#Not saying it's because he's racist but I'm pretty sure it's because he's racist

[dandunn]

Cis men generate the most rancid vibes when you suggest a movie to watch that isn't in their immediate sphere of interest

[coquelicoq]

Quoique d'une pâleur presque livide, cet homme [Simbad le Marin] avait une figure remarquablement belle; ses yeux étaient vifs et perçants; son nez droit, et presque de niveau avec le front, indiquait le type grec dans toute sa pureté, et ses dents, blanches comme des perles, ressortaient admirablement sous la moustache noire qui les encadrait. (p. 346)

WE HAVE ACHIEVED MOUSTACHE I REPEAT WE HAVE ACHIEVED MOUSTACHE

[samar-arijjj]

WHAT. THE. FUCK???????

[lune-redd]

Hello, it's Lelly.

As you may know, I have recently deactivated my Twitter account. A lot of people are speculating I left because I was being harassed for drawing my older depiction of Bubbles from The Powerpuff Girls as chubby. However... that's not the direct reason I left. In fact, I didn't really see much of the comments of folks on there getting riled up about it as I muted the tweet the morning I saw that it blew up. I was only merely aware of it all by being told about it from friends, with there being some other users on the site making other really fuckin' stupid comments about my art.

This does however lead into why I actually left Twitter, and it's because of Twitter's overall toxic nature. Overtime, I've really gotten sick of how absolutely revolting Twitter has become to experience. The site is basically built around dunk culture and doom scrolling. You know that one tweet of someone making an example of Twitter's utter stupidity by using pancakes and waffles as an example?

I bring this up because I think this fits my point about how Twitter has this thing of assuming the absolute worst about the most insignificant things, even the most innocuous. The "Bubbles obesity" comments weren't the only stupid comments that came out of that post. I also got a quote retweet that I was "forcefully feminizing Buttercup", even though the whole fucking point of that drawing was to depict a usually tough character in an unusual situation for her. I have also gotten stupid comments on other drawings though, like the one where Mitch pushes Buttercup down for trying to look taller than she is and I got called a misogynist for it, though I'm pretty sure that one was bait (Twitter users have a tough time figuring out what is and isn't bait, it's dunk culture that I'm about to talk about really doesn't help this).

The site's dunk culture is also really fuckin' bad. Quote retweets are a disease, as unlike Tumblr's reblog comments, quote retweets count as a different post. Someone disagrees with you? Show your audience how stupid they are on your page! Hey, are you trying not to see the most abhorrent racist statement imaginable? Well TOO BAD FUCK YOU here's a le epic own giving them all the attention in the world even though one of the most common internet rules are DON'T FEED THE FUCKIN' TROLLS YOU IDIOT. Oh hey, are you trying to explain how you prefer a certain artistic choice over another in something you like? Well you're a deranged ungrateful whiny nitpicker, get owned!

I've seen so many of my friends be belittled for simply discussing their artistic preferences of things they're passionate about. I'll never forgive y'all for beating down my friend for saying he prefers the original Crash Bandicoot design over his redesigned look in Crash 4, even when he had legitimate reasons for why he felt that way. I'm sick and tired of it all. The reaction to my art is only a mere example of the shit I despise about that site.

I had been planning on leaving Twitter for quite some time, as my follower count was growing nearer and nearer to 10K. I had planned on leaving after 10K followers because that amount was wayyyy too fuckin big for me to handle. I'm a young and growing lad, and I felt it wouldn't be good for my mental sanity to handle all that, so I dipped. The amount of attention I've been getting is simultaneously both wonderful and extremely overwhelming. Even the explosion of new followers and asks on here is quite the load! (Seriously, calm the fuck down y'all) I am very grateful for all the supportive asks I've gotten even though I won't be able to answer them all, thank you all so very much.

tl;dr I didn't leave Twitter because I was being harassed or anything, but rather because of the site's overall toxic and belittling environment.

Adios.

-Lelly

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

AITA for asking my partner not to talk about how happy he is that Ghandi was assassinated?

I hope this doesn't get too long! 🍀

I (26, F) am Irish Australian, my partner (33, M) is Sikh. He's shared many beautiful things about his culture with me, and has a thoughtful way of describing the relationship between Sikh history and current culture.

However I get a bit uncomfortable when he talks about how Gandhi was assassinated by a Sikh person. I know enough about Gandhi to be aware that while he might've had some good impact, he had plenty of underreported bad too. But I don't pretend to understand the extent of it all.

I also understand what a complex thing that sort of cultural history is, my family joke about being proud of the assassination of Mountbatten by the IRA. But we keep that talk behind closed doors, it requires more understanding of the Troubles than the average person has. Also, joking about death is a bit nasty unless you know everyone is comfortable

My issue with my partner is that when he talks about Gandhi's death he's not speaking with a historical context. He gets very serious and sits up all tall and says proudly that Sikhs are a warrior race and they fucking delivered. He has done this in company and in private and it's always very intense and a mood killer, he is not joking at all. I think that level of confident pride in the death of another is kinda messed up

So, I asked him to not talk about it in such a full on way. He refused to apologise because he is proud of it and he said that he's glad they did it (I appreciate his honestly there). I asked if he would be pleased to see a similar event play out today, a Sikh assassinating a major political influencer. He said he would be happy and asked the same of me regarding Mountbatten (this had come up in the conversation, obviously I'm paraphrasing, the whole thing was pretty upsetting tbh) and I said no cos it's not an active war. Also, that I don't actually stand behind that I'm just comfortable with the complexity of it to joke with my family and still know people understand where I stand. Like, the IRA killed his kids too. The whole time was fucked.

He said he's not joking. He, gently, said I was being a bit of a hypocrite. He didn't promise to not talk about Gandhi, but hasn't brought it up since. I feel like he's pretty unhappy about it

I dunno, I asked him without really thinking about it all and I think he makes a good point about the Mountbatten parallel. I'm not sure if the difference in my feelings is my own ethics or just me being a bit racist. And it's not his job to make me not be racist if I've got some stuff to work through. But still, I think if it was any culture I'd be uncomfortable with that much aggressive pride in murder. Like, I've grown up in a country without a death penalty, death is not something people can dole out imo, and his approval of it is so absolute and genuine, there's no pulling the punch. Unlike my way of talking about Mountbatten.

So, AITA for asking my partner to stop talking about his pride in a Sikh person assassinating Gandhi?

What are these acronyms?

[qqueenofhades]

what's been particularly vile to me is this group of white online leftists who insist that anyone who cares about more than this one issue for the election is a bad person, like, as if us black and brown people are making up reasons to be afraid and not.....believing the gop when they say they are coming for us. believing trump who has said previously that he does not bluff, that he will do the things he's said he will do (i hate what social media has gone to the word gaslighting but it feels like gaslighting. we lived through four years of trump. we saw the damage. stop treating us like we're being dramatic). it must be great to not have to worry about that i guess? "life won't change under trump" is such a telling admission because maybe theirs won't but mine will. and so many others' will.

and it is often again these (white) online leftists that love to call anyone who disagrees with them a white liberal (derogatory) because they know it would be racist (bad) to be this shitty and condescending to poc but they don't want to actually listen to anything black and brown voters are saying. it's easier to just call us white liberals and throw our opinions out, to ignore the work of black people for decades to gain the right to vote, to disregard the weight of telling them to not do that. it's genuinely appalling. they care so much about racism until it's time to engage with poc who have different opinions than their online echo chambers, then we're just stupid liberals with terrible opinions like..... wanting to live. not wanting four more years of trump. so sorry for that.

sorry for this vent in your inbox, i'm just so fucking tired of white people trying to rewrite history as if trump wasn't that bad. he was for my family and countless others and i am terrified for what's to come if he wins.

The thing about (the often-white) Online Leftists is that they have become just as much as a radicalized death cult as the diehard Trumpists. If you don't want to die for The Revolution and/or sacrifice your life, friends, family, the rest of the country, etc., then you're Insufficiently Pure and must be Purged. (Which I think is just complete BS, as none of them could actually handle sacrificing anything, but it's increasingly the only kind of performative rhetoric that is acceptable in leftist-identified discourse spaces.) This is functionally identical to "if you aren't willing to lay down your life for our Lord and Savior Donald Trump and the Great White Christian Nationalist Dictatorship, you're a liberal cuck," but with the names and justification changed. It doesn't change the underlying radicalization, nihilism, and insanity of the premise.

Another thing the Trumpists and the Online Leftists have in common is that they are busily rewriting just how bad Trump was in order to serve their Ideology. Ever since January 6, 2021, the Republicans have thrown everything they have at revising and whitewashing any suggestion that it was an "insurrection," and the Online Leftists have done the same, in an attempt to "prove" their insane point that Trump "would be better" than Biden. This is embodied in the recent ultimate-brainworm-nonsense maximalist-online take that "Biden has to lose so the rest of the world will see that the US rejects genocide!!!" That's right, the message that the rest of the world would take from Biden losing to Trump is that the US rejects genocide. Never mind if Trump literally wants to commit all the genocide possible and to install himself as a fascist theocratic dictator. In the deeply twisted minds of the Online Leftists, this is the only possible interpretation of Biden's loss, so they'll push for it as hard as they can! The Trumpists and the Online Leftists, at this point, are working pretty much in concert to damage Biden for similar insane reasons and get Trump elected. Etc etc., one Nazi and ten people at the same table is eleven Nazis.

Like. Sure. Four years ago, when Trump was president and people were dying by the thousands because he didn't want to wear a mask because it smeared his bronzer, just to name literally one of the terrible things he did every single day (and not even mentioning how much worse a second term would be) we were absolutely better off. Super-duper great. (Sarcasm.) Either that or "there is suffering and evil in the world and the only solution is to drastically increase the suffering and evil for everyone and to destroy what progress we have managed to make because It Does Not Fix Everything Now" is an absolute moral imperative, and either way, yeah. I'm calling bullshit.

[creatingblackcharacters]

Hello! i'd made sure to read through your pinned posts before asking this, so i hope it's not come up already, but how do you feel about characters (esp in anime) who have dark/tan skin and white (usually straight) hair? I've seen a pattern of it with a few characters, in particular the character of Noe in The Case Study of Vanitas and Miriko in My Hero, and was wondering if you'd have any thoughts on these sort of designs!

Thank you for your time, and if you've answered something like this before/don't feel comfortable with the question, please lmk!

Well, you said you read through my stuff first, so I'm sure you can guess a little on what I'm gonna say. I actually have a redesign of Miriko AND Noe, my pretty boy. Gave them both afro textures and rounder noses. Personally, I'd feel less annoyed by it if they gave the characters textured hair and made them unambiguously Black 🤣

Jokes aside. The issue is that for the many artists that give their characters this design, they're doing it because they think it "looks prettier" than what regular Black people look like. They're not actually doing it with the intent that "this is my Black character", it's "this is my character with brown paint bucket". Hell, every time I see Miriko in fan art, she gets lighter and lighter.

And while yeah, I enjoy unnatural colors on Black characters, if you never draw Black characters unless they... Don't have Black features... 😐😐 We have a problem! We may need to check our biases to determine if we feel lesser about Black features! Why did you do it? Is there an in story reason for your character to have these particular features that we're less likely to have? (For example, my OC Philia's eyes are green because they're supposed to reflect her (white) father's. He's supposed to be looking into the mirror of his own soul, his own life, when he looks at her. It's for storytelling and symbolism. I didn't just do it because I thought she'd look "better" with them.)

Your Black characters shouldn't have to have light eyes or straight blonde or white hair to be deemed "cool enough to include". Black features are not a monolith, there's an infinite number of ways we can look. If none of those are somehow pretty or good enough for you... Again, we may need to check our racist and colorist biases.

[piratecaptainscaptainpirates]

Yet another thing that will never not have me by the fucking throat is Ed's remembering his conversation with his mom in s1e5 - the "we're just not that kind of people" talk.

Because that's a talk that I'm pretty confident in saying most kids of color get when we're around that age, old enough to understand but young enough you don't get it. Ed's mom is obviously trying to be so, so careful with him - there's no way for this talk to be easy, and there's no way it won't hurt, but they're having it at home, where he's safe, while his father is asleep. She wants to keep Ed safe, but to keep him safe, he has to understand that there are beautiful, soft, amazing things like that piece of red silk, and he cannot have them. Given where she worked, Ed's mom no doubt had a very clear understanding of what happened to people who look like them when they try to step outside the role they were prescribed by society. OFMD absolutely nails what this conversation is like.

And the thing is, when you're given that talk, even though it's important and you have to know it and your parents are doing the best they can, you're going to internalize it. Ed clearly does; I know I did - I'm from a town that's 98% White and my parents told me in very clear terms that if anyone called me a slur I was supposed to just nod and smile and do whatever the fuck I needed to so I could walk away, and to this day if anyone starts being racist around me I just fucking freeze. When I see Ed scramble to hide that piece of red silk when Stede sees him with it, it reminds me so much of that, it breaks my heart. Even though Ed is likely sure, even by the beginning of s1e5, that Stede will not be mad at him for having it, he got the message that he's not supposed to own things like that.

I see a lot of talk about Ed's class issues, but it's not just that he grew up poor, he grew up brown and those two things go together to shape how he understands himself. Ed obviously internalized this talk; he's got more riches than you can shake a fucking stick at but we don't see him enjoy it. He kept that piece of silk hidden away and even though we know he loves soft, fine fabrics, his quarters on his ship are devoid of those comforts.

Ed has internalized that he's not the kind of person who gets nice things, and it's heartbreakingly realistic. It's so fucking well done. I really hope in s3 we get to see Ed slowly accept that he's just as worthy of having nice, comfortable things as anyone else.

[oldmemoria]

okay heres the fucking thing about this script controversy that some people don't seem to get.

just gonna say it blatently:

strap in babes this is gonna be a long one!

The way Miguel O'Hara is written in the leaked transcripts is blatantly racist, here's why from a Latino himself!

all wrapped up in a sweet little bow for everyone who doesn't know how to comprehend what they're reading, cheers!

er. i mean.

¡Salud!

Miguel fans are not mad that they depicted him in a bad light and that they made it clear that he is in the wrong

WE FUCKING KNOW. WE'RE NOT STUPID.

Miguel has been depicted as a morally grey asshole since the early 1990s, which is when Spider-Man 2099 was initially debuted. And while yes, the movies are.... inaccurate, to say the least, it still stands.

The issue here is how he is depicted. They directly call Miguel O'Hara, a Latino man, an ANIMAL (he is directly called an animal TWICE. FUCKING TWICE.)

[1st image id: Miguel leaps onto Vulture, Clawing his way in past the renaissance armor. he is an ANIMAL. (keep in mind ANIMAL is literally in all caps.) /end id]

[2nd image id: Miguel SLASHES at the walls of light that surround Miles. Clawing the energy field apart, an animal in the throes of bloodlust -- /end id]

I need you to really soak in the fact that he is called "AN ANIMAL" twice. I'm awful at alts and ids but I feel I must so you can read it in plain text. sorry if they suck.

Our issue is not that the writers seem to have a bias against the character. a lot of writers write characters they dont particularly like and in turn tend to write them from a foggy lense of their own perception. An example would be Kate Cary and how she didn't like Crowfeather, a character she had to write about. I'm sure some of her bias seeped through. but this is different.

writing a Latino man as a bloodthirsty animal, implied to be called a predator because they call one of the people he fights (im not sure if its miles or the vulture, im leaning towards believing the former.) his "prey", THOSE ARE ALL RACIAL STEREOTYPES. ALL OF THEM.

[3rd image id: But Miguel can only see his prey: /end id]

There is no context to be needed here, the context is that this is miguel we're talking about and that they call him an animal. it does not matter if he is a villain or not (which he isnt, factually he fucking isnt im tired of having this conversation, fuck you). it matters that he's depicted in a racially insensitive way.

and this person brought this up pretty well actually, I didn't even think of it:

[4th image id: Tumblr user @/404-505 saying:

i want to be so mean to them

they couldn't write miguel crossing the border and stealing a job so they wrote him crossing into another universe and stealing his own identity

they couldnt write miguel as a drug addict so they gave him spider steroids instead /end id.]

They bring up a really good point about these clear stereotypes being seemingly. . . disguised behind points that are narratively relevant? This could literally just be pure coincidence, but noting how the writers wrote him before... it isn't looking too good for them. Sorry. Not sorry.

It is clear that there is some kind of bias against miguel that led to really disgusting, racist retoric. Whether or not it was intentional or if it was a first draft or whatever, the writers, which may i remind you were white, still wrote this at some point.

it makes me question whether or not they hated him because of his "bullshit utopia", their words not mine, or because of their own racial biases.

We cannot know because miguel is the only mexican character on the cast. I know Miles is Puerto Rican, but there are differences between how they were portrayed. also Puerto Ricans and Mexicans come from competely different cultural backgrounds that share simularities but are still different dont even try i will destroy you.

Using another users words again, but:

[5th image id: Tumblr user @/transmiguelohara says:

Don't talk to me about the Miguel parts in the script. I'm so disappointed in how the writers view him.

The difference between the way Miguel is written (antagonist, not the villain) vs Spot (the villain, whats to kill Miles' dad and everyone he knows) is soooo.....I don't know man it just screams racism in sorry. Describing Miguel as a bloodthirsty animal? Repeatedly? Treating him like he's mindless and has no motivation beyond having a hair trigger temper? It sucks man. /end id]

It also strikes me that now that we finally have a brown-skinned miguel, they write him like, well. this.

I don't really know if this is petty or not, but I want to wrap this back to the way the fandom also sees Movie Miguel.

Because TRUST ME it is not good either.

Miguel O'Hara Vs. FANDOM: Spoilers, it's been troubling since the beginning.

From the beginning (and by beginning in this case I mean since he was announced to be a character in this movie) Miguel has been continuously sexualized, beyond belief. He is repeatedly called "papi cholo" which NEED I REMIND YOU "Cholo" is a derogatory term used to call someone, usually a mexican person, a criminal or a delinquent.

FUCK YOU if you are not Latino OR hispanic and use this to describe people. from the bottom of my heart.

I'm pretty sure the majority of the people who called/ still currently call him "papi cholo" are mixing it up with "papi chulo" (white people moment.) which means something completely different but is still troubling as hell.

"papi chulo", which is slightly different in the way, just directly translates to "big daddy". Which again, Latino men being overly sexual "Latin Lovers" is ALSO A RACIAL STEREOTYPE. also its just blatant fetishization. Point blank fucking period.

Not only that but I notice a lot of art and fanfiction depicts him doing a lot of violence, or being very overbearing and demeaning, or in short terms.

a lot of people write him as physically and sexually aggressive.

fuck do you mean he growls during sex i can and will send you to space with no return.

which

for the millionth time

racial stereotype

halleluiah or however you spell it.

Having him say random spanish phrases you don't know the meaning or connotations of in your fanfiction is icing on the cake at this point.

fucking end me.

it isn't even only sexual depictions, since he's been shown in the movie, a lot of people seem to just see him as this guy who goes off and tries to kill children at a hairs trigger. which uh. fun fact no he fucking doesnt.

you clearly didn't watch the movie as well as you thought you did. hes just sarcastic and generally pretty level headed through the majority of his runtime, whether its implied by how characters around him act, or its just what we see on screen.

He doesn't necessarily have anger issues, the moment we see at the climax of the film is quite literally a mental break. he is not acting in a way that he usually would because he was cracking under the stress of holding the multiverse together with some scotch tape and orange glitter glue.

Also side tangent but he also has a mental break in the comics that's a little more... droopy and sad as compared to the movie, but it still happens. he has shitty mental health is what im saying. he only really lashes out angrily when hes at his wits end because that's how he grew up. he was taught to suppress his feelings and seem smaller when he was upset.

he is the result of abuse and neglect. of course he wouldn't be amazing at emotional regulation.

Which before anyone says it no, this is not an excuse for his actions. just an explaination that isn't "hes an angry animal that has it out for miles UwU" that everyone seems to have in their brain. I'm tired of you all. truly.

the sentiment that hes agressive and angry and his only emotion is anger and upsetness unless he's horny which is when he experiences all these emotions tenfold is. racist. idk how clear i have to be for people to get it through their damn skulls that the way the fandom depicts him is harmful. do i need to slap you in the face with a fish until you understand. do i need to burn your fanfiction. will you get it now that a 15 year old latino boy has to scream it in your face.

and dont even get me STARED on how inaccurately he is written

this is a more light hearted section because idk. feels like i should have it because this part is just comical, pun intended. How can you fuck up this hard guys.

I was gonna give them the benefit of the doubt because "Miguel has fresh trauma!" "He only shows up for like 10 minutes!" "insert 3rd reason!" for his drastic change in demeanor and personality, which, without context, are valid reasons for him to be a little different. trauma fucks you up man. we only see 10 minutes of him. but at this point im chalking it up to complete incompetence

it doesnt take that long to read a comic book guys. you could have done a little research, I know you can do it.

first off:

[6th image id: Miguel's SPIDER-SENSE goes off! He races to the edge if the building and peers into an empty alley -- /end id]

LMFAO WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN "SPIDER-SENSE"

Unless you didn't get the total of TWO jokes that they made in ONE scene (the vulture fight scene), Miguel doesn't have a spider sense. at all. He has elevated senses, but he doesnt have a spider sense.

guys

guys.

you made TWO jokes IN A ROW about it. YOU WHACKED HIM IN THE HEAD TWICE WITH IT. HOW DID YOU FORGET

I cant help but laugh! this is a rookie mistake! these are seasoned writers! They could have done at least a little research, or at least remembered that he doesnt have one, no? is it that hard? or does his lack of a spider sense only matter when you're making fun of your least favorite character? thats what I thought.

this one is less funny. not to sound like a stereotypical comic nerd but this infuriated me a little bit I'm not gonna lie.

[8th image id: tumblr user @/darksidecorner reblogged tumblr user @/spiderxpawz with:

They definitely didn't

a screenshot of the script reads:

AN INDUSTRIAL TANGLE OF HUGE PISTONS -- the literal DARK UNDERBELLY that undergrids Miguel's bullshit Utopia.

Miles doesn't know where to go... but he doesn't need to: SOMEONE YANKS him up into the safety of an alcove.

the user then continues:

This in particular made me PISSED because they quietly canonized that Miguel is CEO of Alchemax while conveniently ignoring that he did everything in his fucking power to BETTER Neuva York. Downtown wasn't built by him. It was built by people WAY before him.

I can excuse and defend some comic deviation, but THIS? Holy FUCK /end id]

I honestly cant tell if I find this part funny or pathetic because seriously. he did not do this. why are you blaming him for something he had nothing to do with. i dont think he decided "hey i should build a city for rich people over poor people because reasons" when he was like... not even alive. Alchemax did this before he was even sentient. it had always been this way since he was born. he also actively hated this decision. because he actively hates alchemax.

but right MIGUELS bullshit Utopia yeah HE did this that EVIL LITTLE BABY i cant believe him

kill me.

In conclusion:

I. . . Don't really know, to be honest. I'm still processing all this. I am genuinely disappointed and upset because this isn't okay. It never will be, and if it takes yet another blunt essay with absolutely no filter for people to understand it then so be it. I don't care if this comes off as mean. This is something I feel qualified to talk about and I will express my disappointment and anger if I want to.

All of the posts I reference I have reblogged within the last 24 hours of making this post, they shouldn't be that hard to find, but if you want the links to them here they are:

https://www.tumblr.com/spiderxpawz/735344322114977792/live-mexican-reaction?source=share

https://www.tumblr.com/404-505/735289664739606528/they-couldnt-write-miguel-as-a-drug-addict-so?source=share

https://www.tumblr.com/transmiguelohara/735289238625648640/cant-believe-the-writers-have-the-same-reading?source=share

if you want your image to be removed or for your link to be removed just ask and I'll do it. but currently im kinda bummed out and tired.

goodbye.

[rubydubydoo122]

hi, i'm kind of a newbie in comics and can you elaborate why pit madness is not real? thank you (i haven't got to the modern comics yet)

I’m pretty sure Pit Madness just… isn’t really a thing. There isn’t anything in Canon that outright says ‘the pit makes you crazy’

If anyone wants to correct me on anything, feel free to, because I’ve only read major comic book storylines

I think Pit Madness was made up in Fanon to justify Jason’s ‘insane’ actions— like eight heads in a duffle bag, or the attack on Titans Tower, or his whole pill helmet era— but they’re forgetting that Jason came back to life after being brutally murdered and I think he has a right to lose his mind a little bit after that, especially since he also had some major brain damage. It’s probably more likely that Jason has a chemical imbalance and has CPTSD, from his early life on the streets to the things that have happened to him during his time as Robin.

It’s also a way the fandom reinforce racist stereotypes about the Al-Ghuls. ‘But Talia threw Jason into the pit and pointed the pit madness towards Bruce’ that did not happen. Jason did most of his world tour on his own free will. He planned his return to Gotham all by himself.

In fact, Talia loves Bruce and she was finding Jason’s world tour, so she was probably guiding him away from killing Bruce.

Also, something something ‘Ras is a crazy creepy old man’ he wouldn’t be over 600 years old if the pit waters drive you insane.

I think there is a brief period of time RIGHT AFTER you emerge from the pit where you lose your mind, but it eventually wears off and it wouldn’t last for as long as the fandom makes it out to be, and it wouldn’t be flashes of Rage. It would probably be more akin to insanity, because it’s a cursed fountain of youth.

Also, Cass and Damian were also put into the Lazarus Pit (I’m pretty sure?) and they

Sorry if any of that came out aggressive, but Pit Madness drives me insane (pun intended) if I’m wrong about anything, someone please correct me.

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

My central thesis has always been that the Harkles wanted everything the Wales have and more. I know I remember reading that she cried after hearing William was made Prince of Wales. Right from the get go, her PR was all "Meghan is way better suited to be royal". Then there were all the Commonwealth flowers on her bridal veil and their insistence that they move into Windsor Castle. Now I don't believe everthing Neil Sean says, but his latest video mentions that Megxit was an ultimatum to get Windsor. As that is the traditional home of the Monarch, I feel as though they were attempting a coup.

Then there is the thought that Harry believes that the Dutchy of Cornwall should be split and he should eventually be made co-King or King of the Commonwealth. Let the Wales have that tiny island while they are jetted and feted around the world.

Here's my question for you. Did Meghan and Sparry REALLY believe they could leapfrog over the Wales??? I know her jealousy and envy of Catherine is bunny boiler level and he absolutely eviscerated his brother in Waagh. Has this been their plan all along?? Death by a thousand cuts for the Wales to force them to resign their place in the LOS or that they could somehow convince Charles to make Harry the heir??

I'd like to know where you think the delusions stem from. It wouldn't be the first time in history that younger brother has attempted to remove old brother from the throne.

Sincerely appreciate your blog and all the work you put into it. I'm always learning something new.

I'm pretty sure that was exactly their plan: they wanted to use their popularity to force The Queen to name them as her successors. I don't remember where I read this or when, but allegedly Harry sent "documentation" to someone - to whom specifically I can't recall, but options are The Queen, Charles, William, and/or grey suits - providing evidence for claims that he and Meghan were more popular than any of the others and deserved more than what they were getting.

And if they couldn't get the actual crown, they were going to do their damnedest to try and get a co-kingship with William. That's where Meghan's obsession with the Commonwealth came from; she had been told (again, I don't know by whom - all signs point to Harry exaggerating to keep her interested or maybe Charles spitballing ideas during his 'Magnificent Six' planning circa 2012) that William would rule Britannia and Harry would rule the Commonwealth.

I think that's why Meghan went all in on 'racist Kate.' Not only did she want to knock Kate out of the spotlight, she wanted to do enough damage that Commonwealth/realm nations would threaten to quit and The Queen would capitulate by offering to install Harry and Meghan as new leaders. This actually had a chance of working; it's been said quite often during her last years and since her passing that The Queen saw the Commonwealth as her greatest legacy and there was speculation that she would have done anything she could have to keep it in tact. And had Meghan played her cards right, she and Harry probably could have ended up becoming the main ambassadors of and for the Commonwealth, like a Commonwealth version of the UN Secretary-General.

But where the plan failed, obviously, was that it required blaming Kate for problems and issues that don't exist. Because remember, in 2021 when Meghan was making these claims, we'd just gone through the huge global reckoning that was Black Lives Matter and the agreement during/after BLM was "call racist people out on their BS. Put them on blast. Don't let them get away with it anymore." So not only would Meghan have been perfectly justified to name names, cite events, bring receipits, air the real dirty laundry and everyone would've been so much more supportive of it. But she didn't. Instead she played coy and said something like "I'm protecting them even though they don't deserve it."

Girl, please. That was Meghan's one chance to go justifiably scorched earth and air out all the dirty laundry and she fumbled hard.

Anyway. Let's get this train back on track. Where do the delusions come from? Traumatic childhoods courtesy of Mommies Dearest.

We all know Harry's story with Diana. She was a young, fun, free spirited loving mom larger than life with a neediness that she depended on her children to fill, rather than her own husband or other adults her age, so Harry grew to find satisfaction in supporting and providing her what she needed. He probably saw, and understood, the way Diana received what she wanted by exaggerating what she needed and following it up with excluding or isolating herself until whoever came chasing after her to give her what she wanted. And ultimately this led her (and Harry) down a path that ended up killing her; she exaggerated the relationship with Dodi to get attention from Hasnat or the BRF, then isolated herself in France to force whoever (Hasnat? Charles Wales? Charles Spencer?) to come chase after her. We know how that ends.

That's where Harry's delusions, IMO, come from. He saw how it well it worked (mostly) for Diana - exaggerate her needs/wants, then run and hide until she gets it - so he does it too. He probably started doing it right after she died, when no one knew what to do or how to handle him so they kept indulging in everything he wanted, so those wants kept manifesting bigger and bigger. And I think the way we see the BRF treating Harry is what would have happened to Diana had she lived; eventually the public would sour on her (this was already happening, by the way), which would then enable the BRF to grey rock her, devenomizing her in effect, and move on without Diana having too much of an influence on their day-to-day.

It's sort of similar for Meghan. We don't know specifically what happened (the way we do with Harry and Diana), but we know that Doria was a young, fun, free-spirited mother herself married to an older husband who had other priorities (eg kids from his first marriage). Unlike Diana, Doria probably didn't want the responsibilities of motherhood (which is the vibe Meghan and Thomas have given about Doria during Meghan's childhood) and left. And like the BRF, Thomas may have also overcompensated Doria's absence in Meghan's life by giving her everything she asked for, which made her asks get bigger and bigger and when Thomas couldn't deliver, she threatened to leave him...like Doria did and Thomas, erstwhile girldad he was, just kept throwing more and more at Meghan to keep her happy. Her delusions come from preying on other individuals' trauma to ensure she gets what she wants. The bigger her wants (ie the more grandiose her delusions), the harder she manipulates other people's trauma to make sure she gets what she wants. Which is kinda the opposite of Harry and Diana; they create the trauma to get people to do what they want, whereas Meghan exploits it to get people to do what she wants. Both are skills they learned after being abandoned (metaphorically and literally) by their mothers.

And all of Meghan's PR about "young mother," I think it's more insidious than that. Yes, it's a very overt evocation of Diana's narrative. Yes, it's a judgement against Kate. But it is also digs at Doria. "See? Motherhood is hard but I'm prioritizing my kid. How dare you to have left me" kind of spiteful digs meant to shame her for whatever happened that caused her to disappear. Meghan is the kind of person who must always have the last word, so I wouldn't be surprised if she's been targeting or belitting Doria about not knowing certain things about Archie/Lili because she wasn't around when Meghan was that age.

So...yeah.

I've realized now that this is the third or fourth Wednesday in a row that I write these super long analytical/in this essay I will posts. I guess Wednesdays are my thinking days...

[lillotte17]

I just woke up, so good morning, let me see if I can string any words together in a coherent pattern. This has actually been on my mind for weeks. Slowly driving me insane.

200 years. Two. Hundred. Years. 2 HUNDRED years.

That amount of time is literally incomprehensible to us in terms of personal memories and trauma. We can barely remember anything collectively as a species for that amount of time without losing bits and pieces of it. It is more than 2/3 of the time that Astarion has been alive. Well, "alive."

I am currently in my mid thirties, it would be like if I had died when I was 7 or 8 years old and then had to try and remember everything about my personality and my family and my morality from that time period. I do remember it, of course, but a lot of it is pretty vague. A lot of things that I know happened, or that I know I did, I remember because there are other people in my life who knew me then. Astarion wasn't a child, of course, but time still has it's way with things, and there is no one in his life he knew from before he became a vampire, with the possible exception of Cazador, and he's hardly a reliable source of information. Trauma also damages memories, and he has spent more that 2/3 of his life being constantly starved and beaten, and abused in pretty much every possible way a person can be.

The main point being that it is simply not possible to make any firm assumptions about the kind of person Astarion was before he was turned. Maybe he was a horrible, power-hungry, back room dealing, lying, racist, POS trash-man who deserved what he got when that group of thugs jumped him. Maybe he was kind underneath all his bluster, and had a strong sense of justice, and he was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Most likely, he was something in between. But we can't know. And Astarion probably doesn't really know anymore either.

(I firmly believe that Cazador chose him specifically to be a spawn, and possibly even orchestrated the attack on Astarion. They might not even have really been Gur. Astarion would only have Cazador to rely on for confirmation about what really happened to him that night, and having a culture of people who hunt monsters and were likely already targeting Cazador himself be the same group that murdered Astarion seems pretty mmmm convenient.)

And for all that he is a chaos gremlin, prickly rat-bastard, dumpster fire of a man, it is honestly pretty astounding (and rewarding imo) just how much growth he can have over the course of the game, which is only a few months, tops. (assuming, of course, that you are playing a good aligned Tav/Durge) But even before that, after the first night he tries to bite you, he is the one who immediately promises that he's not going to feed from innocents, with no prompting at all from the player. He doesn't ask to keep feeding from your PC, and he only drinks from you if you offer it. (unless you direct him to in a fight, I guess, lol) That feels huge to me. He has been STARVING for 200 years. Part of being a vampire is that he's always kind of starving, but he doesn't want to be a slave to that hunger any more than he wants to be a slave to anything or anyone else.

I'm not saying that he's secretly a good man deep down, but even from the start, the potential for him to be better was already there. Which is AMAZING because, as I said earlier: TWO HUNDRED YEARS.

Like, imagine that you know absolutely nothing about yourself except misery and torture and losing things, and it fucks you up, and you KNOW it's fucked you up, and you are terrified that one wrong move could send you back to the place that you just escaped from, and you still say, "I'm still not going to attack the innocent people around me for no reason, though. Sure, I might laugh if they manage to get themselves killed in an amusing way, but it's not going to be my fault."

[matan4il]

911 ep 709 first watch reactions

The way this ep starts with giving us a clear shot focused on the front, solely on Buck sitting between the man he's dating and the man he's been married to for the past six years, and only on them. XD I'm here for it.

Oh, Bobby. :( Feeling unworthy of his medal, and remembering his dad, and how everything went wrong after he got it. </3

Aaaah. Man, IDK. The openly and explicitly homophobic and racist captain cartoon just feels like an easy target now. Prejudice doesn't seem like it mostly gets expressed that way anymore, and when we only teach people to reject that kind, we not only fail to teach them to recognize subtler forms, we may be misleading them to think those more nuanced ones don't count.

Love Athena trying to "save" Bobby by contacting Amir. I'm always a sucker for a couple where they both save each other.

I enjoyed the little play with "Mother Hen," and I know it's not specifically about Buddie, but it is damn funny that when she's told she's raising more kids, they're the ones the camera focuses on. lol Raising a kid together for 6 years, still a couple of morons in desperate need of parenting from their colleagues. Even when Bobby's "wordless goodbye" moment with Buck is letting him cook for the 118, Eddie's by his side and they're doing it together. I swear, 911 said, "Take note, this is what a marriage looks like" and then just kept hammering the point for 6 seasons now.

Okay, I am pretty sure that, while Bobby's acceptance of Buck's first relationship with a guy, is really lovely, "Because we haven't had to talk about it" is not an actual good criterion for discerning whether someone is good for their partner or not. People whose spouses are abusive don't talk about it, either. :/ I am NOT saying that's Buck and Tommy, because it obviously isn't, it just feels like a line thrown in there to be cutesy, but which isn't actually helpful to people, who might take it too seriously.

I AM GONNA LOL FOREVER. So, just like Buck's bi awakening was all about Eddie, now Eddie's messed up whatever he has with Kim is gonna involve Buck, too? Gotcha. Battlefield boyfriends being off-battlefield boyfriends once more.

So... Buck was going to see Tommy, in an ep where TPTB have already paid for Lou in the role, so might as well use him as much as possible, but instead a non-emergency run in with Eddie's current whatever-Kim-is makes Buck ditch Tommy, and run straight over to Eddie's to help him? Look, I'm obviously a One True Pairing kind of shipper, so Buddie are it for me, as much as I can enjoy and see the value of Buck and Tommy as a stepping stone, and nothing will make me stop shipping Buddie (especially not after the tsunami eps), but 911 is feeding me way too well with how it frames these scenes and stories, I don't think the show's trying to get me to stop.

Man, if anyone's ever had a doubt that Eddie is the world champion at denial, this kitchen scene will def cure that.

"I'm worried about you." "Yeah, I'm worried about me, too." And then Buck, the one person who can ALWAYS penetrate through Eddie's denial wall, no matter how thick it is.

Eh, IDK how much the part where they try to re-define Shannon as the love of Eddie's life works, or how much it just serves to show he's still in denial, just a different kind than before, when Buck got through to him that he can't go on like this with Kim. For one thing, in his little retelling of their dysfunctional r/s, Eddie doesn't mention that Shannon was leaving him a second time, even before she died. Literal denial and repression.

So I'm gonna choose to believe Hen and Karen will get Mara back, because I can't deal with that particular storyline otherwise.

Kim's reaction is too deranged for me. Who does something like that, even if we assume the kindest of intentions? And then Marisol and Christopher's timing... I didn't sign on to watch a soap opera, but I guess I'm getting one free of charge?

"Now you gotta save yourself." If that ain't a painful summary of what growing up means, IDK what is. the conversation with Bobby's dad in his sleep was a good, painful scene, built right, leading to him hopefully getting his closure through saving his wife from a fire, and leaving us with just the right amount of suspension for next week and the season finale, where we'll see if he can let go of his past mistakes without a doppelganger dressing up like his dead wife...

Thank you for reading! If you’re looking for more, you can find my s7 reactions tag here, and more of my Buddie meta and content in my pinned post. xoxox

[etoilesbienne]

I try to be a fair person I try to be understanding. but I am sick and tired of having to read about the many sins of Léa for being a whistleblower. People are straight up putting words in her mouth for things she did not say.

Frankly I'm a little appalled that the MCYT community can have a huge moment about the heavy amount of misogyny present in the space and come away with the take she didn't actually experience hate from the fan community. No the other admins didn't not experience hate, but she didn't say that. She said she received hate for being the first person to come out. Or how she was discredited repeatedly and the "Jay" document was used to shame her pointedly and make her out to be unreliable and "a hater." Gee whiz I wonder where I've heard "she's just hysterical and took things too seriously and is a vindictive person out to get others projects to fail." That sure sounds familiar. Especially in CC spaces pertaining to women. Why would she be exempt from misogyny at the hands of the fandom?

Though the way people behave about former admins expressing frustration at the lack of internal translation is making me crazy. There is nothing wrong with Quackity speaking his native language in a stream for announcement. None of these admins ever said he was at fault for speaking Spanish, they were criticizing the lack of internal communication outside of the streams, and the fact the studios had no official translators on payroll to help with communication issues between languages. They aren't asking for him to speak English, tbf most of these admins don't even have English as a first language, why would they want a stream in a different language they aren't fluent in? I don't think Léa was expecting Quackity to suddenly start speaking French. They're asking for translations in the languages they do speak so they can understand these important announcements about their jobs, because they were not receiving the information about these announcements any other way. To be honest it still boggles my mind, even after all of this, that QStudios never even had official translators to relay messages between Quackity to other streamers and admins. Regardless, I feel like people are interpreting this pretty fair criticism of the complete lack of translation to non-English languages impeding the already barely existent communication to be as bad faith as possible from every side. On one hand you have people choosing to believe that is what the admins are saying and agreeing with it and then being racist toward Quackity over it, on the other hand you have people choosing to believe the admins are being racist toward Quackity and sending them hate over it. I'd be insane to deny racism toward Quackity wasn't also happening though.

I don't know what else to say than people who have been working insane hours for months on end to be exploited, and they're upset. This is a server a lot of people cared about as fans, of course the first person to come out and reveal the terrible conditions is going to receive the most amount of hate over this specific instance. It's not an unfounded claim. Have you seen the shit people say about Léa on twitter? It also doesn't mean the other admins didn't receive hate in their own regard, it's just the first person to come out is usually the biggest punching bag for it. Misogyny didn't magically dissipate from the fandom with the removal of a few problem CC. My god hear yourselves and the way you talk about a woman coming out as receiving workplace abuse.

[joesalw]

ok since you said you're all for swiftie rants, i feel a bit better sending this in 😭 i'm still a fan of her music (for the most part) but her as a person? never again.

i've been a casual swiftie since i was little and since her debut. i say casual because i didn't involve myself with fandom drama. never had any fan accounts or went to concerts. i didn't obsessively follow her life. i just loved her music and she seemed like a cool person. i always looked forward to her albums and new music.

when she started dating joe, i remember liking him from the beginning. he seemed grounded and chill. and kind. and i loved that she found someone like that. that he helped her through a really difficult time in her life and career. she just had a different glow with him to me. he helped her for the better in many ways imo. then 2023 happened and i was just... very confused. i wasn't on anyone's side in the beginning, just a "they were together for so long and they're probably both hurting, i wish people would leave them alone" and then she started dating THAT man like a month after their breakup was announced. i didn't know who matty was and god i wish it stayed that way. her dating him was a big wakeup call for me to think "yk what maybe she's not as cool as you thought." that saying "show me who your friends are, and i'll tell you who you are" is true imo. i don't know how someone can be friends with let alone DATE a man who not only does this, but admitted to it and LAUGHED about getting off to black women being brutalized. and that's not even all he did, idc if it was just a "joke" or an "act." it's not fucking funny and never was.

joe got harrassed and slandered repeatedly for a whole year. multiple of his female costars/friends did too because swifties were convinced he cheated on her with them. and taylor did absolutely nothing at all to stop it. not surprising ig because she never does, but still disappointing. if anything, she encouraged it. and what do you know? she was actually the one who cheated on joe. with matty fucking healy, who she had been pining over for a decade. she was the one who left joe. all because he was "too depressed" for her. i'm sorry but i have to laugh. what is this??

as far as the album goes, personal drama aside, i did like it for the most part. wasn't my favorite but i still liked it and i would've enjoyed it A LOT more if it wasn't so on the nose about everything that happened (and yk the whole "without all the racists" line. really? after dating matty? i think you'd be pretty fine if they were there idk). i would REALLY love "guilty as sin" if i didn't know it was a confession to emotionally cheating on her bf of 6 years because he was depressed and masturbating to matty healy who's just about every ist and phobic out there. i would really love "but daddy i love him" if i didn't know it was her jumping after her fans for actually having more morals than her and calling her out for dating that man. it's just... ugh.

sorry i kinda went off there 😭 it's just really disappointing to see her act this way. thank you for this blog! it has been very helpful for me and i'm sure a lot of other fans upset with her and everything that's happened.

yup

[the-great-ladyg]

So, I watched the James Somerton second apology video so you don't have to, this are my highlights, feel free to add more if I missed something important:

He monetized the video to donate to HBG's team and Wikipedia, apparently, he said also he has reached some of the people who he plagiarized but still, if he did he would have explicitly said "I'm donating to them"

Did he really said "well, I'm a white cis gay man, I don't have the same experiences as others in the community" as an excuse on plagiarizing others' works? And the "I thought I might be able to won over some people" sounds like some white savior shit

He still throws Nick under the bus, it really shows that James doesn't regret any other times he did that and it sounds like he hired Nick as a shield for criticism and not to have a more diverse work team

He apologizes to Jessie Gender and many others, but doesn't explicitly addresses why he might have offended them on first place (except for the police incident), yeah, he says he was reactionary, but he has been on many occassions. I'm not expecting a full detailed explanation, but at least he could have said "for the Nebula drama" or something like that

James says that at one point, due to covid economic consequences, he and Nick became poor and that led him to plagiarize more since they had to upload more videos, and look, I suck at organizing my time, I tend to do everything with little time before the date, and I wrote most of my thesis on the last minute with one or two days of investigating and I still didn't plagiarize, I could cite all of my sources the correct way, if my early 20s procrastinating ass could wrote a 70 page thesis on my own without plagiarizing, he could write a script with a second person without stealing but he prefered to do it anyway

Also the alegedly head injury, I'm not going to say that's a lie, but knowing how this guy uses any card on his favor, this might be something he pulled from his ass to justify himself

I don't know why but some of this Telos drama explanatiom sounds again like he didn't even know how to do all of this, and I get what is to start a project having little to no idea on how to start or continue, but he tried to do so much with so little without asking for any help when he clearly needed some help other than Nick, and also sounds like another excuse to justify plagiarizing

"Misinformation made its way into our past videos", no, my friend, it doesn't make its way when you investigate or check a site other than the first one you see, James loves to say he likes to investigate but still says things like this. "It wasn't malicious", (seriously, the audacity of this bitch), oh yeah, there's nothing malicious coming from the mysogynist biphobic and transphobic dude who misgenders trans people and erases a woman's bisexuality, specially when this lady told you she wasn't a straight woman as you said and this was a known fact for a few years

The ADHD thing feels like some ableist shit, like "don't blame me, I have ADHD uwu", James has offended many groups and communities through his youtube career and in his apology video he still finds the way to insult another group that suffers from many harmful stereotypes

As I said on a post addressing his first apology video, James can't create a space for everyone if he's transphobic, mysogynist, acephobe and racist, and he pretends he's convinced he was creating an "inclusive space"

Just as many people have said before, he didn't address anything of the things he's been accused of except plagiarism, he only says "I'm sorry to everyone who I have offended", no dude, you don't address mysogyny, racism or transphobia this way, James is a piece of shit and a coward.

And this idiot has put on public display some of his videos, specially the ones that show his racism (yeah, the Killing Stalking and Painter of the Night videos), I'm not clicking on them but I'm pretty sure he didn't cut his racist mysogynist rants, because they might not be plagiarized (if James is to be trusted) but they show the worst parts of him when he's trying to be original, and putting this shit videos on public shows he regrets nothing on being a piece of shit.