#Perpetuation of Rape Culture bro

[vanilla-voyeur]

I think I've criticized feminism a bit much for someone who claims to not be an antifeminist. So let's round things out with something that MRAs tend to fall short on properly addressing. That thing is rape culture.

So I agree that it is condescendingly misandrist to say things like #TeachBoysNotToRape. The MRAs will say that it's wrong either with the argument that rapists are just inevitable and unstoppable sadistic monsters like some sort of natural disaster rape tornado or that everyone already knows rape is bad. The real problem with that hashtag is that it lets girls off the hook for a rape culture that they very much perpetuate as well. They're not just innocent victims gifted with a perfect understanding of consent by matter of birth. We should instead #TeachChildrenConsent.

People with bad sex education often do not recognize their consent violating actions as sexual assault. This is just plainly obvious to anyone who's worked in sexual education where they have to explain to quite surprised people that consent for one activity is not consent for every activity or past consent is not future consent or consent can be revoked. They can be taught these things. And it will reduce rates of rape.

But that education absolutely needs to be just as much aimed at girls as it is at boys. I just started a new job where... let's just say it has it's positives and negatives. There have been men who have said weirdly sexual things at work that made me uncomfortable. However the person who says the most overtly inappropriate sexual things the most often is a woman. And she complains about misogynistic bro culture in our industry while participating in sexual harassment herself. I don't think she realizes that these comments aren't ok even when the person saying them is a woman and she's saying it exclusively to men.

The belief that rapists are just sadistic monsters instead of people with warped but fixable views on consent actually makes it harder to hold people accountable for rape. Because if you're picturing a rapist as a sadistic monster then nothing you can do could be classified as rape because you're just a nice normal person. Or your pastor who's been accused of rape must be falsely accused because he's a respected pillar of the community that has always been nice to you. Or that teacher couldn't be a rapist because she's hot and what guy wouldn't feel lucky to get with such a smoking babe. The sadistic monster narrative is another pernicious part of rape culture

So yeah, the MRAs are wrong on this one. We should absolutely #TeachBoysNotToRape. So long as we don't forget to #TeachGirlsNotToRapeToo.

[daydadahlias]

Hi lovely Jess. I was just thinking how I'm pretty sure Lashton is the most popular ship, at least in this platform. You instantly came to my mind given the nice amount of (amazing) Lashton fics you've posted. My question is: do you also think Lashton is the most popular ship? If so, why do you think is that?

I think it has something to do with how Luke and Ashton are perceived by many people: Luke as a more "femine" kind of guy, and Ashton as more dominant person.

Hello darling Lisi!! So, unsurprisingly, because I'm me, this turned out longer than I meant for it to lol. Warning in advance.

But, actually, lashton is not the most popular ship in the slash community! I would say it is at current date (as most active writers are lashton writers), that's true. So I know why it feels like that! Almost all new content in the slash community is lashton. But, if you go on ao3 and filter by ship, this is what we come up with.

muke: 2773 works

lashton: 2612 works

malum: 1671 works

cashton: 1246 works

cake: 1184 works

mashton: 722 works

BUT I do have my theories as to why lashton is as popular as it is (especially in comparison to the other ships; there's such a significant disparage between lashton & muke and the other ships). And I have personal beliefs as to why muke is so popular as well. Keep in mind, these are statistics from since the beginning of 5sos, and most were written in the 2014-15 era (for perspective, there are 510 pages of 5sos fic on ao3 and only 163 of those are written 2017 and after, and if you've noticed there is a very distinct difference between fic written after the band's haitus and before). 2014 Muke really sold it to audiences but Lashton has gotten to be the more popular ship as the band has grown older (and Ashton has grown noticeably buffer/more masculine, and Michael noticeably less sexual) so I think it would be completely fair to assume that the majority of the fics in these 163 pages (roughly 20 fics displayed a page) are lashton.

Now, the reason I think lashton is so popular (and I almost wrote a very mini shitty essay about this a while ago that I decided no one wanted) is for exactly the reasons you said.

Luke is viewed by consumers as a very explicit type of Pretty Boy; he has delicate features, he's rather soft-spoken and shy at times, he's long-legged, blond, and blue-eyed, and at this point in his career he has no problem wearing makeup, sheer clothes, and shaking his ass.

Meanwhile, Ashton is a very masculine-presenting person. He's intense at times, very obviously a dominating force (while Luke has always been a more submissive personality type) in interviews. Also, Luke is the youngest. Ashton is very much the driving force of the band, he's the leader in a lot of ways, and Luke is the baby. There's so many videos and indications that Ashton very much takes care of Luke in a paternal way (ie. letting Luke live with him in 2017, offering the microphone to Luke in interviews, hyping Luke's low self-confidence by telling him when he looks good, constantly assuring Luke he's doing alright with answers/performance, fixing his clothes, very fond teasing and occasional small pinches/touches of affection). Ashton plays dad for all three of those guys.

And, as I've established in a lot of my rants about this, people get off on very explicitly noticeable power dynamics. And the power dynamic (both physically and mentally) between Ashton and Luke is so absolutely apparent even to people that don't know them.

Ashton provides for Luke and is consistently in a "dominant" position over him from the sheer standpoint that Luke idolizes Ashton (and always has). It's very much the caregiver/recipient relationship.

And people enjoy that trope in romance because (and I cannot say this enough) media very much pushes heteronormative abusive as fuck dynamics on pretty much everything. That means there is a Man and a Woman. A Dominant and a Submissive. Predator and Prey. And it is oftentimes very easy to shoehorn Ashton and Luke specifically into those given dynamics based on what an audience already knows about these guys/sees on a surface level. On a very, very surface level Ashton is the Hard Top Daddy Dom and Luke is a Submissive Slutty Pouty Princess.

I can't help but point out how many blogs there are on tumblr that have bios/handles/content centered around "Bottom!Luke" or "Princess!Luke" and those people are always lashton shippers. You'll never find that kind of content for any of the other ships in this fandom. Which is very, if I'm one hundred percent frank with you, (I personally think) really gross. I don't like the way this fandom treats Luke like a fleshlight and Ashton as the dildo that gets to fuck him. Considering how much more there is to those guys than sex. PWP doesn't have to be so dehumanizing. But that's a whole other rant lol.

What I'm trying to say is, the reason why lashton is the most popular ship is how easy it is to make them straight. It's the constant placement of hetero standards/stereotypes on queer men. And because Luke is easy to make feminine and Ashton is easy to make masculine, they're perfect for fetishization.

[theritualofourexistence]

Clarity in the Cancellation Crusade

After posting multi-paragraph comments on a couple different things that have popped up in my feed recently, it seemed like I should probably just sit down and write this out.

“Cancel culture.” Crazy shit, right?

The recent onslaught of cancellations includes Mr. Potato Head, Pepe Le Pew, a handful of Disney movies (Peter Pan, Dumbo, The Aristocats), and *audible gasp* Dr. Seuss. The Muppets also got a newfangled Disney+ content warning, though I’ve seen significantly fewer headlines about that.

The thing that inevitably happens when the news media decides to publish a headline about a children’s toy or book being “canceled” is a veritable parade of social media complaints about how sensitive people have become. I saw this particular post over 10 times in the period of a couple hours one day last week…

The question I’ve been asking recently when I see posts like that is this: “Who do you think cancel culture is?”

Because “cancel culture” isn’t real. In the majority of the cases currently making headlines, the choice to remove a character from a movie or stop publishing a book has been made by the company responsible for that character or book… and that is very much a normal thing companies can choose to do.

No one I’ve posed the above question to has overtly mentioned “Libtards,” but it’s certainly implied. People who haven’t read a Dr. Seuss book in 20 years are now suddenly all up in arms (literally?) because “the Liberals” are coming for “And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street.”

The Liberals are not coming for Dr. Seuss. They do not care about a potato toy. Also, nothing is happening to the Cat in the Hat. I repeat: NOTHING is happening to the Cat in the Hat.

The choices to stop publishing that book and to market a vegetable toy in a less gendered way were made by the companies responsible for producing those products… not the Liberal “cancel culture” ghoul. In fact, it’s really, really hard to find public outcry about any of the things that have been recently “canceled.” There was a single NYT article that recently discussed the problematic nature of the Pepe Le Pew cartoons… that said, Warner Bros hasn’t aired that show in decades and it is not clear whether that article had anything to do with the skunk’s scene being removed from the new Space Jam movie.

Even growing up I remember things like political correctness needlessly becoming a partisan issue. When we fall into that media trap, all we’re doing is watering the plant of an already poisonous and ineffective two-party system. Be bigger than that temptation. Push back against media intended to further divide Americans. If something stinks, it’s probably rotten. Sure, there are certain topics that fall under the umbrella of political correctness that sound alarm bells for censorship issues… but didn’t everyone’s mom tell them that if they didn’t have anything nice to say, they shouldn’t say anything at all?

Again, though, the most important thing to remember about this recent wave of “canceling” is that censorship concerns are moot. A person who owns a thing is legally allowed to do all the censoring they want. It’s not the government that has decided to stop publishing 6 books written by Dr. Seuss… if it were, we could have the censorship conversation. These changes aren’t happening because there is a Democrat in the White House. They’re happening because the company who makes these products, has for whatever reason, decided to take a different approach.

In the case of the Dr. Seuss books, Dr. Seuss Enterprises re-evaluated their choice to publish 6 books based on racist themes and images. I have only heard of two of those six. The image below is, in my opinion, objectively problematic:

The fact that a major company behind such a well-known name has seen that something is problematic and has decided to stop publishing the books containing overt racist images is awesome. It sets a great example that we can all learn from. Humans have an amazing capacity to learn… that’s one of the only reasons we are in charge here on Earth. If we fall on ice once, we are often more careful on ice the next time. When we see that something is racially problematic, it’s a good thing if we can take action to get that thing out of rotation. More on that later.

Fundamentally, what is happening right now in Media Land is gross sensationalism.

“Cancel culture” isn’t real. Should people face consequences if they say or do racist things? Yes. We should all agree on that. Should we stop publishing books that perpetuate racist stereotypes? Yes. There are plenty of non-racist books that provide an education about racial differences without the added (exceedingly inappropriate) zing of Asian characters being painted yellow and African characters being given monkey features.

If you’re not convinced that some of Dr. Seuss’s material is racially problematic, I encourage you to pop on over to Google to check out the series of ads he did for FLIT in the 1930s. Yes, it was the 1930s. In the last 90 years, we’ve learned that images like that are not okay… let’s use that knowledge to let old racist graphics die.

Still can’t accept that “cancel culture” isn’t real? Still feeling like there’s something in the air now that is different and worse than before?

Okay, then, let’s consider it further.

Things have been “canceled” by people for millennia… this isn’t new. Being all for cancel culture when Colin Kaepernick kneels for the anthem (a perfectly legal form of peaceful protest considered respectful by many veterans) but opposing cancel culture when it’s threatening to eliminate an obviously racist thing is not exactly a moral stance. Burning your Nikes in the street but then turning around and spending $400 on a copy of “If I Ran the Zoo” on eBay after Dr. Seuss’s own family has pulled it from publication due to racist imagery is… silly.

The same people who seem to be so vocal about “cancel culture” now are part of the same communities who tried to cancel plenty of things in my lifetime. Things like trick-or-treating, Harry Potter, school dances, books and movies with LGBT+ characters and themes…

History absolutely bubbles over with things that have been canceled… often for good reason! Some examples that come to mind: 

DDT

the Catholic Church (see the 16th century Protestant Reformation)

doing our everyday poopin’ in outdoor holes

polio

hoop skirts

phrenology (new science cancels old science like every damn day)

Ford Pintos (not to mention cars without seatbelts)

telegrams and rotary phones (replaced by easier and better ways to communicate)

lead paint

asbestos

Four Loco

Y’all remember when we all did the ice bucket challenge to cancel Alzheimer’s?

Learning that something is problematic and moving past it is LEARNING… not cancel culture.  Learning and growth are good things. We all benefit from them.

Another thing worth commenting on from that Cat in the Hat post that circulated in my Facebook feed: why do we consistently demonize sensitivity? Racism feels like something we should all be sensitive about. If being sensitive about something results in meaningful change and a less hateful country, isn’t that… good? Why do so many Americans seem to place so much value on their “freedom” to hurt others?

And don’t get me started on comparing this stuff to Cardi B. It boggles my mind that that’s happening at all. Why is there suddenly so much outcry about one song that features female genitals in a literal ocean of songs that feature male genitals. I grew up knowing every word to songs about sex well before I even knew what sex was. Your kids are only desperate to listen to WAP because they know it makes you squeamish. And take a second to think about why it makes you squeamish. Genitals are human and scientific and we literally all have them. If you have more of a problem with WAP than with any of the other 10,000 songs about dicks and sex, you need to spend some time examining why that is.

Here’s another post I’ve seen bouncing around the social media feeds:

Something about this is just plain hilarious to me. Like what are racism and rape culture if not THE REALEST issues? This country’s problem with systemic racism runs so, so deep and is reflected very plainly in centuries of cold, hard numbers. It’s not that I *think* systemic racism is a problem. The data very clearly shows that regardless of what white people think about race in this country, systemic racism absolutely IS a problem. Racism and rape culture, arguably at the root of the most recent canceling spree, are not just real issues, they’re real American issues. They’re cultural issues. And solving cultural issues is not easy. We know that these issues have been passed down through the generations so maybe changing children’s toys and books and shows isn’t such a bad thing to try. There is SO much work to do to address racism and rape culture in the United States, but small steps are still progress.

If choosing to stop airing a show that blatantly perpetuates rape culture means one less young person is stalked or assaulted or raped, that’s worth it, no? What if that one young person who doesn’t become a victim is your daughter?

If choosing to stop publishing a book with racist themes and images leads to even one kid understanding more about the nuance of race in America and the breath-taking extent of white privilege, that’s worth it too.

Would I rather the media spend time and money to bring American attention to bigger issues associated with this nation’s racism and rape culture? 100%. There are ENORMOUS fish to fry. Dr. Seuss is not an enormous fish. Potato head toys are not enormous fish. Pepe Le Pew is not an enormous fish. They’re not even big fish. They’re small. They’re tiny fish. They’re anchovies. But frying some fish is better than frying no fish.

Canceling Pepe Le Pew is not hurting anyone. Warner Brothers owns Pepe Le Pew. Warner Brothers owns nearly everything; they are not hurting for money. And canceling Pepe certainly isn’t hurting American kids. There are plenty of other kids’ shows to watch that are significantly less problematic. Just because you watched Pepe Le Pew and went on to be a properly respectful adult doesn’t mean there aren’t other kids out there who did internalize a harmful disrespect for consent. No, Pepe Le Pew probably isn’t single-handedly responsible for anyone’s decision to stalk or rape anyone else. But could a show reinforce the groundwork that ultimately leads a kid down a path where he is unable or unwilling to respect the boundaries of others? I mean, it’s not the craziest thing I’ve heard this week.

Canceling six total Dr. Seuss books that are already pretty obscure is not hurting anyone.

Changing the name of an already genderless potato toy to reflect that genderless-ness is not hurting anyone.

A brief recap: racism and rape culture are very real, very American issues.

If the decision to stop doing a thing doesn’t hurt anyone and may even save someone some hurt, why does that decision bother you?

Also, in all your frantic Facebook posting, make sure you are differentiating between “cancel culture” and consequences. When the media tosses around the phrase “cancel culture” it has this tone of finality that is, plainly, not realistic. Fads and trends move so quickly in the internet age that the idea that a group of people could “cancel” something permanently is just not possible. People who do or say racist things, though, should face consequences. People who do or say transphobic or homophobic things should face consequences. Consequences are one of the only ways we learn to do better. And again, that’s not my opinion, it’s science.

One of the consequences that can have the most impact is, you guessed it, losing money! In this capitalist hellscape, money talks. Boycotting and choosing how we spend our money are some of the most engaging ways to combat racist and homophobic garbage. When you have your temper tantrum because the company who owns a book with overtly racist imagery decides to stop publishing that book, that speaks volumes about your priorities. If you respond to that company’s decision by buying the book in question on eBay for $400, that speaks even louder volumes. What are you doing? WHY are you doing it? I’m guessing you don’t even know, and you should probably spend some time thinking about it before you flush away a chunk of your stimmy on a freaking RACIST KIDS’ BOOK.

All actions have consequences. All of our choices never affect just us. How we vote affects other people. How we spend our money affects other people. Spending our money on things that are problematic perpetuates the problem… whether it be racism, rape culture, homophobia, or transphobia… or so many other things this country desperately needs to address.

It’s human to not like change. Change is going to happen, though, regardless of whether or not we’re comfortable with it. In the information age, we have a remarkable opportunity to steer that change. Leaving behind racist relics is change, so it may be inherently uncomfortable. But change that moves our country away from racism and rape culture is GOOD change.

I am begging you. Use critical thinking… if you’re seeing a headline about something being canceled, look up WHY. Some of these headlines are absolute bunk… they’re shared just to get people all riled up and create American division. However, just like we *should* cancel lead paint, a children’s book with overtly racist images shouldn’t be published anymore and it’s weird if you disagree with that. Disagreeing with that decision, as silly as it may seem, perpetuates racism. I know how triggered y’all can get when someone suggests you might be perpetuating racism, but it is what it is. Do your research. Don’t spend your money on racist garbage. Be better.

I feel like this post is me just barking the exact same thing in different ways, but I also feel like there is so much more I could say.

I’ll leave you with this:

What will it take for Americans to weigh the threats of racism and homophobia the same way we weight the threat of lead paint? If it’s a matter of costing lives, well, the numbers speak for themselves.

[inapat14]

Tex Avery, the Warner Bros. And –  Looney Tunes

From the  early days of the 20th century to its prolific forms today, Animation has always been a wonderful creative genre, pushing aside both –  technical and –  creative boundaries. But when we think about animation and cartoons from our childhood, we will often first mention Disney:  the stories, drawings and perfectly identified characters.

When it came to other names, we know them all, but often not as well. The graphics, -  credits, -  expressions and the characters rocked part of our childhood but it is often difficult to know where, when or how exactly.  Less well ranked, they nevertheless deserve to be mentioned with respect, like their creators, true artists of the genre who have succeeded in giving life to their imaginary world.

For this first article and to put things in order, let’s talk about –  Looney Tunes and their not-so-famous flagship creator, Tex Avery. And let’s begin by a little bit of background :

In 1923, the Disney studios were created. But at the same time they are not the only ones. All the big majors embarked on the adventure and quickly established a partnership or an animation department in order to broadcast their creations to the cinema alongside newsreels. 

That is when the Warner Bros. set up a partnership with Leon Schlesinger, founder of Leon Schlesinger Productions, a studio rich in talents and creations that have become cult. It is in these studios, at the end of the 1930s, that –  the Looney Tunes characters were created. Absurd characters, cunning, rather clever (sometimes diabolical), overflowing, unpredictable. Characters in total contrast to the sensible characters created in the previous decade like Mickey Mouse or Popeye. Tex Avery has been hired by Leon Schlesinger Studios in 1935. He led a team of ultra-talented artists: Chuck Jones, Bob Clampett, Bob Cannon, Virgill Ross and Sidney Sutherland. Together, they collaborated on the Looney Tunes series in black and white, then on Merrie Melodies in technicolor.Originally, Fred Avery (who will take the pseudonym Tex Avery in tribute to his home state, Texas), wanted to work for comics. He couldn't find a job there and decided (luckily for us) to fall back on animation, "time to… ». He will become the masterful innovator of midcentury cartoon humor. 

Avery will only stay 6 years with Leon Schlesinger and will even leave the studio before the total buyout by the Warners Bros which marked the beginning of the Warner Bros Cartoon. But even if Bugs Bunny or Daffy Duck had already been drawn a few years before being taken back by Tex Avery, he was the one who shaped them. 

This slender gray rabbit who spends his time nibbling carrots and playing with his enemies ? Avery is the one who gives it his cult line, drawing inspiration from his own teenage expressions: "Hey, what's up, doc? ". The great specialty of Avery and its teams was to infuse characters with an irreverent personality. He developed some of the kinkiest, weirdest cartoons ever made but also modeled legendary characters. Today Bugs Bunny is an iconic figure in the Warner Bros. Animation. His popularity even led him to become a mascot for the company Warner Bros.

The Tex Avery style can be summed up in one word: wacky. Everything is crazy about his work because he sought to break the codes. He dismantled the period fairy tale animations into something funny. He tackled all of Walt's taboo subjects: sex, politics, the fourth wall ... The characters are the masters of cartoons and it is often thanks to their hateful flaws that audiences tend to love them.

Unfortunately, this freedom of tone has not always been well received, which isn't going to help Tex Avery get easy recognition. In addition, the gag-man was modest and did not set up his own studio despite his many successful creations. 

He nevertheless obtained 6 Oscar nominations between 1940 and 1956. Gradually and during the second part of the 20th century, his professional peers recognized his importance. Many films and animated series have been inspired by his work, such as The Mask or the Animaniacs.

Of course Bugs Bunny or –  Looney Tunes are not the only interesting part of Tex Avery’s work (quite the contrary, he is also the father of Droopy for example…), but it would take more than one article to talk about all his genius ! But if all of this made you want to know more about Tex Avery, I would recommend –  seeing the King Size documentary : Tex Avery and the Looney Tunes Revolution.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=III4mVWV_2I&t=647s

But Warner Bros and Looney Tunes are also back in the news today ! 

 First because of The film Space Jam: A new Legacy which should be released next July, and put some Looney Toon’s characters at the heart of the debate ! Indeed, the character of Pépé Le Pew was edited out of the sequel to the cult film bringing together the Looney Tunes and the stars of the NBA, because he was accused of perpetuating -- « rape culture ».

On the other hand and if all of this just made you want to dive back into the animations: be aware  that that the legendary crew is back! 200 new Looney Tunes shorts have been created and are currently showing in the US on the HBO Max platform. -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nalw1XRAiMI Mathilde Agaisse

[wigwurq]

WIG REVIEW: PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN

Ok you guys. It’s officially kinda sorta Oscar time and I am streaming everything in order to prepare for my favorite season - AWARDS! I really loved Promising Young Woman but what about the (very few) wigs? Let’s discuss. 

The film follows Carey Mulligan - armed with a plethora of hair extensions - as she seeks revenge on all of the terrible bros of the world who perpetuate rape culture. As with the nurse wig above, we know these extensions to be fake but they are all still fabulous.

Even when she isn’t trolling men at bars, Mulligan’s short bob was made longer by these hair extensions and honestly - they look great.

Still, wearing extensions or not - never trust a bro in a fedora. Honestly, writer/director Emerald Fennell’s takedown of these idiots is so specific and perfect - as is her consideration of using hair extensions at all to show exactly the kind of girl that Mulligan would have to present in order to attract these assholes. Side note: the only decent man in this entire movie is Alfred Molina and it was everything. 

There are only two wigs elsewhere in this movie...one on Mulligan’s boss, Laverne Cox. Certainly, Laverne Cox has looked better and worn far more fabulous wigs but for this understated role, this simple perm is just fine.

AND THEN THERE’S JENNIFER COOLIDGE. Coolidge is the original MILF, the taker of the damn dog (you dumbass!), and the perpetual blonde trophy wife deglams it ALL with this dowdy brown bob AND I’M HERE FOR IT!!!!! Every movie should be so lucky as to have Jennifer Coolidge in it, and she is honestly completely heartbreaking as Mulligan’s mom. And this deglam wig totally works!! Who knew we needed a brunette Jennifer Coolidge in our lives to ground everything in our lives!!! Halleluj!

VERDICT: WURQS

[ardenttheories]

Homestuck's always been antagonistic and insensitive, but I don't recall seeing any of you try to dox Hussie? But please, continue to rationalise how cyberbullying lgbt people for not being nice enough and having opinions about a fictional character you disagree with puts you in the right. A story doesn't go the way you'd like and this is how you respond? You COULD have just not bothered reading it instead of CHOOSING to make your online life about something you hate like a toxic weirdo.

Hi, Kate. I’m so glad you could find my blog. (Edit: that was a joke. Apparently, some anons find it impossible to tell that I don’t actually think you’re Kate). It’s clear to me that you didn’t take the time to read through any of the content that’s actually on here, since you’re throwing around rather wild accusations, so let me take this down step by step.

Homestuck has only rarely been antagonistic and insensitive. Things like the Alpha Trolls - which were clear criticisms of fandom culture - were relatively few and far between, and when we complained about them, they actually stopped. Remind me, for instance, how relevant the Alpha Trolls were to the plot? How long they stayed as mockeries towards the fandom? Yeah, not long. I actually have talked about this before on the blog - alongside other things I thought were negative towards the fandom from the original comic - but the difference here is that... in the entirety of Homestuck, these things were outliers and inconsistencies. They stuck out because they were in stark contrast to the otherwise wonderfully handled content Homestuck went over.

For instance, Homesuck is critical of abuse - especially in terms of relationships. We see through a critical lense the shit normalisation of parental abuse can do to a child - with actual talk of triggers and of the mental and emotional scarring left behind, and the complexities of the child’s feelings towards the parent’s death through Dave - and we see how self destructive relationships can be, how harmful they are, and how hard it can be to leave them - such as Terezi’s very toxic blackrom with Gamzee, which was always portrayed as something negative and harmful especially with how worried Karkat was for her and how withdrawn she became during its run, and Dirk’s relationship with Jake, which goes very much over how communication can cause a deterioration in romantic relationships especially when the two participants have conflicting mental illnesses. 

It also goes over how men, though they can be mired in toxic masculinity, can choose to be good. How sometimes we’re not born as good people, but we can become good people through the love we have for the people around us, through frequent attempts to check what we’re doing, through the sheer willpower to be good. Dirk’s entire arc, knowing that he could very easily become Bro but deciding he doesn’t want to be, that it’s something he wants to work on, is so important and incredibly powerful. Mental illness in men is often just given as an excuse to make them violent with no attempts at betterment - so Dirk actually existed as proof that you don’t have to be that stereotype. 

In contrast, Homestuck^2 completely uncritically gave Jade, who was cis, a dog dick, made her, a bisexual woman, a sex maniac and the yaoi “woman who gets in the way of the gays” trope, made her a cheater and someone who forced her partner into the relationship to begin with, and made her a neglectful mother after having cheated with her best lesbian friend in something that has incredible recall to just about every futanari video ever - and they tried to claim that this was good representation of trans women, actually, and that the only reason we didn’t like it is that Jade is “a woman” who “has sex”.

Likewise completely uncritically, they made Gamzee, an anti-black stereotype, enter a relationship with Jane, a fascist, and then made the entire thing into a cuck joke wherein Jake being frequently drunk and sexually assaulted was funny because he wasn’t “man enough”. They then forced him to go back to his abuser after he left her in a scene that read very much like, “ridiculous man thinks woman is abusing him, go back and do your manly job”. 

This, of course, doesn’t even go into the travesty that is any form of trans representation in the comic. Roxy, a trans man, is barely even focused on as trans; they make no attempt to enforce in the fandom that he’s a trans man the way they do that June is a trans woman, and even then, they seem to think that just saying someone is a trans woman is actually good representation. Not, like, bringing it into the comic - just saying that it’s a thing. And of course, that’s not even going into the completely uncritical lense they have of Vriska, wherein her being a trans woman completely frees her of any and all blame for the past abuses she has comitted, and once again she becomes an amazing character to save the day without a single flaw - which in turn inherently associates trans women with abuse apologism, abusers, and the ideology that just because we’re trans we can get away with anything scott free. 

I honestly cannot think of one instance of good and genuine representation in Homesuck^2, nor can I think of any scene where negative content was actually treated as the negative thing it actually is. There’s no critical lense at all, not like we have in Homestuck; there’s just no fucking comparison. And this isn’t a one-off situation, either. Whereas Homestuck does do fuck ups - isn’t perfect - in between the otherwise brilliant content, Homestuck^2 is just founded upon these horrific takes. There’s almost no good content in between, and what is left is a slog to get through when surrounded by the thick slurry of shit that compromises futa Jade, abuse apologism Vriska, and victim blaming Jake. 

Of course, we didn’t “doxx” Hussie. Hussie actually listened to our complaints, for the most part, and worked with us to create something that worked well. The way Homestuck^2 was touted to work. You know, since it was meant to be written with the fandom in mind, influenced by the things we suggest and react to. We went into Homestuck^2 with the explicit idea that we were going to be listened to and taken into consideration when it was being written - the way we were with old Homestuck. I’m very sorry to say that, when you make these expectations, people are going to be a titchy bit upset when you then commandeer the entire thing and exclude the fandom from any of the process that you said they were going to be part of.

Additionally, it’s rather funny, isn’t it, that what you call doxxing is actually just people upset with how triggering content is being handled, and going to the people who actually wrote the content in order to voice their complaints? It’s almost as if social media exists to allow this communication between reader and author, which is a fundamental thing you’ll learn in any creative writing course, such as the one I’m on currently, wherein you’re actually taught how to respond to social media and to build up your image with your fans. 

Homestuck^2 is an ongoing piece of media. We’re well aware that we have a potential to change these uncritical takes and the horrific way they’re being handled if the writers will just listen to genuine criticism. This is, frankly, no different to the people who go to J. K. Rowling’s Twitter to tell her how harmful her transphobic comments are; because if she believes these things, they will work their way into her texts and will perpetuate harmful ideologies. 

The literal same thing is happening in Homestuck^2 - again, such as futa Jade, which normalises the point of view that bisexuals are cheaters and completely trivialises what it means to be trans, or Gamzee, which perpetuates just about every anti-black stereotype possible. Media does have a very powerful impact on what people see in the real world. This is why, for instance, positive black characters are so important in media; if they’re always portrayed as villains, then people will see real world black people as villains as the ideology is perpetuated to the point of fact. This is especially true if the people already believe in the ideology.

Fiction is one of the best ways that we can counteract this cycle. If you make a character that they like, and they happen to be positive representation, and then they watch more media that is likewise positive representation, it’s more likely to stick that these positive representations are the actual experiences of minority groups. Also? It’s important TO those minority groups. A black person, especially right now, doesn’t want to see an anti-black stereotype fuck a fascist, engage in sexual assult, and then enact pedophilia - only to die at the hands of a hero and be laughed at for the death. Surprisingly, shit like this is why we need to tell the writers that what they’re doing is harmful, that they’re perpetuating phobic ideologies, and that we need better representation - especially in a comic that is this widely read, and also has a very large minor fanbase. 

I shouldn’t need to explain why exposing minors to anti-black stereotypes, transphobic, homophobic, biphobic, abuse apologism, victim blaming, and the trivialisation of rape and sexual assault (especially towards men), might be a federal fucking issue. 

So, no, we’re not actually cyberbullying LGBT+ people. We’re trying to hold shitty writers accountable for the incredibly toxic and harmful ideologies they’re forcing into a text that has always been written with critical thought in mind. 

I should also point out how funny it is that you’re focusing on how some of the writers are LGBT+ - as if we’re not? I’m trans, I’m gay, and I’m ace. Yes, I can actually be these things and absolutely furious that a trans women is writing some of the most transphobic shit I’ve seen in a while into characters she then claims to be completely free of blame. We can be furious that people within our own community are enforcing negative stereotypes.

Being LGBT+ does not make them free from blame. We cannot give them a free pass to be racist, to be transphobic, to be homophobic, biphobic, to be abuse apologists, just because they’re LGBT+. Not only because that’s just a terrible fucking idea to begin with, but because it also reflects so, so badly on the community as a whole. As if being part of the community instantly means that you can do no wrong? As if there can be no toxicity within our own community, despite the fact that there very much is and it is still an issue to this day?

That is such an issue, one of the biggest issues even shown just in Vriska and the way Kate handles her as a whole - and, once again, is WHY we need to get them looking at this shit more critically. This view that LGBT+ people can do no wrong and cannot be criticised is shoved into Homestuck^2 and, once again, perpetuates the ideology. This isn’t something to be proud of. This isn’t something that’s actually okay.

Also, your point that the writers aren’t nice enough and that we disagree on fictional characters - well, I’ve already been over the second part. But for the first part, I would like to remind you that they aren’t just random LGBT+ people on the internet that we’re going to because we think their takes are a little shitty. They’re actual writers working on a piece of media. They are official content creators. 

Again, one of the first things you learn on any creative writing course is that when you become a writer, you gain a significant amount of responsibility for your interactions with the fandom. This is something that you genuinely have to expect, and if you don’t, then, unfortunately you just don’t know what it means to write something that thousands of people have a potential to read. As a writer, it is your responsibility to portray your image online; it is your responsibility to engage with the fans in a meaningful way; it is your responsibility to not cause drama and to listen when criticism is brought up, to have genuine discussion and not to perpetuate hatred - especially towards your own fanbase.

Consider, for instance, the way I’m talking to you right now. This is the sort of tone that someone should take when talking to a fan about genuine criticism. When things are brought up, you go over them step by step, you listen, you write back - you don’t go on a flurry of “fuck yous” to a minor who asked you why your team didn’t post anything about the BLM movement on the official Twitter, and you definitely don’t respond to every comment with genuine criticism with the word “pigshit”. You almost definitely don’t tell your trans masculine and masculine-aligned nonbinary fans that their opinions don’t matter.

As a writer, Kate and the rest of the team have a responsibility with their interactions with their fans. They aren’t just normal fandom voices anymore; they’re official fandom voices, voices that have more weight behind them than anyone else. They’re who people are going to turn to when it comes to anything regarding Homestuck^2. Their words now reflect literally everything about Homestuck^2, the future of Homestuck as an expanded universe, and the opinions of the group as a whole. They have to be careful with what they say. They have to be held to the same standards as industry voices because that’s essentially what they are - especially now that Homestuck is something you pay for. 

Also, this isn’t a point of the story not going the way I want. This is a point of many of people in the fandom being upset with how content is being handled, upset that their voices are being shut down, upset that triggering content is being laughed at or used flippantly and without care or respect. This is people being upset that trigger warnings were removed specifically to make the comic unsafe for them as a punishment for daring to say that something was wrong. This is people being upset that a piece of media that used to be so fucking good at portraying sensitive content in a critical light, that used to be so good at normalising LGBT+ identities and healthy representations of those identities, has suddenly turned to this. 

The story can go whatever way it wants - and frankly, that’s fine be my. What isn’t fine is that content is being used specifically to hurt and to incite.

And, of course, that final piece; nothing will improve if we don’t say that it’s wrong to begin with. Someone needs to voice the complaints of the fanbase, othrewise these toxic ideologies are going to go unchecked. One of the biggest things I’ve come to understand while making these posts is that a significant portion of the fandom feels isolated in their hurt; they don’t think other people feel the same way they do, and several people have mentioned feeling like they were going crazy because they were upset with things that the text and writers are normalising. It’s so important to make sure that these people know they’re not alone. It’s so important to make sure that our voices are heard. It’s so important to try and create critical discussion and debate over something that so many people still fucking love. 

The thing is, I don’t hate Homestuck^2. I actually really, desperately wish I could enjoy it. I wish I could read through it and theorise, could go in depth about how amazing the characters are, could write long and extensive posts on how creative and engaging it is - could even just go on about how interesting the Meat-Candy divide is, and all the points they’re trying to make about canonicity. But I genuinely fucking can’t. There is just so, so much wrong in the text that is completely unrelated to plot and to the overarching Point that makes it impossible for me to read, to want to read, to try to encourage other people to read. They’re things that literally don’t need to be in there, either; stereotypes and toxic ideologies and uncritical or badly handled sensitive topics that could be rectified so, so easily. 

Homestuck^2 could be amazing for a lot of the fandom. It could be something that we all rally around the same way we did for the original comic. For for a lot of people, it has ruined their fandom experience, has ruined their desire to want to read anything more to do with Homestuck, and has caused a significant portion of the fandom to just drop out entirely. That in and of itself should be a sign that this isn’t just a little fandom drama. That this is something much bigger and much more serious that, just maybe, needs to be looked into, talked about, understood - and, potentially, changed. 

[jonismitchell]

hey arden do you have any book suggestions? i don’t have any preference/specific genre i’m looking for but i just need something new to read while in quarantine :)

you’re in luck! i happen to be a massive nerd and i’m going to compile a gigantic list of recs for you. here we go.

the only classics worth reading: i want to preface this by saying i did not pick these books because they are written by women. they are just good and they happen to be by women. this reinforces my theory that only women can write.

emma by jane austen: better than pride and prejudice by a long shot. the characters are funny, the romance is swoon worthy (don’t think too hard about the age gap), it says very smart things about society, and i could write an essay on how it revolutionized fiction.

wuthering heights by emily bronte: my all time favourite book about how awful people are and how the cycle of abuse perpetuates itself. it’s absolutely exceptional in every respect. i won’t go into too much detail because i don’t want to give anything away, but you should definitely read this book.

jane eyre by charlotte bronte: i’m not saying i’m a bronte sister stan, i’m just saying i’m a bronte sister stan who can’t be bothered to take five seconds to copy the accent. anyway, i read this book when i was a wee lass and i stole it from an apartment in nice. the characters are genuinely amazing, and it’s an early feminist book, which i think is fantastic.

the handmaid’s tale by margaret atwood: you don’t get more feminist classic than this. set in a dystopian future where women are only valued for their ability to procreate, atwood examines gender roles and still delivers a brilliant adventure story. if you end up liking this, try the power by naomi alderman, which essentially tells of the opposite society.

the bell jar by sylvia plath: an introspective story about mental illness. it’s the type of writing that i feel hits hard at about any age, and i remember feeling really haunted after finishing the whole thing in a night. definitely high up on my list of amazing novels.

feel good books: sometimes, we need to read something that’s not revolutionary but still radical. don’t worry, i got you. here’s the lasagna of novels.

finding audrey by sophie kinsella: this book is funny, heartwarming, and makes you think. as someone with anxiety, i felt really represented by a lot of audrey’s behaviours. her mom is lowkey nuts, but i feel like that shouldn’t impede your enjoyment of the book.

the shadowhunters series by cassandra clare: LISTEN. objectively cassandra clare is a terrible person. objectively these books are not good. but they are amusing! they are comforting! they are interesting! also, there are a million of them. start with the infernal devices: clockwork angel, clockwork prince, and clockwork princess. set in old old london, this series features the only valid love triangle ever, girls who like to read and kick ass, and boys who are soft and play the violin. next, head to the mortal instruments, which is pretty much drinny fanfiction. don’t think too hard during these and you’ll have a good time. after that, read the short story collections the bane chronicles and tales of shadowhunter academy. if you got really into the lore (like me) these books are funny and a little captivating. finally, get to the highlight of this whole thing, the dark artifices. the one true love of my life, emma carstairs, stars in this brilliant trilogy about forbidden love. yes, it’s super corny, but all these books are super corny. if you can’t get enough of the universe (or accidentally got hooked) try out the collection ghosts of the shadow market. once you finish that, you can read the first books in the new series(es), red scrolls of magic and chain of gold. all of these books are jam packed with magic and vaguely plagarized demons. not brilliant, but a fun ride.

emma mills books: emma mills writes cute happy contemporary romances and i can’t recommend her enough! first & then tells the story of a jane austen obsessed nerd who crushes on a jock. which could actually be about me, and if you trust my judgement, you probably like me enough to read this book secretly written about me. foolish hearts gives theatre kids and boy band stans alike a chance to feel represented in what could be one of the sweetest (and funniest!) romances of all time. famous in a small town gives band kids and people who are clarinet-sized a chance to shine, and includes a country singer who struck me with her similarities to taylor swift. (our song is even referenced in the novel!) by far my favourite would have to be this adventure ends, which is hilarious and heartbreaking and talks about fanfiction without looking down on it. all of these books are definitely feel good and will make you believe in heterosexual romance.

mildly upsetting fantasy: just fantasy trilogies that will hurt you.

the poppy war by r.f. kuang: wonder what harry potter would be like if the magic system was complicated and the murder was high? no, like high on opium? and the plot was based on chinese military history? look no further than the brilliant work of art that is the poppy war. this book is by far the best fantasy out there, i cannot exaggerate that enough. also out is the equally compelling sequel the dragon republic, and the final book in the trilogy is set to hit shelves this year. please please please read this amazing book.

six of crows by leigh bardugo: six dysfunctional criminals try to steal from the most heavily guarded prison in the world. what could go wrong? this novel is intelligent and witty, and will keep you on the edge of your seat as you’re dragged into this scheming and brilliant world. in my opinion, this is the only valid book in the grishaverse. this and its equally well plotted sequel, crooked kingdom.

the gilded wolves by roshani choski: this one is definitely similar to six of crows in its funny and smart main cast. the magic system is super unique and the plot is endlessly enjoyable. it’s also set in old old paris! so france is always fun. there are also tons of mythology references and disaster bisexuals. and apparently the sequel (the silvered serpents) comes out july of this year.

scythe by neal shusterman: the first book on this list by a man, wow! i’m so inclusive. anyway, this genius trilogy is set in a world where humanity has solved almost every single problem, except overpopulation and corruption. an elite order called scythes are tasked with killing and managing the order of death. it’s like the hunger games went took a political science seminar. everything spirals out of control very quickly and the characters are so great. the sequels are called thunderhead and the toll respectively, and the overarching tale is gripping.

the cruel prince by holly black: i’m not kidding when i say this is the only faery book that matters. this book stars a human girl who grows up in the magical world and more violence than is statistically necessary. but it’s good! this is also a trilogy (every book on this list is the first one in a trilogy, i am the worst, i’m sorry) and the sequel the wicked king is quite possibly the best scheme-y magic politics thing i’ve ever read. and the final book, queen of nothing, doesn’t disappoint by a long shot.

contemporaries no one talks about

the boy who steals houses by cg drews: this book has autistic representation! and it’s written by book blogger paperfury, who is even more of a delight on the page than she is on the internet. be warned, this book includes heavy mentions of abuse and graphic violence that are unavoidable. but it will break your heart and stitch it back together again. also, waffles.

some boys by patty blount: this book deals very candidly with the aftermath of rape and public pressure. it is also one of my favourite books of all time for its treatment of ‘bro culture.’ and the heroine, grace, is incredibly strong. i read this book in maybe fourth grade? and it essentially inspired me to start giving a damn about social justice. so yeah, there’s that. (i also haven’t read it since fourth grade, so someone will have to tell me if it holds up).

emergency contact by mary choi: i’m rereading this for the second time right now and it’s still really awesome. it tells the story of an unlikely friendship, big dreams, and does it all through a really interesting narrative voice that manages to effectively capture two very different people. it is yet another romance, but it’s really wonderful and heartwarming. (unlike the other two books in this section).

children’s books that treat kids like people

a series of unfortunate events by lemony snicket: this is quite literally my favourite series of all time. it’s upsetting and kind of wrong once you think about it a lot, but it’s also maybe the best thing ever written. i literally cannot explain how much i love these books. there are thirteen books, so you’re definitely in for a good, long time.  

the mysterious benedict society by trenton lee stewart: three books about propaganda and smart kids and found family. i literally do not know what else you want out of a series. it’s fun and there’s only a little bit of kidnapping, so it’s very family appropriate compared to the other books on this list.

wuh luh wuh

the seven husbands of evelyn hugo by taylor jenkins reid: i KNOW no one shuts up about this book but you really should read it. like, there’s nothing that will ever top the narrative. the drama, the glamour, the girls who love girls, you know? all the components of a brilliant novel. it’s also got some truly poetic prose and genuinely beautiful moments. the reason everyone talks about this book is because it’s amazing. send tweet.

girls of paper and fire by natasha ngan:  (massive trigger warning for sexual violence)  haha! another violent fantasy book that’s part of a trilogy! thought you escaped that, didn’t you? this magic system is brilliant and the book is so good. it’s a breath of fresh air into young adult fiction. and did i mention it’s a wlw romance? i read this during a math class and had to go to the bathroom to cry when i finished it, because there was finally a heroine in a fantasy novel who i could see myself in. there’s also a sequel, girls of storm and shadow, that is equally amazing.

it’s not like it’s a secret by misa suigura: wlw girls with soft poetry vibes. complicated family lives. candidly dealing with racism, sexism, and homophobia. this book is really good. simply read this book.

i have even MORE book recs but i decided to cut myself off because this is the longest thing i’ve ever written for tumblr. hope you enjoy!

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Sudowrite

For the past couple weeks, I've been playing around with Sudowrite, Amit Gupta and friends' GPT3-based text generator for fiction writers. You give it it characters, plot summaries, dialogue or twist endings. https://www.sudowrite.com/ You can feed it part of a paragraph and it'll autocomplete it, and you can set a "vibe" for the autocomplete: Neutral, Extraordinary, Ominous and Funny. For example, some dialog autocomplete. Here's my prompt: "The following is a conversation between Masha and Marcus, who are arguing about whether programmer have a moral duty to ensure their code does not contribute to human rights abuses. "Masha: It's so easy to say that you should only work for good if you are a bro who can waltz into a job. "Marcus: Come on, who do you think is most likely to be on the receiving end of cyberwarfare? Hint: it's not wealthy white dudes who get hit with stalkerware or lawful interception code." Here's what Sudowrite adds: Masha: Sure, the privileged are the first targets for the digital equivalent of fire and brimstone. But even you have to admit that there are plenty of people who get hurt by our code every day. Marcus: What's your point? I don't see what's controversial about that. Masha: I'm not saying that people shouldn't fix bugs. But who are we to determine what constitutes a fix? When a programmer writes code that is responsible for cyberwarfare, or perpetuates rape culture, she's also part of that process. Masha: And when you're part of something that's broken, your choice is to fix it or you're part of the problem. Marcus: I don't have to agree with what someone's personal agenda is, but I think most people can agree that you should help when you can. Masha: I'm not talking about altruism. Marcus: You sound like an actual commie now. Masha: Lok, it's true that the general assumption is that all we should do is code and shut up. But what if there's a chance that that's a social pathology that we can correct? Marcus: Wow [Me again] This is pretty impressive. So far, Sudowrite hasn't helped me write anything, but I keep coming back to it, because this kind of machine language stuff is fascinating to see. Sudowrite's now open for public testing - there's a form on the site you can fill in to apply to get into the test. https://www.sudowrite.com/

[ellsss]

TW: rape and rape culture.

DISCLAIMER:

Before y’all come for me, I do not condone rape or sexual assault. I just think this take is BS.

Wildest Take 3: Aang kissing Katara in Book 3 in the invasion and the ember island players promotes rape culture and proves he’s toxic

Okay y’all, my thoughts on this is:

I’ve had it up to here with people politicising tv shows all the time!

I ship Kataang and I’ll always tell you how crazy this take is. I also think the whole Zutara being anti native thing is dumb so I’m not saying this just to “defend my ship”. Aang and Katara are freaking kids bro😂😂 Aang definitely wouldn’t have explored the whole consent conversation. I doubt that Katara would have either. He’s 12 and she’s 14.

Also, him kissing Katara the first time, was because he didn’t know if he was gonna come back alive or not, and that the invasion could have been the last time he would ever get to tell her he loves her, so he showed her non verbally.

As for the second time, Katara said she was confused, and Aang thought kissing her would give her more clarity. After Katara rejects the kiss and tells him she’s still confused, Aang responds, “I’m such an idiot”, showing that was the wrong decision. This kiss is the one that everyone mostly talks about being “rapey”. I still think this is dumb. He wasn’t kissing her to force himself on her, or assert his dominance over her to hurt her in any way. He thought that it’d help her with her potential feelings for him.

Like? What do you expect him to do. Say “I’m going to kiss you now” before he did it to get her consent? 😂😂 Hes not toxic for thinking it would help her with her feelings. I can understand some people saying he could have dealt with this better since it seemed like he was trying to rush the process. It was a selfish decision on his part. But him doing that isn’t going to make other people want to force themselves on women and it’s not promoting/excusing rape or sexual assault. Especially since he recognised that it wasn’t the right decision.

If anything it shows he isn’t toxic because he had enough self awareness to recognise it wasn’t a good choice. Also, Katara’s reaction showed that it put her in a weird position. It’s doing the exact opposite of perpetuating rape culture. Aang isn’t rapey for this 💀

I hear this same thing about Korra and the kiss with Mako and I still think it makes no sense because she kissed him out of emotion, she heard that he liked her back and her emotions came over her. It wasn’t because she was trying to be “rapey” and that isn’t promoting rape.... and he kissed her back!

[bigtittyhimmler-blog]

Who Goes Nazi? Brooklyn Edition

If you’re anything like me, a twenty-something Twitter leftist with an advanced degree in the humanities, you hate absolutely everyone around you and badly want to kill them. You live in a brownstone playground of Timorese food and adult coloring books, and you want to suicide bomb the L train but leave a note blaming it on manspreading or whatever, so people don’t think you’re one of “those” random mass murderers (the bad kind). You hate having to tell people at parties that you “work in content,” and you hate the fact that they all also work in content. You hate that they all make content for outlets that are slightly cooler and more prestigious than the outlets you make content for. You hate that none of them have even fucked you for like thirteen months. You hate that you can’t even hate them for the ways in which they’re different to you, because there aren’t any. But fear not! There’s one thing you’ve got that nobody else does: you know that you’re definitely, 100% Not A Nazi.

But what about them? Imagine if the Nazis took over America and it was suddenly cool and prestigious to be a Nazi, and there were trendy Nazis on the TV the whole time, and they once again sold soap with slogans like “Dove: The White Pride Soap for Hating QTBIPOC and Not Amplifying Their Voices.” But also don’t imagine, because that’s exactly what’s happening.

 This game was invented by Dorothy Thompson in her classic 1941 Harpers essay Who Goes Nazi?, in which she presciently pointed out that intellectuals are definitely more Nazi than aristocrats, but not nearly as Nazi as union leaders. But she set her essay at some dinner party in the Hamptons or wherever, and last time I went out there I went swimming in the sea and a wave hit me and I lost my bikini top and a bunch of bros in boat shoes started laughing and pointing at me in a way that despite my white privilege I still feel was somehow like imbued with racism, and then afterwards I just stayed inside for three weeks writing content and ordering groceries online, so the setting needs to be updated. Let’s look at your group DM. Which of these Twitter creatives who live in Brooklyn would go along with it and become a Nazi? (All of them.) And who never, ever would? (Me.)

 Mr A isn’t actually in your group DM, and you’ve never encountered anyone like him irl, but you literally can’t stop talking about him, so he gets included anyway. Mr A is a short ugly loser, and he’s already a Nazi. He doesn’t even live in Brooklyn, he lives in his mother’s basement, and eats chicken tenders, and he doesn’t get laid, but in a different way to the way you don’t get laid, which has to do with patriarchy. Mr A is a Pizzagate. Mr A is a Gamergate. Mr A is a segregationist. Mr A opposes the reforms of the Emperor Diocletian (284-305). Mr A won’t shut up about the superiority of a “free silver” bimetallic monetary system over gold specie, and keeps on talking about the “gold shills” in a way that doesn’t really make sense until you realize that your own name is Goldschmidt, and yeah, he doesn’t really care about expansionary monetary policy at all, he’s talking about the Jews, and specifically you. Mr A is basically a pathetic worm whose life sucks and nobody likes him, but also he represents the whole of the repressive forces of society and he’s at the top of the social hierarchy. Everyone you’ve ever met is actually Mr A, wearing various masks. He is the source of all your problems. He must be killed, and once we kill him, we need to find more people like him to be the source of any problems we have left over.

 Mr B is in your group DM, but you also have a separate group DM with everyone else except Mr B in it. He keeps trying so hard to be nice, and says stuff like “so how is everyone’s day today” with a smiley emoji, and when you’re talking to him you get this airless feeling like you’re about to suffocate in his treacly good-natured presence. Every time you see Mr B at a party you’re afraid that he’s going to blurt out that he loves you, but you can’t keep your distance too much because he’s so clearly autistic, and you don’t want to be ableist. Anyway once in the group DM he said that while he obviously thought divining for water with Y-shaped copper rods was good and important and valid, he didn’t understand what it had to do with socialism. That made everything better, because clearly he’s a Nazi. The whole group DM expended hours of emotional labor educating him about how dowsing is part of LGBTQ+ culture and how his dismissive bro-y attitude was reactionary and gross, and eventually he posted a video of himself crying and begging for forgiveness and promising to do better, because you guys were the only friends he had. This was classic white fragility, but in the end you let him stay. You just have the other DM now, where you make fun of him and it’s ok, because if the Nazis came and he had license to start being cruel and sadistic to other people, he’d definitely do it.

 Ms C is one of those women who doesn’t like other women, and you know this about her because you can’t fucking stand the bitch. Plus she says stuff that’s really not ok, even though it costs nothing to have empathy and be kind. You’ve personally heard her use the D-word, the H-slur, and the L-pejorative, all while laughing and holding a glass of white wine by the stem, like she doesn’t need to consider the harm this does to others, just because she’s “funny” and “an artist.” She’s the Cool Chick. She makes nude self-portraits (the bad, skinny kind), and she’d throw you under the bus in a second for male attention and approval. She’d definitely go Nazi. But the worst thing about her is that she has the impudence to be bisexual and Asian, which makes it really hard to call her out. But then you realized that all Asian people are collectively responsible for the long history of anti-Blackness and misogynoir in their communities, and you’re thinking of holding her collectively responsible for the Rape of Nanking too, once you’re certain she’s a sushi Asian and not the dim sum kind.

 Ms D’s boyfriend works in finance, or like accountancy or something, or I think I heard he was a musician? Maybe a drummer or possibly he used to bartend at a place where they had live music. Anyway they definitely have vanilla cishet sex in the missionary position and you can’t stop thinking about it, his body, her body, naked, moving, breathing, together, almost silent, tender, disgusting. She says she’s a socialist but doesn’t devote every minute of her waking life to getting mad about people online. This means she’s just vaguely following a trend, and if the trend were being a Nazi (which it is), she’d be a Nazi (which she therefore is). You can’t imagine yourself actually hitting her but it’d definitely be punching up to maybe poison her food?

 Mr E used to be a comrade, but then he did a tweet that got 38.6k RT’s and now he’s moved to Los Angeles to spend his whole time in writers’ rooms. Last you heard he was pitching an animated show for adults about a snail with borderline personality disorder. It hasn’t even been greenlit yet, but you’re already thinking about all the ways in which it will be a missed opportunity and do harm and perpetuate tropes. Mr E will definitely turn out to have been a Nazi, and then you can start an anonymous petition to get the show cancelled so he has to move back to New York. Once he’s back you can send him a long email about how much it sucks his career burned out and how (even though you won’t say it in public) sometimes people do actually take the social-justice thing too far. That way he’ll be a comrade again, which is good, because we believe in rehabilitating people who have a genuine change of heart.

 Mr F probably thinks he’s better than you. He’s a union organizer. So are you (you added “#Unionize” to your Twitter name), but his union stuff involves workers who aren’t in tech, content, or grad school, and he probably thinks that makes him more in touch with “the real workers,” who he probably thinks are just a bunch of cis white males in a factory, who are probably all racist and probably have thick, heavy dicks that intrude on your mind in a kinda #MeToo way a lot of the time. He talks about class, and you agree that class is important because you’re not a lib (you support Bernie, you just want him to Do Better). But from the way he says it you’re certain he doesn’t acknowledge all he/him lesbians as part of the working class. He’s trying to save a tiny sector of the workers from a necessary and important socio-economic shift that will impoverish them and make their lives worse, and that’s what being a Nazi is. This is why his union needs to stop dragging their heels, change all of their rules and priorities, and let you get him fired.

 Ms G (me) will never go Nazi, because she is beautiful and kind and pure, and has all the good opinions instead of the bad ones. Because of this she’s allowed to do things that other people can’t do. She can totally fail to understand what having an authoritarian personality actually means, and construct a version of the Who Goes Nazi? essay in which the people who go Nazi are just people who are already right wing, having confused politics with personality, probably because she herself has no personality other than her politics. She can minimize, ignore, or even encourage the infliction of actual suffering when it happens to the wrong kind of people. She can write that “nothing that terrible has really happened” since the publication of Mark Fisher’s Exiting the Vampire Castle, even though Mark Fisher himself is mysteriously not around to appreciate that fact. She can do some shit with threatening to leak an unedited draft that I don’t even want to go into. She knows that the Nazis don’t come promising hatred but promising to be your friend, but it’s ok because she doesn’t really have any friends, just mufos. She’s doing great. She’s building a better, kinder world. She will never, ever be the Nazis.

[full-moon-phoenix]

Honestly I don't understand why people are saying that the She-Ra reboot is SJW it literally has nothing to do with toxic feminism and doesn't even try to hate on men which most SJW shows tend to do in fact it does the complete opposite it respects both the male and female characters and makes all the characters unique and multi layered from their designs and personality the show really talks more about relationships and how to handle abuse, the characters just happen to be female in majority

People really just want an excuse to hate on diversity. Or modern shows in general. Mainstream fandoms and Hollywood culture consume all kinds of toxic masculinity, brutalization of women, perpetuation of rape culture, shameless male self inserts, and mindless dude-bro wish fulfillment fantasies chock full of guns and explosions, but have a female wish fulfillment show with different body types and sexualities and suddenly it's "pandering to sjws" and "trying too hard".

[novacorps]

let’s talk about the REAL origin of the KKK and how it mirrors the birth of the alt-right

The KKK probably didn’t actually start as a racist thing but became a vehicle for it.

It basically started because this group of young professionals who probably never owned slaves (think the college educated alt-right of today) and basically got bored and decided to make a secret fraternity for shits and giggles. “It would be secret, to heighten the amusement of the thing, and the titles for the various offices were to have names as preposterous-sounding as possible, partly for the fun of it and partly to avoid any military or political implications.” And they recruited people to join and hazed them just like a fraternity. 

For fun, they disguised themselves in sheets on horses and road through the streets. It caused such a stir, they were like YO?? This is fucking awesome we’re causing so much shit trolling everybody

So, they started adding weird shit to the costume.

They’d wear animal horns, fake facial hair, polka dots, reflective material, satin, sacks over their head (think Victorian Halloween costumes), black/red face (which was commonly used to hide your face at the time and make it seem like they were black and native americans were the ones committing crimes), and often colorful robes and women's dress. Basically these guys were literally just out here straight up looking like something straight out of The Purge meets someone’s Mardi Gras fursona. like they went either went HARD or they had a fucking sack over their head going yo i’m TOTALLY in the kkk

fun fact: there was so much crossdressing that in accounts of people describing them, they were sometimes like I THOUGHT THEY WERE A BAND OF WOMEN??? and a lot of times their victims recognized them because they were wearing their wives dresses

At some point, they decide to scare blacks for shits and giggles because they thought they were easy targets and afraid of ghosts. "Much of the Klan’s early reputation may have been based on almost frivolous mischief and tomfoolery. At first, a favorite Klan tactic had been for a white-sheeted Klansman wearing a ghoulish mask to ride up to a black family’s home at night and demand water. When the well bucket was offered, the Klansman would gulp it down and demand more, having actually poured the water through a rubber tube that flowed into a leather bottle concealed beneath his robe. After draining several buckets, the rider would exclaim that he had not had a drink since he died on the battlefield at Shiloh. He then galloped into the night, leaving the impression that ghosts of confederate dead were riding the countryside.” 

some quick history: “Back in those days planation owners had little log cabins built around in a circle, around for the slaves. And the log cabins, they dabbed between two logs, they dabbed it with some mortar. And of course when that falls out, you could look out and see. But every, most every night along about eight or nine o’clock, this overseer would get on his white horse and put a sheet over him, and put tin cans to a rope and drag it around. And they told all the slaves, ‘now if you poke your head out doors after a certain time, monster of a ghost will get you.’ they peeped through and see that and never go out. They didn’t have to have any guards.” Fry said such disguises meant to scare slaves were common and that the first Klansmen, knowing this, naturally chose similar uniforms, often embellishing them with fake horns and paint around the lips and eyes.

black people were like........ lmao bruh. we don't actually believe in ghosts?? but we believe white people can be fucken crazy. because who the fuck wouldn’t be unsettled by a bunch of weirdos riding up in masks looking like the pre-war slave patrols riding around on horses who would literally fucken shoot you if you left ur cabin. let’s just take a moment to appreciate that white slave owners’ solution for making sure slaves didn’t run away during the night was the same logic as adults trying to scare their kids into staying in bed so they can go get nasty: stay in bed or the GHOSTS will get you

“The whole rationale for psychological control based on a fear of the supernatural was that whites were sure that they knew black people. They were not only firmly convinced that black people were gullible and would literally believe anything, but they were equally sure that blacks were an extremely superstitious people who had a fantastic belief in the supernatural interwoven into their life, folklore, and religion. Such thinking had obvious flaws: the underestimation of black intelligence and the overvaluation of existing superstitious beliefs. Blacks were frightened, no doubt, but not of ghosts. They were terrified of living, well-armed men who were extremely capable of making black people ghosts before their time.’

alright so. at the time (reconstruction, or just post-civil war), the southern states are passing these new laws (black codes) that basically went: go fuck yourself poor whites and blacks, you’re not getting any of our power and WHILE WE’RE AT IT let’s just virtually re-enslave blacks (e.g. blacks can't assemble in groups, have guns, learn to read and write, testify against white people, etc. and forreal spouting a lot of the same white nationalist ideas as the alt-right today. they were like: “we hold this to be a Government of White People, made and to be perpetuated for the exclusive benefit of the White race" and driving a wedge between poor whites and blacks. 

which begs the question of like bro. why weren’t poor whites and blacks out there looking like that handshake meme hating rich whites in power?? and that’s because poor whites and blacks were usually poor in very different ways so that they were at best tentative allies. Poor whites typically owned land but usually not the other resources that would have allowed them to exploit their land intensively. blacks needed social services because like they were out there like drake starting from the bottom. so, the rich white dudes in power were like heeeey poor white people you know if we give blacks these programs... we gotta tax ur land that you’re already struggling to hold onto and reap benefits from. there’s clearly NO OTHER OPTIONS. so you’re at this point in time where not only do you have this racism where a lot of white people think they’re better than black people, the north going guys can u please play nice and let the black people have some rights?? and the south being like U CAN’T TELL ME WHAT TO FUCKEN DO, but ALSO a lot of growing resentment from poor whites about black people making their lives harder. and if we’re learned anything from history, this is the PERFECT environment for white, racist extremists to THRIVE (e.g. illegal immigrants are taking our jobs! we need a muslim ban!). 

SO. back to the kkk. Everyone thought the KKK was SO. FUCKING. WEIRD. they talked about it constantly locally. and it got outta control.

stuff like the night riding QUICKLY started getting out of hand. “Anyone could put on a sheet and a mask and ride into the night to commit assault, robbery, rape, arson or murder. The Klan was increasingly used as a cover for common crime or for personal revenge.” 

so suddenly all these racist extremists and people with who could become extreme (same logic as liam neeson who who said he wanted to kill some black bastard after hearing his friend was raped by a black man) ... like there’s a growing place for them to meet and exchange ideas and make each other worse. so all these people and groups on the fringe start associating themselves with the kkk and using the kkk as a way to connect with people who also wanted to do terrible things. 

the klan has, perhaps unwittingly, just accidentally organized extremists who might never have otherwise been able to organize like that

“Describing the actions of Ku Kluxers who marched in a Mardi Gras parade in Memphis in 1872, after conservative Democrats regained power, a newspaper writer reported that some of the marchers carried ropes. “It was a favorite bit of pleasantry to lasso a negro,” the writer noted. “No violence was offered but the contortions and grimaces of the captives were highly amusing.” The public pain and fear of these victims of Klan “pleasantries” offered visual confirmation that order had been restored in the South. Besides being fun for the perpetrators, performance also had a cloaking quality. As Parsons writes, “Klansmen used performance for reasons that lay far beyond any hopes of obscuring their identities or cowing their victims.” By making their violence appear theatrical, Klansmen could essentially confuse authorities, who would take time to decide whether the perpetrators were joking. Performances also misdirected outside audiences (like Northerners), who might have trouble figuring out what the Klan was all about. “The Klan was conceived in a tableau vivant, nurtured by minstrels and serenaders, housed by circuses and masquerades, and given an afterlife in Mardi Gras processions,” Parsons writes. All of that playing with current forms of popular culture meant that Klan violence confused observers—especially white Northerners, who were fans of minstrelsy, too, and quite ready to laugh at a black person who was the butt of a joke.”

but like?? it’s just for lols right? it doesn’t necessarily mean those guys were RACIST or they were ALL racist. that’s just the kind of edgy humor everyone was DOING at the time. “In a painful irony, circuses and minstrel shows, which had provided the theatrical vocabulary for acts of Klan violence, included Klan-themed skits in their programs; these representations then provided cover for the Klan, who could continue to claim to Northern observers horrified at the violence that the Klan was an imagined entity.”

and then like. it really fucking starts going fucking down. you start having a “few bad apples” doing shit like burning black churches and schools (exactly like what’s happened with dylann roof, attacks on synagogues, shooter in new zealand). 

journalists in the north are losing their goddamn mind and reporting on it because the kkk is just SO. FUCKING. WEIRD. and how can you not? people are dying and saying they’re associated with the kkk which are doing... what again? these weird dudes dressed up like they’re going to mardi gras??? c’mon. THOSE guys? that’s a bit of a stretch to blame the KLAN for that. 

in fact, the north was so obsessed, the klan became TRENDY in the north. northerners would dress up as them at costume parties and have KLAN APPRECIATION GROUPS. sometimes ironically, sometimes not.

so the klan becomes a recruitment tool for those people. just like geek culture and youtube became a tool for radicalizing and recruiting white men.

"By making their violence appear theatrical, Klansmen could essentially confuse authorities, who would take time to decide whether the perpetrators were joking. Performances also misdirected outside audiences (like Northerners), who might have trouble figuring out what the Klan was all about."

SO. There’s a website online called Stormfront which is a is a white nationalist, white supremacist, antisemitic, Holocaust denial, neo-Nazi Internet forum, and the Web's first major racial hate site.  In addition to its promotion of Holocaust denial, Stormfront has increasingly become active in the propagation of Islamophobia. They use controversies like GameGate, places like 4Chan, Reddit, and YouTube to convert people. Often, people will meet and interact with neo-nazis without even knowing it. 

“I think one of the real things that made it so difficult to get out and realize how radicalized I’d become in certain areas was the fact that in a lot of ways, far-right people make themselves sound less far-right; more moderate or more left-wing,” Sherratt said.

Sherratt wasn’t alone. YouTube has become a quiet powerhouse of political radicalization in recent years, powered by an algorithm that a former employee says suggests increasingly fringe content. And far-right YouTubers have learned to exploit that algorithm and land their videos high in the recommendations on less extreme videos. The Daily Beast spoke to three men whose YouTube habits pushed them down a far-right path and who have since logged out of hate.

Here’s a couple highlights from Stormfront:

[birdsy-purplefishes]

I have MANY thoughts and feelings about Midsommar.

Okay I saw Midsommar last night and it was an experience. So this post is probably going to be long and rambling and it is definitely 100% for-sure going to contain some spoilers. I’m gonna put a whole lot of it behind a Read More.

First, though, I want to say that while I thought this film was great it is definitely one of the most disturbing things I have ever seen. I went into it knowing almost nothing--and honestly I wouldn’t have been prepared even if I had read spoilers--and that was the ideal way to see it for me but there are many triggering things and some very problematic things in this film. I’m gonna try to be vague as possible but you might not not to watch this one if anything from the following list is something you can’t handle. That said: I am very easily disturbed by a lot of things and I found that this film was so bizarre that I never really felt like I couldn’t finish it. It’s... kind of weirdly selective about which gruesome stuff it shows and what it doesn’t. The most terrifying things to me were implied things and I didn’t realize them until after it had ended. Somehow... miraculously... this film didn’t come across as gore/torture-p*rn to me. So Trigger Warning / Content Warnings for this movie: Violence, blood, gore, horrible suffering. Sex, nudity. Mental illness and stigmatization/perpetuation of harmful myths about mentally ill people. Suicide. Ableism. Racism. A rape scene that I think most people didn’t even realize was a rape scene because it’s bizarre and left somewhat ambiguous. Emetophobia triggers. Body horror. A whole lot of drugs. Squicky grossout stuff. Emotional, psychological, and religious abuse. 

There’s probably other stuff I forgot. Basically everything horrible is in this movie. It was definitely worth it but it’s a hard watch.

Okay, now for spoilery stuff.

The backstory shown in the first few minutes is incredibly disturbing. Dani’s bipolar sister murders their parents and kills herself. It’s graphic. It’s disturbing. It definitely portrays suicide in a negative light, which is pretty much good, but: can horror movies stop perpetuating myths about mentally ill people?! This stuff is damaging! It makes mentally ill people out to be monsters and then ignorant people treat them worse. It makes mentally ill people feel like there isn’t any hope for them! This part sucked a lot. The only interpretation of this that isn’t awful is the fan theory that there are clues in the background that suggest that the cult may have actually framed Dani’s sister but that’s kind of a stretch. None of the other foreshadowing in the film is as subtle as the supposed hints that the cult fabricated the whole thing so I doubt it.

The foreshadowing is actually super obvious. It’s the typical horror film where the characters have no idea what’s going on & you’re like “DUDE GET OUT OF THERE!” the whole time. People on the subreddit are pointing out all kinds of foreshadowing and even the tapestry at the beginning shows you who all of the characters are and like 90% of the story.

Dani’s boyfriend, Christian, sucks. His friends suck. There’s a lot of macho bullshit and they’re just cold and dismissive. And the boyfriend’s a manipulative little leech. You hate him so much! I found myself hoping that she’d kill them all except maybe the cute friendly Swede. Basically the entire movie he’s gaslighting and dismissing her and his friends talk shit about her constantly. It’s the typical “oh, women are irrational and over sensitive” macho bullshit. Like to the extent that all of them know about the murder-suicide of her entire family but none of them try to fucking shield her from seeing the suicide ritual. Not even the guys who know damn well what it is going into it!

The fact that they’re all anthropology majors and they go into it with a sense of cold detachment and an insistence on cultural relativism (or utter obliviousness) and it makes them total assholes wasn’t lost on me and I’m glad that someone went into detail: https://slate.com/culture/2019/07/midsommar-graduate-students-villains-ari-aster.html 

The bros say something about him dumping her and finding somebody who “actually likes sex” and there’s a lot of interpretations to that, none of which are less than horrible. Like does he try to pressure her into doing stuff she doesn’t want to? Probably! Like whether she has emotional or physical sexual dysfunction isn’t discussed and that’s kind of brilliant because even if she does have issues it’s not her fault at all and the dudes are g a r b a g e for even suggesting it.

The cute friendly Swedish dude (Pelle) who was the only one to be kind to Dani at all was actually the worst manipulator of all! He’s totally luring her in! He’s love-bombing and manipulating her! He literally “draws” her in. He does some forced-teaming shared-trauma bullshit. I gotta say though: I fell for it! I wanted her to dump the guy for him! I’m almost surprised that she didn’t fall for it. I think it’s more due to the fact that she’s traumatized and grieving than anything.

The most disturbing thing about the guy, though, is that I can’t decide if he does all of this because he’s evil or because he’s genuinely a true believer and believes with all his heart that he’s doing good things. That will haunt me forever tbh. Just... always watch out for guys who want to “save” you. They are the scariest fucking abusers.

The whole cult is love-bombing her, actually. The whole film is like Cult Tactics 101. They find a vulnerable young woman who’s lost everything. She doesn’t feel a sense of love and belonging anywhere. She has no support system unless you count her garbage basically-sociopathic-but-aloof boyfriend who really doesn’t count. Pelle hand-selected her because she’s the ideal cult brainwashing candidate. He’s seen firsthand just how much shit she takes from Christian and how she’s constantly falling for his gaslighting and tolerating him mistreating her. I was actually kind of disturbed at how many women I saw online reacting to the cult saying it was empowering or matriarchal. It’s not at all! The first elder we see leading things is female but the ones handling the book and enforcing the rules are men. I can only recall two women elders who do much of anything and they’re both just prominent parts of ceremonies. They’re announcers/performers. They’re definitely complicit but the men are behind the scenes controlling it. And look at the sex ritual! There’s no real emphasis on female pleasure and it’s all being a good little brood mare. It’s a performance. And small babies are kept away from their mothers to be raised communally. They send the mothers away from their babies! Even the May Queen role sucks if you think about it for even a second. The whole “we’re a family” thing is just creepy as hell. There’s even a lot of foreshadowing to it that I missed, like the guy who greets her shaking the mens’ hands but saying “welcome home” to her. Said guy also calls his traditional garb “girly” when Dani compliments it, btw! And of course the division of labor is patriarchal. The clothing is patriarchal too.

The mental health ableism stuff is bad but there’s ableism based on physical disability as well. Arguably it’s supposed to condemn the cult for fetishizing disabled people and promoting incest to deliberately create disabled people but... it still comes across as “look at this deformed kid” and it’s fucked up.

I can’t tell if the movie is trying to show us that the cult is racist or if the movie itself is racist. They kill off the three non-white outsiders pretty quick. Was that classic horror movie “the black guy dies first” bullshit or was that supposed to be like “look, these seemingly peaceful and loving people are xenophobic and racist and there’s a reason why all of them are super duper white despite bringing in outsiders”. Like I came out of the film definitely convinced that it’s no coincidence that the blue-eyed blonde chick gets singled out as special by these people.

It made me really uncomfortable to realize that the sex ritual is technically a rape scene. We get clues that Christian goes into it voluntarily to some extent, sure. When he knows that girl (and she does look like a young girl!) is trying to seduce him we don’t really see his reaction but he doesn’t seem to refuse outright. He seems ambivalent until he's offered the drugs but then he hears that they’ll make him lose his inhibitions, looks at the girl, and gulps the liquid. He saw it as an excuse to get away with cheating and he took it. But that doesn’t change the fact that he’s drugged when he actually agrees to the sex. He’s tripping the whole time. He’s being pressured and prodded and even literally physically manipulated. He’s out of it. The girl seems kind of out of it too. It’s really fucked up. But like it’s so weird and you’re so mad at him for everything shitty he’s done to Dani that you’re just like what?! But when you think about the fact that he’s drugged and you see the way he’s horrified after he realizes what he’s done... it’s horrific. He was violated.

I like that we see just how viscerally traumatic it is to be cheated on. Dani vomits, collapses and wails. And our sympathies are with her.

The cultists imitation of their members’ suffering is actually deeply disturbing and a huge aspect of the love-bombing thing, especially for Dani. She goes from being barely held by her expressionless piece-of-shit boyfriend while she wails to having a whole bunch of women replicate and act out her suffering. They do this too at the botched suicide and the final scene. They even kind of do it when she fails to eat the fish. It kind of looks communal and empathetic but it’s a feigned empathy. It’s another way that people in the cult lose their own personal identities. Nothing is yours there! Not even your suffering is yours.

To be honest... I went to see this film ‘cause a lot of the reactions to it were women gleefully enjoying seeing a shitty boyfriend suffer a horrible fate. I’m always down for misandry and cinematography! BUT... this was just excessive. The boyfriend is a total bastard. He did kinda need to die tbh. But he basically gets tortured to death. It’s made pretty explicitly clear that it’s horrific. They make no effort to mercy kill him like they did to the elderly guy whose jump failed to kill him. And like... the actor even gets it. The guy’s a scumbag and he doesn’t give a shit about anyone but himself. He even backstabs Chidi From The Good Place! But what happened to him is just awful.

The director and the lead actor actually disagree about the ending! Ari Aster says that Dani knows what she’s doing when she condemns Christian to die. Florence Pugh says she’s out of it.

I say it doesn’t actually matter whether Dani chose to kill Christian or not or what her motive was. Honestly it might have been a mercy killing given the state that he was in! Like maybe it was revenge for her and maybe the cult did it to make her feel empowered but it sucks being forced to choose who lives and dies. It sucks that some creepy cultist basically stole her man. It’s the whole “a pedestal is the same as a cage” thing for sure.

Last thing I can think of for now: I’m very surprised and more than a little distressed at all the people--especially women--who see this as a happy ending for Dani. Sure, it’s kind of a dark fairy tale revenge fantasy. But she’s objectively worse off than she is at the beginning of the film! She’s brainwashed and trapped! Like... I forgot where I read this now but basically Aster says that she goes from with one gaslighter to being with an entire cult of gaslighters! What do you think is gonna happen to her in the future?! She’s gonna have to live with her dead boyfriend’s baby that he had with some rando chick if that fertility ritual worked! She’s gonna have to live in a shitty commune. She’s gonna have PTSD 5ever from everything that happened. It’s honestly a tragic and horrible ending.

I’m... still processing this. I know I’m gonna end up adding to this. Feel free to chime in and discuss it with me! This movie was just Intense. BONUS LINKSPAM: Good Takes And Shit!

https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2474518/jordan-peele-says-midsommar-has-the-most-atrociously-disturbing-imagery-hes-ever-seen

https://themuse.jezebel.com/boy-problems-whos-got-em-midsommar-does-1835878652

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/alisonwillmore/midsommar-ari-aster-florence-pugh

https://www.vulture.com/2019/07/the-end-of-midsommar-ari-asters-last-minutes-explained.html

https://www.vulture.com/2019/07/the-end-of-midsommar-ari-asters-last-minutes-explained.html

https://www.npr.org/2019/07/03/738422258/midsommar-shines-a-solstice-nightmare-unfolds-in-broad-daylight

EDIT: Also!!! This film?! Somehow is a comedy! It’s funny as fuck and I’m definitely going to hell for laughing!

[rapeculturerealities]

On Nov. 1, when the Los Angeles Times first published allegations of sexual misconduct against Brett Ratner, Sil Lai Abrams thought, "Russell's next."

Abrams, 47, is an author and domestic-violence activist who, like many accusers in the hectic aftermath of major exposes about Harvey Weinstein, felt an urgent need to speak out. She had already told her own story of not one but two alleged sexual assaults — 12 years apart — in her 2007 book, No More Drama. But she had not dared to use real names.

Then everything changed. Abrams felt emboldened by the #MeToo movement to reveal that "Ronald," described in the book as "well known for only dating models and for his hard-partying lifestyle funded by his very successful record label," was Russell Simmons, who Abrams alleges raped her in 1994. "Well-spoken B-list celebrity Ray," who Abrams says assaulted her in 2006, was A.J. Calloway, a host on the entertainment show Extra, which is produced by Warner Bros. and airs in major markets on NBC owned-and-operated stations. Both men deny the allegations.

Events unfolded as Abrams had predicted: The Ratner stories were soon followed by claims against his close friend, Simmons. On Nov. 19, model Keri Claussen Khalighi accused Simmons, now 60, of assaulting her in 1991, when she was 17, while Ratner looked on. Writer Jenny Lumet then wrote a guest column in The Hollywood Reporter detailing her own allegations of sexual abuse by Simmons, after which he stepped down from his various businesses. At this point, more than a dozen women have accused Simmons of rape or assault.

By the time Khalighi came forward, Abrams had already made contact with a journalist. On Nov. 2 — the day after the Ratner allegations were published — Abrams approached MSNBC host Joy Reid, a professional acquaintance who Abrams knew because she had been a guest on Reid's show speaking about domestic violence.

"I needed to tell my story, to say his name out loud, to let people know what he had done to me," Abrams says. And she had allegations not just about Simmons but about Calloway, which she believed would dispel "this one-and-done idea of assault." Many people experience more than one attack in their lives, she explains, but "it's just not spoken of."

Reid started to dig into the story. In mid-December, MSNBC's standards and legal departments began putting Abrams through a grinding vetting process. She responded to their requests, providing documents from years earlier, including several court orders issued in New York against Calloway. She supplied contact information for sources who could verify aspects of her past, including some who had been told of the alleged assaults in the immediate aftermath.

In January, Reid taped an on-camera interview with Abrams at MSNBC's New York studio. But a process that had begun in December dragged on frustratingly for weeks and then months. At times, Reid texted or emailed Abrams about her sense that the network was "slow walking" the story with "stupid" requests. Finally, in April, Abrams says Reid told her that the network was no longer responding to her queries as to when the segment might air.

MSNBC's decision to pass on the story came in the midst of the Time's Up movement, even as other publications and outlets were revealing allegations of misconduct against high-profile men at an unprecedented pace. It also occurred amid heightened scrutiny of NBC News (MSNBC president Phil Griffin reports to NBC News chief Andy Lack) in the wake of the NBC's decision to let go of what became Ronan Farrow's Pulitzer Prize-winning expose of Harvey Weinstein. (Farrow has promised to reveal the backstory of his experience at NBC in a forthcoming book.)

NBC also has been criticized for its handling of the Billy Bush-Donald Trump Access Hollywood tape — a story that ultimately was broken by The Washington Post. And the network has faced questions about its own internal culture. In the wake of allegations against Matt Lauer, NBC exonerated itself after conducting its own "culture assessment" without hiring outside investigators. (Deborah Rhode, a gender expert and director of the Center on the Legal Profession at Stanford Law School, said of the probe that "experts think the best practice is to hire outside investigators.")

Asked about MSNBC's handling of Abrams' story, a rep for the news division responded with a statement: "When MSNBC pursues any investigative story our mission is always to be as thorough as we can, to scrutinize sources and corroborate information before we report. Anything else falls short of our journalistic standards." A spokesman added that NBC News had enlisted seasoned investigative journalists to assist Reid and certain aspects of the story did not meet its standards. The Hollywood Reporter has conducted its own investigation of Abrams' claims.

The network also provided a statement from Reid. "Investigative reports like these take time, and not surprisingly, sometimes journalists get frustrated as well," the statement reads. "I inappropriately shared that frustration privately with Sil Lai. I completely respect MSNBC's standards and practices. Meticulous research to get the facts right was the only option, especially given the seriousness of the allegations."

At this point, Abrams says, her story is not just about her claims against two high-profile men but about the hurdles she has faced in trying to coming forward. Despite the wave of post-Weinstein accusers and the Time's Up moment, Abrams believes "the system is working as it always has. Stories are being silenced and it doesn't matter how much information, how much corroboration and evidence that you have. You can do everything the right way and you'll still be shut down because a news organization doesn't want to take a risk and face a potential lawsuit, which perpetuates the abuse of power and empowers men like Simmons to say they're going to be OK."

read the full story here

[khattikeri]

on the toxicity of anime fandoms: an essay

I don't really like anime fandoms. Unless I really like a show, I don't engage in them. 

Tumblr is a bit of an anomaly because of all the LGBT people who use the site, but the rest of anime fandom (on sites like Twitter, Reddit, 4chan, MAL, Crunchyroll, etc.) tend to not share the same overly liberal viewpoints, and especially tend to promote toxic ideas. 

For one thing, there's JK culture. JK stands for joshikousei, or high school girls. All those cutesy childlike moe high school girls with short skirts and sailor uniforms? They perpetuate pedophilia and normalize the prostitution of high school girls (which is a legitimate thing in Japan that older men can do-- pay for a high school girl to "perform services" for a given amount of time.). Even if the "services" are seemingly innocent things like hanging out at a cafe instead of sex acts, it's still horribly inappropriate and creepy for grown ass men to be demanding this of high school girls, and equally so for anime communities to accept and normalize it as though it isn't essentially a form of normalizing child prostitution as if the fact that it's young high school girls in school uniforms instead of elementary schoolers makes it okay.

Continuing along the lines of JK culture is the blatant acceptance of pedophilia as an ordinary form of sexual attraction. Ironically or unironically, the fact that ‘lolicon’ and ‘shotacon’ are words in an average anime fan's vocabulary is disgusting to say the least. When every small, innocent young girl is referred to as a loli, it brings great contempt to my heart, because that right there is the anime community saying that they accept pedophilia and pedo culture.

It is an acceptance of child abuse, child sex abuse, and rape. It paves the way for allowing child prostitution and ignores the fact that millions of young girls suffer at the hands of gross pedophiles every day. It is truly disgusting to see grown anime fans being either turned on by the mere existence of young children, often elementary school age, or laughing at the idea of these young children being used as a pedophilic otaku's sex toys and fap material. 

I mentioned earlier that Tumblr tends to be far more liberal than other anime fans, especially in regards to LGBT headcanons and the like. This brings me to my next point: fujoshis and homophobes. Two disgusting sides to the same disgusting coin. Complete opposites, and they both ire me to no end. On one hand, there are fujoshis who perpetuate rape culture through their vehement support of yaoi (mlm relationships usually written and consumed by straight women; sex-ridden power fantasies that almost always include dubious if not outright lack of consent and rape). They both diminish the reality facing LGBT people in Japan and worldwide, and cause homophobes in particular to lash out more when faced with a potential LGBT relationship in their precious favorite series.

Homophobic anime fans are quick to be grossed out by the idea of a healthy, canon, non-fetishized LGBT relationship; both by the relationship itself and the people who ship them. Shipping wars are always annoying, but even more so are those homophobic fans who insist that everyone is straight and cisgender. Two male characters can only be “bros” and friends-- but to them, that doesn't apply once it's two girls; then it's yuri and they get to masturbate over the thought of two cute underage girls being "naughty" with each other. Going even further are the fans who claim that they aren’t homophobic while still disparaging healthy LGBT relationships by calling it “unrealistic” or “fujobait”. How ironic, all of them!

Even if an anime fan isn't either a homophobe or a fujoshi, they are still exposed to homophobic ideas, and eventually come to the wrong conclusions regarding LGBT people because of how they are depicted in anime and talked about in online fandoms. In other words: both homophobic anime fans and fujoshis allow rampant homophobia and other discrimination towards the LGBT community to continue in real society by allowing it through fandom.

Speaking of power fantasies, there are plenty of those present in popular shounen and shoujo series, and all of those involve the same thing: women being subjugated or abused by men. In nearly every shounen out there, women take a back seat in order to develop the male character. Many of the women (or more typically, high school age girls) are designed solely to look cute or sexy, dressed provocatively and used as fanservice. Damsel in distress tropes aren't always bad, but when nearly every female character is used as fodder for a man's character development and hardly has a personality of her own, it tells young people and anime fans two things: one, that men need to be dominating, and two, that women cannot and should not have agency. This continues the cycle of sexism within society as well as leads to the fetishism of Japanese people and Asian people as a whole by western communities.

In shoujos, this sexism is also reinforced. Most stories involve a young girl who eventually falls in love with a boy who displays aggressive and/or abusive tendencies. These portrayals of abusive relationships with terrible communication as “romantic” leads to women continuing to be used by men and mistreated by society in general. When anime fans -- most of whom are either women who have long since been indoctrinated into believing that their abuse by men is normal, or men who see women as lesser beings-- watch these things, they continue to view the world through a sexist rose-tinted glass, and perpetuate the themes they see as a societal norm through discussion of it in their online fandoms. In this way, shounen and shoujo manga and anime allow sexism and the objectification of women to persist both in society and within anime communities. 

It’s worth mentioning that while these themes are all normalized by western anime communities, they are also widely embraced by Japanese otaku as well (who are frowned upon in mainstream Japanese society). Although Japan and America are still countries rampant with sexism, it is rather telling that the true nature of otaku and weeaboo culture in anime fandom are things that aren’t even considered acceptable by layman’s standards.

This is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the toxicity that anime fandoms bring. It is because of all of this that online anime fandoms are in general not enjoyable for me, nor will I ever feel comfortable engaging in their discussions. Too many western anime fans and fandoms embrace pedophilia, sexism, and homophobia-- things that a decent amount of Japanese citizens consider to be gross otaku culture*-- as a norm. Even if these western fans personally don’t believe that those are good things and are being “ironic” by laughing and joking about them online, they are serious matters that affect the world we live in, and I can’t accept anyone who would act as if perpetuating toxic ideas like these are in any way okay. 

footnotes: *homophobia and sexism are common in Japan, yes (as they are in many other countries, as well). They are not typically viewed as solely being part of otaku culture, but it should be known that Japanese otaku tend to take these things to the extreme, which is considered shameful and disgusting to most people.