#This is a lighthearted post btw I mean no harm by it

[blueberry-yogurt-academy]

A Cervitaur’s Greatest Adversary [Cookie Run Fanfiction]

Read on AO3

Requested by: @rowanthepinetree

Rating: Teen and Up

Pairing: Earl Grey Cookie / Fig Cookie

No Archive Warnings Apply

Summary: Earl Grey and Fig are going to visit Earl Grey's sibling, Roguefort. However, their only mode of transportation is Earl Grey's car, which proves to be a problem for a certain deer-legged cookie...

[side note: this is going to be the last cookie run fic i will post on this blog! for now on, all of my cookie run fics as well as requests will go to my writing blog, @every-book-and-cranny so please check it out if you’re interested!]

remember, reblogs > likes applies to writings too!!!

see below the cut to read!

Author’s Note: HIIIII so this was a request made by my friend, Rowan! It's sort of a thank-you for a gift that *he* gave me a few weeks back! (Thank you again for that, Rowan, btw!) I'm sorry once again this is so late.

Also!!! Rowan helped me out with writing Fig's accent so props to him for that too! I'm sorry if I still made some mistakes though, this is my first time writing Fig.

The ending to this oneshot is piss-poor even by my standards. I am very sorry for that. I was trying to do one of those clever, funny one-liner endings but it just did not work out :( Also I think I made it a little more angsty than what was originally intended djdkd but it's still mostly lighthearted! (I always say I prefer fluff over angst and then I usually add more angst than necessary...I guess I like a good mix of both more shjkd)

Anyways, I hope you enjoy, despite how short it is!

.·:*¨༺ ༻¨*:·.

Fig, for all of their life, always had just walked everywhere. There were a couple of reasons for this. One, they loved nature and the entire world as a whole, so they had a tendency to pause every so often to observe the sights around them as they trekked to their destination—something that was significantly harder to do in a car. Also, the thought of all the pollution-ridden smoke that emitted constantly from a car to harm the trees, the animals, the air, was enough to make them cringe. Two, it was the most convenient mode of transportation for them, what with…let’s just say the way their body was shaped.

…This latter reason was why Fig, as they stood before their boyfriend Earl Grey’s car, grimaced. Poor Earl Grey, he held the door open for Fig innocently enough—Fig wasn’t sure if it had even slipped through his mind that his car wasn’t exactly accommodated for them very well at all.

“Um…my love?” Fig gently called out to their partner.

“What’s wrong, Fig? Why do you have that look on your face?” Earl Grey asked, scrunching his brows, obviously still not understanding. Oh, Earl Grey…Fig loved him dearly.

“Well…tha thing is…I don’t think I’m gunna be able to fit in ya car,” they said awkwardly, gesturing toward their legs.

Earl Grey finally started to understand, and his mouth dropped slightly as he began to understand. “...Oh.” He huffed a bit, but then a grin crossed his face. “Well, I mean, we can still try!”

Fig involuntarily jumped a bit at this. “Wh—ya sure that's a good idea?!”

“Well, I don’t know about a good idea, per se,” Earl Grey began, “but I think we can manage it, if that’s what you mean. I’ve had to strap two defiant twins into car seats before—on a time limit, no less.” He chuckled a bit at this. “I think I can manage to fit you in here.”

Fig sighed and thought it over. They were going to visit Earl Grey’s sibling, Roguefort, and they by no means lived close by, so they couldn’t just walk there, as Fig would have preferred. Earl Grey was looking forward to seeing his sibling very much—and Fig was of course excited to see their friend, as well.

So, Fig decided they would try, for their boyfriend.

“Alright, let’s give it a try, my love,” Fig finally replied with a smile.

Earl Grey smiled back, holding the door open wider (he’d part-way closed it after hearing Fig speak).

Gingerly, Fig started to trot toward the car, dreading the inevitable even more as they got closer to the vehicle. They started to climb in—arms first, of course. Alright, Alright. This is fine, Fig tried to repeat over and over again in their head.

Then, they tried to put their hind legs in, and that’s when all hell broke loose, so to speak. First of all, they ended up tripping, bumping their chin onto the soft backseat of Earl Grey’s car. Luckily, Earl Grey dashed right up to help them back again, brushing them off (even though they hadn’t gotten dirty nor very hurt at all). “That’s okay, try again,” he gently encouraged.

Just wanting to get in, Fig tried again, and ended up tripping again. Earl Grey helped again, as well. “Dear, try to go in a bit slower,” he advised. “It’s okay, it’s no rush. I’m right here.”

Earl Grey’s voice was so soothing and reassuring, but Fig still felt highly embarrassed. Their already pink face flushed a bright red and they pursed their lips tightly.

“Do you want me to help you up, maybe?” Earl Grey offered. “Would that help?”

Fig thought for a moment and nodded. “Ya,” they answered. “Thank ya, my love.”

Earl Grey went up behind Fig and carefully took a hold of their hind legs, slowly hoisting them up. As Fig sank deeper into the car, they felt their chest move forward quickly and their eyes widened. However, as soon as their entire body seemed to be in, they felt their hind legs hit the side of the car. Earl Grey made a small ‘mmm’ sound and tried harder to push Fig in; at one point he accidentally bumped Fig’s knees against the side of the car, making the cookie yelp a bit.

“Oh!” Earl Grey cried out. “I’m so sorry!”

Fig sighed a little. “It’s fine, my love.”

“Fig, what’s wrong? Are you hurt?” Earl Grey asked, genuine concern in his voice.

“No, it’s just...” Fig began, their voice sad. “I’m sorry ya have to date some kinda an’mal like me.”

Earl Grey grew distraught at this, and his face and heart both sank as he realized what his partner had meant. “Darling, what? No, I don’t think you’re some kind of animal, of course not,” he answered seriously, placing his hand on Fig’s shoulder.

“But, you ‘ave to try to push me in ya car like I am one,” Fig replied, their voice shaking up and down, almost as if they were trying to sing a melancholy song. It struck Earl Grey then that he’d never even heard Fig’s ‘sad’ voice. Fig was always so cheery and happy…it hurt Earl Grey deeply to see his partner so upset, so unlike their normal self.

“Fig…that doesn’t make you any less of a cookie,” Earl Grey told them, both his hands on their shoulders now, “nor any less of my partner.” He leaned down to kiss Fig on the lips. “I love you so much. If this is frustrating you, or making you feel upset, we can find an alternate solution. No problems.”

Fig looked back at Earl Grey, hope and admiration in their eyes. “Really, love?”

“Of course.”

Fig smiled for the first time since laying their eyes on that vehicle, their adorable dimples showing. They leaned in to kiss Earl Grey one more time, which the blond gladly accepted.

“I’m glad ya don’ think badly of me,” Fig commented. “That's really what I was w’rried about. I ‘ave to admit, it was a bit funny to try to push me in,” they finished with a giggle.

Earl Grey chuckled too and flexed his arm a bit. “That was my workout for today, that’s for sure.”

The two shared a laugh, and later in the day, they went to rent out a limousine.

[just-another-miserable-prick]

~Welcome to the madness that is this wonderful account~

Aight, so-

Name's Ella, she/they and I ramble a lot. This post is all about tags, my (very much wip) TTTE AU(s), all that good stuff. I like drawing and writing, I'm not too good at either of them. Also, English is my second language. My native language is Hungarian btw.

Tags:

#Ella's rambles - Quite self-explanatory, but for those in the back, if you see this tag, I'm just rambling about whatever comes to my mind, let that be lore, OCs, whatever.

#Ella talks - I'm gonna use this for my vent posts/real talk, if I were to do any of that. Will likely be seen along with my ramble tag cuz I tend to ramble about everything.

#Ella's drawings - It's in the name, just my drawings.

#Ella tried - This is for my writing endeavors, as I'm not very experienced, or good at writing. But hey, I'm trying here!

#Ella's AUs - This is exclusively for lore and AU stuff. I have one for the time being, the In The Sky AU, which I'll talk about later.

#Ella's canons - This is for my headcanons! And trust me, it's a lot.

#Ella's reblogs - I'll use this for the shit I happen to reblog, really self-explanatory.

#Remind me to trim my bangs - This is my "note to self" kind of tag. Don't take this literally. I do remember to trim my bangs. Most of the time.

(Will probably add more later)

A few warnings before I forget:

⚠️Vulgar language: I have the vocabulary of a sailor, which means I cuss far too much. If you don't like that sort of thing, this isn't the place for you.

⚠️Less than lighthearted themes: while I like keeping things fun and lighthearted, there will, on rare occasion, be mentions of death, suicide, self harm, less than ideal upbringing (and that's putting it lightly!), and other not-so-fun themes. If you're sensitive to any of the above, again, this isn't the place for you.

(May add more later)

So my AU:

(Sodor High School AU has been banished to the backrooms)

In The Sky AU: My passion project AU that takes place in the sky, with the "engines", or "Wingmen" as I call them living their everyday lives flying around the Island of Sodor, mainly relying on tourism and cargo traffic for their work.

I actually have an AU sideblog @ttte-in-the-sky-au!

Let's talk OCs!

I have a lot, but the most important ones are:

Mihály

Erzsébet

Endre

Ella

Ships! This is very much headcanon territory, so feel free to disagree with any of the following:

Edward x Henry: Absolutely my OTP, the cutest couple on this planet. Pure fluffy adorableness.

Gordon x James: The type of couple to argue over which one of them is hotter- they have ego wars a lot, but I see them being a fun duo most of the time.

Emily x Rosie: Boss babe coffee-holic and the one to keep them in check. All I know is that they're adorable lol

I believe that's it for now, but before I forget, feel free to send me a PM! I might not reply fast because of school hours, but I'll do my best to read whatever you have to say!

And with that out of the way, have a good one!

[kincringeemporium]

The Promised Party Cat Callout (Long Post!)

Here we go, y’all. I’m not gonna go all-out with the salt and vitriol typical of my longer posts, because... this isn’t about me being salty. This is about highlighting the issues with Mod Party Cat of the fictionkinfessions blog. 

Nor is it intended to bully or chase Party Cat off of Tumblr. Yes, this is a callout post; no, it’s not an invitation to attack the blog with hate or stalk their sideblogs. And no, it’s not just my personal opinion, which we will get to. 

This is intended to show Party Cat exactly what is wrong with how they’re running the blog and how they’re behaving. If they learn from it, good. If they don’t... then, they don’t. 

Last of all, we did gather opinions from both kin and non-kin in a survey. This isn’t meant to antagonize the entire kin community. In fact, the information from kin really helped to support this argument. Thank you to the kin people who did respond to the survey. 

(Btw, survey is still open: https://goo.gl/forms/lDoffQVVmELDo2EZ2 ) 

Obvious content warnings for dark shit apply. (Abuse, depression/suicide, etc.)

With that being said... let’s begin. 

The main reasons for the callout are these: 

Passive aggressiveness to or about other mods

Passive aggressiveness to anons/senders 

“Cutesy” or overly positive typing/behavior in serious situations 

Material that is generally improper for this kind of confession blog 

Hypocrisy

Majority of survey takers agreed with each other and with the points made in this callout

We’ll go one by one. 

Passive-aggressiveness to/about mods

(The bottom half of the mod page was linking to Party Cat’s other blogs and crediting some theme elements. Not relevant to callout.)

There isn’t a lot of information about the other mods or why they left; the general consensus on Maude is that they left because of school, but nothing about Kuroocrow. Now, why is this passive aggressive? 

There was no need to publicly say that there’d been a “catfight” (ha ha, funny) with Maude. We don’t know if Maude even gave Cat permission to say this. If not, it’s disrespectful. (Nothing wrong with saying they’ll be okay.)

What Cat is saying about Kuro is even more aggressive than that. “They refuse to do anything to help!” Okay. That could be true. There’s still no need to rant about it. 

“Ask them on my behalf what the fuck is going on with them!” Adding ‘on my behalf’ comes across as incredibly self-centered. And saying ‘what the fuck’ adds to the aggressiveness. Even if not intentional, that is how it looks, and it needs to be changed.  

All that needs to be said is something like this: “It’s just me, Party Cat! Maude is on hiatus, and Kuro is absent. If anyone knows what’s going on with them, please DM me!” There. That’s respectful and to the point. 

Passive-aggressiveness to Anons/Senders 

This section will be... long. 

So.. there’s a lot of overlap here with the ‘cutesy typing’ issue, but I’ll get to that later. I had to crop the screenshot to just this because there was so much that wasn’t 100% relevant to the callout. (Context for this post: Cat promo’d a kin server, an anon found some unsavory things happening in the server, anon warned Cat, and Cat said this.)

“...Seriously there’s like a few thousand people following this blog” is an unnecessarily rude way to say this. The point itself is legitimate and understandable. It really just need to be reworded so as not to come off as salty. 

Alright, I’d understand this one if there was anything in the blog description or about pages to warn people that the blog can get dark. Confessions about death, suicide, rape, incest, murder, violence, high emotional distress, etc are jarring to see when this blog tends to be lighthearted.  

While this anon does look a little bit defensive or offended, that’s so slight compared to the defensiveness of the response. Personally, I read the question as confused. (Y’all, who agrees with me? Who disagrees?)  

Cat... people don’t tend to expect very dark content on a blog like this, especially when there’s no warning, and they might not even bother to blacklist the tags you use because they don’t expect it. (That’s a guess. If I’m wrong, then smeone should explain it. ) There isn’t much of an answer here - you just answer their question with another question. 

So, okay, I agree with Cat saying that this ask is vague. And it’s not good to add “but” after something like ‘No disrespect...’ -- because “but” does negate whatever precedes it. 

Those are the only things in this screenshot that make sense. Now we’ll get to the things that are passive-aggressive. 

“Maybe it’s because...” Vague in itself. ‘Maybe’ gives you wiggle room to get out of this perfectly legitimate critique, instead of saying “Hey, I seem this way because...” 

“People keep asking me things without providing the barest amount of information...” People actually do provide information. Sometimes it isn’t enough. That doesn’t mean they aren’t trying, and they could be dropping the subject because of how you respond (nobody really wants to interact with someone being rude). 

“I just fill up the dead air with jokes!” Plenty of people do. And it’s fine... just not in this situation. When something serious comes up, you shouldn’t simply make a joke and move on. This reads like an excuse, and even a way to shame people. (”Oh... it was only a joke? Now I feel bad! :(” ) 

“And then people get more mad because... I don’t know!” This looks like you are blaming people for their feelings. People are allowed to feel mad. It’s never okay for them to send hate or be dicks -- which they’re not doing. 

“Nobody reads that page, lollerskates!!” This could easily be solved by a regular, repeated post linking to the FAQ. Or a regular, repeated post explaining why confessions sometimes aren’t answered. Or something like that. Just a bit more effort. 

Okay: “This blog is only for kin. We want to keep it within our community. If you have questions, check out this FAQ!” 

Not okay: “You have no business interacting! You don’t know anything!” 

That ‘sincerely’ isn’t very sincere at all. Most antikin will respect kin not wanting anti interaction on their blogs. Those that don’t are being dicks. And non-kin people who don’t have anything against kin are not at all likely to be hostile toward you, so being this hostile to them is unwarranted. 

It’s confusing that this community, in general, would like non-kin and antis to become educated about what kin is/means... then such an influential blog sends a message like this. Regardless of how people feel about Cat, she does have pretty decent influence and a huge following; it’s very easy for impressionable kids to pick up on this weird double standard. 

There’s nothing wrong with preferring to let someone else educate non-kin. There’s nothing wrong with pointing non-kin in a different direction. 

There’s a lot wrong with blatantly pushing them away like this. It’s rude. 

Inappropriate Cutesy/Overly Positive Typing 

Cat isn’t stupid and knows full well what this anon (same one from before) meant. There was no need whatsoever to make such a giant joke of the question. 

(Not to mention... why the hell would she tell everybody that she has so much medical debt and can’t afford electricity? I don’t know her situation so I can’t say it is/isn’t a joke too. It is something that could genuinely upset people, and some would even believe it. It’s a terrible thing to say.)

“:3c” Not harmful in itself. Just doesn’t belong in a serious ask. 

This anon meant a post in which they were venting about abuse... they were angry that a character had abused their kintype. Cat knew that, considering their abuse content/trigger warning tags. This response looks sugarcoated and mentions some random anecdote about a thing Cat does, which is not appropriate in a situation regarding child abuse. 

This was in response to something that was legitimately annoying Cat and breaking a blog rule. It does not look like an appropriate or effective way to address the issue - even looks immature. Did people take this seriously? 

Yes, this really is a tag on a venting ask about a real life abusive stepfather. A joke. In a venting ask... about an abusive home life. There is a tag saying ‘Your stepdad sucks’, which is good. A joke, though, is too far. 

(Apologies for a repeat screenshot - I saved this one for right now, for the sake of organization.) 

There is, as I’ve been saying, no need for this. It’s very strange to ‘roleplay’ and act cute when there’s possibly a toxic Discord server going around.  

When asked if any of Party Cat’s mannerisms were bothersome, one person said this: 

Others said these things: 

Inappropriate Material 

Shoutout to @queen-dragon-slut (damn Tumblr won’t link you) for getting me this screenshot. 

What the hell, Cat? This is serious -- this is even more serious than people sending confessions saying things like “Ugh, I hate this kintype!” or “Ugh! I hate that character!” This person actually endangered their own health and safety to force themselves into a ‘kin shift’. And it’s in no way Cat’s fault. 

However. 

To not even provide the anon with links to help blogs or any kind of resources, list some tags, and move on, shows an incredible lack of effort. Not only that, but I feel bad for this person. One note. That’s it. Nobody seemed to care that someone was suffering this badly, Cat included, which is, quite frankly, disgusting. 

Again, something this dark doesn’t belong on a casual confession blog (which is what your blog looks like it’s supposed to be). And again, it genuinely fucking worried me. Is this person okay? 

And it’s not even tagged. Not as ‘suicide’, not as ‘depression’, not as ‘suicidal ideation’, nothing. Which is what this is. This person feels like they’re not needed, like they’re pointless, which exactly what suicidal ideation does to you. 

You can’t DM an anon saying, “Hey, you alright?” You can, however, at the very least, link them to the help blog page. 

Mod Ryan, who is also part of the fictionkin community whether we like it or not, has seen: 

Confessions about incest 

Confessions about being abused otherwise 

Confessions about stalking and being stalked

People saying they liked to kill 

People saying they weren’t at all sorry for violent things their kintypes did

Asks saying characters or people should’ve killed themselves 

@queen-dragon-slut said about some of the suicide-ish confessions:  “ Tbh when somebody sends in a confession saying “I killed myself in my canon” it just sounds like they have some fantasies of wanting to kill themselves but cover it up by saying that their kin kill themselves and try to play it off. That’s not healthy.”

Hypocrisy: 

Alright. That looks reasonable -- but wait. 

The asks and other screenshots I just posted do strongly come off as suicide wishes, if not actual notes. 

Here’s what people had to say when asked if they’d seen Party Cat acting hypocritical. I did not even mention suicide asks or dark asks in the survey question: 

____  I wish I had time to say more but class starts in twenty minutes. When I’m back, I will add onto the callout with one more thing: that people feel Cat isn’t doing enough to help distressed anons.

Huge thank you to everyone who helped out with this! 

It’s something that people have wanted to say for quite a while, and something that should’ve been said a long time ago. 

Nobody should be demonizing Party Cat; there is a real person behind the screen. This should be a learning experience for her. Not an attack. 

-K 

[hope-for-olicity]

This is an old bone, but I’m going to chew on it some more because the public perception of romance novels is a perpetual source of irritation in my life. As a general rule, I try not to spend all my time defending the genre from the fifty-million polemics written about romance novels each year (which seem to spring up faster than dandelions in the spring). If we waste our energy shooting down shallow, unsubstantiated arguments, then we have no time left to devote to real consideration of the genre (its flaws, its value, its sociocritical commentary, etc.). Which, of course, is what they want.

Today, however, I’m going to make an exception.

Because back in June there was an article in the National Post that really hit the wrong note with me—so much so that, rather than fire off the rage-fueled response I wrote that same day, I have been sitting on this post for two months. I’ve been hesitating for two reasons: one, rage is not a good look for my writing style, and two, the issue I have with the article itself is a point of massive frustration for me both personally and professionally. I wanted to be sure that when I finally wrote this post, I was able to clearly articulate why.

But right off the bat, let’s get one thing clear:

Dear Romance Detractors of the World,

THE ROMANCE GENRE IS NOT YOUR JUNK FOOD.

Sincerely, We’re all really tired of this argument.

Sadaf Ahsan’s article, “In Defense of the Trashy Summer Read,” ran in the National Post on June 27, 2018. After months of fairly decent media coverage for the genre—this year has been an amazing one for positive representation of the romance novel in the media—I was hopeful that, despite the use of “trashy” in the title, Ahsan’s piece would, in fact, be a defense of the romance.

But Ahsan quickly disabused me of that notion. She begins the article by asking us to “redefine how we think of trash”—not to redefine what we think of as trash, but what we think of trash. Not an auspicious start, since she is clearly still associating romance with “trash.” But, thankfully, the word trash, through annoying, has been used so often with regards to the romance genre that it’s really lost most of its power. So, though annoying, Ahasan’s ability to distinguish between trash and quality wasn’t enough to set me off. No, it was when she compared romance novels to junk food that I really lost my temper.

So I have decided that it’s time for a Romance Novels 101 refresher course.

LESSON 1: ROMANCE NOVELS ARE NOT TRASH

To explain why Ahsan comparing romance novels to junk food set me off, I have to back up a few years.

In 2015 the Smithsonian ran an article by Emma Pearse on their magazine website, “Why Can’t the Romance Genre Get Any Love,”about the academic study of the romance genre. In the article, Pearse makes the argument that romance novels have as much literary merit, and are as worthy of academic study, as any other piece of fiction, from Tolkien to Tolstoy. She draws particular attention to the fact that most other forms of genre fiction, in particular fantasy and science fiction, have been studied in universities and taught in classes for years. But romance has not been afforded the same degree of attention, time, or effort.

We all know why romance novels are so commonly dismissed as trash, of course. Critics will defend their stance by claiming that romance novels are:

Badly written. (I draw your attention to this excellent piece by fellow Rioter Danika Ellis on why you should stop using the phrase “badly written” to critique books you just didn’t like.)

Sexist. (Which is funny coming from people who are frequently sexist in their attacks on romance novels.)

Causing women to confuse fantasy and reality. (You can tell from the the pulsing vein on my forehead that this is my favorite.)

But at the end of the day, the main reason that romance novels are dismissed as fluff and nonsense is because they’re (mostly) written by women, and when has something created by women for women (and about women or centered on women) not been automatically been dismissed out of hand?

But the more you try to explain to them that romance novels have value—literary value, cultural value, critical value—the discussion becomes a Magic Eight Ball of Ignorance (-5 to Intelligence). Every time you make a rational argument and shake the ball, the words “mindless brain candy” keep floating to the surface.

via GIPHY

LESSON 2: ROMANCE NOVELS ARE NOT JUNK FOOD (OR FAST FOOD)

If you want an example of a typical response from the Magic Eight Ball of Ignorance, check out this early comment on Pearse’s article:

This guy pissed me off in 2015 when he claimed that romance novels were of no more consideration to thinking people than fast food was to food critics. And when I saw Ahsan making the same argument in her article earlier this year, I had to resist the urge to set fire to my laptop. Because of all the arguments against the romance genre, this is the one that I hate the most.

Below is the third paragraph of Ahsan’s article, in which she introduces her “junk food” metaphor. Which she then carries through the entirety of her article, as though she’d discovered the most fucking clever rhetoric trick known to man. (Reader, she had not.)

“Because the thing is, trash – mostly as it pertains to pop culture – is a lovely thing. And the very best, the most vacuous and lighthearted, is deliciously digestible. Like devouring a brightly coloured cupcake or the jelly donut you know isn’t going to offer you anything more than needless calories and a sugar migraine, devouring a trashy novel is the utmost not-giving-a-damn-that-literature is able to offer.”

This paragraph exemplifies everything I hate about the faulty comparison of romance = fast food/junk food. There are dozens of things in Ahsan’s article that I could tear into that are wrong, ugly, idiotically stereotypical, and just plain ignorant—if only I had the time. But this right here is the worst of it. When she follows this paragraph up with remarks like:

“Who cares about extra calories? Who cares about a jelly stain? Who cares if you’ve named your cat Fabio after an iconic romance novel cover star?”

or

“they go down easy, but fast, one after the other, like beers you’ve been tossing back all afternoon, or that bowl of guac you may or may not have finished all on your own. What’s one more drink; one more chip; one more prurient paragraph?”

Ahsan illustrates exactly why this sort of argument makes me so angry. For one thing, it is much too easy for someone to spin it in a way that sounds positive even while the undertone is derisive. Like I said, going into Ahsan’s piece I had hopes that it would be pro-romance, given the title. And on the surface it seems to be. Read romances, Ahsan says! Don’t let anyone shame you for reading romances! These are arguments real romance readers make everyday to encourage each other and to embolden new readers.

The difference is that when actual romance readers say these things we mean “read romances” and “don’t let people shame you for reading romances” because. The “because” being that romances are amazing, creative, ever diversifying, feminist, and (naysayers and literary gatekeepers be damned) possess amazing literary value. When Ahsan says “read romances,” etc., it’s not “because,” it’s “but.” Read romances, but never forget that they’re bad for you and to supplement your romance reading with real books.

Fun fact: the definition of prurient is “marked by or arousing an immoderate or unwholesome interest or desire; especially: marked by, arousing, or appealing to sexual desire.”

Excessive. As in, you should be ashamed of the degree of interest. This word has a explicitly negative connotation, and you will never convince me Ahsan didn’t know that.

LESSON 3: ROMANCE NOVELS ARE NOT WARPING ANYONE’S MIND

And that’s the ugliness of the “junk food” metaphor. It encourages you to “indulge,” but it never wants you to forget that it considers what you’re consuming to be bad for you, and ultimately it looks down on you for your choices. This sort of thinking is tied into a long history of people dismissing the romance genre as useless, valueless, ineffectual literature, even as they oppose that same argument by claiming romance novels are harmful to women. (See above re: the vein in my forehead and the idiotic idea that romance novels blind women to reality.)

That’s right, women are so stupid and unaware that we can be tricked by a piece of fiction. Did you know that? I didn’t. Must be because I’ve been reading too many books to pay attention. We’re so incapable that we have to be told what we can’t read, what we can read, and how much of one thing we can read before it warps our simple little minds. Now smile, pretty girl, and say thank you! But, then, pretty might be the wrong word to use, because based on the awful romance reader stereotypes that Ahsan evokes in her article (apparently we’re all sloppy, lazy, lonely, cat-owning, sex-obsessed spinsters, btw), I doubt the average asshole romance hater would consider us all that attractive.

Okay.

Apparently even two months later I haven’t gotten all the rage out.

So, before I go find something to bring my blood pressure back down out of the stratosphere, one last time for the people in the back:

ROMANCE NOVELS ARE NOT YOUR JUNK FOOD.

[habibialkaysani]

because I haven’t seen a whole lot of discussion on this so far...

…we kind of really need to talk about zari attempting suicide twice in one episode (first with the gun when sara manages to stop her, and then with the bomb when she is convinced she will actually die and won’t come back and then she finds out it’s all a ruse from gideon).

I bring this up for two principal reasons. first, because mental health issues have never been addressed on the show in a sensitive way (take nate referring to kuasa as a “psycho water witch” and amaya comparing her to a gorilla - which has racial undertones too, btw - or nate telling mick that self-harm is “completely insane”, and those are just from season three). it’s unlikely zari will talk about her suicide attempts to anyone on the team, even though sara can relate, having taken the tibetan pit viper venom when she was on arrow to save her family. 

my second reason is that zari is canonically muslim. aside from zari’s family, the only other person who you could say was muslim across the flarrowverse (please do correct me if I’m mistaken) is an unnamed assassin who appears in 2x13 of arrow, who says part of the shahadah (which is the islamic declaration of faith) before he kills himself with poison to avoid giving information to sara, oliver and quentin.

I hope you see where I’m going with this. I’m uncomfortable with seeing a muslim character trying to kill herself for the greater good (in some way). I don’t like that, intentionally or not, that is the default for the paltry number of canonical muslims in flarrowverse (and don’t even get me started on the league of assassins and the way error casually borrowed actual islamic prayers to accompany gross acts of violence and to be the backdrop of an organisation of literal killers), to either attempt or commit suicide in such a way. and if I need to spell it out for anyone, yes, this made me as a muslim highly uncomfortable because people already think “muslim” is synonymous with “terrorist” and “suicide bomber”, and so seeing a canonically muslim character think she’s about to face death by bomb is just not okay with me.

and, okay, maybe the assassin’s suicide isn’t comparable to zari’s. the assassin would rather die than give up intel to team arrow. zari, meanwhile, carries that bomb to part of the waverider to save the others from the blast. put simply, the assassin is an antagonist and zari is a protagonist. the assassin is the coward. zari is a hero.

but I don’t understand why zari needed to do this to be a hero in the first place. she’s shown to have a knack with kids, and she’s helped the team on missions that have meant saving a lot of people - a whole city, at one point. why did she have to be subject to this kind of psychological torture (and before anyone tells me I’m exaggerating, zari relived that hour so many times she knew what everyone was saying by heart and also tried to kill herself. twice) by an ai who doesn’t trust her for reasons unknown? (like come on. mick has betrayed the team a couple of times now. rip has been full on brainwashed and gideon still listened to him, jeopardising the team’s safety. and look, I have friends who like rip and friends who like mick, so to be clear, I’m not trying to hate on either of them, but you have to at least see what they have in common - white, male, not of a religious minority. compare that to zari who is a persian muslim woman of colour. hmm. qwhite interesting, right?) it’s like gideon made her go through some sort of sick initiation to be considered more than an acquaintance and a “proper” member of the team. and I get that gideon isn’t really a person. but again, when you compare how zari is treated with the white men on the show, it says a lot.

and this isn’t about intention. I don’t care if @marcguggenheim didn’t mean to offend because it makes no difference to the actual offence caused. but when I heard a muslim character would be introduced to the flarrowverse, while I was obviously happy, I was also apprehensive. I now see that I was right to be.

okay so to be clear, my intention with this post is not to piss in anyone’s cornflakes, or rain on anyone’s parade. I don’t want to guilt anyone for not seeing this, because even for me as a muslim it didn’t click immediately. it was only really on reflection, having taken the time to digest the episode and try to put my finger on why something was off about it, that I realised the terrible connotations of the episode. that’s not to say that zari didn’t have some good moments that were lighthearted and funny, or that she didn’t grow as a character in this episode. but I don’t like that she needed to prove herself, so to speak, and I like even less the fact that she felt the only way to do that was to end her own life.

[hellagaypokemon]

there’s something I really need to get off my chest, regarding someone I once considered my fave youtuber and the way he seems to view gay people..

I’ve been watching Mark’s videos for about 3 years now. I first found his videos through finding Yomimash while looking for good Slender Man LPs to watch, and found Mark when they played that gory cat multiplayer game together. I decided to watch his videos more regularly after watching his unfair Mario and cat Mario videos which were absolutely hysterical, and have been watching his content regularly ever since.

but there’s a pattern I’ve noticed that’s really made me uncomfortable lately.

I’m really starting to think that Mark is homophobic.

now, not the kind that’s obvious, where someone actually has hate in their heart (think: mike pence, the westburrow baptist church, ext) but the kind that doesn’t bother to check all the tiny biases that one accumulates in a bigoted society (the kind of thing that causes people to think there’s nothing wrong with things like this, or not seeing what’s wrong with things like constantly calling video game enemies b*tches/sons of b*tches/wh*res/ext and talking about how a player or enemy that got swiftly/dramatically killed “got raped”) because both are harmful, but I’d argue the smaller things even more-so, as no one takes the WBC seriously, but the microaggressions are so ingrained in our society, no one but those harmed actually notice, and when we attempt to call them out, we’re told we’re just being overly sensitive and to lighten up/not take things so seriously, or even that we have a victim complex.

in all the years I’ve watched him, the only time he refers to us, it’s as a joke. he and his friends love joking about “suckin’ dick” and each other’s and just general constant dick jokes (makes you wonder why he was so shocked he got a 7 for his mental maturity test) and specifically joking about gay people, which in and of itself is homophobic when you realize that type of humor is what’s called a “punch down” which in and of itself is harmful, but on top of that, specifically straight people thinking of gay people/same-sex affection as a punchline is in itself a microaggression (and if you want sources, look at the latest Golden Globes, or one of many of Stephen Colbert’s skits, just to start)

but, dick jokes in and of themselves aren’t that bad. I mean, I don’t find them funny, and the amount with which he uses them seems more like a crutch than anything, but w/e. I don’t have to find everything he says funny, but it just gets worse from there.

like for instance that pirate prop hunt video where Bob ignorantly comments about how “the whole gay thing is not real cool with pirates”, because pirates are cool and the only way he could view a pirate being gay was if he was like Smee from Peter Pan, even though most pirates were gay, to the point that the word “mate”/”matey” (the word that first comes to mind when one thinks of pirates) actually comes from a French word that more or less translated to ‘significant other’. (also, to top all that off, he’s just also not comfortable being alone with a gay man when there’s only men around, and the idea of being checked out by another man, aka treated by a gay man how straight men treat women, which he made very clear makes him very uncomfortable)

which, in and of itself is absolutely awful, and I really wish more people would have called him out on how absolutely overwhelmingly homophobic that is, but as it stands, even Mark thought it was ok enough to post.

because while Mark did say that he’s “ok” with gay people/pirates, he never really truly called Bob out or pointed out how hurtful such comments are. instead he turned it into yet another dick joke, and decided he’d put a generic “trigger warning” in the front of the video (without actually telling us what the trigger was for, making it completely useless, only succeeding on making me feel on edge the entire video because I had no idea what to expect)

he never called out Bob on his comments outside of personal minor disagreement, which clearly did not phase him since he kept going. I understand wanting to keep things lighthearted for the video, which could explain the very minor disagreeing and turning it into a joke, but there was no reason he couldn’t cut that bit out (as the prop hunt videos are always full of cuts so we the viewer only see the parts they deem funny enough to show us) and just leave it out of the video entirely, which tells me he found the homophobia from Bob and the subsequent dick jokes and everything else around it entertaining enough to leave in, even though he KNEW it would be upsetting enough to need a warning.

this hurt, but I chucked it up to not wanting to ruin the fun mood they had going, since they seemed to be playing for a few hours, and simply decided to not watch any more videos including Bob and hope that Mark talked to him after the fact. it still sat in the back of my mind though, and I was never able to fully forgive ether of them.

I’ve also yet to hear of any of his charity live streams focusing on LGBT charities ether general or focusing on a specific subset, nor has he really made any effort to actually acknowledge us (unless to joke about us).

when same-sex marriage was legalized I looked damn near daily on all the social media accounts of his that I was aware of, but I never managed to find anything. I’ve since been told he simply posted on facebook an image of the rainbow flag and “today’s a good day”, but...I still feel like my original feelings stand, as I never found it myself (and have yet to actually see it, so for all I know that post could have been completely made up in an attempt to shut me down) and for something so important, for someone who will go on a tearful 30 minute monologue about the importance of love and being kind to each other and so-on at the drop of a hat, it really feels strange that when #lovewon, after all these years of fighting and hate and death, all he had to say was “today is a good day”.

and then when Orlando happened, I was sure he’d say something. I mean, with that much loss of life and so much hate surrounding it, I thought surely he’d have something to say. I mean, he talks about death and suicide and great losses of life and how important it is that we all stick together and love and protect one another all the time. there’s no way he could just gloss over this one, right?

and yet, he still managed to. he did make a statement, but it was what, almost a week later? and just a generic “love each other” sort of post that never actually referenced anything. I’m not even sure he mentioned the shooting specifically, just saying “with everything going on right now” or something and we all knew what he meant, because there really wasn’t anything else he could be talking about. but he never once mentioned anything specifically. it was a racial and homophobic hate crime, the worst mass shooting of our time, and all he could offer to his fans was a general “be good to each other”, which he says all the time, only this time much shorter than normal.

just a little two paragraph post, a general statement, for the worst mass killing of modern time on US soil.

and if I recall, within a week of it he had another charity livestream, and it wasn’t for Orlando. nor was the next one, or the next one. he “doesn’t feel it’s his place” to say anything, and apparently he doesn’t feel it’s “his place” to send help for people literally dying ether. well, unless they’re children dying of cancer, or people trying to kill themselves. they’re the only people dying that he seems worthy enough and “his place” to send money to and bring awareness about.

but the thing that hurt me the most personally, was his comment just a few days ago in his blooper video, not two minuets in (all of which had been literally nothing but dick jokes btw) he tells two of his buddies to act like they’d just realized they’re lesbians, and they immediately recreated a porn scene, and then they all laughed at just how funny that was.

I couldn’t finish the video.

I was too hurt. never before had his homophobia been so obvious, and directed at my community specifically. nothing had hurt me quite like this does.

I’m still floored to be completely honest. I had been giving him the benefit of the doubt for so long, thinking he just really likes making dick jokes and he’s secure enough in his sexuality to be able to make jokes like that (which is a privilege in and of itself btw) but I thought surely, surely someone who’s so passionate about doing the right thing and being good to people and who actively talks about being ok with us and not uncomfortable around us at all (unlike Bob) and who actively jokes about the fanfiction and art he knows about that depict him and his male friends as lovers, surely he himself would never partake in dehumanizing anyone, surely he couldn’t be homophobic.

but when you look at him and how he treats us compared to say, HarshyCritical, you can see the difference. (especially since after making this post it was brought to my attention that just a minute into the latest video he made with Bob, the one posted the same day I write this, they laugh at the use of a violently homophobic slur)

especially since the person whom John seems closest to and colabs the most with is himself a gay man. they even share a channel together where all they post is multiplayer colabs.

I don’t know if John’s done any LGBT-centric charity streams, but the fact that his good or possibly even best friend is a gay man and how he treats the narrative and characters in a game where the story is all about dealing with homophobia and being yourself says a lot more in his favor that anything Mark has done. (which is also very ironic since John lives in the very homophobic state of Texas and Mark now lives in the very liberal state of California)

I honestly can’t find a single thing he’s said about us specifically that wasn’t a joke, and he’s made it painfully clear that in the end that’s all he sees us as.

inherently sexual, a porn category, something to laugh at, something other.

and the thing that hurts the most, is no one cares. he just got 16 million subscribers. most of his fans are homophobic fangirls who treat homosexuality as a fetish for them to enjoy, and everyone else is too much of a stan to think critically of his actions. no one will want to call him out. he’s too much of a “good person”, since everyone’s expectations of men and male gamers is so low, with the bar being fuckin buried in the dirt, that someone like Mark who cares about sick kids and depression and preventing suicide and all of his talking about caring about each and every one of us as individuals, he looks like a damn angel just by walking over that bar, so anyone wanting to call him out will be blown off as someone who just wants to bring him down because of jealousy or some bullshit like that.

so at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. he could be as openly homophobic as he wants, and every non-straight fan could up and drop him on the spot, and I doubt it would really affect him much.

and I think that’s what hurts more than anything he’s actually said or done.