#The algorithm can only be blamed for so much

[thesimselfsworld]

Ngl I don't get the point of following someone and then not interacting with their posts in any way like why did you follow in the first place

[rpwprpwprpwprw]

jungkook in multiverse: fanfics recommendation 💌

Your neighbour? Spiderman? Best friend? Husband? Idol? Your dead ex? Yeah, he can be that guy.

ps: thank you authors! love you guys. so much. your stories means the world to me <3 (like this is art piece! no joke

jungkook masterlist.

🌟miss taken by @junghelioseok | fluff | smut | teacher!au | single parent!au | e2l | completed

summary: you pride yourself on being a professional, but sometimes your students' parents really test your patience.

my review

🌟clandestine by @junghelioseok | smut | fluff | brother’s best friend!au | completed

summary: forbidden fruit tastes the sweetest.

my review

🌟 see both sides like chanel by @michuga | best friends to lovers, sexual tension, fluff, reader is a little absentminded, jk is a damn tease | completed

summary: your best friend, jeongguk, has only ever dated boys. unbeknownst to you, (he was also into girls).

my review

🌟 LATE NIGHT KOO 01:15 by @guksfairy | dabble, jungkook x reader | completed

my review

🌟 dream encounter by @michuga | jungkook x reader | completed

summary: you meet the man of your dreams. literally.

my review

🌟 heartwave by @chrrybbmb | spiderkook!, spideyjungkook, spideykook, spideyjk, spideykoo, spideyjk | ongoing

my review

🌟 i love you — a compilation by @kissforyouu | compilation of cute, funny and delicious stuff | completed

my review

🌟 peach and vanilla lip balm by @httpknjoon | genres | fluff, crack,  secret relationship au, established relationship au, friends to lovers au | completed

summary: No kissing rule was made between you and your secret boyfriend when he learned how you got your lip balm. But can Jungkook win in this rule he probably brought to himself?

my review

🌟Third Time's the Charm by @jjungkookislife | ex-boyfriend!jungkook x ex-gilfriend!reader | genre: crack, exes to lovers | completed

summary: Jungkook will do whatever it takes to get you back.

my review

🌟Inevitable by @ahundredtimesover | Genre/Tags: exes au, parents au, baseball player!JK; angst, fluff, smut (18+) | completed

summary:  You convinced Jungkook to break up years ago so he could pursue his lifelong baseball dream. Now he’s back home, staring at you, and the little boy next to you who looks unmistakably like him.

my review, my review, my review

🌟to be loved is to be seen by @twilghtkoo | pairings. idol!jungkook x reader | genres/aus. fluff, established relationship, idol!au | completed

my review

🌟 checkmate by @kookie-krumbss | genre : fluff, angst and smut | pairing : photography major/ bartender jungkook x econ major/ accountant reader | ongoing

summary: It's been 5 years since you've last been on the dating app - checkmate. The premise of the app is quite simple: enter your bucket list, and the algorithm finds your best mate to check off your bucket list goals. With a free premium pity membership given by the app, maybe its time to hop back onto the dating scene.

my review, my review

🌟está dañada by @aquagustd | genre/rating — R | angst, fluff, smut | neighbor au, slow burn, singer!JK | completed

summary: life through the eyes of someone who watches you fall apart and helps gather the shards of your heart, only for you to make the same mistake time and time again, but he refuses to accept the truth because to him, you’re infallible.

my review

🌟 the jeons (gym daddy) by @justarkive | family!au, non.idol jungkook, girl!dad jk, fluff | ongoing

summary: a collection of chaotic family drabbles. thats it.

my review

🌟Blame Morpheus for your sins by @voitier | [mini-series!] friends to lovers, college au | ongoing

summary: 𝒾𝓃 𝓌𝒽𝒾𝒸𝒽... you and jungkook had been attached by the hip since you were little toddlers learning how to live in your own bodies, which led you two to spend most (if not all) of your life together. one weird dream makes your whole view about your best friend change. how will you live with that?

my review

🌟the lunchbox delivery by @jincapableoflove | genre: househusband! jungkook, corporate office worker! reader, established relationship, flufff | ongoing | drabble

summary: jungkook, your soft yet badass househusband, goes on a city-wide mission—apron and all—to deliver the lunch you forgot in your morning rush.

my review

🌟shameless by @kooktrash | genre/au: gym instructor!y/n x jungkook. infidelity au. obsessive [she/her. afab] yandere | completed

summary: unsatisfied with your current relationship, you find yourself swept into an affair with a regular at your gym. it turns out he’s not the sweet, charming man you fooled yourself into believe he was but for some reason, you keep going back to him.

my review

🌟long way home by @sparklingchim | genre: dilf!jungkook, friends to lovers | tropes: single dad jk, boxer!jk, !angst! | completed

summary: jungkook's life makes an 180 degree turn when he's suddenly a single dad and while you're trying to help him come accustomed to the new circumstances, your long-standing friendship takes new turns as well.

my review

🌟Assistant Boy by @httpjungkookcom | Genre: assistant boy!jungkook x desk receptionist!reader, smut | completed

summary: Summary | sitting pretty at a desk all day gets boring, dealing with minimal tasks and check ins. you're unbelievably excited when a new assistant joins the office. and said assistant is a pretty boy with an even prettier personality.

🌟 lovenotes by @voyter | neighbor au. secret admirer koo | completed

summary: trying your hardest to avoid valentine’s day, you suddenly find yourself at the center of it when a secret admirer starts leaving notes at your door.

🌟 Baby Girl by @euno11a | Pairing: DILF!Jungkook x PreSchool Teacher!Reader | ongoing

summary: You always gave yourself one rule, never fall for a single dad. It would be messy and you’d never be his number one. So why did your favourite kid’s dad have to be so hot?

🌟 Broke Boy, Fake Girlfriend by @aajjks | genre: 18+, crack, roommate au | fake dating \ completed

summary: Your annoying roommate, Jungkook’s shameless fake dating act goes hilariously wrong when he thinks he can charm you into paying for his café splurge, but you turn the tables with some dangerously sweet flirtation.

🌟Dentist appointment by @hellokittykookies | genre: fluff | completed

summary: you’re scared of the dentist and jungkook comes with you to cheer you up. Unexpected words come out of you after the appointment.

🌟Instagram by @jeo9n | genre: fluff, slow burn, friends to lovers | ongoing

summary: you’ve been texting jungkook on instagram non stop ever since he opened his account as a joke. but what you didn’t expect was for him to actually text you back.

🌟NO NUT NOVEMBER by @voyter | boyfriend!jk | completed

summary: jungkook and his friends are all in on the internet's most ridiculous trend: no nut november. but you’re determined to make your boyfriend lose — and you know just how to do it.

🌟Introvert by @avianyuh | completed

summary: Jungkook is an introvert. He enjoys seeing his friends, but he hates having to leave the house. When Jimin throws a birthday bash, Jungkook being one of his closest friends feels obligated to go. He has his whole night mapped out. He'll greet Jimin, eat some food and then leave once he's made small talk with the other guests. But when the party makes a detour and hits the club, Jungkook is plotting his escape route. Or at least he was until he met you.

🌟Winter things by @girlygguk | genre fluff, smut | golden retriever bf x black cat gf, long distance established relationship | completed

summary: it’s jungkook’s favorite time of year and the only thing on his list is you. getting to finally feel you, see you, meet you outside of his computer screen. now it’s happening. and, god, you’re even prettier in person.

🌟Hot Eve by @aajjks | smut, ex!boyfriend!jk | completed

summary: getting fucked raw by your ex boyfriend stuck in an elevator on Christmas Eve.

🌟NOT JUST ON CHRISTMAS by @girlygguk | genre established relo, college au, fluff, smut | pairing nerdy!jk x gf!reader | completed

summary: he's the first boy you've ever brought home for christmas. jungkook's nervous. you're horny.

🌟Inkling by @gguksgalaxy | AU: Tattoo Artist ›› Genre: Smut / Angst | completed

summary: Jungkook is your brother’s boyfriend’s co-worker, they own a tattoo and piercing parlour. In other words, he’s tall, gorgeous, has his passion literally etched into his skin, looks incredibly good in a man-bun, and is semi-unattainable for you. Why? Well…you’re not entirely sure but him ditching right after a very heated make-out session sure isn’t a good sign. His extremely poor mood the next week sure isn’t either, but the only way to fix it is to face the beast head-on. Right?

my review

🌟Better Than Him by @margotw10bis | roommate!Jungkook x reader | Genre: fake-dating; romance; smut; one-shot | completed

summary: When your boyfriend cheats on you and decides to bring his lover to the wedding you invited him to, you take vengeance by pretending you have a new boyfriend: your hot roommate.

[were--ralph]

why exactly do you dislike generative art so much? i know its been misused by some folks, but like, why blame a tool because it gets used by shitty people? Why not just... blame the people who are shitty? I mean this in genuinely good faith, you seem like a pretty nice guy normally, but i guess it just makes me confused how... severe? your reactions are sometimes to it. There's a lot of nuance to conversation about it, and by folks a lot smarter than I (I suggest checking out the Are We Art Yet or "AWAY" group! They've got a lot on their page about the ethical use of Image generation software by individuals, and it really helped explain some things I was confused about). I know on my end, it made me think about why I personally was so reactive about Who was allowed to make art and How/Why. Again, all this in good faith, and I'm not asking you to like, Explain yourself or anything- If you just read this and decide to delete it instead of answering, all good! I just hope maybe you'll look into *why* some people advocate for generative software as strongly as they do, and listen to what they have to say about things -🦜

if Ai genuinely generated its own content I wouldn't have as much of a problem with it, however what Ai currently does is scrape other people's art, collect it, and then build something based off of others stolen works without crediting them. It's like. stealing other peoples art, mashing it together, then saying "this is mine i can not only profit of it but i can use it to cut costs in other industries.

this is more evident by people not "making" art but instead using prompts. Its like going to McDonalds and saying "Burger. Big, Juicy, etc, etc" then instead of a worker making the burger it uses an algorithm to build a burger based off of several restaurant's recepies.

example

the left is AI art, the right is one of the artists (Lindong) who it pulled the art style from. it's literally mass producing someone's artstyle by taking their art then using an algorithm to rebuild it in any context. this is even more apparent when you see ai art also tries to recreate artists watermarks and generally blends them together making it unintelligible.

Aside from that theres a lot of other ethical problems with it including generating pretty awful content, including but not limited to cp. It also uses a lot of processing power and apparently water? I haven't caught up on the newer developements i've been depressed about it tbh

Then aside from those, studios are leaning towards Ai generation to replace having to pay people. I've seen professional voice actors complain on twitter that they haven't gotten as much work since ai voice generation started, artists are being cut down and replaced by ai art then having the remaining artists fix any errors in the ai art.

Even beyond those things are the potential for misinformation. Here's an experiment: Which of these two are ai generated?

ready?

These two are both entirely ai generated. I have no idea if they're real people, but in a few months you could ai generate a Biden sex scandal, you could generate politics in whatever situation you want, you can generate popular streamers nude, whatever. and worse yet is ai generated video is already being developed and it doesn't look bad.

I posted on this already but as of right now it only needs one clear frame of a body and it can generate motion. yeah there are issues but it's been like two years since ai development started being taken seriously and we've gotten to this point already. within another two years it'll be close to perfected. There was even tests done with tiktokers and it works. it just fucking works.

There is genuinely not one upside to ai art. at all. it's theft, it's harming peoples lives, its harming the environment, its cutting jobs back and hurting the economy, it's invading peoples privacy, its making pedophilia accessible, and more. it's a plague and there's no vaccine for it. And all because people don't want to take a year to learn anatomy.

[ohnoitstbskyen]

... y'all know Lae'zel is acting scared, right?

Video transcription: I've seen a lot of comments on my short about Lae'zel dismissing her entire character because she's mean and… I'm just checking in here… you guys know she's scared, right? She's terrified. She was kidnapped by the worst monster she knows, infected with the most horrifying death anyone in her culture can have, and then stranded on a hostile world, alone, with nothing to guide her except the dogmatic military cult indoctrination of a cruel lich demigod, telling her that her only hope of salvation is to follow Gith doctrine with total unyielding faith. And still she tries to save you. When she keeps insisting that you must get to the Githyanki crèche, it's our only hope, she's trying to guide you towards the only salvation she knows from the parasite, so she can share it with you. And Gith... aren't supposed to do that, saving an outsider is not part of the doctrine, she's breaking the rules trying to do right by you. None of that means she's not being an asshole, she's rude, dogmatic and unpleasant. But everything she does comes from a genuine, very misguided and abrasive, desire to do the right thing. It doesn't make her behaviour okay, but there is more to her character than just "being the mean one."

To expand on this a bit more than I can in a 60 second short, people acting from fear and from their damage is a major theme among the Baldur's Gate 3 companions.

Lae'zel is terrified and falling back on the only thing she believes will give her back some control over her situation, which is the dogma of the military cult she's in. Shadowheart is much the same, amnesiac and grasping on to the only solid thing she knows, which is her faith, which preaches deception, loss and duplicity as the only certain factors in life.

Gale is an inveterate people-pleaser desperately dependent on other people to help him feed his magic addiction, with his overtly affable exterior hiding a rolling boulder of guilt, ambition, greed, arrogance and legitimate hurt. Asterion is... well, no way to really lay out his deal without spoiling, but the boy has been through it and his self-destructive, hedonistic and selfish impulses are all coping mechanism and self-defense all the time.

None of that make their shitty behaviours okay, but in a fictional story, those kinds of flaws and toxic behaviours are what make for interesting stories and characters. I don't blame anyone for finding Lae'zel unpleasant and abrasive, but I do get a bit Old Man Yells At Cloud about people who casually brag about shoving her off a cliff-side, or murdering her because "she was a bitch" or whatever.

Like... being unable to face discomfort in your media is not a virtue, and lashing out reactively against fiction that doesn't validate your power fantasy isn't a flex.

Of course, I saw a lot of those reactions in YouTube comments and on social media, so my sample is biased by those algorithms, but still. A lot of people seem aggressively proud that they never engaged with her story because the terrified indoctrinated child-soldier wasn't immediately nice to them and I can't explain it but something about that reaction feels puritan to me.

[glowettee]

your dream life is jealous of how much time you spend doomscrolling.

hey sweethearts!! mindy hereeeee, so i've realized something… like how we're all literally addicted to our phones?? and how our dream lives are sitting somewhere in the corner of our minds, pouting and wondering why we never hang out anymore??

i had this moment last week where i realized i'd spent THREE HOURS scrolling through videos of people organizing their fridges (which like… is satisfying but also?? what am i doing with my life). and then i had this thought that actually shook me: what if my future self could see how i'm spending my time right now? would she be proud or would she be like "girl… what are you DOING?"

the truth is that our phones are literally engineered to be more interesting than our real lives. they're designed by actual geniuses who understand our brain chemistry better than we do. it's not a fair fight!! and yet we blame ourselves for not having "enough willpower" which is honestly just mean??

✧ why we're all trapped in the doom-scroll cycle:

our phones deliver perfectly timed dopamine hits (the happy brain chemical!!) that make us feel momentarily good but leave us wanting more

the algorithm knows exactly what will keep us scrolling (it's literally studying us)

our brains are wired to seek novelty and our phones offer infinite novelty

real life has friction and requires effort; scrolling requires zero effort

we use our phones to escape uncomfortable emotions that actually need processing

the comparison trap makes us feel like we're "researching" our dream life rather than building it

i realized something that changed everything for me: the time i spend consuming other people's lives is time i'm not creating my own. and like… that's the whole game??

✧ how to break free (in ways that actually work):

identify your "scroll triggers" - for me it's when i feel anxious about my work, when i first wake up, and weirdly when i'm hungry?? once you know your triggers you can create little alternate pathways

create "phone-free zones" in your home - i have a little basket by my front door where my phone goes when i come home, and my bedroom is completely phone-free (i bought an actual alarm clock like it's 2005 and honestly?? life-changing)

practice the "dopamine pause" - when you feel the urge to reach for your phone, pause for 60 seconds. just sit with the discomfort. often the urge will pass, and if it doesn't, at least you're making a conscious choice

redesign your home screen to be boring af - delete all social apps from your home screen, make everything grayscale, turn off all notifications except calls/texts from actual humans who matter

schedule specific "input" and "output" times - block 30 minutes for consumption and 90 minutes for creation. your ratio should always favor creation over consumption

try "analog hour" before bed - read physical books, write with pen and paper, stare at the ceiling and let your mind wander (this is where all my best ideas come from tbh)

use the "future self" visualization - whenever you're about to fall into a scroll hole, close your eyes and visualize your future self. what would she want you to do with this precious hour of your life?

create ✧ focus-core ✧ routines - these are deeply satisfying rituals that give your brain the same dopamine hit as scrolling but actually build toward your dreams (for me it's making fancy coffee while listening to a specific playlist, then writing for 45 minutes)

practice "productive procrastination" - if you absolutely must avoid your main task, have a secondary important task ready (like if i don't want to write, i'll organize my study materials instead)

implement the "touch it once" rule - when you pick up your phone, have a specific purpose and do ONLY that thing, then put it down

the hardest truth i've had to accept is that there's no magic hack that makes this easy. creating a life that's more interesting than your phone requires actually building that life brick by brick, day by day. and the beginning is SO HARD because your brain is literally withdrawing from its favorite drug.

but i promise you something magical happens after about two weeks - you start to feel… different?? more present? more alive? and you realize that all along, the life you were searching for in your phone was waiting for you to look up.

your dream life is waiting for you to stop watching other people live theirs and start building your own. it's jealous of your phone, yes, but it's also patient. it knows that eventually, you'll come home to yourself.

xoxo, mindy 🤍

p.s. if you catch yourself scrolling after reading this, please don't feel bad!! just gently put your phone down, take a deep breath, and remember that you're breaking a literal addiction. be kind to yourself through the process, okay? tiny steps in the right direction are still steps. 💗

[musings-of-a-rose]

Hi, just wanted to say that I love your work! Especially with Benny and Frankie so much that I have an idea for Benny! Female reader (not picky about the name) meets Benny at a bar days after she catches her now ex-boyfriend cheating on her and they hook up at his place, but she leaves before he wakes up. She later finds out she's pregnant but doesn't tell anyone who the father is. Months later while still pregnant, her friends convince her to come with them to see a MMA fight and low and behold Benny is there fighting. He doesn't see her at first, but when the fight ends (which he wins) he sees her and she leaves abruptly while hiding her stomach since she's wearing baggy clothing. However, Benny manages to catch up to her, where she reveals the news to him. They then talk some more at her place where he reveals to her that she's been on his mind ever since that night and begins the start of something new.

One Night Can Change Everything

Pairing: Benny Miller x f!reader 

Word Count: 6400+

Rating: Mature - 18+ ONLY!

Warnings: Just like ao3, “creator chooses not to use warnings.” If you click Keep Reading, that means you agree that you’re the age to handle mature themes. Also by clicking Keep Reading, you understand warnings may not be complete in order to avoid spoilers for the story. 

Notes: Rea is a general nickname for a “reader” character that @mermaidxatxheart came up with and I think that’s genius! This is not beta’d.

**If you want to be added to the taglist, join here or let me know!

❤If you enjoy the fic, please consider giving me a warm beverage! (It is not required in any way!)

→Tell Tumblr this should be shared with others by reblogging! That's what the algorithm loves (it's how it works here. I don't make the rules!)

**Reader is not described

Main Masterlist

Benny Miller Masterlist

“Ok, that’s it. I’m making you get out of this bed now,” My best friend Sage declares as she towers over my bed, where I have lived for the past several days. Ever since I caught my boyfriend sleeping with my co-worker. Co-workerS.

Ex-boyfriend now, I suppose. 

I groan, attempting to roll over but Sage grabs my shoulder and flips me back over, digging her fingers lovingly into my skin. “I love you Rea, I do. But you have to get out of this bed. He’s not worth it.”

She’s right. I know she is. But we had been dating for nearly 2 years, mostly. It was on and off, but we had talked about marriage, kids, all of it. I thought he would be my forever but apparently, I was his “for now”. 

Fuck this asshole.

I sit up quickly, nearly colliding with Sage, and yank the covers off me, determination flooding my veins, choking out the hurt. For now, at least. 

“Alright, alright. I’m up.”

Sage points to the bathroom. “First, please take a shower. Then we’re going to Mick’s.” 

I’d almost forgotten about Mick’s, Sage’s favorite bar. Probably because it’s full of rugged, blue-collar men and Sage definitely has a type. Not that I can blame her. 

“Ok, but I’m just going for you. And science.”

Sage snorts. “Sure, Rea. Sure. Don’t forget to shave.”

—--------------

An hour later and I’m walking into Mick’s front door, loud music vibrating through me. It’s busy, but I’ve seen it busier and we manage to snag a couple of stools at the bar. Within 10 minutes, Sage is led to the dance floor by some burly lumberjack, complete with flannel shirt and all. I throw my hand up in the air in a “what about me” motion as she glances behind her, shrugging and gesturing around the room before focusing all of her attention on the flannel clad bear of a man in front of her, who is surprisingly agile. I turn back to the bar, taking my hand off the top of my glass, tossing the last of the liquid down my throat, coughing slightly at the burn. I set my glass down, my finger trailing along the rim, wondering if I should call an Uber or wait for my friend, when a man slides in next to me, flagging down the bartender. 

“5 beers, please.” His voice has a slight drawl to it, his tone warming me all over. 

“Seems a lot for one man.” Where the hell did that courage come from?

The man, clad in a button up light blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up that opens to reveal a camo print shirt, turns his head to me and for what feels like days, I’m rendered speechless. This man is gorgeous - a sloping nose,  sandy blonde hair that flips out from behind his backward hat, some patchy facial hair, and the most intensely blue eyes I’ve ever seen. They glance quickly down my body and back up, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. 

“Ain’t all for me, sweetheart. Got a table full of impatient assholes waiting for a beer.”

I cock my head to the side. “You lose a bet or something?”

The man tips his head back and laughs, his shoulders shaking with it and I feel my body tingle. I could listen to that sound forever. 

“How the hell did you know that?” His smile is wide, all of his attention on me, his eyebrows raised in question.

I shrug. “I’d send the guy who lost a bet to get the first round, at least.”

He chuckles. “Smart girl…I’m Ben. Friends call me Benny.”

I tell him my name. “But my friends call me Rea.”

“I like that. Nice to meet you, Rea.” He sticks his hand out to shake mine, but before I can, 4 beers slide in front of him and he glances down at them, his shoulders dropping ever so slightly. 

Finding courage from somewhere, I lay my hand on his forearm and have to resist squeezing. “You have to go back so soon?”

He smiles again, the skin around his eyes crinkling with it. “Nah, sweetheart. I’ll be right back. Promise me you’ll wait right here?” There go the eyebrows again, pulling together and making him look like a puppy. Fuck I am so screwed.

“I’ll be waiting.”

He hesitates for a brief second before taking my hand and kissing the back of it. “Now that’s something to make a man move fast.” He winks, grabs the four beers, and heads off into the crowd, making his way towards the back of the room. Hate to see him leave, but damn I’m loving watching him go, his 6’3 frame easily visible over the crowd. He drops off the beers somewhere at the back of the room, turning quickly to push his way back through the crowd, his eyes locking on mine and giving me a sly smile. 

“You waited.” He slides back into the barstool next to me as I pull my leg from it, the universal gesture for this is saved.

Fuck his eyes are so blue. “You came back.”

A smile plays at the corner of his lips. “Did you think I wouldn’t?”

I look down for a moment, my mind going back to my ex and all of his cheating, making me feel less than. Benny seems to sense something, his large hand hesitating a moment before he gently squeezes my arm. “You ok?”

I shake my head, my eyes locking back on his blues. “Yeah. I’m great now you’re here.”

Benny is easy to talk to, fun, and flirty. He���s in Delta Force, or was, with his actual brother, one of the men that he’d owed a beer to earlier. We talk about everything and anything, Benny eventually pulling me to the dance floor and whisking me about, sometimes dancing and other times being silly and smiling when I laugh. After several songs, we need a break, managing to snag a couple of stools at the bar, sipping on a couple of drinks. 

“So you live local?” He asks me, taking another swig from his beer.

I nod. “Yeah. I don’t typically come here, but my friend Sage dragged me out of the house.”

“Well remind me to thank her. She here?”

“Actually,” I turn and look out at the crowd for several moments, finally seeing her in the back corner, making out with Flannel Bear Man. I chuckle. “Yeah, she’s a little occupied.”

Benny chuckles, taking another swig of his beer, his free hand hesitating a moment before landing on my bare thigh, just above my knee. “Well I can keep you company.” 

His warm hand against my skin has my brain short-circuiting. I can’t think of what to say so I return his question. “Are you local?”

He nods, his thumb slowly rubbing circles across my skin. “Yeah. But some water main or somethin’ broke in my building. They put us all up in hotels until they fix it. Burst a few pipes.”

“Oh no! Is your stuff ok?” I place my hand over his on my leg, giving it a little squeeze and move it further up my thigh, heat immediately rushing to an area not far from where his hand is. 

He clears his throat. “Uh, y-yeah. Well, I had some water damage but didn’t lose anythin’ big. They just have to put down new floors.”

The music volume suddenly goes up by several volumes, turning the place into a mini club. Benny winces and I can see that it triggers him, the loud sounds and people becoming a little much. I lean in closer to his ear, gently rubbing circles into the back of his hand. 

“It’s too fucking loud! Wanna get out of here?” I pull my head back to look at him, our faces only an inch apart. His eyes flit between mine, briefly pausing on my lips.

“If you’re sure, hell yeah.”

I smile and he returns it before I lean back into his ear. “Let me flag my friend down and let her know. Stay right here so I don’t lose you.”

He turns his head, his nose brushing against my cheek. “I’ll be right here.” Hating that I have to move, I gently place his hand on his thigh and give him a wink before turning, scanning the corner where I had last seen Sage. She’s still there, Flannel Bear Man sucking on her neck. I force my way through the crowd and eventually emerge in front of her. Sage’s gaze takes a moment to settle on me.

“Rea! Where’ve you been?” She yells above the music.

I gesture to where I came from. “At the bar. Waiting for you.”

She gasps as Flannel Bear Man starts to bite her skin. “S-sorry, Rea. I-”

I cut her off, not wanting to intrude any longer. “No worries. I’m getting out of here. With a guy. I’ll get an Uber.”

Sage reaches out and grips my wrist, breaking the suction from Flannel Man who only seems to just realize I’m standing here. 

“A guy? You found someone? Do you need condoms?”

“Sage! I have to go!”

“Wait!” She pulls her clutch from somewhere and digs around in it, quickly sliding a few foiled square packages in my hand. “ Remember, it’s just a rebound. Don’t get attached. Have fun and be safe!”

I can’t help the heat in my cheeks, but I tuck the condoms in my bag. “Thanks. I’ll ping you my location.”

Sage releases my wrist and smiles at me before I turn back to Benny, shoving my way through more bodies on the dance floor. I emerge on the other side and see him still sitting where I left him, hat turned backward and looking so fucking hot. 

This is all so unlike me, but I like Benny. Sage’s words echo through my head “it’s just a rebound. Have some fun.”

I walk up to Benny and he turns his head, standing and giving me a wide smile. “Ready to go, sweetheart?”

I nod and he offers me his hand, which I happily accept, his touch warming me all over as he guides us through the crowd and out the front door, the volume immediately decreasing the moment the door closes behind us. 

“Now I can hear myself think!” Benny chuckles as he pulls my hand to his lips, lightly brushing them against my knuckles, his puppy dog eyes on mine. “Did you drive?

“Hhhm? Oh, uh no. Uber.”

Benny nods. “I have my jeep. I can drive us somewhere? Unless you’d feel safer using Uber?”

I study him for a moment, deciding that I trust him. “I love Jeeps.”

He smiles, his grip on my hand tightening slightly as he directs me to the parking lot, chatting a little too fast about his Jeep, like he’s nervous. He helps me into the passenger side, sliding across the hood to make it to the driver’s side quicker, smiling at my laugh. He starts the Jeep and gets the ac started before turning to me.

“Where to?”

It’s just a rebound. Have fun. “I’d love to see your hotel.”

His eyebrows raise, that same smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Yeah? You don’t have to. I mean, we could just get a burger or somethin’.”

I look down at my hands in my lap. Did I misread the signals? He was definitely coming on to me, right? I wasn’t reading into that? Before I can spiral further, Benny puts his hand over mine. “Hey, look. I like you and think you’re fucking hot as hell and would love to take you to my room to uh, show you the room. But I don’t want to presume or make you feel obligated or anything.”

I would choose a fucking gentlemen for a rebound. Fuck. I close my hand over his and meet his eyes. “Thanks, Benny. I don’t want to push you or presume either.”

He chuckles once, removing his hand to put his Jeep in reverse and then back into drive. “Sweetheart, you can take advantage of me any day.”

That breaks the awkwardness and has us laughing, falling back into conversation easily as Benny navigates through traffic. Gently, I lay his hand on my bare thigh again, wrapping my hand over his. He’s talking about something, I honestly can’t focus because he’s started to move, his fingers tracing slow lines across my skin as his hand moves further up my leg, getting closer to where I desperately want him to be. We hit a red light and the Jeep goes quiet, Benny turning to look at me as he slides his hand further up, his pinkie finger just barely tracing the crease of my thigh, heat and wet pooling just beyond his touch. My lips part and I let out a gasp of air, my eyes finding his. 

There’s a moment of hesitation but then I grip his shirt, pulling him towards me, our lips crashing together. He nips at my bottom lip and I gasp, Benny taking full advantage to slide his tongue into my open mouth, a small moan escaping me. His free hand leaves the steering wheel to grip the back of my head, holding me to him as he explores my mouth. The car behind us honks and we jump apart, the light having already turned green. Benny sticks his hand up to apologize to the car behind us, driving on, but immediately places his hand back on me, this time, his pinkie grazes up my panties and I squirm a little in my seat, not used to this much attention. He stills his movements.

“Is it too much?” He’s actually concerned.

“More like, not enough.”

Benny makes it to his hotel in record time.

Heated touches and kisses down the hallway has Benny dropping his room key a few times. As he tries to jam it into the lock, I slide my hands around him from behind, moving up his stomach from under his shirt and fuck he has a nice body, my hands moving lightly over his toned chest. He finally jams the key into the lock and flings the door open, tossing his keys on top of the dresser. He spins back around to face me, his eyes blown wide and dark with lust. 

He swallows hard. “Are you…are you sure?”

I step close to Benny, gently take his wrist and turn his hand palm up. One hand still holding his, I open my bag and fish out one of the foil squares, and place the condom in Benny’s hand. He glances down at it before looking back at me, a smirk playing at the corner of his lips.

“Rea, did you get a condom from your friend?”

I can feel the heat blooming in my cheeks. “No! I mean, technically yes but she-”

He cuts me off with his lips, one hand wrapped around my head and the other grips my hips, fingers digging into my skin as he pulls me flush against him. I can feel him hard beneath his jeans and I moan into his kiss, pressing myself against him so I can try to relieve some of the rapidly increasing hear between my thighs. He moves us and I feel the bed hit the back of my knees, but he holds me tighter before breaking the kiss. Both of us rip the shirts from our bodies, my bra quickly following. I reach for my pants but he grabs my wrists and stills them, his blue eys falling to my chest. He gently cups a boob and lightly pinches the nipple and I gasp, the small movement shooting straight between my legs. 

Then Benny sinks to his knees, eye level with my pants. He pops open the button on my jeans, sliding them down my legs where I help him kick them off. His large fingers trace the outline of my panties, the heat pooling there as I gasp at his touch. He hooks his fingers into them and slides them down my legs too, his eyes locked on the space between my thighs. 

“Fuck you’re beautiful,” he half whispers. A half chuckle escapes me before it turns into a moan as he slides his nose up my slit, bumping into my clit. He growls, using my hips to push me down on the bed, tossing my legs over his shoulders like it was nothing. 

Which I have no time to think about because his mouth is on me, his hands on my inner thighs, pressing them further apart, widening his canvas. His tongue explores me, seeking all the areas that have me writhing under his firm grip. He somehow finds spots that I didn’t even know existed, sucking lightly, lapping, the coil of pleasure quickly tightening until a sound erupts from me, somewhere between a chant and a moan, my fingers gripping his hair to keep him in the same spot as he prolongs my release. 

My head is in a blissful haze, but I manage a whine as he pulls away from me, taking his pants off when he does. I hear the sound of the condom opening and I watch him as he rolls the condom on himself. I lean up on my elbows to see better, because he’s gorgeous, not girthy but longer, and definitely not anywhere near a size I’ve had in me. 

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. I’ll take my time.” I blink, looking up at his face and see that there’s a hint of concern there, like he wants to make sure I’m comfortable.

I scoot further up on the bed to give him more space. “Don’t worry about me. I can take you.”

His eyes darken and he grabs my ankle, yanking me back down towards the end of the bed. I squeal, my body heating up again as he lowers himself between my legs. He pauses, his eyes bright as he glances between my own. 

“You’re so beautiful,” there’s that almost whisper voice again, his eyebrows pulling together so he looks like a puppy.

“So are you, Benny.” We take each other in for a few more moments, my body about to burst with all of the tension and hormones racing through it. “Now please fuck me, now.” I know I’m begging, but I don’t care. 

And neither does Benny, apparently, as he smirks. “Yes ma’am.”

He slowly presses his hips forward and I let out a moan as he stretches me, pushing further and further in. I’m not sure how, but he bottoms out, dropping his head to my chest, breathing heavy for a moment. 

“Fuck, you feel so good. Gimme a sec so I don’t blow my load like a teenager.”

I manage some sort of confirmation sound, but then a moment later, he slowly pulls out and presses back in, repeating this a few times so I can adjust to his length. It’s driving me mad and I writhe under him, feeling every inch of him as he slowly moves in and out of me. He pulls out, his hips pausing as he looks down at me and it’s like time stops. Just for a moment. Then his lips crash to mine as he pushes forward quickly, sliding into me in one fast movement and I cry out, my hands gripping his biceps, nails digging into his skin as his hips set a fast pace, his direction and speed adjusting to my moans of pleasure. Every time he pushes in, he hits a spot somewhere at the back of me, a place no one has touched, and it sends sparks through my vision, my entire body like a livewire as he pushes me towards the edge.

“Fuck, Benny, I’m gonna-” my body ignites, pleasure radiating out from my cunt, his name tumbling from my lips in praise, begging him to keep going, or stop, or do it again. I have no idea, my head so engulfed in pleasure. 

“Fuck!” He yells, pressing into me one last time before he grunts, little pants and gasps tumbling from him. His head falls to my chest as he comes down. 

We stay like that for several moments, trying to catch our breath. Eventually, Benny pulls out, tossing the condom in the trash can by the bed before rolling onto his back next to me.

“What’s your third favorite dinosaur?”

I laugh, my entire body moving with it as Benny joins in, tears running down our cheeks as my movements turn me towards him. 

“I don’t think I’ve ever been asked that question, let alone just after sex.”

Benny shrugs, smiling. “Had to break the tension and awkwardness somehow.” 

“Well that definitely works!”

His face grows serious. “You didn’t answer the question.”

After that laughing fit, I think on it a moment. “Pterodactyl. Because they can fly.”

Benny nods. “Interesting. What’s your favorite then?”

“Nope. I’m saving that answer for after round 2.”

His eyes grow dark almost instantly. “Round 2? Like, tonight?”

“Well, my friend gave me a whole row of condoms and I don’t want to take any home.”

—----

A few hours later, I’m laying in Benny’s bed, thoroughly fucked, Benny sprawled across the bed on his stomach, lightly snoring. He’s so fucking beautiful. But then Sage’s words echo in my head “It’s just a rebound. Have fun and bounce.” I sigh, unsure of what to do. I actually do like Benny, but is that just because he’s the first guy to actually pay attention to me in a long while? Self-doubt seeps in, my ex’s hurtful words and actions taking away the blissful feeling I’d had moments before. I shake my head, telling myself that if any of it was true, I wouldn’t be in a gorgeous man’s bed, a man who just spent the last few hours pulling every spark of pleasure possible from me. 

I quietly stand, gathering up my clothes. I get them on and lace up my boots, trying not to wake Benny. It’s better if I leave before he wakes up. Rebounds don’t work out anyway, so why prolong the inevitable? 

I turn to head towards the door and see the hotel pad of paper and pen next to the phone on the dresser. I stare at it a moment before grabbing the pen, scrawling a quick “Thank You” with a heart at the end. I slide it under his keys and walk to the door, glancing back at the sleeping form of Benny, the man who just restored my confidence. I close it quietly behind me, making sure the lock clicks into place and request an Uber to take me home. 

—----

Over the next few weeks, I try to get Benny out of my head. I try to stop thinking about him or talking about him. I know he’s a rebound, and those relationships don’t work out, as Sage has reminded me more than once. And I’m not sure I’m ready for a new relationship. I think. But talking to him had been so easy, effortless. Like we had been friends since forever. In a moment of desperation, I looked up the hotel on my Uber app and called it, knowing they wouldn’t give me any information about Benny. I can’t blame them. I don’t even know his last name. 

—----

2 lines. The pink lines emerge bright against the white of the testing stick, showing me the same result as the other 4 pregnancy tests I’d taken. My stomach lurches again and I make it to the toilet just in time. I close the lid and flush, wiping my mouth with a washcloth as I stare at my reflection. How the fuck did this happen? We’d used a condom every time, and he used them correctly. It must have been a faulty condom. Fuck, Benny. How am I going to tell him? No really, how? I don’t even know his last name and now I’m having his child. A knock at the door pulls me from my spiral.

“Rea?”

I sniff and wipe my face again. “Pregnant.”

She’s silent for just a beat. “Can I come in?”

I make a noise in approval and she opens the door, heads directly for me and pulls me into a hug where I let myself lose it. Tears streaming down my face, dry heaving breaths, all of it. It takes me a while to calm down enough to talk. Sage wipes my face with a cool cloth and it helps to soothe me a bit more. 

“Are you going to tell him?”

I scoff. “How, Sage?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. Call the hotel? They have to have his info.”

I shake my head. “They won’t give it to me. Especially since I don’t know his last name.”

Sage cocks her head to the side. “How do you know?”

“Oh. I uh, I may have called a few weeks ago to uh try and uh…find. Him.”

She opens her mouth and then closes it. “That doesn’t really matter now. Do you know what you want to do?”

There’s so much I don’t know. I don’t know Benny’s last name. I don’t know where he lives, just that it’s local. I don’t know what he’d even say. I don’t know how this happened. I don’t know a lot. But there’s one thing that I did know right away.

“I’m keeping the baby.”

Sage takes a deep breath and nods once. “I can’t wait to be an auntie.”

—----

“Come on, Rea! You need to get out.”

I sigh, rubbing the side of my belly. “I’m 6 months pregnant, Sage. I don’t belong at an MMA fight.”

Sage copies my sigh and places her hand over mine. “You’ve been cooped up in your room for weeks. Just…come out to get some fresh air?”

“By sitting in a crowded auditorium surrounded by drunks?”

Sage shrugs. “I’m sure they won’t be drunk drunk. Besides, Henry has a special section all roped off just for us.” 

Henry is super sweet. The burly bear sized, flannel clad man from Mick’s had fit right into our friendship, even becoming a sort of surrogate brother for me. And it’s clear to me that he loves Sage with everything he is just by the way he looks at her.

I sigh again, shrugging in a defeated manner. Sage squeals and grips my arm. “Thank you! Oh, you’ll have fun! Just wait and see!”

So now I find myself in a crowded auditorium, surrounded by people drinking. Well, ok the crowd isn’t bad around us. Sage was right - Henry had literally roped off an entire section just for us and glared at anyone who tried to grumble about it. He was really into MMA and had a couple of cousins that were fighting so he always had tickets to some match that was happening. Are they called matches? I don’t know. 

Whatever they’re called, we’re a few in, Henry leaning over to tell us about each of the fighters as they’re announced. These matches are pretty brutal - I didn’t realize just how violent they can get, even with rules in place. The last match ends and the guy with the mop comes back out, cleaning away the blood that came from the last guy losing several teeth with a blow. Once cleaned, the microphone squeaks back on to announce the next fighters.

“From Red Feather Lakes, Colorado, standing 6’3, weighing in at 195 pounds, I give you BEN MILLER!”

A familiar memory scratches at the back of my head as the crowd screams and the doors open from the locker rooms somewhere in the throngs of people now on their feet. Henry leans in to yell in my ear.

“This guy is great! He’s kicked my cousin’s asses a few times! He…”

Whatever he said after fades into the background, which has dimmed to a loud hum, as Ben Miller struts into the ring, tossing his shirt to the side, revealing a very familiar tattoo and his face finally comes into my view.

Benny. 

My stomach leaps into my throat, my heart hammering through my chest as I stare down at the man who I could never shake from my mind, even before I was having his child. Which he doesn’t know about. 

A bell dings and Benny takes a few steps towards his opponent, who immediately clocks him in his jaw, Benny’s head flying backwards. The man manages to get a couple more hits in, Benny almost absorbing all of the hits. But then the man hesitates and Benny takes that moment to attack, winding his way around the ring, jabbing at his opponent in swift, concise, planned motions. The man only stays up for a few more seconds before crumbling to the ground and giving in. The crowd goes wild as the ref holds Benny’s arm in the air, blood trickling down from his nose, a giant smile on his face. My stomach lurches and I quickly stand, yelling something about the bathroom to Sage as I grab my jacket and run for the doors, the room suddenly too small and loud. I shove open the arena’s double doors and stumble out into the nearly empty hallway. The doors close behind me and I pause a moment, taking a few deep breaths to calm myself. But then the doors open behind me again and I attempt to stand up right.

“Rea?”

Benny’s voice echoes down the hallway and through me, my insides simultaneously tightening with nerves but also excited and swooning at his fucking calming tone. My back is to him but I don’t move. He takes a step closer.

“Rea? Is that you?”

Fuck. This isn’t how I would want him to find out. But how would he find out? It’s not like I could find him. I didn’t even know his last name. I don’t-

“Are you ok?”

His voice is closer now, only a few steps behind me. I swallow hard, willing myself to hold it together as I turn to face him, keeping my jacket covering my belly. His bright blue eyes immediately find mine, a smile quicking spreading across his beautiful face. He’s still shirtless and I have to focus to keep my eyes on his face.

“Rea! It is you! I thought I saw your face in the crowd! Did you see me fight?”

I manage a small smile. “Y-yeah. I did. Congrats.”

He shrugs. “Thanks. That guy was easy but when I saw you, I thought maybe he’d hit my head harder than I thought. What…I mean uh, how are you?”

I sigh, my small smile dropping. “I…I have to tell you something.”

His expression turns serious. “Ok. But if it’s about me not calling you, you sort of left me without a last name or number.” He chuckles but stops when I don’t react. 

I hold his gaze a moment longer before letting my jacket fall to the side, exposing my belly under my form fitting black dress. His eyes immediately fall to my belly, his head turning to the side as he takes it in. I can see the moment it clicks, only a second or 2 after I moved my jacket, his eyes widening as his brain works double time to do the math. He points to himself.

“Is that…am I…the dad?”

I nod, rubbing my hand along the side of my belly where the baby is currently moving. “Yes.” I wait for the yell or scoff of disbelief, storming off, telling me I won’t get anything. All of what I had anticipated. But when I look up at him I see tears shining in his bright blues.

“You’re not fuckin’ with me?” His eyebrows pinch together, enhancing the shine from his tears and I shake my head.

“No. You’re the only one I’ve been with since my ex.”

His eyes shift down to my belly again and his hands start to reach out, but then he stops, looking back up at me. “May I?”

I give him a small smile and nod. “Yeah.”

Benny drops to his knees in front of me, placing each of his large hands on either side of my belly, rubbing small circles into my skin. I take his hand and move it, placing it right over where I’d just felt movement. 

“He was just kicking over here.”

His eyes shoot up to mine. “A boy? I’m gonna have a son?”

Fuck how can his eyebrows do that? “Yeah. A son.”

And the tears start to fall, quietly streaking down his cheeks as he laughs, trying to dab at them with the hand I hadn’t just moved. “Hey, little man. It’s me. Your dad.” A hard kick lands right in Benny’s hand and he whoops, rubbing the spot with his thumb. “You got your old man’s feet!” He continues to talk to my belly in the middle of the hallway, not caring if anyone sees him. His face is animated and lit up, despite the dried blood caked under his nose and for a second, I can see an entire future laid out before us. A wedding, a house, dancing together, maybe more kids. The love. It’s only when I snap out of this fairytale vision that I realize I was smoothing back his hair. I yank my hands back and drop them to my sides.

“Shit I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to-”

He glances up at me. “Nah it’s ok. Actually, it felt good.” He watches me for a moment before his expression hardens. “Ok I need to get off this floor.”

He waves away my offer of a helping hand, gesturing towards my belly as he groans, standing to his full height before stretching out his legs. “I’m gettin’ too old to be kneeling on hard ass floors.”

We’re quiet for several moments, each of us just watching the other. 

“Why did you leave without sayin’ anything?”

I take a deep breath. “Benny, I…I’m sorry. I thought about you after that night. A lot. My friend had told me to just make it a rebound, to get my ex out of my head. Which it did, but what I didn’t expect was..well..you. I liked, well…like you a lot. You make me laugh, have some amazing stories, you’re funny, and hot as hell. But you also make me feel seen and heard. Like I wasn’t just there for convenience, which is ironic considering how we met, I realize that. I thought about trying to find you but the hotel wouldn’t tell me anything and I didn’t have anything to go by. And then I found out I was pregnant and I feel so guilty for not t- telling y- you, but I di-didn’t know h-how. I’m so s-s-sorry!” I can’t fight the pregnancy hormones anymore and the tears come, streaming down my face as I try to turn away, looking down and wiping furiously at my face. But then he’s there, pulling me towards him as best he can, his hand cradling the back of my head. 

“Hey, it’s ok. I never did tell you my last name or ask for your number neither. I could’ve but I didn’t.” My crying slows and he pulls back just enough to look down at me, wiping away a tear. “And I’ve regretted it ever since. I haven’t stopped thinkin’ about you either, Rea. But I really had no way of finding you. But now that we’ve found each other again, can I have your number? I’d really like to take you to dinner.”

I let out a shaky chuckle. “It’s ok, Benny. You don’t have to do that.”

He cocks his head. “Do…what?”

“Take me to dinner. Listen, you can be as involved as you want. I won’t hold you to anything. I just wanted you to know. But you don’t have to-”

“No. I’m not asking you out because you’re pregnant. I’m asking you out because I’ve wanted to for months and regretted it every day that I didn’t.”

“Benny, really. It’s ok.”

“No, I- will you wait right here a moment?”

I nod and he places his hand on my belly once more, his son giving him another thump before he practically runs back through the double doors. Once they close, I walk over to the wall and lean my back against it, my emotions running through me. Is he telling the truth? Were we both just fucking idiots? That’s an obvious yes. But still, I don’t want him to feel like he owes me. It would be nice to hang with him again, though. No, Rea. Don’t make him feel forced. The double doors fly open and Benny comes running up to me, his wallet in his hand. 

“I don’t need money, Ben-”

He shakes his head. “No. Well I mean if you need it, I’ll gladly give it but that’s not…here.” He slides out a small slip of paper from behind his driver’s license and unfolds it, handing it to me. 

It’s the thank you note I scribbled to him and left in the hotel.

Tears well in my eyes again. “You..you kept this?” 

His eyes sparkle as they look at me. “Hell yeah I did. I told you, I couldn’t stop thinkin’ about you. But I had no way of findin’ you. I went to the bar every night hoping to see you walk in. But I never did.”

“I got too busy with work and then..” I gesture down to my belly and he laughs, placing a hand on my stomach again.

“Yeah I can’t blame you for not wanting to be in a bar. Especially your first trimester.”

My eyebrows raise. “What do you know about trimesters?”

“My sister was a hot fuckin’ mess during hers. Sick all the time, emotional, all of it. She felt bad about it too no matter how much we told her not to worry. My niece is 5 now and has the attitude to match.” He chuckles. “I can’t wait to meet this little guy..my little guy. Ours? Fuck this is hard to say.”

“Either way, I’m just glad you can say it.” I clutch the paper in my hand for a moment before handing it back to him. 

“So when’s that dinner?”

We’re married a year later. 

---------------------------------

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[milatiny-xx]

fan service special | p.sh

pairing: park seonghwa x gn!reader summary: you tried to convince yourself that you're not really that jealous of atiny. you know seonghwa is loyal to you and fan service is part of his job, but this time you need to hear it from him. tags: jealous reader, just fluff with kisses and cuddles, a minor fade to black (implied mostly) <3 wc: 2.1k a/n: if park seonghwa doesn't have the most perfect mouth on god's green earth idk who does. why is he literally soooo pretty x

⊹₊⟡⋆ masterlist | taglist ⊹₊⟡⋆

Seonghwa has been out of town for a little over a month. He's away for ATEEZ's North American leg of the In Your Fantasy tour. Of course, you're beyond happy for him and the other members that they're so successful.

But you miss your Hwa terribly.

Video calling helps but, with travel and protocol, he's not always available for it. Talking over the phone is better than nothing, but it's just not the same. You need to see him.

To fill the Seonghwa-shaped void in your life, you've taken the pathetic step of scrolling social media to watch fan edits of him. Once you start, you sometimes find it a little hard to stop. You watch them all—or as many as you can find in the two hour stretch of free time you have before bed.

You're embarrassed by the fact that your algorithm is completely flooded with thirst traps of your own boyfriend. You're even more embarrassed to admit that you enjoy the demon line videos best. It's nice to have clips from his concerts across the globe. Since you aren't able to be at all of them, you love still being able to see bits and pieces through fan edits.

At the same time, it's like a curse, watching the way Atiny see Seonghwa. It makes you jealous. As much as you enjoy the videos themselves, you don't like reading the thirst comments—people you've never met imagining what your boyfriend's tongue is capable of, fantasizing what he's like in the sheets...

It can be difficult to swallow.

You can usually get over the comments but sometimes you find yourself deleting drafts of angry comments you considered posting. Of course you would never, ever want to do anything to jeopardize Seonghwa's relationship with Atiny or ATEEZ as a whole.

After all, you're technically Atiny, too. And you can't say that you blame them. You completely understand how feral they feel about Hwa. You get it better than anyone and, sometimes, you just wish you could remind them of that.

But when you see that comment...you aren't sure what to do with yourself. On a concert video of Hwa doing the Wake Up drop, a fan left a comment saying: "if this man ever gets a partner, they better watch their back bc i'll ruin that relationship rn".

You've seen similar comments before. But something about the way the comment is written and the aggressiveness of the replies underneath...it just rubs you the wrong way.

Your stomach churns, a sick feeling swirling around in your gut. You're so upset, you can't even bring yourself to type and delete a mean reply. You think about it for the rest of the night. You sleep terribly and feel even worse in the morning.

The only thing that finally gets you out of bed is the fact that Hwa is scheduled to come home today in time for dinner. You're planning to take him out to his favorite restaurant as a welcome home surprise.

To distract yourself during the day, you clean and organize the entire house. You want it to be nice for Hwa when he gets back. It helps. But only for the few hours that it takes you to do it.

When finished, you have nothing else to do but wait anxiously for your boyfriend's return. That leaves you with hours and hours to stew over that stupid comment. You waste another hour on a shower, standing under the boiling hot water and trying to get over it. But even after scrubbing yourself clean, your skin is crawling.

Exhausted, you slip into one of Hwa's sweatshirts and lie down on the couch. Curling up with one of your plushies, you squeeze your eyes shut and inhale his scent. At least Atiny could never know this—what it feels like to cuddle into his clothes like this.

The next thing you know, someone is gently rocking your body. Your eyes stick together like glue as you blink yourself awake. Drowsy and confused, you peer around the room. It's dark. Groaning, you reach up to massage your sore neck.

Your gaze lazily shifts to the side where it locks with Seonghwa's.

"Hwa!" you exclaim, throwing your arms around his neck.

He gasps quietly as you lunge forward. His arms wind around your waist, catching you as you start to slip off the couch. Seonghwa chuckles, the sound warm and inviting. You melt onto his knee. Breathing him in like an addict, you clutch him way too tightly for either of you to be comfortable.

"Hi, darling," he says, his sweet voice melodic and gentle. "I missed you."

"I missed you so much, Hwa," you mumble into his shoulder. "You have no idea how much."

His palm is warm on your back as he massages your spine. You release a deep sigh. He rests his cheek against your head. You stay wrapped in each others arms for a few more moments before he moves to pull away, but you grasp onto him even tighter.

"Are you okay?" he asks.

You can't respond right away, embarrassed about still being upset over that comment.

"Y/N?" he continues, voice somehow firm and soft at the same time, "Are you alright? Is something wrong?"

"I just...just missed you so much."

"I know, jagi. But I'm back now. Ah, you said you had a surprise for me when we were on the phone last night. I'm excited to see what it is."

"Oh!" you gasp, pulling away. "I forgot! Oh, what time is it?"

"Nine o'clock. Why? Did we miss something?"

"Oh no!" you whine and drop your face into your hands. How long was I asleep for?"

"Uhh...I'm not sure. You were out cold when i got home, and I didn't want to disturb you, so I just decided to let you keep sleeping. Was that…wrong?"

"No, no of course not," you say sweetly, reaching out to cup his face. "That was so sweet of you. It's just that I made dinner reservations for us at your favorite restaurant. I wanted it to be a welcome home surprise, but the reservations were for six. we missed it."

"Oh, my darling, I'm sorry. I should have woken you up when I got back, but you looked so tired."

"No. It's not your fault, Hwa. It's mine. I can't believe I fell asleep. I should have been able to stay awake until you got back. But I was so exhausted from..."

"From what? Did something happen?"

It's devastating—the way he looks at you. It's like you're a baby chick who needs caring for, like you're the most precious thing in the world. His eyes are soft, gentle, caring. Atiny dubbing Seonghwa the mother of ATEEZ makes all the sense in the world. You can say for certain that they're spot-on. That look always manages to make your heart flutter.

"It's nothing. Really," you say quietly.

"If it's upsetting you, then it's something. Please tell me, jagi."

"I saw a comment on a video of you and it really bothered me. But, please, don't worry about it. I'm overreacting, and I know it."

"A comment? Where? What did it say?"

You don't respond, glancing up at him. His eyebrows are furrowed, his concern clear in his expression.

"What did it say?" he asks, more firmly this time.

You repeat the comment, word for word from memory, and gulp. Seonghwa doesn't respond. His expression melts, that soft mothering stare morphing into deep wrinkles on either side of his mouth. He releases a deep sigh. He closes his eyes and drops his head.

"I know it's silly to be bothered over something so trivial as that," you explain. "I mean, I see comments like that all the time. Usually on thirst traps, so I try not to take them seriously. This one just really made me feel awful. I know I shouldn't be jealous of Atiny. I'm basically one of them since I'm your biggest fan on the planet. But...I just feel jealous. I don't like the thought of so many people knowing you like I do. I want to be special to you. I want there to be things that Atiny doesn't understand like I do."

He raises his head, eyes softening again as he holds your gaze.

"What sorts of things?"

"Like…well like…" your eyes flick down to is lips. You impulsively reach forward, pressing your fingertip against his lips. "Like how these feel. And that look that you always give when you're comforting me, and how your arms feel around me at night, and all the little sounds you make only to me. I know fan service is part of your job, but sometimes i worry that you do it too well."

Seonghwa smiles, his palm sliding onto your cheek. You lean into his touch, closing your eyes. Your heart is pounding with nerves. You aren't sure why.

You feel his nose brush against yours first. Your lips part in anticipation, a reflex triggered by all the times your man has kissed you so sweetly.

No feeling in the world could compare to the sensation of Seonghwa's mouth on yours. His plump lips are the perfect size. They fit around yours like a glove, slipping in between your top and bottom. His kisses are deep and wet and soft, with the perfect amount of pressure.

Hwa's arm snakes around your waist, holding your body against his. You wrap your legs around his hips. Your fingers interlock behind his neck. His head turns to the side to deepen the kiss.

You accept his mouth greedily, hungrily like a starving person, as he kisses you slowly. Each time his lips separate from yours, he pauses a moment. And each time, your breath hitches as you wait for him to come back to you. When he kisses you again, it feels like lightning ricocheting through your body. You lose track of how long your mouths move together, mind clouding with desire.

When he finally pulls away, you can barely rip your eyes open to peer at him.

"I'm sorry," he whispers. "I can't imagine how hard this is for you. I'm not always thinking about the impact on you when I act like that onstage. But I should."

"No, not at all. I don't want you to act differently or change yourself. What you're doing is incredible and beautiful, and it works. I wouldn't change a single thing about you, Hwa. I mean, look at you. You're perfect."

You smile, cupping his cheeks with your hands. Your fingers brush his long black hair behind his ears. A shiver runs through your spine at the silkiness of his locks. He grins sweetly. He reaches up, wrapping his hands around your wrists. His thumbs draw rhythmic circles on the backside of your hands.

"I love you, jagi. Everything about you. I don't deserve you," he says quietly. He angles his head to the side, pressing his warm lips to your palm. "You're perfect to me. I love Atiny, but they could never, ever replace you. No one could. Even if you are jealous."

You giggle but then flatten your lips to glare at him. His head lolls to the side. He narrows his eyes as his beautiful mouth quirks up into the slightest of smirks.

"So...you watch thirst traps of me?" he asks.

You press your lips into a tight line, feeling heat spread across your cheeks.

"Well, sometimes!" you answer defensively. "With you...slutting it up out there, it's hard to avoid them."

"Slutting it up?" he repeats, raising his eyebrows.

You hum in agreement, raising your chin teasingly. You giggle and thread your fingers into the roots of his hair. He grins. He tips forward, pressing his lips to yours. You sigh happily, drinking him in. When he pulls away, he rests his forehead against yours. He nudges the tip of your nose with his.

"You are my number one, my darling," he whispers. "You always will be. I promise."

"I love you, Seonghwa."

"I love you too, Y/N." You smile, brushing your fingers over his mouth. "Now, how about I treat my sweet bunny to a...special fan service. One that only you get to experience."

"Oh? Like what?" you purr.

Seonghwa catches his lip between his teeth as he gently tips forward, pressing your back against the couch. His eyes darken, dropping down to fake in your body.

"I have a few ideas. Some things I've been missing and other things I've been thinking about while I was away."

"Hmmm, I think I'd like that."

"Good," he responds, his voice husky. "We have a lot of time to make up for. Buckle up, jagi. I missed you a lot."

taglist: @rileylovescats @wooyoungsbrat

[didalexiabreakupwitholgaisback]

Most of the culers are drama queens. Last year they turned against Alexia and didn't even consider she was coming after a career threatening injury. Turning against players has become a hobby for most fanbases. While I don't want to comment on Keira or Ingrid, as I don't know what exactly the circumstance was, but scrutinizing every move online and commenting nasty things should be a crime. Leave these players alone and enjoy their game.

does everyone remember when alexia completely zoned out during the world cup celebration? if i only showed you this clip, then you would assume she was pissed about not getting playing time during that tournament. 😂

anyway, this is basically all i have to say to these types of "fans."

yeah, i feel like every year the fandom feels like it's getting more and more toxic. i don't know if i can just blame these social media algorithms or whether people are so sad with their pathetic lives that it gives them some amount of joy to shit on others. either way, it's not cool and people forget that players see all of this online too. 🙏

people are making a huge deal out of nothing. in fact, in the post i just shared earlier today about ellie roebuck, you can clearly see ellie and keira celebrating and laughing together.

so again, it's a 2 second clip of her not wanting to lift a trophy that is making the rounds and creating these narratives, when there are much longer clips of keira celebrating with the others.

and we all know that keira is leaving in the summer, but she continues to show up and do her job, and that's all we ask of her! 🙏

thanks anon. 🫶 the culer fandom never used to be this negative and it is really bums me out that over the past few years, we are getting worse. but i guess this is something that is happening in the world of woso/futfem as it gets more popular. and yes, it's always after the fact that people realise it was all one big overreaction. *sigh*

[courtkossai]

think time to also warn for folks .

blog thehavenhollow currently make point to post about spiritual truths and awakenings , with language and methods that no doubt can get folks hurt .

neither owner of this blog , kit or avery , seem to care very much about this , and claim that there is no force in this . while both may feel this intent is not forceful , seem to very purposefully choose language so as to draw in .

kit and avery make claims that those who belong in this family will simply know , and that appearance of blog is in fact divine proof of this fact ... not just algorithmic coincidence . these two say that mission is to teach such family about divine powers and control , true home among stars , and to break down illusions which some grand force create in order to suppress masses .

theories of grand forces like this often have antisemitic roots , even if many will not blame jewish folk outright .

theories and schools of thought on starseeds have racist undertones at best , and can too easily lead down road to denial of proven human history .

theories of manifestation and divine power can be dangerous to whole host of folks , as very basis is that thoughts control world .

kossai have many thoughts on categories of madness and psychosis , and how modern systems use these to hurt and oppress , whether or not one actually measurably fit within frameworks . however , incorrect and frankly dangerous to suggest that these labels only exist to smother any form of truth - religious , spiritual , or otherwise . both answers must get to exist .

kossai post this so folks who need to block will hopefully see this before any encounters with this blog - will ask , please do not send hate or cruel messages . frankly doubt even kind , educational messages would help either one to understand impact at this point .

[emergency-plan]

DPxDC Idea

I had a little idea an have no time to actually write a fic, so I just wrote a sorta-summary and am posting it like this.

This is inspired by the game Home Safety Hotline and may contain hints to spoilers for that game. It's really clever, I really like it. I recommend you play it if slightly spooky without any "real" horror appeals to you.

Alright, Danny's been Ghost King for a few years and has realized more than just his usual rogues make their way to the living world, and a lot of those ghosts don't stay in Amity. By himself, it'd take forever to track down all those spirits and specters that are out causing mischief. Luckily, not many that escaped his notice are all that powerful and could only cause minor disturbances, just enough to get noticed by the living.

Many people outside Amity don't even recognize the activity as ghosts, so they blame other sources. Scratching in the walls is mistaken as mice, whispers and apparitions are mistaken as hallucinations and carbon monoxide hallucinations, attempted overshadowings mistaken as stokes or migraines. In this day and age, where does everyone turn to when looking for advice or how to solve problems? The internet.

Team Phantom devise a method to try and track down ghosts that are stuck or tormenting the living by building a website meant to look like a help hotline, and with some algorithm trickery make it one of the top options when searching for signs similar to ghost presences. Add some bits and bobs to make it appear as a more normal-looking website on any computer affiliated with government organizations, and you’ve got some protection from the GIW.

Calls start slowly, so the three of them can handle it by themselves. Once more people are calling, they decide to start a call center. They hired some trusted people around Amity and even a few ghosts who want to help. To get around worrying about the ghosts messing with the tech while personally taking a call, they decide to automate the system to record caller’s reports for the employees to listen to, and then send a report back, offering their services to bring the spirit back to the Realms.

It’s been surprisingly lucrative, and Danny hasn’t had to dip into his kingly funds much other than at the start. He still keeps prices low, just enough to not garner suspicions at offering a free service while paying his workers fairly (he doesn’t want to know why some of the ghosts want mortal money). What he’s started having more trouble with is not enough employees to take the calls. Sometimes ghosts lose track of time and don’t show up for their shifts (he doesn’t blame them, time gets weird in the Ghost Zone), and he’s run out of people he trusts who want the job.

Eventually he decides to put out an ad, deciding he’ll slowly trust whoever takes the job with a little more information over time, see how they react, and measure to see if they’re trustworthy.

What he doesn’t think about is how posting it on the website will let more people than just those that live in Amity apply.

Meanwhile, in Gotham, one Cassandra Cain is looking for a job. She doesn’t need the money, B gives her access to way too much, but she wants the experience. She’s at the age she’s heard most kids get a job, and she wants to see what it’s like.

And she quickly found out retail and fast food are NOT for her. She doesn’t think those conditions are fit for anyone, honestly. She’d have to see if she could get Bruce to work on that. But that still leaves her out of a job. She got overwhelmed with a lot of people, so virtual options would probably be best, and something that let her interact with people without having to speak. There weren’t a lot of options out there, and she wasn’t skilled enough with a computer yet to take programming ones.

That’s when she found the listing for the hotline call center. Based in a small Illinois town, but had virtual options, listen to recorded customer calls, diagnose their issue, and send an information packet on potential next steps. It was indirect, could also help her practice her reading, and flexible. It was perfect.

It didn’t take long to hear back after she applied (Danny was freaking out, he didn’t think anyone outside Amity would apply. He’d turn this kid down, but she’d mentioned her difficulties with speaking in her application and SWEETY YOU DONT MENTION STUFF LIKE THAT ON AN APPLICATION. But she said the job would be perfect for her and he just couldn’t…) and she got the job!

Her first day rolls around and she’s given access to the database. A lot has been redacted, but she has descriptions for common problems like mice, carbon monoxide, black mold, etc. she gets her first call recording and carefully reads through the entries before selecting the one that sounds right. She sends it off and waits for the next. The calls come a little too regularly, with too similar intervals between them, so she figures her new employer is testing how well she’s doing (Danny’s giving her previous resolved calls that weren’t anything supernatural. She even got the ants right! He had even gotten that wrong!)

Eventually, her shift ends and she tells her family how well her first day went at dinner. They congratulate her and go on patrol as usual. The next day, things ramp up a little.

She logs into the database at the beginning of her shift and noticed some new entries. She now had access to descriptions of shades, blob ghosts, will o’ wisps, and more minor spirits. She gets a recording reminding her all this info is confidential and that she’s not allowed to share it with anyone. She’s a little confused, but she reads through each just as carefully. The calls come less regularly, so she figures she’s actually connected to the system now (Danny gave her access to the most common ghosts they get calls about and is listening in while he’s handling ghosts to make sure she doesn’t get anything she’s not prepared for).

Her shift ends and over dinner, she mentions that she’s had to diagnose some odd things. They assure her there’s more pests and hazards out there than you’d expect. She doesn’t tell her family about the distraught woman haunted by the Ecto-Echo of her husband’s habit of making her coffee every morning after he passed a few weeks ago. Or the person who had a Shade masquerading as their shadow. Just about one of her caller's cockroach problem.

The next day follows a similar pattern; more entries, slightly more powerful ghosts, reminder that the info she's been given access to is confidential and could get people hurt if it got in the wrong hands, congratulated for her good work, read through carefully and learn signs of each, diagnose calls, before calling it a day (Danny was so proud of her, she'd only confused a blob ghost with a ghost animal once, and it hadn't caused him any trouble when he went to collect them).

She'd used the bat-computer to check up on some of the callers she'd diagnosed, and they seemed to be doing fine. Some had posted about their weird experiences on their social media and how her employer had somehow helped them, but often didn't quite know how (Danny liked to hide his powers, so most of what customers saw was him using ghost tech. When it couldn't be solved with just a quick souping, he had to pull a little ghostly trickery while the customer wasn't watching). She didn't know how her boss was somehow across the world multiple times a day to help clients in different countries, but he seemed to at least be helping people. She started not having any stories she could tell her family at dinner.

At some point, she heard reports that one of the speedsters probably messed with time travel again before clocking into her shift. She had almost all the available entries and had gotten very good at recognizing tricky cases. She answered a recorded call, just like at the beginning of each of her shifts, but this one was a little different. Danny had sent out an announcement to be on the lookout for a specific phenomena that often occurred after shifts in reality, as they were highly dangerous and needed to be dealt with swiftly.

She studied each entry and paused on what she was supposed to keep a careful eye out for. Revenants, corpses that came back to life, often seen shambling around the graveyards they were buried in. Something about that sounded familiar. A section in their entry said the person brought back often had a ghost in the Realms (which she still didn't know what that was) that was in terrible pain from shifts in reality trying to pull them back to their body, but the separation of dimensions preventing them.

Expectedly, she did get a call from someone convinced there was a zombie wandering somewhere along the east coast. She double checked it couldn't be anything else before submitting it and notifying her boss.

Curious, and she knew no one would be in the batcave around this time of day, she brought her laptop with her down to the bat-computer. She found cameras in the area the caller reported, and froze at what she saw. Shambling across an abandoned street was a rotting corpse. It really did look like a zombie. It was covered in dirt, wearing an old-fashioned suit, and had skin sloughing off its bones.

But what Cass could only focus on was how much its movements read that it was in pain. It was suffering in such a horrible way its mindless being didn't even deserve. It was horrible.

Then, there was a flash of green and an area of the cameras were covered in static. The glitched portion somehow read with kindness and pity. It slowly approached the corpse, simple reaching out gently (what was presumably a hand), ignoring the way it lashed out. It suddenly fell, caught and slowly lower to the ground by the strange being she couldn't see. It closed the thing's eyes before carrying it off in the direction the map said a graveyard could be found.

After that, she finished her shift and went to dinner. Her family asked if she was alright, and she only replied it'd been a long day.

She clocked in early the next day and messaged her boss for more information on Revenants. Dinner that night was one of the few times Jason agreed to come by, and if he noticed how she kept glancing at him, he didn't say anything.

A week later, she asked her boss what might happen if a Revenant was exposed to, as it was called in its entry, a "Corrupted Ecto-Spring" ("...an ugly hole in the fabric of reality that connects the world of the living to the Realms. The ectoplasm that leaks through the tear stagnates and festers into toxic pools that kills humans and makes ghosts sick."). Danny requested a video call.

[quinton-reviews]

What advice would you give to someone considering making video essays?

Don't be weighed down by the expectations of others. It seems these days there are now too many people assuming that if you want to make something labeled a "video essay," you have to match a certain style or tone. In many ways, it's overbearing - if you make something that has too many skits, too many jokes, that doesn't have a strong thesis outside of "this thing is bad", people say you're "failing to find a point." But if you put weeks of work into the filmmaking process and you want to call it a documentary, it feels limiting to have people insist that it's just a rant video instead of something more.

In truth, I recommend just trying to make *videos* first and trying to find your voice. No one starts off on YouTube being totally original, but as you learn the craft you will find your own brand and style. I think it is important for smaller creators to experiment, in spite of keyboard warriors being obsessed with the idea of everything under the sun needing to be new.

Starting off, your biggest struggle will be finding contentment in the experience of making videos - finding your closure. If you don't have an audience watching your stuff right away, spending weeks working on a video with 0 views can feel pointless and frustrating. Without finding a resolution for each project, you'll start to wonder why you're doing it.

So instead, find a friend in your personal life who will watch the videos with you. Make content for you and the people you know, and find contentment in that experience. And when you start to grow and gain real followers, pivot your style to match that new status quo.

Creating content for YouTube is a process of throwing things at a wall until something sticks. The big secret is the moment something sticks, you drop everything you're working on and do *that thing* five more times. This helps build trust in the algorithm and helps build your brand to new viewers finding your content. But don't write yourself into a corner - allow yourself to experiment and evolve even as you're finding success. If I didn't do that, I'd still be making drama videos about LeafyisHere. I'd be burnt out, miserable, and bitter. But because I allowed my style to evolve with my own tastes, I now am at the highest point in my career (to the loud annoyance of many people online).

But the biggest advice I can give is that if you think being a YouTuber will solve any issues in your private life, it won't. That's the biggest mistake I made starting out, I thought having this parasocial connection with other creators would fix my loneliness and anxiety. It didn't, in fact, it made things worse; and I am the only person to blame for that. I quickly learned that the most important people in my life still were (and still are) my real-life friends - people I go to bars with IRL and people I chat with on Discord - and not other creators. Sure, having this mindset has made me more isolated in many ways, but honestly I think that's the way it has to be for someone like me.

Final piece of advice - create your YouTube channel with a secret email you never post about online. It makes it much harder to dox and hack you. Peace out!

[weebsinstash]

Ok so tmi (on the tmi blog lol) but the first day of my Cycle I had a dream that I had just given birth and I was holding my baby and I was goddamn euphoric even though the logical part of me was like “???? I am 22 and broke i CANNOT have a baby rn” and I woke up crying and called my friends like I WANNA HAVE A BAAAAAABYYYYY I WANT A BAAAAAAABYYYYYYYY so basically. Imagine. Miguel catches you in a moment of weakness. And he NEVER. FUCKING. FORGETS IT.

Oh wow girlie those period hormones grabbed you by the uterus and absolutely REFUSED to let go

NO BUT FOR REAL don't look at me but I've been thinking of a concerning number of ideas where it's like, "Reader suddenly realizes they may want a baby and is actually putting serious thought into it and Miguel finds out (bet your ass Peter B tells him, i can see him as a "well intentioned" platonic guardian/mentor figure who sells you out to Miguel the second he thinks you're doing something risky or he thinks it's for your own good) and Miguel starts making all these plans and preparations behind your back to have a baby with you" and obviously I like the extra juicy option of "he found out you got extremely depressed and tied your tubes or something because you either see no point in you having a kid/think it's too late, OR, Miguel was the only person you were looking at as a potential father and you either decide it wouldn't work out or he does something to hurt you and you lose trust in him" so like, the double whammy combo of him being hit with the news you basically walled off your fertility that he's kinda fantasizing about AND you blame him for it

You see him chokeslam Miles on the train and having all these serious anger and stress issues and you're like "hmmmm don't like that" and basically make the tubal ligation appointment that week (but, you know, he'll either interfere before you can actually get it or even reverse it later on)

Like. Ugh I'm not sure if I should go super into detail bc I feel like I want to put this scene in the YouTwo fic or in a different idea i have thats more centered around motherhood, but, picture he catches you in his monitor room one day after you've lost your home dimension, you're having a little more than just a small identity crisis, and he catches you having Lyla show you the model for your life, or what the algorithm had predicted your life was supposed to be like before your universe just magically poofed away. You're just staring at these holograms with tears running down your face and he occasionally catches you starting to reach out like you want to touch what you see. He comes to stop you because he already knows all too well where this could lead, you can't become tempted to break canon and go somewhere else, but you beg him to let you watch just a little longer

"I was supposed to get MARRIED! I was supposed to have a BABY! I was supposed to have a family!! It's not fair!!"

And he's in total agreement with you because, who even fucking knows why your universe suddenly destabilized and vanished. He sees you as this person who has so much promise and potential who had their destiny and future literally snatched away from them and now you're lost and confused on what you're supposed to do, like really he totally understands why you feel so aimless. But watching these holograms is like torturing yourself, and he goes to stop you when you just keep crying because this is basically sending you into a critical mental health episode

"Someone was supposed to fall in love with me... we were supposed to have a baby... would I have been a good mom? Would I have had a boy or a girl? Cant you at least let me find out what my daughter's name would have been?"

And it's like NOOOO you can't hit him with the daughter card, don't you see what you've DONE!!! Gets him right in the heart. Now he's got this massive soft spot for you, bigger than it already was anyways, and he can tell over time you're just really starting to, grieve the future you were supposed to have, falling into a depression. Peter B is hanging around with Mayday like he usually does as both men can tell you're really staring at his baby today and he offers to teach you how to hold her. you're standing there misty eyed twirling one of her little curls around your finger as her dad starts volunteering information to you, "you know she's about XYZ months old now, they aren't really talking yet at this age but they're really curious about their surroundings and--"

Miguel watches as you start talking about children and suddenly get this really really tortured expression and just say "it's not meant to happen" and or some combination of "it's too late for me" and gives him his baby back a little too quickly in typical "I am clearly leaving the room to go cry" fashion. Meanwhile Peter B is like 38 wondering why you think you're out of time or it's not supposed to happen

Miguel's working one day and Peter is trying to shove his phone in his face, "you know I think this is one of the BEST photos of Mayday I've ever taken, she's looking so cute here, you just GOTTA see it" and Pete just won't let up and Miguel finally looks just to humor him because the man is being unusually annoying and, it's a photo of Mayday, duh, but being held by you, and you're clearly looking down at her with watering eyes and the smallest little smile that says "I'll die for you" and Peter is just all 😏 as Miguel is 'suddenly' interested in the photo. "That's a really good photo of MAYDAY, right? 😏 I figured you would like it, that photo of MAYDAY 😏" and Miguel is just grumbling and grouchy bc he sees what this guy is tryna do, but he's still like ".... send it to me later, I'm trying to work right now"

It's even worse if you're a member of his strike force because you're constantly around him, Peter B, and Jess. Miguel just, idly wondering where you are and deciding to walk around a little bit and eventually finds that you're having some sort of conversation with Peter B and Jess and he can tell you look really weepy as the other woman invites you to feel her baby kicking, like, you could not more obviously be developing baby fever, and you ARE around that age, and ESPECIALLY if you live in Nueva York because it's like, YEAH you're still a Spider and YEAH you help the Society with stuff but. Your home universe is gone, your canon is gone, you're kind of. Free as a bird really? But you're also scared because, if someone was destined to love you, does that mean it technically isn't meant to be to fall for anyone else? You can't exactly hook up with people at the Spider Society because of canon or them already having relationships, and you don't exactly have identifying documents if you wanted to try and adopt

I think it'd really reach a stressful breaking point if you and the strike force go to another universe to fight an anomaly and Miguel catches you staring out into the crowd of people you just saved and he sees what youre looking at instantly and his heart sinks. Another you, another normal you, never bitten by a Spider, is standing there with her husband and her little sputtering baby, and he has to all but drag you away as you cry "it's not fair, it's not fair, why does SHE get a normal life!!"

Sidebar for a moment, I think that's probably also one thing that would be so INFURIATING about the doppelganger stealing your life story because THEY have a home universe and YOU don't. They take your life, they take literally everything you have left, your friends, your sense of community, your literal purpose. I've already decided on YTs motivations but could you imagine you finding out YouTwo actually has a decent life and maybe even a husband and kid of their own and you're just furious because they're basically abandoning their duties back home not only as a Spider but as a parent/spouse to steal what YOU have? You can't kill them because it would break their canon and kill like countless people but Miguel and the others would def let you beat the shit out of your evil double and get some of your anger out. Like. Jesus could you imagine Miguel kicks you out thinking you're the fake and after you're gone, YouTwo breaks canon and that's what exposes them, or theyre exposed when they eventually take a trip back home and get caught. The Society's regret, the guilt, the anger, just marinate me with the drama

But anyways back to Being Sad and Babycrazy, you go missing one day and Miguel has to decide what to do when he finally tracks your bracelet and you're back in THAT dimension again. He has to physically track you down using your bracelet's signal because you refuse to answer his messages and you're, in the home of the other you while she takes a brief nap, in the nursery, holding her baby. Miguel quietly climbs through the window and you're in a rocking chair and you've got her hugged to your chest and your eyes are closed and you sense him and, obviously cry because you know you have to leave. Unlike with the holograms he doesn't give you any leeway on this, putting his foot down that this has to end here, this cant go on, this is already so dangerous. And, you're good for him and understand, leaving the baby back in its crib as you and Miguel warp away. You're heartbroken but ultimately understanding when he has to disable your watch's ability to visit that specific dimension again, and you're obviously extremely depressed for a while, having multiple Spiders coming to check in on you as word spreads around that you aren't doing well

I can just see Reader becoming kind of desperate because the only options for a baby you really have left is to either 1. get a serious relationship, which you're scared of because you have to trust that person and who can you even pick, you're nervous about breaking canon or something, or 2. Get some random person to impregnate you so you can run off with the baby

Miguel gets a call from Peter B that you went to a bar and you're EXTREMELY wasted as you try to pick someone, ANYONE up and like, you have admirers for sure but there's enough decent people around to keep the creeps in line, clearly you are in a vulnerable state of mind right now, and Miguel gets to tote your drunken ass back home as you drunkenly word vomit all your feelings to him because, unfortunately for you, he has your trust, and you need comfort right now, and you even ask him about what being a parent was like for him. You encouragingly tell him he shouldn't give up if he still wants kids, you trying to be genuinely nice and not trying to imply anything, blubbering about how he deserves to still be happy and he's still got time, and here's Miguel who's practically tracking your cycles at this point, TOTALLY not going to use anything you say to him while you're piss-drunk against you

Especially if you add ABO into the mix and you have a Miguel who's either Alpha/Omega and is already babycrazy af and he sees you literally fucking YEARNING for it, like. You've got a 6'9" Alpha basically looking at you, his poor lil Omega crush, with the big yandere goo goo eyes and how you need all this love and support and stability and how you're in need of a proper husband and of course he's all too willing to volunteer himself for the job. Even if he's too awkward to come right out to you and say it, he'll be thinking in his head and planning behind your back ways to take care of you, keep you away from any drugs/alcohol (no more smoking weed with metro boomin Spiderman, you've gotta detox your body to have a baby! Also, different concept but, Miguel basically keeping you in a bubble to control all your meals and recreational activities and all of that so he can make sure you're perfectly healthy for a baby)

Don't let this man catch you slipping up! Throw you to the Spider Society and you'll come back pregnant 😭 he sees you so depressed and wanting a baby and it's like well, if your life needs new meaning, he can help literally make one for you 😏 he's been feeling protective and nurturing of you anyways, so, it's an extra benefit for him to think of getting to have both you AND a little baby of your very own ❤️

[mudelebentru]

Like I have commented in the past, academia is also adopting incel ideology, and there are researchers that try to wash incel's image by conflating regular participants of incel communities with just sexless/lonely/single men on the spectrum.

They, in the most idiotic act, ask the participants "Are you single against your will?" Yes? Oh, so you are an incel. Pretty sure that guys like Interstella or this average looking dude trying to convince me he was an incel would respond "yes", despite expressing to not even trying or rejecting women in their objective dating pool.

It's curious to me how these scientists don't even bother to ask to the self-ID incels what the term means, if they did, they would quickly realize that it's just a slang term that doesn't belong in academia.

They don't say it out loud, but even them, justify their research by arguing the potential danger sexless young men represent to societies (young male syndrome they call it, total made up term like every juicy theory on EvoPsych).

In public, they downplay incel misogyny and harmful rethoric, along with their anti-social actions, while collaborating with agents like Lamarcus Small (I remember you that his forum is linked to at least 50 deaths worldwide), but in their papers argue for the importance of an intervention to "help incels" to prevent more deaths (yes, as it deranged as it sounds), because ya know, young men without sex normally turn into little hitlers that go through life killing people without much reason outside of "peepee sad :("

They have received tax-payers money from anti-terrorists organizations to research incel forums. Outside of these midwit researchers, the one that are more outspoken over the incel danger, explore their online activity and find out clear links between incel communities with alt-right and male supremacist rethoric, along with pro-rape, pro-pedophilia, pro-mass shootings discourse.

If we consider the research that paints them as harmless, there's nothing special about them.

"They were bullied" In the last survey of american youth, roughly 20% of students of both sexes declared being bullied

"They are autistic" Both men and women are autistic and live on a ableist system that harms them and isolate them

"They are NEETs" Plenty of people in that situation too

"They face high inequality" There are people right now battling to feed their families

And so on, there are multiple groups that advocate against all those circumstances or that try to lessen them. Being sexless, in another hand, is a personal circumstance that can't be solved by anyone. "Incels lives" already can be improved by multiple mediums, and sexless people have been noticed by researchers and studied before that term even emerged.

There's nothing interesting in them, and there's no big societal antagonism towards people who suffer of those things. The only reason people despise "incels" is because any person with ability to make a lazy google search can find out their hateful rethoric. (Oh, no, hateful people get hateful responses...clearly there's targeted hate towards them)

But the scam has to continue, they need that label, and they will milk it until their last breath, even if that cost more lives. Incel is a real thing, and their forums and communities are just locker room talk, ya know? And incel attackers (innocent people died!!!!) did what they did because ya know, young male shit uwu, there's no evidence of any forum out there pushing people to kill themselves, there's not evidence of any forum glorifying incel violence and inciting it, ya know? That's feminist speech uwu Stop being so hateful, stop gaslighting* them!!!! Don't you see that everything is looks and women's standards are too high????

I hate this braindead panorama of people making careers over a problem that only exists because people want it to exist. I blame the algorithm, I blame researchers, I blame influencers, I blame the "debunkers" of the manosphere, I blame EvoPsychs, I blame the victimists accountability-free retards that embrace the label, promote the ideology and then pretend to be attacked by any slight contrarian position.

People is dying and nobody cares. Women have classmates and co-workers, and brothers, and fathers, and relatives falling into the misogynistic rabbit hole, and they dare to call it "male crisis".

It's not fucking real, the only crisis is that thirthy greedy selfish pieces of shit want people to be angry and distracted for the real life problems in favor of a "gender war". The only crisis is that vulnerable people already prone to radicalization and misogyny are being sent to spaces run by people that want to turn them even crazier and dangerous to themselves and society. They want them to kill more, they want them to kill themselves, they want them angrier, they want the motte-and-bailey to keep functioning.

Fuck everything.

*Everyone is so quick to support their victim mentality that any mention to the importance of personality is met with that word, even from non-incel people. Gaslighting is abuse,so yes, they are suggesting that if you have 0.1% of common sense you are abusing the poor baby incels.

[mbep]

DAV Solavellan ending musings

This is too long to post on Twitter so it's going here, on the blog I haven't touched in years, because I have to scream into the void. I can't possibly compete with the hardcore Solavellans who have been following this saga for a long time (I only got into DA last year by playing DAI and the DLCs) so this isn't a comprehensive or deep analysis by any means, but I love them all the same.

I got into DA because the Twitter algorithm put Solavellans on my timeline and I am eternally grateful for that. I already knew all the story beats (and the big reveal that he's Fen'harel) before playing DAI and I enjoyed catching the moments where he's obviously hiding something. The scene in Crestwood and the parting in Trespasser still made me emotional, even knowing what was coming.

The final scene in DAV was short, but no less meaningful. I think that was mostly to avoid creating such a big gulf between romanced and non-romanced Inquisitors and I'm glad Bioware didn't create that inequality, on behalf of the non-Solasmancers.

The first thing I will say is that Gareth David-Lloyd does a phenomenal job with the acting. They've been great since DAI, and they're a big reason why Solas is such a charming, nuanced and compelling character. The whispered "vhenan", the strained "Mythal", the sobbing, how quiet "ar ghilas vir banal" is… They deserve at least an award (all of them in fact) for that.

The animation is amazing too: how Solas doubles over when Mythal finally acknowledges how she set him on this path and shares the blame, his wet eyes and facial expressions looking at the Inquisitor… The thing I love most is him not looking back when leaving, and her putting her hand on his shoulder as they enter the Fade. Very Orpheus and Eurydice, but he does what Orpheus could not: he does not look back. He trusts that she is there and if she is not and has a sudden change of heart and leaves him, he will not blame her. But she is there, and lays a guiding hand on his shoulder; "Ma ghilana, vhenan", as the Inquisitor tells him in Trespasser.

There are a lot of Trespasser parallels and a lot of people more knowledgeable that I have analysed them, but I love how much this scene is a response to that. So here's my two cents: "I walk the din'anshiral. There is only death on this journey." = "I am here, walking the dinan'shiral with you." Weirdly they spell "din'anshiral" differently in the subtitles LOL I personally think the Trespasser spelling is correct. This is the line that hits hardest, in my opinion. She says this the first time they see each other again, when they don't even know they are leaving together. She means that all this time, the years apart, she has walked with him. She has not stopped searching for him, trying to find a way to change his heart (as the epilogue of Trespasser says). All this time he thought he was alone, she was there with him: both have been feeling the pain of their separation, the burden that his duty to Mythal has put on each of them (him having to fix their mistakes and her trying to change his mind), the regret they both have that things might have gone differently.

"Var lath vir suledin." "I wish it could, vhenan." = "There is no fate but the love we share." The translation from elven is very sweet, but a very interesting choice. In elven she actually says "Banal nadas. Ar lath ma, vhenan." Two sentences that Solas says in DAI: "Banal nadas." / "Nothing is known for certain." Said by Solas to the nightmare demon in the Fade when it taunts him by saying "Your pride is responsible for everything that has gone wrong; you will die alone." The same quest reveals that Solas's greatest fear is dying alone. She reminds him of what he said then, that the nightmare demon is wrong: he is not alone, he can change that fate. "Ar lath ma, vhenan." Solas's confession of love to the Inquisitor. I don't think she ever actually tells him she loves him in DAI. Eight-ish years later, she says it back to him, proving that their love did indeed find a way to endure.

"I cannot bear to think of you alone." = "But you do not have to go alone." He is once again leaving to right a wrong. In Trespasser, he was leaving to do what he thought was best, what he wanted to do to fix his mistakes. Here, he is leaving to seek atonement, to soothe hurts not with violence, but repentance. And she once again offers to go with him. (I personally didn't choose this dialogue option in Trespasser because I don't think my Inquisitor agreed with what he wanted to do, but it's a very sweet line nonetheless) This time, with all that has changed, he is more open to letting her go with him, but he still cautions her: "Where I am going is terrible." I love the translation of her reply: "It won't be terrible if you're with me," because the order of the pronouns is interesting to me. Not sure if it's intentional, but I feel like I would have said "It won't be terrible if I'm with you." It's very subtle, but I think there is a difference: "if I'm with you" puts a lot of emphasis on the Inquisitor, i.e. "I make things better"; "if you're with me" means the same thing but it's humbler, less prideful, i.e. "I will be there for you to make things better".

The parallels in animation are also great. The way he turns when she speaks as he's leaving, the bow when he says "ir abelas, vhenan"… THE KISS. God, the way they hold hands like they do in Trespasser is insane.

The music in this scene is the best in the game, and it's a crime that it's not on the official soundtrack. Not just the atonement music, but the way it shifts into "Lost Elf Theme" from Trespasser once the Inquisitor steps forward gives this scene the emotional weight the music in DAV honestly doesn't have. The music is a big part of why I cried watching this.

Side notes:

-My Inquisitor looks nothing like she did in DAI LOL Hey, I was already hours into CC, it frustrated me that the presets were so different from DAI and I did not have the patience to tweak everything. Also I'm horrible at distinguishing faces. She still looks pretty so I guess she got a glow up during their time apart LOL Vivienne and Leliana took her to get a makeover in Val Royeaux.

-The DAV soundtrack honestly isn't bad. I enjoy quite a few tracks on it; "Where the Dead Must Go" and "Not the Chosen One" are among my favorites. The main theme isn't compelling though, and "The Dread Wolf" track would have made a better main theme (it's the best track on the album). The OST lends the atmosphere that music is supposed to, but it doesn't have the character on its own that the music in DAI does (thank you, Trevor Morris). I could be anywhere in the world doing anything and if I heard the DAI main theme I would lose my mind. "Lost Elf Theme" always makes me so emotional; it's a plea, a feeling of hopefulness and being resigned to one's fate at the same time.

[javis-burner-phone]

To Writers in the Pedro Pascal Fandom:

This fandom went full Chernobyl this summer. I need a hazmat suit to get through these tags. I recently saw an anon reach out to a fic writer here.

The anon is right that there's a problem in the fandom space, but they're misplacing blame. I'm writing this post for the non-hateful writers that have tried to feel a part of the community, but ended up feeling left out. I'm posting this on a burner account for obvious reasons that you'll see below:

The hateful posts about "big writers" have absolutely disgusted me, but I can relate to the frustration that many fic writers are expressing. We see very fun and active areas of the fandom where writers are communal, hyping each other up, reblogging fics, but only within certain friend groups. Most of us writers don't have that. Instead this fandom sometimes feels like a desolate wasteland for many of us.

Here's where us writers need to place the blame:

Since the introduction of algorithms, there has been a cyclical effect: popular Tumblr posts are boosted due to everyone's default feed settings and posts from new, lesser known blogs are pushed down.

Over years, this has impacted fandom spaces in a sort of feedback loop. We're currently seeing the late stages of this. This effect pushes most fandom activity towards the already popular blogs by default. (Yes, Tumblr has always shown popular posts first, but algorithms, and the feedback loops they create, have made the effect stronger over the years.)

Is that the "big writers" faults? No. Are friend groups to blame? No. In fact, we should have more friend groups in this fandom. That's how fandoms used to be. There were dozens of overlapping friend groups that would have long reblog chains and mainly interact with each other. New people could find other new people pretty easily and make their own groups.

Now new people/smaller blogs are far less exposed to other new people/smaller blogs by default. *That* is the problem.

Eventually, I found my people. I feel a part of the community and you can too.

You just need to make 3 virgin sacrifices and find the lochness monster in order to do so. What I mean is, it takes a lot more effort than it used to. Be ready for that:

1. Sort by "Latest posts" when searching fandom hashtags. Imagine if Ao3 used an algorithm to show popular fics first instead of sorting by most recent fics. New writers would be screwed, right? That's what Tumblr does. Support posts that resonate with you, but have low engagement. Leave likes, comments, reblogs! Guess what happens when someone that feels isolated in this fandom gets a bunch of notes from you? They're gonna check out your blog. They may want to connect!

2. DM people. Is there a lesser known blogger whose posts you like? Ask to be mutuals! Start a conversation! If you can't be social it's gonna be near impossible to build community. Sorry if you have anxiety, but that's the truth. Warning: half the convos will fizzle out. Move on to the next person as soon as you sense this.

3. Don't try to connect with bigger blogs for friendship. I've tried and as long as you gush over them, they respond, but the interaction ends there. DMing them works, but the convos almost always feel one sided and fizzle out. I'm mutuals with some bigger bloggers, but I had to add their usernames to my filtered content list in account settings. This means they can see my stuff, but I can't see theirs. Seeing them have fun in their friend group just reminds me of my failed attempts to connect. Maybe filtering them isn't fair, but that's how I deal with my negative emotions. No, they are not rude for not befriending me. I don't feel entitled to friendship.

(edit: I got a weird anon about this part. It's more difficult to befriend people who already have close-knit connections here. It's not impossible, but I've had much better luck with fellow isolated fandom members. The secret ingredient is our shared desperation lol. Befriend whoever you want ❤️)

4. Join/start a small PPCU discord server. The big servers will just make you feel more isolated, but the intimate ones are way more communal and it's easier to make stronger connections there than on Tumblr. 

These tips are for people that actually want to find solutions instead of spreading hate and complaining.

I'm saying this as someone that averages 50 notes on most of my fics after a year in this fandom(edit: saw this poll and thought I'd clarify. I get 50 notes now, but for 8ish months I got 5 on a lucky day. This post is for people who still feel isolated because I know how it feels.) It takes way more effort than in the early 2010s to feel a part of a fandom, not because of cliques, but because of the feedback loops the algorithm creates. 

I understand the frustration, but I'm not going to spread vitriol just because the fandom ecosystem went to shit. 

[chobbemoe-art]

Okay so about what you said, is your proposed solution to fixing the fandom situation to contribute to it more with healthy content instead of boycotting the fandom?

Which would make it morally correct and needed to contribute to it as much as you want and can?

I didn't know the fandom was being boycotted but if it is, it shows rn lmao. I feel that we as a fandom need to do something about the problems plaguing it and the material running rampant rather than abandoning it, we need to do various measures, some range from easily doable to more complex, but for what I know there are a lot to tackle, which have been affecting fandom culture for decades.

These I think are the main ones

1. Problematic materials

2. Harassment

3. Low media literacy and young audiences

4. Inattentive or enabling creators

5. Algorithm-rotted behaviors

☆Mind you these problems have been around in all types of fandoms before, and while I think compared to how those problems looked in other big fandoms that came before it we have evolved a lot, mouthwashing has become the prime example as to how a fandom can ruin a piece of media and its message. I don't fully blame the creators, since it's clear it's their first time handling such a big following, but I do think they have become complicit in some of the detrimental activities that occur even in their own server.☆

I will try giving out some solutions, but my main outlook is the following, problematic creators and fans will always exist, whether we like it or not, the only way to avoid them poisoning the content they interact with is by being more resilient than them.

1. Problematic materials:

I think it's important to state that handling and talking about taboo subjects shouldn't be problematic in itself, Mouthwashing is special because the game addressed hard topics like rape, misogyny, toxic relationships, violence, cannibalism and more, with its owed respect. Letting fans try to tackle those themes in their fan creations with respect is important because it opens dialogue and an exchange of perspectives.

It's possible people accidently glorify or mishandle subjects like that, and that shouldn't be a reason to allow harassment to run rampant, understanding that people have different visions that may go against your preconceived notions is important, and the first thing should be an open respectful dialogue with the creator if they did mishandle the subject. However, and I want to make this really clear, once that discourse is had and the person is still maliciously depicting those subjects with disrespect, then actions should be taken and the benefit of doubt given prior should be revoked.

What actions? This is when we have to be smart, harassing them will only give problematic creators an alley to make themselves the victim, which allows them to usually garner sympathy and get away with what they have done. Simple, we I.B.R depending on the degree of their actions in the platforms that allow it:

Ignore: usually reserved to minor behaviour but that you personally may find distasteful, for example to me the ship Daisuke×Swansea makes me gag, that's why I ignore creators that show it, because even if I don't like it, I do more by ignoring it when it appears and creating my own content than by spending the same time harassing the people that do create that.

For content that isn't explicitly problematic but it isn't clean either.

Block: this is for creators you don't want to see at all, people think blocking is extreme but genuinely, the peace of mind it grants is impressive. I usually use it for people that uwufy Jimmy, because although it isn't explicitly harmful to like Jimmy as a character, his fans tend to erase and even glorify his actions, and I find that really distasteful, so avoiding interaction is best. If enough people block problematic creators, their engagement drop and less people see them, it's a silent but app compliant way to ensure you don't accidentally participate in the spread of that content.

For purposeful mishandling heavy subjects and characters, glorifying terrible actions.

Report: it should encompass everything before it, and it should be used when real criminal behavior is being shown. If enough people do it when necessary, I bet a lit of the noncon material that sadly is available in this fandom, would dwindle.

For explicit noncon, abusive shipping (Anya and Jimmy) (Jimmy and Curly) (Just Jimmy with any of his victims).

2. Harassment

*Shudders remembering Voltron fandom* We have evolved, there aren't as many cases of big doxxing and harassment as old fandoms sadly had, but it doesn't mean it hasn't happened (Looks at the Joestatic situations).

Some people that are conscious of the game having septic tank levels of horrible in the fanbase, seem to try to overcompensate with overcorrective measures to the slightest misdemeanor (like with ocshipping for example), having that well deserved panic misdirected towards things that are frankly not that important, and usually shifting the attention away from truly problematic behaviour. (I have seen more people having backlash about Curlya [which isn't great yeah I know] than when some freak does ship art of Jimmy and Anya)

Again, we need to remember that being in the fandom should also mean having fun, and people being stressed to post their ocs kissing idk Daisuke in case they get backlash is detrimental to the health of the fandom. We need more people to be cringe, to create and learn from their mistakes if need be, because if we overpolice every aspect of the fandom, that just creates a sterile wasteland were nothing creative comes out because people fear harassment.

I will once more refer to the I.B rules, since curating your own fandom is crucial to make the experience your own, the important factor is allowing people that may be weird but not problematic to create, to nerd out and coexist. Always using dialogue first if need be, and respect first and foremost.

3. Low media literacy and young audiences

Here is where we might be in a pickle, fanbases have and always will have people of all ages interacting with the material, even if unintentionally. From MLP acquiring a big adult fandom to FNAF getting a lot of young children in the fandom (me included), if people like it, they will interact with it, even more if it becomes famous.

What does take me aback is that Mouthwashing, being a mature and even explicit game with mature subjects, has such a low bar of age interaction in the server (13+) I know minors won't stop interacting with mw content, but that doesn't mean we should ease access to them either.

I always believed that fandoms should have some divisions, because sometimes having it all so mix takes away from the experience and quality of discourse. I think creating adult only spaces that aren't NSFW is important, so talking about the subjects tackled, showing fanart and more without overcensoring for minor audiences is possible. I find it tiring that in a server for a game talking about sexual assault and violence I have to tiptoe about the same subjects because the unintended audience is there.

If Wrong organ doesn't want to keep all the minors out (even if I think it would be best), at least making it 16+ would be nice, nobody younger than that has any business seeing gore and other graphic topics.

Some division ideas:

- Mixed chatroom (all ages, just like it is now I guess)

- 16 and up chatroom (it can handle harsher topics but nothing explicit)

-Adult only chatroom (SFW) (all the topics can be handled without the need to oversee if it's adequate for minor audiences)

And because freaks will always exist, I know it you know it, we know it. (I'm not better, I love me a shirtless Swansea from time to time)

-Adult only chatroom (NSFW) **highly regulated plss I beg**

Now with the media literacy, part of it being low is kids not knowing what that is and running around like headless chickens with the first misinterpreting action they see instead of analysing the content. I think book recommendations, video analysis and genuine dialogue is the cure (God knows that helped me understand Curly’s character grayness so much better than on my first viewing of the game). Not much else can be done in that department.

4. Inattentive or enabling creators

Wrong organ, ily so much but please, yall are letting so much worrying content pass in the showoff chat that sometimes I don't even want to bother enter it. I know the devs and mods cannot control every fan, but at least a verbal denounce of proship (as in problematic) content would be nice. Or trying to hold accountable problematic creators that run around your server, at least enough as to not spit on the games message that enabling is just as bad as letting things rot in the name of the bigger picture.

Also I hope I don't need to clarify this but please don't harass the devs, let's be normal guys, this is constructive criticism not a brawl.

So yeah, let's start holding people accountable to their responsibilities just like the cautionary tale of the Tulpar warned us about!

5. Algorithm-rotted behaviours

Last but not least, imma curse out short form content based algorithms for making fandom lifespan shorten severely. Material that in times prior to tiktok could feed a fanbase for years now rot in a few months, and that is genuinely infuriating.

Creators cannot take time to curate long projects anymore in fear that leaving the algorithm alone for some time to do so will leave them out of the hype train, and I can't blame them, but that creation model is truly exhausting. Expecting people to create polished masterpieces everyday isn't only detrimental to the big creators but the the lil guys starting out too, since if from day 1 you don't post 500 post a week the algorithm can leave you talking to the void, and that as an artist sucks balls.

Let's go back to having patience for projects to come out, let's be fans of fans and their fan projects, if it takes time we fanart and theorise and talk until that voice dub does come, until that writer does post and until that singer does sing. Because being fans of fans feeds us past the original works and makes the bonds of the fandom stronger.

Give that smaller artist a like, redraw a silly post, engage in the comments of that post, we need to make the most of the social media outlet and make it last longer than a couple months.

☆In conclusion, let's create more, talk more, learn more (and block more), to make the fandom grow healthy☆