#and there's only a few people who i can legally ramble about this specific stuff to 😔 life is so suffering

[arcaneyouth]

i think the one downside to people thinking my comic is super awesome and compelling is that i don't actually get to ramble about spoilers very often because people really want to see it play out naturally aisdUHASLDIUHASLIDH which is fair and flattering. i'm going to implode with all the words in my chest i'm not allowed to say tho

[excaive]

i love KJ so much. i see them in my dreams. obsessed with this freak and desperately need to know more

BIG FAT MOOD ANON 🤝

I can share some facts n fun stuff! Some I've mentioned whenever I ramble about KJ but I haven't like done anything that gives an overview of them in one place :3

This will be in no particular order. Also way longer than I initially imagined but I can't shut up about KJ ever <3

KJ's name KILLJOYE is based on the initials of their legal name, which isn't relevant to know and I also don't actually know their last name so I couldn't tell you fully even if I wanted to

He's a pretty well known music artist in Black Orbit. You'll know who people are talking about when throwing around their name KILLJOYE, even if you haven't heard anything he's made. Primarily rap, and it will absolutely be hit or miss because they're a Certified Freak™ and makes very niche tunes that will make you go "eugh..... yuck. what sane person would listen to this." (and then either you'll just turn away or you'll keep listening either out of morbid curisosity or you're a freak who unironically is digging it) I just thought about how I haven't made a playlist that's specifically for what I think KJ would make BUT their personal playlist will suffeciently let you know their vibes as a person and the vibes for what they'd make themself. I did talk about oc playlists a while back and how the first few songs will tell you everything you need for what to expect - and KJ got a few new songs so I've moved around the order a bit and I think this is so funny:

Disgusting Pink(Freak)........ yeah this literally KJ.

KJ became friends with Roger online when they were teens! Met thru a music sharing forum as they both enjoy making music. When Roger moved into KJ's place when he was about 20, they eventually teamed up to make music together as REDROOT. here's that playlist for the kind of music they'd make together. If you're curious about how their voices sounds if you listen to the tunes, I just loosely imagine that deep/rumbly vocals are KJ and more high-pitched vocals are Roger

Going off what I just mentioned, KJ is able to alter their voice due to their parasite, which allows them to get real rumbly and also just make noises that should only be possible by fucking around with the vocals in a program.

KJ's normal speaking voice is like.... idk how to explain, but when they're excited (which they are most of the time) they'll get more high-pitched. They sound like whatever makes you unable to describe them as feminine or masculine sounding. KJ is a freak and they sound like one. That's all you need to know <3

KJ is gay and they're intersex

If you ask them about anything related to skateboarding, they'll infodump so hard if you let them or if you aren't careful. You'll activate them. He knows like literally everything. Be it the history of skateboarding and how it evolved, the history of the skateparks in Sunjin (in case u don't know, Sunjin is the massive metropolis that Black Orbit takes place in), all the technical parts about skateboards and the different types, and everything about how to skate and do tricks and which parts of the body is especially important and how to be postured to pull off tricks well and how to avoid getting too hurt if you do fall etc etc.

KJ is very involved with a skatepark in the region they live in! That's where they vibe with their many friends. It's such a chill and friendly skatepark and easy to approach for kids and adults who wanna learn how to skate - and it's also just a great place to vibe and hang out with friends!

KJ is extremely social. They hang out with their skatepark buddies as well as their music fans often. He's definitely overwhelming to be around at times, but if you just tell him to tone it down, he'll be considerate of that. If possible, he'll just get his energy out away from your space and vibe with ya a bit later.

KJ does have OCD and struggle with intrusive thoughts mostly, but nobody except Roger knows about the latter (well. the extent of it. It's Bad) If you've been around KJ long enough, you'll notice repetitive actions but most of what they do you won't pick up on unless you're aware of the reasons behind it.

KJ has 3 dimples on their face. They're not very obvious but they are There when KJ smiles and I do forget to add em, especially if i simplify the way I draw KJ

Here's a comparison between KJ's haircut pre-story and post-story (if you don't know, KJ isn't involved in the main story of Black Orbit. They have no plot-relevance. But they ARE a key-person to Roger's life - if not for KJ, Roger wouldn't be part of the main story at all)

This is mostly to differentiate between KJ depending on where they are in life for art reasons - realistically, they'd keep the pre-story look, but I'm here for the Layers and Symbolism. They're very different post-story (still a massive freak tho. Might even be more freaky actually <3) and the grown out hair symbolises letting go and changing. Not as rigid, not as obsessed keeping things in one specifiic way that ultimately was holding them back. Breaking self-made rules. Wearing the cap more tilted makes it more loose than snug on their head - making them more open, which is big part of their character development! Despite loving being social and around others, KJ never really opened up to anyone. They kept a massive safety wall between themself and people they care about that was only noticable when they got hospitalized because they were so active with socializing and taking initiative that nobody really realized they had no proper way to get in touch with KJ, so they just. disappeared. Roger was the only one who knew why and where they were hospitalized since they live together.

Man. I can go on forever about KJ and very specific symbolism that no one but myself (and some friends) will be able to pick up on.

I do have some more facts to share but I'll put it under a cut as it's NSFW related. I'm not gonna describe anything terribly explicit, but it is certifed freak facts ;p

I've mentioned this before but KJ doesn't have a gag reflex. This is due to the nature of their parasite, so they don't choke whenever their parasite pops out their mouth.

KJ can hold their breath for a stupid amount of time. This is also because of their parasite.

KJ has purple tendrils in their throat that they have control over and isn't part of their parasite. The tendrils are there because of their parasite, but they aren't part of the parasite itself.

KJ has a pretty flexible jaw. Also due to their parasite

They have an oral fixation. This is not because of their parasite, they're just like that

can you tell where this is going

Anyway!

KJ makes bank by taking advantage of their mouth situation. It's a win-win situation because they'll have money to spend for their homies because they're ride or die for friends - and they're also just a freak who can provide the most wicked sloppy toppy in the city

They do this on the side of making music. This business is under wraps, and even if there's no concrete public proof they do it... It's very obvious. With a mouth like that belonging to the weirdest fucking gay guy around who makes questionable, mouth-related, nsfw songs..... like c'mon. water is wet. Even if anything scandalous leaked? Everyone knows KJ is a freak and the only thing this info would do is the equivalent of KJ getting a stupid amount of onlyfans requests. Now all the other freaks in the city knows KJ will get on his knees for good cash and they all want a piece of that mouth. KJ can never lose <3

They still do this when they start dating Roger post-story. Roger already knew about what they were up to, and it didn't deter Roger from catching feelings for KJ. Besides, living with KJ and also Cass later on (both people who are very sex-positive) doesn't give Roger any reason to believe that KJ's business would affect the integrity of their relationship. That's just more money for date trips or other things, and KJ is into some things Roger can't provide for various reasons and that's fine.

What KJ provides is only what they can do with their mouth. Make sure to read their TOS throughly or they'll bite off your precious parts, and you'll be absolutely certain they're serious and threatening you if they have to give you a warning. Don't fuck around and find out or you're going to the hospital <3

ANYWAY. There's some freak facts.

If this doesn't deter you from liking KJ, that's epic

If you are deterred.... well I can't do anything about that. I don't constantly call KJ a freak for nothing, it's what it says on the can. If you like them even more now, i'm shaking your hand. Join the club with me <3

[proudfreakmetarusonniku]

fine then @skilatilu trans TommyInnit hc under the cut

- I love the LabInnit headcanon and hc Tommy as a clone of Philza, with just enough hybrid and human DNA to be able to gestate and grow like a normal child. Unfortunately for him, this left him human enough to have an actual biological sex (unlike pure angels like Philza, who are monosex.), though before puberty it was only able to be determined through like genetic tests (which Tommy had gone through a ton of due to being a lab rat).

- When Tommy was about three, Techno burnt down the lab he was imprisoned in (it was a government lab dedicated to unethical weapon experimentation). When Techno and Phil were looking through the rubble, they found this kid trapped in a cage covered in surgical scars and looking eerily like Philza, and Philza just immediately adopted him. Most of the records of Tommy’s experimentation survived (thankfully, as he has specific medical needs and stuff due to being a patchwork abomination of every species under the sun), so Phil read through them and assumed Tommy was a girl (though he doesn’t really get the concept of gender) and named “her” Clementine.

- Tommy didn’t figure out he was trans for a while, mostly due to being raised by an angel who doesn’t have a gender and his pig friend who doesn’t care (with supplemental help from a half fridge musician and his salmon wife). He always knew that the name Clementine didn’t fit him, though he did love it and much preferred it to being a nameless string of numbers like he used to be.

- He figured it out around the same time as Fundy and his friend Niki (ye i headcanon c!niki as trans for the reason of why not). They all started transitioning around the same time. Tommy very insistently tried to get Niki to choose Clementine as her name. He failed. (Tommy would have been around six or seven, Fundy would have been eleven, and Niki would have been nine)

- Tommy chose his own name, but Wilbur joked it was short for Tomathy and it stuck.

- It’s not too soon after that that the SBI found Tubbo on the side of a road, curled in a sopping wet cardboard box. They learnt through the confused rambling of a child that he was the child of some rich business man, was kidnapped for ransom but escaped, and had been sleeping on the streets for a while. They also found out that he’d named himself (”“Tuberculosis, ‘ts a pretty word, but you c’n call me Tubbo for short!”” the sopping wet seven year old explained proudly, not noticing the barely stifled giggles from Wilbur.) and that he was also transmasc. This isn’t relevant for now but it is important for later sorry.

- When Tommy was nine, he moved from Philza’s isolated cabin far away from danger to the Dream SMP, after being invited. (Tubbo was not, but he snuck in behind Tommy and no one had the heart to kick him out). Of course, soon he was followed by friends and family, and they built a nation and we all know what happens there.

- The L’Manburg war ends when Tommy is ten and peace lasts for two years, so it is when Tommy is twelve, nearly thirteen, that the Pogtopia vs Manburg war begins. Fundy ““accidentally””  does not notice when Tommy steals puberty blockers from him for himself and Tubbo, and definitely does not order more for them (because by this point he’s sixteen and on t already).

- As Tommy grows older, and turns thirteen, and then fourteen, he starts stealing from Fundy’s potion supply of testosterone because this is Minecraft and they totally can make hormone replacement in potions because that’s cool. Tubbo refuses it, scared to be found in possession of some (Schlatt had already found the hormone blockers he’d tried to hide, and slapped him and berated him. Schlatt assumed he was transfemme so it wasn’t as awful as it could be, but it was still pretty traumatic, so Tubbo’d stopped taking them, especially after he saw how Schlatt would misgender and deadname Fundy in private).

- After Nov 16th, Ghostbur potion master extraordinaire brew the hormone potions for Fundy and Tommy. (He’d brew them for Tubbo, too, but the idea was still a bit too much for him, and Tubbo had so much work to do he forgot anyway.)

- Look, I’m all for exile arc angst, okay, but I’m not writing Dream misgendering Tommy during exile. The only person allowed to be transphobic here is Schlatt and that’s because he already canonically is. But uh I’m actually writing a one shot about trans c!Tommy during exile and it’s at 3000+ words and I haven’t mentioned trans stuff in it yet I got too distracted by the angst.

- While Tommy was staying with Technoblade, Techno helped him brew up hormone potions.

- As Tommy sewed up his tattered clothes (with the help of Technoblade, on the days where his hands were too shaken), there was a split in his hoodie where he couldn’t find the right fabric to sew it up and make it look nice so Tommy sewed a trans flag patch over it. (The patch was later damaged through the explosions in Doomsday, and he replaced it with a patch from Tubbo’s old shirt, but Tommy’d totally sew on another trans patch if he had the time.)

- Tommy used to have his hair long as a child, even after he came out, but he cut it off before moving to the SMP, so no one would mistake him for a girl. He really liked it short, but it grew out in exile and he couldn’t be bothered to cut it. When he was with Techno, Technoblade would braid his hair up out of his face and by then Tommy knew no one alive on the SMP would be transphobic and he liked having it braided more than short (it reminds him of Techno and Phil), so he let it grow out again.

- Tommy knew he liked girls before he knew he wasn’t one, asked Wilbur what liking girls called, and Wilbur told him it was lesbian. Tommy didn’t realise that that was what girls who liked girls were called until he was about fourteen and was very confused why people were laughing at him when he called himself a lesbian.

- Tommy’s very insistent on being a Big Man, and insecure in presenting himself in any other way, despite being raised by Philza and Techno, who both don’t know about gender, and Phil’s probably never wore trousers in his life while Techno has a collection of gowns. This comes from when Tommy was little and being babysat by a family friend, Schlatt, who Tommy deeply admired. Schlatt’s... interesting opinions were one of the few contacts Tommy had with gender roles for a while, and Tommy deeply admired Schlatt and thought he was cool, so it influenced him a lot.

- The reason Tommy goes by Tommy Innit instead of his legal last name (Minecraft) is that after Philza asked Tommy for his new name, Tommy went “It’s Tommy, innit?” and began jokingly insisting he meant that it was TommyInnit instead of just Tommy as an injoke.

[kyidyl]

Kyidyl Explains Bone - Part 1

(These posts will be collected under the tag KyidylBones because I have the sense of humor of a 13 year old boy.  Also, I’m going to start cross-posting them to my science side blog @science-of-anthropology​ in an effort to like give people a place to go if they’re just here for these posts and not for my other random thoughts.  That blog also contains a lot of decent info from the days I was premed and taking premed physical science classes.)

Intro and Ethical Considerations

Ok, all you weird nerds out there (<3), how’s your day going? Good? Are you ready to hear me ramble about one of my favorite things on earth? Well, then gather ‘round ye old tumblr fire.  We’re gonna learn about *people*! Because all the stuff I taught you before was stuff you basically learn in anthropology undergrad and in a field school.  But! I *specialized*.  I have secret powe--*coughs* I mean, a special interest.  See, my favorite topic in the whole world, the one on which I will ADHD infodump for DAYS about if you let me, is the intersection of human evolution and culture.  My ultimate goal is either to work in a museum, or be a scientist that studies this.  That’s why I went out and got a masters.  

A bioarchaeology masters not only taught me how to dig up people, but a whole HOST of other things related to people and digging (Like genetics and using drones to survey an area for digging.). But before we can get into the details, there’s a few things you have to understand.  First: 

On sex, race, ethnicity, and gender

Anthropologists of all kinds are well, WELL aware that these 4 things are extremely fraught and extremely complicated.  Probably more aware than any of the other sciences.  But, when you learn to identify skeletons you learn to do it based on sex and race for a couple reasons: 

1. When identifying a body for the police department, their databases are entirely based on these identifying characteristics.  A lot of forensic anthropologists work with the police to identify remains.  If we can’t pick out demographic qualities then we’d never match them up to people in the missing persons database who are listed along a sex binary and racial categories.  But believe me when I tell you we all do it under duress and in annoyance because we know how complicated these things are for people.  

2. When dealing with populations that are gone and can’t tell us what they identified as, we arrange them by sex and race to make some sort of sense of the demographics of an area.  This is how we know, for example, that people from Africa intermingled early and often with people from Europe.  Being able to ID these markers on a skeleton is faster and cheaper than DNA tests and often the only method available, especially in prehistoric populations. 

So I will be discussing features on bones in these terms, but understand that it’s not my way of excluding trans people.  We, as of yet, just have no good way of *identifying* trans people in the archaeological record. 

And second:

Ethics

Ethics is a huge and thorny topic so I’m going to only make a couple notes here.  I bounced this series around in my head for awhile and the reason I didn’t do it sooner is that despite having human remains in my possession for legitimate scientific reasons, it’s extremely unethical for me to post pictures of them on the open internet.  The same goes for the tons of pictures I have of human remains from my masters studies.  To that ends, the images I’ll be using will fall into one of four categories: images from my textbooks, images on the public web that are available for educational use, and images of Bone Clones, and my own image of damage patterns on animal bones.  This is also a warning that, yes, there will be images of human remains here.  I’ve decided, though, that when a post starts to contain human remains, I’ll insert a cut.  So you will not be surprised by human remains randomly in your timeline.  

Now, here are some ethical things I need you guys to understand and adhere to: 

- These people had names in life, and you do not get to give them new ones.  Naming a skeleton is verbotten in archaeology circles, and often will extend to Bone Clones because they are casts of real bones. The correct terminology here is either “the/this individual” or “the remains”. If specificity is needed they’re either given an identification number or referred to by their demographic information.  If you have the name of the individual bc there was a gravestone or records, then it’s ok to use it.  Often we don’t though for privacy reasons.  

- These were people.  They had tastes, beliefs, people who loved them, etc. - all of which were different than mine or yours.  Please keep that in mind when commenting.  

- There is no ethical way for a lay person to obtain human remains, aside from direct donation by a relative or friend.  No, I don’t care what they website says in their statement about ethical sourcing.  They did NOT obtain the remains ethically.  The people who sold the remains almost always do so under duress, usually economic.  And if they weren’t given, they were stolen.  There is No.  Ethical.  Way.  To.  Purchase.  Human.  Bone.

- Modern bone collections obtained by institutions for education usually are obtained ethically.  Often via donation by a living donor before their death for the purpose of scientific education.  In other instances they are obtained from legally-dug excavations, from donation by family members (IE, no money exchanged and consent given.), or with some other kind of permission.  However, there are many existing bone collections that pre-date this practice and are NOT obtained ethically.  In the US these are undergoing identification (we’ll get to this in another post) and repatriation, but this is just one of the many thorny issues that physical anthropologists and archaeologists have to be aware of.  

- What other societies do with their human remains is going to seem strange and sometimes disgusting or objectionable to you.  Not always, but definitely sometimes.  This is their choice and in this house we respect the emic (within the social group) view on death rituals.  

I think that’s everything...if I remember more I’ll sprinkle them in as I go along.  Ethical violations are a Big Deal among archaeologists and other social scientists who handle human remains.  It’s one of the few things we don’t joke about (because as we all know, archaeologists are forces of chaos.).  The history of completely unethical treatment in the field makes us very sensitive to how human remains are handled and where they came from.  Questions are 100% fine - you all are still learning and I’m not gonna get mad at you for not knowing yet.  I’ll gently let you know if it’s inappropriate.  

So here’s the stuff I’m planning on getting to: 

Human vs. Animal

Sex identification.  

Racial identification.  

Age identification. 

Teeth! 

Damage to the skeleton (this might be two posts.).  

Other random stuff that might come up while I’m doing the other things.  

So....let’s begin....mwahahahahahahahaha. And for making it to the bottom of this post you get a bonus picture of me AND the dog:

His name is Gage, and my name is Kristina - you’re welcome to use it.  I know probably “Kyidyl” isn’t easy to say in your heads.  :) It’s pronounced kai-dul if you were every wondering tho.  Now you can put a face to the internet voice. :) 

[heraldofzaun]

This is my “Viktor has never been a stereotypical evil villain, you guys are just mean” post.

Hi. Well. That says it all, really, but I guess I should elaborate. I think that Viktor has always been a victim of society [cue Joker meme], it’s just that what society has shifted over the course of his lore update.

With new lore, it’s very clearly Piltover casting him out for his (in my opinion, pretty unethical from the get-go) ideas on free will/worker safety/etc. and that subsequently making him worse. But with his previous lore - what I run off of on this blog - I’ve seen a lot of commentary about how he’s always just been “evil”, or that his motivations weren’t defined, etc. And while I can agree that his old lore certainly has less of a word count (5x less, actually) and doesn’t make his motives crystal-clear, it’s just not true that his original incarnation was just a villainous scientist. (Nor is it true that he was perceived as one by his old fans!) It takes a little bit of looking at Blitzcrank’s lore, and the Journal of Justice (hey, remember that?) to see, but it’s there... So, here goes. I’m sorry for how long this ended up being (2k words!) - it ended up touching on a lot more than just Viktor.

Viktor’s always been stolen from. (Except for Blitzcrank’s newest lores, which contradict Viktor’s new lore, which... That’s a topic for another time.) It’s always been Professor Stanwick Pididly (now Professor Stanwick) who’s done the stealing - originally, he was a professor at Zaun’s “prestigious College of Techmaturgy”. In new lore, he’s a professor at an unnamed academy in Piltover. I think the best way to track the new/old changes is bullet-points, rather than writing this all out. Tumblr doesn’t allow T-charts, sadly.

Professor Pididly in old lore:

Zaunite professor.

Stole Blitzcrank (well, the accolades for developing Blitz’s sentience) from Viktor and Viktor’s doctoral team. (While this is headcanon, I’ve always assumed that Stanwick was Viktor’s (and Viktor’s team’s) doctoral advisor. I can’t quite imagine how else he’d pull off stealing a group project like that.) Viktor subsequently withdrew from the college and “barricaded himself in his private laboratory”. (Which is his house in my personal take, because really - what sort of doctoral student can afford a lab?)

Blitzcrank’s case reached Zaun’s legal system, resulting in a “legal maelstrom” (Blitz’s original lore) that ended with Stanwick presumably being legally declared Blitzcrank’s creator.

Blitzcrank’s lore states that “most now know the truth” in regards to who his creator is. This is important for later, so stick that in your back pocket.

Pididly is referred to as “Professor Pididly” in JoJ issues 3, 18, and 23, which are given the dates of August of 20CLE, March of 21 CLE, and June of 21 CLE.

Side note: According to Orianna’s judgment, which is dated May of 21 CLE - stay with me here, it’ll make sense - Blitzcrank entered the League “years before”. As League at this time was mostly running in time with the real world, this makes sense - Blitzcrank was a 2009 champion and Orianna was released in 2011. Judgments seem to be dated to a few days before a champion’s release, in order to tie with the lore - one had to be “Judged” before made a champion... but I’m rambling. Anyways, years before, back pocket.

Is referred to as “Chairman Pididly” in JoJ issue 27, dated August of 21 CLE. “Chairman” seems to be a title given to those in political power in Zaun. Another example is Chairman Magnus Dunderson, Zaun’s “Chief Executive” (issue 5). (I could’ve sworn that there is canonically a “Board of Executives” in old lore Zaun, but scrubbing through the JoJ on the wiki hasn’t turned it up - just Blitzcrank’s lore mentioning the “Council of Zaun”. Maybe it was fanon? Anyways.) Back pocket!

Also stole some work from Viktor in order to revive Urgot. Urgot’s revival was reported on in issue 3 of the JoJ, and the confirmation that it was from Viktor’s work is in Viktor’s original lore.

Professor Stanwick (Pididly? I feel like they ditched his last name because it was “too silly”, also because Stanwick sounds British-adjacent anyways and that’s Piltover’s “thing” - but anyways) in new lore:

Piltovian professor.

Stole Blitzcrank from Viktor alone, who made the robot to help clean up a specific chemical spill. Viktor went to Zaun for a few weeks and came back to find that Stanwick had “held a symposium on Blitzcrank and presented Viktor's research as his own”. Viktor subsequently continued on his studies, culminating with him later being expelled for “violating basic human dignity”. Viktor returns to a laboratory that he had in Zaun.

Blitzcrank’s case is solely a university matter. Viktor petitions Jayce to help support his claim, but Jayce is Jayce and doesn’t help out. The “matter [is] decided in Professor Stanwick’s favor”.

Blitzcrank’s lore doesn’t really say anything about if people know that Viktor made him (them, technically, but Riot doesn’t get to make the robot non-binary), but I guess it’s implied in the 3rd iteration? (That would be the first new one, after the IoW retcon making most champions’ 2nd lores being the same lore with any reference to the titular League of Legends removed.) He works with Viktor in that one. It doesn’t fit with Viktor’s updated lore at all, actually, because it mentions Stanwick absolutely zero times. (A post for another day...)

Has nothing to do with Urgot, since Urgot’s different now.

So, the general plot of “professor rips off a student” is there, it’s just got an added layer of “professor rips off a foreign/out-group student” in new lore to tie into the overarching idea of Piltover exploiting Zaun. (Is Zaun considered foreign? Yes? No? It’s sort of textually implied sometimes to be another city, but can it actually be when it’s physically underneath Piltover? Is the metaphor in new lore a class thing, then? Is it both? Am I supposed to take Viktor’s Russian accent into account when reading this text? I don’t know.) Anyways, so far so... same, in the broad strokes. Unless Viktor’s villainy in old lore is specifically because someone from his city ripped him off, I don’t know how you can compare new/old lore and say that old painted him as a villain.

But what about the everything else I put there? We’re getting there - that’s part of Viktor’s in-universe stuff. I’m taking a quick detour out of universe, to Jayce’s very first lore...

Which had Viktor stealing a techmaturgical device from Jayce. While I can’t cite this, sadly - thank you, Riot deleting the old forums and me not having the patience to look through archives at the moment - there was a backlash around this on the forums. Why would Viktor, a character who’d been stolen from, steal in turn? So Jayce’s second lore, the one that most people were familiar with before the new lore update, was made. Now Viktor stole a crystal after trying to partner with Jayce, Jayce was less well-established as an inventor, he had a bit more character... All good things. (Also, this is probably where the new lore direction of them being former college colleagues come from.)

Also, as an aside: this is the first use I can see of crystals specifically being described as arcane power sources... The only other discussion of magical crystals was the Brackern... which was then merged into magical crystals having to be from the Brackern... Which means that...

But anyways! Clearly Viktor fans didn’t see him as a villain in 2012, or at least not one that would victimize others in the same way that he’d been hurt. They made such a fuss about it that Jayce’s lore was changed to paint Viktor more sympathetically! (When’s the last time that there’s been that much backl- oh. It’s Seraphine again. Anyways.) So, again, Viktor’s perception as an evil scientist mostly seems to have come from people who weren’t really familiar with his lore. So... case closed?

Except that I also want to talk about in-universe things! Everything that I told you to put in your back pocket! Because this post is already over a thousand words and I have thrown myself firmly into this vortex.

Viktor’s victimization by society [Joker meme] is actually probably worse in old lore, which is a fact that I think has been pretty overlooked. While new lore Viktor gets kicked back down to Zaun and gets his work stolen in academia - with Stanwick presumably never being questioned on whether or not he made Blitzcrank, because there’s that whole “Zaunites are bad” thread that is both in and out of universe... Old lore Viktor sure does get it worse, although I admit that this requires some interpretation of canon. His thing with Blitzcrank was, again, a “legal maelstrom” - and with Blitzcrank being considered a Zaunite celebrity before this court case, it seems relatively easy/logical to infer that this maelstrom was a very public case.

So all of Zaun gets to see Viktor crash and burn in court. I’d say that’s a bit worse than just academia seeing it, as is the case in new lore.

And then there’s Blitzcrank’s lore flat-out saying that “most now know the truth” about who made him. (While this lore does predate Viktor’s existence - isn’t it odd to think about a Blitzcrank made by a faceless team of generic doctoral students, rather than Viktor... and a faceless team of generic doctoral students? - I see no reason not to take it as canonical for Viktor’s original lore. There’d been minor lore touchups before, so if Riot wanted Viktor’s creation of Blitzcrank to be an unknown... they could have edited Blitzcrank’s lore.) But Viktor’s still on the fringes, and nothing in his lore (which, again, was written years after Blitzcrank’s) seems to acknowledge that by the time he enters the League we have confirmation, date-wise, that it’s been years since the truth came out. (Orianna Judgment, etc.) That’s to say: people knowing that Viktor made Blitzcrank does nothing for him - he gets no apologies or anything like that.

Of course, if you take League lore as happening concurrently and nix the Judgments and the League, I guess that this is tenuous - but working within the framework of when he was released, it seems clear to me that the implication of all this lore is (whether it was intended by Riot to be read this way or not) that no one in Zaun cares that Viktor was stolen from. It’s an open secret. No one’s seeking justice for him. But it gets worse...!

So, it’s generally known that Stanwick didn’t make Blitzcrank by the time that the JoJ is running. And he’s just a professor for most of the run of that part of the lore, until... Issue 27. In which he becomes Chairman Pididly, someone who is now implied to have political power. (I have to assume he gets the position due to the political goodwill from Noxus that his revival of Urgot must have brought Zaun, but that’s just interpretation.) But! Even though most people know that Stanwick didn’t make Blitzcrank - that he stole Blitzcrank - he ends up not losing his university job (he’s still Professor Pididly for most of the JoJ, after all) but... gaining political office!

All of this is to say that Zaun is so crooked that you can have the fact that you stole from someone and ruined their life revealed... and get a promotion to government! You can shatter an idealistic man who had a “hope to better society” and make him into someone like the Machine Herald and face absolutely zero repercussions. I think that that is significantly worse than how new lore Viktor’s victimization by Piltover consisted of an academia-only dispute that left him with just some bitterness... New Viktor was, after all, kicked out of Piltovian academia for ethics violations, not for Blitzcrank.

Everything surrounding old lore Viktor is a bit harder to piece together, since you have to look through a few lores and make a few inferences, which is why I think that people don’t realize exactly how bad he had it... (That and time erasing memories, or people being new to the fandom, or people not being interested in Viktor, or...) But he had it bad, and I’m honestly disappointed that we never got to explore much of Zaun’s particular brand of corporate corruption in canon. Now they’re the perpetual underdogs, both victims and villians, and Riot isn’t quite sure how to write them beyond constant exploitation from Piltover. (Even the chem-barons have taken somewhat of a backseat lately in new lore, from what I’ve seen - Piltover seems to be the primary cause of Zaun’s ills, because the combined region is now an upper city/lower city metaphor about class. The chem-barons just seem to be written as a result of Piltover’s ignoring of Zaun - because Zaun seems to be more of an undercity than a sovereign city or state, but that varies depending on whatever piece of lore you’re reading and... Another post, another time.)

So. TL;DR: Viktor’s always been a character who was victimized by a city, be it Zaun or Piltover. Viktor’s always been a character more complex than just a maniacal villain, although it takes more work to see that in his old lore as compared to his new. (His new pretty much screams “we are trying to make him and Jayce morally grey”, after all.) This victimization is arguably worse in old lore, as it’s implied that he went through a very public legal case that ended with Stanwick taking credit for Blitzcrank. In addition to that, Stanwick’s subsequent shift to politics implies that Zaun is so corrupt that most everyone knowing that he’s a thief isn’t an issue at all. He’s untouchable.

Viktor’s always been the result of an idealistic man being crushed by a society that doesn’t care for him and his dreams. That’s nothing new.

[wantaichi]

karasuno as guy best friends

all platonic over here, folks. 

[reuploading due to tagging problems grr]

SUGAWARA KOUSHI made you swoon the first you met him and no one could blame you - ‘hii i don’t think we’ve met, i’m suga :)’ cue hand shake and soft hand squeeze and pretty eyes staring right into you melting your insides.. he’s just naturally sweet towards everyone and you learn this eventually. loves giving head pats and asking about your day and telling you to ‘take care text me when you get home!’ you‘re always telling him whoever he’d end up with would be the luckiest person on earth and you’d never forgive them if they hurt him. the type of guy best friend who spams your profile pic with comments - ‘wHO IS SHE’, ‘ohhh she glowin!’ - and acts all surprised as if you hadn’t just asked him to choose that photo for you. has a sixth sense for you that’s always so on-point he could tell when you’re faking a smile and would drag you out of the room discreetly saying ‘c’mon lets talk’

DAICHI SAWAMURA acts as the parent/legal guardian throughout your friendship, always reminding you to drink your water and to drop instant noodles from your diet. he has your birthday penciled into his planner and phone calendar, remembers your hyper-specific coffee order from starbucks, and knows all your pet peeves - from slow walkers to being told to ‘chill’ because it invalidates your feelings. the best friend you can trust to do your yearbook write up for you because he knows all your best qualities and remembers all your achievements by heart. doesn’t seem to be aware of his own popularity - his mental age surpasses that of people his age - and couldn’t be bothered with anything concerning romance so you’re always trying to pimp him out set him up with friends and friends of friends who are dying to date him

ASAHI AZUMANE’s always seen as the understated friend in the group just quietly soaking up everyone’s stories in the background but actually has a comedic streak only you and few others know about. it’s easy to miss because he’s too shy to say his jokes out loud so he mumbles them to himself, and they’re so insanely corny - delivered with a straight face - it had you tearing up from laughter the first time you caught him. you love that his brand of funny is free from any kind of attention seeking and feel lucky to be one of the few to witness this side of him. his sense of humor shines best when innocently poking fun at his close friends like doing accurate re-enactments of suga smizing at his reflection or daichi holding his screen 10 inches from his face, or when you’re expressively telling a story and he goes “do that face again” so you do it and he’s like “one more” and idiot you does it again before realizing bitch is trolling you ugh

NISHINOYA YUU is your wild card friend - you never know when he’d show up to things, but when he does, everyone knows. the friend you wished upon a shooting star the way Lilo did and ended up getting a gremlin smh. he’s the spark plug for spontaneous action in your life - would randomly text blast everyone on a weekend to hangout and watch that rooster fight in his neighborhood or go feral at the batting cage downtown, and you’re like wtf...game. deep conversations aren’t really his thing but you’re always so down for anything, to ride along with all the shit he enjoys and listen to his ramblings and it’s that rawness he loves about your friendship. the best friend that has a tendency to go missing in action all of a sudden and no one knows where he is but will randomly hit you up at 10pm to grab ramen with him or those ghetto ass meals ($0.80 rice burgers ftw) on the sidewalk that give you both diarrhea

TANAKA RYUUNOSUKE tried to shoot his shot with you the first you met; now cringes whenever reminded about it because you’re a sausage to him now, as sausage everyone else on the team. the best friend who’s down to hang out literally from morning ‘til dawn, have friends over for a week, go out for late night visits or spontaneous road trips - really anything that serves an excuse to be with the bros (including you). you’d joke about growing sick of each other’s company but deep down you know he’s the one person you could never tire of and run out of fun things to do with. the best friend you could simply be drinking grapefruit shochu with or eating cup noodles and it’d still be one of the most memorable moments with him. the most reliable especially when you’ve gone through a messy break up or when it’s red season - will come over with a whole bag of instant ramen, some takoyaki and some ibuprofen (regardless of the situation)

you and HINATA SHOUYO hit it off within the first hour of meeting each other. you’ve screeched talked about everything there’s to know about the other - volleyball, school life, mutual friends, music taste, siblings, irrational fears and childhood traumas - added each other on facebook, followed each other’s instagram, made plans to watch that game in another school; all within an hour. there’s just something about him that makes it easy for you to open up about anything. the friend that gets you all flustered at the start because he’s so touchy and always poking and hugging you every chance he gets (turns out he’s an accidental flirt). he’s your number one fan and cheerleader and has a way with words that always lifts your spirit, but also definitely the best friend who always gets you sent out of class because your thumb wrestling match or game of tic tac toe got over competitive

KAGEYAMA TOBIO isn’t sure who or what exactly counts as a best friend but he knows which people to trust and which ones trust him back and accept him as he is. yours is a friendship where seeing and talking to each other might happen every few weeks (or even months) but knowing you can count on the other for support and encouragement. there’s never any pressure to be more expressive and he feels comfortable to just be his normal self around you; you’ve probably bonded over mutual interest like volleyball or just sports in general, something that made a lasting impression and led to keeping in touch. you can’t be there in all his games but you make sure to stay updated and send him a ‘congrats!’ or ‘you did your best!’ after matches. you’re sometimes mistaken for his s/o (with how comfortable he is with you), and though neither of you give a shit and even ride along with it sometimes, deep down you’re both thinking: ‘HARD PASS’

YAMAGUCHI TADASHI - timid and innocent, that’s the first impression he gives off to a lot of people. he seems hard to get to know at first but all it takes is a little kindness and authenticity for this boy to warm up to you. deep down he’s hemorrhaging with happiness whenever someone introduces themselves and welcomes him as a friend - he’s never really sure if people like him and he doesn’t like imposing on others. even on a best friend level you’ll learn that there’s so much more layers to him - that he’s loudest when nerding out on things like underdog athletes and comics and art, that he has an eye for aesthetic and beauty and is easily attracted to pretty faces and stylish dressers (but is blind to red flags sighh). he keeps you updated with the trendiest stuff like that milk tea store that just opened or that new release on netflix — always up to date with everything ugh

to TSUKISHIMA KEI, people are either strangers or friends. you could be talking or working together on a daily basis but he’d still consider your friendship superficial; inversely, you could be hanging out only once/twice a week but your conversations would always be interesting or challenging enough for him to keep you around. you’re most likely the louder one or always the one initiating conversations and asking to hang out with him; he’ll call you annoying but secretly appreciates your genuine interest in reaching out to him. you’ll know he acknowledges you as a friend when gives you song recs based on your music taste or asks for your opinion on things - should he get new headphones or that limited edition t-rex figurine? he’ll engage you in debate while studying, in talks about social issues and maybe some existential stuff and you’ll learn that the unforeseeable future led by your generation keeps him up at night

a/n: because my guy best friends started messaging out of nowhere and i’m missing them more than usual.

[frangipansi]

Hi! If your inbox is open, I'd like to request a scenario with all (or any) of the demon brothers, + undatables reacting to a blind MC? Like, none of them expected to have a blind human and Devildom and they have to revamp everything to make it as safe for MC as possible. Can be she/her or they/them pronouns for MC. Bonus points if MC is extremely talkative and won't shut up lmao. Thank you!

OKAY! So, finally got this one out. I’m sooo sorry for the wait, but I wanted to try and do this right, not just some Daredevil nonsense, but I didn’t want to make the mistake of a ‘helpless blind MC’ either; because they’re not helpless.

I am also lucky enough to have a regular customer at my work that happens to be blind and she has been very happy to give me a helping hand to make this ask more real. She’s such a delight and her guide dog is beautiful and I could ramble on with our interactions, like one time she scolded us for moving the fixtures because she had just memorized the layout of the store then told her guide “you’ll earn that pay check today!”

SO! With her in mind, more so from her younger days that she reminisced with me; I have decided to work this piece around this customer’s condition specifically so I’m not just pulling shit out my arse.

To give you an idea, this MC suffers from Retinitis pigmentosa; their symptoms being tunnel vision and night blindness. So while they are legally blind, they can somewhat see. They use a cane when going out, use their hands and/or cane when inside a place knew to them – that happens to be in poor light (Devildom) – until they have the layout in their mind and move more confidently.

~

This also took a while because I couldn’t get a fic/scenario to work cohesively and hc was just not working either! But I’ve hopefully gotten it now, and I do hope you like it. I’ve also placed this under the cut because I’ve waffled on here.

Diavolo:

Interested. Anyone within the Devildom without eyesight, are generally the souls of the damned who aren’t permitted to move freely. Heck, he’s removed some of their eyes himself.

He wants to know instantly if there is anything he needs to change and improve to make sure MC’s stay is not only comfortable but enjoyable.

Absolutely loves how open MC is. He’s amazed at the resilience of humans; delighted to hear MC say how capable they are, though he does insist on one of the brother’s remaining her escort for the duration of their stay. Capable or not, he is well aware of how demons would use MC’s lack of sight to their advantage.

Really wants to ask how amplified their other senses are; disappointed to know most things depicted in movies are – for the most part – an over exaggeration.

Organises a tablet for them with all RAD textbooks uploaded so they have that ability to zoom in so they are able to read the text at their own comfort. Other systems such as braille, text to talk etc are also implemented if that is something MC prefers to learn by.

Lucifer:

Considers Cerberus as a guide dog? Impossible, the human would be eaten alive. Perhaps another smaller hellhound? Goodness no, they’d still be eaten.

Asks MC about their condition –on behalf of Lord Diavolo of course – so he is aware of anything that may help their stay in the Devildom.

Very pleased to see how receptive MC is, very talkative and informative about her condition; he’s surprised to learn the varying levels of visual impairment. Consults Diavolo on brighter lighting to improve her movements around RAD and already planning on improvements within his own home.

During MC’s first few nights in Lamentation, Lucifer appears on edge; always keeping an eye when they’re moving about on their own. Enjoys watching how they learn to memorize layouts, quietly telling themselves how many steps it takes from one room to another, touching hallway objects.

Ready to run to their side that one time MC walked into the wall; turning into the kitchen a little too soon; until he hear them chuckle to themselves and ran their hand along the wall until they found the doorway and walked through it. No damage done. He’s learning to leave them be, understanding that he doesn’t need to dote on them.

Mammon:

MC is blind? Ooh yeah! The things that boy could swipe to make some quick Grimm, and right under their nose. It was gonna be too easy!! Completely stunned when they still catch him out. “How’d ya know it was me?!”

Watches them narrow their eyes as if trying to spot him before coming up beside him and close the drawer he was just rummaging through. The nerve this human has to threaten The Great Mammon by saying they’ll use their cane to whack him.

Surprised at MC’s explanation on how they knew it was him. They recognised his scent; not only did he have his favourite cologne – which he didn’t think he wore that much of – they noted how he had a metallic smell, like the kind you get when touching coin constantly.

Likes to watch MC move around their room; at first using their hand to remember the layout and then moving as if they saw as well as he did. Considered rearranging things to see what would happen.

Okay, so MC isn’t helpless… but, other demons don’t know that. Considers using MC as bait; distract idiots so he can rob them and sell their things for a little Grimm. “I, The Mammon, am a genius!” “No, Mammon.”

Levi:

Couldn’t even imagine being in their position; all that manga he couldn’t read, anime they couldn’t watch… never knowing what Ruri-Chan looks like!!! Gasp! No way. Poor MC!

Really confused when he sees them one day, curled up on a chair in the common room, wearing a pair of glasses and a book in hand. Wanders over and looks over their shoulder before questioning what was going on; nodding when they told him that with reading glasses and preferably larger font, they could indulge in many a storybook.

As their relationship blossoms, he has a dedicated reading nook in his room for the two of them, including a lamp to brighten the area to help improve what sight they have. Likes that they’re happy to listen to him read to them his TSL series. He thinks about writing to the publishers for the next editions to have larger fonts; that way he could buy MC a set of their own.

He likes to sit and watch them bring things close to their face to inspect them better; his figurines which they – to his relief – handle with great care, or his manga comics to see which characters he’s fawning over.

He secretly loves that MC likes to chill by his fish tank wall. Why? They state that while there’s too much distortion for them to actually make anything out, they enjoy the ambient colouring and light; the two eventually just listen to music together like that as a means to relax.

Satan:

Of course he is utterly curious about MC’s condition and is glad to see how open they are to talking about it. He’ll look things up himself in his own time but nothing like hearing it from someone’s own experience.

Asks if those romance and crime novels are accurate; “so, do you touch people’s faces so you know what they look like?” finds it interesting that for the most part, this doesn’t happen; but it makes sense, he wouldn’t be too thrilled by someone he barely knows putting their hands onto him.

Writes down notes that he considers most important from the board during lessons and offers them to MC should they need them for their studies.

Another one who likes watching MC learn their way around Lamentation, like how they touch cupboard handles until they find the one they need while grumbling about how crappy the lights are.

Shared appreciation for just lying on the ground whenever a cat is near them, all responsibility out the window as number one priority is giving adorable little hellcats their undivided attention. Loves that MC is willing to con Lucifer into believing a cat makes a wonderful guide animal.

Asmo:

Oh poor MC, unable to see just how beautiful he is… Oh, they can kinda see? If he gets real close? Oh he can definitely do that! Bummed that MC promptly puts in some boundaries but once their relationship develops they do enjoy the closeness with him.

Learns – albeit slowly – that his looks aren’t going to win MC over, and instead begins to better understand the value of personality and getting to know a person. Should MC like Asmo, it’s because of who he is and not for all the fluffing he does with his looks.

Whenever he happens to be the brother escorting MC, just know he’ll always detour to the main hub; treating the two of them to manicures and pedicures, facials, all that fun stuff.

When shopping, he loves how MC feels the fabric of things he grabs for them and has an even bigger appreciation for how things feel on him. Absolutely enjoys offering explanations whenever MC would ask about colour or cuts if they can’t make them out should the lighting be too poor for them.

Will starting looking around for ‘fashionable’ canes. Yes, he knows it’s about practicality and he’s not going to take that away from MC, but what’s wrong with wanting to match their cane with that gorgeous outfit he’s picked out from them?

Beel:

Having no experience with a visually impaired human, he’ll ask MC if he should carry them places; it’s no big deal, they looked pretty light after all. Apologises if they happen to get a bit defensive so keeps close while they walk together, worried they may walk into or trip over something.

He’ll be curious about whether or not other senses are heightened due to the loss of another and is lowkey disappointed that they wouldn’t be able to hear someone in the kitchen stealing his food when they’re somewhere else in the house.

He loves cooking with them; the tastes of what he creates seem to be more balanced and they’re more than happy to sneak him a few snacks while Lucifer is occupied elsewhere. They’ll fool around, tasting things to see who can pick up more notes.

Things turn into a game between the two of them; if he spots MC in a room he’ll sneak up and try and get to them before they realise he’s there. “Too heavy on your feet,” or “you were giggling,” is something he hears a lot when trying.

Though MC can’t really see while he’s training or playing a game, he really appreciates that there still there to cheer him on; he’s taken to wearing a bright headband in hopes that they’ll be able to spot him out a bit better. They don’t half the heart to tell him they still can’t find him.

Belphie:

In the beginning, he’ll use MC’s lack of sight to their advantage; sly and manipulative to lure them in. Watches how they react to his voice, how their eyes or head move in the direction he’s in, learning how they work their other senses.

Tensions between the two would be tight after that moment and he’ll feel tremendous guilt for what he did to them; keeps himself at a distance, afraid they’ll recoil if they sense he’s too close and understands if they would.

Amazed that they find it in them to forgive him and help mend bonds between him and his brothers, and will spend whatever time he’s able building up trust with MC; whether that’s being their escort around Devildom or just being there for company.

He loves – when trust is established – that MC is just happy to lay with him while he star gazes and talks about what he sees, trying to paint a picture for them while they huddle up together in a fluffy blanket, sharing his cow print pillow.

Simeon/Luke:

They’re angels; their job is to look over and protect humans. So they are already well aware of how capable MC would be – Simeon more so than Luke since he’s younger and more interested in Michael – but they will still offer their assistance should MC need it.

They’re also the sort to take notes down during class that MC may not be able to see on the board; but they’ll ask before assuming.

Simeon has taken to writing a little bigger if it’s something he’d like MC’s opinion on his work; the two forming a bond through fiction and history. The two can be found losing track of time and just talking about any given thing.

Luke enjoys cooking with MC; asking them what they think of the taste of something he creates and asks how he can make it better. He’d love to be able to wow Michael upon his return to the Celestial Realm and MC will always critique his work rather than sugarcoat like Simeon would or just outright scare him like demons would. With a little push from MC, he takes lessons from Barbatos.

Solomon:

Quite unphased; he’s dealt with various impairments before seeing as he is still human despite being a very powerful sorcerer. He doesn’t offer assistance but will give it should MC ask him for help.

He has many a spell in his books that could quite possibly cure or ease symptoms of various impairments and is very tempted to bring this information to MC; but decides on holding back until he can figure out how to approach the subject. He’ll ask them how they feel about their situation and go from there.

Would also offer heightening other senses should MC want them; even temporarily if they’re just a little curious. “Let’s see what’s so crash hot about being Daredevil!” “My thoughts exactly MC.”

[ceterisparibus116]

Daredevil scenes / plot points you would have done differently? (I get a suspicion a lot of them have to do with the law stuff, Frank Castle's trial especially. 😉 )

Aaaaa I love this question! Warning: VERY long response:

DEFINITELY the Frank Castle trial. Man, it could’ve been SO GOOD. I have a lot of issues with it, obviously, but the main one is that Matt treating Frank as a hostile witness could’ve been amazing (character-driven, emotionally-charged, also at times hilarious), and we were ROBBED.

 I also wish Matt could’ve been involved in more trial prep. The show makes it seem almost like Matt’s skill is limited to courtroom antics, but charisma and the ability to think on your feet in the courtroom mean next to nothing if you haven’t laid a foundation with good legal research and legal writing. I would’ve loved it if the legal plotlines showed us more of that. Like, you know Matt and Karen’s date night in S2 where she helps him come up with witness questions? I would’ve loved it if: a) they’d gotten, like, ANY part of that scene correct from a legal standpoint, and b) if we could’ve gotten MORE. I know that kind of thing might seem boring, but I don’t think it would be. You can really show off characters’ personalities in that kind of environment, and then the audience gets the reward of seeing that hard work pay off at trial.

 Speaking of, I know we’ve talked before about S3 splitting everyone up. I still think that could’ve maybe been worth it if we’d gotten a S4 where we could see how everyone learned from how disastrous the S3 isolation was, but without S4, everyone’s isolation in S3 is really unfortunate. I would’ve loved to see Nelson, Murdock, and Page working together for at least half of the season, instead of just the last 3-ish episodes. It would’ve been fascinating to watch, since Matt would still not be in a great headspace, and Karen would still be hurt, and Foggy would be just Trying To Deal with his idiot best friends. (But since we don’t have that, at least we have my S3 canon-divergent retelling thing: Take A Deep Breath – shameless plug.)

 I also would’ve generally kept the stakes lower in S2 and S3. I think you agree with me that both seasons would’ve been more powerful if we’d had more lower-level villains. But one of my favorite things about S1 is that we get to know the people who are at stake. Unlike in the Avengers where it’s just “the world” or “New York” or something, S1 showed us a little boy who wanted to go back to his dad, and Elena, and that one juror who was being exploited, and Melvin, and even a bad guy like Vladimir, and they’re ALL sympathetic. We really understand who Matt’s fighting for, but with the exception of Grotto, Jasper Evans, and Julie Barnes, I don’t feel like we really get that in S2 and S3.

 Related: our S2 ninjas needed a clearer motivation. (That goes for Defenders, too.) Imo, they needed personal stakes. Fisk’s mission to clean up Hell’s Kitchen was personal. Frank’s mission to take out bad guys was personal. Everything about Elektra was personal. Dex’s desperate attempt to find a place for himself and find people who care about him was VERY personal. But the Hand? Not personal at all.

 With Elektra…I’m torn. Part of me really wishes Matt could’ve told her no and maintained his boundaries all along, because a) I hate love-triangle-type drama and drama that could be resolved if people just stopped keeping secrets, and b) it would’ve been so refreshing to see the femme fatal trope subverted, and c) it would’ve given Elektra more agency. That being said…that might be veering too far away from comics canon. Matt is canonically a disaster with relationships, and he and Elektra have this whole…epic…magnetic…thing. I personally would argue that the show isn’t beholden to the canon in this specific way, but I can see how people would be upset if Matt and Elektra hadn’t turned out the way they did in S2.

 I would’ve liked Marci to have a smidge more character development. She was so sweet and supportive in S3and I don’t…quite…know where that came from? Oh, well.

 Speaking of character development: I wish Matt and Foggy could’ve had some real conversations. Aside from when Foggy found Matt at the gym in S1 and they talked about moving forward, I don’t feel like they had deep conversations that weren’t arguments. Matt’s S3 apology is good, but I would’ve loved to see Foggy apologize for how he contributed to the problems in their friendship. I also wish we could’ve seen Foggy explicitly thank Matt for, y’know…SAVING HIS LIFE.

 As for Karen, I wish her revelation scene to Matt had been more about HER. It says a lot about how selfless she is that she used her own pain to try to convince Matt not to kill Fisk. But even though I know Matt’s super depressed and everything, I would’ve loved to see him put his own angsty issues aside for a sec and just be there for his friend and the woman he loves. Even the fact that she is the one who crosses the room to be close to him is telling; he should’ve gone over to her when she started crying and been there for her.

 Although if I’m talking about Matt’s romantic relationships, I wouldn’t have minded if the show went a Clairedevil route. Although that would require A LOT. I do wish, if I’m being really fanciful, that we could’ve seen Claire in S3. Or, at minimum, seen Matt and Claire interact in Defenders.

 FATHER LANTOM TELLING MATT THAT GUILT IS A SIGN THAT HIS WORK IS NOT DONE. I cannot with that scene. I love Father Lantom, but that? Really? I mean, I get it. That’s a common way that Catholic doctrine is interpreted, and it’s what Matt basically wants to hear anyway, but it is SUCH a dangerous thing to tell Matt (and I feel like Father Lantom should’ve known that???) and it’s also, as I understand it, not even the technically correct Catholic interpretation of guilt. Like, that’s literally not what guilt is or how it’s supposed to work. (Although who knows. I’m not Catholic, and as I understand it, Catholics themselves vary a lot in their interpretations of doctrine. So idk.) If I were writing that scene, I would definitely not have written Father Lantom to say that.

 On the religious theme, I wish S3 had circled back to Matt’s original objections related to the book of Job. He gets quite a few things wrong in his recap, and I’m not sure if Maggie didn’t correct him because she didn’t know better, or because she didn’t think a Biblical literacy lecture was what he needed at the moment, OR because the writers couldn’t be bothered to read the book. (In fairness…it’s a long and complicated book. But they couldn’t have been bothered to read a commentary on it?) I wish S3 had not stopped at giving Matt an abstract tapestry analogy to heal his faith when it also should’ve addressed his specific complaints.

I wish we’d had more time to see Matt and Maggie repair their relationship, or start to. And I wish she’d hugged him at Literally Any Point.

I wish the whole Matt-hallucinating thing had been clearer. Was he actually hallucinating? Or was that just his internal monologue manifested through other characters? If he was hallucinating, did he just...stop? Is he not freaked out about that? What was going on????

Oh, and if only they could’ve gotten Dex’s psychological diagnosis right.

 Other than that, there are a couple scenes that I feel like drag on way too long (S3 especially has an odd amount of monologues that generally strike me as OOC anyway—except with Fisk; he’s just Like That) but I don’t want to go into all of them. It would be hypocritical, given how long this reply is. :P

 So yeah, I think I’ll stop there, although I’m sure there’s more, haha. Thank you again for the ask and the excuse to ramble about Daredevil! I look forward to your thoughts as well.

[mooooooosicals]

Why is it that I just learned what neurodiversity was when quarantine started? Why did I not learn about it when I was younger? I'm just... It answers so many questions that I've been asking about myself for years.

Learning that everything I've felt actually falls under certain categories that go against the stereotypes I was taught... it both relaxes me and angers me. I just wish I were taught right from the start how it actually works.

I realize I've been being too vague so lemme give y'all some examples:

As a kid, I was always taught "person first language is more polite." And I thought I was being inclusive when I used it. Or when people say "go easy on them, they don't know any better," literally infantilizing them, and I just accepted it as "yeah, that's what I should do."

Believe me, if I could take back all the ableist actions I did before educating myself, I would do it in a heartbeat. I regret it deeply, and nothing I can do will ever cancel that out. Learning what I did during quarantine, a large amount of guilt took over me thinking back to everything I've done in the past. I hope I've changed for the better, but I cannot deny that I was in the wrong before learning.

Another thing that just absolutely tears me apart is that a lot, like a LOT of my traits are considered neurodivergent, but I was never taken seriously. I faced a lot of "oh, she's gonna grow out of that," "you're being a baby," "she's an only child, they're all like that," "what are you, [insert r slur here]?", "weirdo," and the one that hurts the most, "suck it up."

I always felt distant from other people, never being able to figure out why I couldn't connect with other people in the same way, say, my parents could. I understood that there was something... different about me, about the way I thought about the world, the way I communicated, but I couldn't put my finger on it. For 16 years of my life, I couldn't figure out why, why I was mocked so often, called a "crazy cat book girl," being the butt of every joke the Boys™ would make. I couldn't figure out why I couldn't function under triggering situations, like sudden loud noises, where I would literally go nonverbal. I couldn't understand why what I said was considered "rude" or how I was "talking too loud." I couldn't understand why tapping my foot or twirling my hair was bad and needed to be stopped. I didn't know why I got weird looks whenever I started talking about something I was enthusiastic about in class. I could go on and on and on and on and on for ages but this ramble is long enough as it is so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Just. For so long. I couldn't understand myself.

Enter quarantine.

I turned to the internet to indulge on one of my new "intense obsessions" as I called it (another thing I always questioned, since when I was obsessed with something, I went all in, annoying everyone around me hehe). I met a bunch of people who happened to be neurodivergent, and when talking about their own experiences and realizing how much I related to them, I went into a panic.

For so long I was taught "you [neurotypicals] are above [neurodivergent people]" (which is wrong, on so many levels, we need to do better on education about this kinda stuff). Then, I find out just how much I have in common, and suddenly everything I thought I knew is put into question. Who even am I?

Ever since them, I've just considered myself a "spicy neurotypical" because I don't wanna offend anybody by labelling myself as neurodivergent and then being wrong, but recently I feel like that's changed.

I finally got through to my parents when they realized that I could not just "suck it up," I have traits that actually need to be addressed, and urgently. I honestly think it broke them, my mom in particular, because she always wants to be the best mom she can and to not have anything hold back her relationship with her daughter. I'm glad she finally is starting to see through my lens, but it's still gonna take a while. Still, I'm relieved in that aspect.

Ever since then, we've been pursuing a diagnosis of some kind, more specifically sensory processing disorder, so that when I go to college I can get accomadations. I won't have an official examination until August 4, just a few weeks before entering college on August 30, just a few weeks before I become a legal adult on August 26.

I had a meet up with one of the people who works with the psychologist the other day, to kind of get a sense of my situation. It was odd because they didn't just ask me about sensory stuff, but also about how I act. The more questions I answered about my behavior, the more I came to realize this wasn't just a sensory issue, but a behavioral situation as well.

My mom was on the phone with them the other day and-

They theorize I'm autistic.

You don't realize how emotional of a realization that is for me.

No dude, like I'm actually tearing up writing this.

If only someone could have told me this when I was younger.

If only someone could have told me this when I was at a Wiggles concert, having a meltdown because of the confetti canons.

If only someone could have told me this when I was overwhelmed by the flahsing lights and the loud pyrotechnics when watching Phantom Of The Opera.

If only someone could have told me this when I couldn't connect with my band section and I couldn't figure out why they were treating me as a kid when I'm older than some of them.

If only someone could have told me that it's okay. That I'm not a lost cause. I'm not immature. I'm not a weirdo, I'm not [words I can't repeat], I'm just. I'm just me. Just imagine how much trauma I could have avoided.

(disclaimer: these traits can be found in neurotypical people too. it's the fact that I have so many of these traits that gives me and others the reason to believe I could possibly be neurodivergent. However it's a whole spectrum of stuff, it's different for everyone. Don't use me as a resource. These are just my experiences.)

TLDR: As someone who is afab, we aren't taken seriously until it's too late. And it's extremely damaging.

We need to do better. Actually. We need to better.

(sorry this was really long, I'm just very emotional rn. might delete this later. I may not even be autistic or have sensory processing disorder or adhd or any of that. I may just turn out to be "spicy neurotypical." But who knows. I'm just,,, I'm just praying that I'll get my answers in time. The right answers.)

[whitehotharlots]

Privilege Theory is popular because it is conservative

Privilege theory, as a formal academic thing, has been around at least since 1989, when Peggy McIntosh published the now-seminal essay “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” Even within academic cultural studies, however, privilege theory was pretty niche until about a decade ago--it’s not what you’d call intellectually sound (McIntosh’s essay contains zero citations), and its limitations as an analytical frame are pretty obvious. I went through a cultural studies-heavy PhD program in the early twenty teens and I only heard it mentioned a handful of times. If you didn’t get a humanities degree, odds are it didn’t enter your purview until 2015 or thereabouts.

This poses an obvious question: how could an obscure and not particularly groundbreaking academic concept become so ubiquitous so quickly? How did such a niche (and, frankly, weird and alienating) understanding of racial relations become so de rigeur that companies that still utilize slave labor and still produce skin whitening cream are now all but mandated to release statements denouncing it? 

Simply put, the rapid ascent of privilege theory is due to the fact that privilege theory is fundamentally conservative. Not in cultural sense, no. But if we understand conservatism as an approach to politics that seeks first and foremost to maintain existing power structures, then privilege theory is the cultural studies equivalent of phrenology or Austrian economics. 

This realization poses a second, much darker question: how did a concept as regressive and unhelpful as privilege become the foundational worldview among people who style themselves as progressives, people whose basic self-understanding is grounded in a belief that they are working to address injustice? Let’s dig into this:

First, let’s go down a well-worn path and establish the worthlessness of privilege as an analytical lens. We’ll start with two basic observations: 1) on the whole, white people have an easier time existing within these United States than non-white people, and 2) systemic racism exists, at least to the extent that non-white people face hurdles that make it harder for them to achieve safety and material success.

I think a large majority of Americans would agree with both of these statements--somewhere in the ballpark of 80%, including many people you and I would agree are straight-up racists. They are obvious and undeniable, the equivalent to saying “politicians are corrupt” or “good things are good and bad things are bad.” Nothing about them is difficult or groundbreaking.

As simplistic as these statements may be, privilege theory attempts to make them the primary foreground of all understandings of social systems and human interaction. Hence the focus on an acknowledgement of privilege as the ends and means of social justice. We must keep admitting to privilege, keep announcing our awareness, again and again and again, vigilance is everything, there is nothing beyond awareness.

Of course, acknowledging the existence of inequities does nothing to actually address those inequities. Awareness can serve as an important (though not necessarily indispensable) precondition for change, but does not lead to change in and of itself. 

I’ve been saying this for years but the point still stands: those who advocate for privilege theory almost never articulate how awareness by itself will bring about change. Even in the most generous hypothetical situation, where all human interaction is prefaced by a formal enunciation of the raced-based power dynamics presently at play, this acknowledgement doesn’t actually change anything. There is never a Step Two. 

Now, some people have suggested Step Twos. But suggestions are usually ignored, and on the rare occasions they are addressed they are dismissed without fail, often on grounds that are incredibly specious and dishonest. To hit upon another well-worn point, let’s look at the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders. The majority of Sanders’ liberal critics admit that the senator’s record on racial justice is impeccable, and that his platform would have done substantially more to materially address racial inequities than that being proffered by any of his opponents. That’s all agreed upon, yet we are told that none of that actually matters. 

Sanders dropped out of the race nearly 3 months ago, yet just this past week The New York Times published yet another hit piece explaining that while his policies would have benefitted black people, the fact that he strayed from arbitrarily invoked rhetorical standards meant he was just too problematic to support.  

The piece was written by Sidney Ember, a Wall Street hack who cites anonymous finance and health insurance lobbyists to argue that financial regulation is racist. Ember, like most other neoliberals, has been struggling to reconcile her vague support for recent protests with the fact that she is paid to lie about people who have tried to fix things. Now that people are forcefully demanding change, the Times have re-deployed her to explain why change is actually bad even though it’s good.  

How does one pivot from celebrating the fact that black people will not be receiving universal healthcare to mourning racially disproportionate COVID death rates? They equivocate. They lean even harder on rhetorical purity, dismissing a focus on policy as a priori blind to race. Bernie never said “white privilege.” Well, okay, he did, but he didn’t say it in the right tone or often enough, and that’s what the problem was. Citing Ember:

Yet amid a national movement for racial justice that took hold after high-profile killings of black men and women, there is also an acknowledgment among some progressives that their discussion of racism, including from their standard-bearer, did not seem to meet or anticipate the forcefulness of these protests.

Kimberlé Crenshaw, the legal scholar who pioneered the concept of intersectionality to describe how various forms of discrimination can overlap, said that Mr. Sanders struggled with the reality that talking forcefully about racial injustice has traditionally alienated white voters — especially the working-class white voters he was aiming to win over. But that is where thinking of class as a “colorblind experience” limits white progressives. “Class cannot help you see the specific contours of race disparity,” she said.

Many other institutions, she noted, have now gone further faster than the party that is the political base of most African-American voters. “You basically have a moment where every corporation worth its salt is saying something about structural racism and anti-blackness, and that stuff is even outdistancing what candidates in the Democratic Party were actually saying,” she said.

Crenshaw’s point here is that the empty, utterly immaterial statements of support coming from multinational corporations are more substantial and important than policy proposals that would have actually addressed racial inequities. This is astounding. A full throated embrace of entropy as praxis. 

Crenshaw started out the primary as a Warren supporter but threw her endorsement to Bernie once the race had narrowed to two viable candidates. This fact is not mentioned, nor does Ember feel the need to touch upon any of Biden’s dozens of rhetorical missteps regarding race (you might remember that he kicked off his presidential run with a rambling story about the time he toughed it out with a black ne'er do well named Corn Pop, or his more recent assertion that if you don’t vote for him, “you ain’t black.”). The statement here--not the implication: the direct and undeniable statement--is that tone and posturing are more important than material proposals, and that concerns regarding tone and posturing should only be raised in order to delegitimize those who have dared to proffer proposals that might actually change things for the better. 

The ascendence of privilege theory marks the triumph of selective indignation, the ruling class and their media lackeys having been granted the power to dismiss any and all proposals for material change according to standards that are too nonsensical to be enforced in any fair or consistent manner. The concept has immense utility for those who wish to perpetuate the status quo. And that, more than anything, is why it’s gotten so successful so quickly. But still… why have people fallen for something so obviously craven and regressive? Why are so few decent people able to summon even the smallest critique against it? 

We can answer this by taking a clear look at what privilege actually entails. And this is where things get really, really grim:

What are the material effects of privilege, at least as they are imagined by those who believe the concept to be something that must be sussed out and eradicated? A privileged person gets to live their life with the expectation that they will face no undue hurdles to success and fulfillment because of their identity markers, that they will not be subject to constant surveillance and/or made to suffer grave consequences for minor or arbitrary offenses, and that police will not be able to murder them at will. The effects of “privilege” are what we might have once called “freedom” or “dignity.” Until very recently, progressives regarded these effects not as problematic, but as a humane baseline, a standard that all decent people should fight to provide to all of our fellow citizens. 

Here we find the utility in the use of the specific term “privilege.” Similar to how austerity-minded politicians refer to social security as an “entitlement,” conflating dignity and privilege gives it the sense of something undeserved and unearned--things that no one, let alone members of racially advantaged groups, could expect for themselves unless they were blinded by selfishness and coddled by an insufficiently cruel social structure. The problem isn’t therefore that humans are being selectively brutalized. Brutality is the baseline, the natural order, the unavoidable constant that has not been engineered into our society but simply is what society is and will always be. The problem, instead, is that some people are being exempted from some forms of brutalization. The problem is that pain does not stretch far enough.

We are a nation that worships cruelty and authority. All Americans, regardless of gender or race, are united in being litigious tattletales who take joy in hurting one another, who will never run out of ways to rationalize their own cruelty even as they decry the cruelty of others. We are taught from birth that human life has no value, that material success is morally self-validating, and that those who suffer deserve to suffer. This is our real cultural brokenness: a deep, foundational hatred of one another and of ourselves. It transcends all identity markers. It stains us all. And it’s why we’ve all run headlong into a regressive and idiotic understanding of race at a time when we desperately need to unite and help one another. 

[snickiebear]

Hi bby! 1, 2, 3, 6, 16, 27, 29, 33, 35! 🖤

mittens!!! loml!!

1. From one to five stars, how would you rate your writing? (No downplaying yourself!)

oh goodness... um, i’d say a 4?? yeah, that sounds about right, only because i often make so many tense mistakes and even when i edit there’s always something to fix. and just,,, im still learning a lot (aren’t we all). plus, sometimes the stuff i put out needs so much more work (see: my recent shisaku fic... i want to tear it up and put it back together.. ugh.. also wt&r, just everything)

2. Why do you write fanfiction?

OH GOODIE! i just... well, i wrote a lot when i was twelve-fourteenish, then kind of on and off through the years. never really had anything to ground me and get me to take writing seriously. and then i found naruto and sakura who has so much unused potential and it just made me so angry to see her treated that way. 

point being, the naruto fandom (more specifically the sakura fandom) rooted me down and allowed me be able to grow as a writer even though i’ve only been posting since january my writing style has changed so much, and i can physically feel myself becoming a better writer. 

plus, i just love it. the thrill of being able to use these characters and pairings and do what i want with them?? i drink it up, i love it!!! its so freeing and such a great way to really dig deep within writing itself. 

3. What do you think makes your writing stand out from other works?

i think its just the way i word things, you and a lot of others call it poetry but meh i just call it fancy words or word vomit from my brain AHAHHAHA

also, my thing is God Killers, God Eaters, and Angry Wrathful Women at this point, so maybe thats another thing?

but honestly,,, i have no clue... you’d have to ask my lovely readers, im so thankful for them 😭

6. What element of writing do you find comes easily?

plot probably. this changes often though. usually when i have an idea, the rest comes to mind and i jot it down and come back and change things and stuff, so thats usually pretty easy tbh... at least for now LMAO

and inner dialogue, inner struggles, showing the entire internal thing. its fun writing that angsty part of a story, the small insights into a character’s mind, how miserable and alone they feel. or, perhaps how happy they are, overjoyed and at peace. 

OH AND WORLD BUILDING. i pride myself so much on my world building. i honestly think thats one of the better things im good at! just weaving small details into the text, and subtly building a world within your mind, oh i love it so much!!!!

16. Any guilty pleasure trope(s)?

mmmm nothing really comes to mind? men simping for women who could kick their ass? tho idk if thats really a guilty pleasure....am very fond of same age aus, sometimes mafia aus too... ummm,, yeah

(probably big dick tenzo tbh... and the fact that kakashi’s face is a legal weapon AHAHAHA,,, and broken, vunreble men. also, shattered, all consuming women.)

27. What’s the nicest comment you’ve ever received?

oh god... i cannot chose! you, ele, al, and hika leave the kindest comments, and literally any comment on the things i write just make me so so so so so HAPPY. i just them more than kudos tbh. 

but! one comment on the intimacy of being understood i always come back to. it was left by GuardianMars and they wrote that the fic was like a “love letter to the pairing.” and that well. i think about that comment all the time. 

there have been so many others comments that have utterly touched my heart and that i will go to read on terrible, horrible days and i value ALL comments. especially those who say “i’m rereading this again” or “i’ll read anything you put out” that just. there is something so intimate about that, that utter faith and loyalty that i do not know what to do with. 

its so touching and makes me truly believe in the good of the world. 

29. Have you ever gone outside of your comfort zone for a fic? How did it turn out?

yes! i am attempting to get better at writing smut because ol&w is going to have some fucking in it so i experimented in that shisaku fic and just..... yeah idk man. idk... its something i do want to get better at cause, meh why not? and i want to write some good porn for my readers damnit! HAHAHA 

33. Is there anything you wish your audience knew about your writing or writing process?

hmmm,,, probably that i stress so much and yet so little at the same time? allow me to elaborate! i stress so much about whether my writing is actually good or if people are just being nice LMAO and also posting, i get cold sweats and a thumping heart and yiKES

but also, i enjoy writing so its like “fuck you (jk ily guys) imma write what i wanna!”...do you see my issue? HAHAHA

also, im a planner. most of the time, and a lot of the details in my more serious fics (ol&w) are blink and miss details but they’re important and i LOVE foreshadowing!!!! like yes, i will vaguely mention something and itll simply come back with a vengeance! 

35. Ramble about any fic-related thing you want!

aaaaaa okokok thank you for this ask LMAO i just love talking about writing and rambling (as i often do,, im a long winded person, im very sorry)! 

but anyways! my summer semester just started up and i’m taking three purely online classes and the college im attending (im a dual enrollment student; meaning a high school and college kid,, taking advantage of the system!) fucked up my schedule so! im taking two TWELVE WEEK CLASSES that will end in AUGUST???? and then my fall sem starts five days later so... no summer break for nadia! yay...

writing will be very slow and updates will be too, which i am so sad and frustrated about because i’ve finally hit a paved road and now we’re driving into the forest! all bumps and bruises damnit! BUT worry not! i (as i said above, am i severe planner. every day has a plan, i am also an avid lover of lists also. i have lists for EVERYTHING) am working out a schedule so that i can get all my school shit done as soon as i can (while not failing) and write while hopefully not burning myself out.  

ol&w is such an intricate fic and im truly trying to give it the justice it deserves,,, im just hoping that my dear readers can bear with me HAHAHAHA there is honestly so much going on in that fic; shikamaru’s development, the underlying plot, the hate to love build up, the world building, and then laying down the foundations for the next fic (because yes, this is supposed to be a trilogy.. question is; will i be able to write it?) (answer: maybe. hopefully. i desperately want to but it might take some time.)

BUT ASLO i have so many oneshots i want to write! kisame week! kakashi week! kibasaku long fic! and not to mention my og work that i plan on rewriting and putting up on ao3 because a few people showed some interest. there is just so much to do and write and i am itching to do it all! but. well, but school, and the exhaustion of insomnia, and the weight of stress, sigh. 

shit sucks, it is what it is. but writing is like my safe haven and i just love pouring all myself into my fics and then baring my soul to you all and you take a peek and decide to keep looking. that is my favorite part of this little pocket of tumblr. 

this was not really... fic related? more like a dump of issues! so sorry about that AHAHAHAH 

anyways! thank you so much mittens! :)))))))))

pick my brain!

[beaversatemygrandma]

I’m just gonna ramble about something political that I Do Not understand rn, so ye. Under the cut.

So, I’ve been around radical right people, I’ve been around your normal leftists, but one thing i can’t understand rn are centrists. American centrists. Which are basically republicans who aren’t fascist nowadays. Now, I got into the strangest argument with my dad over climate change. I said the words ‘global warming’ and he immediately started talking about how global warming doesn’t exist and is just a phrase used in politics. Then started saying that climate change does exist, but global warming doesn’t. And I’m just there wondering what difference do these words have, like at all?? Yeah, I understand that global warming is the now outdated word for it, but they’re literally the same exact thing. And then he starts talking about the floods in Europe. I’m with all the scientists in saying that it’s the rising oceans and climate change causing this, because the area that flooded is well equipped for floods and water issues. And then he went on to explain how it was just el nino and the large fluctuation of weather that comes around every few years. It is that too, I’m not saying it isn’t. But even if something catastrophic like this happens every few years, hasn’t it still been getting steadily worse recently? Like the flucuations are more dramatic, there’s 100F+ weather in the arctic circle and that heat wave in the pacific northwest AND the flooding. Like that’s not your basic el nino storms. That’s not the ‘every four years you get more hurricanes’. This isn’t hurricane katrina in 2008. This is literal wildlife cooking on riverbeds and flooding previously known as unfloodable areas, at least not to that much of a bad flood. (Have the waters gone down yet? I’m genuinely wanting to know rn.) I’m just stuck at how all of this is the same as the bad floods and heat waves they got in like the 1910s in this area. And how somebody can deny years and years of weather records. The world has been heating up and fluctuating wilder and wilder each year since the industrial revolution and now it’s to the point where if it gets any worse, nature will likely pull the ‘full shutdown switch’ and put us into a damn ice age before I’m even old enough to have these crazy thoughts.

And I’m still absolutely stuck on how Biden’s a ‘hardcore liberal’ when he’s literally a centrist, Known to be a centrist, just because he’s pulling a show about caring about the environment. (I know he’s cutting corners for the country’s corporations and how they’re legally considered people in this hellhole country, but he’s putting on a show about climate change and genuinely helping a little bit.) And it’s making people mad, rightfully so, because he’s on the corporate train of blaming the common people for this excess pollution when it’s the corporations and oil riggers who have literally caused a portal to hell in the ocean just a couple weeks ago.

And don’t even get me started on the vaccine hesitancy and denying the fact that viruses have the ability to mutate and evolve quickly. Like I’ve been getting the rants about how we’re looking to go into an economic shutdown again due to this ‘bogus variant’ and I’m like “Yeah?? Because nobody’s getting vaxxed???” And the response about how the vaccine doesn’t work because people who get it can still spread it. “Because there’s a variant the vax wasn’t made specifically for.” But apparently none of that makes any sense and I’m just “drinking Biden’s kool-aid”. I’m reeling over having this conversation like twice a week and how we’re acting as if everything is back to normal. It is somewhat in this area because this county has an 82% vaccination rate (which is Phenomenal tbh. I feel safer here than i did in FL about this stuff for sure. My home county is only at like 55%.) But that’s just this county and my dad is a literal delivery driver for a company that goes through the whole southeast. Like he was in Georgia on Friday and who knows what kind of shit they’ve got going on around there. Like he’s in contact with an unvaccinated child (she’s 12, barely underage for it) and my grandma who also doesn’t have it (supposedly she doesn’t want to and wants to wait it out bc she always catches the disease like tenfold whenever she gets a shot, which is fair, but literally not how it works and i didn’t feel like getting into that with her. I’m just glad she’s doing better than my granddad was and she’s already older than he was when he died last year. I think it was actually the anniversary this week. And I’m not about to just Let my last grandparent get killed by this damn plague.)

Anyways. I don’t know how all this is an issue here. I thought that my dad would be smarter than my mom about this sort of stuff, but definitely not. Idk what i expected from someone who got their ged when i was three. Not that there’s an issue with that sort of intelligence or anything, I’m just disappointed that the conspiracies and whatever sound real enough for people to believe. Probably because news nowadays is written for rich and smart people who are actually able to comprehend these numbers and facts and be able to interpret how the language works in these articles (thanks IB english, i think i did learn something here. At least i can read the damn news without a college education.) but agh, i just wish this chaos would be fucking understood and everybody would belive that the government is supposed to be something you can trust (not in this country, Ik i can’t, but at least for the first time in my life i feel like it actually has people in mind and not just the big money corporate entities.)

But hell, Idk what i can do about it. I can understand these things but I’m shit at articulating them. Especially in an understandable way. (I’m the one in my forced standard science class my senior year that the teacher had to un-dumb things for me because i didn’t understand the simple form he gave all the dumb jocks he had as teacher’s pets. and again, no offense to them. I just needed the chemistry level reasoning for these things because otherwise it just didn’t work in my brain.) But oh well, I just don’t understand these things and I’m not getting any closer to it. Fucking shame that i took high level classes that taught me what i needed to understand this shit. Oh to be blissfully ignorant. (Ngl, I want to go back to where i wasn’t the smartest person in a hundred foot radius. Bc I’m really Not Smart. But things are making me think otherwise and I’m not liking this uncomfortable feeling of superiority, bc its makes me feel like those egotistic bastards like musk and whatever.)

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #309

“show me how to lie - you’re getting better all the time  /  and turning all against one is an art that’s hard to teach.”

Have you ever played Jackbox Games? If so, which ones of their party games are your favorites? No, but I looooove watching Mark and The Boys play them on charity streams. They can make up the funniest shit. I can't recall the name of the specific one I'm thinking of... but I enjoy watching most of them. I do think one or two are boring, though. Do you have artistic friends? If so, have you got their artwork displayed? I have some very talented friends, but I don't have anything of theirs displayed somewhere. Have you ever considered pole dancing? Why/why not? No. It takes an incredible amount of strength, plus confidence I don't have. That and I'm just not into it. What's the last thing you fixed yourself? Uhhhhhhh bitch I couldn't tell ya. Are there any CDs you've held onto for sentimental reasons? No. Did you read the Barbie magazines with comics made with the actual dolls? "I didn’t know that was a real thing." <<<< Me either. What's the last thing you knitted? I've never knitted before. Who was your first online friend? Emma. :') She was the first person who joined my RP mob back in the Animal Planet forum days. Why do you take surveys? Be honest. Boredom, distraction, and sometimes I just wanna ramble about whatever. Does mail get delivered to your door or do you have a mailbox outside? Our mailbox is by the side of the road at the end of our driveway. Your doorbell rings out of the blue. What's your reaction? Let Mom answer it. I don't answer the door ever if I don't expect someone or can peek outside and don't recognize them. Are all the lamps in your home LED or other energy saving lights? I don't know. Do you prefer writing by hand or typing? Typing. I can't write very long at all before my carpal tunnel flares up. Think of one of the biggest decisions you've had to make in your life...If you made a different choice, how different would your life be now? I'd be dead, that simple. Have you ever taken a course on CPR? No. What makes you laugh most effortlessly? You can guess it pretty easily. What makes you cry most effortlessly? I make it a rule that I "can't" listen to "Eternally Yours" by Motionless In White because there hasn't been even ONE occasion where it hasn't made me cry, even when I was stupid enough to binge it because it's just a good song. I've broken that "rule" before because I do just genuinely enjoy the song, but I know the pain truly isn't worth it, so I haven't heard it in a decently long time. What is the best smell in the whole world? Cinnamon rolls, probably. My body wash is currently that kind of smell, and Jesus Christ it's the best part of showering. Do you wear a watch? No. Can you tell time from an analog clock? Yes. What a time it'll be when kids can't anymore... Is there a number or a combination of numbers that feels important to you? Only dates, but not numbers themselves. What is the most socially awkward thing you've done? *gestures at my life as a whole* Is your computer decorated in any way? No. If your old class was to have a reunion, would you attend it? No. No. I don't want to relive my high school experience; it would be too painful for me to willingly walk into. What's the worst thing that's ever happened to you? I would say "the breakup," but technically it was letting him basically own me and my every neuron of joy. Not by his will of course, but my own. I was stupid and just... handed those rights over without really realizing it. I can harp forever and ever and EVER about the importance of making sure you own yourself and your emotions. Do you ever donate money to charity? If so, which charity and why? Blah blah blah, I don't get an income, you know this. Whenever I do, I 100% plan on donating to every charity stream Mark ever hosts again, as well as some other people's. I'd love to donate to a lot of places. Would you ever want to get married? If so, why? Yes, because society has made it too instilled in me that it's just like... this ultimate validation of "forever" with your partner, even though I know you can be just as or even far more invested in your relationship without marriage. The only *true* benefit of marriage imo is for legal and financial reasons, but yeah, I still want it. Like I said, it's too deeply embedded in that brain of mine that it's a relationship goal. Why do you live the way you do? I'm not even living the way I want to, so... Have you ever abused an animal? No, and I say "fuck you" with every ounce of sincerity and loathing if you have. Do you think animals are less important than humans? If so, why? Nope. We share this earth and grew from the same roots, so what *really* makes us better? We might be smarter (generally) and more developed as the apex predator, but that does not equate to being more important than, say, even a gnat. That creature has the exact same level of rights to be here as the human species does. I could go on and on and on about this topic. How close was the last person close to you who has died? Not extremely, but she was still important to and loved by me. Grandma and I were very, very different and butted heads more than once, but her love was unconditional, and she showed boundless kindness to others. She showed a courage I see as unmatched in the face of death. I truly, deeply, in the very core of my heart hope she is at peace and experiencing all joys she ever wished for. How does death in general make you feel? Well, it depends on how I'm looking at it. I fully accept it is an inevitable phase in simply existing that none of us will ever evade, so it's not exactly terrifying to me, though of course I don't want it anytime soon. If I'm thinking about people I love dying, I definitely get sad about it and scared of that possibly eternal separation. Is there a person you absolutely loathe? If so, why do you loathe them? Not that I know personally, no. Has anyone ever told you that you're rude? If so, what caused it? No; I think I'm very mannerly, honestly. Have you ever seen a therapist? I've regularly seen therapists since I started middle school. I advocate for everyone to have one, honestly, whether you have a mental illness or not. Have you ever been homeless? In technical terms, yes, but a friend let me stay with her until Mom and I settled into a new place. Have you ever been completely broke? That's the actual story of my life. Well, not me personally considering I've never had to take care of myself financially, but my mom struggles very, very badly with this, and mind you, she's frugal. Just disgustingly underpaid when she worked, and her current status with disability isn't exactly incredibly generous. I live under her roof, so. Have you ever had a steady job? No. Have you ever needed a loan? If so, what for? Have you paid it back? Yes, for school, and no. I do NOT want to know how in debt I am with schools. Have you ever wanted to go to space? Not seriously, no. What's the weirdest thing you've ever seen or heard? I am 99.99% sure mine and Jason's old roommates were having some ~kinky~ sex once while I was alone on the couch against their bedroom. Preeeetty sure the girl was making meowing sounds. They were furries (who I want to emphasize have zero judgment from me; I actually think they're very brave and creative), so that was... something I definitely wasn't used to hearing, haha. What has been the most exciting moment of your life thus far? Probably when Mark N O T I C E D me on Tumblr by reblogging a gif I made of him and his pupper, and I LITERALLY struggled to sleep for three days lmfaoooo. How many birds can you name just by looking at them? Uhhhh a pretty decent amount, I'd say. Which birds are most common around your neighborhood? Crows, sparrows, cardinals and bluejays if you're lucky, robins... pretty basic stuff like that. What do you think is the most interesting sea creature? Octopi are absolutely fascinating with their intelligence. How do you reset your head to zero, so to speak? Take a nap. That usually works. Have you ever gone exploring an abandoned building? Yeah, I love that shit and really wish I could do it more. Bring my camera, too. Are there any foreign television shows you enjoy watching? Some animes. Do you have any clocks in your house that chime when the hour changes? Do those types of clocks annoy you? No. I actually quite like them, though. Has anyone ever let you borrow some of their music, promising you'd love it, but you really didn't? Did you lie to the person and agree, or tell the truth, that you hated it? My dad lent me his Shinedown CD once clearly without thinking I could just look up the album online, haha... He's an old clueless man, leave 'im be. But anyway, of course I listened to it for him and I enjoyed it; I especially loved "The Human Radio," "Kill Your Conscience" and "Pyro." Have you had the same doctor pretty much your whole life, or have you went to a bunch of different ones over the years? Have you ever been to the doctor thinking something was horribly wrong with you, but it turned out to be something minor? Mine has changed a few times, but I haven't had "a bunch." As for the second question, not to my recollection. Is the background on your phone a default picture, or a picture you took? What is the picture of? The lock screen is a pastel-styled list of mental health reminders: "i am strong, i am loved, i am enough." My home screen has been some adorable meerkat pups for a while, which I didn't take. What is your favorite type of print (ex: zebra, stripes, argyle)? Do you have a lot of things with this print on it? Ummmm maybe plaid? No. Are there any stores you feel uncomfortable going into (ex: if you dress girly, do you feel uncomfortable going into Hot Topic)? Are there any stores that you refuse, or just never go in to? The only situation I could think of would be a sex shop. That'd be so fuckin uncomfortable. What is your favorite brand of clothing? Is this a brand that is sort of expensive, or is it pretty affordable? I'm heavily biased towards Cloak, haha. I just support anything and everything Mark takes part it, and it's his and jacksepticeye's business. I have one shirt and it's genuinely great quality and reall comfy. I wouldn't call its products expensive, but they're not cheap, either. What person do you text the most? My mom or Sara, depending on the day. Do you have any pictures that always make you laugh, or cry? Are they digital pictures, or printed pictures? What is the significance? No. Not pictures I have anymore, at least. Have you ever eaten raw pumpkin? Omg I would never. I hate the flavor of any sort of pumpkin food. Does your car have a name? I don't have my own car, but Mom jokingly calls hers "Olivia." Who was the last person you made plans with? One of my sister's in-laws that's actually the mother of one of my closest friends contacted me to plan some family pictures. What is the rudest thing someone has done recently towards you? I can't think of anything recent. How do you feel about your hair right now? It needs to be trimmed and dyed. How fast have you driven a car? I think accidentally leaning towards 80 on a highway. When you're hanging out with friends + you become bored, do you just leave or endure the boredom? Given I can't leave without a car, I deal with it. What did you last plug into your computer? What were you doing with this? The charger for obvious reasons. What color(s) have you dyed your hair? Red, purple, black, then red, purple, and lighter brown highlights. I really wish I could dye it more and actually have the color stick... Was your first kiss perfect? It was to me. What song did you hear last? I have "Over The Mountain" by Ozzy on now. (: Does anyone have any blackmail on you? No. Have you ever walked into the guys' bathroom? HA, once during a teacher work day (my mom was an assistant) at my elementary school. My sisters and friends went in there to be little "rebels." I remember being mega confused with urinals, haha. Then as a teen and adult, I've been in the dance studio's boy's restroom as well as a church's to help Mom clean. Who was the last person you had a deep conversation with? My therapist. Are you shy? I am VERY shy. Are you talkative? Generally, no, but when I'm in a very good mood, I tend to be. Has your most recent ex ever seen you cry? Oh jeez, she saw me wail once. When was the last time you were called "cute"? I'm not sure. Would you rather be called "hot", "cute" or "beautiful"? "Beautiful." Do you have a little sister? Yep. Definitely not "little" anymore, though. About to have her Master's in social work... How many arguments have you had with the last person you kissed? Given our childhood, we've fought a lot, but mostly just as kids over very, very stupid things. As adults, we've had a serious argument once or twice and then just some very minor disagreements sprinkled in there. Do you know anyone who's been arrested? Oh yes. What're you planning on doing after this? Another survey. What time did you go to sleep last night? Damn, it wasn't even 8:00. I was EXHAUSTED and actually slept decently for once in my life. Do you like waking up to good morning texts in the morning? I mean, I'd think most people would. It's a sweet, easy way of someone showing they care and think about you. Have you left some things unsaid with a certain person? Yeah. What was the last thing that made you happy? We had syrup to add to my breakfast, haha. I don't know if these are a thing everywhere, but I looove what we just call "pancakes on a stick," which is like a corndog, but with sausage and pancake batter. Dipping it in syrup is amaaaaaaziiiiiiing. Do you like the smell of rain? I don't love it, but it's refreshing sometimes. It's mostly just associated with a bittersweet memory, so it can be triggering to smell. I know, that sounds immensely stupid. What was the last thing you took a picture of? A very, very relatable meme to show Sara, haha. She doesn't have a Facebook, so that'll do. When you go to McDonald's, what drink do you usually get? I always get a Coke. What’s the nickname of your home state? Tar Heel State, from discovering tar in the since aptly-named Tar River. Have you ever thought about your wedding? I mean duh. What’s the worse type of weather in your opinion? Hot and humid, ugh. Especially right after a summer afternoon thunderstorm. It's unbearable. You can't fucking breathe outside, and you set one foot out of the door and it's soaked. Do you have a Kindle or iPad or neither? Neither. Would you rather read or write? Write. When was the last time someone took a picture of you? The time Misty visited last month and we were taking family pictures. Would you rather see Taylor Swift or Carrie Underwood in concert? I wouldn't pay for either or even willingly go to one or the other, but if I had to go for whatever reason, Carrie. She has a beautiful voice as well as a good handful of songs I actually like. I'm not a Taylor fan; there are only like, two old songs by her I enjoy. When someone screws you over, do you get back with revenge? No. I may not be the best at adulting, but damn, I'm not that bad. Name something negative that you hate about yourself? I overthink like a motherfucker. About everything. Is there a dead end road near where you live? I live on one. Huh, that's actually been the case three times... wow. Four if you count the apartment. Who are you tired of seeing in the news a lot (celebrities)? I don't care. I don't even pay attention to the news, other than Covid updates. Have you ever had to call and complain about a product you bought? No. Name something positive you love about yourself: I care a lot about people. Can you smell anything right now? No, besides however my house naturally smells that I'm numb to. Have you spoken to a relative on the phone today? No. How does alcohol affect you? I flush in my face very obviously, and I become more outgoing and talkative. Have you ever eaten tofu and if so, did you enjoy it? I've never tried it, but I very much doubt I'd enjoy it. What was the last type of meat you ate? Pork. What colour is your toothpaste? Blue and white. Have you ever been suspended from school? No. Have you ever inhaled helium? Once, I believe. Are you a fan of Adam Sandler? Yeah, I think he's pretty funny and a talented actor. What was the last fruit you ate? An apple. A candied apple for Valentine's Day, but still an apple, haha. Have you ever watched Parks and Recreation? With Sara's family, yeah. It was fine. Have you watched a movie this week? I haven't watched a movie in many months. Have you set an alarm today? Yeah, just to ensure I was up for group therapy today. Have you asked someone for advice today? No. What was the last website you were on, other than this one? YouTube. Have you ever been to Hawaii? No, but it'd be cool. Well, thinking about the humidity... Have you watched more than an hour of TV today? No; I haven't watched television in a long time. Do you keep magazines by your toilet? No. The last time you got dressed up, where did you go? I got my makeup done and put on a dress for a Halloween "witch" shoot with my friend and some other people. The pictures pretty much don't exist because they're blurry as shit and way too dark because we left too late. I don't know why we even left the house to do it by the time everyone figured their shit out. I was really disappointed because I thought Summer made me look really, really pretty. ;_; Did the one person who hurt you the most in your life apologize? Yes, but I don't know if he really meant it. He might have just wanted me off his back, but I kinda feel now that he meant it, at least regarding how it happened. Are you proud of who you are? Only in the sense that I think I have a good heart. Otherwise, no. I've accomplished so little. Have you ever been to Costco? We don't have those here, so no. Do/did you have to wear a uniform to your high school? No, thank Christ. Only in middle school. How many video games do you own? A whole lot. Have you ever been to a casino? If so, which one(s)? No. Have you ever visited a sex shop? No. How many sets of keys do you have for your house? One. Do you give spare keys to your place to your friends and family? Our landlord/family friend has one. Then obviously my sisters do, too. Have you ever ridden a bicycle through a busy city? Oh hell no. Do you use Instagram? How often do you post there? Yes, two for each of my photography "styles." I don't post a lot myself, but I react to stuff. When was the last time you high-fived someone? I believe the last time I was at my sister's and my nephew caught a Pokemon on his first throw in Pokemon GO. He and his sister LOVE that game; that's the first thing they ask to do when I come over, haha. Their dad doesn't like it because it's "evil" (which he finds most things, really...), and it's something I could roll my eyes into the back of my head about, but I still have to respect his parenting and ask if they can play it first. He let's 'em, just not long. He also took away the Pikachu plushy I gave Aubree because it's her favorite one. :^) Guess who doesn't fuckin like him lmao. Do you like writing? How often do you write? I love writing! I don't do it very much nowadays except through surveys, though. RP is kinda on pause, so surveys is really how I just get stuff out, even if it isn't creative. Are there any posters or artworks hanging in your living room? Artwork and family photos, yes. What's your favourite place to get pizza? I'm a basic bitch that loves her some Domino's. How many times have you been to the beach? Quite a few times. We live only like two hours away, and considering Myrtle Beach is a common dance competition location, we've been a couple handfuls of instances. Has there ever been a fire inside your house? Tell me the story. No. After we moved out of my childhood house though that we actually owned, the fucking idiots who were moving in completely roasted it to pitch by setting boxes on the goddamn stove and accidentally turning it on. The house had to be entirely rebuilt. My parents were livid considering it was THEIR house. Have you ever had a scary encounter with a wild animal? No. What was the best school project you remember doing? I actually really enjoyed the huge essay I did on toxic masculinity the last time I tried college. I've always been very firm about letting men be humans and not emotionless robots, but I learned a lot more while researching and writing. Name a video game you can play over and over again: Shadow of the Colossus is #1. I've beaten it at least 30 times, maybe even 40+; it's been too long since I've seen the save files. It's a relatively short game (you can beat it in less than like, four hours if you know what you're doing) and just very relaxing yet simultaneously absolutely epic to me. God, I want a PS4 to play the remaster, like beyond words. It looks incredible, and I want to try to get white Agro. Have you ever petted a cow, a sheep, or a pig? A pig, yes. I love pigs.

[rushingheadlong]

Okay, so here’s some longer ramblings about my Thoughts on Brian’s use of Queen songs in his solo tours… focusing mainly on the Back to the Light tour here because by the time Brian toured for Another World he had a VERY different opinion about and relationship with Queen (in that I think he had reached a much healthier place with regards to the band than where he was in the early 90s).

Also specific tour info and setlists are all mainly from QueenConcerts.com, I’m not citing anything specifically in-text this time, sorry.

So I’ve talked about some of this before, but basically two big things to keep in mind here are that:

Back to the Light was Brian’s first solo album and first solo tour. (The Star Fleet Project doesn’t count, as he never toured with it, never recorded it with the intention of releasing it, and the album liner notes literally say that it’s not a solo album.) While obviously he had experience touring with Queen, touring solo was an entirely new experience for him with challenges he hadn’t really faced before.

Brian really wanted nothing to do with Queen after Freddie’s death and not just in an immediate, “I’m grieving and we need to figure out how the band is moving forward,” sort of way either - Roger and John were the ones to start sorting out the remaining tapes to make Made in Heaven because Brian refused to help at first. (Yes some of that was because of the BttL tour, but he started helping between tour legs in 1993… there was no reason he couldn’t do the same in 1992 except he just didn’t want to.)

And because of both of those things I think Brian was caught in this place of needing to distance himself from Queen (to give himself space to grieve, to find himself as a solo musician, to build a new identity for himself in the wake of everything that happened in the late 80s/early 90s…) and also recognizing that he couldn’t do that for a wide variety of reasons.

For one thing, Brian didn’t really have enough solo material to fill out an entire setlist. Take a look at a typical setlist from the BttL tour:

23 songs (+ the band introduction) and a 2-song encore. Of those 23 songs, 8 were Queen songs, though not always the full song. The remaining 15 songs included 3 separate solos (not counting Last Horizon) and two cover songs (1812 overture and Since You’ve Been Gone). The encore is another cover song and a Queen song.

(Of the BttL songs that he didn’t play regularly on his tour, Rollin’ Over is technically a cover to begin with, Nothin’ But Blue and Just One Life are both slower songs which Brian seems to have limited in his setlist, and the last is I’m Scared which he may have had trouble adapting to be able to play it live, given the “Chaos Karaoke” section in the middle.)

The point being, that Brian really didn’t have enough solo material to flesh out an entire 1.5-2 hour concert and at this point he didn’t even have enough covers ready to perform like he would for Another World. Picking Queen music to supplement his setlist was the most logical choice to go with.

Brian also would have been in the position where he was simply known best for his work with Queen, and there’s some evidence that he struggled with getting enough recognition for the early legs of the BttL tour. The South American leg in 1992, for example, was only 5 concerts and then for portions of 1993 Brian was actually touring in support of Guns N’ Roses rather than headlining the shows himself. (The first North American leg in early 1993 was also apparently rather poorly promoted.)

So Brian may very well have realized that he needed to lean into the Queen fans who had followed him over to his solo career, at least to some extent - and this in itself might have put him in a difficult position because not only did he not want to tie himself to Queen at this point in time but he probably also had to tread carefully to make sure that he wasn’t seen as trying to “profit” from Freddie’s death or music that was by-and-large considered to be Freddie’s in origin.

And he seems to have handled that by choosing to play songs that he wrote himself. Love of My Life is an obvious exception but he clearly acknowledges during concerts that he’s playing it for Freddie, and even so that song had morphed into a Brian-and-Freddie song over the years anyway just by virtue of how it was performed live over the years. He also plays a snippet of Bohemian Rhapsody, but everything else from Queen on that “typical” setlist are his songs. Even one-off Queen songs are generally his, or else just small snippets of someone else’s song (like the Mustapha clip). No one can say that he’s trying to “profit” off of Queen and Freddie if he’s technically still playing only his own music.

(If we want to veer off into absolute baseless wild speculation for a moment... I do wonder if Brian might have had legal concerns about playing Queen’s music. I don’t know anything about Roger’s work with The Cross, but the BttL tour took place before any of Roger’s true solo tours so this would have been the first time the question of playing Queen music after the “end of Queen” came up. And, unfortunately, it does happen that when groups disband that there are sometimes legal restrictions put in place on who can play what songs on solo projects.)

(I’m not saying that this was something that happened with Queen and, frankly, I don’t think Roger or John would have cared if Brian had wanted to play “their” songs... but I can see Brian, who was already in a very unstable place with regards to his mental health, building this up to be an issue in his own mind and letting his anxiety and depression run wild with it, and ultimately deciding to head off any issues by only playing “his” songs instead.)

Stepping back into things we have proof for, for the most part Brian chose songs of his that were faster and heavier and put them in places in his setlist where he can “power through” them without needing to pay them any special attention or really acknowledge that these are Queen songs to begin with. This lets him keep the energy of his concerts up in general (important for gigs where he was the support act) but also lets him trade on Queen fans’ recognition of songs like Now I’m Here and Hammer to Fall - these songs are known in a way that his solo work wasn’t (and still isn’t), so people who came to his shows to see “Queen’s guitarist” get moments strategically interspersed throughout the concert where they’re given high-energy songs that they know and can enjoy.

And the placement of the Queen songs is very strategic. Brian doesn’t go more than three songs (or 3 songs and a solo) without playing a Queen song, and he ends his concerts with the upbeat and well-recognized Hammer to Fall so even if people had felt “meh” about his solo work they get to leave the concert with a favorite Queen song fresh in their minds instead.

I also think that despite his feelings about Queen and the fact that Brian very clearly struggled with how to handle his obligations to the band in the wake of Freddie’s death, there was probably some amount of comfort in playing familiar songs during this period of time - not only as a way of dealing with his grief, but also to give himself moments where he needed to be less “on” because he already knew these songs so well after years of playing them (and simply by virtue of the fact that he wrote them himself).

If you watch enough of Brian’s solo concerts you can start to notice that there are moments where he tends to forget that he is the lead singer now. He starts wandering the stage during the guitar bits and almost doesn’t make it back to his mic in time to sing again, especially during the Queen songs. And I think for Brian there might have been a feeling of needing his solo songs to be “perfect” because (in his eyes) that was going to make-or-break his career as a musician after the end of Queen, but he could be lax with Queen’s stuff because that’s who he was and he knew the fans would be happy enough to hear him nail the Hammer to Fall guitar solo that it wouldn’t matter if he almost missed singing the next verse.

And, like I mentioned before, these early tours were difficult. He was touring with a new band, he was a support act again instead of the headliner (which meant adjusting his set to fit the limited time he had), he had technical difficulties, he was touring with a new and probably temporary guitar tech… As much as he wanted to stand on his own, I’d imagine these tours were probably incredibly stressful especially in the beginning, and having a few moments to just play music that he knew like the back of his hand was probably a godsend for him.

But at the end of the day, Brian still had an incredibly conflicted relationship with Queen at this time. His cover of God (Dream Is Over) is literally about the ending of Queen and includes the line, “I don’t believe in being Queen anymore, I just believe in me - just you guys and me.” He very strongly felt that Queen was over and he wasn’t in a position where he could handle any obligations to the band, and he was deeply mourning not only his friend’s death but the loss of something that brought him immense happiness over the last 20 years of his life.

On the one hand, the very specific and calculated ways in which Brian incorporated Queen songs into his solo tours is reflective of his attempt to distance himself from the band - but at the same time, Brian has said that returning to touring was like “therapy” for him after Freddie’s death, and I do think that by trying to be strategic about how he used Queen in his solo shows he inadvertently created a situation where he could work through his feelings about the band in an extremely controlled and positive environment.

Rather than being left to flounder and find a way forward on his own, he could go out and perform a carefully curated selection of Queen tracks to crowds that would respond positively and remind him that this music was still loved. He could play Love of My Life for Freddie and get it sung back to him and share his pain and grief with others so he wasn’t alone with it. He could give it his all performing his new music and then take a step back with a Queen song and just breathe and recognize everything that was good and was working for him in those moments.

And I think the fact that the tours were a source of healing for him is a large reason why he started working with Roger and John on Made in Heaven in the fall of 1993, even though he continued touring through mid-December, especially considering that he didn’t join them between tour legs earlier in 1992-1993. Granted, he probably would have eventually joined them regardless but I definitely think that if the BttL tours hadn’t been as therapeutic as they were he would have joined them later, and we probably would have gotten a very different album for Made in Heaven than what the final product did end up being.

(As a final sidenote, it’s worth noting that during his Another World tours Brian had roughly the same ratio of Queen songs to other material, except the bulk of Queen songs were played in one large chunk in the middle of his shows rather than strategically spread throughout the setlist. It seems like rather than building his concerts so slower songs were bookended by faster/heavier songs, he chose to put Queen songs in the middle surrounded by his solo material and covers - possibly because he didn’t feel like he needed to rely on Queen’s material to get him through a show, but he still wanted to acknowledge that music and that chapter of his life especially now that he was in a better place at least in terms of his relationship with Queen.)

[werevulvi]

Would you like to explain the nordic model of prostitution? Like what is it, why you dislike it and how it compares to the australian?

Uh, this is a big question, and it was a while ago I read up on those two models. So I had to sit with it for a moment before conjuring up a reply. I don’t know exactly what kinda info you wanted here, so I’ll just overwhelm you with everything I’ve got! Which... isn’t all that much, all things considered. I really don’t have any sorta energy to start digging for sources of it now or anytime soon, but I can ramble on a bit about my past findings and the conclusions that they led me to:

First off, what those models of prostitution are: are essentially sex industry laws that regulate buying and selling of any kinds of sexual services. They're what decide whether it's legal or not to sell/buy and to what extent you can legally do what, in regards to brothels, porn, being your own boss, etc. America has a completely different system of such laws, detached from both the Nordic and the Australian, which is probably one of the most dangerous such systems of laws, for the prostitutes. Although I'm not like SUPER familiar with its exact laws and regulations, I pretty sure it's illegal to sell sex there, which makes it very risky for those who do. In the Nordic model it's legal to sell (but with quite some caveats which I will shortly get into) but illegal to buy. In the Australian model it's legal to sell AND buy, but with safety restrictions regulating the how and to what extent.

Secondly, some highly relevant background info about me: Some years ago, I was actually interested in becoming a sex worker myself, because well, my trauma sought a new, exciting thrill... However, I wanted to do it as legally and safely as I could possibly manage. I also wanted to sell physical sex acts, not just sell foot pics on the internet. So basically I did a ton of research on how to be legal full service prostitute in my country, and to my sheer frustration, found that the Nordic model has so many flaws and contradictions in it that there's no way I could possibly sell sex without running into some serious trouble.

Although PLEASE keep in mind that I'm no longer interested in making prostitution my career!

But also to prove my point (before having even made it yet): even IF I'd still consider becoming a sex worker, I would feel safer doing that in the Netherlands, or possibly even in (certain parts of) America, and most definitely in Australia, than I would in Sweden. Of course it's good if the shitty Nordic model prevents me from starting up such a business, but if that's the only focus here, then you're completely missing a very important, in fact crucial, point: The reason it prevents me from doing so is not because it makes sex work seem more unappealing than it already is, but because the laws around it are unnecessarily FUCKED. That is the literal law putting me in danger, possibly even more so than the john's would, which is a huge failure on part of the government. The government's job should be to protect, not kick and step on people who are already fucking lying down, for daring to lie down to begin with, which the vast majorty of whom did not choose to.

Now, let's get into the issues with the Nordic model that I stumbled into during my research:

1. Although it's technically legal to sell sex, it's illegal to do it at your own home, the client's home, hotels, outdoors, literally any imaginable physical location. Which means prostitutes run a risk of facing eviction and getting arrested for the location (which is every location) they perform their services.

2. You have to pay taxes for the money you earn, like any other "job." However, the catch here is that the only way you can to do this is if you apply for starting your own business as a sex worker, which you're not technically allowed to do (???) by applying for something called an "F kassa" which is basically a form of private company financial set up (very Sweden specific, bureaucratic bullshit) which is the "lowest" and most difficult form of it to work with. Basically by that system, you have to manually calculate your taxes by yourself every month, which has a VERY high risk of fucking it up accidentally, which gets you at a very high liability for accidental fraud. It's also an extremely mentally taxing (sorry for the bad pun) way to pay taxes, unless you're a mathematician. Due to this, most Swedish sex workers do not pay their taxes, which you can probably imagine how living under that kinda stress could do to a person.

3. Because buying sex is still illegal under the Nordic model, prostitutes still have to stay quiet if something bad happens with a client, because giving up clients to the cops hurts their business, as well as increasing the risk of the cops finding more of their clients to bust, and fewer john's wanna go to a prostitute who is not trustworthy.

4. Trafficking is still happening a lot, even in Sweden. But problem is that because any and all such activity is strictly illegal, including brothels and the like, they hide underground and are not found out about until after having done severe damage for many decades... if at all. Pimps etc in Sweden are extremely skilled at keeping their business secret because duh obviously?! Hidden trafficking gets discovered all the time, but they get better at hiding, thus harder to discover.

5. There were a ton more issues I stumbled into, but these were the most concerning ones that really leaped out at me. Other issues includes: not being able to get safety stuff like condoms covered financially unless you go through hell and high water to record for every little rubber you buy and use and what exactly it costed, etc, but even then it's still pretty much impossible in practice. Not allowed to keep your income on a bank account because of the legal issues of where those money come from. The extremely high risk of keeping contact with clients without getting caught, whether you use a phone, e-mail, snailmail, etc.

Conclusions: In my opinion, the Nordic model only makes shit a hell of a lot worse, in an attempt to protect sex workers. But the result is that it only forces people to go underground and hide from the law to protect their business, which goes for both trafficking as well as individual prostitutes with their own businesses. It tries, but fails hard.

Basically, the law says you have to abide by things that are not actually possible to abide by in actual practice. I wrecked my head for months trying to figure out how to be a law-abiding prostitute, but to no avail. It made me not just frustrated for myself, but also worried about sex workers in my country, whether they're trafficked or otherwise forced, or choosing to do it on their own volition. The Nordic model makes sex work dangerous, not only because of the clients possible (or likely) abuse the sex workers might face, but because of the law itself. And that's where I personally think the law has gone very, very wrong. It should protect sex workers, not punish them further and putting them in even more danger.

(Also, although my knowledge of the Nordic model is very Sweden specific, I got the impression that it's flaws are quite similar in other Nordic countries, aside from a few details here and there.)

The Australian model, I have far less knowledge about. I basically just watched a few youtube videos about it and skimmed through maybe half an article, buuuut... what little I heard of it seems to do a far better job at both protecting individual sex workers who work for themselves, AND reducing trafficking, which really spoke to me. Yes, the Australian model allows far more, but that is not at all necessarily bad or dangerous. It allows the shit (trafficking) to float up to the surface much more easily, makes pimps far more careless with their businesses (ie easier to bust them) and can offer a far better safety net for those who (more or less) choose to do it on their own volition. But what exactly is and isn't allowed in that model, I'm admittedly unsure. But a lot of stuff pertaining to prostitution there has been de-criminalised, NOT legalised, and that's a very important point to keep in mind.

But also, I understand that the Australian model cannot possibly be "perfect" by any means. It's probably more so that I understand the Nordic model to be so horrific that whatever the Australian model does differently pretty much cannot possibly be worse. That's how badly I think of the Nordic model. It seriously angers me to the bone, how horrible it is. And thus, I can't help but getting very wrapped up in my emotions about it when I hear radfems praising the Nordic model, when all it does is brushing the inconvenient dust under the carpet, while the Australian model has already done quite some impressive actual cleaning, in the few years that have passed since they de-criminalised prostitution stuff.

The actual real life outcome should matter more than how nice the model looks like in theory. Sweden offers an absolutely terrible living situation for sex workers of any kind in actual practice, despite having such a "nice" system that's "meant" to make it safer for sex workers and reduce trafficking, which it absolutely does not do. Australia literally proved their "more allowing" system actually works in practice to improve the safety for sex workers and to reduce trafficking, despite it looks morally corrupt and too allowing in theory, and that's what matters to me. The outcome. The lives.

[masterweaverx]

I be a nerd, I be liking D&D, and I be watchin' a lot of Tulok the Barbrarian's 'Building Character' series, where he puts together how to play as various fictional characters in fifth edition up to level 20. He's done Ruby, he's done Yang, but I was bored so I figured I'd follow his format and try to guess how he'd do Blake. This is going to be a lot of Nerd Rambling, so here we go.

So, outlining the goals: Agility is a must for any Blake build, she's got a lot of nimbleness to her. She also uses two swords--one of which is also a whip and a pistol, and the other a sheathe that can be combined to make an extra sword--so she should have weapon versatility. And of course there's her semblence, can't have a Blake without a Blake Buddy, and we need that Blake Buddy to be useful.

Tulok uses standard point array for a reason, it skips over the fiddliness of 'rolling' and 'pointbuy'. Also useful for organizing high stats to low. Blake's very nimble and a lot of her weapons count as finesse or ranged, so putting the 15 into dexterity is a no-brainer. She's also very good at spotting things and analyzing the situation--wisdom's generally where that sort of thing comes from, so it gets a 14. Charisma is the skill you need to make big speeches about how the White Fang has gone downhill and get people to listen, plugging the 13 in there seems good. And she likes her books, so 12 for intelligence is obvious. Between strength and constitution I think I'd dump strength--constitution is about HP and endurance, so it'd get the 10, and proficiency in the Athletics skill should make up for the weakness having an 8 in strength gives.

For race, I'd say a Swiftstride Shifter works best. Specifically the statblock from the Races of Eberron Unearthed Arcana--I've seen one without Keen Senses and, yeah, that didn't make sense to me. Swiftstride Shifters get +2 to their Dexterity, bumping Blake up to 17, and +1 to their Charisma, evening that out to 14. They also get sixty feet of Darkvision, Keen Senses for an automatic Perception proficiency, and Graceful for an automatic Acrobatics proficiency. And then there's the big draw--automatically got 35 walk speed (5 more than the usual norm), plus they can trigger a one-minute transformation for both another +5 speed (total of 40 feet) and the ability to move 10 feet as a reaction when an enemy ends their round within 5 feet of them without triggering attacks of Oppurtunity. (Also get some temporary hit points during the transformation, but that's a side benefit.) Blake's hard to hit even before she gets class levels. And her first class level will make her even harder to hit.

For Background I figure Courtier from Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide works best. It gives Blake proficiency in Insight and Persuasion, two extra languages of her choice, and the feature Court Functionary. To quote the online source I'm using:

Your knowledge of how bureaucracies function lets you gain access to the records and inner workings of any noble court or government you encounter. You know who the movers and shakers are, whom to go to for the favors you seek, and what the current intrigues of interest in the group are.

Very much something Blake would be interested in. Admittedly, for her noble courts are more the 'legally dubious' organizations like the White Fang and the Happy Huntresses, but being the daughter of the chief of Kuo Kuana probably gives her some political acumen anyway.

I'm not going to go level-by-level like Turlok does, I don't think anyone here wants me to ramble too much, but I will say Blake will be getting nine levels of Rogue and eleven of Fighter. Four Rogue levels, five Fighter levels, five more Rogue levels, then six Fighter levels. Starting with Rogue gives her a lot of proficiencies, and fighter... a lot less, when she multiclasses into it, but enough to shore up Rogue. Rogues get proficiencies in Light Armor and Simple Weapons (and a bunch of specific Martial Weapons, but multiclassing into Fighter gives her all the Martial Weapons anyway so no need to be specific there). They also get proficiencies in Thieves' Tools, which work on traps as well as locks, and on Dexterity and Intelligence saving throws--Blake's smart enough not to be fooled and nimble enough to get out of the way. Finally, they get four skill proficiencies, and I figure Blake would go with Athletics, Deception, Investigation, and Stealth to round out her ninja-ing. Multiclassing into Fighter gives a character proficiency in Simple and Martial Weapons, as well as Light and Medium Armor and Shields; honestly, Blake isn't going to be using those proficiencies much, it's more for the class features, but I thought I'd mention them.

With nine levels of Rogue come most of the standard Rogue abilities, which mostly make Blake that much harder to hit, so I'll only go over the stuff that has to be chosen. Blake gets two expertises on their first and sixth level, which she can choose to place on any skill to double her proficiency bonus on them; Acrobatics, Athletics, Investigation, and Persuasion are what I figured fit her most.

A third level Rogue chooses a Roguish Archetype, and the website I'm using has 'Acrobat' as an option; that gives Blake Ariel Artistry at third Rogue level (When she moves, she can instead take two short movements by flying. Each movement is half her speed, and she must end each one on a solid object or the ground. If she does not, she falls and her movement ends.) and Fearless Aerialist at ninth Rogue level (she no longer takes damage from falling).

And then there are the Ability Score Improvements at fourth and eighth level; for fourth level I figure Blake would appreciate the Dual Wielder feat, and because I'm splitting 4-5-5-6  that means the eighth level Improvement is actually Blake's third improvement, so there's be +1 to Dexterity and +1 to Intelligence (because she already got +2 to Dexterity from Fighter), so that would cap her Dexterity at 20 and make her Intelligence 13. Also, the Dual Wielder feat for reference:

You master fighting with two weapons, gaining the following benefits:

You gain a +1 bonus to AC while you are wielding a separate melee weapon in each hand. You can use two-weapon fighting even when the one-handed melee weapons you are wielding aren't light. You can draw or stow two one-handed weapons when you would normally be able to draw or stow only one.

So this basically covers most of Blake's "normal" mobility, but her combat capabilities and Semblance will be covered by Fighter.

The non-variable Fighter improvements boil down to 'extra attacks, extra actions, and a few features to help you shrug off damage.' Blake is nothing if not tenacious. Of the variable features, I think she'd pick up the Two-Weapon Fighting Style on her first Fighter level, because that lets her use her ability score with the damage of her bonus attack with her offhand weapon (high Dex, lotta hitting power). Her ability score improvments at Fighter Level Four, Six, and Eight would be two points to Dexterity, Charisma, and Wisdom respectively. For those at home, that means her Dexterity is 20, Charisma and Wisdom 16 each, Intelligence 13, Constitution 10 and Strength 8 when all's said and done. Of course, third level fighters get to pick a martial Archetype that gives them benefits as they level, and Echo Knight is perfectly suited for Blake. Right off the bat, she gets this:

Manifest Echo 3rd-level Echo Knight feature

You can use a bonus action to magically manifest an echo of yourself in an unoccupied space you can see within 15 feet of you. This echo is a magical, translucent, gray image of you that lasts until it is destroyed, until you dismiss it as a bonus action, until you manifest another echo, or until you're incapacitated.

Your echo has AC 14 + your proficiency bonus, 1 hit point, and immunity to all conditions. If it has to make a saving throw, it uses your saving throw bonus for the roll. It is the same size as you, and it occupies its space. On your turn, you can mentally command the echo to move up to 30 feet in any direction (no action required). If your echo is ever more than 30 feet from you at the end of your turn, it is destroyed. You can use the echo in the following ways:

-As a bonus action, you can teleport, magically swapping places with your echo at a cost of 15 feet of your movement, regardless of the distance between the two of you.

-When you take the Attack action on your turn, any attack you make with that action can originate from your space or the echo's space. You make this choice for each attack.

-When a creature that you can see within 5 feet of your echo moves at least 5 feet away from it, you can use your reaction to make an opportunity attack against that creature as if you were in the echo's space.

Unleash Incarnation 3rd-level Echo Knight feature

You can heighten your echo's fury. Whenever you take the Attack action, you can make one additional melee attack from the echo's position.

You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Constitution modifier (a minimum of once). You regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.

At Fighter level seven, Blake would get Echo Avatar, which lets her send her Echo on scouting missions for ten minutes at a time. Not very in character, sure. But she's very aware of everything anyway, so it's not surprising she'd have eyes and ears everywhere. And then, at level ten, she gets the very appropriately named Shadow Martyr, which lets her make her Echo teleport and take the hit for any creature she can see being attacked as a reaction. That is very much in character for Blake.

Technically, the eleventh level of Fighter (and the twentieth level of the build) gives her another extra attack, which could be devastating with all the weapons she can juggle thanks to Dual Wielder and her weapon proficiencies. I'm not sure if that's better then a tenth level in Rogue, which would give her another ability score improvement, but it does mean she can rain down a lot of pain very quickly--and the woman cut down a missile barrage once! While boosted. But it happened!

So yeah, that's my take on it.