#are actually not that at all. the abuser's brain was just extremely on fire all the time forever and they've never examined that

[echthr0s]

"just because someone has a PD doesn't mean they're automatically going to be abusive": nodding, yes good, go on

"if they're abusive they chose to be that way": [EXTREMELY LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER NOISE]

[sarah-yyy]

Jie jie what is the devil judge and should I watch it

why would y'all give me a reason to scream over tdj, i'm still recovering.....

SO this show is from like 2021 so like a lot of y'all have probably already watched this, but for those of you who haven't and want to suffer, this post is for you because jiejie loves you 😘

what: modern kdrama // completed // 16 eps, roughly 50 mins each where: netflix // viki why: this was sold to me like this (verbatim) - think eat the rich courtroom shenanigans with morally grey judge who is also extremely hot

little bit of background - setting is in a dystopian, post-pandemic south korea. to instil faith in the judiciary, they've basically reality-showed court proceedings. viewers can vote to sentence the defendants through an app. this Live Court is presided by:

JUDGE #1 - the morally grey but extremely hot judge in question, kang yohan

where do i even START with kang yohan. unloved (unwanted, really) second son of a rich family. his terrible dad used to keep him in the basement, and was v abusive, but he had a brother he loved and loved him v much. inherited the family fortune when his brother and sister-in-law died in a tragic fire (the circumstances of the fire is......sus). lives in a huge ass mansion with his niece (elijah💕) who for the better part of the show is shown to suspect he killed her parents for their fortune. kind of a vigilante (except self-serving, mostly).

this is the star of the Live Court, makes essentially all the decisions, mostly without much consultation with his associate judges, which procedurally is not right, but you'll v soon learn that kang yohan does not give a fuck about the rules, and will do whatever it takes to achieve his goal of taking the social responsibility foundation (SRF; basically a foundation run by the elite rich of the country driven by public donations) down.

JUDGE #2 - also somewhat morally grey and also hot associate judge, kim gaon

sweet boy. just wants to Do Things Right. starts off a stickler for rules. he's introduced as being put on the Live Court panel by his mentor to watch over kang yohan and to stop him when he makes extreme decisions (which kyh being kyh does on the daily). lost his parents when he was still in high school because a fraudster scammed his parents of their live savings. is huge on Justice.

this boy is extremely suspicious of kang yohan, and sets about investigating him with the intention of p much revealing his crimes. somehow gaon goes from that to uhhhh living at kang yohan's house, becoming elijah's adopted dad, making dinner for them??? WELL. all for the investigation, right?? gaon sacrifices so much for justice, what a good boy.

JUDGE #3 - a lot less morally grey but still extremely hot associate judge oh jinjoo

MY GIRL 💖 we (tragically) don't see enough of judge oh but she's Righteous, really earnest, super For The People, and a lot smarter than she plays off to be. huge kang yohan fangirl (same, 언니, same). used to sit in a more rural court, and this is her first time in the limelight. is ambitious, but not so much that she will put innocent people in harm's way.

(side note: as an actual to god lawyer who goes to court very frequently, i have not, to date, met a hot judge, but can say with confidence that if any of these three were presiding at my hearings, i would be a lot more enthusiastic about going to court.)

so the cases that the Live Court trials are high profile ones and often result in controversial sentences - kang yohan picks these cases, and they are, again, targeted at toppling the SRF. the key members of the SRF are the president, the minister of justice, several conglomerate presidents, and:

jung sunah

epitome of jiejie step on me please. introduced as a director of the SRF who assists the chairman of the foundation very closely. later inaugurated as chairwoman of the SRF. p much the brains behind the SRF.

grew up poor. possibly killed her mother when she was young. likes shiny things. low-key kang yohan obsession (same, 언니, same) stemming from the time she worked as a maid in their household when they were both young. vicious. will literally kill a man. will kill MANY MEN to achieve her goals (some murders are valid imo).

the rest of the villains are actually quite interesting as well, also low-key fond of minister cha but this post is already too long...

ANYWAY this show centres around kang yohan trying to take down all key members of the SRF through the Live Court - not all of it goes smoothly for him, because he has Meddling Sidekicks like gaon (bless his soul, but sometimes he does v dumb things with good intentions), but yohan makes things work!!

this show also ft. v homoerotic exchanges between yohan and gaon if you're into it (you should be) (is there fic where yohan rails gaon six hundred different ways because i feel like there is and y'all should point me in that direction thank you), found family vibes, extremely !!! plot twists (when i found out about the cause of the fire i was literally screaming). all the characters are interesting even if some of them (*cough*president*cough*) are annoying, and the pacing of the show is good - doesn't drag and makes you want to keep watching the next episode

LONG STORY SHORT: watch this, 11/10 would rec, thank you for making me watch this buddies, this is literally the first time ever i've felt like writing fic for a kdrama

[whetstonefires]

Hello! For the reverse tropes writing prompts (if this catches your fancy) — murderbot diaries with fake amnesia and Really nice guy who hates only you

this is really not in the spirit of that second inverse trope, but for mb this was the only thing i could think of, and it was very funny.

=

"Gurathin," said Gurathin. "SecUnit, you know it's me."

"I don't think I know that," it said, pleasantly, in an okay but not excellent imitation of its creepy canned dialogue options. "Please present some identification, and we'll see."

Gurathin didn't bother sending his data over the feed again. Murderbot walked away, but left a drone eyeballing him. He resisted the urge to flip the drone off. "Come on," he told it, knowing SecUnit was paying attention. "Let me in."

He watched the SecUnit bend forward slightly to show two of Mensah's kids that it was paying attention to whatever they were saying, and then bend over further to help the toddler up onto a chair. It was just fucking with him now. On the other hand, if the prickly bastard started letting children hug it just to piss off Gurathin, who was the real loser?

It finished spoiling the children and moved over to smoothly de-escalate a brewing disagreement over the punch bowl. Gurathin tried to catch Pin-Lee's eye; she did not cooperate. Gurathin tried to walk through the open door; the hovering security drone took a potshot at him.

SecUnit got roped into conversation with Bharadwaj and her media colleagues. It said something that made everyone laugh. It wasn't scowling. It was faking looking people in the face pretty well; that was just creepy.

It went on like that; Gurathin had never seen it go this long interacting without pissing someone off. Presumably it was venting all of that impulse on him. Ratthi introduced it to his favorite cousin; zi was visibly charmed.

Gurathin goaded the drone into firing two more warning shots before the SecUnit circulated back over to him.

"SecUnit. Come on. You have known me for actual years. I helped you rob a place once."

"I don't recall."

"We met on that planetary survey mission, don't tell me you don't remember that one, it's the reason you're even here." That came out maybe a little harsh, but everyone was letting the SecUnit abuse the power of being entrusted with party security to bully him, he was allowed to be annoyed.

"Oh, were you there? That data must have been lost in a corrupted filetree," it said, with incredibly cutting blandness.

Gurathin groaned. "Okay! Okay. I'm sorry."

It technically counted as a reward when SecUnit stopped giving him the customer service face and switched to the hairy eyeball, which just showed how stupid this whole situation was. It was clearly not satisfied with just that.

"I'm sorry for using your personal name without permission. I wasn't trying to weaponize it or anything, it just slipped out, but I know that's not an excuse and it was a really inappropriate disrespect for your boundaries."

SecUnit kept looking at him. Gurathin knew two other SecUnits now, neither of whom was as supremely weird as this one; that was why he'd started mentally tagging it with its personal name, just to keep things tidy. Of course, if anyone else had done that and made the resulting mistake, SecUnit probably wouldn't have been half so mad.

Gurathin sagged.

"I'm sorry for going through your personal files and using your name against you back during the survey," he mumbled, wishing he kept drones around to control with his brain so he could watch SecUnit's extremely expressive face without having to look at it. "That was really shitty. Rim paranoia isn't a good enough excuse for refusing to see you as anything but a tool of the Company. Okay?"

SecUnit was looking as pained as though Gurathin had stripped naked in its presence. "Yes, fine, you can come to the party just stop having feelings," it said, in its normal voice.

"Great!" said Gurathin. "The spinach puffs had better not be all gone."

"I don't pay any attention to the things humans consume," it said, moving out of his way and taking its drone with it.

"I know," Gurathin acknowledged, rolling his eyes and trooping after it. Ratthi waved enthusiastically at him and Pin-Lee raised her cup in a welcoming toast. Apparently SecUnit's relenting returned him to the ranks of people who existed again. "Believe me, I remember this about you."

[local-queer-disappointment]

Fuck's a pro shipper?

We've got a new one boys try not to scare em off /j

Okay but seriously, I'm more than happy to explain. I assume that if you're asking this question you're not aware of the proshipper vs antishipper, uh, "conflict", I guess. So, here is what both of those terms mean, to the best of my descriptive abilities:

Antishipper (often just "anti"): someone who vaguely believes that consuming problematic fiction (usually specifically problematic sexual fiction like lolicon or incest) is either a true reflection of them as a person or a corrupting force that will cause them to play out these desires in real life, onto real people. Basically, if you read age gap, you touch real kids in real life or secretly want to.

Proshipper (sometimes "profic"): someone who does not believe the above, and believes that fiction is not the same as reality because it doesn't harm anyone and therefore people should be left alone as long as you have no reason to believe that they would ever do something like that irl. Often hand in hand with things like anti censorship, kink positive, etc, though being a proshipper does not necessarily mean you have a problematic ship or kink yourself (example: me).

You're probably asking this question because you saw me day in my bio that I am a proshipper. I've tried to stay neutral in this initial description, but obviously I probably didn't manage to be completely unbiased considering that I believe myself to be right (most people do) so if you want to ask further questions after this that's perfectly fine. That being said:

Why am I a proshipper?

So, to understand this, let's first look over the issues within both communities— every group has issues, after all.

What problems do proshippers have?:

- sometimes 4chan assholes co-opt the label "proshipper" just because they're lolicons, even though there's good evidence to suggest that they would do or even have done criminal sexual acts in real life, or that they possess actual csam (child sexual abuse material, a term being used in favor of "cp" these days as porn implies consent). Proshipping has nothing to do with the harmful idea that you should be allowed to exploit and abuse real children.

- there are still many gray areas which proshippers themselves don't agree on. For example: I've seen a bunch of arguments about if writing fanfiction of live action shows or movies changes the equation. The general consensus of proshippers is that writing fanfiction of a character played by a child actor is definitely a more delicate situation and should not be sexual as it's inextricably tied to the image of a real child, but there are others who believe differently.

- I'm genuinely struggling to come up with more of these. Um, sometimes lolicons are really shitty people, like in point 1. This isn't SUPER relevant though cause in reality the overlap between predominantly queer or female proshippers and Reddit incels who just wanna jerk off to a petite anime girl is pretty small, though I'm sure it exists somewhere .

Now, what problems do antis have? (Fair warning, this is gonna sound even more "biased" but I hope my logic is still sound from the outside :p):

- I don't have any statistics on this (haven't exactly been many research papers on fandom drama), so you're going to have to trust me when I say that antis are absolutely NOTORIOUS for extreme harassment campaigns. The first time I was exposed to the word "antishipper", it was attached to a story of a former animator committing suicide because antis had gotten them fired by "exposing" their porn alt on Twitter and they could no longer afford medication for their disability. So, hell of an intro!

- their opinions are, in pretty basic ways, not backed by science or even practical common sense. The human brain can distinguish between fiction and reality after around age four or five

and people certainly aren't trying to hand nsfw content to children that age so I think it's safe to say that the people who are reading these things won't be "confused" by them or whatever. Also, even just using your brain and talking to these people, you find out most of them project onto the YOUNGER character.

- they claim to support victims but often simply don't. I won't keep dragging threats into the spotlight because I know there are probably antis who aren't as violent, but it's honestly astonishing to me how often they jump straight to wishing death and terrible things on people, and this has included more than once telling a rape victim they hope they get assaulted again just because they're a proshipper. See, a lot of these "taboo" sexual fantasies like age gap and incest actually themselves stem from a traumatic experience, and any therapist will tell you that fiction is a much healthier way to explore intrusive thoughts and urges than more dangerous coping mechanisms like self harm or substance abuse. And when confronted with this, in my experience and many others', antis will simply ignore that fact or say that the therapist is some sort of evil enabler.

-the general cognitive dissonance of believing an incest fanfiction will make you "forget" that incest is bad vs being fine with horror movies and slashers speaks to a deeper and honestly kind of worrying anti-sex mindset. I'm not sure I'm qualified to tackle this particular topic, but I definitely agree that it's a thing; after all, I have no idea how else those two things could coexist.

Anyways, I'd like to close this off by saying not everyone is as crazy opinionated as I am, I'm just autistic and like talking lol. A lot of people who id as proshippers just have a sort of minding their own business, ship-and-let-ship mentality, and a lot of antis are unfortunately just teenagers who were told proshipper = evil pedophile groomer and thus they put "proship dni" in their bios just cause they don't know and don't really care what it means. It is undeniable that many antis are kids themselves, and that does worry me, because fandom drama (especially Twitter fandom drama) is dangerous and vitriolic and also they're putting extremely serious threats on their digital footprints at the tender age of 14! But whatever, I'm not their parents, that's just my worry. Sorry for rambling this long lol, I wouldn't blame you if you dropped out halfway through but this is basically my summary of this whole thing. Do with this knowledge what you will! Or, you know, don't! I'm not a cop!

[khepiari]

Hyped Up Rambling: Spoilers for ONE PIECE Chapter 1104

There are many daddies in One Piece.

But there is only one person who deserves the title of FATHER!

And it’s you, sir Kuma.

As much as I have grievances with Odachii, this is an arc written by a father for his daughter.

Parental love hurts. But still, parents continue to love their children despite the pain, loss, fear, and hardship.

Again I am reminding you all. The series finale actually began exactly two years back when Luffy punched Saint Charlos.

Kuma just continued the fight that Luffy lit the fire for! As my best friend put it, “Kuma is following in Joy Boy’s footsteps. Bringing light to the world…”

Even a “slave”, stripped and robbed of all his rights, mental prowess, and dignity and abused to the point of being on the brink of death will FIGHT TO PROTECT! A slave who lost everything rose up on his two feet to protect his child and punched the man who sits on the highest seat of power, and Joyboy aka Luffy made it possible.

And do you know who the people in power fear the most?

The slave they robbed of autonomy.

The scholar they denied true knowledge.

The ethnic groups they massacred.

And the God Born Out Of People’s Despair who comes to seek vengeance.

AND KUMA IS ALL!

May I also remind you all, Borsalino is worse than Sakazuki, he is a scum without any hope in him or in anyone. He is scarier than a straight-cut villain like Sakazuki.

There is a reason idealists are easier to defeat than cynics. You can’t beat a deadbeat easily.

My favourite rascals! Franky and Sanji have no chill! They went after Saturn, without any fear or hesitation, just like they went after Saint Roswald, Doflamingo and Big Mum. Their brain operates on: we are Future Pirate King’s Crew, we will kick anyone who is a scum!

I still can’t believe so many people hate Franky! The dude has literally the least count of losses and the funniest battles! Because he doesn’t fight one one-on-one guy, and he shines in the fights when minions and their bosses are involved against lone him! In Dressrosa he ran wild; kissed a girl (yes without consent; thanks scum Odachii) to defeat her, had a hard-boiled match with Senor Pink, destroyed the SAD factory and went to support the fairies on his own! And In Wano he ran his monster bike right into Big Mom’s face and knocked her out! We need more Franky love!

And finally!

I don’t like to pit series against series, but this is how you utilize the most cliché theme in the entire world: LOVE. You have to show it with actions and gestures and not tell it to your readers. Yes, Gege, I mean you brat; do better.

Why do you think we the readers and viewers still crumble at the theme of love? It’s extremely simple.

Love is radical.

Love is unpredictable.

Love is powerful.

And time and again in One Piece—Love is an Anomaly.

Ace was born because of Rouge’s willpower born of love.

Sanji was able to retain his humanity because Sora did everything in her power to protect her kids.

Robin was saved because her teachers, mother, and Saul loved her so much that they chose to protect her.

Nojiko and Nami had a chance to live because Bellemere protected them.

Trafalgar Law made it through a life-threatening disease and nihilistic approach to living because Corazón bet his life on him.

Hiluluk’s love for Chopper pushed him to be the doctor who wanted to cure everyone.

Zoro’s love for Kuna is what pushes him to work hard.

Because Franky wants to protect his “Family” he becomes the face of criminal activities.

Shirahoshi never revealed her mother's death circumstances because she decided to protect her mom's dream.

Examples of love changing the course of history are endless in One Piece, hence we should remember: Love is the invariant.

[littlehypnone]

Please would you maybe write a ficlet about Phantom being cared for after he drops to be tinier than usual after a meltdown, if you have the time and brain space?

this one is a bit messy, sorry if some sentences don't make much sense

925 words, tiny phantom (they/them) having a meltdown, cg mama dew, happy sleepy ending

Everything was wrong, everything was just going wrong and Phantom was done.

He woke up too hot, the sheets were all tumbled up, his hair was so tangled it hurt when he tried to run a hand through it, his favorite bat plushie fell to the floor, there was light abusing his eyes from a space between two curtains. When he actually got up he couldn’t find the clothes he wanted and everything else was extremely uncomfortable. It was itchy and tight and it felt bad and he hated it.

Phantom got dressed in the best clothes he could find. A lesser evil, he thought. He padded to the kitchen. There was a mess in the sink, his mug amongst the dirty dishes and the countertop was sticky. He couldn't find his cocoa powder and all the rummaging through the shelves made his ears hurt, it was way too loud. It was barely ten o’clock in the morning and he was already about to cry.

Then the rest of the pack slowly piled into the commons, finding him curled around his plushie in a tight ball on the couch. Without his cocoa. Their footsteps were loud, their voices were loud, they turned on too bright lights and too loud and bright television.

Phantom’s last straw turned out to be Aether slipping in the kitchen—who left it so messy all over?—and dropping a metal pot onto the tiles. The noise made Phantom wail, clutching his shaking hands to his ears as he tenses impossibly more. Now the pack finally noticed the quintessence ghoul’s distress, but it was a bit too late, he was already having a meltdown.

Phantom was dropping, fast and sudden, tears that had been welling in their eyes for a few hours now finally spilling down their cheeks. They didn’t register being covered in a nicely smelling, fluffy blanket or the whole pack, apart from Dewdrop, leaving the room.

It got quiet. It finally got quiet.

It was around twenty minutes later that Phantom’s eyes cleared a bit and Dewdrop could do something, anything. He knew the quintessence ghoul went tiny, the whole pack knew them and had gone through enough of their meltdowns to know what to do. Or rather what to not do.

“Hey, baby,” Dewdrop said quietly, gently trying to get Phantom’s attention. They blinked slowly, big eyes looking at the fire ghoul and finally seeing him, too.

Phantom whined pathetically and wiggled their fingers—their little version of grabby hands. “You want me to hold you, batling?”

“Mmm… ma…”

“Gotcha,” the fire ghoul smiled and wrapped his arms around Phantom, dragging them into his lap. They didn’t settle, though, kept squirming and pulling on their clothes clumsily. “Bad clothes, hm? Let’s get you changed, then.”

Dewdrop picked Phantom up and settled them so they rested mostly against his hip, face hidden in the other’s neck. They went to the quintessence ghoul’s bedroom and Dew—still holding them—dug around for the soft comfy pj’s he knew Phantom preferred when little and after a meltdown.

Once found, Dewdrop laid them down on the bed, but that caused some more squirming, batting at the sheets and whining. “Not here, I guess. That’s alright, batling.”

He hauled them up once again and left to go for his own room, hoping that would satisfy the little ghoul. He’d go from room to room, try them all a thousand times, if that’s what it’d take to get Phantom to calm down and get comfortable.

There was no need to do all that this time, though. Phantom squealed happily and started up a little purr when they were placed in Dewdrop’s bed, still warm from the night. This time when they squirmed and wiggled in the sheets it was to get buried in them a bit, not to get out.

“There we go, happy little baby,” the fire ghoul chuckled, pleased with how Phantom was coming out of the meltdown. They’d stay tiny for the rest of the day, maybe even wake up small the next day, too, but they could be in that nice space, not the icky one. That was Dewdrop’s goal.

Dewdrop got them dressed in the comfortable pj’s, sending a text to the group chat at some point, and crawled into the bed himself. He pulled Phantom into his lap, cradled them in his arms, close to his chest, and started purring, knowing that would do wonders in soothing the little ghoul.

“Ma,” Phantom voiced their contentment before their own purr started back up. Dewdrop smiled, convinced he wasn’t going to escape being a mama now that Phantom picked it up too. The fire ghoul wouldn’t complain, though. He liked it, actually.

The door opening quietly interrupted his thought and Swiss peeked his head in, presenting a bottle he brought for Phantom. He gave it to Dewdrop with a sympathetic wink and left.

“Are you asleep, batling?” he asked, getting a yawn in return. “Not yet, gotcha. Got you some chocolate milk, baby.”

Dewdrop tapped the nipple of the bottle against Phantom’s mouth and slipped it in when the quintessence ghoul parted their lips. They sucked gently and started purring louder when the sweet milk hit their taste buds. “Good little ghoul, drink up.”

They didn’t finish the bottle, starting to doze off around the half of it. When drops of the milk started spilling from the corners of Phantom’s lips Dewdrop replaced the bottle with a soother and readjusting his hold on them once more, let Phantom get a well deserved rest.

[harostar]

So uh...

Apparently going away for the weekend equals things absolutely fucking exploding.

I’m sure everyone has, by this point, heard SOMETHING regarding Rooster Teeth and its latest controversies. 

Namely, multiple former employees speaking up about their horrendous experiences with the company. Wage Theft, Underpaying, just flat out NOT PAYING PEOPLE, extreme Crunches, toxic bro culture, homophobia, transphobia, racism, sexism, ect ect ect.

I’m trying to gather some of the main points, so excuse my brain still going ??????????

Long-time employee Matt is given the boot, with his position “dissolved” in the latest rounds of corporate layoffs.

Kdin issues a statement regarding Hostile Environment, Abusive working conditions, and considerable amount of unpaid work/medical bills.

The floodgates open.

Others speak up either confirming Kdin’s experiences and/or adding their own experiences. 

HR being more than useless. Higher Management being abusive and out-right not paying employees in every way possible. 

Barbara (Yang) removes all mention of RT from her twitter profile.

Arryn (Blake) and Sam (Nora) reveal that someone at the top that isn’t at the company anymore had threatened to recast their roles, when they raised concerns re: payment. 

Jen (Pyrrha) talks about issues with being paid and further confirms the other ugliness going on.

Michael Jones (AH, Sun) confirms his part in Kdin’s mistreatment, issues a public apology that was accepted by Kdin. I’m not diving into that, since I don’t feel comfortable speaking over the actual parties re: where they are now versus where they were then.

Others issue apologies to Kdin, which are....uh.....not graciously accepted. 

RT issues a very by-the-numbers statement, which is worthless. 

More former employees talk about having horrible experiences with over-work, issues with being paid, and general abusive environment. 

CRWBY showrunners have for the most point not issued statements, likely because they are in a tricky position re: the corporate overlords. Some people have been noting the statements they are Liking or otherwise supporting. 

Several people reveal that RT employees that do voice work have been getting cheated out of being PAID for this extra work. Because “you’re already an employee” kind of nonsense.

Everyone speaking out has basically stated the problem is Corporate and the Top Brass of the company. Asking people to please remember that the showrunners, writers, animators, voice actors, and other creative talent are all potentially victims of the same horrible stuff. 

Basically, a huge fucking dumpster fire.

[testure-1988]

Hi, I'm really sorry for the situation you're in. I really hope this isn't unwelcome, but I hope that you can incorporate some security routines into your day to day life because this guy is clearly very dangerous.

Please feel free to reach out to me, or tell me to go away!

Hi. I don't think I have to worry about him. He lives 14 hours away from my vicinity. But yeah, I never realized how bad he is and just how far he'd take it. If I were heartbroken (and I've repeatedly told him I'm not interested), I'd try to heal, move on, and know it's not worth it) but he was hanging onto me to try and change my mind when I just wanted to be friends. I wouldn't try and set myself on fire (and post a video saying goodbye on Instagram)! That's beyond fucked up. The dude barely knew me! You'd think he text me about it, not post a public video online for all of his followers to see! That's extremely childish (and he's a 52 year old ) He did visit me last month, but I was with my family, and I enjoyed hanging out with him (despite spraining my ankle & foot...he was a big help with making sure I was comfortable after my fall, which I appreciated). We had all the same interests (music, movies, etc.). I'd always text him, and we'd watch movies online; it was lovely. But he'd always act like I was his psychiatrist; he'd be fighting with his dad or with his ex-roommate (who made off with $150,000 of his expenses), and then he'd just always talk negatively about himself and about how shit his life is/that he should've been aborted (he DID have a horrible life growing up cause his dad is/was an abusive shithead loser who beat him & his mother and spent all of the household expenses on gambling). I'd constantly be worried sick over him, and it was starting to wear me out mentally (he was thrown into prison for a month. I had no idea what the hell happened to him, so I was constantly stressed out 24/7 thinking he was dead). He didn't want an actual therapist to help him. Then we fought last year, and on the same day, his dog was hit by a car. He tried shooting his brains out (he missed); now, he attempted suicide again. The consequences of what he's done now are lifelong if he doesn't pass away (he said he was informed he had a few weeks left, but I don't know if that was bullshit to manipulate me cause he was still trying to get me to date him, even after he sent me insulting texts). I don't want to date someone and worry about them committing suicide if we ever broke up. I don't need that in my life and if the other person did kill themselves, then I'd be wracked with guilt for the rest of my fucking life. Straight cis-men & saying no, name a worse duo.

He's going to be put into psychiatric care, and I hope he gets the help he needs.

[etovest-archived]

I do want to hear about warren's emasculation please tell me more

CERTAINLY! i want to preface this by saying that all of what I'm about to say is just a personal interpretation of a character because I Love to read too much into anything but also. Everything Is There.

To explain more plainly I do think Warren has an extremely conflicted relationship with gender and masculinity. We know he was abused, we know his father was a sexual predator, we don't know the Extent of the abuse but we don't really need to. What we can infer from this is that the first role model he had for masculinity in his childhood was beyond fucked up, and therefore his own view of How A Man Should Act has been distorted. Now obviously he doesn't Want to be like his father, but these things leave their marks and more often than not they don't even scar, they remain open wounds. (I also don't think he's had much time to address this, the timeline regarding his time in prison is foggy at best, but Emily does imply that he ran away from home as soon as he could, so I really don't believe he's had Therapy, y'know.)

Then there's the whole "I wasn't hitting back not because I thought myself better, but because I thought myself weaker" that tells us also another thing regarding his bias as what a Manly Man is: whether it be physicality or character, he doesn't think he fits the right criteria, and we all know what bullies say to their victims, they often hit weak spots. Which leads me to believe that his perception of his own gender is somewhat deformed, warped. He Needs to be a man, because everything tells him he should, but he Doesn't Want to be one, or, let's say, he doesn't want to be the type of man that he's always known. Like, for example, Bryony says Warren told her he "felt emasculated" by the fact that she was the one paying all of their bills, so she let him pay for the broadband, and then he replies: actually I just wanted to get the movie package, which of course could be a lie told because he was embarrassed, but I believe he was genuine in this, and thus I also believe that he was Playing a character. Masculinity itself is highly performative, what with the whole western constructed way of societal norms and toxicity (I'm from Italy, we are the poster children for that), so it could be said that Everyone is playing a character regarding their gender, and that Everyone should address how fucked up that is, but Warren plays a character with clothes that don't fit. He's a man, he doesn't necessarily want to be, he just thinks he should.

Now, this is where my interpretation kind of takes the highway out of canon and becomes more Hypothesis and What Ifs, but I have the "I think of nothing. I simply am not" branded with fire on the folds of my brain, so I spend a considerable amount of time thinking about it. I'm a big fan of voids, and hole theory, and how nothingness itself is an oxymoron (how can Nothing exist? If its defining quality is the lack of something, does Something exist? or is it the lack of nothing that defines Something? Fun stuff) AND I also really like this piece by Audrey Wollen. Of course, Warren's desire for the total annihilation of self is deeply linked with his trauma and his cptsd, his general suicidal tendencies, but also. What If. What if he wants to be nothing because everything he's tried has sucked him dry, if the way he's lived so far was by being chained to the Conforming Way Of How A Man Should Be. It's just a single part of his character, of course, yet I find it extremely fascinating!! Warren wants to be nothing and then somewhere along the lines this changes, I can't wait to see How this is handled in season 3 I am going to pass out now.

[not-poignant]

Hey Pia!

I have sort of binged your stuff over the last two months! I love all of it, and the characters feel so detailed and easy to love. I ended up with some questions. I am sorry if these have been asked already.

1. In Fae-verse what would happen if Gwyn got out from Crielle early and left Efnisien with her and Lludd (kind of like the Feral!Gwyn Au). Would Efnisien ever get away like in Spoils? Would his heart song ever change? Is Fae-verse Efnisien sort of stuck with the family curse and unlikely to go through anything like he does in Spoils?

2. I think it said somewhere that Efnisien's true power in Fae verse was char, burning, that sort of thing. Is that in some way related to Olphix and his fire or is it different?

3. What kind of Fae would Arden be and his power/ heartsong?

4. What kind of Fae would Gary be and his power/ heartsong?

I appreciate it's quite a few questions so please don't feel like you need to answer any/all of them!

Thank you for writing :D

Hiya anon!

I'm glad you've been enjoying all the things, that makes me really happy. :D

Okay so for answering your questions:

Efnisien is born evil. There's no 'getting away' - he's worse than Crielle and he experiences genuine joy and happiness over that. He was evil as an infant, and he was never abused or harmed in any single way. It's impossible for fae Efnisien (in the canon) to go through anything like human Efnisien's growth journeys. He's a completely different being to me!

It's not connected to Olphix. :D All common fae are connected to a different elemental force. Gwyn's is light. Crielle's is dra'ocht. Efnisien's is fire/char.

No idea! But probably Unseelie. I've gotten this question a lot and I've never known. I think that's partly because if I ever by some miracle write him into the universe, I don't want to lock myself in to a fae type I just made up off the top of my head for an ask, and want to leave it extremely open. But I'm pretty sure he'd be Unseelie.

No idea! But also probably Unseelie, lol.

I don't really think things like 'how would they work in this world' until I actually have to sit down and write them. I think there's a part of my brain that likes to leave a lot of reserve space so I can be more creative. I've noticed that like, especially in the years past, I used to make up more answers or invent more answers on the spot, but then I'd feel like I was letting people down if I then went and did something totally different, and I'd also feel very restricted? So these days I do prioritise like, 'if this ever happens, I'd like to not have already put something in place if I don't know for sure.'

Gary could be Seelie too, tbh, I just vibe with him more as an Unseelie fae. That makes more sense to me. Arden has enough deep-seated sadism that I'm comfortable with him being a kind of fae that can feed off pain or anguish or similar, but not sure on the type at all. My brain just goes 'no' whenever I try and think about it lol

[miniscrew-anon]

I got sucked into playing Oxygen Not Included again and now it’s living rent free in my brain like the boys. Enjoy these extremely specific headcanons on them playing base building/resource management/colony sim games.

Sky - He plays like a normal person. Does his best to make his base thrive but makes all the beginner mistakes. His second attempt is way way better but nothing crazy. Never gets too deep into the mechanics. Only plays for a few hours and eventually stops because someone starts backseat playing.

Wild - Chaos. His base is somehow drowning, on fire, in the middle of a drought and freezing. All at once. Literally nothing is working and his little guys are all dying to death. His second attempt is not any better. Nor is his third. He’s not good at micromanaging and constantly tries to build things that are way too big and wayyyy too resource heavy and it ends up killing him. He was super into building a really cool hot tub/massage room and neglected to make sure his guys have oxygen. But he’s having fun so it’s all good

Champion - Is on top of everything. Reads the entire in-game encyclopedia before he even starts the game so he knows everything he needs to. His base is very spartan but at least nothings on fire. Enjoys the challenge of planning ahead and creative problem solving.

Twilight - Gets way too invested in the little creatures. Creates a whole big ranch and makes the place really, really nice for his pets. His people are vegan and he lets his base starve to death because he can’t bring himself to eat his animals. But also mourns the loss of every one of his people. It’s a heartbreaking game for Twilight. He prefers games when he can pet the animals, not eat them.

Warriors - Base building isn’t his preferred genre but he gives it a try anyway. Aesthetics before anything is his playstyle. His base works well enough but he does surrender some efficiency to make it pretty. Dresses up all his little guys and gives them snazzy clothes. But he loses interest pretty fast and goes to bother Sky.

Hyrule - His base is a mess of hallways and ladders. No real central area because he just want to expand and see what’s out there. Is a real explorer. He ends up accidentally opening up his base to the cold vacuum of space and kills everyone.

Legend - Hates that he’s constantly running out of resources. If it’s not air then it’s water, and if it’s not water it’s food, and if it’s not food it’s space, and if it’s not space it’s fucking air again! He curses up a storm every time something goes wrong. Which is all the time.

Four - Spreadsheets. Lots and lots of spreadsheets. Sixty hours in and his base is ten miles long with a ridiculously convoluted yet effective HVAC system that abuses every game mechanic to be self sustaining. Runs on things like giving his base contaminated food to give them food poisoning to make them vomit so he can refine that vomit back into clean water to offset the moisture entropy. A monster of efficiency. Four loves building games where there are calculable data sets and realistic physics. Can and will play this game forever is no one stops him.

Wind - He streams it and names his colony members after viewers. Uses console commands to do crazy things like spawn in 100 colonists and summons meteor showers to spice things up. He’s pretty decent and he actually learns to to use the convoluted automation mechanics. Also mods. Lots and lots of mods.

Time - His base dies immediately. This old man never got more advanced than Pong and so when he is confronted with a game in which the density and weight of different gasses is important he can’t handle it. He accidentally digs down and his whole colony suffocates on carbon dioxide within 5 minutes. He puts the game down and never plays again.

Dark - Only plays for a bit before he stops. Even though it’s just simulation he doesn’t enjoy the strange sense of claustrophobia it gives him. He’ll happily watch Twi play it though.

Shadow - He logs into Fours game and disconnects one (1) wire somewhere in the base.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 3/14/2023

one of the good things about the tuesdaypost series is that it reassures me i did actually do things in a particular week, even if the week felt very much like an unmemorable gray blob

listening

Aretha Franklin's Chain of Fools this came on last night as i was making dinner. two (three? let's not think about it) years ago i found the las vegas jazz station bc i wanted something on in the background while i wrote cowboyfic. and now (when i remember internet radio exists) it's in the rotation of things keeping me company while i tend to my databases

-

reading

it's been just over two weeks since philip marlowe has burrowed his way into my brain. i have read through most of The Simple Art of Murder, which contains the titular essay and eight novellas/short stories. if you enjoy reading and thinking about criticism as its own genre/art form, this seven page essay is well worth reading. chandler had extremely strong opinions about his colleagues that he kept to himself with varying degrees of success. aside from a brief catty snit at what we now call "cozy" mysteries, it's a very level look at the challenges and limitations of detective fiction as a genre.

The realistic style is easy to abuse: from haste, from lack of awareness, from inability to bridge the chasm that lies between what a writer would like to be able to say and what he actually knows how to say. It is easy to fake; brutality is not strength, flipness is not wit, edge-of-the-chair writing can be as boring as flat writing; dalliance with promiscuous blondes can be very dull stuff when described by goaty young men with no other purpose in mind than to describe dalliance with promiscuous blondes. There has been so much of this sort of thing that if a character in a detective story says, "Yeah," the author is automatically a Hammett imitator. And there are still quite a few people around who say that Hammett did not write detective stories at all, merely hardboiled chronicles of mean streets with a perfunctory mystery element dropped in like the olive in a martini.

i had a tremendous amount of fun reading through the novellas and picking out elements he reused and expanded upon in later full novels.

im yoinking this example from wikipedia but this sequence in The Big Sleep:

The room was too big, the ceiling was too high, the doors were too tall, and the white carpet that went from wall to wall looked like a fresh fall of snow at Lake Arrowhead. There were full-length mirrors and crystal doodads all over the place. The ivory furniture had chromium on it, and the enormous ivory drapes lay tumbled on the white carpet a yard from the windows. The white made the ivory look dirty and the ivory made the white look bled out. The windows stared towards the darkening foothills. It was going to rain soon. There was pressure in the air already.

first appeared in the short story The Curtain:

This room had a white carpet from wall to wall. Ivory drapes of immense height lay tumbled casually on the white carpet inside the many windows, which stared towards the dark foot-hills. The air beyond the glass was dark too. It had not started to rain, yet there was a feeling of pressure in the atmosphere.

when you are an exacting self-editor who will spend five months on one short story i imagine it's quite easy to go back and expand on a previous framework? it is fun to see how the sausage gets made

-

watching

the westerner (1940, dir. Wyler). really had me thinking about the Types of westerns i like. this is a perfectly adequate, well-acted little open range vs. homesteaders film with an impressive prairie fire sequence. walter brennan (a guy i love to see) more than deserves his oscar. gary cooper is great as a quick-thinking drifter who scams his way out of a noose. our heroine looks very much like olivia de haviland around the eyes. the original nyt review points out that cooper is very much overshadowed, and cooper only did the movie under duress bc he was worried about this very thing (p. 138-140).

between the fact that the movie thinks cooper should be the lead but brennan steals every scene he's in, this movie does not grab me by the lapels and shake me like some others i could name. part of it is that i do not like brennan's character. he is a self-appointed judge with a 100% hanging rate. i also think this is a totally different movie if you are not a woman, bc his character is INCREDIBLY weird about women. the ending tried very hard and failed to make me go "aw he was all right deep down anyway huh".

the other part of why this movie does not work for me: it starts off as my favorite genre "Some Guy has an incredibly fucked up day" but most of it is about good bible-thumping homesteaders enacting the american dream. what if we all got along??? america's big enough for everyone isn't it?? this movie really pulls its fuckin punches re: any sort of a theme, and i do not like cooper as an actor or brennan's character enough to say i had a good time. this movie does not delve into an aspect of the cowboy western mythos i am particularly interested in, but it is on kanopy, and it is part of my goal to watch every western on kanopy in order to convince the boston public library to add more westerns.

-

playing

man i wish fallou/t 4 was good. ive really got to fucking suck it up and start rdr2 even though i know it will consume my life in a time where i do not have a ton of time to spare

-

making

chicken fajitas. no pics all gone.

also: 6/10 baby blanket repeats. im trying to get this out by midapril so if i decide to fly down and look at apartments in person i can deliver it in person. so far i am happy with this rate of progress. i am going to frown about the edging for a while when im done knitting the body but that's a problem for future kay

[terraliensvent]

multiple ppl close to kinah were able to verify that they were in the hospital recovering when the attempt happened. all of those ppl could not collab and lie so one person could get “extra attention” in ur words. Im frustrated with terra staff aswell but that doesn’t mean its ok now to call someones suicide attempt fake so ur feelings seem more valid. I find that extremely sickening. U have zero evidence or good reason for doubt or else u would have vented about it already. all u have is ur feefees. u do need therapy. And mod pls stop validating baseless speculation on smth so serious. what happened 2 people needing proof for claims like this

alright yeah im deleting kinah asks now

first off i dont think that people should just believe whatever they read on the internet, because you dont know who these people are irl. again, thats not to say that you shouldnt give support where you can or that you should make public callouts saying that it was all fake when you dont know for sure, BUT at the same time theres a level of speculation regardless because its the fucking internet. people are wild, people are strangers, and there is a non zero chance that people could have lied. just because people have a level of speculation on something they read online, that doesnt mean they need therapy and it doesnt mean theyre a bad person, it means they have a brain. if YOU want to believe it without a shadow of a doubt then thats fine, and if other people have some doubt thats also fine, just dont go out of your way to fucking bother people because thats just unnecessary.

second off, i need proof for accusations like “so and so is posting feral” or “so and so is an abuser,” saying things like “the way that kinah bounced back into cs makes me speculate” isnt an accusation.

the views of the anons i post here arent reflective of my own views, and if something is a problem i give my own input on it in my response. when i created this blog i didnt want to delete asks because i feel like that controls a narrative and makes me an unreliable narrator when it comes to these discussions. if people want to talk about things like this, i didnt want to force silence because thats not how you hold a discussion.

as an additional note: anons have been becoming increasingly aggressive in my inbox, whether its towards one another or towards myself. i implore all of you to stop being so aggressive, stop making assumptions, and stop playing this holier than thou card. so much of the art and cs community is made up of people who will virtue signal and place themselves on a moral pedestal and my inbox is the last place for that. if you want to rant and complain, go ahead, but stop acting like youre better than each other because you have the Correct Opinion on everything and believe everything you read on the internet.

my final thoughts on this are as follows: there is a non zero chance that everyone is lying. is it a small chance? sure. does this mean we should spread the narrative that it was all fake? no. are you a horrible person who should die in a fire because you dont 100 percent believe that the attempts were real? no, but also dont go out of your way to be an asshole because of that belief. i think we should all publicly operate under the assumption that the attempts were real. if you want to privately speculate, go fucking wild. could kinah going back into cs and making stuff for terras possibly be bad for their mental health? maybe. but also, its none of our business. and thats what im ending this topic with, a lot of this shit really is just none of our business and i think you all give way too much of a fuck about someone who you will never know irl.

i dont dislike kinah, in fact i actually really liked them when they were on staff for terras. but at some point we all gotta throw our arms up and say why is this taking up so much of my brain power when this person is just someone i follow on fucking toyhouse.

we are done with asks about kinahs attempt now, unless anyone has important info or something new to say im deleting them.

[lakesbian]

Do Brian & Aisha & Alec for the blorbo bingo obviously :p

alec:

almost everyone but me is wrong about him. gnawing on wildbow's leg like a rabid dog for dropping the ball in the gender and sexuality department. there has got to be SOME reason i like him so much but i have no idea what it is. did not expect to care about him even remotely but his death put him in my brain forever against my will. i can make him worse. and will hypothetically sometimes for fun. he is chilling on the couch in my mind palace in perpetuum. i want to take him out for ice cream as a special treat. the thing is that i Would say "alec did nothing wrong" as a somewhat facetious rebuttal of the fandom spaces that think he's an ontologically evil cunt for being sexually abused when he was 12 but the same people also genuinely believe he did nothing wrong in his interlude and subsequently i cannot say "alec did nothing wrong" without sounding exactly like said people. so i compromise with "alec did 2 things wrong and the things redditors think he did wrong are none of them," which technically isn't true either, but captures my intended sentiment close enough. i love him forever

aisha:

ilove her forever. she's done nothing wrong in her entire life, ever, at any point in time. i wish her existence was pleasant and easy. please stop putting her in situations. alec is my favorite in a "inexplicable bout of autism" way but aisha is my favorite worm character in a "favorite with all inexplicable bouts of autism aside" way. i wish ward was about aisha. fuck vicky i want an entire book about aisha. everythign ever should be about aisha. extremely underrated undersider. i wish i was autistic about aisha instead of alec so i could inspire an Aishaposting Renaissance on wormblr instead of just an alec one. we should set wildbow's car on fire once for every Wildbow Moment involved in the writing of aisha laborn. also i should clarify. most worm fandom takes about the undersiders are incorrect in general, so i'm defining "fandom" here as just wormblr and not the broader worm fandom--wormblr generally understands miss aisha laborn imo

brian:

every time i think too hard about the way wildbow fucks up writing brian i morph into a man literally too angry to die. there's soooo much interesting shit there and then he just fully forgets to make any of it relevant. Gnawing On His Leg Like A Rabid Dog. i Love brian he's one of the top characters ever. there's something about an exceedingly normal guy who isn't Actually normal but Thinks he is because everyone else is so much weirder than him that's so funny and endearing. i wish his life didn't suck so much but also i love watching how much it sucks. we should all post about him more. i intend to get a phd in brian laborn upon worm reread.

[builder051]

Ok, for realz this time—

I’m launching a project. I will follow through. I’m a bit better in terms of mental and physical health, and I’m regaining the skills to actually plan out and do a project.

I’m taking a lot of suggestions from my inbox and past to-do lists and addressing all of them in a long-form fic (as in, a milti-chapter novella that will release all all at once upon completion, just like my previous big projects.)

So, here are the ground rules:

Talk to me. Send asks or chats or whatever, and I will respond. I’m open to talking about the WIP, just without spoiling key content. Send me your prompts and ideas. I want to know what you are interested in seeing, which may or may not influence the track of the overall plot line. I will not be able to put out short stuff (with the tiniest bit of exception— I don’t know what my brain will deem immediately important in the future). Starbucks Sunday is still on hiatus. I’d love to bring it back if/when I’m able. Gotta focus on one thing at a time.

FAQ head off— the verse is Nat on Fire crossover with heroverse and real time events. It’s 2023, COVID has happened, and everyone is still alive post-endgame. So, all the Nat+Maria and Nat+Steve stuff is established and will set the baseline for the fic’s physical and emotional starting point.

This will address ‘the Rumlow fic.’ It’s part of the plot. I hope that’s satisfactory as follow-through.

This will be extremely dark and potentially disturbing, so mind the trigger warnings. Like, every one you can think of and more. In every category. X rated. NC17 rated. Explicit rated. This is not for kids; whatever age standards you set for yourself are not my business. There will be an overall tw, then specifics under the cut, and then the story waaaay under the cut, if that makes sense.

I am fishing for a beta— I usually work with DD on this stuff, but I think I’d like to have a little third party perspective on this. If you are 18+, into Nat on Fire, and are ok with blatant sex/abuse/gore/death/mental health issues/addiction/harassment/violence… then I would love to chat. This position does require an extreme amount of reading on a fairly short timeline, and the “work time” may be sporadic in terms of amount and turnaround time. I’m sorry for that; that’s just what comes with any long-form writing project. You’ll be credited as a co-creator, a shoutout, or remain anonymous, according to your wishes. If this sounds like way too much, pass it by. But if you want to be the first to learn all the secrets, the opportunity is open. I don’t know how to put it. I’m trying.

So, TLDR, I’m writing a long-form/novella for Nat on Fire, which will release all at once upon completion. It addresses a lot of prompts already in my inbox. I welcome chatter in every way about everything. I’m looking for a beta reader. It’s a hard job, but teamwork is necessary with projects like this.

[aro-pancake]

You know when you wake up, remembering the most traumatic events of your childhood?

Well, I just noticed that I never "fell down the stairs" and broke my arm.

Now that I think about it, if it happened, my parents would lose custody of me the first time, as they would say to the doctor "oh, she fell down the stairs", and 5yo me would look at them dead in the eyes and go "liar liar, pants on fire".

Also, sometimes I casually mention something from my childhood and someone will go "wtf, Pancake? How are you even alive?" or act like I'm trauma dumping. I had a traumatic childhood. I have no idea how I survived that.

Everything I mention will automatically evoke one of those two reactions.

But it's not trauma dumping. It's just one thing that happened in a shit storm of a life. I'm not expecting a therapy session.

My therapist is the one who gets the stuff that my brain actually managed to classify as "ok. This was traumatic", while the rest is normal.

It's something most people don't mention about how it is to grow up in an abusive household.

It's only the extreme stuff that our brains manage to classify as "trauma". The constant yelling, the beatings, the neglect, the fear... It all goes on the "normal" folder after a while. We learn to cope and deal with, staying away, sneaking around, being silent as a cat, learning to fend for ourselves at a young age... That's just how it is. But now and again something bizarre, even for us, happens, and that's what goes on the "Traumatic Event" folder.