#but only if you're there to see it

[apollos-olives]

before october 7th this blog was a meme page btw.

[helluo-librorums]

My snapchat memories serve as a constant reminder that life is always changing. I had a memory pop up recently that I couldn't believe was a year ago already. I am currently living the life I was wishing for a year ago. I never thought that day would come, and here I am. It's truly amazing how things change before our very eyes w/o us even noticing.

Don't give up on yourself. One day your life might just surprise you

[warriorbarnes]

this had me crying real tears

[constantlyfalling]

They're keeping watch. The bestest guard.

[inkskinned]

he says i hate everyone except you and that is addictive and that is kind of romantic and beautiful because you're young and you're kind of a sarcastic asshole too and you don't like bad boys, per say, but you don't really like good ones either. and you like that you were the exception, it felt like winning.

except life is not a romance book, and he was kind of being honest. he doesn't learn to be nice to your friends. he only tolerates your family. you have to beg him to come with you to birthday parties, he complains the whole time. you want to go on a date but - people are often there, wherever you're going. he's just so angry. about everything, is the thing. in the romance book, doesn't he eventually soften? can't you teach him, through your own sense of whimsy and comfort?

at first - you know introverts often need smaller friend groups, and honestly, you're fine staying at home too. you like the small, tidy life you occupy. you're not going to punish him for his personality type.

except: he really does hate everyone but you. which means he doesn't get along with his therapist. which means he has no one to talk to except for you. which means you take care of him constantly, since he otherwise has no one. which means you sometimes have to apologize for him. which means he keeps you home from seeing your friends because he hates them. you're the single exception.

about a decade from this experience, you'll type into google: how to know if a relationship is codependent.

he wraps an arm around you. i hate everyone except you. these days, you're learning what he's actually confessing is i have very little practice being kind.

[vaguely-concerned]

sometimes I think of all the on-the-surface warm, well-meaning but deeply ineffectual advice and attention john gives harrow through harrow the ninth (make some soup and get some sleep! get a hobby! don't be so hard on yourself! self care harrow! as long as I need take no actual responsibility in this relationship whatsoever I would have loved to be your dad!) set up against the stark truth that with his other hand he has been staging her attempted horrific murder again and again and again like a living nightmare on the logic that it will 'put her down or fix her'. and then I find that I wish there is a hell. a special hell where twitch streamers turned necromantic death emperors go

[golyadkin]

I cannot express enough that if your reaction, as a hobby artist, to not getting that many notes on your art is to say "maybe I should just stop doing art altogether" you need to stop posting art to tumblr

not necessarily forever, not even for long, but just stop putting your art on here and start doing it for you again, remember why you enjoyed doing art in the first place and stop relying on the attention of faceless people on the internet for your enjoyment of your hard work

believe me, I get it, nothing crushes the artistic soul quite like labouring for hours on a piece only for it to get like 10 notes, so you need to find your own source of joy in the act of creation and a lot of the time that means making art and not showing it to anybody

[akanemnon]

To see or not to see...

First - Previous - Next

MASTERPOST (for the full series / FAQ / reference sheets)

[rjalker]

Dear people who aren't physically disabled who plan to write fantasy settings:

[ID: Several images taken from the Geordi La Forge yes and no meme format, with Geordi holding out a hand disapprovingly for the no section, then pointing in approval for the yes section.

The first image is the meme:

No: "Saying the existance of magic in your setting means there are no disabled people (this literally just means disabled people are killed. AKA eugenics)"

Yes: "Having disabled people who use magical mobility aids and other assistive devices. Realizing that someone is still disabled even if their prosthetic arm is made of magic instead of plastic."

This is followed by four more panels of yes section:

"Geordi la Forge is still literally disabled. His visor helping him does not erase his disability and make him magically abled."

"Toph from Avatar: The Last Airbender is still literally disabled even though her Earthbending helps her. It does not make her disability ~magically~ go away."

"Having your disability be accomodated does not mean the disability goes away. Having a prosthetic hand, even one that's made of magic, does not mean you're not disabled."

"Magical mobility aids do not mean disabled people don't exist. It just means they use magical mobility aids instead of plastic or metal ones. A limb made of magic is still a prosthetic even if it's made of the soul of the universe instead of plastic and metal."

Then another no panel: "'There's no disabled people beacuse magic'".

Then one last yes panel: "'Magic helps disabled people in a variety of ways'".

End ID.]

This also applies to science fiction; just because Luke Skywalker's prosthetic hand is super advanced doesn't mean it's no longer a prosthetic, or that he's not disabled. Same with Darth Vader - just because he has a suit that lets him breathe and walk around doesn't mean he's not disabled. (And Star Wars' propensity for making the villains visibly disabled while the heroes disabilities get covered up by super advanced prosthetics is a topic that deserves its own post, especially with how ableist some of the authors of the books are. Troy Denning is especially ableist)

Edit:

Because people keep being fucking obnoxious and ableist in the tags, yes,,, motherfuckers, if you refuse to have disabled people in your setting, that does make you fucking ableist. If you say that the magic is used to cure all disabled people and that's why they don't exist, that's fucking eugenics.

You cannot ""cure"", more like remove all disabilities without fucking eugenics. Magically automatically destroying disabled fetuses (a very fucking popular trope!) is eugenics.

The only way to fucking "cure" autism is to fucking kill all autistic people, also known as eugenics!

What about people with PTSD? Do you just fucking brainwash them so they aren't traumatized anymore?

Do you force all Deaf people to be able to hear? Do you force all blind people to be able to see? Do you force all anosmics to be able to smell?

Do you magically force everyone with a speech impediment to speak to your standards?

Do you force everyone born with bodily or facial differences to live up to your fucking standard of beauty?

You cannot fucking say "disablities don't exist in this universe because magic cures everything" without inherently saying that eugenics exists in your fucking universe.

Not all fucking disabilities need a cure. If you ""cured"" my autism I'd just be fucking dead. You'd literally just be changing me into what you think is fucking acceptable.

Stop fucking arguing in defence of ableists on my fucking post so you can pretend that eugenics has never been written about in magical settings when it is extremely fucking prevalent.

And while we're fucking at it, let your gods damned characters become disabled over the course of their story, and call them disabled within the fucking story. I don't care if they're a robot. I don't care if they have magic. Not all fucking damage can be fixed. Curses exist. Hardware can go out of fucking date and no longer be manufactured anywhere.

Let your characters become disabled and do not magically fucking cure them back to brand new every single time they get hurt. The only thing you accomplish by doing that is destroying any chance of ever having stakes.

No, "magical healing leaves scars on the mind from the memory of the injuries though!!!!" is not fucking good enough. Let your characters have scars. Let them become disabled. Stop being fucking ableist cowards.

Edit number fucking 2:

No, motherfuckers, you do not get to comment "if the disability was caused by magic it's not ableist to cure it with magic". You are the ableist this post is about. Shut the absolute fuck up, stop treating being disabled as the worst possible outcome, and just admit you're a fucking ableist. If you don't want your characters to become disabled, then don't fucking make them disabled.

[ID: The Garfield "you are not immune to propaganda" meme, now edited to read:

"If your first thought upon reading this post is, 'Oh, but it's okay to magically cure disabilities caused by magic!' Congrats…you are the exact sort of ableist jackass this post is about."

End ID.]

Edit number fucking 3:

Autistic people exist! People who are born with disabilities exist! You cannot create a setting where disabled people do not exist because we're all "cured" or "fixed" and not inherently say that you are killing disabled people as soon as they're born, or fucking aborting us as soon as you figure out we'd be born disabled! That's fucking eugenics!

There is no way to "cure" autism without eugenics! There is no way to "cure" people with body differences without eugenics! There is no way to make disabled people nonexistant in your setting without eugenics! Thinking you can and should "cure" and "fix" all disabilities IS EUGENICS!

Also:

[ID: A character shouting at the camera, now edited to read: "Shut up about Dungeons and Dragons! Shut up about Dungeons and Dragons! If the rules of Dungeons and Dragons are ableist, then fucking change them! It is your fucking personal responsability to be a better person than your bigoted society wants you to be!". End ID.]

[ID: White text on a dark brown background with white and black borders around the edges, that reads:

"I don't fucking know or care about Dungeons and Dragons.

This post is not about Dungeons and Dragons.

Do not fucking throw the rulebook of Dungeons and Dragons at me like it's some sort of 'Gotcha!'.

You will literally just be blocked like the rest of the ableist assholes who've already tried it.

If you play dungeons and dragons, it's your responsability to make your games not be ableist, even if it means breaking the rules.".

End ID.]

I do not fucking care what the ableist rules are in Dungeons of Dragons. Do not fucking throw ableist rules for a game I have never and will never play at me on a post I made so that people could learn how to make their settings less ableist. If the rules in Dungeons and Dragons are ableist, then fucking change them. If you don't want to change them, then stop fucking playing an ableist game.

Disabled people deserve to see ourselves represented in fiction just like everyone else, without any fucking requirements that we be "cured" or "fixed" before the story ends.

How the fuck would you feel if a trans and gay character's whole story revolved around going on a quest to become straight and cis, did so, and only then was allowed to live happily ever after?

Why do you fucking think suggesting people write stories about disabled people going on a quest to be cured because it's the only way they'll ever be happy is any less fucking offensive?

Also:

This post is NOT a place for you to talk about how disabled people in fiction should have the option of curing their disabilities. It's just not. That's the fucking default for this society. That is not a revolutionary concept. It's not novel. We fucking know this society wants us gone. A post about how disabled people deserve representation is not the place to talk about how "Well, actually, in fiction disabled people should be cured!" Like that's not the fucking universal default???????????

Edit #4:

Everyone needs to stop tagging this singing praise for Fullmetal Alchemist. A story that uses disability as a punishment and the characters are on a quest to cure their disabilities is not the amazing representation you're all claiming it is just because the character who is only disabled because of DIVINE PUNISHMENT uses prosthetics.

Read this post, and this one. Fullmetal Alchemist is a hell of a lot more ableist than you people are letting on.

guess what you can now find a PDF version of this post on the web archive.

Edit #5! August 23rd, 2023!

A) Everyone. Disabilities that can only exist in the magical setting are still disabilities.

Trying to cure the younger brother's magical disability of being a soul floating around in a magical suit of armour is, in fact, going on a quest to heal a disability!

It doesn't matter if the older brother doesn't want to get his limbs back when they're going on a quest to heal the younger brother's disability! Especially when they BOTH get magically healed at the end!

Magical disabilities that can only exist in that setting, but not real life, are still disabilities, and it's not okay to magically heal them either! What part of the Garfield meme on this post did you all choose to ignore?!

B) When you leave tags on a post you are reblogging, the original poster can see them! When you leave tags on this post, I can see them!

If you think this post is ""too aggressive"" then simply do not reblog it! Don't fucking tone police me on a post I've had to edit five times now due to the constant ableism people have been commenting since I made it!

I have been called the R slur by multiple people in response to this post! People have literally reblogged this post to defend eugenics abortions! You can't see these comments or replies anymore because I blocked the poster!

If you think minorities are being too aggressive by responding appropriately to bigotry, you're a bigot! And you should either not reblog the post at all, or at the very least, shut the fuck up and not tone police us!

Do not fucking put tags on this post complaining I'm being too aggressive! That's called tone policing and you're a bigot if you do it! Don't fucking do it on anyone else's posts either! They can see your tags too!

C) When I fucking say Harry Potter fans are banned from this post, yes, this means YOU!

Either stop supporting a billionaire who's literally using the profits from her bigoted shittily written books to fund REAL FUCKING GENOCIDE, or fuck off!

By continuing to support the Harry Potter series, you are literally giving JK Rowling free fucking advertising! You are encouraging more people to read the series and watch the movies, spending more money and giving her more fucking money with which to LITERALLY SHAPE A COUNTRY'S LAWS TO COMMIT GENOCIDE. She is literally fucking fighting to make being trans illegal! She is literally fucking fighting to have even more of autistic people's rights taken away!

You cannot fucking be a fan of the Harry Potter series in 2023 and call yourself an ally to all the minorities harmed by JK Rowling and the bigotry baked into her shitty series!

Read another book! The Web Archive has tons you can read for free! Literally every single book on gutenberg.org/ is free! Including audiobooks for some of them!

If you write Harry Potter fanfiction, simply fucking get rid of the names and identifiable features and start writing original fiction instead! It's literally free!

Not supporting a literal fucking genocidal billionaire costs LITERALLY NOTHING! And if you refuse to fucking stop supporting JK Rowling, which is what you are doing when you support the Harry Potter series and squeal over her OCs, you are not an ally to any fucking minority! No! Not even if you're trans yourself!

= = =

Edit again Nobember 28th 2023 because this comment is just. such a perfect example for all of you that think this doesn't happen.

butter-whore2 said, two hours before this edit:

kind of a fan of tumblr's slightly more algorithmically elements for reminding me of the hell's other people construct for themselves but this one hits like five of the boxes. How do people do this to themselves? it's such a bizarre way to act over media I genuinely do not believe is capable of stirring an emotional response the metaphysics of disability here are unintentionally really funny but disability is not a coherent ontological framework, it's a vague descriptor for literally thousands of different things none of which lend themselves to categorizing Moralizing over fiction is incredibly lame.

Liking harry potter is also incredibly lame, it's not morally wrong nor transphobic and you do not get to decide that lol. people literally do get "cured" of their disabilities all the time, many of them have a positive experience in doing so. this is not what eugenics is.

the anti abortion stuff lol

Literally how do you live like this? you guys don't even read real books I don't get it.

Archived version of the comment for posterity.

So yeah, lofl, block this fucker.

[temeyes]

quickie w/ gaz!! missed drawing my boyfieeeeeee

[probablybadrpgideas]

Just came up with the concept that elves have a larval growth cycle and their larval stage is a goblin.

Then I came up with the better concept that goblins have a larval growth cycle and their larval stage is an elf.

[ladeldee]

I like to think now, every time they look up and see each other they just can't help but happily greet one another

[bitegore]

Zionists want you to conflate Judaism and Zionism. Zionists want you to believe that Judaism cannot exist without Zionism and that all Jews are Zionists. Zionism would have Jews believe that a Jewish state is the only way that they can be safe from antisemitism and will point to any instance of antisemitism as proof that Zionism is the solution- so Zionism wants gentiles to be antisemitic in their support of Palestine. They want you to conflate all Jews with Zionism and the state of Israel, and they want you to treat all Jews regardless of political affiliation as the face of Israel. Antizionist Jews exist, and incidences of antisemitism ostensibly acting against Zionism will not help dismantle the forces propping Zionism up.

Don't do their work for them.

[autoraton]

same as it never was.

[infiniteorangethethird]

I don't know where this "if you don't feel love/empathy you're evil" idea comes from like if you can only be decent towards people if you love them/feel empathy towards them then I'm pretty sure I'm not the one mistreating more people of the two of us

[nuclearanomaly]

He didn't get the memo...