about how bad the erins are at writing for years and while i always agreed i never realized how bad it's actually gotten. there's a bunch of new books coming out very soon, and in one of them, a pedophilic relationship is confirmed between thistleclaw and an apprentice spottedleaf. from the passages that have been leaked, it's being treated as healthy and acceptable in a book marketed towards impressionable preteens. squick.>>

>>like, in normal unanthropomorphic cats this would be completely natural, but these cats are basically humans with fur and it's pretty strongly implied by the book itself that it's totally ok and romantic for an adult to hit on a child who's basically the same age as their young son. what the heck erins 

Ruddles 2: good news: the erins listened to criticism about how there wasn't enough reason given for thistleclaw to go to the dark forest. bad news: they made him an abusive pedophile to explain it away

Ruddles 3: Thoughts on Spottedleafs Heart? Beating a dead horse at this point, but it still is disgusting and creepy in my opinion.

Hello, everyone! I’m getting this out of the way in one hit because I don’t want to drag it out. I don’t keep up-to-date on the new books. I don’t have any interest in sharing opinions about them, because I haven’t read them. I can’t pass judgement on something I haven’t experienced and since I haven’t read them and have no interest in buying these books in order to do so, that’s just how it is. 

Most of the time, you can probably guess what my thoughts are based on the content of this blog that I’ve been running for five years--i.e., I don’t have a high opinion of anything Erin Hunter does, especially not the strange and clumsy narrative twists and turns the series has been taking over the last several years. You can assume that all the things I’ve said about how Thistleclaw’s badly handled characterisation and the narrative around his “evilness,” which you can read by using this tag, are still relevant for every new “vital” piece of information they add about him in the wider series. 

In canon, there’s now no doubt that Thistleclaw is a bad dude. Erin Hunter was always angling for him to be “evil” but their clumsy writing along the way didn’t characterise him convincingly or “play fair” with their young audience, which is my major issue with Thistleclaw as a character in Bluestar’s Prophecy and subsequent books. It strikes me as lazy and perhaps a little irresponsible to write like that, especially when writing children’s fiction, and I suspect it’s because of that poorly developed start that they’re now bringing in this heavy-handed, mustache-twirling level of villainy to "prove” their depiction of his badness. I’ve said a lot about this issue already and I’m sort of tired of it by this point: there’s only so many times and ways I can underline the same mistake. 

As such, I would prefer not to be asked about Spottedleaf’s Heart or Thistleclaw, etc., unless the question isn’t to do with this mess. I might change my mind when more information about the book is released but for now, assume I’m not interested. I’m especially not interested in offering reactions to a book before it’s released: it’s very easy to make incorrect assumptions and/or unsupported ideological leaps without looking at the text itself. Tumblr is rife with this kind of behaviour and I won’t add to it here.

This is not to say I have a great faith in Erin Hunter’s ability to handle anything with nuance or depth but I think the intelligent and sensible thing to do is not overreact or jump to conclusions before analysing the evidence in its entirety and in the original context. Thistleclaw is a bad cat. Spottedleaf is a good cat. Are you absolutely certain that their relationship is supported by the text while you’re spreading this information, or are you just guessing that it is depicted as “healthy and acceptable” simply because it’s been leaked that some kind of dubious interaction is going on between them in the story? Do you know who leaked the information? Is it a trustworthy source? Have you actually read the story yourself, or did someone paraphrase it for you? Is it possible their interpretation isn’t the only--or most correct--one? 

I’m asking you because these are the questions I ask myself every time I come across an issue like this one. Literary critical thinking is worth practicing at every opportunity, I feel, and especially at this time, both on this blogging site and in the wider world. Something existing within a text is not the same as something being “supported” or “romanticised” or “strongly implied to be okay” by the text: bad things happen in stories all the time. Bad people exist in stories all the time. Many stories are built on and driven by the existence of bad things and bad people. It’s how these things are written that can be interpreted as having ethical or educational meaning, and right now I’m not sure there’s enough information on Spottedleaf’s Heart to work with. Not for me, anyway. I would be much more comfortable making a comment on Erin Hunter’s handling of the material after seeing the actual material itself with my own eyes and brain, and so that’s that. 

[real-faker]

Ack sorry about sending another pitch question (I know you said something about people sending those) but you mentioned you pitched a show twice, and since I'm a creeper, I read the tags and you said the pitch wasn't how we'd think they'd be; how were they, then, out of curiosity? If I ever pitch a show, in your position, what should I expect? What exactly happened? Sorry for asking all these questions; you've been my inspiration for a while and I hope I can pitch my own show someday!! Thank you

Oh no, that’s fine!  I don’t mind telling my experience with it, and I’ve even given pitching tips before, but this post is about the extent of my knowledge.  (You can also just search my blog for “pitch”, ‘cause I’ve reblogged stuff from other people that actually KNOW what they’re talking about, haha)  I just don’t want people under the impression that I’m super experienced with it, or that I’ve ever pitched to a big deal network or producer.  I absolutely haven’t.  I have exactly 2 pitching experiences.  The first one was a few years ago at an event in Nashville called “Film-Com”, which is an annual trade show/expo event for financing and distributing filmmaking projects.  Basically you get a booth, and you set up in this convention center with all these other aspiring creators (filmmakers, documentary people, a few video game/new media folks, all sorts), and they’ve invited a WHOLE SWATH of producers and industry professionals to come mull around the show floor with you so you can make connections and get your product out there EAT FREE MEALS and then idk, maybe fuckin’ walk around a bit and look at your dumb shitty projects if they fuckin’ feel like it but they probably wont, so what ends up happening is all the creators just walk around and look at each others’ shit, which for me—being the only animator there—means that a bunch of other jack-knobs who have some vague idea for a shitty cartoon end up giving me THEIR card so that maybe in the future I can work on THEIR dumbfuck ideas.ANYWAY, to get to the point, they selected certain projects and scheduled them to actually go up and pitch in front of a whole room full of producers.  This happened over the course of the whole day, so I suspect the reason none of the producers were walking around interacting with people is ‘cause they were stuck in a room all day hearing 30 different suck-ass pitches and when it was all said and done they were probably exhausted.  I was scheduled as the last pitch of the day.  I enter the room and wait patiently; the person before me is running about 10 minutes over their allotted time.  I scan the room… everyone is MISERABLE.  They’re anxious, they’re uninterested, they’re sighing… the main guy who’s sort of monitoring the whole thing is pinching his brow and trying his best to keep up the pretense of politeness in telling the current pitcher to wrap it up.  NONE of these people want to be here anymore.  It seems like everyone’s spent the whole day “warming ‘em up” for me, but now they’re all sweaty and miserable, so I can either go up there and give another mediocre pitch, OR I can go up there and try my goddamn hardest to make them laugh. 

I go up on stage, just IMMEDIATELY force myself to get over any fears I have, and I pitch W2H.  I screen a short mock trailer I made (no way I’d force them to sit through that whole fucking thing), and it’s sort of like a fever dream, because I can see all of the life returning to their faces, they’re WAY into it, I’m doing fucking GREAT somehow, despite literally zero experience… and when it was all said and done, it became abundantly clear that even though they all LOVED it, not a single one of them could help me.  None of them were animation producers.  None of them KNEW animation producers.  One guy suggested I go into comics, because “comics get turned into film and tv shows all the time”.  I just had the PERFECT fucking pitch, and I pitched to people who couldn’t fucking help me.  As I was leaving, many of them came up to me and actually thanked me for sending them off for the day on a good note.  There was a big dinner at like, the fucking Governers’ mansion or something that night, and again, some of them were coming up to me and thanking me, wishing me the best and all that.  I guess if nothing else, I learned what I’m capable of.

The second pitch was an ACTUAL disaster.  When I’d first graduated I thought I could pitch W2H to Frederator, ‘cause it seemed like a good fit.  They told me (understandably) that they couldn’t reverse-engineer a show from something I’d already produced, and also that it was inappropriate (despite having a show at the time called “SuperFuckers”, but whatever; language and subject matter are different things).  Later on I got an email from them, saying that someone in their office was familiar with my work, and they invited me to come pitch them something that wasn’t W2H.  They also said that I was free to swing by their office any time, even “just to hang out”, and that if I had any questions “whether it be pitching or where to get the best burgers in Burbank”, to hit them up.  How friendly!  How perfect!  I was JUST about to move out to L.A., so I started working on this idea tentatively called “Gayliens”.  I swung by their office once, you know, just to pop in, like they said; thought I’d make myself known or whatever.  They looked at me like I was nuts.  They still invited me in and we chatted for a bit about the history of early Disney studios, but when they asked why I was there, and I reminded them about the email they’d sent, they seemed to have no idea what I was talking about.  I told them I was working on a pitch for them and that I’d be in touch so we could schedule something.  When I finally finished putting my pitch together, I went in for a meeting with them.  It was just 2 folks, we were in like a board meeting-type room (which I imagine is probably standard).  They made some small talk with me first, which I’m sure was an attempt to loosen us all up a bit and set the mood, but all of their questions really caught me off guard.  (I guess they asked where I was working, and when I told them I didn’t have a studio job, they asked how I was making money, and I’m sure it wasn’t meant to put me in an awkward position, but people asking me how I make money literally ALWAYS puts me in an awkward position, because my income sources are scattered and weird.  Try explaining how youtube ad revenue works to your social services worker, it’s a blast.) SO okay, I let myself get tripped up a bit.  I go on with the pitch; they don’t really want me to pitch the concept, they just have me show them my storyboards and read through the whole thing.  They’re DEAD silent the whole time.  I can’t get a read on them at all.  When it’s over, they ask me some more questions that trip me up.  Some of them are 100% my fault; they asked for a title, and I wasn’t ready to say “Oh, it’s tentatively called GAYLIENS,” out loud to people who I couldn’t get a read from.  

It’s all kind of a blur, but the few topics of discussion I remember them bringing up were that “the storyboards look almost TOO good”, like it was TOO polished or well-developed (which is sort of a backhanded compliment I guess???), because see, “when they made Adventure Time… blah blah blah it just started off as this loose idea, and once they were a season or so into it, they started expanding on the universe and developing the characters a little bit more…” — AS IF ANYONE doesn’t understand why AT got so popular???  You don’t have to TELL ME, I WAS WATCHING IT, I FUCKING KNOW.  No one gave a shit about AT until they got Rebecca Sugar and all these talented writers working on it a couple seasons in, and doing all this character-heavy shit.  I tried to present them with something that had all that character shit baked into it already, ‘cause I knew they were gonna’ use AT as an example.  But it seemed like they’re not looking for something that’s already developed with it’s own voice or sensibility, they’re looking for a vague idea that they can mold into something as they go.  

They also told me–and I still can’t get over this–that they’re looking for “”””””characters that people will want to cosplay as””””””, which is funny to me for a plethora of reasons; namely that they have no way of knowing that PEOPLE DO COSPLAY AS MY CHARACTERS, but also that I spent half of my time in college working on ridiculous magical girl Adventure Time crossover group cosplays (don’t fuckin’ laugh) like trust me I’m ALARMINGLY familiar with cosplay, and ALSO, that looking for a new property with the guidelines that it should be “the next big thing that some fucking nerds will dress up as at comic con” just seems like such an out-of-touch-but-trying-to-be-hip, capitalize-on your-fandom-doing-all-the-legwork-for-you, fucking executive thing to say.  I know I sound like a whiny art school kid saying that but my animation instructor was so anti-establishment, and I carry a lot of that with me still, and something about that statement–insignificant as it may be–kind of epitomizes how I feel about the industry?  It’s a hard thing to explain. I walked out of that pitch with my mind feeling like TV static.  My friends were waiting for me next door at a bakery and they were super excited, asking me how it went, and I was just like “I mean… BAD, for sure, but I don’t know where to even start.”  Hahaha.  I don’t know.  It just seems like everyone wants to play gatekeeper I guess.  They want This Thing™, but it can’t be too This Thing™.  They want the thing to have A Fandom™, but they don’t really understand fandom ‘cause they don’t participate in fandom.  They want Your Idea™ but they want to make it Their Idea™.  I don’t know.  I’m just angry and bitter and that’s my experience with pitching.  Admittedly some of what went wrong in these pitches was my fault, or there were circumstances beyond my control, and regardless of how that pitch went, I don’t actually dislike Frederator (I’m on their youtube network), and Fred Seibert has actually done a ton of iconic shit.I don’t think I’ve ever AIRED MY GRIEVANCES in such great detail before, but there you have it.  If you want some tips on pitching, you can check out the links I provided at the beginning of the post; there’s tons of people out there who actually know their shit too, and they’d probably give more proactive advice.  I don’t know if this helps at all, but hopefully you can glean something from it!  That’s just my limited experience with it.  Haha.  Good luck!