#and queer history that I had no idea about previously

[gatheringbones]

[“In a 2019 tweet (since deleted), Twitter user Brooke wrote of ‘carving “trans” into every bone of my body so when they find my skeleton in two hundred years they don’t get too confused’. A reply parodied the response of an oblivious archaeologist: ‘We must be careful not to jump to conclusions about what these ancient carvings could have meant; This individual could have had a passion for mass transit, transcontinental travel, or a combination of poor spelling and a love of trance music’.

Every time I read jokes like this, I get a jolt of hurt and defensiveness: not all historians and academics are like that! I try so hard, every day, not to do the kind of history they’re talking about! And yet I can hardly blame these people for talking and writing the way they do. The fact is that the discipline of history is set up to erase queer lives, and particularly trans lives. We are expected to adhere to double standards of evidence, which encourage us to state with impunity that a historical figure was definitely cis, but to hedge with caveats the suggestion that they were maybe, possibly trans; to use phrases like ‘cross-dresser’ or ‘impersonator’ as if they’re neutral, and to write lengthy defences of ourselves if we decide to avoid them; to expect backlash from colleagues and reviewers if we choose to use any pronouns for a historical figure other than those associated with the gender they were assigned at birth; to say, like the caricatured archaeologist above, ‘We must be careful not to jump to conclusions’, even when the evidence for trans experience is actually abundantly conclusive. It hurts when people memeify the oblivious, transphobic ‘historian’, but it’s also not unfair of them to do it. History, while it may not perpetuate physical harm, still repeatedly enacts violence against trans lives in the past and the present. And it’s not the job of the communities we’ve hurt to give us the benefit of the doubt: it’s our job to convince them that historians can be different.

In this book, I’ve identified new ways, and new places, to look for trans history. I’ve argued for the presence of trans experience in histories of gender-nonconforming fashion; histories of gender-nonconforming performance; and histories of people taking on a social role that isn’t associated with the gender they were assigned at birth. I’ve shown that many trans histories are inextricable from histories of other experiences: the sexual, the intersex, the anti-patriarchal, the spiritual. I’ve argued both for acknowledging trans possibility in histories of widespread gender nonconformity that have previously been explained in other ways, and for understanding gendered histories on their own terms – including seeing them, where necessary, as both trans history and the history of other kinds of people and experiences.

In this last kind of history in particular, I’ve often been confronted by what writer and philosopher Hil Malatino (quoting fellow scholar Abram J. Lewis) calls the ‘irreducible alterity’ of people in the past: the fact that some histories of gender are not possible to map onto or relate to the way people experience gender today. Malatino characterises the acknowledgement of this ‘irreducible alterity’ as a form of care for those past people, an idea that speaks deeply to me. It struck me, when I first read it, how different this framing of ‘care’ was from the arguments historians more commonly make against describing people in the past as trans: that it is presentist, that it is anachronistic, that it inappropriately fixes past people in modern categories. These arguments have rarely seemed to me to come from a place of care for people in the past; instead their priority seems to be history or historiographical methodology as an abstract, faux-objective entity. Still more rarely do they seem to acknowledge the concurrent urgency of caring for people in the present: the people who are living now, experiencing and articulating their gender in manifold ways and drawing strength from the histories of people who have done the same. Might it not be possible to find ways of recognising the essential difference of people in the past – people who disrupted gender before we were trans – while simultaneously holding space for the feelings of identification with them held by people in the present, the people who are trans now?”]

kit heyam, from before we were trans: a new history of gender, 2022

[olderthannetfic]

https://olderthannetfic.tumblr.com/post/753295388848553984/thinking-the-progressive-pride-flag-is-ugly-is#notes

Bruh, I'm sorry but that reasoning does not hold up to any scrutiny if you even give a lick of care to learn the actual bullshit that goes on in queer sphere.

"(poc+trans) they’re marginalized even within the community,"

I'm a bisexual woman. I've been explicitly and blatantly excluded from queer and LGBT+ events when it came out I was 100% bisexual. Even at times where I had a woman as a partner. I've had to deal with accusations of being a predator from the lesbian community when dating lesbians, or "invading" lesbian spaces. I've dealt with accusations of transphobia for using the label bisexual, rather than "more inclusive" labels. I've been told to shut up when talking about my experiences as a bisexual woman, especially if it was me criticizing the behavior from the rest of queer spaces.

I've had to deal with being excluded from queer community events, helplines, or other resources for queer people because I was bisexual. Do not get me started on the times I was with a man, or male presenting partner. I've had to deal with people demanding that bisexuals get dropped from queer spaces, and that we should "choose a side" and that bisexuality doesn't exist.

And you know what? I know that the exact same shit happens to aces. In a slightly different coat of paint, but it nonetheless the same level of vitriol and exclusion happens on a constant basis. There's a reason why there's such a deep solidarity between aces and bis "It’s a flag that was created to draw attention to intra-community issues,"

It's a flag that pretends to draw attention to intra-community issues, but in reality only shines light on a tiny part, and in reality doesn't even do that well. I don't even think most people flying that flag have any idea as to the alleged specifics of why these designs were made. I've seen people throw out incredibly subjective and/or vague assumptions and assertions as to why they exist, while they're clearing doing guesswork.

It's not your accusation that people believe that the "progress pride flag is separating trans people and POC and acting like they weren’t previously included" it's that it feels incredibly shallow and ignorant of queer history, and queer POC history and racism-even from within queer POC spaces-.

It's the problem that people think that flying that flag while doing absolute fuck all to change the problems in queer communities is enough, intra-community also doesn't work if the communities represented don't also actively weed out their own problems. Don't add me I know about the NB-phobia, and inter-trans transphobia, "If you want to pass you're a traitor", dumbshit like "no rice or spice" shit from poc users on (certain) queer dating sites... That shit is and was never exclusive to white people.

The rainbow flag as a battleground for these issues feels cheap, shallow, and childish because it was never created to exclude or target a specific sexuality. It was always a symbol of togetherness and fighting for our rights and right to live. Then some people decided that the flag that always represented the message "We're standing together" suddenly doesn't represent that message anymore, not because the flag doesn't stand for togetherness or the message has changed. No, it's because some idiots completely unrelated to the flag and it's meaning are being terrible people. No, just because someone is queer doesn't mean they get to poison the well for all other queer people and rot the meaning of a flag that always was for everyone, or their actions suddenly get to smear that the meaning of the flag from the get go included everyone, black, white, asian, brown, fucking translucent, and was always meant to show solidarity between all the sexualities. We're standing together as queers, but that doesn't mean individual queers can't be shits all on their own.

At this point we should just slap a triangle on all the pride flags, the flags themselves have absolutely nothing to do with it, but at least we can pretend like it does something, because a few dingbats can't behave and happen to be #that-sexuality/genderID. Let's add a bi and ace triangle to the gay, lesbian and trans-flag. Add an extra trans triangle to the trans-flag, maybe the NB and bi flag as well.

You can have your progress pride flag. You can have your feel good messaging if that's what it takes. But for the love of the rainbow, stop pretending the flag is anything but a shallow way to show-off that you at least know the surface level issues in the queer community.

--

[waitmyturtles]

Turtles Catches Up With Old GMMTV: TharnType and Gray Areas Edition

[What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far. Today, I’ll cover the very controversial TharnType, Asian stereotypes towards queerness, and the very difficult gray areas on how this show has been interpreted by various populations over the last few years.]

TW: homophobic and derogatory ideas and language against the queer community. Critical commentary on TharnType and MAME. This review is NOT for you if you are a TharnType or MAME Big Fan.

(I want to give very special thanks to @so-much-yet-to-learn and @lurkingshan for reviewing previous versions of this post and offering the most insightful feedback I could ask for. Thank you both so much.)

Alright. Deep breaths.

TharnType was a necessary addition to the Old GMMTV watchlist. It was. I had to watch it, for:

- the tremendous IMPACT this show has had on BL culture, along with MAME’s continued influence on the genre;  - how this show affected shipper culture, and the rippling effects it’s had since then vis à vis MewGulf; - how this show continued to define “high heat” and “chemistry” in BL, and -- at least for me, possibly the most interesting point to needle on -- - what fans, ESPECIALLY the majority cishet fandom, are willing to compromise and/or equivocate on in regards to our values towards the queer community regarding what we consume in media, and how safe or unsafe it is for our queer family that this content exists in the first place.

I gotta say some stuff first before I get into this review. This is the worst show I’ve ever watched, in my own opinion. I offer this flag for MAME and TharnType fans in advance, as I get quite critical down below.

I am angry at this show, at MAME, at the BL industry for allowing this show to exist, and I unfortunately hold anger against Tee Bundit, who I know has since made shows, like Lovely Writer, that deeply criticized the BL industry (and I am enjoying his work now in Step By Step, even while I don’t hesitate to criticize it). ANYONE INVOLVED in the making of TharnType needs to hold personal and professional accountability for this show even existing. And I also think that fans need to hold THEMSELVES accountable if they defend it WITHOUT thinking about the long-term social implications of the existence of this show.

I want to also say that I need to check myself, OFTEN, as I write this, because I don’t want to be some fucking loudmouth, self-righteous ally-savior. I don’t. [My AMAZING drama friends, @lurkingshan​ and @bengiyo​, have held me down during this watch. (Friends. Thank you. Good LORD.)]

I want this review to be as fair as possible to the nostalgia of the moment that this show aired; to note that this show gave high heat, which fans clearly demanded, and IS a worthy component of some dramas if it works with the rest of what the show has to offer by way of writing; and to note that many fans saw a chemistry in MewGulf that they hadn’t seen previously. I especially note that there may be survivors of sexual assault who related to certain pieces of this show, particularly through Type’s lens and his own anger.

With that very long introduction, I will note that I’m not going to talk too much about the show details itself. I don’t need to unwind on plot. For me -- FOR ME -- the show’s plot was problematic. 

2019: earlier that year, before TT aired, you had He’s Coming To Me, which was BURIED by GMMTV, and was a TOUR DE FORCE of intricate storytelling and queer revelation. According to this amazing reblog by @so-much-yet-to-learn​ (another longtime BL observer who UTTERLY held me down during my TT watch, friend, I CANNOT THANK YOU ENOUGH FOR THE HOURS you spent me with talking about TT and other issues), shipper fans angry at Ohm and Singto went so far as to SHOW UP TO THE GMMTV BUILDING IN BANGKOK and PROTEST against the split of the KristSingto ship. This is why, in this TT review, I talk about fans needing to take responsibility and accountability for the media we consume. I believe TT exists in part because fans have allowed it to continue to exist in the universe of BL, and many even celebrate TT’s existence -- all while, in my own opinion -- much more compelling art existed before TT (Make It Right, He’s Coming To Me) and certainly after its airing.

In discussion with @absolutebl (yet another drama expert who held me down during my TT watch, THANK YOU, SENSEI), ABL Sensei brings up that, besides a natural tendency to criticize and blame MAME for our needing to have conversations about safety towards queer family, that TT does deserve to be criticized as a standalone piece of content.

I honestly don’t know, Sensei, if I’m mature enough to make that separation, but I will try. MAME herself doesn’t exist in a vacuum: she has an industry, from producers, to showrunners, to actors, to editors, to networks -- that join her in the making of her work. I’ll do my best to separate everything, but.

I noted in my review of Love By Chance that MAME traffics in common Asian stereotypes against the queer community. At the same time, I know that often, we talk about the yaoi origins of BL in Thailand. I think, over time, the explanation of the yaoi origination has been used as a means of explaining WHY certain tropes exist, such as abuse of a partner, bullying, etc. I want to note that while I acknowledge those origins, I also strongly note (as I did in the comments of my LBC review) that yaoi origins are themselves problematic, as created by a majority cishet female artist base, and thus I question the accurate representation of queer themes both in yaoi and in early and/or questionable Thai BL that lean into common stereotypes held by Asian nations. (That being said, I do DEEPLY ACKNOWLEDGE @so-much-yet-to-learn‘s point to me that many in the queer community still consumed this media, as the West was producing next-to-nothing by way of queer love and/or queer perspectives.)

Much of what I saw in LBC and TT -- gang rape, cheating, revenge, derogatory language, hurtful stereotypes of top/bottom and husband/wife -- are repeat, word-for-word stereotypes that I heard from my Asian family growing up. Examples of what I saw by way of problematic stereotypes in TharnType include:

- Tharn repeatedly and casually calling Type “his bitch,” - The use of the F word, repeatedly, by Type, - Type attacking his out classmates, and indirectly attacking his friend, Tum, - The assumption that because Tharn and Tar are gay, that they are promiscuous (even Techno assumes this while leaving Type alone with Tharn early in the series), - Techno himself not calling out Type for his homophobia throughout the series, - The use of gang rape as a means of revenge by Lhong to Tar,

and many more. I will also note that I was incredibly uncomfortable by Lhong’s redemption at the end, as if the story demanded that Lhong’s own actions that drove him to order grievous sexual violence against another man needed to be forgiven. That was a paradigm that seemed apologetic to his actions and did not sit well with me.

As I noted to @bengiyo: us international fans may be lulled to think that Thailand is majority progressive and accepting of the queer community based off of the BLs that we watch. It IS a much more progressive culture in SE Asia in supporting the queer community, and I would assume that gay culture is able to flourish in city centers, as opposed to rural areas. 

But Thailand has NOT legalized same-sex marriage. And I posit that we in the West don’t actually realize that harmful stereotypes against the queer community absolutely still exist and flourish in Thailand, Taiwan, and elsewhere in Asia -- countries that certainly leverage BL as soft power, but nations in which familial or cultural expectations may STILL make ACTUAL coming out and public existence a dangerous or risky proposition. THIS SHIT IS GRAY. BL is fiction -- it is not reality. It is still dangerous -- YES, INCLUDING HERE IN THE STATES -- to be out in very many towns, cities, and communities around the world.

Now. When I went into TT, I understood, AS ASSUMED FACT, that MAME was a sexual assault survivor, who used this style of writing about queerness and queer love to process her own SA experiences. That equivocation gave me the serious jibbles, which I’ll talk about in a second, but I understood it to be the line that most BL observers have made about her work, and/or justification or explanation for her work existing.

I’ve since learned that this is not necessarily fact: that it is not known if MAME is an SA survivor, and that she is notoriously private and has not revealed much, if anything, about her own past.

So, from there, how do I process this? How do I process that it’s FANON -- NOT FACT -- that MAME may or may not write from a survivor’s perspective?

I also note here, thanks to the wonderful @so-much-yet-to-learn​, that many fans who are SA survivors have written in the past about how they related to Type’s anger and/or homophobia after his own assault experience. I also understand that SA survivors have, in the past, had difficulty with strong rejections of TharnType, like the one I have composed here, in reaction to the fear that they cannot tell their own stories of internal anger against their perpetrators and the communities from which their attackers come from.

Thus, I want to note a VERY DIFFICULT PROPOSITION TO WORK THROUGH. What we’re facing here is that there may be people, SA survivors in particular, who related to Type’s homophobia. This is Type’s fictional homophobia -- as written by a very real, assumed-to-be female author. At the same time, I myself very much acknowledge that I still see stereotypes against the queer community, in a very Asian voice that I am familiar with, in MAME’s shows.

Let me tell you why this gives me, personally, the jibbles. Let’s assume that MAME is an SA survivor. As someone trained in the social services, I am not sure that I would advise a potential client to create very public content that is potentially harmful towards a minority community, as a means of their own personal processing. MAME is FAMOUS. Her work is POPULAR. Can we justify the dangers that her work poses -- the stereotypes and assumptions she traffics in against our queer family -- for her own psychological processing?

If I am her therapist, I am guiding her to instead journey map, to meditate, to advise her of HUNDREDS of other therapeutic psychological modalities to process her pain -- all modalities that do not set up a minority community to be stereotyped through very publicly consumed content. 

I posit here -- MY OPINION, FAM -- that MAME has leveraged her own personal bigotry against the queer community in her shows for clout with Asian and international audiences that would not quibble about the harmfulness of the stereotypes that the show portrayed. And she’s gotten away with it for the utter control she has over her own content. AND SHE KNOWS THERE’S AN AUDIENCE FOR IT, so she keeps making what I call bigoted content.

I thought TT was a DANGEROUS show for perpetuating harmful stereotypes about queer family. And I am distraught at the BL industry for seeing dollar signs against that clout and investing in it. 

The equivocating in support of TharnType certainly exists. There are people who view this show with nostalgia, as there still wasn’t the volume of BL content, with heat, in 2019 as we have today. There are people out there who may very well openly relate to Type’s homophobia as a character, and MAME’s homophobia as an author and as a human. Hell, Foei Patara, who we see in everything these days, shared a very anti-LGBTQ+ video on his Instagram just recently.

I DO have to give a nod to nostalgia. I have to try to be fair here. This is the ENTIRE POINT of the OGMMTVC. BL fans in 2019 wanted a thing. High heat, high chemistry. I know that there are fans that are AWARE of these high-level issues of MAME’s work. And yet, there are many that still look back on TharnType with fondness, because it brought something new to the field. 

What I’m suffering from here is the equivocation of MAME’s work by way of analysis against a presumed opinion -- NOT fact -- that MAME is an SA survivor. That seems to open some sort of door to allow us to watch her work, despite the dangers of the stereotypes contained within her work.

The ethics of this. I’m not a strong enough person to go near that equivocation. Because I am not a survivor. I’m an Asian. In MAME’s voice, I hear the stereotypes against the queer community that I grew up with. And that’s where I’m writing this review. I’m hurt and appalled by her proliferating what I term to be dangerous viewpoints against my queer sisters and brothers -- assumptions that I heard growing up in my Indian community.

Fuck. Am I ever glad that I DIDN’T watch this show in 2019. I’m protected by a fortress of past and present works that I can rely on that proves that there are other arenas in which BL is being leveraged for good, for progressive art, for the introduction of ideas that support our queer family, AND that might also offer critical commentary on issues that affect other minority or vulnerable corners of society, à la Moonlight Chicken. 

I haven’t even gotten to the MewArt scandal and the problematic nature of the MewGulf ship. All of those are also very important issues, but I can’t bring myself to get deep about them, because just talking about the show itself is a lot. But Mew Suppasit’s past alleged behavior is certainly problematic, and is worth considering if folks were to think about watching this show.

In any case: I’m never watching another MAME show again, ever. And as a side note, MewGulf didn’t do it for me. At this point in 2019, I feel like we’d seen ships with much better chemistry and even heat, like PerthSaint (a MAME ship, actually), OhmToey, MaxTul, and even OhmSingto and their utterly brilliant acting. @he-is-lightning-in-a-bottle noted in the comments of one of my TT late-night posts that they didn’t see the MewGulf chemistry, and frankly, I didn’t either -- I didn’t see that these guys, as the acted characters of Tharn and Type, bodily and ferally WANTED AND VISCERALLY LOVED each other in fiction, the way that actor pairs like EarthMix, OhmNanon, FirstKhao, and others have since perfected in their work as their respective characters.

This post is about the responsibility that so-called “artists” bear when taking up the mantle of created content about a minority community, as well as the responsibility that we bear, as fans, as the majority cishet female fanbase, to consume this content. MAME and the slices of the BL industry that support her MUST understand that perpetuating stereotypes about a minority community WILL HAVE VISCERAL SOCIAL IMPACTS in REINFORCING THOSE STEREOTYPES, among a majority cishet fanbase and across society, to the danger of the existence of our queer family. 

THIS IS WHY WE NEED MORE QUEER CONTENT BY QUEER FILMMAKERS.

That is the way in which this paradigm will be broken over time. And us in the cishet fanbase MUST STAND READY to support art -- in the words of dear friend @wen-kexing-apologist -- by queer family, for queer family, about queer family. We in the cishet majority bear a responsibility to break the paradigm of dangerous stereotypes, perpetrated by who create content through their own bigotry, either consciously or unconsciously -- or both.

[I finished TharnType in record time. I needed to get it out of my system. And now I’m fully invested in OffGun and having a DELIGHTFUL time with Theory of Love: I AM OBSESSED WITH THIS SUBVERSIVE, MINDBENDING SHOW. Ooooooooooooooooooh. Right up my alley! Hopefully I can muster my usual Monday review for ToL -- let’s see. I still feel somewhat broken by TT, but ToL and OffGun have been SUCH a salve.

Here’s the list as it stands currently. We have two changes! First, thanks to a suggestion by @wen-kexing-apologist and @lurkingshan, I’m adding a non-BL (!!!!) to the list in 3 Will Be Free. I have a number of separate Jojo Tichakorn priorities to achieve before Only Friends airs, and this is a big one; as this is a show from 2019, I want to see where GMMTV was willing to go in pushing queer content in non-BLs, and this is the perfect time to watch it. I’ll still include a review in this space! 

And, per @absolutebl Sensei’s suggestion, I’ve added YYY (2020) to this, to enjoy Cheewin unhinged in what seems to be a disaster of a show -- but an important one for real queer representation (THANK YOU, SENSEI!). I’m excited for chaos. I’m watching it out of chronology with ITSAY and planning it as a mental break. As always, I’ll take any feedback on the list as it stands!

1) Love Sick and Love Sick 2 (2014 and 2015) (review here) 2) Make It Right (2016) (review here) 3) SOTUS (2016-2017) (review here) 4) Make It Right 2 (2017) (review here) 5) Together With Me (2017) (review here) 6) SOTUS S/Our Skyy x SOTUS (2017-2018) (review here) 7) Love By Chance (2018) (review here) 8) Kiss Me Again: PeteKao cuts (2018) (no review) 9) He’s Coming To Me (2019) (review here) 10) Dark Blue Kiss (2019) and Our Skyy x Kiss Me Again (2018) (review here) 11) TharnType (2019)  12) Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey (BL cuts) (2016 and 2017) (I’m watching this out of order just to get familiar with OffGun before Theory of Love -- will likely not review)  13) Theory of Love (2019) (watching) 14) 3 Will Be Free (2019) (not a BL or an official part of the OGMMTVC watchlist, but an important harbinger of things to come in 2019 and beyond re: Jojo Tichakorn including queer content in non-BLs) 15) Dew the Movie (2019) (not an official part of the OGMMTVC watchlist, but I want to watch this in chronological order with everything else) 16) Until We Meet Again (2019-2020) 17) 2gether (2020) 18) Still 2gether (2020) 19) I Told Sunset About You (2020) 20) YYY (2020, out of chronology) 21) Manner of Death (2020-2021) (not a true BL, but a MaxTul queer/gay romance set within a genre-based show that likely influenced Not Me and KinnPorsche) 22) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) (review here) 23) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake Of Rewatching Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS 24) Lovely Writer (2021) 25) I Promised You the Moon (2021) 26) Not Me (2021-2022) 27) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) (thesis here) 28) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) and Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (2023) OGMMTVC Rewatch 29) Secret Crush On You (2022) [watching for Cheewin’s trajectory of studying queer joy from Make It Right (high school), to SCOY (college), to Bed Friend (working adults)] 30) KinnPorsche (2022) (tag here) 31) The Eclipse (2022) (tag here) 32) GAP the Series (2022-2023) (Thailand’s first GL) 33) My School President (2022-2023) and Our Skyy 2 x My School President (2023) 34) Moonlight Chicken (2023) (tag here) 35) Bed Friend (2023) (tag here) (Cheewin’s latest show, depicting a queer joy journey among working adults)]

[summeroflove-if]

Hi Chantelle!

Firstly, I wanted to thank you from the bottom of my heart. I didn't know I needed a queer cast interactive fiction that badly, even if I'm a cis straight female (although neurodivergent). But the cast is so damn wholesome. I love the open-mindedness. So, thank you for creating such a dreamy experience.

Secondly, I created a demisexual MC (Calliope, they/them) that was engaged previously and has had a threesome at some point. Now, my mind made up a story about how it came to it. They were having a threesome with their ex and their best friend. However, the engagement ended because the partner and best friend were falling for each other afterwards.

Then it hit me!! Here is my ask: Will it be possible that the ex we were engaged to would be a participant joining at a later stage? If nothing like this is planned it probably is way too much work. Yet, the idea sprung to me, and I was like, 'Oh my god! Imagine!!!!'. 👹 So I needed to ask.

I hope you have a wonderful day! Stay save!

Firstly, I've been avoiding answering because this ask made me all mushy, so thank you for this lovely ask!

I promise that there will be no exes to be seen, neither yours nor your ROs. And I say this because you could easily have your ROs ex come in but all of these ROs have a pre-written romantic history, even if it's a lack of one.

There will be talk of exes though, but it's not leading to anything like an ex coming in, it's more to give the ROs depth and for you to understand their past and how that led to now.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Andrew Doyle

Published: Mar 11, 2024

As a child of the Eighties and Nineties, I remember well that homosexuals were fair game in the mainstream media. One columnist in The Star railed against “Wooftahs, pooftahs, nancy boys, queers, lezzies — the perverts whose moral sin is to so abuse the delightful word ‘gay’ as to render it unfit for human consumption”. After the death of Freddie Mercury, sympathy in The Mail on Sunday was limited. “If you treat as a hero a man who died because of his own sordid sexual perversions,” one writer cautioned, “aren’t you infinitely more likely to persuade some of the gullible young to follow in his example?”

It was sadly inevitable that the AIDS crisis would exacerbate this ancient prejudice. A headline in The Sun declared that “perverts are to blame for the killer plague”. And while a writer for the Express held “those who choose unnatural methods of self-gratification” responsible for the disease, letters published in its pages followed suit. One reader called for the incarceration of homosexuals. “Burning is too good for them,” wrote another. “Bury them in a pit and pour on quicklime.” Someone had been reading his Dante.

I happened to come out in a much less hostile climate. In the early 2000s, we were enjoying a kind of Goldilocks moment, neither too hot nor too cold. We weren’t generally on the receiving end of homophobic slurs, but nor were we patronised by well-meaning progressives. My memory of this time was that no one particularly cared, and I was more than happy with that. Being gay for me has never been an identity, it’s simply a fact, as unremarkable as being blue-eyed or right-handed.

And so it has been troubling to see a resurgence in the last few years of the kind of anti-gay rhetoric that was commonplace in my childhood. Of course, it could be argued that the rise of social media has simply exposed sentiments that were previously only expressed in private. As Ricky Gervais has pointed out, before the digital era “we couldn’t read every toilet wall in the world. And now we can.”

Yet the most virulent homophobia appears to be coming from a new source. Whereas we have always been accustomed to this kind of thing from the far-Right — one recalls Nick Griffin’s remark on Question Time about how he finds the sight of two men kissing “really creepy” — but now the most objectionable anti-gay comments arise in online spheres occupied by gender ideologues, from those who claim to be progressive, Left-wing and “on the right side of history”. The significant difference is that the word “cis” has been added to the homophobe’s lexicon. Some examples:

“Cis gay men are a disease.”

“Cis gay men are truly some of the most grotesque creatures to burden this earth.”

“I hate cis gay people with a burning passion.”

“If you’re a cis gay man and your sexuality revolves around you not liking female genitalia I hope you die and I will spit on your grave.”

“Cis gays don’t deserve rights.”

“There’s so many reasons to hate gay people, most specifically white gays, but there’s never a reason to be a transphobe.”

“It’s time to normalise homophobia.”

Of course, any bile can be found on the internet, but these kinds of phrases are remarkably commonplace among certain online communities. Even a cursory search will reveal innumerable examples of gender ideologues casually branding gay men “fags” or “faggots”, praising the murder of gays and lesbians, and claiming that the AIDS epidemic was a positive thing. Many thousands of examples had been collated on Google Photos under the title “Woke homophobia: anti-gay hatred & boxer ceiling abuse from trans activists & gender-identity ideologues”. The site was taken down last year, presumably because it violated Google’s policy on hate speech — or perhaps because it revealed the toxicity of the ideology the company has spent so long promoting.

If such ideas were restricted to the demented world of internet activism, we might be justified in simply ignoring it. But we now know that the overwhelming majority of adolescents referred to the Tavistock paediatric gender clinic were same-sex attracted. Whistleblowers have spoken out about the endemic homophobia, not simply among clinicians but also parents who were keen to “fix” their gay offspring. And of course there was the running joke among staff that soon “there would be no gay people left”.

And now a series of leaked internal messages and videos from WPATH (World Professional Association for Transgender Health), has revealed that clinicians in the leading global organisation for transgender healthcare have openly admitted in private that some teenagers mistake being same-sex attracted for gender dysphoria. The result of the “gender-affirming” approach has amounted to what one former Tavistock clinician recently described as “conversion therapy for gay kids”. Homosexuality was removed from the World Health Organisation’s list of psychiatric disorders in 1993, and yet here we are medicalising it all over again.

So how did we reach the point where gay conversion therapy is being practised in plain sight by the NHS? Much of the responsibility has to lie with Stonewall, a group that once promoted equal rights for gay people but now actively works against their interests. It has even gone so far as to redefine “homosexual” on its website and resource materials as “same-gender attracted”. It should go without saying that gay men are not attracted to women who identify as men, any more than lesbians should be denounced for excluding those with penises from their dating pools. What trans activists call discrimination, most of us call homosexuality.

Indeed, activists often claim that “genital preferences are transphobic”, or that sexual orientation based on biological sex is a form of “trauma”. The idea that homosexuality is a sickness was one of the first homophobic tropes I encountered as a child. Now it is being rebranded as progressive.

As for Stonewall, its former CEO Nancy Kelley went so far as to argue that women who exclude trans people as potential partners are analogous to “sexual racists”. She claimed that “if you are writing off entire groups of people, like people of colour, fat people, disabled people or trans people, then it’s worth considering how societal prejudices may have shaped your attractions”. It is worth remembering that Stonewall is deeply embedded in many governmental departments and quangos, as well as corporate and civic institutions. Anti-gay propaganda is being reintroduced into society from the very top.

Meanwhile, the Crown Prosecution Service has been meeting with trans lobby groups such as Mermaids and Stonewall to discuss changes to prosecutorial policy in cases of sex by deception. Since these meetings — only revealed after sustained pressure from a feminist campaigner who submitted Freedom of Information requests — the CPS has recommended what Dennis Kavanagh of the Gay Men’s Network has described as “a radical trans activist approach to sex by deception prosecutions that would see them all but vanish”. In trans activist parlance, the barriers to having sex with lesbians and gay men are known as the “cotton ceiling” and “boxer ceiling”. Now it seems the establishment is attempting to support the coercion of gay people into heterosexual activity.

Consider a recent post on X by Stephen Whittle, OBE, a professor of equalities law at Manchester Metropolitan University. In a reply to LGB Alliance’s Bev Jackson, Whittle took issue with the notion that “love is all about genitals” (an argument that Jackson has never made). Having dismissed this straw man as “a very hetero/homo-normative perspective”, Whittle then claimed that “a lot of gay men can’t resist a young furry ftm [female-to-male] cub”.

While it is true that there are some bisexuals who identify as gay, it is simply not the case that homosexual men “can’t resist” certain kinds of women. As Jackson rightly noted in her response, this is rank homophobia, “disturbed and disturbing on every level”. Yet it has been expressed by an individual who has been described as a “hero for LGBTQ+ equality”. With heroes like these, who needs villains?

Another example is Davey Wavey, a popular online influencer, who has encouraged gay men to perform heterosexual acts in a video called “How to Eat Pussy — For Gay Men”. It may as well have been called “Gay Conversion Therapy 2.0”. We are firmly back in the Eighties, where gays are being told that they “just haven’t found the right girl yet” and lesbians are assured that they just “need a good dick”. And yet now these demeaning ideas are being propagated by those who claim to be defending the rights of sexual minorities.

The Government’s recent guidance on how schools are to accommodate trans-identified pupils — in which biological sex will take precedence over identity — has been met with horror from gender ideologues. One of the common refrains one hears from activists is that it represents “this generation’s Section 28”. But this is to get it precisely backwards. Gay rights were secured on the recognition that a minority of the population are same-sex attracted. In dismantling the very notion of sex and substituting it for this nebulous concept of “gender identity”, activists and their disciples in parliament are undoing all of the achievements of previous gay rights movements.

The widespread homophobia of the Eighties, epitomised by Section 28, was based on the notion that homosexuality was unnatural, dangerous and ought to be corrected. Present-day gender identity ideology perceives homosexuality as evidence of misalignment between soul and body. In other words, it seeks to “fix” gay people so that they fit into a heterosexual framework. It is no coincidence that so many detransitioners are gay people who were simply struggling with their sexuality. Gender identity ideology is the true successor to Section 28.

The proponents of this revamped gay conversion therapy dismiss our concerns as “transphobia” and “bigotry”, or as part of a manufactured “culture war”. Worse still, the new homophobia is being cheered on by those it will hurt most. While prominent gay figures continue to feed the beast that wishes to devour them, we are unlikely to see this dire situation improve any time soon. It was bad enough in the Eighties, when gay people were demonised and harassed by the establishment. Who thought we would have to fight these battles all over again?

[bonefall]

Ask Etiquette

HELLO sorry for the intimidating post lmao, I just need something to toss up on the masterpost because I feel bad deleting asks and then people will never really have an idea of why I never answered them

I get a ton of asks (usually anywhere from 10 - 20 a day!) and I'm not able to get to them all! I try to answer as many as possible but I'm still just one guy. So with that in mind, there are some sorts of asks I will simply not answer, and some 'requests' I have for people who send them in;

Please keep your asks short PLEASE try not to send me essays if you want a response; I still love reading them! But if you send me walls of text/analysis you are asking me to write a lot in response, which I'd rather spend on actually writing or designing cats. (On that note if you send a bunch of questions at once, the likelihood I respond goes down.)

Do not send me personal questions Listen... I'm a stranger on the internet. I'm overjoyed to see when my art connects with people and helps you realize things! But don't ask me sensitive questions like how to move out of your abusive parents' house!! PLEASE learn internet safety and get less comfortable with volunteering that kind of information to people you don't know!

Do not ask me personal questions you do not need to know what i study or where i work. get less comfortable asking these sorts of questions to queer people on the internet, especially when they talk openly about having previously been abused or stalked. (not that a person should even need to be as open about that as i am)

If I don't have a good response I won't answer Especially for suggestions I don't vibe with. I try to only say "No" if I have a particularly interesting "No" to talk about, if that makes sense! If I had to write a full explanation for every veto or idea I don't vibe with, this blog would be 90% what isn't in BB.

No AUs within the AU. "What if Hawkfrost survived his impalement? What if Firestar never joined? What if Tigerstar was never born?" Listen, buddy, you're creating an exponential distraction for possible ways the story could have gone and I'm not looking to write several essays for the literal hundreds of alternative ways Clan history could have been written. It takes you 5 words to ask "What if X never died" but it takes me paragraphs to answer. (This isn't about suggestions btw, I very specifically mean ppl asking hypotheticals for fun.)

Don't be rude. I feel like this should go without saying but please mind the parasocial gap. Especially if you're on anon, I don't know you, your backstory, or your cadence.

No "Fight Baiting" You're free to ask me to speak about fandom trends, or for my opinions on general ideas, character discussions, and popular arguments! But it crosses a line if you're linking someone's posts with their uncropped usernames, sharing unsolicited google docs, youtube videos, etc, with the intention of getting me to attack a third party. We can talk about ideas without making it a PVP battle.

And, lastly, CLANMEW ASKS!!

I make a hard effort to get to everyone!! Those are published on Clanmew Day (WHICH IS NOW JUST GOING TO BE THE 30TH OF EVERY MONTH SO THAT IT'S LESS CONFUSING) but PLEASE understand I get a ton of them.

As I write this I have more than 26 tabs open of unanswered Clanmew asks, a lot more in my inbox, and 9 already in the queue. So that you understand the sheer volume of asks I have there.

If I didn't get to you that month, chances are that I'll get to you on the next, but please understand why I ask for folks to not re-send asks

So here's Clanmew-specific requests;

PLEASE just try a translation on your own first! Don't just send me raw lists of OCs to translate, give it a go first using the Lexicon, just so I can see you tried. I will happily and gladly make more specific words for you when I see you try!

When you send OCs you've translated, ask me for a new word at the end if you didn't already in your list. Just in case I can't think of a witty comment or a word suggestion, you will help me a lot

Please try to format with lists like this one Folks will send me double or triple-indented lists and it will take up my entire screen when they've only sent like, 5 names. Remember that posts you send to me go on people's dashes, be considerate please You can open a list like this by starting a new paragraph, typing -, and then an immediate space. Hold Shift + Enter to indent without adding another bullet.

If you could put "Clanmew" somewhere in your ask, like even if you open up with "Clanmew: Here is my question blah blah," it would help immensely I physically can't get to every ask I receive on Clanmew Day, so if you have "Clanmew" in your ask somewhere, it makes it a lot easier for me to find it when I can finally answer! I really wish Tumblr had ways to sort asks, but currently, I've just gotta make due with Cntrl + F.

[magentagalaxies]

Kids in the Archive: Episode 4

it's been a while, but thanks to the influx of new-old kids in the hall scripts i got from bruce's storage last summer and the fact that i already finished all my homework for this week i'm happy to present a new episode of Kids in the Archive! for those unfamiliar, kids in the archive is my show in which i focus on one individual kids in the hall sketch and give you a behind-the-scenes comparison of script and screen

Previous Episodes: Episode 1 - armada finale ("do we make it?") Episode 2 - fran & gordon: the vacation Episode 3 - comfortable

for our return to the archives, i'll be covering the S1E16 classic "Is He?"

this sketch is one of my favorites from season one, and one of my favorite cathy and kathi sketches altogether. i'd cite this as one of the many examples of kith being ahead of its time with regards to gay humor - i've shown this sketch to other gen z's who had no idea "is he (limps wrist)" goes back further than online memes. as a queer-comedy-history nerd i already knew about the gesture's origin, but i still was taken aback by how all these jokes feel completely timeless

The Handwritten Notes

overall, this sketch is fairly faithful to the script i received, so there aren't quite as many "alternate version" moments to showcase. however, this script does have the interesting quirk of having handwritten changes to it that don't follow the version in the tv show. other scripts in my collection have this, and i'm fairly sure these notes were made for adapting the sketch to a live show or tour. the photo above selects the walkout music as "9 to 5", and sets the scene in a break room with coffee and donuts rather than at their desks. this might be an easier setup for a live show with more limited sets, and build in time for the fan reaction to seeing favorite characters return

unfortunately the version of "tour of duty" on youtube was taken down, so i can't now compare these notes to the version in that tour recording. i do remember that i liked that version less. while i enjoyed the wordplay and euphemisms on their own, i felt they slowed down the flow of an already good sketch and distracted from the existing punchline. none of these euphemisms are present in this sketch, but there is one handwritten edit that i think weakens the writing

The "Improv"

in my previous episode, i cleared up the misconception that comfortable featured a fully improvised exchange. kids in the hall rarely improvised full dialogue on-air, even if they used it at some stage in their writing process. however, there are still small "improvised" elements to these performances that show the performers putting their own spin on the established structure. in "comfortable", it was scott replacing the "da da da da" song with "hava nagila" (for some reason, we may never know). in the case of the cathys, this improv often comes from trailed off sentences

most instances of kathi's giggle aren't specified, but during the stage direction "bruce just giggles like a ninny" scott improvises some sentence fragments to cover for kathi's awkwardness

The Ending

as i previously mentioned, there's no big difference between the script i received and the sketch that made it to air. it's a mostly faithful transcript of all the dialogue that was spoken, with some written descriptions of actions that take place. i feel like i'm just describing what any script is at this point

overall, i enjoy having "is he?" in my collection, not because it presents an alternate reality with different casting and whole other scenes like some of my scripts, but because of the indescribable feeling of having the script this favorite sketch of mine was made from. every wonderful part of this sketch started out as just words on a page, and was built upon to create something truly special. again, i could be describing any script, but damn it i love "is he?"

as always, i hope you enjoyed this episode of "kids in the archive" and be sure to stay tuned for the next one (which will hopefully be coming out much sooner this time). if you have a specific sketch you'd like to see a script-to-screen comparison for let me know and if i have it i'll make an episode and tag you in it.

[mastermindmp3]

If you just want the song analysis, skip to the next banner. However, I do think the context added by my rambling is at least interesting.

Hey, so remember how yesterday, I opened my analysis post with a comment about how I try to analyze the songs without analyzing Taylor Swift's life, because I feel it's limiting to my ability to understand the song. It's not a form of analysis I'm very good at either, frankly.

I feel like that comment goes especially so for But Daddy I Love Him. Because I was certainly there for the rat-filled fortnight, as in, he literally played guitar for Phoebe Bridgers at my show. And there's a lot I could say that has already been said, more eloquently and by people far more qualified.

I'm a biology student, not a sociologist. But as an Indigenous woman, there is a level of hurt that comes from the people we admire tolerating racism within their spaces, and how that can often play into revealing a pattern of behavior. On the opposite hand, I can see the annoyance (and indignation) that she was held more accountable for his actions than he was. Indeed, I believe that this is what the line "[My good name] is mine alone to disgrace" refers to. On the other, other hand, the whole situation leaves a powdery, bad taste in my mouth.

And now to never talk about that again, because I don't feel qualified to give you a conclusion on it. I'm still listening to the music, after all. The rest of my analysis will be from the perspective of the song as a story, not as diary, my preferred modus operandi.

I wanted to say all that as set up in: I didn't know what to think about this song. I was unsure what angle I wanted to talk about this song from, because divorcing it from the backlash was hard. She literally says "Scandal does funny things to pride," and we'll talk about that later.

Initially, I thought about covering against the grain readings. Recontextualizing the song completely, giving it a new meaning. I thought about maybe covering the history of forbidden romance as a genre (and its many evolutions, from ironically, interracial love stories to queer romance.) I even thought about talking about the Little Mermaid, tying the song into one of the pieces of iconic fiction, and tying that back into the idea of forbidden romance as a queer reading of straight fiction (Howard Ashman, the lead lyricist for Disney, ostensibly the heart of the Disney Renaissance, was a gay man whose partner accepted his Oscar after he had passed due to AIDs.)

And... none of that worked. There are like, five versions of this post in my google docs that will never see the light of day.

Sitting in standstill traffic trying to leave last night's Hozier concert, I finally came to a conclusion. Well, I didn't. Jean, who's previously helped me on both Little Tortured Poet's Department and My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys, made a comment that "Without the rest of the album, [But Daddy I Love Him] reads like any 2003 emo song about a sleazy bassist. Sure, we know better, but the singer doesn't."

And that got me thinking: TTPD is an album that is very much in conversation with itself, and Taylor's discography as a whole. I said, "How much does not knowing that wider context change the song?" That's an angle to analyze, baby!

alternative title that wouldn't leave my mind: Dark AU!Love Story, don't like don't read

But Daddy I Love Him is, out of the whole album, the song that benefits from context the most. It is petulant, petty, the speaker digging in her heels on the subject of true love. Indeed, Scandal does funny things to pride. I jokingly referred to it as "Dark Love Story," but the songs are foils ( and likely intentionally, since both songs have to the singer begging "Daddy" to let her have her lover. It also makes sense to foil one of her most popular songs, so that general audiences are likely to make the connection. )

We, the audience, know that the Speaker's romantic interest isn't good for her. We don't like him, because likely, we've already listened to the previous songs on the tracklist, and he's already clearly hurt the singer. The prelude (in the CD and Vinyl booklets) refers to the album as one story, which helps set up this framework in the listener's mind.

However, even in the context of the song, there are scant hints of this. The Speaker, with her rose colored glasses firmly on, still refers to her lover as "crazy."

There's also an interesting tie to her older works, known affectionately on Reddit as Car Lore in the use of cars as metaphor for romance. To quote the seminal essay by u/Alex_Demote, "But for Taylor, being in a car is often the same thing as being in a relationship."

Here, the speaker's lover "[floors] it through the fences" at her request and they only hear "screeching tires and true love" His actions are incredibly dangerous. Even if she's told him to slam through the fence, anyone who actually loves her would say no. A joy ride isn't worth risking your life.

By literal laws of physics, screeching tires are tires that aren't moving. Whether the speaker knows it or not, this romance won't go anywhere, or if it does... well.

I'm an Aston Martin that you steered straight into the ditch (imgonnagetyouback) / Loving him is like driving a new Maserati down a dead-end street (Red) / You were driving the getaway car, we were flying but we’d never get far (Getaway Car)

Though, do we know it's a car? Obviously, this is Car Lore I'm applying here, but our only other references to a land vehicle (aside from the Aston Martin, which is The Speaker) are in So High School, which has it's own parallels to But Daddy I Love Him, see below, and in imgonnagetyouback:

Whether I'm gonna be your wife or / Gonna smash up your bike, I haven't decided yet

And here comes my main point: Driving a car through a fence is reckless, yes, but not likely to be fatal. A bike? A bike? It's only with the context of the rest of the album that the danger our speaker was in comes into clear view. In the song itself, the Speaker only knows he's a bit of a troublemaker, but doesn't mind. She is either blind to the truth of the matter, or looking past it. After all, my boy only breaks his favorite toys. She'd rather burn her whole life down.

But, at the end of the song, her parents "came around" and while the "wine moms are still holding out," the Speaker seems quite happy to be "his lady." Time does give some perspective, but this song doesn't: though the final chorus could be reframed as about a new lover (as she says "Fuck 'em, it's over,") it still reads like everything worked out with her "wild boy."

Like I said on Down Bad, the songs on TTPD are slices of time. This song is the Speaker in a state of blind love, a poisoned honeymoon phase, and without the rest of the album of hindsight, the song just reads... Mean. The teenage prank of "I'm having his baby," refusing to "come to [her] senses," and even referring to herself as "not growing up at all," slamming through fences that someone else will have to fix. It's the exact kind of pettiness that a sixteen year old might pull.

Hey, speaking of sixteen: So High School. If But Daddy I Love Him is a dark take on forbidden love, So High School is its antidote, is that quintessential Boy Meets Girl, and plays deeply into high school cliches. It's also the only other mention of a land vehicle, to my knowledge. The speaker's infatuated with how her lover, "Got [her] car door, isn't that sweet?"

The other, very teenager-y love song on the record is so opposite. It's cheerful, and most importantly, the singer realizes it too. So High School serves to further contextualize But Daddy I Love Him as the speaker's attempt at a rebellious stage, and the rest of the album is her showing how it all crashed and burned.

Conclusion? Her daddy might love him, but he does NOT have land vehicle proficiency. And context can give far more perspective than time ever could.

also hey WDYM GET BACK HERE—

[aritany]

Hello! I wanted to ask about the querying process in regards to your previously published books. Totally fine to ignore this if you're not in the mood to discuss it, but I was wondering if you mentioned your past publication history in your query letter, whether there was any discussion about it before you signed with your new agent (congrats!!!) or if the focus was entirely on your latest manuscript, etc. I'm asking because I have a past publication history but don't really feel like it would do me any favors in hooking an agent. I'm not sure if not mentioning my publication history is considered bad query etiquette? No idea who to ask because it's a pretty specific circumstance—but one you've clearly successfully navigated. <3

hey anon! great question.

this is what i put in the bio section of my query letter! 

“I’m a nonbinary Canadian artist, musician, and author of DEAD GIRLS DON’T SAY SORRY from Knopf BFYR. Kirkus Reviews called it “unsettling and sharply observed,” which really nails what I’m going for in my writing. My love of art, music, and the western Canadian landscape regularly spills into what I write, always featuring complex friendships, twisty romances, and explorations of queerness.”

i didn’t mention sales anywhere in the letter, and beyond the above, only ticked the appropriate boxes for the “have you been agented/published before” questions. i honestly don’t think it’s necessary to include it, per se, but any agent worth their salt will ask you down the road, so i personally felt it was best to be up front.

i had two offers and two calls with agents, and neither of them seemed at all bothered about the prior publication or that it was a slow release, which i did bring up. the agent i signed with said she intends to market this new book as my “break out” book.

(it helps that technically MAYBE TOMORROW I’LL KNOW is a different genre. if youre writing in a different age category, prior publications are barely a consideration.)

the relative flop of dead girls was a huge source of (not entirely unfounded) anxiety for me, as my prior agent told me it was basically going to kill my career and that i’d probably need to publish under a pen name to succeed, but as it turns out, you just need the right person to believe in you.

and i believe you will find that person.🫵🏻

[mindibindi]

SEX EDUCATION FINAL SEASON: If There Was Orgasm, Then I Missed It.... 🍆💦🍑🍌👅🍌🍒🔥😏

The final season was good. It was not great. It was not everything I wanted it to be. It would’ve been a satisfying enough season if it had not been the last. And I acknowledge that it’s difficult to write a satisfying final season to such a popular, ground-breaking show. That said, here are few thoughts on the final season of “Sex Education”. Some came. Most didn't. Not Moordale: It took guts to do away with the old school and transplant the characters into a new environment. This was an interesting experiment which centred what had previously been marginalised and drove the progressive politics of the show further forward than they perhaps could’ve done in their old, more traditional, more repressed surroundings. (I liked that Otis and Maeve revisted Moordale Secondary tho). All the new characters were great, but then this show has always done a great job of finding interesting actors that seem to bring a level of freshness to their roles. Well done to the casting director. Props for the popular kids being two trans cuties who are having sex and issues in their sex life. Seeing Eric in his queer element was great. There was better disability inclusion, but the writing felt a little clunky and preachy at times, as this show is wont. And obviously we lost a few characters in the shuffle. Lily was the one I missed most. She would have loved Cavendish.

Aimee and Ruby: In terms of the young cast, the most satisfying storylines for me were Aimee’s and Ruby’s. When Aimee and Isaac began to connect, I was like: Yes, go there, do THAT. Maeve coming round in the end and realising that they're family was nice. Loved Aimee getting closure with her jeans thru art. Also liked the further fleshing out of Ruby’s backstory and her journey towards gaining popularity through being kind(er).

Eric: My least fave storyline was Eric’s whole religious epiphany thing. I liked that he found a fellow christian with whom he could share his conflicted feelings about being both queer and god-loving, but I’m not into organised religion or religion of any kind really (as is my right after being raised in it). I don’t believe in god so I don’t believe in divine signs. I don’t think they broke the reality of the show as such, but they were a bit obtuse and boring. I think when Eric spoke in church, his mum should’ve said she loved him as he is, his sisters (who've been supportive in the past) should have done the same, and they should have all left the church together. I think them all coming to the fundraiser later was super trite. It looked like a hasty way to wrap up that storyline after Eric left to rescue Cal. I also think that religions in general have to do way more than make placating noises, so having Eric enter into one was not my idea of a happy ending for him.

I think a better storyline for Eric, based on his history of being pulled in different directions by attractions to more than one person, would have been to discover polyamory. We had one polyamorous couple in the mix this season but it was mentioned once and they appeared together maybe twice. I think it would have been more in tune with the show for Eric to realise that traditional monogamy didn’t suit him and start seeking partners that would celebrate him in exploring ethical non-monogamy. Then we could have had an inside look at how that works for poly peeps, how people navigate less traditional sex and relationship models, what comes up for them mentally, emotionally, sexually, socially etc. In my opinion, the religion stuff just closes down possibility for this character, puts him in a box that the show admits is problematic. I would have preferred to see him open up to more possibility than any church can provide.

Adam and Fam: I liked the whole move into horses thing, liked that he became a teacher like his dad. It felt a little not-fleshed-out tho. It felt like the start of a new life for him, but just the start, with a long way still to go, which is kind of fine. That character does have a lot to learn and heal and these things take time. It would’ve been good to see him interact with some kids, maybe see how he treats a young boy differently to his father (maybe horse girl coulda had a son?). I’m not entirely sure about rehabilitating bullies/abusive parents. In my experience, it doesn’t happen but I recognise that this show is working with ideals, with the question: “what if we did sex and relationships better?” As such, I think they did a beautiful job of reconnecting father and son. It helps that both actors are so good at playing awkward masculinity. One awkward hug does not solve years of abuse and neglect but it was a start, I suppose. Horse girl was nice enough. When Adam admitted to being bisexual, I kinda wanted her to say: “Oh yeah, me too.” Because otherwise, she was just kinda there, emblematic of possibility. Adam should’ve moved into the farmhouse as a boarder, and Maureen should have moved some new boyfriend in. The parents should NOT have got back together. Hard nope. Some relationships end, and this was one that should’ve. Maureen should have continued her sexual exploration, maybe got into burlesque or BDSM. The dad should have had a hot affair with the art teacher (who should’ve been less of a ridiculous middle-aged man-eating woman cliche), or better yet, the home ec teacher. Bring food into sex.

Cal: Gender dysphoria distress is not something I have personal experience with so I would be interested to hear what people who do thought of this storyline. I was up for it but, if I’m honest, I can’t say I’m any more enlightened on what it feels like or what I should do for someone in similar circumstances. Though I like them, I think this is in part due to a lack of range in the actor playing Cal. I can say that the scene where they are by the ravine feeling suicidal meant a lot to me personally, cos I do have experience with that. (Jackson shoulda figured out where they were sooner tho).

Jackson: Didn’t love Jackson or Viv’s storylines. Jackson’s whole history was established way back and I NEVER appreciate when shows walk that back and go: “oh no it actually happened this way.” His whole swimming thing was cos Hannah Waddingham’s character was anxious about them having a connection but if he is the result of a previous relationship and her partner was already pregnant when they met then that changes that whole dynamic. Her insecurity makes more sense, is more intense, if having a child is a decision his mums take on together. Great to explore a scenario in which Jackson seeks out his biological roots but I don’t think he needed the extra trauma of two lying mums and an uncaring biological father. They should’ve stuck with the original context, there was enough shit there to sort out. Nice to see HWad’s in the mix, even if she only had two lines (but she’s super busy and big now so that’s probs why). I notice that all the previous acrimony between the mums has disappeared. So no therapy. No Jackson dealing with divorce. And no Hannah Waddingham having an affair with Gillian Anderson. So yeah, pretty disappointing all round.

Viv: Friendships are important but I kinda thought Jackson and Viv would’ve made a good couple…? Viv’s storyline was good for a teachable moment on coercion but not much else. Also I don’t think the boyfriend needed to grab her so hard. It doesn’t need to be hard to be scary and wrong.               

Maeve: I liked how they brought Maeve home then sent her back, which was absolutely the right thing for her. Dan Levy was great and, again, the scene where she confronts him about being gate-keepery meant a lot to me personally, as a low-SES student at University. The stuff with the brother was all v. well-written and acted, although they seemed to forget about lil sis pretty quickly. Liked everyone showing up for the funeral, esp. the old Moordale teachers. The song was a def. highlight of the season. We also got some closure for Maeve/Isaac and Eric/Adam. Otis was, of course, a dick throughout but awkward lovable dickhead is kinda his brand. The climactic sex scene with Otis and Maeve was okay. Top marks for playing Jeff Buckley who was a big part of my high school experience. I wasn't as weirded out by it as I thought I might be (mostly cos I remember Asa Butterfeild from "Ashes to Ashes"). But jeez, for a show on sex, they don’t give a lot of time to foreplay, do they? IMPORTANT PSA for het dudes of all ages: DO NOT expect to be inside a girl/woman 10 seconds after kissing her. Maeve interacting with Jean was another highlight, but I would’ve liked a final call/text between Otis and Maeve, rather than leaving them both staring out windows thinking of the other. (On the other hand, totally get people who were for an Otis/Ruby endgame).

Jean: Okay, so I like this show as a whole but one of the major reasons I watch is for The Gillian. Jean Milburn is another in a long line of her iconic characters. So on the positive side: I actually liked the sister storyline. I have a sister and that felt appropriately intimate/infuriating. And they finally cast someone who actually could conceivably be related to Gillian Anderson (unlike “The Great”, “Crisis” and even Melissa in “The X Files”). GA has very unusual facial features but these two looked alike, got the dynamic right, and the backstory illuminated Jean a little more for us. I kinda missed overconfident, fashionable Jean, but hey, when you have Gillian Anderson, you’re gonna use her, right? I don’t know postpartum depression but I know depression and that felt real to me. Beautiful job, as always from GA. The relationship with Otis followed a similar rocky trajectory to other seasons and was as well-played as always by both, even if it yielded little in the way of growth. It did annoy me that Otis was like: “we need help” but then he barely acknowledged Joy when they were in the same room. My brother has just had a baby and whenever anyone walks in the room, it is ALL ABOUT the baby: talking to the baby, talking about the baby, holding the baby, playing with the baby…. So I was like: Otis! Pick up the baby! Cuddle your sister! (Being ignored in favour of the baby could also have heightened mum’s PPD. And how about modelling a young man participating, even minimally, in child-rearing, dear show??). The radio/podcast stuff was fine. As an Aussie, I was delighted to see Hannah Gadsby in the mix. People may not know this but she is a comedian, not an actor, so I loved seeing her do such a great job. Loved seeing her interact with Gillian so much, and looking fab too. Gillian also looked gorgeous, even while falling apart, and more so as her medication started to kick in. I say this just cos I like seeing women onscreen looking their age.

The biggest disappointment here was the disappearance of Jakob and the disintegration of that relationship (which had a lot more going for it than Adam’s parents). I don’t know if the actor was unavailable or if this was just the direction they chose but I missed both Jakob and Ola. If they were going to write them out tho, I do think it was better to have them gone before the show began. I didn’t wanna see that breakdown. They’d already introduced some elements into this relationship that weren’t necessary, imo. I don’t think they needed to make Jakob’s dead wife unfaithful. I think illness, death, single dadhood and late-in-life love is quite enough to deal with, esp. considering the limited screen time they had. I also don’t think they needed the overly hasty move-in, which seemed to me like a totally rookie mistake for a sex and relationships therapist to make. Of course that was not going to work! Otis and Ola being needlessly stroppy was likewise unhelpful for what could have been a joyous, sexy mature-aged romance. They placed all these unnecessary stresses on this relationship in order to force it to fail, the final stress being the paternity of Jean’s child, which, if they hadn’t introduced Jakob’s dead wife’s unfaithfulness might not have been such a huge deal, he might have been able to stick around and raise a child not biologically his (he already had two of those). I personally didn’t like what it did to his character either, since he initially seemed like such an open, honest, easy, considerate, responsible, mature, big-hearted kind of man. Was this their idea of giving him layers? Why did they have to turn the ONE good grown man in the show into a petty, bitter, suspicious little coward?

There was so much potential in the Jean/Jakob relationship and the problem with introducing so many new elements in a final season is that you risk not wrapping up some of the core elements you began with. Like Eric, Jean’s final season doesn’t really match her trajectory throughout the series. When we met her, she was having a lovely time having lots of casual sex but no relationships. Which is fine, except that her reasons for doing so were more to do with hurt and avoidance than with pure sexual expression and honest personal preference. She was still reacting to the disintegration of her marriage and the infidelity/promiscuity of her ex-husband (so to have her left for supposed infidelity/promiscuity seems again needlessly cruel). She was afraid of further heartbreak and, thru her relationship with Jakob, began to overcome that fear. While the PPD and Joanne storylines were solid, illuminating and enjoyable, they did not contribute to resolving the core issue Jean initially presented with. With Jakob, Jean was starting to ask herself: ‘’how do I trust again after being devastated by the infidelity of my son’s father?”, “how do I let go when I can’t control every outcome, aspect and possibility?”, “how do I live with someone again after living alone for so long?” Oddly enough separate residences never seemed to occur to anyone on this super progressive, groundbreaking show. Or you know, Ola could have gone off to college and Otis found some opportunity in America, leaving Jean and Jakob to try again in a different context, with different skills and a different spirit. (But personally I would have gone with separate residences for a time).

You could say that Jean’s issues were partially addressed in her relationship with Jo but we all know that familial and intimate relationships are different. Related but different. Jean’s issue was how to combine intimacy, trust, sex, romance and relationship. That can’t be resolved with a sister or a son. It can only be resolved with a romantic/sexual/life partner. Even if Jakob left for a while, I would have liked to see him come back (I wasn’t sure whether he would but it looked increasingly unlikely as the season continued). Otis or Jo could have called him. Or he coulda heard Jean on the radio. In the end, it looked like Jo and Motorcycle Man were going to be a thing so they coulda made a v. weird parenting foursome (which also would’ve helped alleviate Jean’s depression and workload! Look at that!). Now how’s that for an alternative family model? Why have one parent when you can have four (esp. when two of you have already raised kids)? That would have been great for Jean and Jakob (who get a little more time to themselves) and for Jo and Motorcycle Man (who may need some more responsible parents around). It would be good for Ola (who NAMED Joy, let’s not forget) and her sister, and also for Joy to have some loving siblings, since her big bro won’t pick her up and cuddle her.

[spicybylerpolls]

I don't believe in foah but i do believe in crush culture, especially when it comes to famous people that have a limited dating pool due to their "status as celebs that get creepily irl stalked" (this has happened to an underaged finn and noah before - the noah one even captured on camera that can be found on tiktok during the pandemic quarantine while in the finn one he tells bill hader in an interview about being stalked by a grown man all the way to his house almost that had the audacity to shoulder checked him to get finn's attn). in a vid complitation of finn and noah friendship, it's clear that finn goes out of his way to include noah during s2 promo since will wasnt well known in s1 and there's an old article out there about the 1st time they met during st casting call.

apparently finn tells the interviewer of the article how when casting was officially done, he highlights how when he met noah again as a co-actor that noah forgot about him lol. noah didn't remember finn from the audition but finn remembered noah. finn also said that he was shocked/excited that the voice of charlie brown (noah) was here while noah couldn't recall anything finn's been in. So, to me, when reading that article it felt like finn cared about noah in the beginning as a crush of admiration like "crushing cuz i wanna be successful like this kid already". and finn expressed in another interview how he's afraid to be a washedup child star while playing in both IT and st.

so imo foah is more about the two acknowledging the other's talent, especially since they both tried out for each other's st role (finn went for mike and will same as noah). if anything I thought finn had a crush on caleb cuz multiple instances on vid where finn gushes about caleb's acting skill (when caleb did an excellent billy roleplay during a guess who that character is game and in the s2 promo vid where finn compliments caleb A LOT compared to the other actors, while caleb only complimented gaten but that could be just the netflix editing team cutting n splicing, comment did poke fun at how finn hyped up caleb and how caleb didnt mention finn at all). in one early vid finn had to get caleb to hug him cuz caleb only hugged gaten in greeting as those two met previously on broadway cuz they had a longer history. caleb was going for a handshake/dap but finn had his arms open for a hug like how gaten got one right before finn was noticed by caleb. and in the same interview where finn told how noah forgot they had met already, finn describes caleb as cool and funny from the 1st time he saw him during casting calls. But again that can just be finn being mesmerized by all the talent his peers possess since he is passionate about his craft.

Yeah, these are all valid counterpoints! It's interesting no one has ever really shipped Faleb... or Faten? (I don't know what their ship names would be). But that's maybe partially because people have always subconsciously seen them as straight while subconsciously seeing Finn "his eyes soften" Wolfhard as queer? And also because Finn does seem to be especially close with Noah compared to the others?

Hmm, I've never thought of the idea of Finn having had a crush on Caleb before, but that's an interesting concept. I do think "Foah" could possibly be more about the two acknowledging each other's talent, but who knows? Maybe it's both lol. (And nonny, now you got crush culture by conan gray stuck in my head).

[11-eyed-rook]

Seriously, I feel like this needs to be understood and said more often but...

YOUNG QUEERS SHOULD LEARN MORE ABOUT (AND UNDERSTAND) QUEER HISTORY, BUT OLDER QUEERS ALSO NEED TO MAKE SURE THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES ARE ACCESSIBLE TO ALL IN THE FIRST PLACE.

But there's more to it.

And here's where I'm coming from, personally (it'll be a bit long, my apologies, but it should give you a perspctive on what I mean):

I'm 27, pansexual, genderfluid (AFAB; male-leaning overall, experiencing certain forms of dysphoria much of my life), I'm from a country that's somewhat conservative-leaning, used to be a part of the USSR and hasn't had the friendliest attitude towards the LGBTQ+ community or pride events even in recent years. Transphobia and homophobia continue to be major issues here, and due to more older more conservative-minded people using social media, a lot of hateful thinking is spread around, misinformation and literal lies are spread around, and opinions are becoming more extreme in some circles.

Being openly queer is simply not something you can be here safely (even now), even if you happen to know people that accept you.

I don’t think I’ve ever even met/personally known any openly queer people in my country in my entire life, and the only ones I know of at all are either celebrities, or they’re involved in some political circles, and even so, I don’t see much talk about queerness – much of the time the fact is mentioned as a side-note “fun fact/reminder” rather than something important; very few of them ever seem to talk about their own experience of queerness, and even so – in general terms, briefly. That's if they mention it at all, of course...

To put into perspective how deeply closeted I’ve had to be - my own father literally threatened violence (rather, he threatened to end my life) for trying to come out as trans some years ago (and believe me, he’d go through with it, I don’t doubt it). Just for TRYING to come out. I was already an adult by that point. He's always been very homophobic and transphobic, and that has only gotten worse with time.

I started questioning my gender very early in my childhood, without even knowing that being trans is a something that can happen, without knowing that not everybody questions their gender, without knowing why I’ve felt the way I have. I didn't know anything about the LGBTQ+ community until about the mid-2000s, even so, surface-level news, and anything else - mostly from the perspective of extremely homophobic/transphobic conservatives, some trying to ban pride events and making sure that everybody is pulled into the idea of "the gays = bad". I started trying to understand what it meant to be queer/gay once I had internet access and the occasional moments of privacy - I was afraid of asking questions, because I was made to believe that it's "bad" to be this way. Some time later, I’d realize that I have no gender preference when it comes to attraction. I understood myself to be bisexual, at around age 12-13; it was one of the only things I had a word for. I still wasn’t familiar with the trans community. I had no resources I could fully trust. I still was just learning to speak English properly. I had no queer friends. But what I understood is that I can’t express what I DO know about myself, because I’d be in danger.

I had to figure things out on my own. Only when I was about 15-16 years old did I find friends who are part of the LGBTQ+ community, all of them outside of my country. I finally started feeling less alone in my personal experiences. I found out that what I was feeling about my gender, is me being trans. I started to learn terminology I was previously completely unfamiliar with. Yet...

I’m 27. Pansexual. Genderfluid. Most of my friends are part of the community in some way. And somehow, I still know very little about queer history as such. I still don’t know what sources I can trust when trying to learn about queer history. Whatever little I do know, is stuff that “almost everybody” knows to some extent or another. I’ve felt a sense of guilt, because I’m queer, yet, I know practically nothing of the community's history and struggles. Older queers have made me feel inadequate about it, not directly, but in those general callout posts about “NEEDING TO LEARN THE HISTORY”.

Younger queers than myself, know even less than I do.

In the age when LGBTQ+ media is censored in some places, banned in others, completely unavailable to many, even actually illegal in some places, how can you expect every queer person out there to know all there is to know, if you don’t offer a helping hand here or there?

This is a sort of “callout” to older queers than myself; those that know the history or lived it, those that can provide information. If you have resources that you can share with those like myself, please provide them rather than shaming us for “not knowing more”. Some of us simply do not have access to the resources you’ve had access to, to the knowledge you have, maybe even the experiences you’ve lived through/been a part of yourself.

You see how the internet is, and you should know how hard it is to just trust random shit online, especially nowadays. Censorship isn’t helping, either. And this is a problem in developed first-world countries, needless to speak of anywhere else.

Just because we’re born queer, doesn’t mean we’re born knowing our history. What’s obvious to you isn’t always obvious to everybody else.

Be understanding and offer a helping hand when you can (I try to when I'm able to). Some learn sooner. Some learn later. But if you can help somebody learn at all, maybe try to help. Shame isn't an educational tool. Offering otherwise unavailable resources in this day and age, is more valuable than you might realize, even for stuff that might seem like "common knowledge".

I want to understand. Many others do too.

You see the world as it is. Our history is being erased left and right. Save and share whatever resources you can.

[wodania]

honestly no i don’t think it’s weird at all to be upset about the exclusion of satin in the show.. if anything though as a gay guy im pretty glad they didn’t have him if loras is any indicator.. imagine them with a fairly effeminate gay coded character? no thanks 🫣

Loras was a sign of the end times 😭 I think I’ve made a joke before that if JonCon had been included he probably would’ve been written like one of those modern family dads and I feel more and more right each passing day.

Gonna rant a little (a whole shit ton like it’s really long I’m so sorry I got carried away) about gender and sexuality in ASOIAF/GoT here because I’m a lesbian and obsessed with analyzing these things :

tldr; D&D set up gender roles/rules where there weren’t previously any, and removed and added character traits as they saw fit (especially looking at feminine = gay and masculine = straight). If a character did not fit their perceived mould, such as Qarl the Maid, Jon Connington, and Satin, and could not be altered to fit that perceived mould, they were cut entirely. They also, in a possible attempt to be more relatable to a gay audience, introduced systematic religious homophobia where it was not previously, brutalizing their gay character. They wrote them as stereotypes and ignored them if they could not possible be shaped into one of their stereotypes.

GRRM obviously plays with gender roles and dynamics with his characters, yet D&D makes it so black and white. Gay people are all effeminate men. Hell, even Asha/Yara falls into this. She and her lover Qarl are a major fuck you to westerosi gender roles and expectations. He’s an effeminate man and she’s a masculine woman in a dominate powerful position. Yet he’s removed from the show. Absolutely no hate to queer “Yara”, but it is interesting in hindsight how that ended up working out. Had she been written differently, I’d argue that bisexuality compliments her character - if it weren’t for the history D&D has. When they do play with gender roles, it’s so tacky and one dimensional and ends with weird, nonsensical scenarios of female badassery with none of the development present in the books. Then, on the other hand, any vulnerability or deviance from societal expectations that male characters experience are wiped clean. Jon Snow is made into a generic fantasy hero type. Men who are seen as “weaker” or more “submissive” are brutalized on screen as torture p/rn, as shown with Theon Greyjoy. And men who are gay must be effeminate or promiscuous in one way or another. Loras deviated from that, so he had to be stripped of his defining traits and turned into fan service. Satin deviated from that even more, being a sex worker, and was stripped from the show entirely. Loras didn’t sleep with men enough, and the show writers wanted to change that. But Satin slept with men too much, and was in too close of proximity narratively and physically to fantasy hero Jon Snow. They wanted gay sex depicted in an easily digestible way for their perceived cishet audience, and found the idea of a boy selling his body to survive abysmal and not appropriate for such an audience, though they had no problem exploiting female prostitutes for the pleasure of the viewers . And in a weird attempt to be “relatable” to modern audiences, d&d introduced a self imposed barrier: homosexuality being illegal. Likely thinking that gay audiences would love to see their favourite gay Loras Tyrell brutalized and spat upon, D&D did exactly that, failing to realize that gay audiences would much rather see a queer character existing in a dark fantasy without their sexuality being what puts them in danger, compared to seeing something they already witness every day (religious-motivated violence and persecution) thrown into the show. Like it’s such an insult to the source material, especially considering that the 1990s book that hardly makes explicit references to the relationship of Loras and Renly does a better job at making them likeable, well developed characters than the “modern” 2010s tv drama. The flower crown, rainbow, cutesy edits dating back to the early days of Game of Thrones is a far cry from the depiction of politically savvy Renly and brutal and bloody Loras in the books. And the show just kind of encouraged that view of the two, as the cutesy gay boy fan service, hairless as a newborn baby and scared of blood. On the topic of JonCon, it would have been near impossible to introduce him and have him fit this set rule of “effeminate men = gay” and “masculine men = heterosexual”. JonCon is an intimidating, stone faced character who’s demeanour is hinted at being similar to that of Tywin fucking Lannister, as Tyrion almost accidentally refers to Jon as “father”. Aka, Jon is scary af. He’s older, grey, potentially dated the ugliest man in Essos who was also significantly older than him, and is also a father. Hardly a character that can be put into the set limiting roles of the show.

I’m honestly going to stop myself right here this is getting too long and I should just sit down and write an essay 💀 like genuinely I should write a paper

[arimiadev]

Visual Novel Developer Interview – Scene Direction in Of Sense and Soul

Hi everyone! For this month's visual novel dev article I thought we’d try something different. I typically write articles based on my own experiences and research, but I want to include more commentary and experiences from other developers.

So today I’ll be interviewing another visual novel developer!

ingthing is a visual novel developer and friend of mine who is currently developing Of Sense and Soul, a queer Victorian romance visual novel following a pair of men after a misconstrued newspaper ad.

Of Sense and Soul (@ofsenseandsoul) is a highly detailed, lovingly crafted visual novel that showcases how we can elevate indie visual novels to new heights. Its attention to visuals is something that can be felt throughout every store page and screenshot for the game but is even more breathtaking once you actually play it.

Today I’ll be interviewing the lead developer, ingthing! You may have seen her previously talk on this at Visual;Conference, an annual online visual novel developer conference.

find the archived version of this interview on my blog.

Note: ingthing will be referred to as “Ing” and Of Sense and Soul will be shortened to “OSAS”.

Arimia: Hiya Ing! So to get us started, can you introduce yourself and tell people how you got into visual novel development?

Ing: I’m Ing, I’m an artist and designer who had a gay webcomic idea with her friend one day and then two years later we decided it should become a visual novel instead! Now I lead my own little studio and we’re making a Whole Thing out of OSAS. [Of Sense and Soul]

Arimia: Cinematography is such a large aspect of OSAS. What made you want to focus so much on cinematography for it?

Ing: In the beginning we actually didn’t consider cinematography so much—our original Demo was very static and was a simpler affair of putting sprites on a background. 

It was really when I was designing the user interface that I began to think about it, starting with a NVL style screen that displayed a letter that the main character was reading. I had the idea of placing the main character sprite on the left of the letter in order to display their emotions while reading the letter as a close-up—and that meant I started the framing of the scene, and how the “camera” could affect the player’s experience of the game.

LEFT: An earlier draft of the Letter Reading Screen in OSAS. RIGHT: A screenshot of the same scene as shown in the Extended Demo.

What really solidified my pursuit of cinematography in OSAS was the prologue sequence—I knew immediately I wanted to use the art for it with a camera pan down the long, vertical image. I watched Visual Novel Design (Vimilikesart’s) YouTube video Ren’Py Images and Action Editor Tutorial and decided to use Action Editor to achieve this, and once I learned how to use the tool the rest was history!

Once I knew what the possibilities of the Ren’Py in-game camera were, I quickly learned more about its Animation and Transformation Language (ATL) through manipulating it, and started adding cinematography to the entire Of Sense and Soul demo.

Arimia: Why do you think this is important in visual novels?

Ing: As an experience, visual novels are unique in that they are a time-based interactive medium. You’re asking your audience for their attention for a significant chunk of their time, the same way a movie or TV series would—and that’s a lot of hours spent in front of a screen if it stays fundamentally unmoving. 

Dialogue and narration are also commonly shown in a text box at the bottom of the screen, and the text content itself is what tells most of the story. In my opinion, having a static screen that only changes when images are being switched in or out discourages players from paying attention to the visuals, and more of their focus might turn to the text alone—which would not only make their playing experience more monotonous but also impact their enjoyment of your hard work.

I think every visual novel developer or player is familiar with the imagery that makes up a scene—namely, sprites and backgrounds—and these are very important to get right, as they offer a visual to connect with stories and characters. Most backgrounds and sprites offer variation for appropriate times of day or facial expressions, or even props, poses, and outfits if they’re fancy—but I would say their possibilities as image assets alone are finite. You can match a scene to a narrative and match a character to their description, but their effectiveness in conveying a scene is entirely dependent on when, where, how, and why you display them, which is one major element you have control over when scripting a VN. 

With Of Sense and Soul‘s demo, I’ve had the joy of watching in real time as streamers and players respond to my cinematography—and the level of investment in the story they develop when given engaging visuals cannot be overstated! It was clear the action happening on screen through the main character’s eyes was connecting with them. Sudden angled zooms on shocked characters’ expressions earned a gasp or laugh, while thudding heartbeat effects and pans across a character’s face with their eyes concealed drew concerned looks or “Oh no”s from players without fail, every time the scene was intended to elicit those reactions. It’s one thing to show a character’s emotions on their face or describe how they’re feeling—it’s another entirely to tell it through the audience’s visual instincts.

…the level of investment in the story [streamers and players] develop when given engaging visuals cannot be overstated!

(As an aside, I’ve been told that when they arrive at the voiced segments of OSAS, some players begin to feel like they’re watching a movie instead of reading a visual novel—which in my eyes means the cinematography was successful!)

Utilizing cinematography in your visual novels can not only help you keep your audience’s attention by creating a better visual narrative and keeping them eager to see what comes next, but also allows you to maximize the image assets you do have—which, for many visual novel developers, is limited. I think that’s pretty important, and a win for everyone all around!

Arimia: I think using what limited assets you have is definitely key. What are some ways you think other devs can make better use of their limited assets, from what you’ve seen in other games?

Ing: I think prime examples of devs making creative use of their assets can be seen in a lot of games made for the O2A2 game jam in which each game can only have one of any asset. Some ways devs have used their backgrounds, for example, with added motion or repetition, like in lastrain by usarin in which a background is looped to give the appearance of a moving train, or in Fleeting Confession by xxmissarichanxx where the foreground confession booth screen is used both in front of the sprite and in the back, but blurred and semi-transparent for the latter.

A more simple and commonly used way to better utilise image assets is just by changing the parts shown of them—many visual novels will zoom into a background or sprite to show off specific details, especially if events described in the story itself are taking place in, say, a table in the corner of the room.

I think what most devs who do play with camerawork and presentation have set up, though, is they’ve already planned their assets ahead for those uses—devs who do full-body sprites will have more flexibility than half-body sprites, and backgrounds that are larger than the final game window offer better quality when zoomed into.

Some devs also play around with “comic book” style cut-ins, like the prologue for Tomorrow Will be Dying by Team Robo and actually, your game, Lost Lune! Even in the screenshots you can see some fun silhouetting of sprites and comic frames being used to bring drama to scenes.

Arimia: These are all great ideas for VN devs! Personally I love playing around with camera stuff and trying new things to make scenes more dynamic—there’s so many ways you can frame scenes. Is there any technique or method you’d like to add to OSAS that you haven’t been able to yet or plan on?

Ing: I do actually want to do some cut-in style frames and potentially use a vignette effect for flashbacks. I tend not to plan a ton for scene direction, but I see what other devs are doing and go “this looks so cool” and hoard it in my brain like a squirrel preparing for hibernation.

Arimia: Yeah, definitely. I was playing Mahoyo recently and it took me forever to finish it because I’d get so inspired by the scene direction!

How do you mix the visual scene direction with other aspects, like audio? I’ve never delved into voice acting for my games but I know voice acting is a large part of the charm for OSAS.

Ing: Definitely relate to just staring at sequences for ages and rolling back and forth to examine how cinematics work!

Honestly the weirdest part with voice acting for OSAS is we never originally thought it would be part of the game. Because the game has a very “paper-like” feel and was intended to be more grounded in words, VA wasn’t something we felt would be necessary.

What really changed that was the addition of scene direction. Once cinematics were in and we knew what the sprites and settings could do to tell the story, voicing was a natural next step because the game was suddenly so lively!

The audio absolutely plays a big part in how scenes are directed and sequenced—to an extent we follow the emotionality of the soundtracks playing in the background to reflect the emotions of the scene. A more melancholic track might be accompanied with more sluggish-feeling pans across the scene, where a lively track might have quicker pans between sprites to reflect the dynamic of the conversation!

One of my favorite audio-led camera effects is the heartbeat effect used in Seamus’ demo segments; when the heartbeat is pounding in Seamus’ (and the player’s) ears, the camera zooms in/out and blurs along with the sound effect, creating a much more impactful effect than if we were to just add the audio.

Arimia: Yeah, the heartbeat effect is something that just sticks with you—I’ve never seen anything like it in other VNs. Parts like that really draw you in (literally and figuratively).

Okay, my final question is- share a cool trick in Ren’Py!

Ing: I’ll share two!

The first is boring, but…

You can actually define your color hex codes in your files and apply them wherever you need them (like your GUI styles)! And then when you need to change the color itself you won’t have to find all instances of that hex code and change them individually, you can just do it from your main definition.

If you’re in the Ren’Py developer console (Shift+O) you can change your save file name using $ save_name = "filename" for your personal testing needs and it won’t affect your save_name for the game itself.

And that way you can keep your save files for testing named and also make yourself laugh with them!

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

And there you have it! I hope this interview with ing on scene direction was helpful, inspiring or at least interesting. Cinematography in VNs has been something I’ve been really interested in this year and I hope to see more visually unique VNs in the future.

You can find Of Sense and Soul’s demo on itch.io and Steam via their website. There’s so many super inspired segments, I really recommend you to check it out! The game is also currently on Kickstarter—if you’re planning to host your own, I fully recommend checking out the page for it. The attention to detail on the Kickstarter page is a league of its own.

You can also follow them on Tumblr @ofsenseandsoul!

[yr-obedt-cicero]

I was reading some of Allan McLane's work, for those that don't know, he was a grandson of Alexander Hamilton, being the second son of Philip Hamilton II and Rebecca McLane. I noticed something intriguing about one of his books. In the second volume of A System of legal medicine, by McLane and Lawrence Godkin published in 1894, there is an article titled; ‘Sexual Crimes’. The section is written by one of the many collaborates, Charles Gilbert Chaddock. Chaddock was a Professor of Diseases of the Nervous System, and neurologist to Rebekah Hospital. An additional fun fact, the first known use of the term homosexual was in Chaddock's 1892 translation of Richard von Krafft-Ebing's Psychopathia Sexualis, a study of sexual practices.

Chaddock discusses a lot of sexual topics but one is “sexual inversion”, which was a theory of homosexuality popular primarily in the late 19th and early 20th century. Sexual inversion was believed to be an inborn reversal of gender traits: male inverts were, to a greater or lesser degree, inclined to traditionally female pursuits and dress and vice versa.

The most common sexological theory of same-sex desire was that it was the result of physical, emotional, or psychological “inversion.” In other words, the gender of persons who desired their own sex was somehow reversed. When a man desired a man, it was actually a woman—presumably existing within the man's body—who was desiring a man. When a woman desired a woman, it was actually a male essence within the woman's body who felt that desire. This metaphysical explanation, accepted as scientific (at this point of the emergence of psychology as a science), had a substantial effect on the public imagination for the next fifty years. It became how many people understood the phenomenon of same-sex desire. Theories of Inversing were published widely, and sexologists were understood by the average person to be the experts on a “new science.” The idea of the “invert,” or “third sex,” also quickly and profoundly informed two popular and lasting stereotypes: the mannish lesbian and the effeminate homosexual man. (Although there were preexisting stereotypes of the effeminate male, sexological taxonomy invented him as a homosexual man.)

Source — A Queer History of the United States, by Michael Bronski · 2011

Chaddock wrote that;

Since in any case sexual inversion is but a phenomenon arising from a neuropsychopathic condition, as previously indicated, it is seldom an isolated manifestation, but is most frequently observed in combination with other sexual perversions. In accordance with this, the medico-legal questions arising in sexual inversion may be identical with those raised in the sexual perversions previously considered. The further possibilities of a criminal character are related to the crimes of pederasty. The individual affected with contrary sexuality satisfies himself with men by means of passive or mutual onanism, or by coitus-like acts (coitus inter femora); if active pederasty is performed, it is only as a result of intense sexual desire, or out of wish to please another. Passive pederasty may be performed by contrary sexual individuals to please the active party, or out of lust where they feel themselves entirely in the feminine role. To distinguish such cases from pederasty not dependent upon a pathological condition, it is but necessary to exclude the existence of psychosexual inversion, and to remember that where this crime is performed apart from perversion it is as a means of sexual indulgence in the absence of opportunity for natural satisfaction, and as a new means. of sexual gratification where natural methods of sexual pleasure have been exhausted by excess. Non-pathological passive pederasty is practiced only for gain.

Source — A System of legal medicine, Volume 2, by Allan McLane Hamilton · 1900

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Arty Morty

Published: Apr 28, 2024

“‘Woke’ isn’t dead — it’s entered the mainstream” says Gaby Hinsliff, a columnist at (where else) The Guardian. To which I ask, what’s the difference? Any music nerd will tell you: a countercultural movement is dead the minute it goes mainstream.

Take the early ‘90s “grunge” phenomenon. It lost its edgy appeal once the look was subsumed into the suburban retail fashion supply chain, and the fad quickly passed after that. “Alternative music” was a misnomer by the mid-’90s: in what way was it “alternative” when it dominated the Billboard charts? By 1997, the corporatized counterculture that had come to define the era was lampooned on (where else) The Simpsons, when they introduced Poochie the surfin’, rappin’ dog “with an attitude,” a crass attempt to remain “hip with the kids” in the satirically self-described “worst episode ever.”

[ “Wokeness” is the worst episode of political counterculture, ever. ]

“Wokeness” is certainly a countercultural phenomenon. Like “alternative,” the term “woke” only makes sense relative to the mainstream: to describe people who position themselves politically far to the left of whatever ideas have already been embraced by the establishment. So it’s more of an intensifying adjective to other causes and issues rather than a coherent political worldview in its own right. Being against racism or homophobia by itself isn’t woke; being way more against racism than everyone else, and against all the possible queerphobias — even the ones you normies haven’t even heard of is. Being in favour of making the criminal justice system more fair isn’t woke because it isn’t distinct enough from the common sense view. To make it woke, you have to be in favour of doing away entirely with the prisons and the police. You get the idea.

“Woke,” both the word and the movement, always had not-so-subtle transcendental, spiritual connotations: a shade adjacent to nirvana.

This is a point that Hinsliff struggles to grasp. In her column she tries to define “woke” as, variously:

“the broader push for social, racial and environmental justice”

“the idea of being more open to sometimes uncomfortable challenge from minority perspectives that were previously suppressed”

“saving the planet”

“uncovering forgotten histories”

“inclusivity at work”

“ ‘be kind’ ”

“getting more used to acknowledging conflicting views based on different life experiences”

To which Ophelia Benson (who else) keenly observes that, for starters, Hinsliff is mixing up “radically different things”:

Social justice is not the same thing as “environmental justice” and climate change isn’t fundamentally political. What to do about it is politicized (but shouldn’t be), but the change itself is not responsive to whether we shout “fascist!” or “wokerati!” at it. Those are two radically different things, so there’s no point in calling the pairing of them anything.

This is the inevitable path of a movement that exists solely to be more activist-y than everyone else: the condensing of all ostensibly progressive causes into a great, faceless ideological black hole. The logical endpoint of the moral-bidding-war meltdown of “wokeness” is a singularity: a state of mind which, to those inside, is a realm of infinite, utopian virtue. To everyone else it looks literally pointless. “Woke,” both the word and the movement, always had not-so-subtle transcendental, spiritual connotations: a shade adjacent to nirvana.

(Speaking of grunge!)

That tracks with the direction “wokeness” is going: one big nondescript fist of self-righteousness.

[ Until recently, a mural on Toronto’s gay village community centre, The 519, depicted a leatherman in fetish gear, a lesbian in a wheelchair, and a teen girl binding her breasts — a perfect encapsulation of “queer” activist extremism. ]

Here’s a little anecdote, an example of wokeness subsuming everything ostensibly progressive until it ends up meaningless and useless. About 20 years ago, the city-funded community centre at the heart of Toronto’s gay village put up a mural which loomed over the neighbourhood. It depicted, along with a lesbian in a wheelchair, a middle-aged leatherman clad in fetish gear, and a teenage girl straining to crush her breasts into a binder. The message was clear: adult men’s fetishes and distressed teen girls’ trans identities would now be central parts of the community’s activism.

And sure enough, that’s exactly what the community centre focused on in the ensuing years, as the activists shifted over to “queer theory,” with its emphasis on sexual permissiveness and hostility to biological sex distinctions.

(To be clear, I have no beef with the gay leather scene. I just don’t think it’s in need of publicly funded support, and I don’t think leather daddies are in any way marginalized. Binders, on the other hand, I have all kinds of beef with.)

Credit where it’s due: they do pick apt murals. The next shift among “queer” activists was to embrace all-encompassing, universal, woke ideals. That’s been reflected in the community centre’s new mural, which recently replaced the one with the lesbian, the leatherman, and the trans “boy.” Just as the first mural presciently captured the shifting cultural mood inside the building, so too does the second: now it’s a raised fist — a universal symbol of righteous protest — filled in like a quilt with patches that depict the “progress” flag, various shades of the colour brown (skin tones, one presumes), animal hide prints (animal rights?), blue waves (the environment), and miscellaneous patterns whose symbolism I can’t decipher. That tracks with the direction “wokeness” is going: an incoherent melding of anything conceivably virtuous into one big nondescript fist of self-righteousness.

[ The Toronto gay village community centre’s new mural is one big nondescript fist of self-righteousness — a perfect encapsulation of “wokeness.” ]

I’ll bet that the people who work inside the community centre think they’re at the epicentre of all virtue now, and that their noble mission has naturally expanded from when it served gays and lesbians in the time of rampant AIDS and gay bashing, to LGBT outreach, to LGBTQ+ propaganda, to 2SLGBTQQIA++ hysteria, and now at long last they’ve arrived at righteousness in its true, pure form, having transcended all individual causes. Woke nirvana.

But I know for a fact that the gay people who live and work in the neighbourhood have little or no use for the community centre’s services anymore, because it’s strayed so far from the community it was founded to support. I am one such person, and I wouldn’t darken their bloody doorstep. My own “community centre” has nothing to offer my community now but insults and condescension. In its lurch to woke extremism, it’s become not just useless to us, but hostile to us, and in so doing it’s set itself up for its own undoing.

That’s a sentiment we’re seeing across society: people are fed up with the extremists.

To go back to Hinsliff’s Guardian article, does this mean that wokeness is being embraced by the mainstream, or killed off by it? In the aftermath of the Cass review, Hinsliff can’t dispute that there are “tough lessons to be learned” about moral absolutism “that can be fatal to progressive causes.”

But Gaby, I shout at the screen, it’s the moral absolutism that’s being rejected, not the causes themselves. People cared about the environment and gay rights and gender nonconforming people and women’s rights and all the rest before “woke” came along, and they’ll continue to care about all of it long after “woke” is gone.

The moral absolutism is the wokeness.

Hinsliff panders to the Guardian readership by offering a self-flattering alternative view, which says that the woke movement is moving along just as it always intended, having more-or-less already achieved its true goal, which was only ever to gently nudge the Overton window, to take the establishment a baby step to the left, rather than smash the whole system and burn as many witches as it could find:

Woke is no longer wildly anti-establishment; increasingly it’s becoming the boring old establishment, to the point where teenagers will doubtless soon be ripping it apart on TikTok, since turning into baby conservatives is the only thing really guaranteed now to confound their parents. It is radicalism that initially breaks down doors. But what usually ends up walking through them is a version with the sharp edges smoothed off that most people find they can live with, and that’s where woke is heading now. It’s not dead. But it is evolving, and that’s how living things ultimately survive.

Now, you might argue that this is a difference which makes no difference, the distinction between “wokeness is dying because the mainstream are fed up with woke people’s extremism” and “wokeness is actually secretly winning by merging itself into the mainstream and changing it a bit for the better.”

But that’s wrong. There’s a big distinction, and it’s an important one. When we look back, one of these views will put the people behind wokeness in their rightful place in history alongside the McCarthyites and the lunatics of the Salem witch trials: villains at the heart of some of our darkest, most terrible chapters in history. The other view, which Hinsliff is pushing, will paint the people behind wokeness as heroes, whose acts of extremism were merely noble sacrifices “to break down doors” for the greater good of progress.

To which, and I absolutely hope that someone manages to get this in front of Gaby Hinsliff so that you, Gaby, can read these words yourself:

Fuck you.

The woke activists who sent death threats to Kathleen Stock, to JK Rowling, and to countless other women for simply speaking their minds and telling the truth? They are not heroes, Gaby. They do not deserve praise for “breaking down doors.” Some of these activists literally wanted to kill women.

The countless vulnerable young people — often gay, autistic or both — who were coaxed by woke people to undergo unnecessary, experimental, irreversible body modification surgeries? They’re victims, Gaby. Their victimhoods, their stories, are what need to take historical precedence above all else.

You blithely dismiss the victims’ plight, the ongoing pain that they will suffer for the rest of their lives, as collateral damage.

And there are so many more victims — too many to list them all, but here are some: women residing in prisons and shelters; women who just want to use public washrooms and changing rooms in peace, dignity and safety. Lesbians and gay men who just want to socialize as a community and maintain their sexual boundaries. Academics who dare to raise questions. Employees in all kinds of workplaces, afraid to say the “wrong” thing, or fired for having done so.

Graham Linehan, for fearlessly saying what needs to be said, when almost no other celebrity or media figure has had the guts to.

And me. I’m a victim, too. I won’t be getting my friends back, the ones who threw me out of their lives in my most difficult time of need, after I spoke up for gay rights. And I won’t be returning to work in the gay community or the arts community, both of which I was a part of for so long.

You spit in all of our faces when you characterize our woke tormentors as the real heroes.

This is surely just the beginning of a widespread attempt to put a positive spin on the woke cult’s dying legacy by those who were complicit in its ugly doings.

The Guardian always turned a blind eye to the savagery routinely deployed by the woke against perfectly decent people — the paper still employs the profoundly detestable Owen Jones, for example. The cruelties doled out by men and women like Jones never served the noble causes they purported to; they were always mere ploys to put themselves in a more advantageous position on the woke playing field.

I think everyone’s starting to see that now. I don’t think the spin doctoring ploy is going to fly. No one’s going to look back at “woke” with any fondness or gratitude.

If anything, people will want to move on and forget it ever happened. I can understand that.

But me, I have a different plans. I don’t intend to let people ever forget the victims or the culprits of this mass psychosis.

To the woke assholes who were so cruel in their performative commitment to “social justice”: you’re going to have to face some social justice of your own, some day soon.