#and has roots all the way back in 2016

[physalian]

What No One Tells you about Writing #3

Opening this up to writing as a whole, because it turns out I have a lot more to say!

Part 1

Part 2

1. You don’t fall in love with your characters immediately

But when you do, it’s a hit of serotonin like no other. I’d been writing a tight cast of characters for my sci-fi series since 2016 and switched over in a bout of writer’s block this year to my new fantasy book. I made it about ⅓ through writing the book going through the motions, unable to visualize what these new characters look like, sound like, or would behave like without a ‘camera’ on them.

Then, all of a sudden, I opened my document to keep on chugging with the first draft, and it clicked. They were no longer faceless elements of my plot, they were my characters and I was excited to see what they could accomplish, rooting for them to succeed. Sometimes, it takes a while, but it does come.

2. Sometimes a smaller edit is better than a massive rewrite

Unless you’re changing the trajectory of your entire plot, or a character’s arc really is unrecoverable, sometimes even a single line of dialogue, a single paragraph of introspection, or a quick exchange between two characters can change everything. If something isn’t working, or your beta readers consistently aren’t jiving with a character you yourself love, try taking a step back, looking at who they are as a person, and boil down what your feedback is telling you and it might demand a simpler fix than you expect.

Tiny details inserted at the right moment can move mountains. Fan theories stand on the backs of these minutiae. One sentence can turn a platonic relationship romantic. One sentence can unravel a fair and just argument. One sentence can fill or open a massive plot hole.

3. Outline? What outline?

Not every book demands weeks upon weeks of prep and worldbuilding. I would argue that jumping right in with only a vague direction in mind gives you a massive advantage: You can’t infodump research you haven’t done. Exposition is forced to come as the plot demands it, because you haven’t designed it yet.

Not every story is simple and straightforward, but even penning the first draft with your vague plan, *then* going back and adding in deeper worldbuilding elements, more thematic details, richer character development, can get you over the writer’s block hurdle and make it far less intimidating to just shut up and write the book.

4. It’s okay to let your characters take the wheel

I’ve seen writing advice that chastises authors who let their characters run wild, off the plan the story has for them. Yeah, doing this can harm your pacing and muddy a strong and consistent arc, but refusing to leave the box of your outline greatly limits your creativity. I do this particularly when writing romantic relationships (and end up like Captain Crunch going Oops! All Gays!).

Did I plan for these two to get together? No, it just happened organically as I wrote them talking, getting closer, getting to know each other better in the circumstances they find themselves in. Was this character meant to be gay? Well, he wasn’t meant to be straight, but you know what, he’d work really well with this other boy over here. None of that would have happened if I was bound and determined to follow my original plan, because my original plan didn’t account for how the story that I want to tell evolves. You aren’t clairvoyant—it’s okay if it didn’t end up where you thought it would.

5. Fight. Scenes. Suck.

Which is crazy because I love fantasy and sci-fi, the actiony-est genres. Some authors love battle scenes and fistfights. It comes naturally to them and I will forever be jealous. I hate fight scenes. I hate blocking and choreographing them. I hate how it doesn’t read like I’m watching a movie. I hate how it could take me hours to write a scene I can read in 5 minutes. I hate that there’s no way around it except to just not write them, or put in the elbow grease and practice.

Whatever your writing kryptonite is, don’t be too hard on yourself. It won’t ever replicate the movie in your head, but our audience isn’t privy to that movie and will be none the wiser of how this didn’t fit your expectations, because it’s probably awesome on its own. It could be a fight scene, sex scene, epic battle, cavalry charge, courtroom argument, car chase—whatever. Be patient, and kind to yourself and it will all come together.

6. Write the scenes you want to write first

And then be prepared to never use them. It can be mighty difficult working backwards from a climax and figuring out how to write the story around it, but if you’re sitting at your laptop staring at your cursor and watching it blink, stuck on a tedious moment that’s necessary but frustrating, go write something exciting. Even if that amazing scene ends up no longer working in the book your story becomes, you still get practice by writing it. Particularly if you hate beginnings or the pressure of a perfect first page is too high, you’re allowed to write any other moment in the book first.

And with that, be prepared to kill your darlings. Not your characters, I mean that one badass line of dialogue living rent free in your head. That epic monologue. That whump scenario for your favorite character. Sometimes it just doesn’t work out anymore, but even if it ends up in the trash, you can always salvage something from it, even if that’s only the knowledge of what not to do in the future.

7. “This is clearly an author insert.” … Yes. It is. Point?

No one likes Mary Sues, because a character who doesn’t struggle or learn to get everything they want in life is uncompelling. The most flagrant author inserts I see aren’t Mary Sues, they’re nerdy, awkward, boring white guys whose world changes to fit their perspective, instead of the other way around—they don’t have anything to say. I’m not the intended audience to relate to these characters and I accept that, but I don’t empathize with the so-called “strong female character” who also doesn’t have flaws or an arc either.

A good author insert? When the author gives their characters pieces of themselves. When the “author insert” struggles and learns and grows and it’s a therapeutic experience just writing these characters thrown into such horrible situations. They feel human when they’re given pieces of a human’s soul. They have real human flaws and idiosyncrasies. I don’t care if the author wrote themselves as the protagonist. I care that this protagonist is entertaining. So if you want to make yourself the hero of your book, go for it! But make sure you look in the mirror and write in your flaws, as much as your strengths.

[anotherghoul666]

i JUST started listening to sleep token and went to the tag only to find you there, please tell me more about this band?? collective?? i need more

You got it buddy! One order of a full Sleep Token beginner primer, coming up!

Sleep Token are a rock? metal? genre blending collective based out of England, tho nobody's 100% sure of where the members are from because they are also a masked and anonymous project. Their style of music varies greatly from album to album and song to song. From soft ballads, to electronic music, to indie, to progressive / prog metal, to post-rock / post-metal, and now with their newest singles, a definite shift into heavier sounds with roots in djent and -core genre elements like breakdowns and scream vocals, let's just say they are very diverse and there are not many bands that sound the same out there. Their blending is pretty unique, and imo will prove to be genre-defining in the coming years. They are signed to Spinefarm records and they're touring as we speak in Europe.

They formed in 2016 and self-released their first EP called One that same year. Their second EP aptly called Two was released in 2017 on Basick. They currently have two full length albums out on Spinefarm, 2019's Sundowning and 2021's This Place Will Become Your Tomb, which are the crux of the material you wanna look into. I always advise that you listen to the whole albums front to back because artists plan these tracklists deliberately, so we owe it to them to consume their output the way they intended us to, but! I also realize nowadays nobody does that because of Spotify and streaming, unfortunately, so: for Sundowning, I'd recommend Sugar as a first track because it touches on both the soft and harsh sides of the album beautifully; and for TPWBYT I'd say start with Alkaline (bonus points for a delicious video to get you into their visual side too). On January 6th and 7th 2023, they released two new songs to showcase their new sound, Chokehold and The Summoning. These two singles seem to be the optimal path currently to get into the band. There are rumors of a new album called Take Me Back To Eden to be released this year, there's a tracklist floating around online though we don't know if its legit, and there are also rumors for new singles coming out, at the time of writing this, tomorrow and in two days, on the 19th and 20th of January 2023. There's also a recording of an acoustic show called From The Room Below floating online, with new takes on their previous songs and a few choice covers like Billie Eilish's When The Party's Over, surprising crossovers that are emotional experiences.

Now, visually and in theme, you'll notice the band has a storyline of sorts. The lore of Sleep Token is this: the band was formed after an ancient deity called Sleep (a reductive name that doesn't encompass the deity's nature at all, but its true name cannot be spoken in any human tongue) revealed itself to the singer, Vessel, in his sleep. Sleep appears to be a powerful force worshiped in ancient civilizations, that gave them the blessing of dreams and the curse of nightmares. Since this apparition, Vessel's life purpose has been to worship and make offerings to Sleep via music. The members of the band are all called vessels, we can infer vessels for Sleep. The singer is Vessel I, but the fandom's moved to just calling him Vessel. The other members are just called by their numbers. II is on drums, III is on bass, IV is on guitar. They're all vessels. They wear masks to hide their identities, with what seems to be full body black paint and some variety of stage costumes including hooded coats and capes and now apparently full pauldrons and void wizard staves.

You'll come across some specific lingo when encountering Sleep Token content or in the fandom. These terms mostly come from their official social media so they use them themselves, it's not fan made. "Worship" is the tagline, kinda like "Nema" is with Ghost. You'll see fans telling each other that all the time. To Worship is to take part in enjoying the band in any way you can: listening to the music, watching videos, streaming their stuff, spreading the word, going to shows, buying merch, etc. Sleep Token's shows are called Rituals, like Ghost's. Pictures and videos are referred to as Sacred Moments, or Sacred Moments in Time. The bands they tour with are called Brethren. Sleep Token's songs are called Offerings. Because they are written as a means to Worship the Sleep deity. Offerings can also be in the form of instrument playthroughs, videos, etc. What the band produces. When you listened to new material or acquire merch, you also Consume. A note on their anonymity to finish: while there are rumors about who the band members are, nothing's confirmed and the band's explicit wish is to maintain this anonymity, so it fundamental to respect those wishes and not try to dig. They value art for art, they let the music speak for itself, and they explicitely wish for their music to be detached from who they are as people. Let's leave the magic in place both for them and for us!

Welcome to the fold! Worship!

[seireitonin]

Quick rant on some stupid discourse

“This fandom doesn’t take horror seriously!1!!1!1 it’s just a bunch of ocs!1!1!1!1😡” Bro, Creepypasta has always been goofy af. Even the word“Creepypasta” sounds goofy. Literally every Creepypasta Character is someone’s oc, made my a traumatized angsty teen or young adult in 2011-2016. You expect us to read some silly shit like Jeff the Killer and be shaking in our boots? (Still like Jeff btw) Get real. I like the “realistic and scary” portrayals of the Creepypasta characters too! But I also love fanon. This fandom was literally based off fun. I hate when ppl come with this “im better than you” mindset bc they don’t like fanon/ want them to be scary only. I really can’t stand it. This fandom has always been based on fun and comfort. Everyone made the popular Creepypasta characters for fun and sometimes to vent/ be a self insert. Ppl are acting like we didn’t have comics and fics where they lived in a mansion together and chilled like a family with a y/n insert because ppl were comforted by these characters , myself included. Ppl act like we didn’t always have goofy/ silly fan art. Ppl act like these aren’t vent characters that brought comfort to lots of ppl. Ppl act like the creators themselves didn’t make silly, goofy fun content with their own characters. (Laughing jack, ticci Toby, bloody painter, etc for example all their creators drew them/ portrayed in fun ways in content I still rewatch) Let’s not forget our roots. Creepypasta (the character based side of it) is still so loved and popular because of the fun stuff like that that people can look back on fondly. Why does it make you so mad that ppl want to use the characters differently than you/ make fanon content? So these “ocs” are only decent/ okay when you use them your way and have your seal of approval??? Please be serious. This is coming from someone who likes Fanon and canon. One isn’t better than the other. You’re not better than everyone else because you want to make them “realistic and scary” let that mindset go. Let people have fun. Let people find comfort where they want. Seeing people having fun and being comforted shouldn’t make you mad. The block button exists and is free. Just block them and only interact with the side of the fandom you want to see. There’s multiple sides of it. I block content I don’t want to see all the time. Doesn’t mean I hate these people or their content, I just don’t want to see it personally. But I don’t go around unironically shaming people for content I don’t like. Because that’s dumb. (Unless it’s something awful like using offenderman, demonizing mental illness etc I have called people out for this, semi - respectfully before) Shaming people for not portraying Creepypasta characters made my angsty teens and adults in the way you specifically want to see them/ be portrayed is just so silly. This fandom doesn’t revolve around you and what you want. Or anyone for that matter. Respect other people. No one’s “better” than anyone. Because everyone sees and uses and portrays the characters differently and that’s always been the best part of this fandom. The freedom, creativity, fun and comfort. That’s how it’s always been. Nothings changed.

[scotianostra]

May 17th is Norwegian Constitution Day or Syttende Mai as its known in Norway.

A wonderful spring holiday celebrated with red, white and blue ribbons, national costumes and waving of the Norwegian flag, the three colours are everywhere in Norway at this time of year.

It’s a day Norwegians all over the world take off to celebrate and marks the historic signing of the Constitution in 1814, the year Norway gained its independence from Sweden, which was fully realized in 1905.

In every city, town and village in Norway, children and adults alike express their cultural pride by marching to the bright music of school bands, celebrating the joy of springtime and honoring of those citizens who created Norway’s constitutional government, founding her independence.

Especially popular is the Children’s Procession that brings every child out in their best clothes or national costume.

In Edinburgh the Norwegian community celebrate Syttende Mai too.

Edinburgh’s celebrations include the Norwegian Scottish Society dinner, after a reception at the Norwegian Consulate’s residence.

Each year Norwegian students in Edinburgh hold a breakfast at Prestonfield House followed by a parade along Waterloo Place and onto Princes Street. At the boom of Edinburgh Castle’s One o’ clock gun, the pigeons fly and the parade begins!

Tonight expats and guests gather at The Royal Scots Club Abercromby Place for a celebration dinner held by the Norwegian Scottish Association. The association was founded in Edinburgh in 1966, and has enjoyed over 50 years of Norwegian-Scottish friendship.

Norwegian Scottish Association roots lie in a much older friendly society, one rooted in the shared experience of Norwegians and Scots during the Second World War. Founded in Dumfries in 1941, the Scottish Norwegian Society brought Scots and Norwegians together in difficult times. Having escaped the German occupation of their homeland in 1940, around a thousand Norwegians had come to be stationed at various times in Dumfries, and it was not long before the idea of a formal society was begun.

Of course our history with Norway goes back centuries, Northern Scotland, was, at one time, a Norse domain and the Northern Isles experienced the most long-lasting Norse influence. Almost half of the people on Shetland today have Viking ancestry, and around 30% of Orkney residents.

Many agree that there are many points of commonality between the Norse character and the Scottish one that leads to a sense of kinship between the two countries, even for those living much further south in Scotland, where Viking influence did not reach. Words like bairn and muckle made their way into Scot’s language via the Norwegians.

I touched upon the links during the second world war earlier and have posted before about the Shetland bus which provided a transport link between the Shetland Islands and occupied Norway. Many Norwegian refugees fled their occupied home with the help of Norwegian sailors who undertook daring, high-risk trips across the North Sea. The whole episode became emblematic of the friendship across the seas.

More recently Edinburgh’s Zoo also has a strong connection to Norway as it is home to a very special resident. Sir Nils Olav III is the mascot and colonel-in-chief of the Norwegian King’s Guard. The king penguin’s rank has been passed down through three generations since 1972. Knighted in 2008, he even received a military promotion in 2016 with the brigadier title bestowed upon him in a special ceremony at the zoo.

The Zoo’s link with Norway originated in 1913 when arctic explorer Roald Amundsen presented a penguin to them on their opening. Once a year the penguin inspects soldiers from Norway’s King’s Guard.

Edinburgh's Syttende mai parade – the 17th May or Norwegian Constitution Day parade traditionally takes place along the capital's main thoroughfare, Princes Street. At the boom of Edinburgh Castle's 'one o' clock gun', the pigeons fly and the parade begins!

Pics are from last ears parade.

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

Long time listener, new caller...:) I have read your posts since the Plant days. I've always wondered why you fell down this rabbit hole. Now how... why?

I’ve always liked William and Harry. Started following the BRF more closely in November 2010 because of William and Kate’s engagement. Came to really like Kate and I saw bits of myself in her.

Probably what I liked the most about Kate in those days was her sense of style and dress. In a world that was consumed with presenting and dressing young women for the male gaze, here was someone that dressed for herself and wore the kind of clothes that I liked to wear. I’ve always said that if it weren’t for Kate making modesty cool again - eg sleeves, higher necklines, longer hemlines, long trousers, and blazers - then I wouldn’t have had anything to wear in my 20s.

So then the more I paid attention to the royal family, the more I started to hear and see rumors and gossip about them. That ended up being more fascinating than the “Kate wore those shtupid wedges that The Queen hates!” articles. I started diving into the rumors - where did they come from? Who started them? Why did they start them? How did they start them? - which led me down into the world of PR and media relations.

Then Harry met Meghan and the PR around William, Harry, and Kate exploded. The rumors and gossip proliferated in ways I hadn’t expected or seen before. Then Harry and Meghan got engaged, I got a lot of icks, lurked in the DM comments section, discovered the “three blind mice” tumblrs (Skippy, Felix, and JD), checked it out, and I was home.

(I had tumblr long before then - I’ve been a tumblr since the platform launched because it was the creative fandom artsy side of the internet (predating Superwholock) and that was the kind of stuff I was into.)

Found Soap, Plant, Empress, Sassy and a few other tumblrs through Skippy that were much more my speed. Been here ever since. Kept tracking and following all the rumors and gossip for fun.

Then the pandemic hit. I needed a new lockdown project because the movies were closed and I couldn’t go anywhere. I decided to take all my scribbles and links on BRF rumors and gossip, put them all in a spreadsheet and start tracking if they were true or not and track where they came from to see how they got “into” royal-watching. The side of tumblr I was on started talking more openly about PR, rumors, and gossip and after sending in a bunch of anons to other blogs about rumor tracking, realized there was a lot of interest in that kind of stuff so here I am. And because the root of most gossip, including rumors and theories/conspiracy theories, involves PR, the analytical side kind of fit in neatly with that.

The rumors and gossip have died down - it’s not as frenzied as it used to be back in the 2016-2018 era so it’s a much quieter and not-as-frequently updated spreadsheet now as it was in the past. Ive still got the spreadsheet but because there isn’t a lot of chaos in the BRF anymore, there isn’t as much gossip and rumors, and the gossip and rumors there are, they tend to spread from the astrology/tarot side of the fandom. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that at all!

One final observation: I’ve noticed in the rumor/gossip tracking world is that there’s a lot of projection lately - so it’s more theories than rumors. I think it’s reflective of the current state of the BRF; the people who were once more freely speculating about the BRF or more freely trying to use gossip or public pressure to force particular decisions or actions from the BRF no longer have access to that kind of insider information to be as effective (or as punishing, perhaps) with their gossip and rumors.

I call my spreadsheet “Mythbusters” and it has 1,874 entries - so almost 1,900 rumors or pieces of gossip. 861 of them have been resolved; most are busted as false just with the passage of time.

[orionsangel86]

Mary & George

So we finally have the show we have been asking for since 2016 (I went back and checked my old posts to make sure and it was indeed 2016 where the "British King Can't Stop Promoting His Boyfriend" post did the rounds).

How did it fair in reality? Well, its hardly Tumblr friendly fanfiction - though it was certainly raunchy - at least at the start. This show was scandalous, sexy, rather filthy at times (in a good way), and absolutely stunning in terms of its production and costume design for sure. It falls very much in line with the expectations of modern period dramas in a post Game of Thrones world where we have shows like The Great, and movies like The Favourite gracing our screens far more regularly than endless fucking retellings of Henry the Eighth which are so fucking common I have even been in one of them myself (sorry - my bitter hatred for stories about Henry VIII and his bloody wives is difficult to restrain).

So FINALLY getting a show set during the reign of James I and VI of England and Scotland and his love affair with the Duke of Buckingham is definitely a breath of fresh air.

But its definitely not the beautiful queer love story tumblr might have hoped for when we all first saw that post.

Nope. If you're looking for a happy tale of queer love overcoming adversity, stick with Red, White, and Royal Blue. Mary & George is not a love story. Its a story of scheming manipulative people who will do anything to get money and power. It's a story that uses sex as a weapon and a tool for personal gain. There is no fluffy romance to be found here, no sweet queer love story and no happy ever after.

I mean, this IS the British monarchy we're talking about, during an extremely dark and horrific period of our history only a short time before the country was plunged into Civil War and a King lost his head. But you've been warned anyway. All you'll find here is brutality, betrayal and eventual death.

Regardless of that, this show was fucking brilliant. The first three episodes in particular are quick witted and hilarious and refuse to shy away from treating queer sex scenes any differently to straight ones. The full frontal male nudity that crops up was also a pleasant surprise - I'm happy that cinema has generally accepted a more balanced approach to nudity nowadays - also a surprise was the lesbian romance which was probably the only genuine romance in the entire show. It leaves you wondering throughout but by the final few episodes its clear that if any love is "true" in this show, its the love between Mary and Sandie.

I absolutely adored Julianne Moore in this as Mary Villiers, who ruthlessly claws her way into power and money through schemes, seductions, betrayals, murders, and anything else you can think of. But even with all of this, I can't help but root for her. Who doesn't want to root for a scheming lesbian and her lover as they manipulate everyone around them and ensure they always get the better of the horrible men that make up King James' court? In this house we support Womens Wrongs.

As far as George goes, Nicholas Galitzine is brilliant as a beautiful but dim mummy's boy in the first few episodes, throwing tantrums and pouting with perfection. He shines in the later episodes as the arrogant and powerful Duke who believes he is practically untouchable due to his hold over the King, whilst still showing through the vulnerability underneath where that relationship remains precarious. The underlying joke of the show is that everyone wants George, and George wants everyone. He's a slutty slutty man.

You know how tumblr has a tendency to split queer stories into one of two camps - either pure sweet romantic love stories or very bad evil messy queer stories? (a gross simplification but you get what I mean) Well Mary and George falls firmly in the second camp. I enjoyed it for what it was, but I was a bit dissapointed that the general approach and belief of the storytellers here is that George used the King for personal gain, that the King was nothing more than a hedonistic fool who let his favourites manipulate him, and that any actual love between them was shallow and fleeting. Its all extremely cynical.

Especially since we know its not true. the surviving letters we have between King James and George paint a much more romantic picture, one where love was definitely a significant factor in their affair. Yes, historians love to play down queer history as best they can, but I don't believe that George Villiers was quite the manipulative little slut this show makes him out to be.

And yeah, sure, we can laugh and dismiss any true history involved. Its just a story after all? It was a bloody good story and one I enjoyed, but was it a fair portrayal of the actual men involved? Probably not - then again, the actual men involved weren't very nice anyway, and the show glossed over a lot of King James' more infamous sins. His obsession with witches and demons leading to the horrifying witch trials throughout the country were completely left out. There was also no mention of the famous King James Bible - the one that heavily emphasised any passages alluding to homosexuality being a sin which is used so frequently even today by religious zealots to persecute gay men. The Sodomy laws during King James' reign were enforced with such brutality that they brought us the slur "f*gg*t" (which I'm not explaining here). Yet the show displays acts of sodomy as such a normal part of court life that you'd almost think it wasn't totally punishable by death.

I shouldn't complain. Especially not about the lack of homophobia. Its a great show. You should watch it. But take it with a pinch of salt. The true story of James and George was probably one with a lot more secrecy involved, a lot more sneaking about in the night (after all, why build a secret passage between their bedrooms if they weren't trying to hide it?) and therefore a lot more hypocrisy on the part of the King.

There are some very touching scenes between King James and George, and I feel the show attempted to portray the relationship between them as complex and multilayered, but I'm not sure it succeeds as well as I would have hoped. But perhaps I am just a silly tumblr romantic who likes her queer love stories to actually include genuine love within them, and I always hoped that any story about King James and George would focus on how that love grew over time. Because whilst George obviously went along with things initially for personal gain, I think the evidence we have at least gives an indication that he did love the King, and the King clearly loved George, and I am interested in a story about how they navigated that love at a period of time where it did need to be kept secret, even if it was a fairly open secret, where things such as the King James Bible and the Witch Trials would have affected them, and where George's rise to power would have caused so much conflict and anger within the court.

But regardless of all that, I still loved the show. Its still worth the watch. The gays deserve more messy sexy dramas where they get to be ruthless and powerful and slutty and murderous. Its excellent viewing for all.

Ultimately though, I may have came for the gay duke and his love affair with the King, but I stayed for the lesbians. The lesbians were awesome.

#JusticeForSandie

[avelera]

I've been talking with a few people irl about the TikTok ban and I was wondering if I could get your take on it? (iirc you work in election security). Mainly I'd like to know why TikTok/China is *uniquely* bad wrt dating mining/potential election interference when we've seen other companies/governments do the same thing (thinking of the Russian psyops here on Tumblr in 2016). It feels like the scope is so narrow that it doesn't come close to targeting the root problem (user privacy and data mining as a whole), leading me to think it's only point is "ooh China Scary". Thoughts? (No worries if you'd rather not get into it, I just thought of you as someone who might have more insight/informed opinions on the matter).

So I'm not really familiar with all the details of the case and certainly not all the details of the bill. But I will give my perspective:

TikTok as a particular threat to users' data and privacy has been known for some time in the cybersecurity world. US government employees and contractors have been straight-up forbidden to have it on their phones for some time now. I, for example, have never had it on my phone because of these security concerns. (Worth noting, I'm not a government employee or contractor, it was just a known-to-be dangerous app in the cybersecurity world so I avoided it.)

This is because the parent company, as I understand, has known connections to the Chinese government that have been exploited in the past. For example, to target journalists.

Worth noting, another app that would potentially be on the chopping block is WeChat, which also has close ties to (or is outright owned by?) the Chinese government. This is just speculation on my part but it's based on the fact that all the concerns around TikTok are there for WeChat too and it has also been banned on government devices in some states, so I imagine it would be next if the bill passes.

I think this is important to note because I've seen some hot takes here on Tumblr have said that the entire case against TikTok is made up and there is no security threat. That is simply not true. The concerns have been there for a while.

However, the question of what to do about it is a thorny one.

The determination seems to be that so long as TikTok is still owned by its parent company with its direct ties to the Chinese government, there really is no way to guarantee that it's safe to use. From that angle, demanding that the company sever ties and set up some form of local ownership makes sense.

I am not a lawyer, but, that being said, forcing them to sell their local operations to a locally-based buyer is a pretty invasive and unusual step for legislators to take against a private company, even in a clear case of spying. I'm sure TikTok's widespread popularity is a big part of the threat it poses, which lends to the argument used to justify such an extreme step. (Because it is on so many phones, it really could be a danger to national security.)

That said, at one point young activists on TikTok embarrassed Trump (lots of good context in this article) while he was campaigning in 2020, and there was some talk then about shutting it down which seemed pretty clearly linked to how it was used as a platform to organize against him. I'm sure there's at least some right wing antipathy towards the app that has a political basis going back to this event. Trump signed an executive order banning it, the ban going into effect got bogged down in the courts, and then Biden rescinded that executive order when he got into office, pending an investigation into the threat it posed.

Those investigations seem to have further confirmed that the Chinese government is getting access to US user data through the app, and further confirmed it as a security threat.

Now, to muddy the waters further, there's several dodgy investment funds including one owned by former Secretary of the Treasury to Trump Steven Mnuchin that are circling with an interest to buy TikTok if it does sell. That's very concerning.

Funds like Mnuchin's interest in purchasing TikTok (even though they do invest in other technologies too, so it is in their portfolio) definitely makes the motivations behind the sale look pretty damning as momentum builds, that it could be some sort of money grab here in the US.

China has also pointed out that forcing the sale of a company because of spying concerns like this opens a whole can of worms. If China thinks that, say, Microsoft is spying on their citizens, could they force the US company to sell its operations in China to a Chinese investor? Could they force Google? Could they even further polarize the internet in general between "free" and "not free" (as in, behind the great Chinese or Russian firewall, as examples) if this precedent is set, so that no Western companies can operate in authoritarian states without selling their local operations there to a government-controlled organization, and thus be unable protect their users there? Or, if you don't have so rosy a view of Western companies, could it effectively deal a blow to international trade in general by saying you have to have to sell any overseas arms of a company to someone who is from there? Again, I'm not a lawyer, but this is a hell of a can of worms to open.

But again, this is muddy because China absolutely is spying on TikTok users. The security reason for all of this is real. What to do about it is the really muddled part that has a ton of consequences, and from that angle I agree with people who are against this bill. Tons of bad faith consequences could come out of it. But the concerns kicking off the bill are real.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 7/23/24

i woke up at ass o'clock monday morning to find BOTH of my cats sleeping on the bed with me :') temporary peace and love on planet niceys

also read a book where my takeaway was that there are SO many opportunities in the world for evil engineering but not nearly enough for evil puzzle games

listening

my sister sent me ONE instagram reel/screencap of a tiktok and ive been muttering "emergency! emergency! paging DOCTOR BEAT!" under my breath for the past three days. alarmingly catchy remix of this gloria estefan song. this specific video below is pretty close but there are approximately eight zillion versions

-

reading

Dark Wire by Joseph Cox (photo from here, description from the publisher's site).

The inside story of the largest law-enforcement sting operation ever, in which the FBI made its own tech start-up to wiretap the world, shows how cunning both the authorities and drug traffickers have become, with privacy implications for everyone. In 2018, a powerful app for secure communications called Anom took root among organized criminals. They believed Anom allowed them to conduct business in the shadows. Except for one thing: it was secretly run by the FBI.    Backdoor access to Anom and a series of related investigations granted American, Australian, and European authorities a front-row seat to the underworld. Tens of thousands of criminals worldwide appeared in full view of the same agents they were trying to evade. International smugglers. Money launderers. Hitmen. A sprawling global economy as efficient and interconnected as the legal one. Officers watched drug shipments and murder plots unfold, making arrests without blowing their cover. But, as the FBI started to lose control of Anom, did the agency go too far?   A painstakingly investigated exposé, Dark Wire reveals the true scale and stakes of this unprecedented operation through the agents and crooks who were there. This fly-on-the-wall thriller is a caper for our modern world, where no one can be sure who is listening in. 

i really liked this one! cox did a really good job of slowly unfurling the extremely technical details as they became relevant, instead of one horrible infodump near the beginning, and has a real gift for humanizing little anecdotes that illustrate the concept. he's also dryly funny in a very british way, eg the transition between one paragraph describing a very talented olive oil salesman and his lifestyle to how that olive oil processing covered up drug labs with the sentence "But Catanzariti didn't stay with olives; he pivoted instead to methamphetamine." i loooooove reading about how the drug trade gets around customs. i love edge cases and figuring out why things fail. i truly think some of the finest materials engineers of our time are out there trying to figure out how to get cocaine into australia.

this is deeply reported in a way that's very different from a lot of popsci and pop-history books that annoy me: this is NOT a book where it feels like the author is simply padding out a wikipedia page, supplemented with articles he's already written. he's been on this beat since 2016 and it shows: he has quotes from hundreds of people on many sides of the drug war. something i also appreciate is that cox is not automatically, rabidly pro-cop; he does not gloss over the very real tortures and kidnappings and all the other nasty realities of the global drug trade, and frequently shows how much overreach and entrapment took place during this whole endeavor. i particularly liked a chapter where he flipped back and forth from various law enforcement officials assuring him they of course complied with all relevant privacy laws and blacklisted anyone using it for simple secure communications, and lawyers telling cox "no the cops very much did spy on my privileged communication with my clients and i know this because these texts came up in court". also gratifying to read about some cases overturned or thrown out, in the odd case a judge decided it looked too much like entrapment.

i feel like i devoured this book SO fast but it's a solid 352 pages in hardcover. i also had to wait a good two months on the libby holds lists so there is strong interest in this book! good for cox!

how did i find this book: it's austin underscore walker's fault. they used to be coworkers at vice and cox and three others broke off last year to found 404 Media, which has had an absolutely crazy amount of real-world impact for the size (again! four people!) and how long they've been around. rip vice. wish u did better by your people.

-

watching

watched Hercules (1997, dir. Clements & Musker) with my bestie's five year old. i did not grow up with disney movies and don't really have a nostalgic affinity for them but this shit holds up! i like how meg has the silhouette of a greek vase

-

playing

powerwash simulator has a new free DLC out! we get to go to the aquarium and wash some exhibits and wash the research submarine!!! VERY soothing. took me a good solid two hour podcast episode to clean the exhibits.

the temporary summer event in genshin impact is very darling this year-- there are big indie game vibes and unlocking every chest is a little more complicated or has a little bit more story attached than usual. very excited to see if this continues with the next big update that introduces a whole new land.

i also like that they've picked An Art Style to work with-- everything is very toy-like or origami. not that genshin doesn't have a distinct art style, but playing around with something less realistic is fun!

-

making

look im going to have to add a cross stitch update to the morning reblog. the lighting in here is simply Not Good Enough

[chaos0pikachu]

Trends in BL (Sorta): Genre Trends

So I've seen a few posts discussing trends in BL and I wanted to talk about that from a different angle. Specifically discussing what trends are, how they're formed, and to not remove BL from the rest of their countries own media.

The latter is something I see a lot when discussing BL this kind've ~separation of church and state~ but it's BL and Country's General Media. As though BL lives in a separate bubble outside of all other media and thus never influenced by the media being made in its country of origin nor the countries they share direct borders or trade with. Or all influence began and ended with seme/uke dynamics imported from Japan and nothing beyond that (no, Pit Babe was more than likely not inspired by Supernatural) and it's been static ever since.

All of that is, untrue, but also a really limited way of viewing international media. These countries are places with their own history, culture, politics, and of course, media arts. BL is a part of all of that. Which also effects the trends and potential trends we'll see in BL individually (as it's going to change country to country with some crossover).

I think a way of identifying trends in BL and also the root of those trends is by looking at the media of the country of origin their surrounding countries, and what BLs have unprecedented success and what has the industry learned from them?

So I'm gonna break this down by: genre, technical and business trend(s) in 3 part posts. In this post I'm just going to talk about genre trends in Thai and Korean BL as that's what I'm most familiar with.

Basically this post got hella long, I'm not in college anymore, and my motivation was tied to the length of my Jennifer Hudson Best Of playlist. So I had to split it up, es lo que es.

[This will not be a comprehensive list of like all BL trends ever respect to y'all who do but I do not and will not watch every BL in existence, bendicion]

To start we gotta talk first about how trends in media tend to work and also what we mean by "trends". Because there's genre trends, technical trends, and business trends.

Here's a good article breaking down various aspects of all three. When we talk "trends" in film it's not as simplistic as "office romances" or "cross country remakes" of which, one is a genre trend and the latter a business trend.

Some examples of what I mean:

Shared Universe (genre trend)

3d boom (technical trend, trended a few times in the industry, first in the 1950s until the 1960s and then again in the early 2000s until the mid 00s thanks to James Cameron)

Remakes/Reboots (business trend, this is a business based decision b/c the risk threshold for a pre-established work is lower than for an original work that may or may not have financial data backing it)

Trends in media, whether they are genre, business, technical or a combination, tend to take time to build up, and also tend last much longer than a singular year (generally for as long as something is profitable).

Example: it took time for the Shared Universe genre trend to gain traction.

Batman v Superman (2016) wasn't released until five years after Avengers (2012). Following this, The Mummy (2017) starring Tom Cruise was meant to kickstart Universal's The Dark Universe was released six years after Avengers. Before that Dracula Untold (2014) was supposed to be reworked to also start The Dark Universe (both these films flopped so no Dark Universe, rip).

Since the Avengers release, we have the shared universes of: Monsterverse (which combines Godzilla and Kong franchises together, technically started in 2014, officially started in 2017 with Kong Skull Island), and the Sony Spiderverse (Venom, Spider-man, Madam Web, Mobius lol) and The Conjuring Universe (Annabelle, La Llorona, The Conjuring, The Nun).

It's been almost 12 years since Avengers was released (fuckin'a) and we're only now starting to see some minor diminishing returns (Disney had a horrid year financially last year) for this genre trend, and not even across the board.

I want to iterate that Avengers did not 'invent' the idea of a cross-franchise shared universe. Things like Xena and Hercules, or Hanna Barbara cartoons existed long before the Avengers. However the Avengers kickstarted a genre trend in film. Just because a piece of media started a trend does not mean it invented the genre or technical innovation (James Cameron didn't "invent" 3D but he did revolutionize it with Avatar and I suffered through many 3D horror movies because of it).

[I point this out because sometimes ppl be getting testy when ppl say kinnporsche influenced the increase in mafia/crime BLs with well, um, actually history trapped/manner of death came first - yes, yes we know this. And Bi No Isu came out before all of them so everybody drink some tea and relax, everybody's faves are pretty okay😘]

Okay to let's get to what ppl actually wanna talk about, BL.

(Some) Genre trend(s) in Thailand and Korea:

In Thai BL genre trends I'm noticing are: horror, supernatural, paranormal, action crime, and magic/magical realism. A lot of these crossover, horror shows typically are also paranormal - Ghost House Ghost House (2022), After Sundown (2023) - supernatural shows tend to cross over with magical realism like time travel, or other soft magic elements - Time (2024), I Feel You Linger in the Air (2023), Cherry Magic (2023).

For the horror, supernatural/paranormal genre trend, this isn't at all surprising if you look at Thailand's recent film output from 2020 to 2023: The Medium, The Whole Truth, Ghost Lab, Haunted Tales, Cracked, Death Whisperer, Home for Rent, The Maid, Waning Moon, School Tales, and others, are all horror, paranormal, or supernatural films of some sort.

The horror genre trend especially has been around Thailand for a while, as far back as 2018 with the smash success of Girl from Nowhere which only gained a larger following when it hit Netflix in 2021. I'd almost argue the horror genre trend really picked up with Girl From Nowhere as now one of the main acquisitions of Thai series and film on Netflix are of the horror genre.

That larger media trend is now trickling down into BL with series like: Shadow (2023), After Sundown (2023), Dead Friend Forever (2023) and upcoming projects like Vampire Project.

While supernatural/paranormal series like Ghost House Ghost House (2022), 1000 Years Old (2024), I Feel You Linger in the Air (2023), Two Worlds (2024), Golden Blood (2024?) are increasing. OMG! Vampire (TBD?) will at least be supernatural but we can't say with certainty if OMGV will be horror or not as we only have a poster.

I imagine with the success of Dead Friend Forever, and I Feel You Linger in the Air we'll see the trend of horror and supernatural/paranormal series (I know some have already been announced) continued.

Then there's the genre trend towards more action and crime focused series; which more than often crossover but not all~ the time.

In terms of the increase in crime based Thai BLs I'd argue it was a joint combo of Kinnporsche's (2022) wild skyrocketed success, and the success of Manner of Death (2020). Alongside the influence of rise of crime and thrillers from Korean media (The Gangster, the Cop and the Devil (2019) and Unstoppable (2018))

Manner of Death I'd argue influenced projects like Never Let Me Go (2022), Unforgotten Night (2022), and Big Dragon (2022) if only because of their release times and taking into account the time it takes for a production to film and be edited down.

Whilst all these series came out after Kinnporsche - NLMG released a trailer in Nov, Big Dragon in Oct, and Unforgotten Night in Jun, while Kinnporsche dropped their trailer in Apr - they're series releases are so close to Kinnporsche that I don't feel confident in saying Kinnporsche 100% influenced their acquisition. Ngl it's hard not to see influences of KPTS in at least Big Dragon & Unforgotten Night if only in terms of technical film making, so there could~ be influence but I can't say that definitively. I'm gonna attribute these to Manner of Death since it came out two years prior to these other series.

Meanwhile series both released and unreleased My Gangster Oppa (2023), Red Peafowl (TBD?), Chains of Heart (2023), Kidnap (TBD?), are def riding the crime genre trend that Kinnporsche started and I'd argue series like Pit Babe (2023), Playboyy (2023) were acquired for production in part because of the crime elements included in their respective series.

Meanwhile series like Law of Attraction (2023) (crime/action) and The Sign (2023) (crime/action/supernatural) are combining crime, action and supernatural elements together.

I've said before Kinnporsche takes a lot of cues from Korean and Hong Kong crime films like Jet Li's The Enforcer, and Fist of Legend, Donnie Yen's Flash Point, Raging Fire, and Kung Fu Jungle, Han Dong-wook's The Worst of Evil, Kim Jin-Min's My Name, along with Japanese manga like Bi No Isu and KeixYaku.

Meanwhile The Sign is def taking cues from Chinese costume dramas like Ashes of Love, Fairy and Devil, White Snake (and it's many adaptions), Guardian, & Ying Yang Master Dream of Eternity. Alongside Hong Kong and Korean cop and romance shows like Tale of the Nine-Tailed, Hotel Del Luna, Director Who Buys Me Dinner, First Love, Again.

[I think the only reason Thailand or Korea hasn't jumped on the full fantasy train and pulled an Untamed is because of budget. The Sign has done very well for Idol Factory so I could see more studios trying to go in that fantasy direction if they can get the funding for it.]

Meanwhile shows like Time (2024), Two Worlds (2024), and Cherry Magic (2023) are leaning more into a combination of magical realism and a supernatural. Which is something that's been popular in Korea (Mr. Queen (2020), The King Eternal Monarch (2020)) in the past and obviously Japan (Cherry Magic (2020).

This, again, isn't a fully comprehensive list. I'm sure there's shows I've missed, and there's going to be evergreen genres that are always produced - university, high school, office all with a general romcom flavor - because they're cheap, easy, low risk and for the most part reliable.

That's not an insult to shows like Cherry Magic TH, or Middleman's Love or Cooking Crush or whatever.

Cooking Crush is just going to cost way less than The Sign it's simply a fact. Likewise Middleman's Love cost less than The Next Prince (TBD?) and was less risk as an office romcom. What helps offset the risk of something like The Next Prince is casting Zee and NuNew in the lead roles.

[watch these two trailers and tell me they cost the same]

Think of it of like, the 50 cop procedural dramas networks are always churning out; they do so because they're cheap, easy, low risk, and reliable.

Gmmtv made Cherry Magic not for the art of it all but because it was low risk and low cost to produce with a high value return. I imagine that's also why gmmtv cast Tay and New because while I don't know who the hell they are, lots of folks in BL fandom do because of Dark Blue Kiss and the reuniting of a well liked costars will also help offset financial risk for the project. Studios will often only greenlight a project if "a name" is attached to said project.

Anyways, Korea's turn.

The data for Korea is less because Korea comes out with fewer series than Thailand. Like currently Thailand has 9 ongoing BLs in 2024 while Korea has 1 (oh City Boy Log you lonely thing you).

For Korean BLs I'm still seeing mostly evergreen genre trends: the workplace (The New Employee, Oh! My Assistant, Roommates of Ponngduck 304,), high school/university (Light On Me, Cherry Blossoms After Winter, Semantic Error, Love Class, Love for Love's Sake) and Joseon (Nobleman Ryu's Wedding, Tinted With You, Director Who Buys Me Dinner) romances - which make sense, a lot of these were the trends of romance kdramas in the early to mid-00s.

What I am hoping, is we'll start seeing the acquisition of KBLs that are closer to what's currently trending in Korea: revenge (Revenge of Others, The Glory, Marry My Husband, Perfect Marriage Revenge), thrillers (My Name, Midnight, Somebody, Celebrity, Mask Girl), more class based social commentary (Devil Judge, Golden Spoon, Vigilante, Kingdom), and an increase in both sex and violence (Somebody, A Shop for Killers).

I could totally see more revenge based KBLs in the coming years since revenge and thriller shows can be combined pretty easily and you don't need a huge budget for either. You can also set them in evergreen settings like the workplace (Marry My Husband) or high school/uni (Revenge of Others).

KBLs have mostly stuck with evergreen settings with a couple outliers like Kissable Lips (2022), Once Again (2022) for example. I enjoyed Love for Love's Sake but it stuck in that evergreen space of school based romance, with magical realism. Again, not surprising given KBLs are just following trends of romance kdramas of the past.

Whilst not a bad~~~ thing, it can be a bit stale and hopefully with a bit more budget/investment we'll see the acquisition of series that are more in line with what's trending with Korean audiences currently.

There's other things I'd like to see develop into trends for KBLs but they're mostly technical and business trends.

That's all I got in the tank, this post took me almost six hours to write b/c of all the sourcing and research I'm freaking peeked.

See y'all next time ✌️

Check out other posts in the series:

Film Making? In My BL? - The Sign ep01 Edition | Aspect Ratio in Love for Love's Sake | Cinematography in My BL - Our Skyy2 vs kinnporsche, 2gether vs semantic error, 1000 Stars vs The Sign | How The Sign Uses CGI | Is BL Being Overly Influenced by Modern Western Romance Tropes?

[like these posts? drop me a couple pennies on ko-fi]

[chris-hallelujah]

English Love Affair | m.s.

Matt x fem!OC

Warnings: smut, oral (f receiving), pet names (baby, princess, etc.), p in v (protected), slight dom!Matt, foul language MINORS DNI

Word Count: 2.1k

A/N: Hi everyone! This is my first time writing a fanfic since like 2016 and my first time ever writing smut. Please let me know if it sucks. This is a song fic based on 'English Love Affair' by 5sos. I have not seen this done before for the triplets, however there are HUNDREDS of pieces out there so if someone has done this please let me know. All ideas are my own and I do not give anyone the right to post this to another platform or plagiarize my work.

-

The Sturniolo Triplets had just finished their final show of the international leg of their tour. In order to give the boys and their team a break from the constant go, go, go of tour, it was deemed best to let them stay in London for a few days before heading back to L.A.

Somehow Nick had heard about a local club, The Black Dog, that was the hot spot of the night. Laura encouraged them to go, make some connections with other creators, and celebrate the ending of tour.

Flashing their IDs to the bouncer at the door, they walked in immediately being hit with the night life atmosphere. Loud music blasted through various speakers, the bar was humid with a smell of alcohol and sweat.

Matt sat at a table with Chris across from him, flirting with some girl. Nick had made his way into the crowd of people dancing after he connected with some friends he knew. Chris and the girl shared whispers and giggles back and forth while Matt sipped on his root beer, scrolling through instagram on his phone.

It started on a weekend in May, I was looking for attention, needed intervention. Felt somebody looking at me. With a powder white complexion, feeling the connection.

A suspicious feeling came over Matt as he felt a pair of eyes on him. He looked up from his phone and around the room, locking eyes with a gorgeous brunette a few feet away.

She stood leaning against the wall with a group of friends. A short gold dress hugged her curves like it was handmade for her. She took a sip from her drink and winked at him in the process. He felt his cheeks flush a bit and a smirk come across his face. The girl said something to her friends and began to make her way across the floor to the table. Chris glanced over at Matt and then followed his gaze. Seeing the approaching girl, Chris grabbed the hand of the girl he had been talking to, gave Matt an encouraging pat on the back of his shoulder and went to the dance floor.

By now the distance between Matt and the mystery girl had closed. She smirked and flirtatiously took his drink from him and took a sip. “Well hi there” Matt said with a slight chuckle, “I’m Matt.”

“Ella,” she said returning the drink to his hand, letting her fingers linger on his a bit longer than necessary. “An American boy, huh? What brings you here?” She asked her English accent coming through despite the loud music.

Oh, yea I’m actually famous and just got done touring. How was Matt supposed to explain his travels without sounding cocky? “Uh, I’m traveling with my brothers. They’re somewhere out there.” He gestured to the crowd of people on top of the color changing dance floor.

“And they’ve left you alone? How lucky am I.” Her confidence made her radiant in the best way. Not egotistical but she knew she looked good and she knew she wanted whatever Matt had to offer. She took a step closer to the barstool he was sitting on and leaned into his ear, “since we already swapped spit on your drink, how about we keep this party going?” Her breath tickling his ear. He felt his pants tighten and he wrapped an arm around her waist.

“Oh yea? And what is it that you suggest?” The tension between these two was buzzing.

Before I knew it, it was serious. Dragged me out the bar to the back seat of her car.

Her hand wrapped around his wrist and she led him out the door of the bar. A black SUV was parked not far from The Black Dog. Matt opened the back door and let Ella climb in before following after her. He pulled the door shut behind them and as he turned back he felt her lips smash into his. She was kissing him like he was the air she needed to breathe and Matt was in no way planning on stopping her. Her dress had rode up from all of the movement which gave Matt the perfect access to smack her ass. She let out a small whimper and buried her head into his neck as they both took a moment to catch their breath. "Let's go back to my place, yea?" she managed to get out, "I only had soda, I can drive." Matt nodded and helped her climb into the driver's seat before getting in the passenger himself. Surely Chris and Nick would be able to get back to the hotel down the street on their own.

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

Next thing we were back at her place, a hideaway in Mayfair, all the great and good there.

The car pulled into her driveway and the duo quickly made their way inside, Matt's hand maintaining contact with Ella's waist. As soon as they crossed through the doorway, Matt spun her around and pressed her against the door. The lack of touch during the car ride was making them both hungrier for any sort of relief. Their tongues battled for dominance, hands exploring the other's body.

The story line was so ridiculous. Every single step had me begging for the next. Before I knew it, it was serious. Dragged me up the stairs and it wasn't ending there.

Ella pulled away and took Matt's wrist yet again. She led him up the stairwell and into a door at the far end of the hallway. They passed a few other doors on their way. "Do you have roommates?" he whispered, slowly becoming aware of the situation they were in and how crazy this may look to someone else.

Ella nodded, "Yes, Sophie and Emma. But they are with our other friends at the bar," she paused and checked the time on her phone, "They won't be home for a little while, don't worry." This was music to his ears.

"Fuckin' fantastic," he muttered against her lips. The bedroom floor turned into a mess of thrown clothes as they made their way to her bed. Matt laid her down and crawled on top of her. One hand grasped her boob as he kissed all over her chest, nipping and sucking, leaving purple marks. Ella's hands were digging into his back leaving red lines all over.

"Matt," she whined, "don't make me wait any longer, please!" He chuckled against her chest and began to pepper kisses down her stomach. He got level with the black, lacy underwear that was the only thing left on her body.

"What a shame, these are so pretty," he hummed before looping his finger underneath and ripping the fabric off. No, like, literally ripping them off. "I'll buy you new ones, whatever you want." He was already pussy whipped and nothing had even happened yet. He dove his face down and gave one lick from her hole up to her clit. She squealed and buried her fingers into the sheets, trying to find somewhere to put the energy that coursed through her. Matt's hands wrapped under her thighs to hold her steady. His tongue went to work with his nose brushing her clit with each movement. Ella was an absolute mess underneath him, moaning and crying out.

"oh my god!" she yelled, thankful that her roommates were gone. Matt was also thankful because the noises she was making were only turning him on more and more. He focused his tongue on her clit and inserted two fingers into her, pumping them slowly. The stretch burned so good as his fingers brushed the most sensitive spot inside of her. Her legs began to shake on Matt's shoulders. "I- I'm gonna-" she struggled to get words out.

Matt pulled away briefly using his thumb to replace where his tongue just was, "I know, baby, go ahead. Let me see how pretty you look when you cum." His mouth went back in between her legs. That comment was enough to send Ella over the edge. Her back arched and a string of profanities left her mouth with Matt's name in there a couple of times. He kept going, helping her ride out her high, only stopping when her legs fell limp next to him. Matt put his fingers in his mouth to clean them off as Ella tried to catch her breath. "Think you can keep going for me?" He asked. She nodded eagerly and pulled him back down into a kiss. Matt reached for his wallet on the bedside table and pulled out a condom, thankful that he packed one 'just in case.' He slipped his boxers off and ripped the wrapper open with his teeth. His breath caught in his throat as he applied the condom, finally having some sort of contact to his dick that has been hard for what felt like hours.

"Goddamn, Matt, I need you," Ella whispered in awe at his size. Matt made his way in between her legs and threw one over his shoulder. He slowly connected their bodies, trying to give her a chance to adjust. His head flew back as he let out a groan. Ella gasped as he entered her and she took a few deep breaths to relax the muscles in her body. "You're good, thank you for waiting," she said, giving him the go ahead he had been dying for. He began to thrust his hips into hers and interlocked one of their hands. She whimpered at the pleasure coursing through her and squeezed his hand.

"Holy shit, baby girl, you are killing me," Matt groaned looking down where their bodies connected. "You're doing so - fuck - so good." Ella began pulsing around his cock, approaching her second orgasm of the night. This was enough to get Matt to his peak. "Cum with me, princess." The room filled with Matt's groans and Ella's cries.

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

-two weeks later-

When the lights go out, she's all I ever think about, the picture burning in my brain, kissing in the rain. I can't forget, my English love affair. Today, I'm seven thousand miles away. The movie playing in my head of a king size bed means I can't forget my English love affair.

Matt had officially become unbearable to be around. Always catching an attitude with one of his brothers, hiding out in his room, and having no energy in their content. Not only did Nick and Chris notice it right away, but the fans were noticing it too.

'Has anyone noticed Matt seems off lately?'

'Matt has been in a weird mood since they got back from tour'

Matt laid in his bed scrolling through Ella's instagram. She had even posted pictures with her friends from the night they met so he had memories to look back on of her in that dress. His door swung open and Nick and Chris made their way in. "Do you know how to fucking knock?" Matt snapped.

"Alright, dude, what the hell is up with you?" Nick asked, ignoring the fact that they were clearly not welcome in Matt's room and making himself comfy in the desk chair.

"You just barged in here without fucking knocking! Maybe I just want some goddamn privacy and quiet for five fucking seconds!" Matt's voice began to get louder as he sat upright.

"Kid, you know you have been in a shitty mood since we got home. Is this about that chick in London?" Chris pried. Matt knew he couldn't lie to the people he cared for most. Even if he did, they would see straight through it.

"There was something about her - fuck - she's literally on the other side of the world. She's probably living her normal life and I'm stuck here not able to get her out of my head," Matt sighed. Sure, the two texted throughout the day, but surely she wasn't as down bad as he was, right?

"Listen, we wanna be here for you, dude. Cope how you need to cope. But we gotta figure something out for the vlogs, the fans are noticing and so is Laura. If this girl is truly something special, we want to help you figure it out," Chris said, as he sat on the edge of the bed.

Matt nodded, "You're right, I need to get my shit together. I'm sorry."

The brothers shared a productive conversation about Matt and his feelings and the vlogs before Chris and Nick left Matt back alone with his thoughts. He laid on the bed with his hands behind his bed, remembering how perfect his lips fit with Ella's. A buzz came from his phone on the bedside table. His hand reached over and brought the screen to his face. His mood lightened instantly seeing a text from none other than 'Ell <3' The message he read made his breath catch in his throat.

Call me crazy, but I just booked a flight to LA. I need to see you

[the-virgoperspective]

The Signs As The Most Iconic Albums of The 2010’s (IMO)

Aries: DAMN by Kendrick Lamar (2017)

This album brought heat. Heat that could burn this planet straight to ashes. It’s confrontational, angry, fast-paced, and entirely innovative. There were levels upon levels upon levels to the songs that embarked you on an exhilarating auditory adventure. It’s an aries album! Specifically aries moon and ascendant (this is not a biased decision) because of how each house I feel is represented here. If you really listen to the lyrics and notice the flow of how Kendrick placed each song; there’s no question about it. It covers self identity, finance, communication, family, birth, love, death, travel, community, and the subconscious. It. Covers. Everything. There is a bold confidence here that almost seems like overcompensation for vulnerability/fear in some songs. It focuses on black on black crime, it goes back to its roots, and it’s downright funky (very aquarius in 11th vibes). It’s brash, bold, fiery, and energizing! I could go on about this album for days. It literally won 11 awards in one year! There’s just so much to it!

Songs I Recommend: BLOOD, ELEMENT, PRIDE, XXX. (FEAT. U2.), & DUCKWORTH

Taurus: Ego Death by The Internet (2015)

Sheeeeesh! This album is spectacular! There is such a romantic and smooth vibe to every single song; even the ones that aren’t particularly loving in its lyricism. The r&b/soul elements are alive and well here. The Internet brought the true feeling of that genre back with their own modern and homely twist to it. There is a lot of focus on devotion to another, strong love, physicality, situationships, the low key grind, and enjoying the finer things in life. It has a very venusian vibe but not in an airy way; more so steady and sensual. You can’t help but to move your body in whichever way feels most natural to this album. It’s rich, it’s svelte, it’s earthy, decadent, and simply smooth as butter. The taurus energy is just so strong here, esp taurus sun and venus, as there is a consistent and calming energy within this album. I heavily associate it with this sign because it also speaks to an element of hedonism, as there are clear indications of money/material belongings/love never being enough from life, but I’d consider that aspect to be an extreme.

Songs I Recommend: Gabby (feat. Janelle Monáe), Under Control, Palace/Curse (feat. Steve Lacy & Tyler, The Creator), Get Away, + Girl (feat. KAYTRANADA)

Gemini: Notion by Tash Sultana (2016)

If you have never heard of this artist or album, I implore you to give them a listen, especially if you are a lover of true musicians. This album is difficult for me to describe, mainly because it renders you speechless (which I find funny for a gemini album). It is very mercurial. Tash (this artist is genderfluid and goes by they/them pronouns) was groundbreaking with this album, with it only having a mere 6 songs, and they each hold a different tone yet carry the same message. Tash really shows how exploratory/changeable they are when it comes to various sounds and emotions throughout one song. This album is so varied, tantalizing, and profound. It’s even more mind blowing knowing they created all of these songs on their own and played every single instrument themselves. No joke. Bonus points for Tash being a gemini sun! The lyricism is also very powerful here, as they discuss topics of coming into oneself, paving new paths, and the ramifications of toxic love and habits. This album carries so much versatility and musical passion and that’s really all I can think to say. Such a fantastic introduction. Bravo.

Songs I Recommend: Jungle, Synergy, Notion, Gemini, + Big Smoke

Cancer: + by Ed Sheeran (2011)

Ohhh my. This album still has my heart under lock and key. I had to give cancer (specifically moon and asc) this album because it’s just so delicate and so extremely precious. This album feels like drinking a warm cup of tea while wrapped in a blanket and it’s drizzling outside during fall. Literally. The water/cardinal element and energy is very present here. The way Ed put each song in order to flow so perfectly and cover nearly every emotion was just beautiful. The feeling in this album is very heavy and raw, discussing deep traumas, heartbreak, grief, and addiction; yet also focuses on the sheer joy/love of life and the confidence that can be found within it. This album screams cancer. Bonus points because Ed is a cancer ascendant! He really poured himself into this one and dug very deeply into his own heart. I just feel like this one isn’t debatable or even should be explained. It’s soft, saucy, simple, solemn, and comforting. Honestly, what more can I say? It’s just a perfect cozy album especially if you need a good cry or have been bit by the love bug.

Songs I Recommend: Lego House, Grade 8, Kiss Me, Give Me Love, + Sunburn

Leo: Electra Heart by Marina & The Diamonds (2012)

This is another one of my favorites. It’s timeless, satirical, and downright genius if you ask me. It has a nuance of impulsivity and pomp that is so electrifying; paired with heavy bass and powerful pop beats. It’s leo energy! One thing I have always personally associated with leo placements is power; not only career wise but in their movements, their way of life, and the way they carry themselves. This album was and is powerful! It has carried its popularity through two generations of teen/young adult populations and it’s going absolutely nowhere. I still see memes and references to it circulating! The lyricism is what stuck the most for me (personally) as the entire album is a reflection of what society expects and at times demands from young womxn. It is also a reflection of young womxn trying to figure out who they are, to find themselves, and trying to love. It demands you to look at societies’ expectations and how damaging it can be to a person, and that brings forth (imo) a lot of emotion and self reflection.

Songs I Recommend: Teen Idle, Power & Control, Primadonna, Sex Yeah, + Radioactive

Virgo: channel ORANGE by Frank Ocean (2012)

Oof. Okay, here we go. This album carried me through a lot and I’m not gonna lie, I’m a little biased. It’s difficult to describe this album and how it makes you feel. It covers so many things, loneliness, love, desire, addiction, nepotism, etc. Frank has a criticizing lyricism in some of his songs while also being extremely articulate in the delivery (huge virgo energy). There isn’t a single word that is sung or spoke that I don’t understand. This album is quite varied in feeling and carried a lot of mutable energy to me. It is very intellectual, calm, caring, engaging, and changeable. There is an anxious feeling to it as well and it showcases vulnerability in a way that is inviting yet compelling. You can tell Frank put an incredible amount of thought and time into making this album and that speaks so much for virgo placements to me. I’d associate virgo mercury and venus more than the others but they all still apply. Such a thorough and beautifully constructed album. It’s an A+ and always a classic.

Songs I Recommend: Sweet Life, Crack Rock, Thinkin Bout You, Pink Matter (feat. André 3000), + Forrest Gump

Libra: Mylo Xyloto by Coldplay (2011)

I already know I might get shit for this but let me explain myself. This is such a libra album mainly due to its strong focus on being with someone (companionship). There are many songs that focus on being in love and in a relationship. It also focuses on the beauty and pleasure of life and love, which is very venusian. This album takes you on such a beautiful auditory journey that you really never want it to end. It hits the highs and lows, as libra is not always all about love and light, as isn’t any other sign. The band touches on impulsivity, indecision, relationships, and the strength/health of those relationships. Despite its jovial sounds, they can be discussing such deeply poetic subjects. They can really make anything sound pretty; even ones that are really meant to be sad but are still so stunning in its delivery. Coldplay absolutely did something with this one, as it brings forth such an array of emotions and daydreams. Their music (imo) is made for movies (specifically romances or romcoms).

Songs I Recommend: Hurts Like Heaven, Princess of China (feat. Rihanna), Us Against the World, Paradise, + Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall

Scorpio: AM by Arctic Monkeys (2013)

Let me start by saying that this is one of my favorite albums and I still have every song in my library, so obviously, I’m still obsessed. Which leads me to my next point, this album screams “be in love with me, obsess over me, tell me I’m yours and you’re mine” in nearly every song. The lyrics are a bit possessive, very detail oriented, and make many references to knowing something beforehand or finding something out that they already know (intuitiveness). This is scorpio through and through in my opinion. It’s dark, it’s powerful, it’s sly, and it’s captivating. Alex Turner and his leather clad band were honestly the cherry on top of their sound. They looked the part, with their smoldering gazes, gelled and curly classic hair do’s, and black and white filters in their music videos. They also blew up the alternative scene when it came to western style alternative music, so they had a very distinct sound that set them apart from everyone else. Verrrry scorpionic and yes, once again, I am still obsessed.

Songs I Recommend: Arabella, One For the Road, Do I Wanna Know?, Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re High?, + R U Mine?

Sagittarius: Tourist History by Two Door Cinema Club (2010)

Alright folks, this is another one of my favorites. This is an album that you can dance and/or lose your mind to. There are a lot of metaphors in the lyricism and TDCC did a great job of portraying their messages without revealing much; really leaving it up to you to interpret them in your own way. This album is hard to pin down (much like sagittarius) but focuses mainly on change, passion, independence, travel, taking charge, appreciating life, and appreciating the people you may encounter in your life. It has a very approachable and energizing feel to a lot of the songs and carries that jovial/jupiterian energy that is associated with sagittarius placements. This album has high energy songs and even the low energy ones still have a high to them; much like a rollercoaster. In my opinion, it’s a strong portrayal of the fluctuation of feeling and time, just with its melody and song. This one is very special to me for many reasons, but the biggest one is it just makes me so happy!

Songs I Recommend: What You Know, This Is the Life, Undercover Martyn, Cigarettes In the Theatre, + I Can Talk

Capricorn: Ctrl by SZA (2017)

What a beautiful album. This one I also had on repeat constantly and I know I’m not alone. SZA brought the subjects of internal pressure/expectations of the self and the huge importance of self-worth to the forefront here. It has a huge cardinal energy to it. This is such a coming of age album and focuses a lot on growth of the self and the heart. She really poured herself into this one. It feels very personal, like she is singing straight to you at times, and feels very down to earth as a whole. This album I associate with capricorn asc and venus more than any but I feel like it could apply to other placements as well. Bonus points since SZA is a capricorn asc herself! She used many sound bites of her mother giving her words of true wisdom throughout the album (saturn energy/wisdom from elders) that added a very familial aspect. This album got personal and was very suave and casual in its delivery. It feels like your closest homegirl made it just for you. She was so real for that.

Songs I Recommend: Doves In the Wind (feat. Kendrick Lamar), Prom, Go Gina, Anything, + 20 Something

Aquarius: 2014 Forest Hills Drive by J. Cole (2014)

Y’all, I had this album on repeat constantly in high school. This album is so well rounded and touches on some compelling wordplay; and it’s very poignant and intelligent. J. Cole touches on important topics that most rappers would find difficult or uncomfortable to speak on in their music. This album is very indicative of love/faith and the lack thereof within the self and the community. There are songs that are uplifting, nostalgic, introspective, and at times comical and sexual. There are songs that focus heavily on the rigidity of hyper-masculinity and how hard it can make someone, especially when considering their environment and upbringing. He touches on the hood lifestyle and mindset, growing up in poverty, being the odd one out, and struggling throughout life. This album is two sides of the same coin, casting light on the restriction of the mind, heart, and soul (strong saturn energy) and the beauty of healing. In conclusion, wow, this album opened me up in a way I didn’t think was possible.

Songs I Recommend: Apparently, G.O.M.D, A Tale Of 2 Citiez, No Role Modelz, + St. Tropez

Pisces: Hozier by Hozier (2014)

Where do I even start?! This album is absolutely everything and a bag of chips. It’s affectionate, it’s ethereal, it’s watery, at times lonely, and haunting. The pisces energy is so heavy in this album! It feels like you’re traveling through a forest in search of a lover from a past life; pining, crawling to the one you love. I heavily associate pisces venus with this album (esp with it being exalted in venus). Hozier’s lyricism is poetically profound and transports you to another time with nearly every song. This album has so many elements to it, paying homage to bluegrass, folk, r&b, and fables from his homeland of Ireland. He nurtures the themes of life and death, love and hate, and how they like to mingle with each other. The love he sings for is dreamy and purely devoted, with depth in its rhythm. It’s such a great album to use as an escape as well! This album is incredible and was truly a gift to us all. What an introduction, Hozier.

Songs I Recommend: Run, Cherry Wine, It Will Come Back, Work Song, + In A Week (feat. Karen Cowley)

☥ ombré divider by @cafekitsune ☥

[loverofpiggies]

Hey guys, I got something I’m ready to talk about under the cut. It’s super long! And it’s pretty serious, so feel free to scroll past. It’s also about some serious subject matter regarding transphobia, so if you’re not in a good place and ready to read about something like that, take care of yourself first and foremost. Okay?

Okay.

Hey guys, I’ve been doing a lot of self discovery these last few…. I guess technically my whole life, but I only got serious about focusing and working on it these last few years, and it has to do with my history of transphobia. I want to talk about my journey of growth, and what I’ve done to grow, and maybe it could help anyone else dealing with similar issues.

I was a pretty…. Hateful kid, to put it lightly. I was very angry, VERY angry, and obsessed over all this anger and hatred I had at everyone, but especially at myself. I’ve been in therapy as far back as I can remember, and more meds than I’d like to admit, trying to figure out what was ‘wrong’ with me. Which was a lot, by the way.

Anyway, around 2016, I got really serious about therapy. As a kid I didn’t take it seriously, but by 2016 I knew I needed help. I realized how my anger was ripping me apart, and how deeply it was rooted in hating myself. So, without therapy, and without the tools of therapy, I’d try to alter thoughts as they’d happen. I’d see someone dressed in a way I didn’t like? My thoughts immediately turned to hatred and judgementality. I taught myself to step back, and go, ‘hold on. You don’t know them. That’s a lot to assume about someone you’ve never talked to.’ and it helped curb a lot of my most angry and judgemental thoughts, at least, I thought so. In truth, all it did, was bury the issue, instead of addressing it.

Going into therapy seriously this time as an adult, I started unburying my own trauma, small bit by small bit. I started journaling a lot of it out, and my therapist put it best. Going to therapy is like trying to untangle a ball of paperclips. You might be like ‘ah, I just want to take this one paperclip out’ but it’s attached to so many other things you wouldn’t have guessed, and eventually you just. End up with the whole ball. You go to therapy for one ‘small’ thing, oops, you’re talking about this huge other thing that you never knew was related.

Also at this point, I was pretty serious about my spirituality. I was sick of being so angry and judgemental, I got deep into meditation and learning about compassion, because… well I lacked so much of it for so long. My favorite quote, that helped me grow the most, is “If your compassion does not include yourself, it is incomplete” by Jack Kornfield. Another one I adore, is, “Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.” attributed to lots of people so I’m not actually sure who the original quoter is. If you watched a lot of my early streams, I was pretty obsessed with kindness and spirituality at that point! Half the time the streams turned into talks about that, lol. Sorry if that was a bit much, I was in a ‘place’ at that time.

After realizing how angry I was, and being so exhausted from it, I swung the opposite way pretty hard. I knew what it felt like to be angry and judgemental, and hurt people because of it. I’ve seen people I was very close to in my life, destroy relationships because of anger. And I was trying so hard to make up for it, to stop being so angry. I didn’t want to hurt people anymore, I didn’t want to hurt myself, and I wanted to be kind and understanding about perspectives I spent so long cutting off. And the therapy helped, a lot! I worked on a lot of deep issues, and my mind, more and more, started being less angry. I also got on meds, because we *finally* figured out what my issue was, and got me on the right medication. At least, once I got over my ‘I don’t need medication’ phase. Which was an absolute blessing.

I thought to myself, ah ha! Look at me, look at all this progress! I’m not angry or judgemental anymore. I’ve opened up so many doors, learned so many new things, I’m okay now, I don’t need any further help.’ With all the progress I had made, I really believed I didn’t need anymore work. The growth I made in just a couple years was astounding, and I wasn’t where I needed to be, but by this point I had the tools I needed to work on things myself. This was what I told myself anyway.

Also around this time, I was making my first close trans friends. And there was this weird, nasty feeling in my head, that I thought I had gotten past. These angry, judgemental thoughts cropped back up again, and they shocked me. I thought I was past this sort of anger, this judgementality. I didn’t want to look at it. I didn’t want to acknowledge it, or look deeper. I didn’t want to think that I could be so mean again, especially after all the work and growth I put in. So, I shoved it away, as hard as I could. I didn’t want to see it, and I didn’t want to think about it.

The problem with trying to shove angry, and judgemental, hateful thoughts away, is they don’t actually go away. They stay, and force themselves out in other ways. They come back as ‘jokes’ or ignorant angry comments. They come out subconsciously, as a defensive reaction. But… I didn’t want to acknowledge that I might be transphobic, or have transphobic thoughts. I didn’t want to be angry. So when I’d ‘joke’, or make a comment, I’d feel ashamed, and try to bury it deeper. And deeper. And it just made it worse. I also used my therapy as a defense mechanism too, without realizing it. “I’m fine now, I’ve gone to therapy, I don’t need any more work, I’m fine!” So. I buried it. I think there’s a pattern here.

After years of therapy, you’d think I’d realize what was going on. I was trying to bury this, the way I tried to bury all my anger for so many years. I knew from experience, that burying the issue does not work, and just makes it so much worse in the long run. But, I didn’t actually realize I was burying it. I was so deep in my own denial, that I couldn’t see it. Because there was a lot of deep shame there, too. I had so many amazing trans friends, and the experiences they had dealt with by this time, JUST for being trans, horrified me. I never, *ever* wanted to be a source of pain for them. But I’d still make comments, or ‘jokes’. Then, I’d feel horrible, crushing guilt, and try to force that bad side of me down even further.

By this point, a good majority of my friend group was either trans, or non binary. I loved them so much, and didn’t want to acknowledge my issues, or the fact that I had thoughts that could hurt them. Eventually, one of my trans friends approached me, and my god, I’m so lucky to have them in my life. But they approached me, telling me “I know you don’t mean to hurt anyone. I think… maybe it’s time to talk to your therapist about this.”

And… they were right. I spent so much time in denial, once they said this to me, it clicked. Yes, I do need to talk to someone. I can’t live like this anymore. If compassion is as important to me as I’ve always said, I need to work on any parts of me that still hold anger. But I was also so terrified, after spending so long trying to avoid it, now I was going to open up to someone? And say whatever my thoughts were out loud? What if I couldn’t be fixed? What if I was destined to be hateful and angry forever, no matter how hard I worked? I didn’t want to hear my own thoughts. I didn’t want to see this awful side of me, after spending so long trying to ‘defeat it’. I didn’t even know how dark it got, and my mind conjured all sorts of nasty ideas of how ‘bad’ of a person I was.

So. I walked into my therapist’s office, and said… out loud. “I think I’m transphobic. And I hate it.” I’ll leave a lot of details out, because it’s pretty personal, but I’ll go over the important things I discovered. After she let me speak for a bit, we turned to my gender identity. She asked me things in detail. I’m a cis woman, so I didn’t think I had any issues with my gender identity, so her questions confused me, but deeper than that, they scared me. There was still something inside of me that wanted to fight back, to protect me from whatever was coming. But I pushed forward.

As we pulled apart the paperclips, and started getting to the root of my true, deeper issue, I started to realize something. See, I’m pretty confident and comfortable in my skin. At least, I believed I was. I told myself, anyway. In a similar vein as I used ‘compassion’ to shove away parts of myself I hated, I used ‘confidence’ to shove away the insecure parts of myself as well. Which, I mean, couldn’t be a more false version of confidence OR compassion if you ask me.

I started to realize that I had a deep insecurity about my own femininity. A deep, crippling insecurity. See, my face and body are pretty androgynous. With long hair, I can look like a girl, but with short hair I can look pretty boyish. I don’t have much of a figure, or a chest, so I can be mistaken for a boy under lots of circumstances. That, combined with the fact that tight clothes are uncomfortable for me, meant overall I looked very unfeminine. And I was bullied a lot for it, growing up. Kids would call me a boy. In highschool, I was made fun of a lot, too. I’d be made fun of for not looking like a ‘girl’. This was only one factor of my bullying at the time, like I mentioned before. I had a lot of pretty severe behavior issues, so it sorta made me a prime target for bullying. I wanted to be viewed as a girl, as a woman. But because my looks didn’t fit enough into their ‘boxes’, I was made fun of. I was laughed at, and I can’t tell you how often people would say things like ‘are you SURE you’re a girl down there?’.

And this was the smoking gun. I finally had the realization I needed. This is hard to write, but. Because I didn’t fit in the mold of what my peers thought a woman was, I felt guilt, and I felt shame. And I shoved it away. And realized… subconsciously, I was doing what was done to me, to my trans friends. To the trans community. And it hurt. It hurt so much, to realize what I was doing. But now it also made so much sense. The guilt, the trying to ‘play it off’, the avoidance, the burying. It was so painful to grow up with those comments, that my mind was trying to shove away and hide me from realizing I was continuing the cycle of pain.

Not only that, but in therapy I learned something else. I’m still working through this, but. I realized as well I have dysphoria, and some mild dysmorphia. The fact that I was perceived so differently then I felt about myself in my adolescence, followed me deeply into adulthood.

I realized that when I would have friends talk about dysmorphia, my defense mechanism would kick in, to avoid me thinking that I might have the same issue. In fact, all my defense mechanisms would kick in, to avoid me from reliving the bullying and the trauma.

And anyone who knows anything about therapy, knows how much this shit hurts. It hurts SO much to open up wounds you’ve tried to hide, to look in and see where the real issue lies. To realize that maybe you haven’t been as kind as you wanted, even if it wasn’t intentional.

But… after the tears, and the pain of reliving this, and ripping open all the doors I was trying to close, to shove away… there was relief. I finally knew what was wrong. And that I knew where to start working. How to start helping myself grow, and be better.

So many things clicked, and my issues with transphobia evaporated. Finally facing it, finally confronting it, and realizing the deeper sides of myself, took away all that power my anger was holding onto. I had to reteach myself that, ‘hey, thanks for trying to protect me, but I’m okay now. You don’t have to protect me anymore.’

I’m still working on my issues with my femininity. After realizing this, I went through my closet and got rid of everything that made me feel ‘unpretty’. I went thrift shopping, and found looser clothes that still made me feel like a girl. I’m slowly growing my hair out, to see if I’m happier with long hair, or happier with short. In truth, I’m rediscovering myself again. It’s easier to look in the mirror.

The defensive reactions went away. The ‘jokes’ disappeared, and I didn’t have to fight to bury anything anymore. And I could be the supportive friend I always deeply wanted to be. To push back at a society that doesn’t like people ever sitting outside specific ‘molds’. To help make a world be safer for anyone who doesn’t align with the mainstream idea of what being a person is. To what being a man, or a woman is. To being whatever a human is.

This has been very long. But. I wanted to go through the entire experience, every step, to show how I worked on myself. And how I grew, from this darker, angrier, unhappy version of myself. And that maybe it could help anyone else who’s had the same experience. I also wanted to go through all of this, to show the steps I’ve made. And to my trans and nonbinary friends? To all the people in the trans community that I may have hurt in the past? I’m sorry. Genuinely, and truly. I never wanted to be another source of pain, especially to trans people, who already experience so much discrimination.

This was a painful experience to go through, but one I definitely needed. I’m still journaling, working on my issues and working on becoming a happier me. I had to take my time to discover myself, and wanted to open up about my journey to yall. I was finally ready to talk about this.

Anyway. I hope you have a beautiful day, and I hope every day is happier than the last. Cheers yall.

[watermelonsugacry]

Oooo what about bandmember and The Weeknd Grammy performance to save your tears and Harry’s there. I need a harry and Abel meeting. ilysm girl

ok so YN and Abel first met in late 2016.

She was in a recording studio in LA after finishing up a session with another artist. On her way out, she saw fellow producer Ali Payami. Besides formally being in the most famous band to date, YN was getting more and more recognized for her producing skills.

So after extending a hand out to help the producer in need, she's then introduced to Abel. They vaguely knew each other from commercial success but they actually spent a good hour or so just talking and getting to know one another—she's a firm believer in getting to know the artist behind the music before working with them.

Conversation came easy and a friendship was effortlessly formed as they bonded over their love for music, producing, and knowing how to speak in different languages.

Not long after, she's shown the song he had been working on before he got stuck. And she goes back to her roots: harmonies.

With a suggestion and demonstration of harmonizing with his vocals in his verse:

When I get you moaning you know it's real Can you feel the pressure between your hips? I'll make it feel like the first time

she finds herself in the recording booth laying down vocals for her own verse and chorus for the song.

The two had so much fun making music together that over the next few years, they made three more songs together: Off The Table, Save Your Tears, and You Right.

Harry has only seen Abel a small hand full of times in person. The first time the two met was during the recording of Off The Table back in 2019.

Harry had just taken his keys out of the front door of YN's home to find the open space absent of her presence. He did get there an hour earlier than he initially told her for a nice surprise after she's had a long day in the studio working on her album.

He walks all around her house in search of her and doesn't spot her in her usual spots: living room, at home gym, her bedroom. Suspecting she still must be working, he takes the small walk to her connected guest house she converted into a home studio.

A fond smile tugs itself on his lips at the sound of her laughing but a crease quickly forms in between his eyebrows at the sound of another man's laugh. He knocks on the glass door before entering to find YN in front of the large studio panel with The Weeknd sitting on his own swivel chair beside her.

YN doesn't invite just anyone to her home studio. Aside from Harry and Lizzo, no other artist has recorded in her sacred space.

"Hey b-Harry," YN smiles at her secret boyfriend, pleasantly surprised to have him home earlier than expected.

"Oh shit," Abel laughs in disbelief with a fist in front of his smile. "You're Harry Styles."

"What the 'ell, you didn't seem that excited when yeh first met me," She playfully scoffs.

"You weren't as cool then," Abel teases, making her laugh and Harry's chest burn. Putting on his media-trained persona, Harry takes the artist's outreached hand in a firm handshake, "I'm Abel. Nice you, man."

"M'Harry," He smiles a closed-lipped smile and YN bites one back as she immediately sees through her love's front. "Sorry, am I interrupting something?" Harry asks, the skin on his arms beginning to tingle from not having her in them yet.

"Not at a—"

"Actually," She interrupts Abel and looks to Harry with an amused smile. "We were in the middle of something. If yeh don't mind waiting another half hour or so, we should be wrapping up soon," She advises, making it seem like Harry was there for a recording session rather than anything else.

It really takes everything in her to stifle her giggle at the sight of her boyfriend trying his hardest to keep his front up, knowing full well how much he wants her to be in his arms, pressing her lips to his so lovingly, and having a cuddle.

"Not at all," Harry nods when every fiber of his being is telling him to throw her over his shoulder and ditch the other artist who's taking up her time instead of being with him. "But do you mind if I talk with yeh for a quick sec?" He nods his head over to the other room.

He grows even more frustrated when she hums in contemplation before scrunching up her nose, "Can it wait? M'working."

Harry takes a glance at Abel who's sitting there completely oblivious, clearly not fighting against spending time in the studio with his close friend.

"Of course," He reassures with a smile that YN can quickly tell is forced. "Nice meeting you, Abel."

"Same here, man."

And with that, he's softly closing the glass door behind him when he really just wants to slam it shut.

He waits an hour and a half before Abel finally leaves. Once she comes back into her home after walking him out, she's quickly pressed up against her door by her boyfriend pressing his mouth feverishly to hers.

"Why are yeh laughing?" He asks against her mouth. "There's nothing funny."

"You," She holds onto his cheeks, pulling him back so she can finally get a breath in, "You're cute."

He's quickly attaching his mouth to her neck, pressing open-mouthed kisses at the spot her neck and shoulder meet and she hums happily. He makes his way back up her neck, her jawline, and back to her mouth.

"Missed you," He says, his hand already crawling and dipping into the front of her shorts to where she craves him. She gasps against his mouth, titling her back to thump against the door but since he towers over her, he keeps his lips ghosting over hers.

"I missed you," She pants as he keeps his body pressed against hers. She whimpers when she feels his fingers dip and curl up into her.

"You missed me?" He taunts, his hand only picking up speed. His dimples dig into his cheeks when she nods meekly, her hand quickly gripping onto his wrist. It's moments like these where he basks in the way that behind closed doors, he can make this headstrong, stubborn girl turn into putty in his hands. He even contemplates edging her, leaving her high and dry, and having her wait the same amount of time she did to him.

But the satisfaction of having her writing against him, panting and moaning his name, knowing exactly how to make her feel good, and knowing that he's the only one that can make her feel like this is just too perfect.

"Then show me," He bites at her bottom lip, his own eyebrows furrowing with passion as he watches her tip over the edge.

So needless to say, whenever she and Abel get together—whether it be through making music, meeting up through awards shows, or going to see one another at their shows—Harry gets undoubtedly possessive and jealous. He knows that bottom line, the two are good friends and that she's allowed to be close with people other than him, but he can't help it. Especially now that there's no more hiding and sneaking around since their relationship went unexpectedly public on New Years 2020.

And even after her six-year friendship with the other artist, he still can't shake off the uncomfortable twist in his stomach at the sight of them on stage. Especially her surprise Save Your Tears duet performance at the 2021 iHeart Music Awards.

There's no denying that she looks absolutely gorgeous when she comes out on stage in her plum-colored satin outfit, posing with a jut of her hip and singing so effortlessly as the crowd screams out in a mix of excitement and disbelief. The stage is truly her happy place and it shows as she performs; like everyone else watching, he's excaptivated by her.

So much so, that he almost misses the way that when she sings:

And you deserve someone better

Abel points to her and then himself.

So can he be blamed when he stays extra quiet when he meets her back in her dressing room?

"And it was just so cool to hear the crowd scream like that," YN giggles as she removes her necklaces to place on the vanity.

"You deserve it, lovie. It shouldn't come as a surprise at this point," He looks at her so fondly from his seat on the leather couch.

"I honestly wasn't expectin' that type of reaction but it was..." She takes a second glance through the mirror at her love. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how supportive Harry is to his girlfriend, being with her any way he can and exuding a love for her that is truly unmatched.

But it does take his best friend of 11 years to see that something is up.

She walks the short distance over to him and cups his jaw in her hands and has his gaze meet hers, "Hey."

"Hi," He muses.

"I love you, yeah? Not Abel, not some other musician, not anybody else. You."

Harry huffs out a laugh through his nose, slightly shaking his head in disbelief at how well she knows him. He gently takes a hold of her forearms and leans up to rub his nose against hers, "I love you."

And when he closes the gap between them to capture her lips with his, how can he even entertain the thought of her having eyes for anybody else?

SINCE 2010 masterlist

Taglist:

@wobblymug @be-with-me-so-happily @ashtongivesmebutterflies @kiwiskiwiskiwi @darlingdesire @obsesseddd @hopefulwastelandcreation @cacapeepee @breezie-b00 @harrysfolklore @theekyliepage @sunshinemoonsposts @nervousspiderling @tbslonelyhes @tenaciousperfectionunknown @harrystylesrecs @certified-nalayak @itsjustsel @iknowyouthinkimbulletproof @gviosca @behindmygreyeyes @twobluejeans @allisonxmcu @theemeraldbutterfly @jean-love @marvellover-sam @b-reads-things @reveriehs @rach2602 @thurhomish @perrypughstyles @luvonstyles @mxltifxnd0m @teamspideyman @c00chiemonster @juiceboxrry @s8tellite @folklorehrry @illicithallways @claramllera @eunoiaax @hoya122 @nichmedder @sleutherclaw @gloriousmoneyrascalbiscuit @harianaswhore @teawithcyb0rgs @vrittivsanghavi @vc55bughead @futuristiccroissantlampsludge @onecrazydirectioner @valluvsu @itsgabbysblog @awkwardbisexuall @rosehel @sucker4angstt @isalove @diorchives @mrshiddlestyles02

[autismprotocol]

Hey, sorry if this is long, but I really like what you guys are doing and have nowhere else to put my theories, so...

Firstly, sorry to be that person, but I actually think you mislabeled the entities for two episodes. Needles reads like an avatar of the slaughter to me. It's like Lietner said, the physical description is less important then the emotional or metaphorical. Needles' thing isn't "look at this scary trick I can do with my flesh body." It's "I am going to cause you intense pain at random by stabbing you with my needles. Please be scared of me :)"

I was also surprised you didn't mark Putting Down Roots as a filth statement. Illness, rotting alive, swarming flies, a deeply unhealthy romantic love. All reads as corruption to me.

Now let's get to my fun crack theory. Episode 7 almost reads to me like the point the powers breached into the new world. Think about it, hilltop road was suddenly overwhelmed by a wave of artifacts and "people" (avatars) that map to many different powers (I counted stranger, slaughter, dark, filth, and possibly hunt among the artifacts present). The timeliness doesn't quite match up (we have a statement from the 1800s), but maybe the powers are capable of having retroactively always existed. Or maybe the fan theory that the entities are now the "hungers" that feed on obsession was true until the fears intruded into the world.

Omg thank you so much for the ask I absolutely love over analyzing this goofy lil podcast and i really wanted to have this board be a collaborative and community thing for all of us TMAG/TMAGP fans out there!

starting with the board corrections you pointed out you are absolutely right after reading this I ended up rereading the wiki entries about the Entities because its been a hot second since I've read up on those goobers and I've kinda forgotten how many little nuances that each one has. I had no idea how we missed the clear corruption tie-ins that were occurring in Samuel Webbers journal (Putting Down Roots) especially when you brought up his toxic relationship to his partner.

As with Needles before doing my reread about the fears I just assumed flesh because body modified with needles. but looking into it, sudden piercing needles more cleanly falls into slaughter.

I actually have this ongoing theory originated by my roommate and other blog contributor that the fears might have been scrambled when crossing dimensions. maybe because of this many minor powers have begun to branch out from the main 15 and with that hybrid avatars and entities have been created. With needles I think maybe they fall under the umbrella of slaughter and spiral because of the way they mentally toy with their victims. also could explain why needles has to convince the man on the phone that they're scary because this hybrid power may be new and people have not gotten fearful of it yet.

I'll be making those changes for next weeks board so thank you for pointing them out :D

on to your theory that would make sense especially since this episode (EP 7) is kind of serving as the catalyst for the story to shift into high gear. I think that if the Hilltop charity shop was the entrance point for all of the fears to enter the world it would make complete sense. Hilltop is the one place in the Magnus canon that people have reported traveling to different dimensions. also the date of the incident falls right about the time that Archives started early 2016 so the fears may have also gone back in time to when Jon became the Archivist in TMAs universe (since Jons death is the catalyst that forced them to jump dimensions.) I'm really liking where your theory is heading

also real quick if anyone has more info about the theory that Protocols world lived off of hunger and desire pre the fears appearing I'd love to hear more about that because I've never heard of the until now.

Again thank you so much for the ask I'm so happy you're liking what we're doing here and I hope you continue to share your thoughts and theories with this blog.

-Echo

[bobbie-robron]

Robron Fanfiction Recommendations (Aug-2024)

The below were recommended on Twitter during August 2024.

Front Page News (2017) 29.6K words, lullabelle_moon

Reporter AU. It’s the 1930s and Robert, a small time reporter, wants to break into crime reporting which means trying to get an interview with the infamous Zak Dingle. That path leads him to Aaron who is being used as a scapegoat for a diamond shop robbery with the owner having been shot supposedly by Aaron. During the span of six weeks before Aaron goes on trial, not only is Robert trying to gain support for Aaron through news articles but his attention loses focus from that Zak interview to slowly realizing his heart totally beats for Aaron. Can Robert save Aaron from the noose?

Reunion (2018) 7.5K words, livesybaby

Reunion 2.0 alternative. If you take the events before Valentine’s Day to the day of their reunion and jiggle them around a bit with a callback of Liv’s involvement in getting the idiots back together in 2016, you get this new lovely take involving Operation: Get the pillock back home. Doc pointless being dull as ever makes it all the better 😜.

Reclaim Me! Make Me Yours Again! (2017) 27.3K words, DingleLovesSugdenAlways

Alternative early hell year. In this version, Aaron is still being beaten and taking spice but with more horrors. When a beaten Aaron is hospitalized, Robert has the lawyer work his magic to get Aaron out of prison right away but on tag. What follows is an organic journey of Aaron trying to cope with what he went through in prison both physically and mentally with Robert there every step of the way. There is NO Hippy Henrietta in sight… it’s solely about their journey together!

The Future Starts Slow (2016) 6.4K words, dirtylittlegreasemonkey

It’s Vic’s 22nd birthday and she wants to spend it bowling which Robert hasn’t an interest in. So that leaves her, Adam… and Aaron. Aaron’s going? That changes Robert’s mind right away. Even though he and Aaron are only mates now, he misses him. Well, with having a sister that is rooting from them, a little nudging is needed with the two but will it be enough to push them in the right direction especially when they get stuck on a road?…

A Cold Night in November (2016) 18.1K words, robron_til_the_end

When Liv doesn’t come home as expected, Aaron is ready to call the police until Robert goes out to find her. When Robert does find Liv at the cricket pavilion, she drops the bombshell that she’s pregnant. And from there the story unfolds about the lads accepting her decision about the baby, who the baby’s dad is (and isn’t) and how the situation brings up a traumatic time in Robert’s missing years. It’s all about the little family banding together and growing stronger.

Life As We Knew It (2019) 9.8K words, some_mad_lunge

Enemies to Friends AU. Aaron had been a very close friend of Connor’s for years and then to his husband, Isaac. They even tried to matchmake Aaron (with Robert) but it went wrong big time. Now the couple have died unexpectedly and it’s godparents Aaron and Robert who wind up with custody of their son, Arthur. The dislike is still there but they both are determined to put it aside for the sake of Arthur. Will living together also give them the chance to see each other in a new light to be more just parents to Arthur?

Royal Expectations (2015) 23.4K words, shineistan

Royalty AU. To celebrate Diane’s 60th birthday, the royals throw a birthday party (but for King Jack, it’s also to search for a bride for Robert who has no desire to wed and doesn’t believe in love either). During the party, Robert spots Adam (his sister’s fiancé’s betrothed) with Aaron, and is intrigued right away. What follows are the up and downs or Robert and Aaron with a large dose of Jack using blackmail to get his way (and Aaron away from Robert in the process). Rest assured, Jack gets what’s coming to him in the end…

Be My Forever (2016) 7.0K words, thesalmondean

When Aaron returns from a meeting in Hotten Adam forgot to cancel, he comes across blood at the scrapyard where Robert had been scrapping a car (yes, manual labor shocking). Having left his mobile behind, he learns Robert is at hospital but when he gets there, he is erroneously informed Robert died! Harming himself believing he’s lost Robert, Aaron is shaken when Robert turns up alive and well. Back home at the pub, they talk and reconnect. “But I can promise you I’ll never leave you willingly.” - how true that line became in the end 😢.

[pinehutch]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Spread the self-love ❤

Thank you for tagging me!

I should be honest: I am not much of a fic writer. This isn't self-effacing; I've been reading fic since the early aughts but only have 10 works on ao3. One of them is a poem. One of them is a few hundred words of something I've never finished.

That said, fic is important to me for a lot of reasons, but one is that in 2016 I started following a tumblr for a Dragon Age fic exchange, and in 2017 I wrote the first fiction I'd written in almost 20 years. I had been struggling to write poetry for about 10 years before that, too, and fic writing was part of my path back to writing at all.

This isn't to say that I think fanfic is valueless unless it results in 'original' writing; every story happens in context, and we all know how the lines between fanwork and original work blur, both in fan spaces and in commercial ones. But my particular, personal fondness for fic is because it gave me a path back to the first best thing of my life, which was language, and what we do with it.

With that said, my personal top five (links in titles):

Fundamental Forces (or, Root Causes)

Literally my first fic. This was when I remembered that writing can be fun. It's Dragon Age fic, femHawke/Varric. It's also written with a focus on Hawke's POV, a thing I think I pulled off quite well and have never attempted again. It's very silly. It features a 40-year-old and a 35-year-old being profoundly bad at emotional honesty. I riff on turnips for a while. It has a happy ending, which should surprise no one.

She breathed in through her nose and her eyes fluttered shut. “Kiss me, you idiot. Before they think I’m horrified.” Their first kiss. Quick and mostly chaste and part of a joke. She thought it was fitting.

Chapter Last

This is also T-rated Hawke/Varric, written for the same exchange, a year later. It's about near-misses, and trying again, and not being able to pick up where you left off, and it's stumbling back onto the path later, unexpectedly, and after having found another way. It is about stories, and why we do them.

It's fic of the games, of course, but in a way it's also fic-of-fic: there's a novella that's both a tie-in novel and a diegetic book in the Dragon Age setting, and it was printed irl the summer before I wrote this fic.

What I'm proud of, with this story, is character voice. Whenever I share any Varric-voice writing, even years later, people always say very generous things. Varric's also a writer, canonically, and I had fun mimicking 'his' style in passages of this, and trying to keep in mind how his writing and his inner narration would align and diverge. (Lots of Dragon Age fans are understandably thirsty about Varric; I think I've always found him relatable, in many ways, and it didn't occur to me to thirst. But I love him.)

I don't love the structure; I chaptered this, and way more than I needed to. I'd love to rewrite it, someday, but I also think it's good for me to sit with the awareness of its imperfections and the knowledge that people have loved it anyway.

Afterimage (there are two colours)

The Magnus Archives fic, E-rated. Basira/Daisy. This was meant to be a single installment in a series - I think I have a 20,000 word 'outline' in my gdocs, still, but I'm unlikely to ever finish it. The point of this story is self-indulgent, purple-prose, dreamy smut. Wanting the thing and having it, but not keeping it.

This was baby's first E-rated fic ever written. I have no explanation for this, either.

Transformative Work

Written for the 2022 OFMD Big Bang with @mia-ugly. Mostly Frenchie/Jim, a bit Jim/Oluwande, a bit Frenchie/Oluwande, a light sprinkling of polycule potential.

Transformative Work is my favourite thing I've posted to ao3 for three reasons.

It's 40k! I never finish longer works, so 40k is a big deal to me.

I think it's actually brilliant. Clever as hell, at minimum. But mostly brilliant.

It's collaborative!

Writing has always been a solitary thing for me; one of the things I love about Mia is how we can get on a wavelength about a story. (This is mostly a them trick: they're an excellent collaborator and instigator, in general.) I wasn't at my best when we were writing this, dealing with undiagnosed health issues and workplace burnout and an accumulation of grief, but it was beautiful and joyful work, in the end.

Also, I think it is almost exactly what we wanted it to be, and that is such a high.

Number 5 is a bit of a cop-out but still:

Remember when I said "we all know how the lines between fanwork and original work blur"? This is a poem I started writing when Succession 4.3, "Connor's Wedding" aired. I was in a worst spot than I had been the previous year, health-wise, grief-wise.

The title of this poem, "My Father's Dead and I Feel Old," comes out of Connor Roy's mouth in the episode. I had to pause the episode and just get pummeled by that perfect, simple line of iambs. I was a wreck, just generally. Yeah, man, my father is dead and I do feel old! That sort of thing. (The aforementioned health issue? Still not identified or addressed when this aired in spring 2023, btw. My brain was not braining well.)

But there were words for it. I was off work on medical leave at the time. I had just made the transition from crying like it was a full-time job to sleeping like it was a full-time job. The sleep wasn't helping. The crying hadn't helped, either. It wasn't something people could help. But words, and what we do with them - that helped.

Anyway, I'm actually quite proud of this poem, both as an original piece of poetry and as fanwork. It's not on ao3 for reasons including 'I haven't gotten around to it' and 'I don't know if this is sufficiently transformative, by the invisible guidelines I've just set for myself.'

Thank you for sending this to me, it was a lovely thing to think about on my Friday eve! <3