#accounting dissertation writer

[dandelion-jester]

If I finish this draft of my dissertation today, I get to draw my dnd characters as medieval knights

[domistique]

I honestly don't know what an AI ffs looks like. You don't have to call anyone out but can you tell us why you think smthing is made by AI?

Domistique's Subjective Guide to Identifying AI Fic in the F1 RPF Fandom

Summaries "In the high-octane world of Formula One," "In the high-stakes world of Formula One," "In the [insert descriptor] world of Formula One,"

My biggest "tell" for AI in summaries. It reads like a blurb for a published original novel. Summaries ending with a question framed with two 'options' also ring alarm bells for me now which SUCKS but the same structure is popping up so frequently alongside other indicators of AI that it's the natural conclusion :(.

Look at the establishing paragraphs.

I'm not a writer so I don't know the terminology, but the paragraphs which set the scene and describe the environment the characters are in. Do they always list elements of the setting in a uniform way which seems too formal for a fic? AI doesn't understand 'show, don't tell'. In my experience it tends to exposition the FUCK out of scenes. Fanfiction is built on the assumption that the reader KNOWS about this stuff already. I've seen this countless times across many fics from different authors which proves to Me it's not just someone's style. Establishing paragraphs starting with a descriptive statement, followed by multiple Example clauses listing sensory aspects of the environment. Usually ending with a picture perfect smartass line, often introducing a character or narrative element (tension, fear, attraction, etc) and creating intrigue. ALL THINGS WHICH ARE NORMAL AND GOOD TECHNIQUES IN FICS! but it's the way they KEEP popping up consistently keeping to the exact. same. paragraph structure.

An author posting multiple new 10,000+ word fics every week for many weeks.

If I suspect a fic is written with AI I usually check the account which posted it to see if they are producing an output which human beings are literally not capable of. If someone says they're working full time in the legal field they are not also writing a dissertation of rpf every three days :(.

Sentences with the same rhythm over and over and over again.

Like. "The wind had eased, the moon reflecting like silver in the lake. The soft hum of the car grounded them, sitting there together on the peaceful shore." I just made that up and you can tell because it sucks BUT it is based on a pattern I keep seeing in fic which I suspect to be AI. ONLY when the other indicators are present. Take this one with a grain of salt because it is mainly vibes-based.

This is mostly only applicable when a fic is written in English :(. I think the ability to tell when something is subtly off with a piece of writing is probably linked to the length of time the reader has been immersed in reading in the language, exposure, etc.

I recommend paying attention to your favourite authors' style, quirks, tendencies; the things which are constant across their works and feel comforting and familiar because you know you're in good hands. Then apply that to AI, which in my opinion has a particular style which it ALWAYS follows when prompted to write fanfic. It knows how to create a plot and make it compelling, even emotional, but it doesn't know how to deviate from the formula (yet). It has improved SO much since the first AI fics started popping up. But I really think it will never be completely indistinguishable from the work of a human because humans are loving and caring and silly and take risks and spend their free time writing stories for us to enjoy for no personal gain. No matter the quality of the writing!!! We as readers owe it to them to read critically and attentively and honour their efforts by rewarding them, not a machine.

(biggest disclaimer ever: i am not an expert this is all based on my observations and i may be wrong. if you don't like someone's sentences don't assume they used AI. it's a sense that had to be honed over time and i will be distraught if some poor writer gets harassed because of this so help me god. just. pay attention to patterns. i have many many examples which i am not including in this post because i don't feel comfortable when i can't be 100% sure they are the product of AI. i can dm them if you want!!)

[amyoffline]

In Defense of the Phandom (Mostly): Dan, Phil, and Our Parasocial Social Club

Refer to my previous pinned post for an explanation of and outline for this project. Now that I'm done going through my old reblogs (god, it took forever), it's time to actually research and write this script! This will be my pinned post for the foreseeable future, so you can come back to it by clicking on my blog for the current status of this part of the process. (Note from February 15 - everything is on hold for now while I wrap up my dissertation!)

Script word count: 2,350 | Last updated: January 9, 2025

Research

Peer-reviewed or published literature: ⚫︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ Social media, forum archives, and fanwork: ⚫︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ The great rewatch: ⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ Discussions with other phannies (hey! that could be you, if you want!): ⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎

Writing

Introduction, background, and conclusion sections: ⚫︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ 2009-2013: ⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ 2014-2018: ⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ 2019-2025: ⚫︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ Long tangents (fandom, RPF, and PSIs/PSRs): ⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎ Editing: ⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎⚪︎

More details below the cut!

Research → peer reviewed or published literature:

I read a few things (like Haidt's The Anxious Generation) while I was in the process of searching academic databases, but most of the 403 works I have saved to Zotero for this are currently unread. They're not all the same length or will take the same amount of time to read, so the completion proportion is just getting updated based on vibes. I'm absolutely not referencing all 403 of these things in the script - I just cast a wide net for materials I thought might be relevant. Furthermore, there are some things I didn't save that I know I'll be referencing, like some of the Pew Research Center's work in the early to mid 2010s on teenagers and technology, or the journalistic coverage of what got my school district in huge trouble in 2011.

Research → Social media and forum archives:

The collection of posts, art, and fic (other than mine) to reference in the video. For regular posts and art, especially by people who have long since abandoned their accounts or whose content went pretty viral, I feel comfortable just showing things in the video with credit as examples. For fic, I intend to just discuss trends more broadly and vaguely since, as a fic writer myself, I know we tend to get more flack and less acclaim for our work and therefore prefer to stay out of the spotlight. Let me know if you think I should handle this differently - the academic impulse is to credit sources and reproducible searches for every single thing you do, but that's definitely not best practice for phandom history since we have so much "forbidden" lore. I'll also be reading the IDB forum front-to-back, listening to things like the phandom podcast, reading the current generation of phanzines, and looking at recent (and historical, if anyone has any) surveys done of phannies within the community. I'm assuming those folks would appreciate credit and/or a shoutout.

Research → The great rewatch:

Rewatching everything DNP-related so I can talk about it from more recent memory (and read what's left of the original comments for DNP videos that are still up at their original locations). I know there's a playlist for this but I also know it's incomplete, so I have been doing some poking around myself and will probably continue to.

Research → Discussions with other phannies:

I read a few things (like Haidt's The Anxious Generation) while I was in the process of searching academic databases, but most of the 403 works I have saved to Zotero for this are currently unread. They're not all the same length or will take the same amount of time to read, so the completion proportion is just getting updated based on vibes. I'm absolutely not referencing all 403 of these things in the script - I just cast a wide net for materials I thought might be relevant. Furthermore, there are some things I didn't save that I know I'll be referencing, like some of the Pew Research Center's work in the early to mid 2010s on teenagers and technology, or the journalistic coverage of what got my school district in huge trouble in 2011. The first task is to sort that whole Zotero collection into more manageable sub-collections (on PSR on PSIs, on mental health, on YouTube platform history, etc), which is what I'm currently working on.

Writing → Introduction, background, and conclusion sections

See old pinned post for the outline. Will expand details here once research is mostly done (I plan to read and watch everything in the research section aside from talking to other phannies, then complete the script's rough draft, then talk to others on call, then integrate that with and finalize the script).

Writing → 2009-2013

See above.

Writing → 2014-2018

See above.

Writing → 2019-2025

See above.

Writing → Long tangents (fandom, RPF, and PSRs/PSIs)

See above. These tangents are kind of mini video essays in and olf themselves, so I may write them while I'm reading through my saved stuff in Zotero and before I rewatch all the DNP videos.

[murfpersonalblog]

I lowkey love this. Cuz it just confirms my theory that Lestat's character development's gonna be a marathon, not a sprint. Like Claudia said, Lestat needs to learn to be WORTHY of Louis' love & forgiveness. Just cuz self-hating no-self-worth/respect/preservation Louis automatically gave it to him doesn't mean Lestat deserves it.

And speaking of Claudia, Lestat's got far more serious things to be sorry for & apologize for. Louis has no right to say "it's not on you," cuz he's not the one who ended up dead. CLAUDIA is. And until Lestat reckons with Claudia, he'll NEVER be ready to say sorry to Louis and GENUINELY take accountability & responsibility for all his pisspoor actions. (I pray we get ghost!Claudia as a legit ghost, not just dream!Claudia as a figment of Les' imagination or guilty conscious.)

Sam is an actor, and bless him for adding all kinds of nuance & analysis & meta, and I'm still waiting for his PhD dissertation on TVC/Anne Rice's take on vampires. Cuz Sam's an expert on the BOOKS. Yes, I AGREE with Sam that I'd've preferred Lestat apologizing to Louis; same way I agree with Sam that Lestat should've been physically injured at the Trial. But the SHOW is obviously a distinct entity, and Rolin and Anne CLEARLY have different ideas about how Lestat will be portrayed and perceived, and when. Everyone's always creaming themselves over Sam Reid's takes, as if SAM'S the writer and this show is SAM'S vision and SAM's message. NO. EFF Sam Reid. This is ROLIN'S show, ROLIN'S pitch, ROLIN'S adaptation, ROLIN'S message.

I DO NOT want another Henry Cavill situation, where the perfect actor is axed from the show cuz his fanboy-ego thinks/knows he knows better/more than the effing showrunner who can replace his arse in a flash. Sam, for the love of Louis DPDL, PLEASE be careful, and stop stepping on Rolin's toes. You're scaring me.

[inkstainbleed]

So hello!

I’m pretty new to the #SPN fandom (finally binged the whole series during COVID). I watched nearly all of it without dipping a toe into fandom. I only started toward the end because I was just fascinated by the relationship between Sam and Dean, and I was curious if it extended to Jared and Jensen — which it obviously did, which sent me down a rabbit hole of convention vids and lore and then SamDean dissertations and HCs and endless fanfic (some of which is flat brilliant) and anyway…

I finally want to dip my toe into writing for this fandom but I’m kind of at a loss where to start. I love all the epic sagas and sprawling AUs but I want to start small. I also see holes in every season and plot line, see endless potential in the boys’ dysfunctional relationship, and it’s almost too much to process. So I figured if anyone is reading this (and no one may be, given it’s my first post and all) maybe they’ve got a plot bunny or scene I could give a whirl. Or maybe suggestions for accounts with story prompts?

Above all I love the SamDean soulmateism, whether it’s platonic (or not). I also love their very twisted and complicated childhood even outside the supernatural. I have zero issue (and have come to really enjoy) Wincest but might want to build up to that since it’s out of my wheelhouse. (Though if the muse hits…) I am a writer, but I haven’t written a lot of fanfic and never for this fandom. I like most of the supporting characters so no issues with including them in some capacity.

I love them both. As the oldest sibling I identify more with Dean, but I find myself more emotionally connected with Sam just because he breaks my heart on the regular. Well, they both do, but the tragedy of Sam calls to me.

Anyway, I have itchy fingers and no clear direction so figured I’d scream into the void. I’m older than my 20s so not on TikTok, Twitter is a hellscape, I don’t understand Discord (but willing to give it a shot) and zero interest in fandom drama. I like what I like and no one’s changing my mind. 😉

[mirrorbusterz]

omg someone else notices just how awful the fandom characterises Orion for the sake of Megop THANK YOU

Thats one of the main reasons i love how to school a mech so much cause you do Orion so much justice it's honestly refreshing to see

It's always passively bothered me the way Orion is treated, but when I actually started writing Orion I think something in me realized just how bad the fandom collectively treats the poor guy, which is such a shame considering how conceptually awesome he is as a character. I know this is going to devolve into a rant since I've always wanted to vent my frustrations, so strap in lol

Something I wanted to consider when writing TFP Orion for Dissertation is the way the TFP version of him is perceived by the fandom. We honestly have almost no idea how the 'real' Orion would've acted a person, and the Orion Pax episodes are highly unreliable considering this episode makes no effort to tell it from Orion's perspective at all. It is very much framed from Megatron's perspective considering nearly all depictions of Orion we see on screen is when he is reacting to Megatron's presence.

Now, I don't doubt that Orion genuinely *wants* to believe in Megatron's truthfulness, however, our perception of Orion is still skewed in Megatron's favor. We have almost no idea what is actually going on in Orion's head during his time on the Nemesis, and I think that a lot of fans don't understand that his--dare i say--'submissive' characteristics are reflections of how Megatron sees him. We actually have no clue as to whether Orion himself is comfortable referring to him as 'lord,' especially considering the extinuating circumstances. He has no where else to go, of course he is going to play along with whatever his friend is comfortable with.

This is where I believe a lot of fanon tropes bleed into Orion's characterization, someone who is submissive and defers to Megatron, when the only time we see his character is when he is put in a stressful and outwardly biased situation. I don't believe that he acts this way AT ALL before he received the matrix, and it really limits the way we write our characters if we are only ever pulling from one skewed situation that didn't even depict a 'true' version of Orion in the first place.

I think it makes sense for him to be a little socially inept and bookish, even shy, if we take into account the way Optimus himself acts in TFP--he's intelligent but standoffish, a little hard to talk to--which would make sense if these traits stemmed from someone who spent most of his time cataloguing and recording. HOWEVER, conflating these traits into 'submissiveness' for the sake of sexualization is really really lame imo, and in Dissertation I aimed to flesh him out as a person rather than the sexy librarian that is the object of Megatron's affection.

One thing I wanted to emphasize is TFP Optimus' dry sense of humor that always seems to fall at the wayside. Even the characters in TFP tend to view Optimus as "humorless," when that is clearly not the case?? He has an awkward dry sense of humor that crops up multiple time, and I can't help but think of his many interactions with Agent Fowler where he is clearly enjoying himself and Fowler's bickering.

In Dissertation, I think Orion being a little snarky, sharp, who recognizes logical fallacies quickly and doesn't hesitate to playfully poke at the people he likes. Which is insanely funny when Orion himself walks into multiple metaphorical rakes, which is to highlight that he is smart but is socially inept himself.

I'm not the biggest Megop shipper myself, (I do really really love it in TFONE though) so maybe I am a little biased in my assertions, but I really think that early 2010's-era yaoi BL damaged Orion's perception on a fandom level. I love slash, but for me as a writer it's tiring to see Orion dumbed down to the sexy twunk trope that the older stronger man tops, and I think this is a problem that TFP suffers from the most. I get how homoerotic those two are, but that doesn't mean that tension *has* to be boiled down to done-over tropes.

(As for TF Exodus, I have not read the novel yet, but the snippets I have seen have leaned into the "shy librarian" trope, but this trait he possesses gets flanderized to hell and back by the fandom. I think I'm going to read it after Dissertation is finished so I can compare my characterization with the novel, I think that would be interesting! Just know, I am mainly referring to TFP Orion characterization here instead of the entire Aligned continuity.)

Bottom line, I love Orion and I'm glad that everyone else loves Orion. My intent was not to 'gatekeep' or tell you how to enjoy the character, I just wanted to highlight my personal frustrations with his popular depiction. I'm so glad that everyone is enjoying my Orion depiction in Dissertation though, I'm glad I've built an audience of cool likeminded people!

Btw if anyone else has any thoughts or questions on ANYTHING pertaining to my fic, feel free to ask! My ask box is open for a reason and I love to rant about my process teehee

[obsidianpen]

hello just curious, as i’m just learning about what’s been going on with the tomione fandom. what are some examples of greyana tearing other writers down? as well as copying other writers works?

sigh. It’s hard to give concrete examples, because she’s been using bots and fake accounts to do so, as well as blocking every tomione writer under the sun. Also, a lot of the shit gets taken down and deleted, either by mods or her when she does get called out on stuff. So no, I am not going to dig through the internet to screenshot things, I’ve already written my experience and I don’t have time to write a whole dissertation about this. But if you look at the few previous posts I used a hashtag for greyana in, you should get the gist. And even if you don’t want to believe any of that, that’s fine - but it DOES seem painfully clear that she is a writer using AI trying desperately to become ‘famous’ without doing any of the real writing work. God, imagine if she used all that energy to actually… write… her own… stuff. Anyone is welcome to read whatever they want, of course, but you should know that what you’re getting into was mostly stolen and written using AI.

Okay no longer taking questions in this, if you want to read more go to the tomione fanfiction Reddit!

[starkinvs]

okay. i understand that many people simply do not understand the essence of the previous post/don't understand the subject of the discussion. let's start with the fact that russia imposed its language at the state level by force. fifteen countries of the Soviet Union speak russian in one way or another precisely because their cultural identity was not taken into account. Khrushchev's words at the party congress in 1961: "the sooner we start speaking russian, the sooner we will build communism." do i need to explain what communism was like under the Soviet Union? the next paragraph will present several events on the language front of Ukraine.

April 6, 1933 — by order of the new leadership of the People's Commissariat of the Ukrainian SSR, a commission was organized to check the work on the language front. the task of the commission was "to reject the artificial (what could this mean?) demarcation of the Ukrainian language from the russian language in dictionaries and to eliminate nationalistic spelling rules that oriented the Ukrainian language toward Polish, Czech, and bourgeois cultures."

April 26, 1933 - a meeting in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine on issues of national policy. the tasks have been set out to a wide circle:

— to stop the immediate publication of all dictionaries, to review the dictionaries and all terminology, to unify technical terminology with the terminology that exists in the Soviet Union and is used in Ukraine.

— to review the personnel on the language front and to expel bourgeois-nationalist elements from this front (people who in most cases resisted due to their education and clear understanding of the consequences of such decrees).

April 20, 1938 - the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR and the Central Committee of the Communist Party (bolsheviks) of Ukraine adopted resolutions "on the mandatory study of the russian language in non-russian schools of Ukraine", "on the mandatory study of the russian language in schools of national republics and regions". the resolutions for the first time included an order on the mandatory teaching of the russian language in all non-russian schools. (that is, not only in Ukraine, but also in all other countries of the Soviet Union).

April 17, 1959 - a session of the Supreme Council of the Ukrainian SSR adopted the law "on strengthening the connection between school and life and on the further development of the public education system in the SSR". the study of the Ukrainian language in schools was declared optional (that is, the majority of people were taught only in russian, which only increased the number of russian speakers, thereby eradicating the Ukrainian language, which carries the cultural code of the nation). the number of hours of teaching Ukrainian literature and language in secondary specialized educational institutions has been reduced (reduction of Ukrainian literature, therefore writers who write in Ukrainian, excluding the cultural and historical factor of Ukrainian nationality, completely blurring it and making it almost inseparable from Russians).

1970 - the order of the USSR Ministry of Education on writing and defending all dissertations only in russian. as a result, I am now faced with the fact that while writing my diploma and actively searching for resources, I constantly have to translate and clarify all the information, scanning it for the presence of political and ideological propaganda.

i could continue the list, but I would prefer to be unbiased and give several examples of such a policy.

Belarus.

during the language reform of 1933, the "classical spelling of the Belarusian language" was abandoned - more than 30 phonetic and morphological features were introduced into the Belarusian language, which brought it closer to the russian language. why?

on May 5, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Belarus created a special "Political Commission for Review of the russian-Belarusian Dictionary and New Rules for Spelling the Belarusian Language". it is noteworthy that not a single linguist was part of the commission, and its members were mainly politicians. i believe that russians or ideological puppets.

in the "russian-Belarusian Dictionary" in 1953, when the tracing of the russian language was put at the forefront, and, as a rule, the original Belarusian word followed. the question is the same, what's the point?

the President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko himself expressed an "interesting" opinion.

"nothing great can be expressed in Belarusian. the Belarusian language is poor. there are only two great languages in the world - russian and english" - according to this statement by President Lukashenko, which he made back in 1995, experts count the loss of status and displacement of the Belarusian language in Belarus. Lukashenko then initiated the granting of state status to the russian language, but in the end only russian became the state language, while Belarusian remained secondary and little used.

as is known he is a puppet of the Kremlin. needless to say that the Belarusian language was not taught in schools during the Soviet Union, literature in the Belarusian language was extremely impoverished, and propaganda made its own adjustments. i am glad that now Belarusians are switching to their own language and Ukrainians understand the Belarusian language without difficulty, it works both ways.

Kazakhstan.

the languages ​​of some peoples that were part of the Soviet empire experienced repeated changes of alphabets.

this applies, in particular, to the Turkic languages. Uzbeks, Turkmens, Kyrgyz, and Azerbaijanis previously used Arabic script for writing. in the late 1920s, according to the decree "on the new Latinized alphabet of Arabic writing," their languages ​​were transferred to the Latin alphabet. such an attempt was also made to the Kazakh language, but it did not take root at that time.

in 1932-1933, the state authorities of the USSR artificially created a severe famine(!) in the Kazakh SSR, as a result of which more than 40 percent of ethnic Kazakhs died. At the same time, more than a million citizens repressed by the Stalinist government were deported to the republic. therefore, the indigenous Kazakh population became an ethnic minority. subsequently, the percentage of Kazakhs in the total population decreased even more due to mass migration to the KSSR during major events, such as the development of virgin lands.

during some periods of Soviet times, the number of ethnic Kazakhs in the republic was only 30 percent. it was impossible to speak Kazakh in the cities because it was not understood, and many ethnic Kazakhs switched to russian in everyday life. mandatory study of Kazakh in schools was abolished, the number of Kazakh schools decreased (for example, in Alma-Ata there was only one school with Kazakh as the language of instruction).

"the opportunity to get an education in Kazakh began to decrease in 1939, and later higher education was only available in russian. consequently, parents who wanted their child to study at the institute had to prepare them for this and sent their children to schools with russian. as a result, a whole generation of exclusively russian-speaking Kazakhs appe,ared in Kazakhstan in the 1970s and 1980s." says Ainash Mustoyapova, author of the book "Decolonization in Kazakhstan."

Estonian language.

since 1940, with the Soviet occupation, the status of the Estonian language began to decline: it ceased to be the only state language - russian became the second, the use of the Estonian language in many areas was reduced: in international negotiations, diplomatic correspondence, in foreign trade and on trade marks, in matters concerning the armed forces in training. estonian was forced out of teaching and deprived of the opportunity to develop terminology in the fields of navigation, maritime, aviation and rail transport, it also ceased to be used in mining, energy, textile and some areas of heavy industry, since most industrial enterprises were under the direct control of moscow. sounds familiar.

Crimean Tatar language.

with the beginning of the Red Terror in 1921, the population of Crimea, and accordingly among the Crimean Tatars, decreased by a third.

during this time, several waves of genocide (and therefore expulsions) took place: the execution of the intelligentsia in 1921-22, the famine(oh, we heard about that already) of 1922-23, and up to 1926-27, dispossession and deportation to Siberia, the execution of the intelligentsia. and then Sürgünlik - the forced deportation of the Crimean Tatars from their native land to Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and the Urals.

currently, Crimean Tatar is considered a language that is on the verge of destruction (seriously endangered) according to the UNESCO classification. this means that the language is used by older generations of speakers, while parents do not instill in their children the study and knowledge of the language. this is also a consequence of the Deportation, genocidal actions, in particular, the ban on the use of the Crimean Tatar language in places of deportation, as well as the total Russification in the countries that were part of the USSR.

i will probably stop here, because this list can be continued for a long time, but the idea is the same everywhere - along with the language, the national identity of the people is washed away, the language stores the cultural code, historical information. myths, legends, ancient manuscripts, documents, literary collections, which include a description of the traditions and life of the people, all this has a huge influence. that is why people study different groups of languages, their influence on each other, that is why linguistics exists.

but the fact remains - the russian language is not native to all countries of the post-Soviet space except russia itself, it is an artificially imposed language, a whole scheme of extermination and subjugation of peoples who have mixed into one mass. now I see this as a huge problem: the russian language isolates from another world. people of post-Soviet countries can easily communicate with each other, but there is an opinion that learning english is simply becoming meaningless, because there are as many as 15! culturally and historically similar countries that speak the same language, and all together they are much larger than all of Europe. there is no such thing in western europe, there everyone speaks english as a common language, but each country has its own language, but here, in eastern europe it is very difficult to meet an armenian or romanian speaking their own language and this is pure madness.

this is a policy of isolation from the rest of the world, this is the impossibility of reading news from different sources, which often gives rise to a holy confidence that the propaganda media of their country are definitely not lying, because due to the impossibility of comparison, a person becomes like cattle without a choice who were not given any alternatives. and yes, i believe that if you speak russian and support military aggression, you should be isolated from society, because the desire to destroy is not the norm, a person with a destructive mindset without a clear moral compass is a threat to society, especially if he supports the murder of innocent (!) people.

this should not be the norm and must be discussed and if people themselves cannot understand what is what, the cancel culture will help us. only by making it clear to the russians that they are not welcome in society as long as a bloody regime destroys cities and lives, will they be able to realize that it is time to change something and that these changes must start with them. people can destroy regimes. people can win. people live on this earth only once and there is no point in living as a weak-willed creature.

all this was written for educational purposes. only being educated can we destroy a system that we do not like, because beliefs come from facts, which are based on knowledge. only by winning discussions with the voice of reason and protecting yourself from violence, but operating with common sense, can the new generation influence the future. do not be careless, learn and teach others, get information and inform.

[musingsbycaitlin]

HEY! Writeblr Intro!!!

Hi, my name is Caitlin, and I’m a third year Creative Writing student in rainy England. I’ve got a couple WIPs but none are set in stone so you’ll have to bear with me for a while haha.

- I’m here for a good time so my writing is solely based on my mood and vibe at the time, please do not expect consistency.

- I write short stories mainly but am trying to branch out into novels so you’ll hopefully be seeing a bit more of that in the future.

- I am a university student with anxiety and decision fatigue so things change drastically around here every so often but I promise if I go quiet I will come back.

Let’s get into the WIPs (these will be constantly edited and changing) and feel free to ask me any questions about any of them, even ones that might have been removed from this list if you’re interested.

IF I GIVE UP, SO MUST YOU - a Wild West literary fiction novel

STATUS: currently drafting (on hiatus)

GENRE: literary fiction, sapphic romance(?)

CURRENT WORD COUNT: 3,995

Okay, so a bit of info about this project. I started writing it a bit ago purely because I wanted to write a Wild West novel and then it turned sapphic and then it became literary. It follows an unnamed narrator as she navigates life outside of her small town after she is targeted by bandits in a raid. A coming of age novel that explores what it means to figure things out for yourself whilst battling with false truths engrained into your from a young age.

NIGHT SWIMMING (working title) - a short story collection

STATUS: literally haven’t even started :/

GENRE: literary, horror, surrealist

This collection is my version of NaNoWriMo this year because there is no way I can feasibly write a novel in a month where I also have to write my dissertation first draft and three other short stories like no. I’m hoping to do an update on my page whenever a story is complete, so I will also update this section to include the names of all the stories going in. Stay posted is all I’m saying ;). All I know is I want it to explore the everyday in a surrealist way (as most of my stories do).

DAMAGED GOODS - a dystopian sci-fi novel

STATUS: currently drafting (on hiatus)

GENRE: dystopian, sci-if, speculative

CURRENT WORD COUNT: 2,323

So, I haven’t done an intro post to this yet simply because I had to put it to one side once university started again. A brief summary is this: Auden, an average guy, husband, and father, has gotten into a dreadful car accident. In this society, however, surgery is replaced with metal transplantation. Due to Auden’s extensive injuries, he now must live in suburbia with a completely metal head, arm, and leg.

I’m super happy with this concept and the initial 2,000 words I’ve got I’m pretty okay with. The main issue is where to take it and if it will be a full novel or more of a novella.

EAT YOUR YOUNG - a gothic horror novella

STATUS: currently drafting

GENRE: gothic horror

CURRENT WORD COUNT: 4,950

I haven’t done an intro for this project because I honestly wasn’t sure I’d return to it but the spooky season is upon us and I really want to get back into writing this. Brief Summary: Mr Gerard is an accountant hired by the Heron Manor estate to deal with the affairs of the three sisters residing there after a mysterious death of the man of the house.

This is going to me my main personal priority other than my short stories for now and I’ll try to get an intro out soon.

Okay, so that’s all for me folks. Like I said, any questions please feel free to send me an ask or a message, don’t be a stranger. As a writer I always wanna talk about my projects, OCs, and anything else writing craft related!

I’m tagging some mutuals, if you wish to be tagged or removed :( - let me know x

@annlillyjose @dallonwrites @aesa @winterandwords @iannicellis @isherwoodj

[justforbooks]

Hannah Arendt,

born Johanna Arendt; 14 October 1906 – 4 December 1975) was a German-American historian and philosopher. She was one of the most influential political theorists of the 20th century.

Her works cover a broad range of topics, but she is best known for those dealing with the nature of wealth, power and evil, as well as politics, direct democracy, authority, tradition and totalitarianism. She is also remembered for the controversy surrounding the trial of Adolf Eichmann, for her attempt to explain how ordinary people become actors in totalitarian systems, which was considered by some an apologia, and for the phrase "the banality of evil." Her name appears in the names of journals, schools, scholarly prizes, humanitarian prizes, think-tanks, and streets; appears on stamps and monuments; and is attached to other cultural and institutional markers that commemorate her thought.

Hannah Arendt was born to a Jewish family in Linden (now a district of Hanover, Germany) in 1906. When she was three, her family moved to the East Prussian capital of Königsberg for her father's health care. Paul Arendt had contracted syphilis in his youth but was thought to be in remission when Arendt was born. He died when she was seven. Arendt was raised in a politically progressive, secular family, her mother being an ardent Social Democrat. After completing secondary education in Berlin, Arendt studied at the University of Marburg under Martin Heidegger, with whom she engaged in a romantic affair that began while she was his student. She obtained her doctorate in philosophy at the University of Heidelberg in 1929. Her dissertation was titled Love and Saint Augustine, and her supervisor was the existentialist philosopher Karl Jaspers.

Hannah Arendt married Günther Stern in 1929 but soon began to encounter increasing antisemitism in the 1930s Nazi Germany. In 1933, the year Adolf Hitler came to power, Arendt was arrested and briefly imprisoned by the Gestapo for performing illegal research into antisemitism. On release, she fled Germany, living in Czechoslovakia and Switzerland before settling in Paris. There she worked for Youth Aliyah, assisting young Jews to emigrate to the British Mandate of Palestine. She was stripped of her German citizenship in 1937. Divorcing Stern that year, she then married Heinrich Blücher in 1940. When Germany invaded France that year she was detained by the French as an alien. She escaped and made her way to the United States in 1941 via Portugal. She settled in New York, which remained her principal residence for the rest of her life. She became a writer and editor and worked for the Jewish Cultural Reconstruction, becoming an American citizen in 1950. With the publication of The Origins of Totalitarianism in 1951, her reputation as a thinker and writer was established, and a series of works followed.

These included the books The Human Condition in 1958, as well as Eichmann in Jerusalem and On Revolution in 1963.

She taught at many American universities while declining tenure-track appointments. She died suddenly of a heart attack in 1975, at the age of 69, leaving her last work, The Life of the Mind, unfinished.

Arendt's five-part series "Eichmann in Jerusalem" appeared in The New Yorker in February 1963 some nine months after Eichmann was hanged on 31 May 1962. By this time his trial was largely forgotten in the popular mind, superseded by intervening world events. However, no other account of either Eichmann or National Socialism has aroused so much controversy. Before its publication, Arendt was considered a brilliant humanistic original political thinker. Her mentor, Karl Jaspers, however, had warned her about a possible adverse outcome, "The Eichmann trial will be no pleasure for you. I'm afraid it cannot go well". On publication, three controversies immediately occupied public attention: the concept of Eichmann as banal, her criticism of the role of Israel and her description of the role played by the Jewish people themselves.

Arendt was profoundly shocked by the response, writing to Karl Jaspers "People are resorting to any means to destroy my reputation... They have spent weeks trying to find something in my past that they can hang on me". Now she was being called arrogant, heartless and ill-informed. She was accused of being duped by Eichmann, of being a "self-hating Jewess", and even an enemy of Israel. Her critics included The Anti-Defamation League and many other Jewish groups, editors of publications she was a contributor to, faculty at the universities she taught at and friends from all parts of her life. Her friend Gershom Scholem, a major scholar of Jewish mysticism, broke off relations with her, publishing their correspondence without her permission. Arendt was criticized by many Jewish public figures, who charged her with coldness and lack of sympathy for the victims of the Holocaust. Because of this lingering criticism neither this book nor any of her other works were translated into Hebrew until 1999.[314] Arendt responded to the controversies in the book's Postscript.

Although Arendt complained that she was being criticized for telling the truth – "what a risky business to tell the truth on a factual level without theoretical and scholarly embroidery" – the criticism was largely directed to her theorizing on the nature of mankind and evil and that ordinary people were driven to commit the inexplicable not so much by hatred and ideology as ambition, and inability to empathize. Equally problematic was the suggestion that the victims deceived themselves and complied in their own destruction.[316] Prior to Arendt's depiction of Eichmann, his popular image had been, as The New York Times put it "the most evil monster of humanity" and as a representative of "an atrocious crime, unparalleled in history", "the extermination of European Jews". As it turned out Arendt and others were correct in pointing out that Eichmann's characterization by the prosecution as the architect and chief technician of the Holocaust was not entirely credible.

While much has been made of Arendt's treatment of Eichmann, Ada Ushpiz, in her 2015 documentary Vita Activa: The Spirit of Hannah Arendt, placed it in a much broader context of the use of rationality to explain seemingly irrational historical events.

In an interview with Joachim Fest in 1964, Arendt was asked about Eichmann's defense that he had made Kant's principle of the duty of obedience his guiding principle all his life. Arendt replied that that was outrageous and that Eichmann was misusing Kant, by not considering the element of judgement required in assessing one's own actions – "Kein Mensch hat bei Kant das Recht zu gehorchen" (No man has, according to Kant, the right to obey), she stated, paraphrasing Kant. The reference was to Kant's Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der bloßen Vernunft (Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason 1793) in which he states:

Der Satz 'man muß Gott mehr gehorchen, als den Menschen' bedeutet nur, daß, wenn die letzten etwas gebieten, was an sich böse (dem Sittengesetz unmittelbar zuwider) ist, ihnen nicht gehorcht werden darf und soll. (The saying, "We must hearken to God, rather than to man," signifies no more than this, viz. that should any earthly legislation enjoin something immediately contradictory of the moral law, obedience is not to be rendered)

Kant clearly defines a higher moral duty than rendering merely unto Caesar. Arendt herself had written in her book "This was outrageous, on the face of it, and also incomprehensible, since Kant's moral philosophy is so closely bound up with man's faculty of judgment, which rules out blind obedience." Arendt's reply to Fest was subsequently corrupted to read Niemand hat das Recht zu gehorchen (No one has the right to obey), which has been widely reproduced, although it does encapsulate an aspect of her moral philosophy.

The phrase Niemand hat das Recht zu gehorchen has become one of her iconic images, appearing on the wall of the house in which she was born, among other places. A fascist bas-relief on the Palazzo degli Uffici Finanziari (1942), in the Piazza del Tribunale, Bolzano, Italy celebrating Mussolini, read Credere, Obbedire, Combattere (Believe, Obey, Combat). In 2017 it was altered to read Hannah Arendt's original words on obedience in the three official languages of the region.

The phrase has been appearing in other artistic work featuring political messages, such as the 2015 installation by Wilfried Gerstel, which has evoked the concept of resistance to dictatorship, as expressed in her essay "Personal Responsibility under Dictatorship" (1964).

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

[bread-tab]

Doctorate progress:

This spring I was granted an associate's degree (2 years of university, worth about half a bachelor's) by my community college after 11 years of on-and-off classes, repeatedly burning out, getting diagnosed with ADHD, and going back for one (1) English class that I had previously failed or dropped out of 4-5 times already.

I passed that class last year by the skin of my teeth because I'm an excellent writer but kept missing classes and writing assignments due to being sick.

Apparently this gave me just enough core credits for a different degree than the two (transfer and specialized) degrees I'd been going for in the past. The school sent me a letter saying they would automatically graduate me if I didn't respond within the next 4 months. Due to aforementioned ADHD, I didn't get around to it and subsequently forgot about the whole business until I got another letter with my transcript and instructions on how to order a copy of my diploma. ...I should probably do that.

I have decided not to go for the doctorate on account of, I finally have a full time job and if I take more than one class at a time I will spontaneously combust.

Sad about not getting to do a dissertation and all that fun stuff but like. I'm a whole adult. At this point I'd rather invent my own field of study, do the field work in my spare time, and write some books. That sounds a lot easier.

I've already done my decade in academia. I've had enough.

(Maybe I'll find a school without the structural and institutional ableism, ageism, and classism I'm accustomed to and change my mind. But, like, I doubt it.)

So, a little belatedly, I'm giving myself a pat on the back for finishing school. You never have to do it again, buddy. Not unless you actually want to.

[catsanditalkshit]

I moved out of the US a few months ago.

Not specifically because of the current political climate (I'm incredibly privileged to be a cis-white-straight-presenting woman so I can hide in plain sight for the most part as long as no one asks for ID), but it certainly helped make the move feel easier. I moved for a ton of reasons that were largely personal, but it all boiled down to: a bitch can't heal if she's always on fire. So now I'm watching my friends and family on fire from very far away, and I have a touch of survivor's guilt despite the fact that they're all safe (currently). This isn't a post about that though, just felt like I needed to acknowledge that I'm starting regular blogging probably because I'm feeling guilty, lonely, out of place or some combination of those. Totally great reason to talk shit about things, right?

I'm nearly a third of the way through my MSc program in the UK and one thing is abundantly clear - group projects suck more than a nun's bunghole. I'd even argue that they suck even more with the advent of widely accessible AI. Now I won't get into the objective downsides and problems with AI or my own personal moral qualms with the way the models are built and trained, but I will say that people use it as a damn crutch and it's annoying.

AI can be such an interesting tool if used correctly and, with how ubiquitous it's becoming, it's important to understand what role it plays in the future of any industry. You wanna know what it's not though? A replacement for doing actual fucking work. Like, genuinely, this group project is not particularly difficult in terms of the requirements themselves, but the group work aspect has made it damn near impossible. "Oh well, Tabi, being able to work in a group means that..." Oh shut your trap, imaginary well-meaning internet stranger. It's gotten to the point where one of these people is about as useful as tits on a mouse and my grade (& consequently my visa) is tied to that person.

So yeah I'm going to talk shit. A lot.

Now, my personal use of AI is limited to asking it to tell me how in the hell to use a machine at the gym or what a tool I've been using to pry open a busted utility door is actually for, so I'm no master prompt-writer. I know there are people who can wordsmith their way into some pretty awesome shortcuts and genuinely useful things, but, at the very least, I think I have a lot of learning to do before I can even consider using AI to help me out (and that doesn't even account for my moral qualms).

I'd like to point out that Mr. TitMouse is definitely not one of those legendary AI gurus. He brings AI-generated work to group meetings that's so generic I'm surprised Walmart hasn't found a way to sue him. It's like he gave the poor AI a two-word prompt and then expected a persuasive dissertation. I can just picture our poor, budding robot overlord asking for a hammer to use, getting a Fisher Price tool set instead, but still doing their best to build what they were asked for.

All that to say: if you're going to do something bad, at least be the best at it. I've spent a few too many drives home ranting about how if he didn't want to work, he could use AI in much smarter ways, but nope this guy would rather do absolutely nothing and then try to mansplain the process to anyone who will listen. I was pleasantly surprised when he offered to do actual work last week, but, upon actually looking at the "work" today, he's basically disregarding everything the group had agreed upon and using his own, barely-formed-enough-to-call-generic drafts to create the least functional thing I've ever seen. I know the other group members are trying but this guy is really dragging everyone down. I'm a glutton for punishment though, so I'm going to let him do his thing, make my own in the background and test both out in the wild to see which people prefer. Is it technically more work? yes. Will it technically save me having to deal with this actual man-child as much? also yes. Will I get a small amount of joy from showing the tutors how absolutely BS everything he's done is? big yes. Maybe I'll even hide a little drawing of tits on a mouse in the final product! Who doesn't love a little easter egg 🤭

[dionyrtal]

Hey! I am just curious about your self-publishing journey :) How did it work? I don't have the slightest idea about this process hahah

Have a lovely day!

hi! it all started in 2020 honestly. i had no idea that self-publishing was a "thing", and i was recommended an indie author's vlog on youtube one day. i watched her videos religiously. i was fascinated with the idea!

and when the pandemic happened, i found myself thinking about what i wanted to do with my life, and whether i would get the chance again if i didn't do it now.

i started writing a lot of poetry on the margins of my textbooks (an effect of the lockdown and online education, I think) and i started researching how to do things. how to design covers, format the book, upload it to KDP, set pre-orders, edit a manuscript, etc.

i published my first poetry collection that year in november. marketed it horribly here and started my instagram account as well. i kept writing poetry even when i went back to campus and published my second collection in february 2022 (i think?).

it sold less than the first collection even though i think it's much better in terms of quality. but i was still happy that people who had never heard of me before were taking a chance on my work.

while i was writing my senior dissertation, i started working on my debut novel. i wrote 5 or 6 different drafts, worked with an editor, tried to improve my marketing skills on tiktok and instagram and... i don't know how it happened but i hit amazon's best seller's lists, had an amazing launch in terms of sales, and people were really supportive.

i want to be a full-time writer one day, it's still a big dream!! and i'm so happy that i went the indie route. admittedly, i'm making a lot of mistakes but i'm still learning and i enjoy being in charge of creative aspects of my work (hiring cover designers, working with editors and beta readers, trying to think of new ways to market my book and reach new readers, etc.).

it's a very demanding thing of course and i still don't make enough money to make a career out of it but it makes me so so happy <33

[jawbonejoe]

2024 Reading Round Up

A lot of good books this year! Technically broke my record from last year because I read a pulp not listed, an NA book not listed and it should be noted I read the first half of Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude and then had to pause it. So technically 22.5 altogether for the year.

Stand outs of the year are in bold.

The Haunting of Alma Feilding by Kate Summerscale. A very interesting dive into the case of a purported medium. While Summerscale comes off as too credulous at times the conclusion of the piece dispels that tone and the research into the human drama of this ‘haunting’ is a terrific read.

The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli, translated by Harvey C. Mansfield. A classic and a standard. This was my first read through and while it was interesting I came away knowing I hadn’t been able to digest it as I had not discussed it with fellow readers. The supplementary letters from Machiavelli gave a dimension to him that was very touching.

A Coney Island of the Mind by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. I can’t speak to all of my influences’ influences but as a Tom Waits lover I figured I’d give Ferlinghetti a try. He was alright. I don’t read a lot of poetry so it was a case of sitting there going ‘is this good or bad? Am I stupid or is he?’

First, Become Ashes by K M Szpara. A sexy romp by a local Bmore writer. Reading the voice of another queer writer was interesting, especially since this book makes it clear we have a few of the same cultural reference points.

The Black Count by Tom Reiss. A biography of the half-Haitian Revolutionary French General Alex Dumas, father of novelist Alexandre Dumas and widely believed to be the real life template for his son’s character The Count of Monte Cristo. While not a lot of the man’s personality comes through the page (due in part to a lack of access to his letters and other first person accounts) this book splendidly constructs the world Dumas grew up in, the revolutionary nation he served, and the caprice of one Napoleon Bonaparte whose disdain and poor leadership ultimately sent General Dumas into a fatal decline. Highly recommend this for history buffs who want to learn more about race in the 1700’s!

Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett. First and only Pratchett I’ve read! Very fun and buoyant, I would recommend this as a starting point for anyone who wants to get into Uncle Terry’s work.

1491 by Charles C. Mann. Indisputably my pick for Nonfiction of the Year. A digest of thousands of years of history in the Western Hemisphere, detailing what we’ve learned about live in the Americas pre-Columbus. The book endeavors to center the pre-Columbian ages but also gives a number of illuminating accounts about post-Columbian life in the Western Hemisphere. Absolutely incredible. If you care at all about history this is a must read, it will challenge or altogether evaporate the misinformation still taught about Native American history and it tells a powerful story of how fragile the lives of whole empires can be.

Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller. And disputably the Fiction of the Year! I had heard about this book and delayed in reading it until I cracked it on vacation. As of the first sentence I was locked in. This book MAKES you read it. Its rapid pace, lyrical prose and the deep respect and love for the ancient epics make it an incredible read. Is this Trojan War fanfic? Yes. Is it its own masterwork? Absolutely. It tells the story of Achilles from the perspective of Patroclus, the human who loves him. The parts of Troy that are updated for the modern audience all serve to breathe new life into the ancient story. Highly, highly recommend!

Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, by Kristen Kobes Du Mez. A tough read. Some months after reading someone mentioned ‘oh, this must’ve been someone’s dissertation.’ which I’m inclined to agree with here. This book asks ‘how did 80% of white evangelicals end up voting for Trump in 2016?’ and details how shifting social tides spurred evangelicals further and further right. It answers this question by detailing the theological and cultural waters of the evangelical space from the 1920’s to 2016, including such troubling things as the evangelical and Catholic push against women’s lib, the privatizing of schools to avoid federal desegregation and the hollowing out of the Southern Baptist Church to make it a biblical literalist arm of the larger American Protestant and evangelical movement. The author focuses on the theological disrespect of women more than anything, a drum that should beat but undercuts similar hatred based on race as well. If you want to be that picture of Rust Cohle smoking a cigarette read this book.

Tell the Wolves I’m Home, by Carol Rifka Brunt. A novel about a girl coming of age in the 80’s whose uncle dies of AIDS. She struggles with the grief and love she feels for him and his boyfriend, who is estranged from their family but becomes a ballast for her and her sister as they grieve. If I’d read this book as a young sprog I know it would’ve reshaped my brain.

The Art Thief, by Mark Finkel. The true story of a couple who stole BILLIONS in paintings, statuary, weaponry and other art objects from the 90’s to the 10’s. And I know what you’re thinking ‘oh, but Helen you love thieves!’ I do but the damage and destruction caused and the loss of cultural icons that came from these crimes is truly unconscionable. Very fun read that’ll make you want to steal reproducible objects even more.

When Darkness Loves Us, by Elizabeth Engstrom. WOOO BOY. A TERRIFYING short story that will sit with you ever after. The companion story in this collection is always wonderful but the horror and blackness of When Darkness is the stand out of the two.

The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde. Somehow I’d gotten this far as a turn of the century fag without reading Wilde. No longer! A great read, very enriching and while Wilde’s voice is a little pithy for my tastes (Pratchett too) it is undeniably a terrific story. Looking forward to reading the original magazine edition, recommended to me as a closer version of what Wilde always intended the story to be.

Vision of Heaven and Hell Before Dante, by Eileen Gardiner. Research for my DnD game set in Hell. I’ve yet to read the Inferno but this was a great way to get a sense of how the early modern period viewed Hell and its various explorers.

‘Salem’s Lot by Stephen King. Very fun romp, the only King I’ve read but I thoroughly enjoyed it. The schmoe parts of him are clearly heard in his writing but in no way detract from the book. That post about him looking like a cartoon rat seem very true after reading this book, not in a bad way.

Cursed Bread by Sophie Mackintosh. Interesting read I picked up, telling a fictitious version of the real life mass ergot poisoning in the French town of Pont-Saint-Esprit. A baker’s wife struggles with her sexless marriage and her attraction to a socialite couple who move into town just before the town descends into madness. Interesting, glad I read it, still not sure quite what I think of it.

Benjamin ‘Bugsy’ Siegel: The Gangster, The Flamingo and The Making of Modern Las Vegas by Larry Gragg. A somehow spellbindingly boring biography of this famously flash mobster. Also read for research and while I did learn a bit this book is now mostly a bibliography I use to find more interesting books about the same people.

How to Change Your Mind by Michael Polland. A close close close! runner up for Best Nonfiction. This book investigates the science of psychedelic medicine, starting with LSD’s original distillation in the 30’s up to new psychedelic therapy in the 10’s. A wonderful book, highly interesting, personal and full of enlightening information. Highly recommend!

The Annotated Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler with editing and annotations by Owen Hill, Pamela Jackson and Anthony Dean Rizzuto. The return of the old favorite. I just love Chandler and the BS, y’all know this. Recommend this for second time readers and those who want to know more about the context of LA in the 30s and Chandler and his influences. For first time readers I still recommend just grabbing a regular paperback and letting the story read itself to you.

[firenati0n]

so I learned today that my dissertation that I thought I monumentally fucked up actually got the highest mark I could have achieved, and I am now the proud owner of a master's degree, and I may be getting fucking published, and a year's worth of tension and stress is finally starting to seep out of my body, and my nervous system can maybe have another fighting chance at regulating (unlikely), but—

The first thing my friends and family said to me was "proud of you!" and in the same breath they all, independently, said "you better also be proud of yourself" and then my mother said "your happiness always seems to be short-lived and fleeting, why is that?" and then she hit me with a "you stress yourself out to the point of illness and work yourself crazy only to enjoy none of the results" and—

boy howdy was I at a loss for words because she's right and i hate hearing my close friends and family echo the same sentiment of: I simply do not allow myself to enjoy any fruits of my labor???? I will bleed myself dry for validation and achievement and praise and love and then feel completely fucking insane for even wanting it in the first place.

It's why I stopped writing, why I abandoned so many threads. I wasn't getting any validation. I felt totally worthless.

and then I feel depths of shame previously unexplored at my Big Age for wanting some rest and peace (ironic that i beat myself up for wanting to recharge after I literally studied psych and wellbeing and the importance of rest!!).

I guess I just feel selfish for wanting to celebrate myself sometimes. And feel unable to be happy for myself because I hate boasting. So I'm going to hold myself accountable and say that I'm proud of all I've overcome to get to this point in my life, a point I did not anticipate being at 5 years ago, or even a year ago.

Onwards and upwards. 💛

p.s. I could not have finished that fucking dissertation without the emotional support of the gazillion rwrb fics I read throughout my writing process. I genuinely used ao3 as a coping mechanism and a rewards system for me to power through what was probably the hardest year of my life (for many reasons beyond academic).

to all of my writer/creator/artist/friend mutuals and the general rwrb fic/art community (I know you won't see this but i love you all the same), please know that any gratitude I express will never be enough. if I've ever screamed in your inbox or comments sections, know that it comes from a place of deep, genuine, at times debilitating emotion. y'all literally kept me afloat during some of the worst months of my life. You continue to keep me afloat. I don't know you, and you don't know me, but I know your words, and that is a privilege.

[siriuslysatorusimping]

Hi hello, so nice to talk to you, Kiko!

This is going to definitely sound weird, but do you have any advice for an ongoing Ao3 writer? Pretty sure I'm not the only one here writing Gojo/OC stories or fluffy one-shots since they're so addicting lol.

But it's strange to be so obsessed with writing with so many ideas and time and energy to write, and then it feels like you're in a bit of a slump when that rush of creativity sort of slows.

You mentioned before that you had most of the story for AL mapped out and written, did it help you to plan ahead more before posting? Or was it more of a, "I didn't worry about it too much because it was fun to write and we're all Gojo simpls" kind of a deal?

Anyhow, would love to know if you'd be alright talking about it. Have a good day~

Hiiiii! It's nice to talk to you, too! 😊

Gojo fluff is addictive and I honestly have been rereading Physical Paradox installments today because I need fluff and motivation 😂

Hmmmm, advice for AO3 writers? Honestly, I feel like I'm a bit under qualified for that because I'd been an anon reader for over ten years until July when I finally created an account so I could post Another Level 😂😂

BUT, I do have a few thoughts. I'll try to keep these as simple as my over-explaining ass can 🫠 (Kiko did not keep it simple. I ranted and this post is hella long, I am so sorry.)

If you haven't already, you can read Another Level on AO3 💕

On writing in general: Write for you.

1) I know I've said this before, but it's true. Write as if no one else will ever see what you're writing to begin with. That's how I started with Another Level. I never intended for anyone else to see it when I first started. On the flip side of this though, don't be afraid of bouncing ideas off others.

It's likely vain of me, but I genuinely enjoy reading my own writing. I try very hard to make sure that what I'm posting is something I enjoy reading. But it makes it so much easier to write if you enjoy reading it, because you're just as excited to read it and see what happens as someone who isn't in your head.

2) I think that something really important for when that creativity slows in one area, don't force yourself to keep going if you don't have to. Hobbies are supposed to be fun, not an obligation or a stressor.

Once the joy fades from a hobby, it's no longer a hobby.

Think of it this way: since May of this year, I've written around 300k words for different fanfics. If we look at that from the perspective of a single-spaced, 12pt font perspective, that is 300 pages. I've written the equivalent of a gosh dang Dissertation. But here's the difference between Another Level and a Dissertation: writing and researching for Another Level was fun. It was something I wanted to do.

(We'll ignore the fact that I didn't have to teach classes and grade papers simultaneously as well. I do and don't miss grad school And honestly, I miss teaching. But academia can kiss my ass.)

3) Write what you want to write, not what others expect you to write. This isn't your job. You aren't being paid for a word count or hours put in, you're doing this for you and for fun. When you let other's expectations drive you instead of your own desire, that happiness is fleeting and it's easy to burnout fast.

4) Follow your inspiration fairies, even if only briefly. You don't have to write out an entire universe, and you don't have to keep what you write. But sometimes you have to get rid of the brainworms to make room for other ideas. I've realized that a few of my Goinko 'au' ideas are literally better just as little headcannons or blurbs and nothing more. And that's okay, because now I got them out of my system.

5) If you want to write and finish a series, only post for that series. I'm learning this the hard way right now with Gokduō and Physical Paradox. It is really hard to focus on one or the other because I feel an odd pressure to get the next parts done for both, which is completely the opposite of what it should be.

The pressure drains my creativity, and I've found myself struggling because I'm too worried about what people will think of it instead of what I want it to be. In all honesty, I had a moment today where I almost decided I don't want to finish Gokudō because I'm not sure where to take it, but I realized I just need some time away from trying to force myself.

6) If you're unhappy with it, don't be afraid to scrap it. Use it as a starting point if you want, but don't get too attached to it if you don't like where it's going. Take a step back and ask if/how it's getting you where you want to go with that work, and if it doesn't help you get there, then it can go.

What was my approach with Another Level? (includes JJK Manga spoilers)

I'll elaborate a bit more on how I had things mapped out before I started posting first. Essentially, when the Gojo/Sukuna fight started in the manga, I just knew Gojo was going to die. In my mind, there was no way Akutami would let him live, and I was in a really bad place mentally and wasn't sure how I'd be able to handle it. And then I was like "wait, that's literally why we have fanfic, I can keep him alive as long as I want."

So, I started Another Level with the intention to keep it to myself and use it as my own comfort fic to prepare myself for Gojo's death. Some behind the scenes info: a version of the dream Rinko had in Split Bluff was the very first thing I wrote for Another Level. Except it originally wasn't a dream, it was going to be their reunion. However, they weren't as close, they were solidly friends with benefits who barely knew each other. Then, I wrote a part where Rinko first meets Yuuji at the Goodwill Event and she was Maki's legal guardian and still a teacher at Kyoto Tech, then I went further back and wrote her asking Gojo to get Maki enrolled at Tokyo Tech, and then I went further back and wrote Make a God Bleed.

As you already know because you've read Another Level, none of those stayed the same because then, as I kept writing, Rinko took on a life of her own. She became so much more than just a random OC that I threw together without thinking. And I have to say that I'm so glad she did because I'm not sure I would have been able to deal with 236 without Rinko. Some people have said Rinko helped them, but she's helped me so much as well. I mean it when I say she's cemented herself as my favorite original character that I've ever written because she has so much depth and heart that I accidentally poured into her. Not to mention that she's helped me meet some really amazing people along the way.

I'm in a bit of a rut now because I was on a marathon of writing for about five or six months. I started writing Another Level in May, and while I wrote the first draft for All That I Am Is Yours probably in June or July, I pretty much completely rewrote it once we actually got there. Between May and now, I've written upwards of 300k words of JJK fanfic, not including the installments or drafts I scrapped completely 🙃

Posting schedule with Another Level:

As someone who is severely ADHD, my hyperfocus was strong with Another Level. I was obsessed. And I was even more obsessed when I realized people were enjoying reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

In all honesty, part of what kept me on a strict uploading schedule with Another Level was a desire for the validation and praise in the comments. While I had a lot written, I uploaded so quickly because I wanted to get that lil rush from seeing the comments.

Kiko is about to do a lil bit of oversharing for ya: I'd just left a job where I'd spent the last six months there with my formerly wonderful boss decided to blame me for every little thing that went wrong, and then she couldn't understand why my performance actually started to drop. I hadn't heard a damn word of positive feedback for anything I did in so long that the comments on Another Level helped pull me out of a very depressive state.

But, it quickly became unhealthy because I started to rely on them to the point where it was all I cared about. All I cared about was seeing comments on the newest Another Level installment, and when there wasn't feedback, I got all in my head about what I'd done wrong and wanted to post the next installment as quickly as possible because maybe that one would do better.

Now, this is not me saying that wanting comments is a bad thing. Feedback is very important, and it's hard to know if people are enjoying something when there's not anything to go on. But it does become a problem if it's the only reason you're writing. I've been very fortunate in that I haven't gotten comments or messages demanding updates because I've seen that others do receive those sometimes. I like to think it's because you guys are just awesome and wonderful people.

I've gotten a bit better about being obsessed with comments because I have this nice lil corner of wonderful people and I feel like I've made a few genuine friends here. (Hi Rai, if you're reading this, I hope you're doing well.)

I know that what I just described for my Another Level posting schedule contradicts what I said in the beginning, but I will say that while my posting schedule was heavily driven by that need for praise, my writing schedule was not. I was writing so much because I was enjoying myself. I was having more fun writing than I had in years. I still am, but I do have to keep reminding myself some of the points I made above otherwise I find myself falling into a rut.

THIS WAS PROBABLY WAY MORE THAN YOU BARGAINED FOR AND I AM SO SORRY 🫠

BUT I HOPE IT MADE SENSE AND THAT IT WASN'T JUST COMPLETELY FUCKING USELESS 😭😭🙃