#It's not just the acting thing

[bethanydelleman]

Why is the play wrong in Mansfield Park?

We know that Jane Austen wrote and acted in home theatre productions herself, so why is it so bad that Tom and Yates want to put on a play in Mansfield Park?

They have chosen almost as bad a play as they could

1. It’s about the play they chose. Lovers’ Vows features a fallen woman, Agatha, who had a child out of wedlock. The first act also involves a lot of touching between Agatha and Frederick (her natural son). Amelia, who was toned down from the German version, declares her love for a man before he does, which was seen as very vulgar. Even the bold Mary Crawford struggles with Amelia’s lines! And the Count is also sexually immoral, which is discussed.

It would shew great want of feeling on my father’s account, absent as he is, and in some degree of constant danger

2. It’s about Sir Thomas being in danger. And you may wonder, do we need to have no fun whenever someone is at sea? Maybe? We see in the society that Jane Austen writes about a lot of performative mourning. Someone you barely know dies and you wear black ribbons and don’t get engaged for a while. So it’s not like you can’t have fun when the head of your family is possibly being attacked by pirates, but maybe don’t publically put on a play. They also use Sir Thomas’s study while he is away.

it would be imprudent, I think, with regard to Maria, whose situation is a very delicate one, considering everything, extremely delicate.

3. It’s about Maria being engaged (but not acting opposite to her fiance.) The first thing Maria does is secure herself as Agatha so she can get touchy-feely with Henry Crawford. This may put her engagement in danger. That is her goal, but as a concerned brother Edmund is trying to help her avoid it.

His sense of decorum is strict.

4. It’s about Sir Thomas being strict. Edmund points out that while acting may be okay for other families, his father would not approve of it. Not all Regency families are the same, like today, some are more strict and worried about propriety. The Bertrams are on the far side of conservative, while the Crawfords and Yates’s families are on the lassie-faire side.

The innovation, if not wrong as an innovation, will be wrong as an expense.

5. It’s about Tom wasting money while they are in financial difficulties. Dude hired a scene painter! That cannot be cheap!

This is the end of all the privacy and propriety which was talked about at first.

6. It’s about the publicity. Edmund joins the play to keep a third family from being included in the production, but Tom keeps inviting everyone to come and see them act. If Sir Thomas wouldn’t want his adult daughters to act at all, then he definitely wouldn’t want them acting in front of the whole neighbourhood. In an era where the rich are supposed to showing the way in morality, this is not a good look for the baronet’s children.

“I know all that,” said Tom, displeased. “I know my father as well as you do; and I’ll take care that his daughters do nothing to distress him. Manage your own concerns, Edmund, and I’ll take care of the rest of the family.”

7. It’s about Tom acting like he’s already in charge. By dismissing the cares of his father and acting against his known wishes, Tom acts as a usurper of his father’s power instead of a dutiful son.

So it’s not just acting, its the play the picked, it’s not all families, it’s this family, it’s not just this family, it’s this time and these conditions. 

[werewolf-transgenderism]

truly just learn the phrase "I did not like this" instead of trying to give some moral or ethical reasoning behind why it's actually evil and morally wrong and problematic. you are allowed to just not like things because they're not good in your personal opinion, they don't have to be problematic you can just not like them

[roz-ani]

THIS TOOK ME SO OFF GUARD

IT'S HIS NORMAL VOICE- THERE WAS NO RADIO- THE FACT THAT IT HAPPENED- IT'S THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT EVERYONE'S ASLEEP AND I CAN'T SCREAM

[acidgirl]

[bli-o]

hey autistic people who get overwhelmed by large groups or noise or conversation or etc etc etc you’re not evil for wanting to leave a family gathering. just so you know.

[herd-reject-arts]

So I'm leaving work and something darts in front of me, maybe 10ft away, too fast for me to see what it is. Peek around the tree blocking my path and I see this

Just like... a whole ass hawk. Dude's gotta be about 1.5ft tall. Massive fucking bird. And it's just staring me straight in my soul like this, even as I try to move ahead. It didn't budge. And there's only this path back to my car unless I want to walk on a busy highway. So I have the option of Death By Raptor or Death By Truck.

So I walk in the poison ivy filled patch off the sidewalk. Guy still isn't moving. Still staring me directly in the eyes. And I do this thing when animals are behaving strangely where I'll talk to them, so I'm just like, "Hey, man. I don't know you. You don't know me. This feels really threatening. I'm just trying to get to my car, dude. Can I get some space please? You're a big fucking bird. I see those claws. You could kill me right now, but I'd appreciate if you didn't, ok?"

It didn't move until I was about 2ft away. Again: I'm as far from it as I can be without walking into the street. It clearly wasn't going to budge. I walk past, thing flies up (silent, btw. Scary) and lands on a brick wall a little further ahead

Anyway. Weird guy. Nearly shit my pants when I noticed a bird big enough to carry off a fully grown cat was just... there, staring me in the face, unwilling to move away from me, a human, something it should see as a threat. I watched behind me the whole rest of the way to my car, just in case this bird decided to help me shed this mortal coil. 10/10 experience. Super cool guy.

[garbean]

I love dunmeshi for the like.. built in horror of consumption. Like they eat to survive, they eat to honor their prey, they eat to possibly mourn someone. Laios eats monsters because he wants to learn more about the things he loves, Senshi eats monsters to feel included in the ecosystem because he didn't fit in with the outside and with most creatures in general, Chilchuck DOESN'T eat as much as he could because eating too much could kill all the party members, Marcille eats monsters and hates it but she still does it because she'll die before she could save Falin.

[gayvampyr]

asking people to be mindful of others when sharing a communal space (especially one you cannot just up and leave from) is not selfish or misanthropic. come on now

[inkskinned]

the thing is that they're so fascinated by sex, they love sex, they can't imagine a world without sex - they need sex to sell things, they need sex to be part of their personality, they need sex to prove their power - but they hate sex. they are disgusted by it.

sex is the only thing that holds their attention, and it is also the thing that can never be discussed directly.

you can't tell a child the normal names for parts of their body, that's sexual in nature, because the body isn't a body, it's a vessel of sex. it doesn't matter that it's been proven in studies (over and over) that kids need to know the names of their genitals; that they internalize sexual shame at a very young age and know it's 'dirty' to have a body; that it overwhelmingly protects children for them to have the correct words to communicate with. what matters is that they're sexual organs. what matters is that it freaks them out to think about kids having body parts - which only exist in the context of sex.

it's gross to talk about a period or how to check for cancer in a testicle or breast. that is nasty, illicit. there will be no pain meds for harsh medical procedures, just because they feature a cervix.

but they will put out an ad of you scantily-clad. you will sell their cars for them, because you have abs, a body. you will drip sex. you will ooze it, like a goo. like you were put on this planet to secrete wealth into their open palms.

they will hit you with that same palm. it will be disgusting that you like leather or leashes, but they will put their movie characters in leather and latex. it will be wrong of you to want sexual freedom, but they will mark their success in the number of people they bed.

they will crow that it's inappropriate for children so there will be no lessons on how to properly apply a condom, even to teens. it's teaching them the wrong things. no lessons on the diversity of sexual organ growth, none on how to obtain consent properly, none on how to recognize when you feel unsafe in your body. if you are a teenager, you have probably already been sexualized at some point in your life. you will have seen someone also-your-age who is splashed across a tv screen or a magazine or married to someone three times your age. you will watch people pull their hair into pigtails so they look like you. so that they can be sexy because of youth. one of the most common pornography searches involves newly-18 young women. girls. the words "barely legal," a hiss of glass sand over your skin.

barely legal. there are bills in place that will not allow people to feel safe in their own bodies. there are people working so hard to punish any person for having sex in a way that isn't god-fearing and submissive. heteronormative. the sex has to be at their feet, on your knees, your eyes wet. when was the first time you saw another person crying in pornography and thought - okay but for real. she looks super unhappy. later, when you are unhappy, you will close your eyes and ignore the feeling and act the role you have been taught to keep playing. they will punish the sex workers, remove the places they can practice their trade safely. they will then make casual jokes about how they sexually harass their nanny.

and they love sex but they hate that you're having sex. you need to have their ornamental, perfunctory, dispassionate sex. so you can't kiss your girlfriend in the bible belt because it is gross to have sex with someone of the same gender. so you can't get your tubes tied in new england because you might change your mind. so you can't admit you were sexually assaulted because real men don't get hurt, you should be grateful. you cannot handle your own body, you cannot handle the risks involved, let other people decide that for you. you aren't ready yet.

but they need you to have sex because you need to have kids. at 15, you are old enough to parent. you are not old enough to hear the word fuck too many times on television.

they are horrified by sex and they never stop talking about it, thinking about it, making everything unnecessarily preverted. the saying - a thief thinks everyone steals. they stand up at their podiums and they look out at the crowd and they sign a bill into place that makes sexwork even more unsafe and they stand up and smile and sign a bill that makes gender-affirming care illegal and they get up and they shrug their shoulders and write don't say gay and they get up, and they make the world about sex, but this horrible, plastic vision of it that they have. this wretched, emotionless thing that holds so much weight it's staggering. they put their whole spine behind it and they push and they say it's normal!

this horrible world they live in. disgusted and also obsessed.

[bacchuschucklefuck]

no more fan-ta-sizing about it! everything's already changed~

[rubensmuse]

brennan lee mulligan has to do comedy with that name bc he was born too late to be a presidential assassin

[bigfatbreak]

Birds of a Feather previous / next

[spacizia]

he’s just a swinging space age bachelor man!!!!

[ineffablyruined]

DOES ANYONE ELSE SEE THAT SMILE?!!?

Gif by @stars-bean

It's at the very end. And it's just a split second. A hint.

But I swear it's there.

You all see it, too, right?

His eyes get a little twinkle, the corners of his mouth twitch up. He wants to spend the night before he realizes he shouldn't.

HE WANTS TO SPEND THE NIGHT.

(Someone help me, I'm unwell)

[glitched-starlight]

As Gravity Falls reenters the void, and the inevitably of fanfiction begins to recirculate, there is a comment I fear I must send out to the general public.

As a trans man who gets, like, -1 representation in shows that aren’t explicitly about queer people, I often will latch onto characters that inexplicably have The Trans (TM) written into their bones, which includes Dipper Pines. And, as one might expect, I turn to my silly little A03 account to get my fix of representation and enjoyment of many a trans dilemma. Unfortunately, this is where my qualms get given the spotlight.

This is a generalization, but it seems as though every single godforsaken fic about trans!Dipper (I see this in the Spider-Man fandom a lot too, but that’s a conversation for a different day) he loses all his unhingedness, all his insanity, and is boiled down to a weak and sad little uwu trans boy who can’t handle his own dysphoria and falls apart at every slight inconvenience?

You’re telling me DIPPER, the same man who got called weak one (1) time and then disappeared into the woods for a solid 12 hours and came back half naked and rambling about positive vs toxic masculinity and manotaurs, is going to get misgendered and fall completely and utterly apart? You seriously think he’s going to have a run in with somebody who tries to bully him for being trans and he isn’t going to read them to filth? Are we forgetting that this is the same man who spent a whole episode learning about how to live and let live and then STILL told Pacifica her family was a sham with the mic-drop line of “deal with it”?????

Like good lord, please give this man some credit. I’m not saying he can’t have panic attacks, or trauma, or be treated differently by certain people, but it is the year of our lord and savior 2024 and we are STILL infantilizing trans men in fanon versions of media???

All I’m saying is if Mabel gets to keep her unhinged characteristics, you gotta let Dipper keep his too. Let Dipper punch a transphobe, as a treat.

[anniebass]

high spice tolerance, my ass

(old man smut)