#anti-imperfection

[sorcerly]

*SLAMS MALEVOLENT DOWN ON THE TABLE* ITS ABOUT LOVE ITS ABOUT FRIENDSHIP ITS ABOUT COMMUNITY ITS ABOUT CARE ITS ABOUT IMPERFECTION ITS ABOUT RESTORATION ITS ABOUT CHOICE ITS ABOUT HOPE

[lainalit]

I think we should encourage SJM to hate or fell indifferent about her characters because the characters that she actively likes are the most boring bland wet breads I have ever read about

[seaweedstarshine]

Late to the game as I’ve kinda been kinda non-here for a minute but I scrolled through the Dot and Bubble tag, and thought I wanted to write this post into existence.

There's this part in Doctor Who Unleashed where RTD says this:

“What we can’t tell is how many people will have worked that out before the ending. Because they’ve seen white person after white person after white person, and television these days is very diverse. I wonder, will you be ten minutes into it, will you be fifteen, will you be twenty, before you start to think, everyone in this community is white. And if you don’t think that — why didn’t you? So, that’s gonna be interesting. I hope it’s one of those pieces of television you see, and always remember.”

And I'm like. Yeah. But the reason this works even as well as it does is largely thanks to the work of the previous showrunner with the previous creative team, which was notably the first era to have any writers of color (amongst other firsts in terms of inclusivity in directors, composer, actors). While Chibnall fumbled whenever he tried to write about race himself, he did have the self-awareness to have Black and South Asian writers writing the episodes where race is the focus (and a female writer for the episode where sexism is a focus; my point is, he seemed to know his shortcomings).

I wonder what the current creative team looks like? (not really, but I wasn't 100% sure for all of them)

To quote RTD:

“...before you start to think, everyone in this community is white.”

This is pretty non-self-aware, right? It's pretty “It is said, and I understand this, there was a history of racism with the original Toymaker, the Celestial Toymaker, who had ‘celestial,’ and I did not know this, but ‘celestial’ can mean of Chinese origin, but in a derogatory way,” right? (from The Giggle Unleashed) It's pretty “and I had problems with that, and a lot of us on the production team had problems with that: associating disability with evil,” right? (from Destination Skaro Unleashed)

—none of which are issues that should be overlooked, but think how much exponentially better they might’ve been addressed if he’d consulted with Chinese writers and wheelchair-using writers before going straight to giving the Toymaker weird fake accents and making Davros walk?

How many Black or non-white people do we think saw the Dot and Bubble script before it landed in Ncuti’s hands?

And this just keeps happening.

And like, from some of the shocked responses I've seen from white viewers to the ending of Dot and Bubble, maybe the episode's unsubtlety was needed? From the way RTD talks about it in Unleashed, the episode was written with a white audience in mind, Baby's First Microaggressions (where of course the microaggressions come from people who are pretty self-admittedly white supremacists). Ricky September, a more seemingly normal depiction of someone in the racist bubble of Finetime, seemed like an interesting element, up until the way he died.

The ending worked for me, because I do think the Doctor's reaction is true to how the Doctor would react. I just keep thinking of how much better the core themes could've been handled by someone with actual lived experience on the subject matter.

[rhaenyra-first-of-her-name]

Is HotD allergic to making all of the women in the show anything but a 'perfect' victim or what?

[likealittleheartbeat]

Truly compassionate media doesn’t necessarily step in to save its characters and give them a happy ending. That would be disingenuous, not only to its characters, but to the audience members who have made similar mistakes and are still dealing with the painful consequences.

Compassionate media, however, refuses to use its edits and its narrative to cast judgment on the flawed characters, judgment being quite different from consequences. It makes efforts to understand and depict failure as a basic part of the human condition, and it often seems almost apologetic that it needs to be the one to convey this message to its audience.

[heartfeltletters-written]

one day I will write a master post about all the issues I have with art "made" by AI. I just saw a fic written by chatgpt and I've seen an absurd increase in drawings/paintings using this technology and it makes my blood boil.

Humans are supposed to make art, not machines. Art is supposed to touch our hearts, to reflect on the current times. It's supposed to address, love, heartbreak, friendship, and the other endless emotions that make us feel alive. A software will never be able to replicate those strong feelings.

Stop trying to replace artists, whether they do it professionally or just as a hobby. Nothing and I mean NOTHING will be able to replace the stroke of a brush, the chosen careful words on a page but most especially the thought and hard work that goes behind a piece of art.

[shironezuninja]

Oh, Wow. An extra 10 photos has been added to the Instagram 10 Photo count posts. This’ll make Tumblr jealous.

[rynnthefangirl]

Having issues with the way Team Black handled things should not make you Team Green any more than having issues with the way Daenaerys handled the liberation of the Slave Cities should make you Team Slavers.

[ursaspecter]

I love you crows feet I love you big noses I love you bumpy and/or crooked noses I love you laugh lines I love you face scars I love you chin clefts I love you dimples I love you freckles I love you little line on the tips of noses I love you square jaws I love you forehead wrinkles

[vaguelyaperson]

"JKR was always terrible!" "HP ((a series written in the late 90s and early 2000s)) was always problematic ((by today's standards))!" "JKR was always secretly a racist misogynist!"

JKR is a very real example of how even a progressive ally can fail to check biases and instead be brainwashed by bigotry. More than that, JKR is a tragic example of what idolizing someone as an unfalliable progressive icon can do to someone when they (inevitably) get high on their platform and do something problematic ((the shoehorned gay Dumbledore controversy being the start, imo.))

By hooting and hollering about how she was secretly horrible all along (when she used tropes that were extremely prevalent in early 2000s media), you are distancing yourselves and believing yourselves imperviable to the same fate. That is a major mistake.

Everyone, no matter how progressive they start out, is capable of fucking up and/or getting brainwashed by propaganda. Everyone has unintentional biases they have to unlearn - failing to do so, to their own detriment.

JKR should be a cautionary tale. Not a gotcha! We unmasked you as evil all along!

The fact that so many people miss the point of this makes me very worried about the current strength and direction of progressive social movements.

EDIT: Anyone using this argument to support Hogwarts Legacy or any of JKR's current bullshit will get blocked. This is intended as a learning point that this sort of thing doesn't happen again. I fully support the boycott.

[brucenorris007]

[Image ID: Rouge is reclined on a couch, frowning at her phone, wings tucked in behind her and her free hand dangling just above the floor. In the second panel, the screen of her phone has showing times for Oppenheimer alongside ticket prices for three. Third panel, Rouge is frowning harder, an angry scribbled black cloud over her head. Fourth panel, she lowers her phone and looks across the room.

Second image: Omega is connected to the TV via an HDMI cable; the television is muted, showing gratuitous explosions and violence against machines. A few musical notes hovering around his head imply that Omega has set up the audio to connect directly into his head. Beside Rouge's laid up feet, Shadow sits on the other end of the couch, holding open a book of Sudoku puzzles with a pencil behind one ear. The second panel shows Rouge squinting with the number 18 hovering over her head. Third panel shows Omega and Shadow again; Omega has the number 3 with a question mark in parentheses over his head. Shadow has a question mark to the left of the number 5 over his head. Fourth panel, Rouge has tilted her head to one side, mouth twisted in thought.

Final image: Shadow looks up at Rouge. Speech bubble "What?" to the right of his mouth. Second panel, the question mark to the left of the number 5 changes to a 6, reading 65. Third panel, Rouge smirks and looks back at her phone. Last panel shows confirmation of purchase for one child ticket, one adult ticket and one senior ticket for Oppenheimer for a discounted price.]

@generic-sonic-fan

[essektheylyss]

Debating if I should go harder on the classification snob shaming. I think I will let my rant sit in drafts overnight. Make better decisions in the morning lmao.

[sevensistersofsussex]

for the choose violence asks let’s go with 1, 8, 14, 17, 21, 23, and 25!

the character everyone gets wrong

Caroline or rather how some interpretations turn her into a perfect girlboss.

She had some relatable flaws.

Being jealous of her friend and being in a one-sided competition with her. Not having a filter and letting the insensitive, socially unacceptable things come out of her mouth. She was downright harsh. Not being able to keep a secret.

The whole "being a vampire made her better" thing is strange to me. She was still wildly jealous. With Tyler and that random party girl. With Stefan later when she thinks he and Elena are getting along too well?

I think the only thing that changed with her character is that the telegraphing of those scenes are done in a way to make it seem like she's a boss when in reality, she is still that insecure girl. Which is understandable and relatable. How many of us have insecure moments?

common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

Some people act like the sire bond broke after Elena turned off her humanity and I think all that happened was she got a reprieve from it but every time we see her after she is tortured gets her humanity back is a moment when she's sired to Damon.

It's why she handles his death so differently than the other deaths she experiences. I think the sire bond was trying to drag her down with him.

that one thing you see in fics all the time

Reading mostly Klena, I see a lot of Klaus being obsessed with the bite mark he would have left on Elena and making him possessive over it.

there should be more of this type of fic/art

More rarepair art and fics! I honestly just love them. They aren't canon? Good. They barely had scenes together? Fantastic. They weren't even in the same show? Stellar.

On a real note, the thing I think I'm starting to pin down about my love of rarepairs is how creative you have to be to write them. There is no canon to follow. This is all from your own head and I eat it up.

part of canon you think is overhyped

Klaroline.

I just - don't really understand where the connection was supposed to come from. He put her life in danger to show Tyler the control he had over him and then heals her. And she's like "are you going to kill me" and he's upset that she thinks he'd be a monster on her birthday. And that made him like her?

Ultimately Caroline chose Stefan, the man she'd been pining for since the first episode despite his commitment to her friend and Klaus never really did much to pursue her. He wanted to be her last love but then just...meh?

It just seems people mostly like how those two actors look together and the chemistry they had. Which....the show is full of hot people. They all mostly had chemistry with each other.

ship you've unwillingly come around to

Forwood.

The vocalness of the KC fandom made me just want to turn my brain off for this but the more I think about it the more I like their early days. One of the rare friends to lovers ships that I enjoy. And I think a lot of it had to do with him being there for her with Matt and her being there for him with his supernatural journey.

They really could have been cute all the way through. Just a stable, supportive couple for the entirety of the series. I think it needed some stability in that way.

common fandom complaint that you're sick of hearing

Elena is a crybaby.

And so what if she does cry a lot? So what if any of the female presenting characters cry? What is it about women crying that makes us point to them and claim they are too "emotional" as if it is a bad thing but when a male character kills someone's friend or relative because he got rejected that isn't "too emotional".

[basic-bamboo]

Why is it "if you would be willing to kill yourself for a cause you must be insane" but not if you're willing to kill others?

To be clear, I don't think that either is "insane" and I don't think that "insanity" is a bad thing- my point is that in our culture, being willing to take others' lives in valorant and strong, but taking your own is weak or crazy

[thecruellestmonth]

Normal Batman fans: I don't want to engage with parts of canon in which my fave is an abusive asshole. I choose to engage with other stories instead, and I ignore stories that I dislike.

Nasty toxic Batman fans: Ooh, Bruce is being totally gross again, don't mind if I do~

Good Dad Bruce™ stans: Yes, I fully acknowledge that every single one of Bruce's kids is deeply—at times suicidally—traumatized by his parenting failures in canon, but he is NOT a bad parent! Bruce LOVES his family. Sometimes COMPLICATED PARENTS make their children feel WORTHLESS and ISOLATED, and then don't do anything to fix it! It's totally NATURAL, Bruce is just a COMPLICATED parent! He's COMPLICATED! Bruce LOVES his family. COMPLICATED, I say! NOT ABUSIVE! Would an abusive parent put a hand on his child's shoulder in a vague display of warmth once every few years??? Hm??? Yeah, I DIDN'T THINK SO, YOU STUPID ABUSE VICTIMS!! Bruce LOVES his family. He does nice things—why are you ignoring all the nice things that he's done? He is just an IMPERFECT person, he has made some teeny tiny mistakes repeatedly with 5+ separately acquired children over a twenty-year period. Bruce is just a regular IMPERFECT human being—which means that you critics are the UNREASONABLE MONSTERS imposing PERFECTIONIST standards on a poor innocent middle-aged baby adult man! Bruce LOVES his family. How could we expect exceptionally privileged hyperintelligent parents NOT to regularly use their position of power to make 4-6 children feel inadequate, unsafe, and alone?? What ridiculously high standards! Bruce LOVES his family.

[teja-has-puppet-autism]

y'know sometimes I go to make a post on this here webbed site, and I almost always end up deletin it cause I measure it through the "how widely applicable is this" + "how horribly can people twist this" metrics and it just stops my little fingies from typin

(this turned into me typing an essay in the tags cause I very much did need to process some shit lmao)