#and one of the videos state that one of the reasons why butch is hated is because he takes credit for all of the work that his crews create

[kirain]

Hazbin Hotel and VivziePop Drama

I've been hearing/seeing a lot of drama concerning Hazbin Hotel and it's creator VivziePop, and while I don't know her personally or really care what people think, I do hate slander and the spread of misinformation. Truly nothing in this world upsets me more than when people believe rumours while making no effort to fact check, and that's exactly what's happening right now. That said, I wanted to try and clear up some of the rumours going around about Vivzie and the show, because I think some of them are absolutely outrageous and need to be addressed.

1. Vivzie hired an abuser onto the show.

Now, I’m not here to burn anyone at the stake, especially since I don’t know anything about Chris Niosi (the alleged abuser), who I believe openly admitted to the allegations? Regardless, this is a moot point. He’s not credited anywhere at the end of the episode. So either he was booted before production wrapped up or he had nothing to do with the show in the first place.

2. Vivzie supports bestiality.

Admittedly I thought this one might be true, since she draws so many anthropomorphic animals. In the very least, I figured she was probably a furry, but I haven't seen any evidence supporting this accusation either. Near as I can tell, this rumour started for two reasons. One, because of her famous Zoophobia comic, which revolves around a therapist named Cameron who gets assigned to work with human-like animals. Ironically, poor Cameron suffers from crippling zoophobia, which makes for some pretty decent comedy. I didn't read the whole comic because, quite frankly, it’s not my cup of tea and I just don’t have the time. But from what I saw there are no examples of bestiality anywhere in its contents.

Two, this message, which blew up all over social media:

To me, this just proves that people are more interested in virtue signalling than checking to see if their claims are actually true. Everything about this message is 100% false, which I’ll touch on in my next point.

3. Vivzie is a pedophile and she’s drawn child porn.

This is hands down the worst allegation and holy shit, I really wish people would stop using it to defame someone when they don't have any proof. This is a life-ruining accusation and you're disgusting if you believe it based solely on hearsay. This rumour began to spread when Vivzie allegedly shipped the two underage characters in the above photo and drew them NSFW-style. At the time, one character was 19 while the other was 14, and the relationship was a very illegal student-teacher relationship.

This is WRONG! The characters were not 14 and 19, they were actually 18 and 19, the legal age of consent! Additionally, the relationship wasn't student-teacher. One character is a student and the other is Alumni (a student teacher). This one pisses me off the most because it’s obvious the person who sent that message didn’t even bother to conduct any research. They said, “He’s a teacher, she’s a child.” Both characters are MALE!

Since then, Vivzie has apologised for any NSFW art she drew in the past and stated that it's not a reflection of her art today, and I'm inclined to believe her. Almost every artist has drawn NSFW content at some point in their career, and hers wasn't even distasteful. Other than this one example, there is no evidence anywhere that suggests she’s drawn “child porn”. In fact, she’s never even drawn explicit NSFW.

Please stop spreading this rumour. It’s dangerous and completely incorrect.

4. Vivzie said the "N" word!

No, she didn’t. It was a fabricated tweet. That is all.

5. Vivzie is copyright striking every video that criticises her!

No she isn't. YouTube’s DMCA is automatically striking people who are using full clips without permission. Vivzie has gone public several times, telling people exactly how to avoid getting a copy strike from the algorithm, which is something she absolutely does not have to do. At this point, she doesn't owe you anything. In my opinion, she should just sit back and watch these channels burn.

6. Vivzie copies and traces other artists’ work.

This is another one I’ve seen going around, but I looked into it as thoroughly as I could and failed to find any concrete evidence to support the allegations. As of right now, there are only two examples of Vivzie “copying” or “tracing” other artists’ work, and both of them can be explained. The first is a gif she made with a character from her Zoophobia comic, which looked a lot like the girl from ME!ME!ME!:

Damn, that’s pretty incriminating. She obviously stole-- oh, wait. This gif was part of a ME!ME!ME! MEP (multi editor’s project) and Vivzie didn’t take full credit, despite the fact that it’s not even a direct trace. It’s supposed to look like the original, which she fully cited. The second example comes from a short dance sequence from her Timber video, which seems to have been inspired by several Disney movies. As Vivzie herself stated, that was an homage to the original animations. Lots of artists and shows do this, including the beloved Stephen Universe series.

Regardless, this doesn’t count as stealing character designs or plagiarising someone’s work. It’s meant to be respectful, an admiration of other projects. Other than these two instances, however, there is no evidence of her tracing or stealing other people’s art. From what I’ve discovered, all other designs she’s been accused of “stealing” are characters she bought and paid for. They’re quite literally HER characters.

7. Vivzie supports problematic creators.

I’m getting really tired of guilt by association. Vivzie follows and enjoys some controversial figures, but who cares? We can argue all day about whether or not the accusations against them are true, but it ultimately has nothing to do with the show or Vivzie as a person. I do the exact same thing, to be honest-- follow and listen to people on all sides so I can learn, understand, and form my own opinions. The fact that some people think this is bad, to me, is absolutely mesmerising. Vivzie doesn’t control what the people she follows post, and if they do something overly questionable she publicly criticises and denounces it.

From Vivzie:

Now that that’s been dealt with, I’d like to address some complaints/claims about the actual show.

8. Vaggie is an angry Latina stereotype and a lesbian stereotype. Vivzie is appropriating Hispanic culture and misrepresenting the gay for profit.

First off, I see a lot of people passing around yet more misinformation regarding Vivzie's race. So many people seem to think she's white? Well, I'm here to tell you they're wrong. Very incorrect. Vivzie is in fact Latina, and Vaggie is meant to mirror some of her own personality traits.

Second, who is Vaggie mad at? Context matters, and if we take a look at the episode, we see that Vaggie is literally only mad at two specific people: Angel Dust and Alastor. Why? Well, for starters, it's her girlfriend's dream to run a rehab hotel for sinners, and Angel Dust nearly demolishes that dream single-handedly. Vaggie has every right to be over-the-top vitriolic. Then there's Alastor, a known sadist, narcissist, and murderer who loves trapping people in his nefarious schemes. He invites himself in, effectively takes over the hotel, and pushes both her and Charlie aside. At one point he even sexually assaults her by slapping her butt during his musical number. So yeah, I think her seething ire is totally justified. Keep in mind, however, that when she's around Charlie she's calm, collected, and happy. I wouldn't call that a stereotype.

Thirdly, the lesbian stereotypes. I keep hearing this argument but I really don't see it. Both Vaggie and Charlie have so much personality and trust for each other. Maybe I'm wrong, but the stereotype I know always totes a more butch, tomboyish woman with a ditsy, innocent, naive woman. Charlie is optimistic, but she isn't stupid. She refuses to shake Alastor’s hand because she knows he’s likely trying to screw her over. She’s also not entirely innocent herself and uses words like “fuck” and “shit”. I also wouldn’t call Vaggie butch or tomboyish. She has a cute, girly presentation, complete with a pink ribbon in her hair, lace stockings, and a dress. She's protective of her girlfriend, as I think we all are with our partners, and there's nothing wrong with that. They're flawed characters, as every character is meant to be. This isn't a problem.

9. The show is racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, blah, blah, blah.

I’m amazed this is even an argument. The show is supposed to be a dark comedy that takes place in HELL. You know, the place the worst of the worst end up after they die? What were you expecting? Everyone gets a shot or two fired at them, but that doesn't make them bad characters nor does it make the show itself horrible. Take, for example, Katie Killjoy, the news reporter so many people are up in arms about. She says she doesn’t “touch the gays” because she has “standards”. Well, here’s a newsflash of my own: we’re not supposed to like her! She’s an antagonist. Not to mention ten seconds later Charlie insults her and isn’t the least bit slighted by her pretentious attitude. The characters are strong and don’t take shit from anyone, because to some degree they’re all terrible people who can throw down when it’s called for.

Obviously if you don’t like the show or think it’s offensive, I’m probably not going to change your mind. That’s perfectly fine. You’re entitled to your opinions and you don’t have to watch the show. Just stop lying and stop trying to take it away from everybody else. Stop attacking Vivzie and spreading misinformation without checking the facts. I realise a lot of people probably aren’t trying to be vindictive and only want to do something good, but just remember this: the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

[crunadh]

Fic Writer Review

Thank you so much for the tag @do-androids-dream-ao3acc!

1. How many fics on AO3?

3 works - I'm only getting started :)

2. Total AO3 wordcount?

48.349

3. How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

Published? Only for The Witcher (Video Game). There might have been a few unpublished ones for Lord of the Rings and Dragonball Z in my youth, though.

4. Top Five By Kudos?

I can only give you the top three for obvious reasons, but here we go:

3. Dark Metinna with 52 kudos (and I'm crying a little over it being last in place, because I consider it the best thing I've written so far)

2. Mellow My Mind with 57 kudos

1. A Cat's Love Language with 93 kudos.

5. Do you respond to comments, why/why not?

I always respond to comments! That is mainly because of my own experience as a reader/commenter: when I write a nice and elaborate comment (or even just a nice sentence) and the author doesn't even give me a peep in response, I feel discouraged and unappreciated. To me it feels like screaming into a void and I never want that for any of my readers. So, yes, I will always respond to comments - even if it's just a "thank you". I see you, readers, and I want you to feel seen, too.

6. What's the fic you've written with the angsties ending?

No angsty endings in this house! Only nice and well-rounded endings!

7. Do you write crossovers? If so, what is the craziest one you've written?

No, I don't have written a crossover (yet).

8. Have you received hate on a fic?

No, and I'm grateful for it!

9. Do you write smut?

No, I don't. Hinting at it is the furthest I will go in that regard.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

No. What would be the point of that anyway? *looks at the meagre kudos*

11. Ever had a fic translated?

Unfortunately not.

12. Ever co-written a fic before?

No, and I'm not sure that I ever will. My muse is unreliable...to say the least.

13. All time favorite ship?

Emhyr var Emreis x Geralt of Rivia, of course. I write what I like, after all. Although Lambert x Aiden and Dandelion x Geralt of Rivia is a close second and third within the Witcher fandom. Ask me about other fandoms and I will just throw a list at you. I commandeer a whole fleet of ships!

14. What's a WIP you want to finish, but don't think you ever will?

I only have one proper WIP right now and I will finish it someday. No promises on when that will be, though.

15. What are your writing strengths?

Especially after publishing Dark Metinna, I'm rather confident to say that it's emotions and plots.

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

Romance and action scenes. Smut, like stated above.

17. What are your thoughts of writing dialogue in other languages?

I think it's a very useful tool in showing what goes on in a character. Let's take Emhyr var Emreis, for example, who is, for all that we know, bilingual, because he speaks Common and Nilfgaardian. In Dark Metinna I made him drop back into Nilfgaardian on several occasions:

1. To show his emotional turmoil, thus reverting back to his native tongue (to soothe himself, maybe, or because his grip on Common just slips when he's upset)

2. To be able to say things he couldn't say in Common because our dear, uptight Emperor just can't be soft and gentle around Geralt. But the man behind the mask can.

But for all its usefulness, of course, you can't overdo it, or readers might get bored. Still, I love doing this, especially for fantasy languages like Nilfgaardian!

18. First fandom you write for?

Again, if you ask for published fics - The Witcher. If you ask for unpublished fics as well, it's probably The Lord of the Rings.

19. Favorite fic you've ever written?

Without a question it's Dark Metinna. This fic was my bane and my joy for several weeks as it simply poured out of me. I lost sleep because of it. And I'm so ridiculously proud of it: for its plot, for its characters and for the little quirks I could give Emhyr in it.

So it seems I'm almost robbed of people to tag! But a few of my favorite mutuals and writers remain. So @the-butch-of-blaviken @alllthequeenshorses @useless-empty-brain @traumschwinge maybe you are up for it?

[carmensandiego-dreams-collection]

I completely forgot to say anything about Mystère au bout du monde, the most Game I’ve ever sat through. My full review of it below the cut:

-Everyone in the older Carmen fandom has said that this game is the worst, so naturally I had to go see for myself -It’s a sort-of reboot of Treasures of Knowledge but all the changes it’s made are bad, if it were a movie it’d be a direct-to-video sequel that you’d find in a walmart bargain bin -Shadow Hawkins is now Adam Shadow, and is now an asshole weirdo

-There’s a scene in the Louvre where he’s told not to touch anything and he IMMEDIATELY goes to pick up an ancient statue barehanded because he thinks it’s broken. The museum curator yells at him and tells him it was discovered in that state. It was the only funny joke in the game

-Jules picks Adam on purpose to be her partner but does nothing but rag on him the whole game. She’s also weirdly abrasive at times

-Neither of them are all that likeable in this, to be perfectly honest. Treasures had awkward moments, sure, but Jules and Hawkins were still fun and their rapport with other characters was interesting, especially with Jules and Carmen. This had absolutely none of that, everyone’s an asshole for some reason

-Everyone’s outfit/hair/aesthetics just......sucks shit, there is no nice way of putting it. Like I made fun of Jules’ character design a while ago but there’s MORE you guys, there’s more

-The plaid turtleneck. The JC Penny statement necklace. The high heeled leather boots. The skinny jeans. The hair. The clownishly proportioned women’s jacket. God.

-What the fuck is going on with this shirt??? the sleeves????

-I have a new drawing challenge that I’m proposing right now: take ANY outfit from this game and try to redesign it to be good.

-Some of the art looks unfinished, too, like nobody inked it properly and they just rushed sketches out to ship with the game

-It’s a personal gripe, but IDK why every reboot/reference to TOK feels like it needs to make Jules pointedly not-butch? CS2019 is light-years ahead of this game but it’s sort of guilty too

-Wow Shadow, your partner looks GNC af

-I think the only game that doesn’t do this is Hidden Drums?

-Adam’s outfits are better, but they’re still kinda bland.

-They took away all of his pockets. Fuck you. I hate you

-Shadow needs to look like a 7 year old boy that was allowed to dress himself at all times, you can’t do this, game

-The artstyle in general is also super awkward, the expressions look awful. A collection my favorites:

-There’s this weird love square going on?????? There’s no development for it, but it’s there regardless:

There’s this weird redditor/incel-type guy working in the lab who gives off Viktor from Despicable Me vibes. He constantly flirts with Jules but Jules isn’t into him, and he’s also relentlessly passive-aggressive towards Adam and hazes him because he probably thinks Adam is a Chad because Jules likes him more

Adam also constantly makes passes at Jules but she’s also not that into it, except when she is?? Half the time she brushes him off, but then she’ll turn around and flirt with him. I think the writers were trying to do that thing where a woman plays “hard to get”, except no woman ever has acted like that

I guarantee this was written by men

People call Jules and Adam up and they’re like “haha don’t get too distracted by each other you lovebirds” but they’ve only know each other for like two days max, what are they talking about

You think this shit is over, but then Carmen shows up in the ring with a steel chair and is like “Oh Jules, I find Adam attractive as well, oh hohoho! :3″ and you have to sit there and take it

I’m not really one to have strong feelings about “ships” either way, but honestly the aggressive attempt to remove the personal connection Jules and Carmen had in the first game and redirect it to be a fight over some Bland Dude is an act of homophobia, I’m sorry fjkdsl;afd

Thankfully none of this goes anywhere, but it’s uncomfortable nonetheless

- Carmen is barely in this game for some reason? The first time we see her in at least 20-30 minutes into the playthrough

-There also.... hints of racism? Like, all of the non-white people are sort of unhelpful, and there’s a moment where Carmen steals a mask from a Maasai Tribe and one dude sees her doing it, and instead of stopping her he’s like “her willpower and coat of red fire hypnotized me, so I came her to warn you instead”

- :/ idk man

-anyway, it turns out that all the items Carmen has been stealing are embedded with...microchips? And that when put together they lead to....atlantis??

-like, the honest to god atlantis

-ACME finally puts all the chips together and find the map, but then Carmen hacks in and get the map

-They race to an island that I guess does have the doorway to Atlantis, but right as Adam is about to catch Carmen, Jules falls off a cliff and has to be rescued

- To imply that this is a tense moment, rather than play intense music or have additional art with dialogue, the game instead flashes between these two images as fast as possible in dead silence

-Then, instead of addressing that the game just implied that Atlantis exists in this world, the game ends before we actually get to see Carmen, or even if there’s anything on the island

-After all is said and done, this game was entertaining to watch. I love bad media so much, although it’s a piss-poor game if you actually want something good about the characters. I’m hoping the recent show will spur HMH/Netflix to maaaaybe make another game, although who knows.

-A big thank you to fycarmensandiego for posting the walkthrough on youtube, I’m not sure if I could have sat through this on my own. If you like Carmen stuff, or would like to play this game yourself, you can check out their blog here on tumblr, they’ve done a lot of neat archival and emulation work!

[uncloseted]

tw: transphobia😭 hi I'm a radfem cisgirl (I hate using "cis" and "trans" words but here I need to for the sake of the story) I've got a friend from ny highschool (we're in college now) who's also a radfem and is always sharing great feminist stuff. Yesterday, she shared the comment of a girl saying "this fight for abortion (it is illegal in my country) is for men/people with vaginas too!" and mocked it. I preferred not to make up any opinions about her because of one single post. But today, she shared a picture of Miss Spain 2019 (a trans girl) who talked about her experience with sexism, and mocked her too. This time, it was obvious to me she was just being transphobic trash. She received lots of backlash and deleted the post, but instead made a new post complaining about people caring about transphobia but not about sexism (a very stupid post, if you ask me). This time, along with some comments from other girls respectfully telling her to stop being cruel and mocking towards trans women, she received a lot of support from other TERFS (although these TERFS said they hate being called TERFS just for being honest and brave lmmfao). They said that transwomen don't belong in radfem because they just suffer from discrimination, not oppression, and listed some reasons why: according to them, trans girls don't suffer: obstetrician violence, forced pregnancy, feminicide, child marriage, genital femenine ablation, glass ceiling barriers, being implanted "maternal sense" while kids, getting their ears perfored while babies, among other stuff, and that differentiate ciswomen biological reality from trans women biological reality isn't transphobia. Other girls said they knew transwomen who were mean to them, using derogatory terms to refer to ciswomen and they were mean and cruel, using this argument to generalize about all transwomen smh.

I'm just so stoned that people could be so cruel to transwomen and set them aside from the feminist fight when they suffer from already being excluded from so many things. It sickens me that some people don't belive trans people exist and treat them that bad, specially trans girls. I wish I could debunk the info this TERFS are spreading because it's so dangerous and enables transphobics to keep harming transpeople and I find that unbearable, but I am not as informed as I should be to debute all their lies at once. Could you help me?

So starting with the question of transwomen in radfem spaces, I don’t think many (if any) transwomen would say that they experience the exact same type of discrimination that cis women do.  There’s often this idea that “trans people don’t believe in biology”, but that’s a bad faith argument.  Trans people understand biology very well, often more than their cis counterparts do, because it’s such a big part of their identity.

Yes, transwomen don’t suffer obstetrician violence, forced pregnancy, child marriage, genital feminine ablation, etc. (I can’t even find any articles on the ear thing).  They do experience femicide, at way higher rates that cis women do. Transwomen are women, and they’re discriminated against in their own way; sometimes that’s because they’re women, and sometimes that’s because they’re trans.  Transwomen are largely supportive of fighting with cis women to rid the world of discrimination for all women, cis and trans alike.  

By contrast, TERFs seem to think that because transwomen sometimes suffer a different type of discrimination than cis women, they can’t be “real women”.  But that argument makes no sense to me.  The vast majority of affluent, white, straight, cis women will never suffer the violence that is apparently so central to the cis female experience.  They’re extremely unlikely to experience femicide, child marriage, genital mutilation... and yet they can acknowledge that those issues are feminist issues, even though they’re not universal to all women.  Why shouldn’t the discrimination that transwomen face also fall under that umbrella?  And if they can accept that women who have had hysterectomies, or women who have chromosomal differences, or women who are intersex, or women who present butch are all women, why shouldn’t transwomen also fall under the umbrella of womanhood?

Further, is that really all that womanhood is to TERFs?  Experiencing the trauma and discrimination that so often accompanies being a cis women?  I don’t think inclusion to a group should be predicated on the amount that one has suffered or how many “oppression points” they’ve amassed. And I don’t think being a woman should be predicated solely on biology, especially given that we never really know what kind of biology a person has just by looking at them.  What “being a woman” is is a metaphysical question that derails the discussion of trans feminism, and it’s a question that I don’t think a lot of TERFs actually have a good answer to.  It’s just an easy way to put the burden of proof on trans people and trans allies and waste our time (but if you’re interested, I do have an opinion on this. I just think it’s best saved for a different time).

In terms of trans people being oppressed, there’s all sorts of data to suggest that trans oppression is very real.  In the US, trans people were banned from serving in the military under the Trump administration, a decision that was only overturned a few days ago, and the Trump administration also reversed the Obama- era Title VII policy that protected trans employees from discrimination.  Trans people are overwhelmingly lacking legal protections- there are no federal non-discrimination laws that include gender identity, and in some states, debates over limiting the rights of trans people to use public bathrooms are ongoing.  

About 57% of trans people faced some type of rejection from their family upon coming out.  Around 29% of trans people live in poverty (compared to 11% in the general population and about 22% in the lesbian and gay populations), and that number is higher for trans people who are Black (39%), Latinx (48%), or Indigenous (35%).  27% of trans people have been fired, not hired, or denied a promotion due to their trans identity.  90% of trans people report facing discrimination in their own jobs.  Trans people face double the rate of unemployment that cis people do (about 14%) and about 44% are underemployed. This is despite the fact that a reported 71% of trans people have some level of post-secondary education- actually higher than the general population, which is about 61%.  It’s often cited that women earn 77 cents on the dollar compared to men, but that statistic doesn’t even exist for trans women.

54% of trans people have experienced intimate partner violence (compared to about 24.3% of cis women), 47% of trans people have been sexually assaulted (compared to about 18% of cis women), and about 10% are physically assaulted in a given year. 

About 22% of trans people and 32% of trans people of color in the US have no health insurance (compared to about 11% of cis women), and 55% of trans people who do have insurance report being denied coverage for at least one gender affirming surgery.  29% of trans adults have been refused healthcare by a doctor or provider because of their gender identity.  In one study, 50% of trans people said that they had to teach their medical providers about trans care.  Trans people are four times as likely than the average population to be infected by HIV.  41% have attempted suicide at one point in their lives, compared to 1.6% of the general population.  

20% of trans people have been evicted or denied housing due to their gender identity, and trans people are four times more likely than cis people to be homeless.  Only 1/5 of trans people report that they have been able to update all of their identification documents, and 41% have a driver’s license that does not match their gender identity.  22% of trans people report that they have been denied equal treatment by a government agency or official, 29% reported police harassment, and 12% reported having been denied equal treatment or harassed by judges or court officials.

75% of transgender students feel unsafe at school because of their gender expression, 60% are forced to use a bathroom or locker room that does not match their gender, 50% were unable to use the name and pronouns that match their gender, and 70% of trans students say that they’ve avoided bathrooms because they feel unsafe.  78% of trans students report being harassed or assaulted at school.

And these are all statistics that focus on trans people at large.  The discrimination is worse for transwomen and especially transwomen of color.  All of that certainly sounds like systemic oppression to me.

Every person who chooses to be a TERF perpetuates this discrimination.  It’s just bigotry towards trans people, plain and simple.  And for what?  A reactionary fear that all transwomen are secretly sexual predators and all transmen are confused girls who don’t know better?  Unfortunately, men can be sexual predators just fine without having to jump through the convoluted hoops trans people go through to be recognized as their true gender identity, and transwomen are way more likely to be sexually assaulted than they are to be sexual predators.  There are no reported cases at all that transwomen are dressing up as men to assault women in bathrooms.  There aren’t even statistics on how frequently trans people are sexual predators. And transmen are just as capable of making informed, thoughtful decisions as cis women.  

TERFs shouldn’t be pitting themselves against trans people.  There’s just nothing to be gained from doing that.  They should be working alongside trans people to fight the patriarchy and the discrimination that cis and trans women both face, regardless of what that discrimination entails.

Last thought.  Not to be a stan or anything but if you’re interested in learning more about these issues, Contrapoints has a number of really good videos on the topic of TERFs (including one that just released today!). They delve a bit deeper into the actual questions that TERFs often bring up and provide some nuanced answers.

[vashti-lives]

TL;DR: don’t be JKR say fuck you to Calvinism and hold on to the good of humanity in your heart.

As a tiny awkward queer kid who spent her adolescence in rural America Harry Potter was my first defense when it came to filtering out homophobes. Before I even had the words to understand I was queer I knew Harry Potter was a good tool to judge the safety of adults around me and a good way to say fuck you to the adults who thought it [read: me] was evil, without drawing too much attention to myself. I cannot possibly be the only queer person who did this.

In light of that JKR’s violent transmisogyny is exceptionally hurtful, but, in hindsight not surprising. People have talked a lot about various hateful things present in her books: antisemitism, fat hatred, practically every form of racism, people who like cats… etc. I actually think the most accurate thing you could argue is that these books are deeply misanthropic about nearly everyone. Yeah she hates all the obvious groups but she also hates not just cat lovers but animal lovers in general. The books are deeply contemptuous of Hagrid for example. The good loving people in Harry’s life are nearly universally inept at helping him. She seems to believe that kindness and stupidity are only ever found together.

I’m not defending her in any way— she’s an absolute shit head— but it matters because while I’m sure she was transphobic when she wrote those books I’m also sure she’s a lot more actively transphobic now. The internet has radicalized her to a pretty extreme degree. There’s a really good article about how terfs in the UK are basically a cult [HERE] and I think part of the reason she was vulnerable to this specific cult and it’s reasoning was because she fundamentally already had a really negative opinion about most people. In the end it wasn’t hard for UK terfs to laser focus her general distain for everyone into extreme hatred for one particular group. 

JKR thinks she’s doing the right thing, she really thinks she’s not being transphobic. She’s protecting all the children from all those evil transfolk who wanna destroy butch lesbians, or whatever, because essentially she thinks most people are awful and therefore this is a logical thing for a person to do. Which, as Lindsay Ellis points out in her really excellent video essay [HERE], probably means she’s never going to change her mind.

And that’s why I’m writing this really fucking long post. Not just to navel gaze about why JKR is the way she is but because of the specific way her weaknesses were targeted. Right now, particularly if you live in the US you are seeing the worst of people every day. Most people in the US are trying their best, wearing masks when they have to go out and staying home otherwise, but that just means that the absolute worst 25% or so are probably the people most of us, especially in service industries and essential jobs, are interacting with right now. Its really easy when all you see everyday is the absolute buttcrack of humanity to start to think that’s what humanity is just generally like.  And that’s dangerous. 

Its easy to start thinking that people in red states deserve what’s happening to them because they voted in Trump. Easy to say well let all the old people die because they’re responsible for this anyway. Easy to shrug and decide that America’s coronavirus issue is just karma. But its very dangerous to start generalizing over groups of people who didn’t choose to be in the group* they’re in. I think we’re all feeling kinda pessimistic about people in general right now in general anyway which makes this all the more tempting. 

Don’t fall for that temptation, its a trap. Assholes will take advantage of it in ways it’ll be hard to fight if that general hatred of humanity goes too deep. Say fuck you to Calvinism and hold on to the good of humanity in your heart so if you fall afoul of a cult it’ll just be a weird one and not an incredibly hateful and destructive one**. 

And here’s a link to the UK charity Mermaids [HERE] because fuck JKR.

*IE—ACAB for life, but you shouldn’t over generalize what people in “red” states are like because people don’t choose where they’re born and moving is prohibitively expensive if you’re poor.

**look nobody is immune to cults— anybody can end up in one if they find you in the right moment.

[kendrixtermina]

Now here's an all new theory for where the procrastination comes from

Like the uni councilors thought of like generic selfhate insecurity or like spineless ppl pleasing (nope an anime cured me of that when I was 13 - thst sounded more like what that ladys own problems might be), fear or failure & wanting to spite my father, eveb that getting ahead through "talent" was an unfair advantage bad tainted and evil, or that "talent" meant being beholden and controlled by others (definitely somewhat right - we worked on that, it helped, the second guy was defs much much more helpful & compatible cause he focussed a lot more on strategies than wannabe-maternal pep talks) but there was always something else there that wasnt getting touched

In tje end I dont think I have talent and in any case what really matters is attitude toward "living the examined life" for example whst you do. What you notice.

Now I did notice that things get harder to do precisely because I actually want them(whereas a lot of ppl get distracted from stuff because they dont really want it) - at the same time I can totally function or pick up new habits in day to day life its not like I have some "hardware problem" like, say, ADHD or the like.

Like of course its some emotional knot it couldnt be anything else but I feel they didnt identify what kind of knot? Certainly not that first lady. If im trying to get clarity and you give me reassuring pep talks you just freak me out more for the love of god tell me whats happening. Nothing worse when a Doctor says "it will be over soon" rather than explain the procedure

Fear of/ distraction from wanting itself never really occured to me thats not a common stereotypical fear that ppl talk about.

Let me get this straight I never thought I was better than anyone I knew very well that I'm not. I thought of both those things as ways not to get bullied, maybe get somewhere where I feel that im in the right place.

If I look back at really breaking experiences it was times I really really wanted something and then I couldnt do it or some outside party stepped on my fingers. That Tori Amos Music Video where she escapes from a psycho killer's trunk and then the passerby's dont help her? That was my most favorite music video in the world for years maybe still is.

Like I was told I could maybe skip third grade and I poured all my energy and passion and strenght into that everything I had to do well, make friends with the new class i was so highly motivated I aced all the exams I felt so happy & fulfilled just being in thst flow state all the time... i wanted this more than anything. Maybe it was the first time I really wanted something beyond vague dreams or base desires. But the homeroom teacher hated my guts and put the kibosh on that; Probably because I was unwittingly repeating some of the artogant classist shit my father spouts without realizing how hurtful it is. my parents thought it wasnt worth going to the higher ups for that but having to essentially redo 4th grade in a crap school in the different town we moved to was one of the worst times of my life. Also I didnt find out that the teacher had hated me/acted in a petty way until years after I thought I just failed. That there was a possible place I could have belonged but turns out I really belong nowhere after all.

All my effort was for nothing. It was such a joy - i mean these days even getting code to work or solving math problems has that same joy - but all that effort and joy and wanting did was that... im tearing up and searching for the words to even process this tbh. I think I denied that joy, told myself that I was just a stupud kid thinking I was a special snowflake. It didnt even matter.

Rather than insist on staying up late to make sure my homework was done I just stopped caring and hardly did another piece of homework in my life just faking it on the spot or coasting through. It could have gone another way maybe if it werent for the bullies and my father the chief bully or if only I was more determined but it was like "okay I dont care anymore I just dont care" and I think thats stayed my default response to dissapointment to this day.

This TV show didnt turn out like I wanted? I dont care its just a tv show.

My father treated be with hatred all my life? Its okay I dont care about him and I dont want his love anyway.

Like there were other times when I thought I could be happy.

Like I really wanted to go to this boarding school for gifted kids. Again I thought maybe incorrectly that this would be a place where I can belong and not be bullied it was never about being better than anyone.

Again I wanted it I clamored and cried and made noise nonstop. Maybe I still hadnt wholly lost contact with willpower back then. I still thought of myself as strong willed.

And my father made me regret it. It was around the same time that mom briefly considered divorce maybe I was just the stress valve. Or he took it personally as wanting to get away from him. Duh he abused me of course I wanted away from him. He was such a suffocating control freak! Mom said yes first then he spoke to her and suddenly she followed everything he said. Thats when I really realized how emotionally manipulative was how abusive... i mean one of my first conscious memories of him is thinking "oh crap I will be just like cinderella" but he really laid it on so thick so transparently even a 10 year old could tell its manipulation. If you do this you dont love your mom. If you do this you dont love your siblings. If you dont obey me your mom will kill herself. No she wont you jerk even my 2 year old self could tell youre abusive.

The most cruel thing he did was briefly say yes. Again I got so happy. So invested. Just bending all I was towards that even though he bombarded me with abuse and mental torture.

And then on the day we were supposed to leave he said no youre not going.

Maybe I actually did say I didnt want to go because of one time he was doing this constant scientology type torture on me

That same reaction: "I dont want it I dont want anything so please please let me be"

Ppl think of bad childhoods as a game that you win if yoz turn 18 -or 28 maybe - without killing yourself. But its not. Every year you live it can take away from your potential. Every day less than you have to live it

He sure didnt let me have sucess with his overcontrol and abuse. Anything I was proud of he rules. When I graduated from school with a fairly good but not perfevt final score he humiliated me. When I turned 18 he humiliated me. Everything I did was a burden even just feeding and washing me. Hed give me unwanted white elephant gifts then bitch about how giving them to me ruined his life cause he had to work so muxh "Ingrate Ingrate Ingrate" Butch I never asked for anything I want nothing!

But as I had to eat I did in fact have to ask things of him and I hated it so much.

No wonder that I turned out afraid of wanting things eh?

Hed seen some poster when we went to see tje school I wanted to go to - not by the school by an individual student - about the history of abortion portrayed in a positive way or at least that was his official reason why I couldnt go. Again I had wanted something badly with all my being and again all my being availed nothing. Irrelevant like I didnt exist. All my screaming gone unheard.

And this is so silly cause im not a child anymore I have control and if I were to stop procrastinating I could have money and gave even more control.

I havent even spoken to him in years now hes no longer relevant. Its not about him its about thus bad pattern I picked up.

I like how this books handles it with the idea that certain experiences dont create the type but that it nakes you uniquely suceotible to certain kinds of hurt or certain misunderstandings.

Because with all this discourse about bad message free media ive really come to think that while it can and should be minimized its not possible to eradicate cause human mibds are so quicl so fallible to extract overgeneralizations and make it mean something abput themselves

Like an immature statistical learning model easily overtrained by noisy data.

Another time I was nearly happy was when I started looking for work, doing my thesis...

Same pattern I was engaged, happy to be engaged talking to ppl at both work and in the uni work group loving it all so much...

my life had started to feel meaningful again. And it had gotten to that point in part because of my ex-fiance. Yes the councelling heloed taking up meditation helped, getting high on morning glory that one time helped a whole lot got more self esteem from that than I ever got from my father.

But that all started because of my ex fiance.

He was an i tellectual type and he had a sense of purpose about him like hes a legendary character and everyone around him became legendary too. And he found me useful! Others had called me "walking dictionary" with mockery and scorn he called me his google and it meant love and admiration. Maybe I got a bit of an ego trip off of tjat but I also really stupidly dumbtastically loved him I bragged of him to anyobe who listened everything he did seemed fascinating abd interesting and meaningful, but also I just loved the sweet gentle warmth of being next to him in the morning. Once again I was happy and everything was joyful even when it was hard, I felt strong and meaningful and useful and I let myself openly want things.

And then it all blew up. Worse yet i was so mistaken abozt him it really shook my confidence in my own judgement or any sense of clarity. I was si confused during the fucking breakup like I hadnt been since I left my father's house.

Google hah! More like his personal Alexa! It turns out he didnt respect or like me at all.

I couldnt even be sad or angry cause it was all my mistake. The one feeling I allowed - and even that took me weeks to identify - is dissapointment. Heavy leaden dissapointment i didnt even kniw that was a feeling you could feel so strongly. I didnt even do anything wrong you have to open yourself to have love. He could habe choosen to love me he just simply didnt. He probably thought he did but he wouldnt evebn do something as simple as not make fun of my voice or clean when I am sick.

Once he started putting me in the "wife" role he just became unable to see me. His loss really cause I think he wanted to keep me from all those annoying texts and email he had the nerve to write.

By all means I was right to trust but also right to leave later but still my sense of certainty and purpose and meaning was totally shaken. He did the sort of romantic stuff I didnt think was real. I knew I loved him when we had this conversation about water on mars. He got me the perfect books for my birthday! He said I was pretty and a genius and looked just like an actress. He got me this titanic esque heart pendant with stars. We were stuck at midnight in a train station that one time and he pulled out a picnic rug two plastic glasses and a shampain bottle. It never worked out but he said he might take me to see the LHC! I really thought we would be buried in the same hole folks!. He had read that same steven Hawkings book that I loved. One of the rather few books he actually read as I would find. Sigh.

And I fell right back into that same old pattern. Dont care about anything dont want anything it would be stuoid unrealistic and silly to want.

When I first came to uni I also had this feeling of hapiness and belongingness and wanting, I was putting in an effort, talking to ppl more.. and when things went wrong the slightest bit I pulled by hand back from that like from an open flame.

And here I am years later most the sucess or contact I get is comments on my fanfictions.

I thought I was doing that, or drawing, because its Stakes/Evaluation-free (going by the fear of failure theory) or because at least with the ffs gratification/payoff for effort is immediate compared to original stuff or uni work. Its a nice little niche at least.

I mean I do care about it its not "just" distraction but maybe ive been profaning it in that way... and so etimes I dont even do that and go for full unadulterated undebatable distraction; Line to 7 I guess. Tje only reason I spoke face to face to anyone else than the delivery guy this week is that I had some doctors appointments.

But not its distraction from stuff Im too lazy to do or even from pressure like I always thought. But from wanting things.

So the original fiction went great while it was a distraction from school not so much when its one of the things I most want and actually have the time to do it.

Even thought thats the most practiced skill I have that I never stopped working on since I was 10. 🤦‍♀️

I mean they already explained that its basically like meditation. Or weeds. Or popup ads. Youve got to click them away as they pop up.

I always told myself thst I didnt have to be happy... and thats not even untrue actually but it would sure be neat to be happy again one of these days.

[heyheyitsstillgay]

I'm literally begging you to spill the tea on b*tch h*rtman why does everyone hate him

Me?? You're leaving this responsibility to Me?? Oof.

Aight.

Season 3 bad

Butch is very much an ideas person. After Steve Marmel left the show just went downhill. There was one writer that wanted it to go the grey ghost angle and another who wanted amethyst ocean and it just didn't work and then it got cancelled so the end relationship was so rushed it was terrible.

Changed the lore of his show half way through

So this is mostly Nick's fault, they thought the show being about ghosts was too gritty and they agreed to change it from being about real dead people who were once alive to monsters from another dimension. This is the change that Steve marmel was fired over iirc. Now we have ghost tornados. You can't just change lore like that half way through. Some people think that because he was born again midway through dp that he wanted this change to the lore so the dp universe wouldn't go against the bible's teachings. We don't know that for sure though.

Like JK Rowling returning with needless headcanons except they're not even an attempt at rep it's just "Jazz replaced her life and ambitions with being a lonely woman in a chair, while Maddie becomes a ghost pimp and Jack replaced half his body with robotics."

Remember how he destroyed Vlads character in PP? He still does it. It's like he doesn't remember his own show. In a 10 years later video, Jazz is completely out of character and the family is just okay with Maddie walking around with ghost slaves on leashes. The Fentons are genius' in their own right. And he's reduced them to Danny's sidekicks.

Doesn't appreciate his employees

See these quote tweets when fop was given a reboot he toasted to himself and God while surrounded by the artists that massively helped him to make the show.

Voted trump

He apparently regrets it but still follows trumps family and a collection of far right people

Transphobic

In 107 facts about Danny Phantom fact 94 at 17:00 sticks out like a sore thumb. At the time, trans Danny theories were making the rounds on Tumblr. He'd already denied it was true. A lot of the theories draw Danny in his swimwear because his vest looks a lot like a full length binder and he's the only guy at the pool not showing his chest. The fact states he's said before that it's because of sunburns. It was in an audio interview a while ago where the interviewer suggested that that could be the reason and he decided it was canon then and there. It wasn't true while the show was being made. It's a question of if it's a coincidence that this video was released around peak trans Danny theory time.

There's also this screenshot of a deleted tweet that he never apologised for.

And the episode of fop with reversed gender roles treats men doing traditionally feminine things as a big joke.

Evoked ship wars that made fandom a space for arguements and anger

To summarise, he had a blog platform where people would post art. Most ship stuff was amethyst ocean and then p*mpus p*p existed, he scolded people not because it's an underage ship but because it made him look bad. People responded saying he was just homophobic. It split the phandom in half.

This shows recounts of the war

And this is a summary

Oaxis scam

Oaxis was a family friendly streaming service that he started a Kickstarter for. Here's a good post that went around at the time that talks about it. In the end he surpassed his goal last minute thanks to thousands of dollars donated suddenly by Christians and Churches.

People who didn't realise what they invested in were unable to get their money back and are still waiting for their promised cameos in original shows according to high tier rewards.

The 'family friendly network' (that was all the info given) was actually going to be a Christian streaming service combining Netflix and YouTube. You can upload your own content or stream original content. If the content you upload isn't Christian Approved(tm) then real people would take down the video.

Here's a video of when he went around speaking to churches and actually explaining his thoughts and goals with Oaxis. Hes also disrespectful of mental illness in this video, claiming that violent media is to blame.

Big headed

He's just so full of himself, I watched 1 of his shows, that wasn't my whole childhood. Most animators draw themselves jokingly and then he is very flattering towards himself. He changed his name from Elmer to Butch I mean what more do you need. He thinks God put him on Earth to spread the Lords message via his media following.

He made some of those racist Ugandan knuckles memes

He did edit a video of people doing a racist Ugandan impression, I can't find it I think he deleted it without an apology. I did find this though.

He steals tweets from people

A dp meme page he follows

This even has the exact same tv photo

Then this was followed by this

Refuses to take criticism

He thinks that people call him out because they're trying to take him down.

He only accepts critique from people who have similar accomplishments to himself

'Jokingly' blamed Tara Strong for her best friends suicide

Tara was friends with Mary who previously voiced Timmy Turner, here Elmer says that Mary killed herself because Tara replaced her.

Supports the idea that autism can be cured

He and his wife held a seminar with a collection of people who had mental or physical illnesses that they believed were cured by God. One of them was someone who apparently used to be autistic but is all better now thanks to the Lord. Stuff like this supports the idea that autism is awful and needs to be cured, this is harmful to autistic people.

Doesn't pay his artists and uses friendship to get cheap labour

KurotheArtist collaborated with butch for a while, animating some of his videos and providing ideas and helping with scripts for ones like the draw my life story. Butch is in breach of contract and owes Kuro $1400 for his work on the ImagiNathan project that was later cancelled. Kuro made a video about this which also mentions the whole "curing autism with prayer" as his reason for finally talking about it publicly.

Was caught tracing someone else's art for a $200 commission

His commissions are a minimum of $100. Which is a lot, most of its just for the price of his signature at the bottom tbh. It's $200 for full colour. This video came out, overlaying a picture of the character he was payed to draw over the commission image. Even using an image reference, it lines up far too well.

[bitch-a-la-mode]

Some important things about one of my favorite professors at my university:

- she’s deaf and she makes a lot of jokes about being deaf

- She’s a butch lesbian

- She rides a motorcycle

- Her interpreter is also a lesbian with a shaved head who is very petite and carries around a coffee bigger than her torso

- She always has a Diet Coke for some reason

- The classes she teaches are... you guessed it!... on queer studies

- She has an automatic signature on her email and it is as follows:

Her name

Adjunct lecturer- department of women’s and gender studies

University name

Her email

- cuz you know... in case you forgot her email while you were emailing her lmao

- Her other signature (depending on the email) is “sent from my iPhone”

- *sends a long and very eloquent email to her* her: “lmao okie dokie. Sent from my iPhone”

- If you sign at her the word “math” she’ll yell at you

- If she doesn’t like what you’re saying (I.e. xenophobic, homophobic, etc.) she’ll take out her hearing aid or close her eyes so she can’t see the interpreter

- “Listen I know you guys can technically very easily cheat during the quiz but can you not?”

- Literally 20% of our grade is watching a gay movie of our choosing and writing a 3 page paper about it

- She got arrested a lot when she was young during protests

- “I literally come from a family where all the men are cops, yea I know I’m Irish and this is New York City, but I’m adopted so fuck blue lives!”

- One time she was freaking out while getting arrested during a demonstration cuz she didn’t know what was happening and her friend was yelling at the cop to stop cuz she was deaf and didn’t understand (but her friend was being dragged away by another cop) and the cop didn’t listen so he broke her arm for “resisting” and in retaliation she broke his nose. Because she couldn’t hear her rights being read to her she legally had to be let go and she wasn’t charged.

- she used to go to this annual all women camping event for a week in the middle of the woods in Michigan

- She said in the middle of the night she went to an open shower and she had a realization that that was the safest she’d probably ever feel in her life

- She said at this event, women were assigned “tractor duty” and they would ride tractors around the perimeter of the event and if a man came they’d announce them via megaphone and they’d be escorted around the event

- Apparently the event people were transphobic so she said fuck them and made sure like 50% of the people didn’t go the following years so they lost all their money and had to close down (fuck transphobia!)

- All her readings are free online but the university yelled at her and said she HAD to assign a book for the kids (presumably to buy) so she assigns books that are free PDFs online and the university couldn’t do anything but you could tell they were Lowkey foaming at the mouth

- “If you’re having kid trouble just bring your kid to class and they can learn about The Gays!”

- She has to cancel class a lot cuz apparently a part of being deaf is she gets a lot of ear infections?

- “Make this your first or last class of the day because this class will be canceled a lot”

- Her emails when she cancels are usually: “ears suck. Don’t come to class. Enjoy your day.”

-she has a lot of free days sporadically inputed into the calendar because of her multiple absences. Sometimes she won’t use them so we’ll literally finish the course 1-2 weeks before the official end of the semester and when that happens, she says you can come in and watch movies and if you want you can discuss Intellectual Ideas and she’ll give you extra credit

- I know all this because I’ve taken her for three (3) semesters now

- When she sees a familiar students face (my own included) in another class of hers she waves and yells hi like a person who saw a good doggie

- She hates desks and always makes students sit in circles so we can talk

- “I’d rather die than be stuck in an elevator with someone from a STEM department”

- “Here’s a classical author you didn’t know was gay!”

- She says if you’re just gonna sign in and leave at least do it before she starts lecturing cuz if she sees you she’ll give you a Disappointed Mom Look and you feel legally obligated to stay

- Sometimes she forgets how loud she is and she’ll start yell-singing

- Sometimes she’ll show a video and she doesn’t know what the volumes at and she’ll forget to correct it cuz she can’t hear it so it’ll either be muted or so loud your ears fall off and it’s really a guess who every class

- “Here are free things happening at school that the school *forgot* to tell you about and I’m informing you about now”

- “If you make me read more than 5 pages I will kill you and/or fail you”

- One time a girl handed her a 30 page paper as her midterm paper and she left and yelled in the women’s bathroom for 10 mins. She came back and threw it in the garbage and told the girl “you get an A for the semester but only if you never come back to class”.

- I literally have no idea what happened after that cuz she won’t talk about it

- “Here are good gay bars in the city. Wait you’re all over 21 right? Okay yea these are great bars”

- She’s an Intellectual so she’s friends with a lot of famous gay authors?

- “Don’t ask me for a letter of recommendation I don’t even know how to write. No I didn’t write this syllabus I stole it from another professor and put my name on top”

- “If I see people look away while I’m talking then I stop because I assume they’ve stopped listening and I can’t really tell”

- “I know it sounds like I’m eating my own tongue but tell me if you don’t understand me alright?”

- She’s actually very eloquent idk why she thinks people don’t understand her

- *throws a paper ball into the garbage can and misses* KOBE!

- If there’s an event at her department she makes us go for class (like not for extra credit, like we’ll have class at the event) and if you try to leave she’ll announce your departure and make her fellow professors stare at you in disappointment

-“Madonna is a thief! Who stole from black culture and art! Fuck her!”

- “let’s talk about how evil the United States government is!”

I’ll add more as the semester goes on

[biocontagious-rabbit]

Hey

So a lot of people have been talking about Butch Pal lately and I thought, as a film maker I'd dip my ass into the pool.

First and foremost, Butch Pal is, at its core, a scam. Now let me be clear, it may not be a scam in the traditiinal sense, but in my opiniin it is still a scam. How? Glad ya asked:

So lets look all the possibilities as to why the money donated to Butch Pal didnt /really/ need to be donated.

Im gunna say it to get it out of the way: Butch Pal is a Youtube Show. It is broadcast on a platforn that you get to use and broadcast on for completely free. However, thats not the biggest deal here.

Next theres paying your actors. And while yes every film maker should pay their actors and those involved in filming, this isnt a big production project. You could have just grabbed some lesbian friends and some straigjt friends and done this and im sure they wouldve done it for free. I desperately refuse to believe that not a single one of the three main people involved had any lesbian friends.

Next is equipment. I could forgive this one, but most phones nowadays have high quality camera and, if they dont, you are able to download editing software on your phine for about 5$ to edit the video style and just clip it together in general.

Lastly is production value. Making the show look professional.

Now if Ally Johnson was a real filmmaker or Rob Schow a real producer they would both know that advertising is the biggest first impression to make or break your show. I went and watched the Butch Pal teaser videos (if one can even call them that) and I was immediately disgusted. While, yes they had a clear picture, someone in charge of directing the editing process decided it wiuld be a good idea to use a camera shutter effect.

Now if you know anything abiut film , youd know that things like camera shutter and active zoom not only drastically reduce the production value of your show, but it also is unpleasant to look at and leads the target audience to believe that that WILL BE the show quality.

So far not so good, I cant seem to find a single reason that the money was REQUIRED for the show. Yes, putting up a donation page for support and better equipment would be good, but the money doesnt seem to have gone toward anything that couldve had a cheap to no cost alternative.

Whether or not the show comes out, asking money for support is not a bad thing. However, Ally Johnson decided to take peoples money to pay her ACTORS when she could have had a completely free show.

Sounds pretty scammy to me, but I digress.

I also wanted to talk about the BIG BAD SITUATION.

If you don't already know, Ally Johnson and her big bad Butch Pal team decided to threaten a teenager with suing them for defamation after they publicly stated thinking the kickstarter was a scam.

While suing for defammation is a legal action that can be taken, these cases are only about 13% successful. Federal Law constitutes defammation as fraudulent spoken or written word that brings about hate to a victim, or ruins that persons reputation in some way. The reason many of these cases fail is because the United States Constitution protects the freedom to speak your opinion about a subject or person.

Any self respecting producer, filmmaker, director, et cetera would also know that THREATENING TO SUE A TEENAGER is something that hurts your reputation not only as a person but as a professional or even amateur director.

If Rob Schow WAS an actual producer, he would have told Ally Johnson to leave it alone.

Furthermore, if Ally Johnson WAS a professional voice over artist (as she claims to be) she should know the first rule any acting teacher teaches you is accepting criticism and not letting it get to you.

Scammers (and I mean all of them) often have a defense tactic against those who call them out as scammers. Anyone wanna guess what it is?

Big companies like to use this threat against kids because what are they gunna do? Do you think a kid or teenager really thinks they can win a court case against an adult?

Butch Pal for the Straight Gal is a show run by horrible people who are disguising themselves as professionals.

Ps: if for whatever reason Ally Johnson or Rob Schow see this and wanna threaten me, here's a few things to know.

1) I've been in the film game for 9 years now.

2) I work for myself. You cant get me blacklisted or fired.

3) Ive faced much worse legal action from much bigger teams.

You're fighting in my arena and I'm not scared of you.

[tohrusthoughts]

Entitlement.

The problem with social media and game development is that in the beginning of all this.

People made games and design choices with a through abd through complete package. Yes. Developers made games so that people can enjoy them to the fullest. But it was done in the sense of a novel or a movie.

Once it came out. And experienced it was already out. There was no changing, there was no listening to fan feedback or social justice mediocrity. That was to be adjusted and adapted and made better in the sequel or the next game by the developer.

You can't please everyone, it isnt even fucking quantifiable to attempt it. But you could attempt to make the best product possible and see your intended story and character development through and through with the use of an interactive medium and a type of experience that is impossible to get with anything else.

Now. With the abillity to interact with developers and content creators on easily accesible platforms. The idea is that we can give them feedback on things were looking forward to or would like to see happen. What ideas are good, what ideas are bad.

The innate problem is how oppinionated human beings are. Every single individual believes that the way they see things is the only singular way to view an outlook over design. And some people can share this "singular outlook." Collaborate the notion with no challenging approach or alternative perspective. What they intially see and or think is the only way....cause they didn't like it.

This negative outlook will continously be reinforced either by lack of desire or more commonly by other people who are similiar minded and just go "Yeah thats right! Fuck this thing I don't like it."

Well let me be real with you for a second.

I don't care.

The developers shouldn't care.

No one. Should care that you don't like a design choice or a storypath that you disagree with or don't like.

The reason I state this is as entertainment goes. You're developing a product. Whether its niche or not it fits a specific style and audience. This is defined by genres.

People who like rpg's more often then not, don't like shooters or action games. (Or atleast not in the same way as you can like multiple genres). The point of mentioning this is that when formulating a product within a genre it follows a set of mediums and thoroughfares that fit into that genre as all of these things have been predefined at this point with tropes and junk.

And secondly(but technically more importantly) they follow the creator/developers vision. Their storylines, character concepts, gameplay types, etc. etc. Its their individual vision and ideas become realities.

Not.

Yours.

You didnt make it.

You in fact didn't have anything to do with it.

At best you are exactly as intended a fan.

Fans when it comes down to the bare basics. Do not get to decide what a developer should and should not do with their vision. Whether you as the individul, as the fan, as a collective, or alone like it or hate it with every fiber of your being.

When it comes down to it. Truthfully. Even as a fan and something happens within a medium or a product you just, barebones morally disagree with. Stop supporting it. Move on.

What you shouldn't do. I want to say can't but thats never gonna be the case at this point....shouldn't do is harass, be vile, or hateful, send death threats or the worse style of harassment to people who

A. do enjoy these choices and can find some sense of joy or fun from the product.

Or worse B. do this to the developers.

Telling someone they should go die because of blah and blah is flat morally wrong and makes you a shit person and not worthy of an ear to listen to.

And No. you can't call blabbering like a child over your distaste as criticism.

Criticism is analytical, constructive in both postive and negative and has a purpose of creating a better product.

If social media worked like this towards developers and content creators it would be ok I like to think.

But its not. And we're not going to pretend it is.

I look at development in video games and anime as a hobby. I don't work in the industry but i throughoughly love watching creativity unfold.

And please believe me not all of it I find positive. In fact its a healthy middle of both. Somethings I get really excited about. "Oh thats really cool." Somethings its like...."Why?"

Investigate the reasoning and decisions, and decide for myself whether or not i wanna continue to support or be a fan.

Easy example. Any game that has lootbox styled orientation mechanics in anything. I will never buy. Something that has happened to many of franchise I have loved. But once it happened. It didn't matter that I was a fan. It dont agree with that concept as a gamer. I moved on.

And when talking about these games that has had this happened to them. I explain my choices. i won't support it and let others decide for themselves. But my money will never touch that product.

But this is where the real issue lies.

Fandoms.

Fandoms as a collective tend to think products belong to fans.

But they don't.

The only people who can lay claim is the people that made it. Full stop.

Right now. Which is what started this rant few will fully read, are complaining about the redesign of Sheila from the Spyro trilogy remakes.

Why?

She went from a bald kangaroo to a kangaroo with red hair. And she looks more feminine.

Feminity is not a negative. Girls can be the typical style of feminine if they choose to be. They can also choose to be butch, androgyness, or anything else. None of those are negative character archetypes but its not we "want" so we make them negative....and thats not only the wrong way to look at it but wrong in general.

What I wanna describe it personally as they added visually a fully realizied characterization. Which is what they've been doing with every single redesign. From her to the dragons.

Hell all the dragons went from generic pallet swaps of the same model to fully fleshed out visually. None of them even remotely similiar to the original designs.....AT ALL!!!!

So why is this ok for them and not her?

She looks like she has a ridiculously tiny waist now and they're sexualizing her.

Ok?

I don't get the sexulization argument. Cause i've looked at this same image. I am attracted to females. I like furry characters. I took one look at Sheila's redesign and went "oh hey thats a lot more vibrant visually contextulizes the character better. Why'd they change the eye color tho? The original i think was better."

Yes..that was it the eye color was the only thing worth noting that was upsetting in the slightest.

Annnnnd then I moved on. Still hyped for the game. It wasn't a huge deal, and even if it was. whats my options harass a developer....nah man don't buy it.

I didn't design it. Nor do I work.on the staff that is developing it.

My opinion on it regardless has no trinsical value one way or the other.

Cont.....one post up.

[imaginationstimulation]

He cupped the two halves of my tush and spoke directly to them. “Run away with me, girls,” he whispered. “She doesn’t understand our love.”

I lay still, staring out the window, letting them have their time together. If I protested, I’d only make his case stronger: I’m less fun than my own butt. Which is not untrue. In my essence, I am a stone, unmoving for ten thousand years, unless picked up and moved. It’s not just sex; I find this whole experience—life—gratuitously slow and drawn out. See it crawl, second by fucking second. If I’m a workaholic, it’s only because I hate work so much that I’m trying to finish it, all of it, once and for all. So I can just ride out the rest of my life in some kind of internal trance state. Not a coma but, like, a step above that.

Our son, Sam, trotted in sleepily, and I warned him not to get in the bed: “It’s all bloody.” Alex quietly removed his hands from my body; he hadn’t noticed that I was bleeding. Sam pulled back the sheets and studied the mess, smiling giddily. “You got your period.”

“Yes.”

“You said it was coming soon and you were right!”

“Yep.”

This new generation of men has been taught (by me) to feel excited about the menstrual cycle. It’s like tadpoles turning into frogs or the moon that follows them wherever they go. I’ve been waiting a long time to have my period cheered on. More and more women my age have given up on our men and are getting together with millennials, youngsters raised by women who were born in the sixties, rather than the forties. I hear it’s great. Not a lot of hangups. But that isn’t an option for me because I need a man with a historical perspective that encompasses my whole lifetime. If anything, I regret not having met Alex sooner. If we had met at my birth and I had been able to assess how narcissistic my parents were, I could have left the hospital with Alex and got started on our relationship immediately. He would have been eight years old—young, but not too young to keep me alive. I need that in a man.

Sometimes my love for him is so intense that I want to crawl inside his body. I want him to be pregnant with me and never give birth, just hold me in. At other times, I wonder, Who is that guy? And why is he in my house? When I get that look on my face, he sticks out his hand and says, “Hi, I’m Alex. Your husband.”

Sam used his small pointing finger to tap each old bloodstain on the sheet; they dated back more than a decade, a disgusting constellation. It was one of those things you didn’t notice until suddenly you did. Like ants. Like everything.

I dressed and brushed my teeth. If I went to the mall immediately and got a new sheet, then the chore wouldn’t have time to gather weight. Once a task goes on the to-do list it settles in, grows roots—the trick is to preëmpt that. I could get a tent light while I was there. We were going camping the next weekend with another family, although unfortunately I wasn’t sure I would be able to join. Too much work to do.

“I can get new sheets,” Alex said, slowly climbing out of bed, limb by limb. Sam asked if we would be watching TV today, yes or no.

“Not sheets—just one fitted sheet. There’s only one place that sells Cariloha-brand California-king sheets individually. What is it?”

“Macy’s?”

“Nope.”

“Amazon?”

“Definitely no. I told you about my bad experience—”

“You did. I forgot.”

Bedding is an unregulated corner of Amazon, where companies charge radically different prices for the same bad sheets. You can’t even get nicer sheets by paying more—money has no meaning there. And don’t bother typing in words like “Egyptian cotton” or “thread count”—you’re just offering them more precise ways to bamboozle you. Get up, find your keys and your purse, and go outside. I hate it as much as anyone, but sometimes you just have to.

My plan was to park on the street and walk into the mall, get the sheet, and go. By not parking in the parking garage, I would outwit the psychology of the mall designers who wanted you to sever ties with the outside world. But walking in off the street was disorienting. I entered through Bloomingdale’s and had to wade through the store; it was like pushing through coats to enter Narnia. Once I made it into the mall, I had no idea where I was. It took me a long time even to find a map, then I traced my finger back and forth between You Are Here and the Low Cost Luxury Sheets Kiosk to memorize my path. The man standing next to me took a picture of the map and then trekked on, studying his phone. Pretty clever. As I walked, I glanced sideways at his tan, brawny body and floppy brown hair, just to confirm. Yes. He was a famous person. An actor. Or maybe a hotelier. Maybe this was André Balazs or whatever his name was. No, an actor. Electricity revved through my veins for no particular reason, just as a courtesy to his stature. I kept an eye on him as I walked toward the sheet kiosk, bracing myself for the moment when he would peel off in another direction. But he didn’t; we continued walking alongside each other, and I began to feel that we were together. And he kept looking at me, out of the corner of his eye. This couldn’t be true but it was. Somewhere between BabyGap and Lady Foot Locker the tables had turned. Now he recognized me.

I was twenty-two when the video was shot. I needed quick money so I could get out of a bad relationship—not a lot, just first and last and a security deposit. I couldn’t admit my plight to my parents, because I had already done this and they had written me a check, with great relief, and that was what my quasi-abusive boyfriend and I had been living off for the past six months. He had come up with the ploy.

“Make it sound bad but not too bad. Don’t say I hit you. Say I threw a chair at you or something.”

“You did throw a chair at me.”

“Obviously I wasn’t fully serious when I did that.”

I felt obligated to stay until my parents’ money ran out, since asking for it had been his idea. Then he punched not my face but the wall right next to my face and I had to move very quickly from terror to concern and rush him to the emergency room, where a young, temporary doctor said that we could either wait four hours for the real doctor to arrive and fix the bone in my boyfriend’s hand or let him “have a go.” The temporary doctor high-fived me after he’d popped the bone back in.

The next morning, I woke up early and walked down to the cluster of newspaper boxes in front of the old people’s bar, and discreetly pulled out the sex-themed paper. I’d always known that this option would be there for me if I really needed it. Just as my parents were there if I really needed them, except for this one time.

I chose the job that seemed to offer the most money for a one-time deal. I thought that they would shoot it in a hotel but it happened in an apartment, on an old couch. I wasn’t directed so much as given a series of props to make my way through, like an obstacle course. A turquoise Teddy bear, a pillow, an empty beer bottle, a metal bowl. Not everything was clear to me (the bowl), but I was too nervous to speak; I just laughed again and again to demonstrate consent. My biggest fear was that one of these men, the man with the lights or the cameraman, would misinterpret my nervousness and halt everything, shutting down the set on the ground that I was being objectified against my will. At that age, I assumed that everyone, deep down, was a feminist. So one had to be careful not to trigger feminism where one didn’t want it.

I was waiting for a costume, something black and sexy or pink and trashy that would help catapult me out of myself. Instead, a man with a baseball cap, who was maybe the director, just said, “O.K., we’re rolling.” I was in shorts, a T-shirt, and sandals. I looked down at my shirt. It was from a sushi restaurant in my home town, but if you just glanced at it you might think it was racist, because of the fake Asian lettering. I imagined thousands of viewers waiting for this racist girl to get herself off. I quickly undressed and made a scissors gesture to the camera to indicate that this first part, the part with the racist shirt, should be cut. No one acknowledged this suggestion, so I rubbed against the Teddy bear, and rode the big pillow. I held the bowl, uncertain, and then set it aside. I put the beer bottle into my vagina. With all this moving around, it was impossible to become even slightly turned on—back then I had to shut my eyes and make my body completely stiff to generate any feeling. But no one said anything until after I had heaved my last fake orgasmic sigh.

“O.K., we got that,” a woman with a clipboard said. The man in the baseball cap gave me a firm nod, like a satisfied coach. I understood then that the five-hundred-and-fifty-dollar fee was not the price of my beauty or my sex appeal; it was my naïveté that I’d sold. Every person, no matter how plain, has one great erotic performance in her—the one in which she doesn’t know what she’s doing and is desperately trying to save her life. A second performance would be a copy of the first, which would require skills I didn’t have.

My face wasn’t anywhere you could see it unless you entered a credit-card number and clicked past dozens of professionals—“college beauties,” “hot Korean girl,” and so on. But a few people made it through the gauntlet. The first time I was recognized was at a healthy-Mexican restaurant; a pale man in gym clothes stared at me for a long time before making a scissors gesture in the air. It was electrifying, as if all my clothes had fallen off at once. I looked away but there was no denying our intimacy; he’d come while watching me. The next one was a father with his family; he scissored his fingers down low, surreptitiously. The last was a butch lesbian teen-ager; she just walked right up to me and asked. Each time, I’d hurry home and enter my credit-card number, clicking quickly past the college beauties and the hot Korean girl. Though I’d felt nothing at the time, seeing myself through these people’s eyes was profound and overwhelming. I’d cry out with abandon; my body would shake and shiver as I came. Then I’d sleep, immediately, for at least two hours.

The video shoot became the central sexual experience of my life; to this day, I can’t orgasm unless I imagine that I’m the pale man, the dad, or the young lesbian watching it, sometimes all of them together, crowded around one computer screen. I’m them, I’m me, I’m them, I’m me, I come. I showed it to each boyfriend I had after that, to blow their minds but also to explain my sexual orientation; I was oriented around myself in that video and anyone who’d seen it. There was only one boyfriend I didn’t tell. He was a very classy man, emotionally speaking, and I didn’t want to give him any indication of basket-casery. After I married him, I kept meaning to bring it up, to draw him into the fold of my sexuality, such as it was. But I waited too long; we were so close now. And after the butch lesbian there was a lull, a seventeen-year lull, in which no one recognized me.

I arrived at the Luxury Sheets Kiosk and the brawny man with floppy brown hair idled a few feet away, trying to decide what to do. The scissoring gesture didn’t seem to occur to him. I ran my hand over the sheets while the cashier rang up a tall woman who kept adding one more thing. His eyes met mine, and I gave him a secret little smile. Truth is, I wanted to collapse with relief. Though a lot had happened in the past seventeen years—marriage, a child, my career—it was suddenly clear to me that I’d only been going through the motions, an exhausting simulation. I wasn’t a stone. I was one of life’s biggest fans, the best example of a living thing. The amateur sex video was like a seed I had planted in my youth; it would always sustain me. Not financially but by sending me these messengers when I was most in need. My blood moved around in my body; I felt the purpose of every muscle. I was ready to dance. And just then a beat began, so I rocked my hips and pressed my wrists together, swinging them like a girl in bondage who nonetheless wanted to party. The beat ended abruptly; it was the tall woman’s ringtone.

“Hello?” she answered impatiently; she had enough going on with all these sheets. I couldn’t believe I’d danced to her ringtone. Maybe it was O.K. Who knows? Who can really see themselves? He was approaching. He was nearly beside me, his face open with surprise. I opened myself, too.

“You’re my neighbor,” he said.

“In what sense?” I said, my eyes twinkling.

“Well, in the sense that I live in the house next door to yours.”

“The house on the corner?”

“Yeah, it’s a duplex. We live in the apartment that faces Amador Street.”

“Oh. Do you park on Amador?” I was bringing up parking just to hurt myself. I hated this conversation.

“I park on Amador and my wife parks in the garage,” he said. “Although lately we’ve been trying to ride our scooters more. I’m Joel.”

I thought about bringing up my husband, tit for tat, but I was too tired. The previous few seconds had taken everything out of me. We parted, saying that we would definitely see each other soon, ha-ha.

I drove the long way around the block to avoid Amador Street on my way home. I parked and turned off the car. It was hot but I left my seat belt on, folded my hands in my lap, and took some slow breaths. Before Joel, I had still believed I could be recognized. Now I knew I was too old. How do you mourn that kind of loss? It just pulls your whole life down. My phone rang: Alex.

“Are you home?”

“Yes. I’m in the driveway.”

“Yeah, we heard you drive up. You coming in?”

“In a sec. I need to pour my heart out to someone so I can be empty and unburdened when I come inside.”

I waited for him to say, “You can pour your heart out to me,” but he was quiet and we got off the phone. He never takes the bait. Which is good. It teaches me to be more direct in asking for what I need. Or does it? So far it hadn’t.

We’d been tunnelling toward each other for years. It was hard work, but the assumption was that eventually our two tunnels would connect. We’d break through—Hallelujah! Clay-encrusted hands finally seizing each other!—and we would be together, really together, for the remaining time that we were alive. So long as we both dug as hard and as fast as we could, everything would work out. But, of course, neither of us knew for sure how the other person’s digging was going. One of us might have been doggedly tunnelling toward the other person, while the other person was curling away in another direction. That person might not even have been aware of how off course he or she was. One of us might have tunnelled straight down for a few weeks, in anger, and then tried to get back on track, but now honestly had no idea where to go. We might break through—Hallelujah!—only to find that we were seizing the dirty hands of a stranger. What to do then? Or we might simply get tired, and stop digging, decide that here was good enough. All the while saying things like “We must be getting close!” and “I can’t wait until the day finally comes!” We might never meet up at all; we might die before it happened. Or worse: maybe there had never been any hope of our meeting up, because what was that even a metaphor for? Oneness? A child’s dream of love? I got out of the car and went inside, carrying the new fitted sheet and the tent light.

The next weekend, I was unfortunately not able to go on the camping trip. I stood in the driveway and waved goodbye to Alex and Sam, tearful for no reason. Then I went inside and walked around the house, room by room, looking at all our stuff through the judgmental eyes of a monk or a nun. I did my work, very slowly, over the course of the day. At 8 p.m. I started watching TV and at 2 a.m. I turned out the light. Then the earthquake happened.

I flew out of bed and moved down the hallway like a person on a wobbly rope bridge. I lurched out the back door and along the side of the house to the sidewalk. The shaking stopped. The street lights were off, no moon. Car alarms were beeping in syncopation. A huge branch was draped across my car. Someone was standing on the corner, waving. It was Joel. I had successfully avoided interaction all week. Now I ran to him through the dark.

“I didn’t get my shoes!” I yelled dumbly, as the pavement trembled again.

Joel thought it was safest to stay outside; I thought so, too—less stuff to be trapped under if it fell. He called his wife, who was in Sun Valley, Idaho. I didn’t call Alex, since I was safe and a middle-of-the-night call is always alarming. Joel’s earthquake-survival kit was more elaborate than ours; we spread out high-tech blankets and pillows on the lawn on his side of the duplex and lay down, waiting for dawn.

Once the car alarms had been silenced, the night was strangely quiet. The freeways were almost empty. Without the lights or the hum of cars, the sky took its place as the foremost thing. Joel and I stared up at it—an enormous gray arena we could fly around in just by lying there.

“Looking at the sky should be a ride at Disneyland,” Joel said.

This was such an accurate way to describe it. I thought about the accuracy for two or three minutes and then said, “Yeah.” We squinted at our houses in the dark and saw that they were leaning; they had shifted. I thought we’d probably move, rather than repair ours; Joel’s was a rental, so he said they’d move for sure. Maybe to Ireland. I said we’d probably move to Ireland, too. The chances seemed high that we would be neighbors again, in Ireland. We scooted toward each other, for warmth, and when I turned on my side Joel spooned me, very innocently. All bodies were good, I realized. Joel’s stocky form beside me was unfamiliar, but good. Hugging. It hit me like a ton of bricks. Hugging was so moving, so basic. Why had I ever taken pride in not being a “hugger”? Two people embracing was the very building block of life.

“Hugging is the building block of life,” I whispered. Joel was quiet and this was exactly right; more words would just take away. I pressed my hand against the lawn, palming the whole earth like a gigantic basketball. Warm tears ran into the hair at my temple, one after another after another. Hello, stranger, I thought. And by “stranger” I meant not Joel but myself. My blood moved around in my body. I felt the purpose of every muscle. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t seen the video.

When I awoke, it was light out and I was lying with the next-door neighbor on his lawn. I could tell right away that our houses were fine. It took only fifteen minutes to straighten up the books and the dishes that had fallen. The earthquake had been big, but no one was saying that it was “the big one.” When Alex and Sam got home, I told a story about hiding under the dining-room table. Our earthquake, the one that Joel and I had survived, was private. I friended him on Facebook the next day and we started e-mailing. Mostly we wrote about details from that night—the silence, the sky, how time had seemed to stretch out. I didn’t have any specific or adulterous plans; I was just wholly open. I saw us going on a road trip. Or maybe taking ayahuasca and throwing up in buckets. His penis was moving in and out of me most of the time. Sometimes I made it very small, like a finger, so that it wouldn’t distract me too much as I worked or emptied the dishwasher. Just a little thrusting tick-tock that drowned out the real sound of time: 7 a.m., 4 p.m., 6 p.m., the most brutal of time’s representatives, but hardly the whole battalion.

I was waiting for Joel’s response to my last e-mail when Alex and I stumbled on him, almost literally. We were coming home from a date night; Joel and his wife were lying on their lawn, staring up at the evening sky. They’d brought out the same pillows and blankets, and a bottle of wine. It was adorable in a way that people like us find cloying, so Alex raised his eyebrows at me before calling out to them.

“Sorry! We usually park farther up but the trash cans are out.”

“No, no,” Joel said, rising to his feet. “We’re good.” He swept his hand toward their reënactment. “It’s a lot more fun without all the shaking!” His wife raised her glass toward me and smiled; she knew the whole story. Alex nodded, cocking his head curiously in my direction. I stared at the familiar blue geometric pattern of the pillowcases. Joel had taken the exquisite energy of our experience and plowed it back into his marriage. How wise. This option had never occurred to me. I had always detonated each thing in the very place where I found it.

Even after I acknowledged that I hadn’t hidden under the dining-room table as I said I had, Alex was still confused. We’d been reading in bed for less than thirty seconds when he started up with the questions again.

“It’s just so unlike you. You hate camping.”

“I know. It was an extreme situation.”

“And you’ve never once said hi to the neighbors.”

“And I still don’t want to! Joel is a completely uninteresting person.” This was now true again.

I turned out my light. He left his light on and lay next to me, waiting. Leaving a space for my confession. I had done nothing. Nothing! My heart pounded nonetheless, the dumb beast. Just as I started to roll over, Alex turned to me and used his big hands to pull all my hair back, stretching my face into surprise. He held me like this, studying my posture of alarm, then let go abruptly and fell onto his back in frustration. We embarked on a silence. It grew and grew until it was a sort of god that we could only submit to. After fifteen or twenty minutes I almost giggled—somebody say something!—and then I realized with horror that he was probably asleep. This wasn’t our silence; it was mine alone. I lay paralyzed as it hollowed and darkened, expanding in every direction with a familiar cruelty. Hello, stranger. Once, many years ago, Alex had saved me from this black hole with the kind of understanding that makes everything else in life possible. Even ingratitude.

He shifted under the covers and I held my breath. If he was awake, I would try. If he was asleep, I would sleep, too, and probably forget to try, or forget that it mattered, or what I meant by try. Try to be brave.

“Are you awake?” I whispered.

“Wide awake.”

I sat up and told the story of the video, starting with my quasi-abusive boyfriend and ending with meeting the neighbor twice. Alex was mostly quiet, only asking a few questions (“What was the bowl for?”). I left out the hugging and the e-mailing and the tick-tocking tiny penis, but, still, when I was finished he silently walked out of the room. I took a breath and held it. I had made a terrible mistake. Why had I done this? My mind stopped, poised to shatter.

Then he came back, holding his computer. He solemnly opened it in front of me, like a violin case before a maestro. I typed in the URL. The Web site looked a little different, but the major landmarks were still there.

“You need a credit card to get to it.”

He left and came back with his wallet. He typed in his credit-card number and I clicked around. I wasn’t sure where to go because the college beauties and the hot Korean girl were gone. It was all new girls. They looked extremely young. I scrolled in a daze. Brunette. Underage. Small tits. I stopped clicking.

“When was the last time you saw it?” Alex said quietly.

“I don’t know. I have it pretty memorized so I don’t need to. . . . Not since we’ve been together.”

“Oh. I think they update . . . you know, just . . . for the viewers.”

It seemed obvious now that they wouldn’t still have a video from the nineties.

“Yeah, of course. I just thought maybe they had a section for . . . alumni or . . . I don’t know.”

I shut the computer. It was too bad. Really too bad. How bad? The consequences would be enormous, I felt.

Alex was in the kitchen now, opening cupboards.

He came back with a Teddy bear, an empty beer bottle, and a bowl. He picked up his pillow and pulled the comforter aside, arranging everything along the foot of the stripped bed.

“I can’t re-create it, if that’s what you’re thinking. It was true amateur porn, not fake.”

“I understand—the real deal.”

“The people who saw it . . . they were really overcome by it. It was their top video to watch, porn-wise.”

As we talked, Alex seemed to be riding the pillow slightly, maybe unconsciously.

“You’re talking about the pale man—”

“The pale man, the dad, and the butch girl. Yes.”

Now he was rubbing the Teddy bear against his crotch. He slid off his boxer shorts. Well. Well, now. I sat back. He was very much an amateur. He didn’t know what he was doing and he was desperately trying to save his life. I’d never seen him move his hips like that. It was funny, or no, actually not funny, just disorienting, slightly grotesque. He picked up the beer bottle, and, after a moment of honest hesitation, sucked its mouth and then—I reached under my nightgown—began slowly working it into himself. I had never wanted to see this, but I came immediately, and hard. He brought himself to the end of the show, manually. I held my breath, waiting for him to come on the new sheet. I’d have to wash it again. Who cares? I do. Just a little. Just enough to ruin each day. And then, with a swift and professional gesture, he grabbed the bowl and came into it. That was what the bowl was for. ♦

Published in the print edition of the

September 4, 2017

, issue.

Miranda July

is a filmmaker, an artist, and the author of five books. Her latest movie, “Kajillionaire,” will be released in September.

[saltyace-defunct]

A (Somewhat) In Depth Analysis On Why (And How) Danny Phantom Should Go Ghost Again

Part One - Three Possibilities

There are three possibilities as to what is going on with all the hype surrounding the return of Danny Phantom, and these can be simplified as the “good,” the “bad,” and the “ugly.”

The good option, which I personally believe is the least likely, is that Nickelodeon HAS greenlit a fourth season, and we just don't know about it yet because it's so early in production. If this is the case then we probably won't see any news or promos until at least 2018, seeing as how the hype train really got its start around August 24, 2016, when Butch uploaded a video called “Danny Phantom 10 Years Later” and the green light would have happened not long after that. Again, this seems extremely unlikely, but if it's true, then Butch has been doing a good job building up hype while keeping it a secret.

The bad option, which will be the main focus of this post (and also isn’t so bad), is that as much as Butch wants to bring the show back, Nickelodeon isn’t so keen on the idea, and that's why he’s turned to the fandom to build up hype, and THEN maybe Nick will listen.

The ugly option is… Well, it’s ugly. I hate that this is even a possibility, but as I’ve stated before, the good option is the least likely, making this one a decent possibility. Maybe there are no plans to #goghostagain at all, and the hype is all just a ploy to rake in the views and attention. Maybe it's all just one big promotion for Bunsen Is A Beast (which by the way I think is a sub-par show, but I'll get to that later). It’s disappointing to think about, but if it is the case, then here's what I have to say: Butch, you are better than this. If you aren't serious about this, then don't go around trying to get people excited for something that doesn't exist. Please and thank you.

Part Two - Forget The Hype

I wouldn't be surprised or upset if nothing ever came out of all this hype, but since we’ve come this far we might as well take the extra step to convince Nickelodeon this is a good idea. Of course, there's not a whole lot the fans can do to sway the opinions of the executives, and at this rate we’re DEFINITELY not going anywhere. Most of what I've seen has been “I love this show so you should bring it back” with no other reasoning. It's all based on pathos with little to no logos or ethos, and that's what I'm hoping to make up for with this analysis. There are plenty of reasons for Danny Phantom to get a fourth season, it's just a matter of letting them be heard through the multitude of YouTube videos saying “Look, Butch said this one thing this one time!! Season 4 confirmed!!!! I am so HYYYPE!!!1!!!!1!”

Part Three - The Passage Of Time

Like many good shows, it ended too early. Apparently the ratings were a bit too low for Nick’s liking, so they told Butch to find a way to end it. (I don't have a very good source, so if you can find one with real numbers and add it in, that would be great.) This is a common trend. Good shows don't get the advertising and promotion they deserve because the network wants to spend more time on their cash cows like SpongeBob and Teen Titans Go, and then the good shows get cancelled because, “Well no one was watching it, so it's not worth keeping, right?” Then, as the years go by, more and more people find the show and say “Why was it cancelled? It’s so good!” The good news here is that if an old show comes back with a much larger and stronger fanbase, it will do really well! Unfortunately there is one problem with the way the fans will probably watch it, and that is the internet. After watching the original episodes online, that's the way they’re probably going to expect to continue watching them. This was a HUGE problem with The Legend Of Korra! (Again, source needed) So I guess this is more of a message to the fans than the executives: Watch the show on the TV, or AT LEAST set it to record!

Another problem that The Legend Of Korra had (it's really only a problem in the eyes of the execs) is that the audience was mostly adults and older teens. You know, the people who either 1) Where the same people who originally watched The Last Airbender and are now a bit older, 2) Were old enough to use the internet in a way that allowed them to find ATLA in the first place, or 3) Are the type of people who enjoy more in-depth, plot-driven, mature-themed shows. I think that the third option is what networks like Nick, CN, and Disney are most afraid of when it comes to choosing which shows to pick up and air. These channels are supposed to be for kids, right? Well, first of all, these networks are wrong to think that kids can't enjoy more complex shows than SpongeBob or that the most important thing in determining a show's worth is how much money it brings in, but I digress. Instead, I’d like to talk about how Nickelodeon SHOULDN'T worry about having a repeat of TLOK if they were to continue Danny Phantom.

Part Four - Plot And Audience

Unlike the Avatar series, which were extremely plot-driven and weren’t afraid to get a bit dark, Danny Phantom is a lot more episodic in nature. Now, if it were too episodic, then I probably wouldn't be arguing for it to come back. I mean, I love My Life As A Teenage Robot, but there’s no real reason for it to come back other than the usual “This is one of my favorite childhood shows! Why did it have to end?” You see, Danny Phantom had a nice balance of episodic plot vs overall plot that made for a great show for kids and teens alike. If it were to come back using the original formula, it would probably do really well with the “intended” audience of preteens. Hardcore fans (the ones who have been begging for a fourth season ever since it ended) might have mixed reactions, though. It all depends on the direction the show goes.

Again, the original formula will work, but what exactly should the plot be? Should there be a time skip or not? These are all questions that I’ll talk a little bit more about later, but ultimately can not answer. The biggest question that I CAN answer, though, is should it cater more towards the new preteens audience or the older, hardcore fans? The answer is a resounding “HARDCORE FANS!!!” We KNOW there are plenty of things that were planned that didn't make it in, and we want to see them happen in a way that satisfies our nostalgia and our (slightly) older tastes. I personally think that even though the episodic nature works from a business standpoint, this continuation should have just a little bit more of an overarching plot. Just a little bit.

Part Five - Butch’s Other Shows

I don't want to dwell on this topic too long, but it's important enough that it's worth mentioning.

Fairly Odd Parents: To put it bluntly, it's dying. We could talk about how Sparky and Chloe are terrible characters, but there's no point because the whole show has been moved to NickToons. It's the channel where Nickelodeon shows go to die, and as unfortunate as it is that FOP has been drawn out to the point that the original fans don't like it anymore, soon enough it will get low enough ratings that it will finally be cancelled. Rip

TUFF Puppy: I didn't really watch this show, but from what I've seen and heard, it's not that great. I mean, it's not horrible, but it just doesn't have a whole lot going for it that makes it worthwhile to talk about. It ended in 2015, so whatever.

Bunsen Is A Beast: This is another show that I haven't seen a whole lot of, and I don't really want to. I feel that even though it has a good message of being inclusive and stuff, it doesn't really go about it in a unique way. You know what show has a similar setup of a character from another dimension going to a human school but is actually good? Star vs the Forces of Evil. I know I'm not the intended audience for Bunsen, so I'm not really in a position to complain, but between it's obnoxious loudness, ugly characters, and seemingly random-for-the-sake-of-random humor, it isn't as good as it could be. Don't get me wrong, I respect Butch for trying new character styles and whatnot, but it just isn't working.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is that there IS room for Danny Phantom to return. FOP is dying and it wouldn't hurt for Bunsen to die off as well. Good programing is what we should be after, not money makers.

Part Six - Questions And Suggestions

This is the part where I re-introduce the hype and fangirling. It’s not part of the main message that the show should come back, but it is important for the follow up question of how. So here are some important questions for Butch. *Takes a deep breath*

How will season 4 go? What’s the plot? Is it gonna pick up where it left off or will there be a time skip? How big of a time skip will it be? Will the intro be the same or will it be something new? What, if anything, will be retconned? What new characters will be introduced? When and how will Vlad return from space? Did Vlad meet Wheatley? Will Dark Danny make a return? Is Danielle gonna be adopted by the Fentons like you said? How are you gonna make up for the fact that the technology is so outdated? What about the Unworld and the Elsewhereness? What is the meaning of the universe??? *Incoherent screaming*

…I might have gotten a bit carried away just then.

Well, time to answer some of my own questions. I think that a decent sized time skip would be a great way to have the characters age with the show’s original audience, and it would also avoid any weirdness with the outdated technology. I’m not sure how big it should be, but 10 years does seem like a good benchmark number. If there is a time skip, this could also be a convenient excuse to brush over a lot of nothingness and say “It took Vlad [this long] to find a way to return, and now, after a long time of peace and quiet, the main antagonist is back to wreak some havoc.” Maybe the first episode of the new season could be a recap and summary of everything that happened between seasons 3 and 4, including an introduction to the new plot. There should be little to no retconning because this is a continuation, not a reboot. If something small needs to be changed to help the overall flow of the story, then so be it, but don’t go erasing the entire last episode just so Danny’s powers are still a secret or something like that. There should definitely be a new intro and theme song that are more related to the new story, even if there isn’t a time skip. The overarching plot should heavily focus on that Elsewhereness stuff mentioned in the video “Secrets of the Ghost Zone Revealed” and somehow include the conflict of ending up in the Unworld. As far as new characters go, I would much prefer to see older characters more in depth, but a few new villains couldn’t hurt. Dark Danny NEEDS to return because he’s my favorite character of all the one-off villains, he’s the only one with an entire two-part episode dedicated to him that basically ended with the promise of his return that never got the chance to happen. I only mention this guy above all the other villains because he’s my fave he is literally an alternate version of the main character. And if there is a 10 year time skip, then that would make Danny the same age as his evil counterpart and--

You know what? I could go on about this hours, but this post is already long enough as is, and I don’t want to turn it into a fanfiction. I think I’m going to leave this here for now and allow all of you to add on to it as you wish.

Part Seven - Sources???

    I’m really bad at including sources, so if any of you can find good and relevant ones for me, that’d be great. Just reblog this post and add them along with any other comments or theories you have related to the return of Danny Phantom. Let’s make this one big cluster of ideas, and hopefully we will one day see that our efforts have paid off.

[dannyphannypack]

Hey I've always enjoyed danny phantom (i even bought the complete series) but i was never in the fandom on tumblr. Do you think you could explain a few things for me? (If you have the time) can you explain the hate butch gets, trans danny, why everyone hates lost planet, and this war people talk about (i think it was within the fandom and a few years back, people talk about how it was the worst thing). I started getting into the fandom and I'm hella lost and maybe you can clear this up for me.

hoy boy, my friend, i had to pull out my laptop for this one. let’s see if i can help ease your confusion without typing ten pages of text.

- the phandom war/the hate butch getsbutch hartman has always had a hard time leaving his fans alone to discuss their headcanons and ships in peace. he’s a conservative christian, and therefore makes a lot of people angry when he invalidates/discredits their gay ships or trans headcanons. he’s very “this is my show and i’d like it if you didn’t stain it with your LGBT+ bullshit,” though he’d never say that out loud. so anyways, a little while ago (i don’t know the exact year) butch started talking to the phandom, discrediting their headcanons and ships, etc etc. it created a sort of rift in the phandom, with one side believing that whatever the creator says goes and the other side just really angry that butch stuck his foot out and tried to maneuver the phandom where he wanted them to go. fighting pursued. not sure how it ended, though. i do know, however, that a large reason why danny phantom fanfiction is largely angst/torture is because it was a nice inbetween for those that didn’t want to get involved with the fighting or for those who had their fluffy ship invalidated. fortunately, i wasn’t there for that whole escapade. recently, channelfrederator on youtube posted this video, and in it he goes out of his way to state that danny is the only boy wearing a tanktop in the pool scene in one episode because he burns easily, even though his shoulders and a bit of his chest are still showing, once again invalidating the trans danny headcanon (many of the people who consider trans danny as almost canon use that specific scene as proof, so you can understand the frustration that followed). everyone is just kinda generally mad at butch for a) supporting trump, b) discrediting headcanons, and c) not being a very good creator. the episodes that butch worked on for the show (namely season three) weren’t that good, and frankly, people think that danny phantom would be better off without butch. i kinda agree with them.

- trans dannyi kinda covered it in the above paragraph, but i’ll offer some more explanation here. basically, there’s many scenes that could be envisioned as proof of danny fenton being transgender. in the pool scene that i mentioned above, where he’s the only one wearing a tanktop, and in the same episode when he accidentally runs into the girl’s room, and in THE SAME EPISODE when paulina says “i’d tell you to go to the boy’s room, but i don’t think you’d qualify.” there’s another scene that sticks out specifically to me (and that i see floating around tumblr a lot) where danny tells desiree to get lost and she says something along the lines of “are you sure there is nothing you desire?” and reaches for his chest. immediately following that, danny gets suPer defensive, shouts “hey, get away!” and discovers he can shoot ectoplasmic blasts from his hands. there’s more proof, but i don’t think i need to get into it more. you’ll see tons of it here and there.

- phantom planetpoorly made. that’s all i can say about it. the show had so much more potential and the ending was, admittedly, a huge letdown. here’s a few things that i, personally, don’t like about the finale.

- when it starts, vlad’s ship or whatever blows up. and there’s fire. in space. there can’t be fire without oxygen that is not how science works oh no.

- hOW DANNY BECOMES HUMAN AGAIN MAKES NO SENSE WHATSOEVER ??? HE SHOULD BE FULL DEAD ??? also why did he give up so fast like “o shoot no one likes me let me just gET RID OF MY SUPER AWESOME GHOST POWERS!!! ok.

- why does vlad need more money he’s already the richest person in the world and like ,,, third world countries don’t have that much money to give calm down vladdy

- i can’t believe vlad liTERALLY launched himself off of a podium like “henlo i’m a ghost follow me” and people just went with it. what.

- hOW DANNY BECAME HALF GHOST AGAIN ALSO MAKES NO SENSE ??? also where’d his suit come from. was he wearing that under his clothes what. what.

there’s so much more, and for the full run-down on the disappointments of phantom planet, i’m going to point you toward my friend’s powerpoint. abby did a really good job explaining my frustrations.

- ship namesyou didn’t ask for this to be cleared up, but when i first joined the phandom, i was confused about the ship names. i’m going to list a few of the more popular ones below, but just ask if you have any confusions or would like to know a specific one ^.^- amethyst ocean // danny and sam- gray ghost // valerie and danny- pitch pearl // danny fenton and danny phantom- pompous pep // vlad and danny- savant par // tucker and danny

yeah, this kinda became an essay. it’s a large task, explaining the ins and outs of the phandom. if you have any more questions or would like to know more about any of the things i answered above, please feel free to ask (or message me, whichever you prefer)! i’m going to head off to bed now, but i hope i helped clear some things up for you. the phandom is, quite frankly, a confusing place.

(unedited)