#but i consider their “real” age to start when that personality first went online + programmed age because it's perpetual

[gamebunny-advance]

Hm.

I probably should have paired the 1010 question with "How old do you think 1010 are physically?" since those can have different answers. But I don't want to over-do the polls in 1 day.

[bunnymajo]

Time to fill out that OC questionnaire but for Thistle this time!

He'll be in the @sonic-oc-showdown so be sure to give him a vote!

Name: Thistle the Tenrec

Species: Highland Streaked Tenrec

Home: Central City

✨How did you come up with the OC’s name?

Since he’s inspired by Amy I wanted to pick another prickly flower name. Thistle flowers can have a lot of negative connotations in flower language just as much as positive ones (aggressiveness, unwanted intrusion). If roses are known for being noble and lovely, thistles are more wild but pesky, they’re also hard to let go if you end up stuck by one. The image of thistle flower suited him the more I thought about it.

🌼  - How old are they? (Or approximate age range)

Same age as Surge.

🌺- Do they have any love interest(s)?

Currently Surge and only Surge. He’s had previous partners but they usually don’t last very long. Current record is 1 month.

(The only tragic thing about Thistle is that he's not trying to be the worst boyfriend ever. He really wants to do good but he's too self-centered and stupid to realize that he's the problem)

🍕  - What is their favorite food?

Key Lime Pie, he likes anything tart but sweet.

💼  - What do they do for a living?

Works part time at a flower shop in central city, he’s actually quite popular with customers. 

🎹  - Do they have any hobbies?

Flower arrangement and astrology charting. Loves reading romance novels and watching old classic movies even if he gets the meaning of them completely wrong. He’s good at baking and also spends a lot of time online on social media. He’s a jack of all trades and always ready to learn something new to get closer with people in his life. He’s here for you. What more could you want from a guy :)

🎯  -What do they do best?

Anything that’s considered traditionally feminine Thistle excels at. Baking, shopping, event planning, crushing your enemies. But even with all of that he’s incredibly good at finding information. Does his new crush have a favorite band? Well Thistle just doxxed every band member and knows the rest of their schedule for the next 3 months.

🥊  -What do they love to do? What do they hate to do?

Thistle likes doing anything that will get him lots of compliments and attention, especially if it’s something he already finds fun. He’s the type to get really wrapped up in tedious side project so probably mapping out his and Surge’s life together via astrology 

Hates doing something that doesn’t serve him in some way, like doing volunteer work for strangers. He also isn’t much of an adventuring type unless it’s to chase Surge down, he’d rather not though, he’d rather keep her tied down close to him and they can live a cozy domestic life.

Running around beating up robots getting sweaty and gross and for what? just to protect the masses? Awful, blech, Sonic can have that. 

❤️  - What is one of your OC’s best memories?

One time he and Surge accidentally shared a soda, therefore doing the incredibly scandalous “indirect kiss”. She vaporized the soda can to destroy the evidence and then punched him in the gut when he told her. He passed out for about two days.

✂️   - What is one of your OC’s worst memories?

His first relationship was an online one where the other person ended up blocking him and then publicly warned other people about his creepy behavior.

Thistle made one of those “am I the asshole?” posts about their relationship and everyone in the forum went “yeah, you were totally the asshole.”

Thistle deleted all his accounts and started over. He learned nothing. “It’s the forum that was wrong, they were all just jealous.”

🧊  - Is their current design the first one?

There’s a few initial sketches I did to get the overall idea going and there’s a few minor tweaks but he’s basically the same design as when I started.

🍀  - What originally inspired the OC?

It was a bumblekast question asking about what a glitch Amy would be like and I liked the answer so much I wanted to develop it into a real character. 

I really like aggressively-in-love characters like this in media actually, something about them being not shy at all about the person they’re in love with leads to a lot of funny or interesting situations, also since Surge is my favorite sonic character at the moment it’s fun thinking about how she would react to someone like this too. It’s a win-win situation for me lol.

🌂  - What genre do they belong in?

The villain in a shoujo romance manga

💚  - What is your OC’s gender identity and sexuality?

Identifies as male, Pan, he/him/they pronouns

🙌  - How many siblings does your OC have?

Zero. Probably for the best because he’s terrible with children.

🍎  - What is the OC’s relationship w/their parents like?

He’s an absolute mama’s boy when she’s around. (It should be noted that Thistle doesn’t really have a tragic backstory or bad childhood. He really is just like that for some reason.)

🧠  - What do you like most about the OC?

Thistle can be a lot of things I like about male characters (a goober in love, not afraid to appear “feminine”, a polite good boy, twisted priorities) and also be the worst person I’ve ever wanted to write thoughts for. He’s a very fun punching bag.

✏️  - How often do you draw/write about the OC?

Probably too much haha, I don’t usually write a lot of actual terrible people so he’s a refreshingly fun rom-com villain.

💎  - Do you ever see yourself killing off the OC?

It’s funnier if he stays alive imo. If Surge ever changes her ways in canon or something drastic happens to her he might lose interest in her and move on to his next victim, that’s about as close as I’d ever get to “killing him”. It would have to be a very drastic personality change though.

💀  - Does your OC have any phobias?

Whatever the fear of being unloved is. 

To him, being loved by someone is the ultimate goal. “I can love so easily, why is it so hard for someone to stay in love with me? I must not be loving hard enough, I need to love someone who craves love just as much as I do. Yes, then it would be the ultimate romance”  - is basically the rationalization here.

🍩  -Who is your OC’s arch-nemesis or rival?

I mean probably Amy, not just for Surge’s sake, Amy will fight anyone she finds being a selfish creep in the name of love.

In Thistle's mind anyone who even smiles in Surge's direction is a rival. She's spoken for, who do they think they are??

🎓  - How long have you had the OC?

A little over a year!

🍥  - What age were you when you created the OC?

33

[bil-daddy]

hi mr bildad um im just gonna dump this here since i have no one else to talk to

as someone who has always praised in their ability to be friends with anyone (i also need human interaction to survive btw) ive been feeling very lonely, especially since now are the school holidays.

my best friend (who is one year older than me) is barely online and doesn't take me seriously enough. and when i ask my friend group (with 2 other people my age) if they want to go out nothing happens. ive asked so many times but it's like they just don't want to hang out. and i keep seeing them post everywhere of them having fun with their OTHER friends (i don't know them bc they're from their primary schools; we are in secondary school now). and the obvious solution is to hang out with my primary school friends, right? well awesome news I DONT HAVE ANY.

and like ive just been feeling really really lonely especially today. i don't even text anyone except for my best friend, and even then she doesnt really respond properly because its like i dump a lot of messages and 4 hours later she skims through them, rinse and repeat.

(also side note i used to have another best friend but he ended up having a crush on me and didn't give me space so i kinda ended the friendship bc i wasn't comfortable with it)

during my entire TWO MONTH school holiday i haven't gone out with friends. not even once. while i see everyone else my age having so much fun and enjoying life while i just rot at home scrolling through tumblr.

so yeah im not really having a great time. hopefully when i get back to school in january things will be better

sorry for the long rant

Hey, kid (human). No need to apologize for the long rant. Actually, I've got a lot to say about this topic, too, so take a toilet break, grab a beverage and a snack, then sit down with your deal old Bildaddy (platonic, metaphorical) for a chat.

First off, sorry you're going through this. It hurts a lot when friends start fading away, and you realize they no longer consider you as close and you consider them. Feeling left out and like you don't have any real friends seriously sucks.

But it's actually something every single person goes through at some time or another--though most of us aren't brave enough to admit it like you have, because it feels embarrassing and shameful. Like there's something wrong with you.

There isn't.

There is nothing wrong with you.

Friends come and go, and 99% of the time it has nothing to do with you, or anything you've said or done. It isn't your fault. That doesn't mean it hurts any less, but it isn't your fault.

But that being said, I promise you, for every person you see pictures of having so much fun and enjoying life, there are twenty--probably even more--at home like you, scrolling tumblr, or tiktok, or reddit, or whatever the kids are scrolling these days.

And even those people you see posting pictures, that isn't their everyday life. They post pics of the good times, not the bad ones (well not usually) or the boring ones. Especially not the boring ones. I bet they do more sitting at home and scrolling than you think. They're just not advertising that for all their followers to see.

But that's not the point. The point is (dolphins! goats!) your current friends aren't fulfilling your need for socialization. And that means you need to find some new friends, anon.

You can still stay friends with your best friend and that old friend group. As in, don't send them a message officially ending the friendship, and don't delete and/or block them everywhere. You can still talk to them in school when you see them.

(Do unfollow them on social media if seeing them hang without you is upsetting--or better yet, pause on using social media entirely--except for tumblr, of course--until you're in a better place, mentally and emotionally. Bildaddy deleted instagram five years ago and never went back.)

But starting today, back off on asking these friends to hang out, and sending long text messages to your best friend that she only skims through. They're not matching your energy, so you need to start matching theirs. Either they'll notice the difference and start making more of an effort (no, not that kind), or they won't and they won't. But either way, you'll stop wasting your time.

Next, you take all the energy you were spending on your old friend group and start looking for new friends.

While you're still on winter break, there might not be as many opportunities, but there are some possibilities. Do you have any cousins around your age who might wanna hang out? Or maybe there are local events aimed at teenagers you can attend? Check libraries and community centers. Or on New Year's Eve, there might be some sort of Parents Night Out event you can volunteer for and help babysit a group of little kids, along with other teenagers that you could befriend?

Then, when winter break ends, look around your school for other students who might be in your same situation--and trust me there are others in your same situation. Is there someone who always sits alone at lunch? Or what about that kid in class who's too shy to speak up? Is there someone getting bullied or ostracized? Someone new to the school who hasn't made any friends yet? Look for the ones who might need a friend as much--or even more--than you do and try to befriend them.

It won't always work, no, cause nothing always works. But it will work sometimes. And you only need it to work enough times to make a couple friends. And if you make the right friend, they might have a friend group that you can join.

I know it's really scary to put yourself out there and make the first move. But you'd be surprised how receptive people are, especially the shy ones who are too scared to say 'hi' first, and rely on the braver ones, like you, for the human connection they need. Because we all need it. (Even me. Because I'm totally 100% human.)

Other ways to make friends are clubs, in school and out of school, which is probably what adults will suggest if you ask them, so I'm not going to spend much time on this. But they're right. If you're not already in clubs--academic, sports, art, books, music, anime, whatever your interest(s) is--join some! If there's nothing of interesting at your schools, churches and other local organizations might also have youth clubs and activities, too.

Shared interests in a sure way to make friends. I see it happening all the time on Tumblr. Those mutuals you wish didn't live so far away? Well, you can find mutuals just like them IRL! (Especially if you start or join a book club that reads Good Omens, or a tv show club that watches Good Omens)

Another option is getting a part-time job at a place other teenagers work. If this is something you can do without disrupting your schoolwork, try it. Fast food restaurants, cinemas, places like that.

You say you're someone who has the ability to be friends with anyone? Well, prove it! This isn't a threat, by the way. This is encouragement. I'm encouraging you.

Now go out there and make some friends, kid! I know you can do it! I believe in you, and everybody here is rooting for you.

And, as always, have an ox rib (platonic)

[minevn]

(sorry for mistakes) I know I'm not most people, but I'm incredibly interested in Kei and Yani relationship (for at least a month now)! I have thoughts that either Kei created Yani, or Kei resurrected/saved a life Yani (considering how Yani parents treated them, I wouldn't be surprised if Yani was actually dying at some point). And your words that Kei previously performed medical interventions suggest that these interventions were performed on Yani. (there were also thoughts about the fact that Kei is Yani older brother, but Yani (judging by the sheet “Understand my ship in 5 minutes” Yani is older) (just stupid thoughts out loud)

A lot has actually changed since I made those "Understand my ship in 5 minutes" And they need to be updated, which I do plan of doing when I eventually finish all the refs! For now though, I will say that Kei and Yani are actually the same age! And these aren't stupid thoughts, I LOVE and ADORE theories and love seeing all your questions about the game so thank you for sharing your questions and thoughts!! <333

MAJOR SPOILERS BENEATH(like seriously I basically explain everything about Kei and Yani do not read if you want to figure everything out in the game)

You did get it right! Kei created Yani, Kei created the entirety of "Mine" actually! See Kei is in love with YOU, the player, not the MC, and made "Mine in order to get your attention and communicate with you! I don't have plans to go into how he knows you in the game cause I think it'd be more interesting to see what others come up with(For example maybe he was just an oc you saw online, or maybe Kei's a virus which is personally what I headcanon him as, but once again I'd be really interested in seeing what others come up with for Kei :3) but he's real, he exists and he made "Mine" to get your attention. Kei created Yani based off of Kei's obsession with you, Yani is Kei's obsession with you personalized and therefore Kei and Yani can do anything they want in this world. This does leave a few questions like "Why did Kei make other love interests then?" or "Why doesn't Yani destroy Kei?" for the first question, Kei loves the feeling of his obsession, he loves his extreme love for you and he wants it to grow and grow, he's a bit of a masochist ig LOL. Watching you get with these nobodies that he created, it drives him up a wall. Another reason to it though is to see what kind of person you like so Kei can base himself off of that(Though he has a bit of a hard time copying Hoshi and Habiki since they're so rude to you and you don't deserve that, rather their more so to prove that Kei is better than them and to make you fall in love with him more) Secondly, Yani can't destroy it's creator or the game itself will be destroyed. Truthfully, no matter what route Yani goes for they're bound for misery. They can't get with you or Kei will erase them, you can't get with Kei or Kei will erase them, and Yani can't kill Kei otherwise they both die. So Kei and Yani are the only ones aware they're in a game and they're the only ones that like YOU, the player(Although if the others knew they were in a game they would like you, the player, as well and rather see the blank slate MC as a way to get closer to you and talk to you) Somewhere along the way I realized that Kei and Yani have a lot in common and decided to make them one, they did both start out as their own people though. It's been mentioned that Yani has an older brother before who was good at everything and looked down upon Yani, well that older brother is a manifestation of who Kei used to be before he met you, perfect and studious doing no wrong and being loved by his parents. Yani was ruthlessly abused by their parents, and although I haven't mentioned it yet to avoid spoilers, Kei went through a lot of what Yani did, forced to sleep outside(so Kei could be away from his computer and therefore you), starved and beaten(To try and knock some sense into Kei. Kei's life was on the line so they thought that maybe if he realized that Kei would come to hate you for putting his life at risk) I've even changed Kei's eye color in his new design to be Yani's eye color! That's what the blocked out spoiler is LOL

I've really been pushing their similarities for a bit, even if a bit subtly, I've been trying to make them say "Y/N" in recent posts while everyone else says "MC" and everyone else birthday ends in "th" while Kei's ends in "st" and Yani's in "nd" similar in the sense that they're separated from everyone else but different enough to not just be the same person. And the binary in Yani's section for the birthday post being creation date since that's when Kei made Yani.

At first Kei was just interested that he could see you and hear you from your computer, but he also couldn't go anywhere. So he just watched and listened to you and fell in love slowly, you were the first thing, the first person that Kei had ever had any kind of contact with and he fell in love with you HARD. He wants you so badly but he can't leave the computer so he created a "physical" him and made a story and game that suits your tastes, something that would catch your attention and draw you in hence how "Mine" was created by Kei!

[obsessedfluffbutt]

I want to talk a little bit about my take on Ronaldo Fryman.

Some notes to start: I don't like Ronaldo. At all. He's annoying and obnoxious and I totally understand where the hate he gets comes from.

Onto my thoughts: Ronaldo is a pretty typical, chronically online incel type guy. He's incredibly toxic most of the time and not particularly nice to anyone if it gets in the way of what he's doing.

Ronaldo is me when I was in school. I was heavily isolated from my peers, living in the middle of farming nowhere, always had to help with the family business, was rarely able to socialize outside of my family if I wasn't online, and was labeled as the "weirdo" in school.

Ronaldo is somewhat isolated outside of the internet, living in a small town, deemed the "weirdo" by his peers and only had close relationships online or with his family. So he deals with that isolation the same way I did, by deeming himself somehow "special" and diving head first into ghosts, and cryptids and conspiracy theories. Online communities for these things can be surprisingly supportive at times, especially if you live in a "haunted" area.

In my case the farm I lived on was well over 100 years old, and was the towns former post office before being converted into a farmhouse when the town basically died. The town itself boasted maybe 200 residents when I lived there, and I was considered "the weird one" out of all of them, with the exception of the lady down the road we weren't allowed to talk to cuz she was "a witch". I'm not even kidding.

All this comes together to mean that Ronaldo isn't some awful character with no redeeming qualities. He's just a total weirdo who needs to get out and experience real people and real relationships, and if he doesn't he'll be permanently stuck as an incel.

In my case, I got out. Met my future partner online, then met in person, we went out experienced all sorts of fun stuff together, and have now been together 9 years.

I see a lot of the old me, the me that sometimes I'd like to forget about and pretend never existed, in Ronaldo Fryman. Which is why I dislike him so much. However I've learned that I have to give myself some grace, I was an undiagnosed autistic child with anxiety and depression who thought I would never live passed the age of 18. I should give the character Ronaldo that same grace.

I grew up eventually, even if slower than those who had better support, and now I own my home, volunteer with a few animal rescue groups, and have had a steady job of my own.

This is why it makes me sad we never got to see any growth or development from Ronaldo in the show. He's permanently stuck in our minds as this chronically online incel jerk.

I'm glad Lars got the redemption arc and growth that he did, but it makes me sad that Ronaldo didn't. Because that makes me think that, if I ever were to run into old schoolmates they would all assume I'm still, in their words, "the crazy weirdo who'll marry a cardboard cutout of an anime character" instead of an individual who grew.

[dykephan]

hi, totally agree with you about the december getting together thing and just wanted to add on to a few points. One about online perceptions and stuff is they mightve both wanted to have this appearance of a cool, sexy, mysterious, emo guy on the internet who is "mature" and has casual sex all the time nbd lol and not wanting to seem clingy. Its kind of embarrasing to want more sometimes (its cheesy, its meant to be). For Dan I also dont think he would want Phil to see him as an obsessed fan (also the age thing) so putting up a nonchalant front would help put them on more even footing. For Phil its just like you already said mainly and not wanting to scare Dan off, following Dan's lead. Also Dan just getting out of a longterm relationship and being 18 he might not have been inclined to tie himself down quick when he was single for the first time in a bit, especially to someone who lives far away, but then obv realized this thing with Phil wasnt just going to be some casual fling. Also lol this "reveal" was not weird/ suprising to me bcos of my own experience of being with this girl for like 3 ish months had been friends previously we were having sex and saying we loved eachother etc but whole time being like we're not dating though lol

oh 100% agree, especially when you're at that age it's sooo embarrassing to admit you do want to find someone who cares about you and enriches your life and shares a future with you... it's so much easier to flirt with strangers online and pretend you're too cool to feel any particular way about it. like you said, i think it comes down to both of them realizing that this was not going to be some casual fling. and 2 months is honestly no time at all considering how much they had to think about & plan for!!

also yeah i agree it wasn't surprising to me it was more just like. first of all like holy shit why are you sharing this information with me unprompted are you sure you meant to say that?? second of all, i guess i didn't KNOW until i KNEW. it's one thing to look at the things they posted around that time period and make guesses, but hearing it out loud made me feel sooooo dumbfounded. idk why but that one hit me way harder than the tour bus thing...

anyway let me share a personal anecdote here because it's only fair after i've invaded their privacy i should embarrass myself a little fksjfks many years ago i started talking to a tumblr mutual and we got super close as friends, we spent literally hours talking every night and we'd even fall asleep on skype just to be with each other. i told her things i have still never told anyone else in my life. and ofc there was heavyy flirting which was fun except i have horrible commitment issues.. doing all this online didn't feel as scary and real to me. but then we made plans to actually travel and meet up, and i started getting. idk. itchy 😭 but i did go across the country to meet her and it was such a perfect weekend, she was so funny and beautiful and even more magnetic in person. it clarified my feelings about her in a way that chatting online never could, but also it scared the shit out of me and so when that weekend was over i went back home and i told her i couldn't do it anymore and that was it. we tried to be friends after that but it just wasn't the same and neither of us had our hearts in it. i still think about her and hope she's doing well but we haven't talked in years

so basically i'm living in the dark dan and phil timeline where they filmed pinof and then said okay bye dude 👍🏻 fuck my stupid baka life

[tic-loud-tic-proud]

Kind of a personal post but whatever.

I started this blog in 2017, as a young girl with recently diagnosed Tourette Syndrome and no community whatsoever. Before TikTok, before fake disorder reddit groups, before there was any awareness on Tourette Syndrome at all. If you tried to search for a Tourettes community on any social media, you were met with misinformation, mockery, and usually just ableism. "Funny Tourette Syndrome Try not to laugh" videos or "What do we want? A cure for Tourettes" memes.

That was except for Tumblr.

The first time I went on Tumblr and found people with TS here, I cried. It was the first time I had ever seen people like me, or even seen my disorder depicted in a way that wasn't cruel. I know, it's super corny.

But 5 years ago, that was all I had. Tumblr was the only place I could talk openly about having TS without being made fun of.

Then, for a small, small, period of time in ~2020, which I now refer to as the golden age of TS awareness, people with Tourette Syndrome started finding community on TikTok. People started educating others, spreading awareness, and building up community like the one I had found here. That was really nice.

Then it changed again. TS became a trend associated with dyed hair, sexy dances, and elaborate makeup. People with coprolalia were once again shunned unless we could be laughed at. I'm sure you all remember the "oodie kids" that mocked people with Tourette Syndrome while hiding behind online anonymity. A certain Tiktoker was accused of faking, and harassed relentlessly, sent death threats, and essentially bullied off the Internet in general (I don't ever condone behavior like that even if it is supposedly proven a person is "faking").

Big YouTubers covered that story. I consider that to be when the golden age ended. All of a sudden it was okay to mock and harass Tourettics again, because "this person could be faking, it's for their own good". Tourettics that had been talking about TS for years were called fakers just for having dyed hair or piercings, because that was associated with "fakers". The majority of popular TS-related tiktokers stopped posting about TS, or stopped posting at all. The few who remained wanted to be seen as legitimate, hence all the "Real person with Tourettes reacts to FAKER" videos we have now. It's still a desperate plea to be accepted by the majority.

We've come full circle. The normal schoolyard bullying I experienced that included name-calling and laughing has evolved into something much worse: being filmed and posted online. I will never know where those videos end up. I will never know whether someone on the other side of the world is laughing at me. I will never know if my friends that see them stand up for me, or if they just scroll past. To me, that's much worse than a kid on the playground shouting slurs at me.

Despite all this newfound "awareness", Tourette Syndrome is still RARE. If you have corpolalia, there is a huge chance that even in TS support groups you will never meet someone else with corpolalia. That's why we find community online. But now that community has been ruined.

In the end Tumblr is still the only place I can talk freely about how TS affects me. But I'm hopeful. I'm hopeful in a few years the faker witch-hunting will be over. I'm hoping then people will leave us alone. But most of all I'm hoping that younger tourettics who aren't being believed by their parents, Tourettic teenagers with dyed hair and piercings, and literally any tourettic going through public school right now can find empathy and acceptance, whether that be online or in real life. I don't want anyone to ever feel how I felt- alone.

[eri-pl]

It's ok to send asks (more or less about Tolkien, let's keep this blog on topic), I will more likely answer than not. It's ok to comment even if the post is old. If something that I wrote contradicts the canon, and I seem not to be aware of it, I would prefer to be informed (politely) of this fact. I usually don't do proper Quenya diacritics. I know it. Too complicated to type, sorry.

Post Masterlist

Online tool to easily make character sorting polls and KMF-style polls.

Tolkien

Proper-ish writing (Silm fanfics)

Ao3 in general

Steve the intern Maia / Ao3 - comedy, Mandos, Darkening

Amandil / Ao3 - sad/estel, fall of Numenor

Irrational / Ao3 - fluff + math + music + nature of Men, kidnap fam

Blood, red like fire / Ao3 - ominous, Feanor's mother, pregnancy

Writing propmts / ideas / sketches

(yes, you can use those, credit me if you quote more or less directly)

Some original Maiar, feel free to use

Crack taken seriously the um… very personal edition? (includes fangirling and Blue Wizards)

Nerdanel could but would she? (I hate Feanor less now, ignore the tag a bit)

Synopsis of “how I would do Third Age Sauron redemption fic (second part of interconectednss. It starts with Saruman not being a jerk. It may end on the world ending. Or not.)

Very AU: Melkor ok, Aule and Yavanna bad but opposing each other.

So, you want to canonize Tauriel? Here’s how.

Maglor in Numenor (it ends better than you’d expect)

I’m not a shipper, but Aredhel

yeet the Ring into space (not a very original idea)

I don’t write real people fics, but

Nobilis/Silm: Feanorians

Consider: A “ghost of Feanor in LotR” fanfic, but instead of, say, Elrond, it is Gimli who can perceive the ghost. (Literally just this. Plus some tags and discussion below post.)

Rework of Beren and Luthien, keeping the early idea of "C&C are helpful", but compatible with the rest of the canon.

Long reblog chain (partially mine) ending with Maedhros with undead Fingon as his hand (lierally).

If Osse went evil

Feanorians should go to a theater

Celegorm humts in his dreams

underexplored topic of Celebrimbor-Annatar discussions: the Feanorian… well, the whole thing about them, Oath and Darkness and all that.

discussions of greek mythology/Silm exchange program (Morgoth for Hermes) (see all the reblogs, there are good ideas there!)

a lot of "what-ifs" about Feanor not doing one of the questionable things he did (for different ones) (below cut)

Musing, rambling, essays, headcanons - masterlist

(yes, you can use those too)

Funny

Badly made Morgoth on a cake 

Spiders! Luthien! Also, Miriel! And more spiders!  (source of this idea)

SmurFingolfin

cursed poll-haired Thranduil

Sauron goo in a jar

Polls!- Finished polls masterlist

Pics

H tengwa

Dagor Dagoradh with a car (+Sauron) + Elrond's van comparision

Finrod in a technicolor jacket

12 versions of Melkor (Morgoth): singing in the Ainulindale, early days, Dark Rider, in Aman, with Ungolianth, warlord, charmed into sleep, gloating to Hurin, bonus 1, bonus 2, bonus 3

the Oath of Feanor as a snake-thing

Feanorian-ish coloring pages: 1, 2, colored eldritch!Oath!knot

Melkor|Morgoth through the Ages + some bonus (tag, not a single post)

why goatee looks stupid on Melkor|Morgoth

kind of tutorial for easy Silmarils / light in graphics software

small Valar in a circle

Feanorian floor tiles (set of tiling patterns)

Ossë

candles&moths

Other 

Cosmere (old posts)

Post-RoW predictions for Stormlight Archive (plus)

Ten spears go to battle

Nobilis (old posts)

Why I cannot play this game

You know you think too much about Nobilis when…

“wyrd” ws “weird”

numbers

What happens to instances of an Estate after a successful Flower Rite — some thoughts

You don’t FR a Mimic

Excrucian eyes : Deceivers

About Warmains

Warmains (feel free to use)

Deceivers (same)

Misc

grammar rant 

another

first one

[dimonds456]

Aight, what you see above is an article that's getting passed around by proshippers. I'm making my own post separate from theirs to discuss the contents of this article and why I believe everyone *should* read it, while also I don't believe the article is correct.

The article was written by a Japanese artist who had been harassed for "proshipping" online, even though they themself did not partake in anything more than aging up 15-year-old characters to 19. As far as they claim, that was it (though the artwork itself is not provided).

Someone had DMed them, asking if they were a proshipper, or a "problematic shipper", to which they shrugged and went "I guess so?" and then that person-referred to as A- started spreading it to all their friends that A was a proshipper and to avoid them, leading to soft blocks, harassment, ect.

Something I'd like to point out that is correct about this article is the meaning of "proshipper." It doesn't mean "problematic ships." Instead, "pro" is the prefix, not an abbreviation. The meaning is in reference to someone who is unbothered by any specific type of ship, and/or supports the creation of problematic ships. This difference is, I feel, important, not because the definition is changed, but because how people view that definition changes substantially.

Keep that in mind.

Something else of note here is the cultural difference. The artist is from Japan, and according to them, Japan allows ships of any kind. Japan, as a country, is proship, which creates vast and varied artistic expressions. Any and everything is allowed.

And, according to worldpopulationreview.com, the age of consent in Japan is 13 (though articles are saying they're rethinking this law).

Again, I recommend reading the article for yourself to fully understand the artist's point of view, but I'd like to break down where the author was wrong about many things. A lot of them stem from cultural differences and are normalized, so you can't really blame them, but it's good to keep in mind when interacting with proshippers from all over the world.

Something they're right about is harassment. I don't think people should be being harassed for stuff like this. Blocked? Yes.

The first thing they got wrong was the general assumption that fiction doesn't affect reality, or that antis cannot tell the difference between fiction and reality. This (at least for a lot of us) isn't true. Using myself as an example, it's clear to me that fiction and reality are two different worlds.

However, to say that fiction doesn't affect reality is false. Both worlds influence each other. If an adult starts dating a 13-year-old in fiction, younger audience members who watch that will see that relationship play out. Depending on how it's portrayed, this can either help or harm that audience member. If this relationship is deemed bad in that piece of media, then the younger members of that audience will remember that, vs if they say it's okay, THAT'S where you've crossed into proship territory that is actively harmful towards your audience.

I am a firm believer that anything should be allowed in fiction, as long as the author is respectful, responsible, and considers the ramifications of their work towards a real audience. So like, having a relationship between a 19-year-old and a 13-year-old should be allowed to be portrayed, as long as it isn't positive. By not allowing these stories to be told at all, that's leaning into some book burning shit.

What the author did, aging up 15-year-olds to 19, is not inherently bad, especially since they say it wasn't sexual in nature (but again, the art itself is never presented).

The second thing they get wrong is calling us a minority. I don't believe there were any studies done on this, but I don't think the majority of Americans go around talking about shipping children with adults? Again, it's a cultural difference that was influenced on this specific artist BY other proshippers. It's a biased view from both sides. I do not believe any studies have officially been done on this subject, so you cannot call us a minority. But, we can't call you a minority, either. I'm not sure how many there are on either side.

But also, I don't think that really matters. Continuing my topic from before with fiction affecting reality, if someone in that audience can get hurt because of your story, then it doesn't matter if the majority don't. It's still harmful and can affect reality- THIS reality- in negative ways. By drawing proship art and saying it doesn't matter because it's fiction, you're helping to normalize this art for ACTUAL predators. It doesn't matter how many proshippers there are, this is STILL harmful.

Something else I noticed, but I cannot point specifically to this article as evidence for, but it may be influencing the author, is the idea of in-fandom vs outside-fandom. The author mentions this a couple times, though usually in reference to the cultural differences between Japan and America.

The author is outside the US fandom, and so doesn't fully understand its inner workings or why so many of us are anti-proship "purest"s. I don't know how else to explain this besides going up to your grandparents and asking them if they think proshipping is okay.

Upon hearing the actual definition- being unbothered or perpetuating any type of relationship between two or more characters in fiction- they might go "yeah I agree with that," because that does sound nice on paper. Freedom of expression.

But what antis have come to realize is that fiction DOES affect reality, and if you were to ask your grandparents if they thing a child should be in a relationship with an adult, they'd probably go "no."

This is purely because they don't understand the culture of being online, and the several, several subcultures that came to be. We know what proshippers are and what they represent, but someone outside fandom space wouldn't.

And now, to any proshippers reading this: first of all, thank you for hearing me out, lol. But then, I ask you to please re-evaluate why you're a proshipper. Is it for the freedom of expression idea, do you just not give a shit, or do you genuinely enjoy seeing kids and adults together? Maybe something else? I'm not going to tell you how to feel about that- you can come to your own conclusion- but I do ask that you re-examine that idea.

If the author is SOMEHOW reading this, first of all, thank you too. My goal here was not to harass you in any way, but to point out the core of why this article doesn't really work. I'm sure in Japan things are vastly different, and that's not your fault, OP. And although I don't stand by what A did to you, I do ask that you think again. Stuff like this does affect reality, even in small ways (but when it comes to p*dos, it can be FAR more harmful than good).

Proshippers help normalize unhealthy behaviors that can seriously hurt children for the rest of their lives. Do proships exist in reality? ...Yes. Not between fictional characters, but those characters can influence people in real life to go "oh yeah the incest ship was okay in this anime, which means it's fine if I'm like that, too." It's not fine. It's not okay.

Again, I'm not here to harass you, and ultimately it's up to you whether you choose to listen. I'm sorry for the harassment at all, that should not have occurred.

Back to my general audience, though, yeah. Again, read the article for yourself (which I do still highly recommend). It gives a good glimpse into the minds and ideas of some proshippers out there. I don't think OP is a bad person, just misinformed. And I believe the same of a lot of proshippers out there. We can't change their minds, but we can make sure misinfo like what is in the article is debunked, and spread correct information regarding the subject.

Some sources:

Again, read the article, do some thinking (on BOTH sides), and have a good one, guys.

[golbrocklovely]

Random question,

Were you homeschooled? If you were, I have literally no socialization when it comes to people besides family. My mental health is rotting, I'm extremely emotionally sensitive, and I feel I really need friends, like it just feels like it would help alot.

What do you think?

i was only homeschooled for 8th grade, but i do get the sentiment of not knowing how to make friends. i used to have a big friend group that i've since lost bc back in 2020 my best friend of 10 years (and basically my life line to that group) decided she didn't want to be friends with me anymore bc her life was too stressful and she figured she was a shit friend anyway so she should cut me loose (along with a mirade of other things that went on that she blamed it on). so, i haven't had a core group of friends in a long time and i struggle to connect with ppl.

i will say, your best bet - at least at first - is to try to make friends online based on things/fandoms you are a part of. i have my couple friends on here, and even tho we almost exclusively talk about snc related shit, i still count them as my closest friends. and it's nice to be able to talk to them about that stuff.

and as for in real life stuff you can do to make friends, idk how old you are, but try to see if there are any local groups or events you can join in your area. see if there is a book group at your local library, see if there are any classes at a community center you can take. hell, even getting a job where some of the ppl in that place are the same age as you is good starting point as well. when you are in forced proximity with ppl, you tend to befriend others more often. that's why a lot of us were even able to have friends in school.

try to go into everything with an open mind. and genuinely remember that 99% of ppl are a, in the same boat as you (confused and don't know what to do next) and b, aren't trying to hurt your feelings. most ppl are nice. of course there are assholes, but try not to let ppl like that bring you down. and gentle reminder, you most likely are not as awkward as you feel. and i know that from personal experience lol

also, my biggest recommendation is working on yourself as well and learning to become your own best friend. i know that's very cliche and silly to say, but highkey one of the best choices i ever made was learning to cut myself some slack and start being nice to myself. if you can afford it, consider therapy. but i know that's not always an option for ppl (even myself). try to do some introspection on who you are, the obstacles you've gone thru and overcame, and do your best to be nice to yourself. i'm telling you, when you start to actually like yourself and give yourself a break, especially on the things you had no control over in the first place, life starts to feel a lot less harder to deal with.

even if your first step is to start reading self help books - do that. write out your feelings more, explore why you act the way you do and if that's something you want to change. set goals that are reasonable, put pride into yourself. treat yourself like you would someone you are friends with. think of yourself as someone worthy of love, bc you are.

but let it be known that this will not happen overnight. i wish it did, but it took me YEARS, i truly mean years, to finally start liking myself and having any resemblance of confidence. it will not happen in one go. you have to be consistent and constantly working on yourself. and i know that can be difficult. but in the long run it will do wonders for yourself.

i wish i had all the answers for you, and i wish i knew the best course for you to take. and i wish you all the luck in the world. i truly believe you will make friends and start a great path on your mental health journey. it won't be easy, and it will take a lot of time, but it's worth it bc you deserve that. you deserve happiness <3

[gunsli-01]

Okay, you know what I'm gonna say it- I am personally mad about the Haruka verdict this trial like on a very personal level and I'm gonna explain why. I feel like I need to preface this with I don't really like getting personal that often online, but I feel like people won't understand my point on this without me explaining myself.

As no one may know, because I don't get personal often on my blog outside of rare occasions, I had a somewhat similar circumstance to Haruka coming up. During my upbringing I was basically treated as defective from the start. However, even though I recognized this within his first trial song I wasn't like oh vote him innocent. In fact, when I saw Weakness, I believed he should've been voted Guilty, but he was already Innocent at that time. Just because of what Weakness centered around. So, this isn't just a case of oh I relate so I won't be critical. Because the more I relate to something the more critical I am likely to be. Eh-hem Mikoto sorry weird cough there.

So, tragic anime-esque backstory time I suppose which is not tragic or anime-esque since things like this happen all the time and continue to. So, I believe people should really stop this weird belief that abuse such as this can only happen in fiction then balking when they find out oh people just really be out here like this. I'm the youngest and last daughter of an incredibly self-centered woman. Since she had a daughter one year before me, she did not want a second one. She would tell me multiple times in my life that she really wanted a son not another girl. Stating the reason behind that desire was because sons tend to be more loyal to their moms (momma boys) and girls their dads (daddy girls).

Even went out of her way to give me my legal name just to later give me the nickname Lee. This was a failure of a plan because in the US you don't plan a nickname, it either chooses you when you come to age like a rite of passage, people just randomly start calling you something in your family and it sticks, or you actively pick one for yourself. What this did do is actively fuck me over in small social ways repeatedly since my legal name is still not even considered a real name due to its spelling and has zero meaning since if you go back to point one it is not a recognized name. If I looked it up right now google might tell me to fuck myself. I looked it up and Google told me I spelled it wrong. Been alive 27 years and still can't spell my own fucking name right I suppose.

This has caused some of my documents to be wrong cause she just didn't bother to tell me or anyone else for that matter how it was legally spelt until I was out of high school. Don't worry there's a great excuse for this in her own words, she was just taking a "hiatus" from parenting that included dropping off the face of the earth and popping back up randomly to force me to get braces because my teeth were just too crooked, missing every birthday I had but at least calling my sister on most of hers even showing up unannounced a few times for my sister's. Her birthday is a month before mine by the way. So, that was super fun, no way one could take that personally at all. Just to then reemerge when I was sixteen to be a parent again and explain it like she was taking a break from writing a manga. It's incredibly funny cause she just assumed I wouldn't know the meaning of that word, but I'd seen it a lot by that point so lol.

All that to say when I saw Haruka's second trial video it recontextualized a lot. Again, I already thought he should be voted Guilty on Weakness alone. Him being weak didn't really explain to me why he was killing any of the things he clearly did in that video. I just thought he was doing it just because fuck it's Tuesday why not. Like his first mv made it pretty clear he was killing animals and people. Also, that the person could have been a sibling. Like I'd been talking to friends about how he did that for a year now.

So, seeing it shown more blatantly was not like a oh whoa that's horrible because I'd gathered that already. There was nothing new to me in Haruka and Yuno's videos to be honest. I was actually very annoyed with Yuno's mv in a "Okay, tell me something I don't know way!" Like all of this is old news come on. So, really didn't rattle me in my core. I don't really think Mu's will shock me at all either but I'm dying when I love you comes out. I can feel it in my bones Mahiru is gonna be on some shit.

So, with Haruka I was like ah okay yeah, no innocent that's a failure in parenting. He killed a lot of things though hm unfortunate where was his caretaker when he was doing that? Also why is there an isolation room in his home? Like bro I can recognize someone's individual behavior is wrong and then consider the circumstances/environmental factors that may have led to that course of action. That is kind of something everyone is very much capable of doing. I can even just detach myself from my emotional sentiments on the issue as a whole and go, "Well wrong is wrong so not a big deal if he's voted Guilty he did kill someone after all."

However, even doing that I was just like this is still a stupid way to vote. Not just because having Haruka undergo something like this could very well be retraumatizing but as I've said before if his mom using negative reinforcement did not work why would it work here? He seems to actively respond better to positive reinforcement given his protectiveness of Mu and how he's been picking up words more through being patiently taught within Milgram.

However, Milgram isn't about rehabilitation, that's not the purpose but if I have a choice between rehabilitating and demonizing, I think the former should be chosen. Of course, for any progress to be made there are times when people must be told their actions were wrong. I think given Futa's second trial a Guilty verdict the first one was a good choice. I just don't think that sort of firm punishment is necessary in Haruka's case. Since we've gotten a great illustration of how he responds to negative reinforcement in general.

I feel like people greatly underestimate what being in an accepting, positive environment can do for someone mentally and the damage that being in a place the exact opposite of that can cause a person. How it affects their confidence, impacts the lengths they'll go to get attention, and how they view positive and negative attention overall. I hope this verdict doesn't negatively impact Haruka too much but as someone with those sorts of experiences I can see how this might just cause him to regress.

Well, didn't think I'd say this when the second trials started but at least he has Mu still hopefully...

[booblywooblies]

actually, on the topic of "the little girl you used to be" i have actually had a concept/philosophy since about 2019 about "the girl in the photo"

so for context: ive always been a little genderless goblin, ive always had bowl cuts and played with boy toys and sports and dirt and animals, i wanted to be steve irwin when i was a kid and i hated barbie. this carried on well into my teen years where i was still a tomboy and people thought i was a lesbian, i think it was really starting to hit me that id eventually have to start living as a woman unless i grapple with the fact that im trans (something ive been on and off thinking about since the age of 7)

so i was like okay, im a trans man and im going to transition, but until then i may as well try being feminine, like, yknow for fun, bc ive never really presented that way

this is where the MAJORITY of my "girl" selfies take place, ages 18-22 (i hit my gender performativity limit at 22 and started to have bad break downs about it so thats about when i gave up went back to normal but thats not important for now)

so during this time i was struggling with like, basically trying to look as appealing as possible, i learned how to pose my back and my face and angle my camera just right and i used filters and lighting and all kinds of stuff. i started to develop this idea of "the girl in the photo" she was never actually me because yknow i have a flabby body and half lidded eyes and a double chin and stuff, and because she wasnt me it didnt matter how fake she was so it was okay if i cleared up my skin with apps and edited my face to look less fat. she wasnt me, but like, at the same time she also wasnt *real*

not just in the sense that she was a false lookalike of a real person but she was also a dishonest representation of an identity that didnt belong to anyone in the first place, she was a figment of my imagination that i captured in images and presented to the (online) world as a character i sometimes played

ive actually considered fishing for funny replies on a dating site using old pictures of me and using the name "maisy" in a fake profile. bc when i was 18 i was on okc a lot, i never met up with anyone because they all saw me as the girl in the picture and it made me feel disgusted. but some of the messages i got were so bizarre and it was fun to make fun of them with my friends.

i still like the old pictures i took, they dont really make me feel dysphoric because, even my friends ive known since middle school have said "thats a completely different person, before and after"

and its like, obviously i am what youd consider transgender, i was born with a certain set of genitalia and i didnt feel the initial puberty my innate hormones caused for me was good for my well being (obviously everyones definition of trans is different but for me this is how it worked out for me) but theres something about this character i created for a handful of years of my life that feels like it was the biggest change ive ever made. me pretending to be a woman in appearances only was the most different my gender has ever been throughout my life. like its so simple to me that ive always been male, i was a little boy, a guy, and now im a man. you cant claim to know if you werent there.

[calismediadiary]

we're doomed - Media Blog Post #6

In the first 2 years of my college education, what I would consider one of the most useful pieces of information would be that when working within my career, I am not and am almost never what is considered the “target audience.” 

Specifically in regard to being a marketing major, you have to understand that you are not trying to make yourself understood but an outside audience that is not you. I believe this is something everyone needs to have drilled into them because in both our media landscape and everyday life there's a lack of knowing that you are not the center and there are many dialogues.  

TikTok humanizes and puts every creator at the center, when you scroll onto a video it is their “art” and online existence that you are witnessing in real time. And I think the trends that have emerged from TikTok show that these people are using their online existence as a means of survival.

Just last month, the trend to livestream you repeating the same five words over and over again was having people receive thousands of dollars within minutes. 

The crazy thing is everyone accepted it and began participating. 

This NPC streaming started off within TikToker PinkyDoll repeating the same words over and over again based on the gifts being sent. However, this essential went viral overnight and every day people and well known influencers were following suit. One of the most famous being the Miles Morales NPC where he repeats different catch phrases and even stays in character when questioned and eventually running from the cops. 

Which is why the ability to trend on tik tok is unreliable unless you are consistently trying every trend. 

Personally, an aspect of TikTok that I find really interesting is scrolling through livestreams. Outside of the bizarre NPC streams, there is no consistency or algorithm to livestreams. You can find one that has 5,000 people watching and the one directly below it is 5 people. 

As someone who is essentially justifying their media addiction under the major of marketing, I do think TikTok is dystopian. But not only that all social media is dystopian and it is insane to assume otherwise. 

Our society is undeniably suffering from the developments that we have had from social media. We constantly refer to the fact that Gen-Z is the loneliness generation, but also it's the generation that has free access and will (most likely in some capacity) continue to have this free access to social media for the rest of their life. We have not yet seen the long lasting effects of becoming people who are able to exist solely online. 

I wrote a research paper on just how affected younger generation are especially within depression, suicide, body dismorphia, and grooming. These are aspects I believe if you asked, without a doubt someone has seen a post, made a post, or even experienced it themselves. And it is insane that we now take this into the norm.

I don’t have a solution, and when considering how TikTok exists I can not explain how it operates, what its intentions are, and if there is a way to indicate if its a good or an evil. 

In a space where you can essentially reach a mass audience, project your thoughts onto a young and impressionable audience, and it keeps going around and around, even rhetoric that doesn’t seem harmful is especially when there are no age restrictions and lies are constantly constructed with the only intent of going viral. 

However, my biggest problem with TikTok hate is parents being able to use it as an excuse for bad parenting. While the fact that the site is far from being child safe is obvious. We are always looking at things that are corrupting children's minds whether it's the video games they consume or Dungeons and Dragons, but parents have still yet to find a way around it. 

People who don’t get access to media are ostracized from their peers because of how integrated media is within teenage culture, and it affects their ability to relate, but are they better off?

[wavernot4love]

alright y'all lil (alright, maybe not so little) recap of the second show of AG's Boom Done tour last night 3.4 in Buffalo @ one of my favorite venues, Mohawk Place. because my brain commits absolutely everything to memory at shows & i like writing it all down before i forget

(for fun & plus maybe folks going to this tour want to know what's shakin, since i haven't seen much online yet):

(note there will be setlist spoilers)

- alright so first, a freakin HIGHLIGHT for me was, of course, GET OUT!!!

Anthony was just kinda messing around with his guitar & then teased it by being like "hmm... how should i play this..." and then went into that and the crowd reception was AWESOME, dude. whatever the opposite of masking is, that's what i was doing there. i definitely started physically jumping up & down once i realized what it was (typical wavernot4love @ the AG show behavior). aka evidently he knew your boy (who like i've mentioned on here, got into Circa last summer through a kind person at a Dunes show rec'ing me Get Out & then BSN. Get Out was straight up my introduction 2 Circa) was in the building (/Ih).

also, i had to shorten my clip to post because in the rest i must've had my phone right next to my mouth,,, which made for some horrifying tone deaf live vox from wavernot4love. be glad i spared y'all from that one.

(i'm gonna put one of those keep reading thingies here, click it 2 see the rest)

- he also played Dyed In The Wool & Frozen Creek, continuing that theme (though I expected these more since he's played em recently). Dyed In The Wool with everyone singing along during the chorus was probably my top moment, and one that's gonna stick with me forever, honestly. i remember thinking it straight up felt like, a churchlike (but positive) experience or something during the songs everyone did that for (remember, it's just anthony this tour no backing band, so it was somewhat quiet in there). more on that later, but AG kept pointing out how nice the singing along was & how fun/awesome this all was, and man, that it was.

- he mentioned valuing spontaneity over a planned setlist every night and basically implied he was just goin for whatever felt right at the time. so just consider the songs i mention here as a basic guideline, he could very well switch stuff up every night. i love that he's like this when it comes to shows - idk dude, like, at one point he even asked folks what time it was, laughing when they told him, jokingly accusing them of being untrustworthy & then going right back into the tunes. dude was just here to play, for as long as he could.

- kinda tied to that, there was a running gag of the set being "inconsistent" (his word). he'd bring up jokingly that there'd be moments where everyone could be singing along, and then songs that nobody knows (and he'd jokingly "apologize" for that), and he'd even (lightheartedly) call specific people out and be like (to laughs) "look at this person, they have no *idea* what i'm gonna play next!" actually i think he said that before Get Out. at one point he was (paraphrased slightly) like, "so if i start playing 12 Circa songs in a row, let me know." i love how he just does whatever the hell feels right in the moment.

- also a couple times he messed up while starting a song (i think due to laughing) and bro would call out folks laughing at him for it (lightheartedly) and be like "this is all performance. vou don't know what goes into this!" (this was not at all serious and said through laughter. straight up half the show was all of us in that room just cracking up together)

- he introduced his Title Fight cover (Numb, But I Still Feel It) by calling TF one of his favorite bands & joking that they're gonna hear this & think it's time to get back together so... if you hear that Title Fight reunited, you know why, which, well, if you know that side of the scene, you know what's up. real shits and giggles moment, if i do say so myself.

- at one point (only bad thing) someone at the front was being objectively Weird in the way people (unfortunately) do to try to get an artist's attention (let's just say it involved throwing money (????? literally what) while yelling stuff about understanding because they're in the industry (??)) and he honestly handled it with so much grace. he pretty much said that made him uncomfortable etc and he would Not be taking more of their money please, he already did that, and that led to him ranting for a second i think mostly to himself in a thinking out loud/under his breath kinda way about *hating* having to sell stuff in the first place in order to do this and like,,, i go into this a bit in the tags but it genuinely reminded me of how i get when i'm passionate about something. what i'm trying to say, is dude clearly was heated & meant it. fully. just felt relevant to include

- then he ranted about something related to the moneythrowing, drunk (question mark) weirdo (long story, but it ended in him telling them to tip bartenders with their money instead of weird things), then used that to go on a tangent about how we should always tip people working in service in general and respect/be kind to them even if they seem rude or whatever because doing that shit is hard & sucks and maybe your kindess will be the wakeup call that causes them to one day have a moment where they're like, man, i was a dick back then for no reason. (i feel like i am nearly direct quoting him here)

- then after a song he joked about the incident saving we were probably just all watching like 🧍‍♂️ and it was like watching dad yell at mom at the dinner table while you just sit there staring at the ground and safe to say the mood was fully lightened after that moment of self awareness fhfhfh

- then a few songs later i guess the person that was being weird had left so he was like, (at this point there were no weird vibes whatsoever, like we were all just scoffing/laughing at the situation and cheering him on) "oh that person who hates me left. did they give the bartender that money?" (someone implied they thought so) and he was like "good." and that was the end with that weirdo situation lol. i have absolutely no idea why that person, drunk or not, thought that was a normal cool thing to do. as always, please don't be weird 2 musicians they are in every sense just Some Guys (gender neutral), treat them like anyone else.

- back 2 totally unserious things, during... uh don't mind me, like i've said in my previous posts i'm still getting 2 know Boom Done, so whatever song has like, the horns kinda near the end? he just started making freakin. horn noises since since there were, in fact, no horns in the building and made us all do them too and everyone was just straight up cackling because it was so stupid (/pos).

- idk one thing that stood out to me was one person belting along at the end of... i can't remember what song it was actually, i think one of his older tunes, but you could tell he heard & a song later complimented it & said it was beautiful. i'm telling ya, he kept going on about how nice folks singing along sounded and encouraging that, which was awesome because i wasn't sure what the vibe was gonna be there since it was just him playing.

- don't want to go into detail since it feels like something between Anthony & whoever he decides to tell it to in real time, ya know, but he did tell a pretty extensive story leading up to Miracle Sun. in terms of themes, it was in regards to (with plenty of laughs mixed into the serious bits, of course) letting folks that matter to him down + falling into a cycle of engaging in stuff that temporarily made him feel better but was moreso just self destructive, in the past. just interesting stuff to hear in connection to a song.

- at the end, before Dear Child, he just talked in the most honest manner about knowing he's let people down, cancelled shows (there were laughs mixed in here too), just not been the best version of himself over the years etc, but appreciating how long everyone has stuck around, and how we keep coming back, & jow much it means whenever we tell someone go check out a song or anything like that, & helping him continue to do this and also support his family and whatnot and man it just. embodied everything i love about AG solo sets i guess. i just admire how open a book &p vulnerable dude is. while i love his more theatric frontman persona of course as it's fun as hell, it's so nice at solo shows like this to hear more from him, in seriousness and otherwise. also dude was posting about how fun it was on instagram later so i'm just glad we all had a great time.

- also at one point before a new tune he was talking about these cds he had that have that on it + some rerecordings, Frozen Creek (feat. Keith of GOW), etc. i love cds so i ran to snag one later of course (they're $12)

- as for other merch he had a few shirts (like that cute one i keep seeing around, with him & the puppy), some art prints, & the Boom Done book thingy (i really wanted it but couldn't swing the $25 right now sadly)

anyways,, i posted on Setlist FM for the first time, here are all the songs i remember for sure (there were definitely at least 4/5 others i am not thinking of, i'd say he did 17ish songs, he played for close to an hour and a half. keep in mind he talked a LOT with us which was awesome)

edit: someone added a few more!!!

anyways, that's the show!!! 1. i may or may not be trying 2 figure out how to pull off one of the other northeast dates (looking @ Cleveland, which is closer but i'd have to drive to, or New York, which is further (+ yknow.. dealing w getting around in NY) but i could take a bus to, this weekend/next week as we speak,,,, that's how freakin good and homey (more on that in the tags aka uhh literal diary section of this post) and impactful this show was.

and 2. if any of this (especially said tags) sounds loopy it sure is because i wrote most of this at roughly four am last night post show, when i was even moreso still back *at* the show in my head. i still stand by all of it though of course, i just know it might not be the most coherent.

this tour rocks. AG's tunes mean so much to me. get out 2 a show!!! tell me about your experiences if ya do/did!!!! yay!!!!

[womanhood2]

Can I ask/what led you to transitioning twice? If you've already answered then feel free to link me so you don't have to type it all out again! Thank you

No problem! I did type up a brief “about me” a few months ago when I started this blog, but I forgot to pin it and I don’t think it went very in-depth about my initial transition so I will go ahead and re-tell it in better depth.

I do want to clarify that my first transition was entirely social, and thus my first “detransition” would be considered desisting and not a formal, medical “detransition”. However, I say that I “detransitioned twice” to clarify that I changed my identity from and back to female on two separate occasions, as I feel like saying “desisted and detransitioned” could lead some people to believe that I simply started identifying as female and stopped hormones only once and at the same time.

But back to my initial transition. As I mentioned it was entirely social and almost entirely online, save for one person I knew in real life (my at-the-time boyfriend). This was 2014-2017 and in the rural American south- transgender was NOT a thing in our mainstream (by 2017 there were occasional mentions of it but it was still rather obscure and certainly not something that happened in middle or elementary schools).  Homosexual relationships were barely tolerated. I should mention I was also a closeted lesbian/bisexual- I didn’t know at the time that those two labels were different, but I knew that I liked girls in a much different way than I “liked”(envied and wanted to be friends with) boys. The only reason I had the “boyfriend” that I mentioned earlier was so that I could make friends with more boys, as girls did NOT like me. This was for multiple reasons: 1) I was an undiagnosed autistic. I only “knew” how to talk about arthropods, horses, and anime. The preppy rich girls at the private k-12 school that I earned a scholarship to did not want to talk about any of those 2) as I mentioned before, I was a “scholarship student”(aka someone who did not have much money and was from a family that lived “out in the country”) which meant that I did not go on interesting vacations, have a boat that everyone could hang out on, wear super expensive clothes and makeup, ect and 3) (once everyone found out) I was a lesbian. Girls did not want to be near me once they learned that I had a crush on another girl. I will not go into heavy detail but there was also an incident where multiple girls who were part of a Christian worship group attacked me after school for being a lesbian. (That was not the only time I was attacked at school for not being straight, but the other time was by a boy. That time was more intense and the school got involved and I came within a hair of being outed to my parents.) On top of this, my family was HEAVILY involved in the Baptist church, and thus not open to anyone (let alone their child) being LGBT

So clearly, being openly gay or transgender was NOT an option in my environment if I valued my safety. Also, no child wants to loose the home and family that they love! Even if you are uncomfortable in your body and jealous every day of the boys that you go to school with, you are 12 (or 13 or 14 or 15) and you would still rather have a bed to sleep in at night and food and parents that do not hit you most of the time than nothing. (That is another trend I tend to see with these openly trans children- none of them seem to have parents who would hit or abuse them for “acting out of line”, “associating that with our family”, ect…. Heh, they really don’t know “oppression”.)

So what was I to do in such a hostile environment? Go to the Internet of course! Online forums where I first learned of being transgender and already had transgender friends there- except some of my irl friend already knew my account names, and I couldn’t risk them telling their parents. So I made new accounts on the same sites but with a different name, pronouns, and often a different age. Eventually I told my online friends about my new accounts, but kept them hidden from my irl friends so that my irl friends only knew my first account (where I was a girl) and my online friends interacted with my through my new account (where I was a boy). I firmly believed that I was supposed to be a boy, and thought that when I got away from my parents, I would be able to transition and all my problems would be solved. Every night I would pray to God that he would make me intersex or make my body produce more testosterone somehow, so that I would look and sound more like a boy, since it would be years before I would be able to transition. I would “practice binding” using methods I saw online (such as the “sports bra method”) when my parents were asleep. (TRIGGER WARNING FOR SELF HARM) I should mention that I also experienced severe dysphoria involving my genitals, and would self harm them.

I should note that I WAS seeing a therapist at the time but she only diagnosed me with social anxiety (not even autism! Despite me telling her about how every child in my school hated me and I had no friends) and eventually for the abuse that my siblings and I were experiencing from our parents (my stepmom specifically would become violent towards me and later my brother during my middle and early high school years). So why didn’t I tell her about the gender dysphoria and self harm? Simple! We were still in the south, and she was a……. You guessed it! Christian “therapist”. 🫠

Right before high school (I was 15) I went on a field trip where I had to spend a lot of time with the girls in my grade. It made me soooooo dysphoric but I could not tell anyone because of the risk that it posed to my safety if my parents found out. I was terrified and so convinced that all the girls somehow knew that I was actually trans, even though I was still dressing (somewhat) like a girl and using a girls name. I thought that they knew that I knew I was trans, and they hated me for continuing to pretend to be a girl. Being with the boys during the times that I could on that trip made me feel so much better. It relieved me to pretend to be one of them, even if from the shadows. That trip really “cemented” in me that I was actually a boy, so when I got home from the trip I decided that I needed to break the news to my boyfriend (we were not allowed to have our phones for the duration of the trip). I don’t remember the conversation very well, but it went something like this.

Me: Hey, I love you and I need to tell you something

Him: Sure, what is it?

Me: I’m pretty sure I am actually a boy.

Him: No you are not.

Me: I really think I am. None of the girls like me and I don’t act like a girl or enjoy girly things. I am sorry if you don’t love me for this.

Him: I would love you even if you were a boy, but you’re not a boy. I am a boy, so if you were a boy I would know. If you tell everyone that you are a boy, then the boys will try to hurt you. I want don’t want to see you be hurt, especially by my friends. Please don’t tell anyone that you think you’re a boy.

It hurt me to hear from my closest friend that he did not believe I was a boy, and that boys/men would not accept me as one of them. However, this did not change my mind. I knew that we were in high school and this boyfriend would probably break up with me eventually. But I did heed his advice and continued not to tell anyone in real life that I believed I was a transgender boy/man.

As for my first detransition/desisting… It’s kind of hard to explain. I remember it but it was rather insignificant compared to what I’ve heard other people go through. It was maybe a year after I “came out” to the now ex-boyfriend. I was in the hallway in my school. The boys were walking past me and I realized they were taller than me now. I was jealous, so jealous, as my hight dysphoria was probably the most intense (possibly second to the genital dysphoria) dysphoria that I experienced. And then I just… made the realization. I realized that at this point it was too late for testosterone already. If I wanted to have a man’s body, I would have needed the hormones years ago. By the time I would be able to get hormones and be able to transition, it would already be too late. I would never catch up. What was the point of chasing something unattainable?

So I went inactive on my trans accounts. I did give my new discord (where I would be cis) to some of the people who knew me on those accounts but it was only very few, only 2 or 3 of which I still talk to today.

Internally, it was a slow process. It started with just joking about being a girl. Then eventually, one day I went into the women’s restroom and realized I didn’t feel like an imposter! Then the “women in STEM” craze came along and I realized maybe I could feel more like a women with these girls. I learned to love my tiny breasts once they started to develop. I learned that not shaving my facial or body hair (something that I had always HATED being forced to do) did not make me more of a man or less of a woman. I still have dysphoria involving my hips, height, and genitals.

So that was my first transition and desisting. I did not expect it to be so long! As for my second transition and consequent detransition, it is unfortunately darker, and involves sexual abuse, manipulation, and drugs and thus I will be making a second post about it since this one is already quite lengthy and contains some heavy content.

[zunra2]

Chell’s Memories

I don’t remember everything about my life before the day I stepped out of that cryo-pod and me GLaDOS. Brain damage will do that to you.

The farthest back I can really remember was when I was seven. It was a few days before the Aperture Science Science Fair For Young Girls. I was crying because I didn’t want to make a potato battery for the science fair because I had already done one in school. I wanted to do something that would impress my mom and dad and all the scientists, maybe even Mr. Johnson himself. But my dad just told me that Cave Johnson would be mad, and that was that. 

…that was the last time I ever gave up on something. Every Science fair for the next seven years was not a potato battery. Granted, they weren’t exactly GOOD science projects, but they were different, and that was all I cared about. It drove a rift between me and my parents. Well, it deepened one that was already there. I knew why. They weren’t that good at hiding it. It was pretty obvious I had some Asian genes, and neither of them had any. It was pretty obvious in retrospect, but I was never mad about it. 

When I turned fourteen, I finally got to stop doing those stupid science fairs and start testing. I only ever got to test with this crappy camera called an “Aperture Science Handheld Atomizing Camera”. It had some strange ability to turn objects into photos and back again. I never really understood it and it never really worked. But I never gave up, and by when I turned eighteen, I left Aperture with a small legacy. Not much, but something. I did miss Ms. Caroline, though. She was always nice.

I didn’t find many jobs on my own. Turns out a stubborn, grumpy jerk with raggedy hair wasn’t exactly a prime candidate for employment for anything but a Waffle House. So I ended up crawling back to Aperture at the age of twenty-four and got the amazing, highly-upheld, adored position of….. part-time janitor. I worked there for a year, my smugly quiet ass just sitting there, silently judging everyone and making fun of them in my head. In retrospect, I only made one real friend. Dr. Horatio Allen. He was a kind person, even though he looked like he hadn’t gotten sleep in years. And I still shunned him, not saying much. I thought “Maybe I am too stubborn”. But that didn’t last long.

On bring your daughter to work day, everything went to shit. Neurotoxin emitters online, chaos. Most of the employees were killed instantly. They were the lucky ones. I and about two thousand others had the unfortunate fate of ending up as test subjects.

I didn’t know how long I spent in that first cryo-tube. Could be decades, could be hours. In any case, I woke up. I was livid. Mad at the world, and mad at GLaDOS. I didn’t make a sound. Not even as I used the portal gun. Not even as I escaped from the “Victory Candescence”. Not even as I took down GLaDOS. Not even as I was dragged back into the facility. 

And then I was asleep again. If I had to guess for how long, I’d say about five centuries. I woke up with a clouded head and burning body. Everything hurt. And there he was. Making light of my brain damage. I did feel alarm, but not too much. I did feel emotionally connected to him. And yet, I still kept my mouth closed. I even sassed him by jumping when he asked me to speak.

…I regret that. I could blame the centuries of being frozen, I could spend hours rattling off reasons or excuses, but… I can’t. It was all me. I hurt him. I didn’t catch him. I didn’t tell him that it was me who killed GLaDOS. I didn’t even speak to him. And I still considered him a friend. I didn’t notice how small and helpless he felt. How insignificant. And then… I couldn’t grab him. I was so angry and furious at him for so long, but when he flew out of my grasp… all that resentment went with him. I finally spoke, calling out his name. But it was swallowed by the vast abyss. I didn’t even hear it.

I have a recurring dream. In it, I am holding onto Wheatley. I am being blown into space, barely able to hang on. GLaDOS’ arm reaches out and grabs me. Wheatley slips from my grasp. But this time… I reach out and catch him. I hold him close, apologizing. Saying I forgive him, and that I’m sorry. I wake up holding my Companion Cube, tears streaming down my face.

GLaDOS… what about her? She seemed so cruel. So bitter. I almost felt bad for her that she had to resort to such meaningless insults. Fat? We both know that’s not true. Adopted? Who cares? I was angry at her, but seeing her turned into a potato, a core that couldn’t even move on its own… I felt bad. Seeing her realize the truth about herself… it was odd. Hearing her horror stories about having cores stuck to her… it made me surprisingly sympathetic towards her. When she deleted Caroline… it stung more that I thought it would… and when she gave me back the cube…

I started crying. Sobbing. I couldn’t take it anymore. The shit I had been through was overwhelming. Where would I go from here? All I had was a portal gun and a cube. But… I never give up. Ever. Even when it looks like all is lost, I keep going. Because I’m a stubborn bitch.

So I kept walking. I saw remnants of concrete here and there, signs of a past apocalypse. Signs that maybe I had been better off in Aperture. I knew there were humans out here. I was sure of it. But the first “human” I came across wasn’t exactly… friendly. They had something attached to their head, and they were approaching me fast. I used the grip of the portal gun and my cube to bash it over the head. I eventually did come across a peaceful village of people and these strange one-eyed creatures. I didn’t speak their language, but they seemed interested in my portal gun.

I decided to live with them. It was easy enough overcome the language barrier. I learned a few words. Their language was similar to English in a way. I never became fluent in the six years I’ve lived with them.

And then I left. The humans and…. Vortigaunts? Liked me a lot, and I didn’t want to hurt them. I just left them a message saying I’m leaving to find more people and more places. In reality… I’m dying.

Repulsion Gel, Conversion Gel, Asbestos, Material Emancipation Grills, Blunt Force Trauma, Brain Damage… the list goes on. I started coughing blood a week ago. I left and started heading in any direction. I still haven’t found a way out of this wheat field. It’s night now…

I reach up into the sky and look towards space. There’s a full moon tonight.

“… i’m sorry…”

I can’t speak anymore. My whole body aches. My lungs burn. I’m so tired…

…

AAAAAUUHGHHH RRRAAGGHHHH WHY MUS YOU DO THSI TO ME I RECOVERRD FROM THE POST CREDITS SCEEN and THE YOU HIT ME WITH IT AGAIN AUAUUGHHH 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

jokes aside you’re writing is amazing!!! feel free to send me any more fics you have! ◡̈