#but the rights issues are fascinating!

[overthinkinglotr]

RE: Amazon's Lord of the Rings series: I think this excellent video from Sarah z -- about the way that right-wing backlash against certain media properties makes it nearly impossible to have genuine conversations about them, because you can't talk about them in good faith without inadvertently adding to the right-wing dogpile of people criticizing them for racist sexist reasons -- conveys pretty much everything I should probably say about it ladjflksdfs. Sarah Z makes a great point that this kind of vicious right-wing backlash often tends to deliberately focus media properties that are mediocre because of other reasons (like boring corporate mandates) and claim they're mediocre because of diversity. Right-wingers intentionally ignore properties that have diversity and are Good, and intentionally ignore the billions of shows/movies that aren't "woke" but are also similarly mediocre. Because right-wingers don't actually care about the "quality of art" unless they can use that as a weapon to attack the people they hate.

[fictionadventurer]

Maybe the problem with Christian fiction is that it's non-denominational. People are just "Christian", with no effort put into showing what practicing that religion looks like for them specifically. No indication that there are other Christians who could have different beliefs. No wrestling with differing ideas and the struggle of how one should live out their Christian faith. And that makes it unrealistic and unrelatable.

[apotelesmaa]

I don’t think ppl give enough credit to rui for his dedication to fucking with people (outside of tsukasa of course) like. Knowing & acknowledging that nene wants nothing to do with him and Tsukasa on her first day of second year and deliberately following tsukasa to loudly ask if she’s getting along with people (just to be a jackass)? Implying his gift to akito will explode even though it won’t bc he wants to bug akito? Like I think rui at his core is full of love and a desire to make ppl smile but I also think he’s 200% committed to the bit first and foremost. If something will be funny he’s going to do it regardless of the consequences. Guy filled with zero social anxiety & a never ending desire to embarrass his friends.

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Thinking about step 9 and the whole concept of forgiveness of one’s self and others and it bringing healing and how bobby and Eddie have been paralleled a fair amount and the idea that Eddie started this process back at the end of s5 with his forgiveness and acceptance of his father but how he hasn’t yet gone anywhere near his mother and their relationship .

How his catholic guilt storyline seems more likely to play on his reltionship with his mother than his father (if his father wasn’t around that much it would’ve been Helena taking him to church etc each week) so the idea of an Eddie - Helena storyline that plays on catholic guilt and potentially his queerness in relation to that has me chewing on glass - it could be so epically good

[cyclone-rachel]

[incesthemes]

as i've rewatched seasons 1 and 2 of supernatural i've been pondering and hypothesizing reasons why john was so adamant on not letting sam know about his destiny. why he was so intent on keeping this secret, why he didn't want sam knowing about monsters, why his role in their hunts appeared to be research-oriented and thus away from the action. my perspective on ignorance and censorship is that it enables further harm, so if john were going to effectively protect sam, it would stand to reason that sam should have a comprehensive understanding of his destiny and what he's up against: give him the tools to fight.

this is obviously not the route john went, so then i have to question why that is—what about censorship was so appealing to him that he thought it not only the best way to keep sam safe, but perhaps even the only way to keep him safe, based on how he begged even dean to keep sam's fate a secret from him in his final words?

so i got to thinking. namely, about the fact that azazel wants sam to be hunting: he killed jessica with the intent to drag him back into the life, which implies that if sam is hunting, he is going down the path azazel wants him to go—he's following his destiny. this aligns with the everpresent theme throughout season 1 that hunting is a monstrous lifestyle, that hunting turns people into monsters. if sam is destined to become a monster, then hunting is the most sure-fire way to get him there.

if azazel wants sam to hunt, then john would need to take the logical opposition and keep sam out of hunting—so, he wouldn't tell sam about monsters until he has to, he'd give sam more passive roles once sam is participating in hunts, he'd train sam in self-defense but not explain why. and importantly, he wouldn't talk about mary, who is the root cause of this lifestyle, the impetus for their revenge quest, more than he has to. if the goal is to keep sam as far away from hunting as possible, and if john is someone who thinks ignorance keeps someone safe, then this more or less explains most of how sam was raised: on the fringes of the family, excluded and sheltered.

but weirdly enough, it wasn't until i was reading east of eden the other night that i finally understood the perspective being presented: late in the novel, the character lee says "when the first innocence is gone, you can't stop."

it made me remember that sam picks. he is a character who wants to understand the world around him and his place in it. if something is bothering him, he turns it over in his head until it consumes him. dean places doubt in sam's head in 2x10 and it obliterates him by 2x11. he's convinced he's going to become some horrible monster because he never stops thinking and trying to figure things out. when his memory is wiped in 4x17 and normal guy sam wesson finds out his coworker is the guy from his weird dreams, he pursues him relentlessly until they're back hunting. when he discovers the wall death put in his mind to keep his hell trauma out in season 6, he pushes and can't stop until it starts crumbling around him. he's intelligent and clever and he wants to know everything. and when he doesn't know, he picks.

and the only way to stop a person like that from picking is to not let them know that there's something to pick at in the first place. that's what the quote from east of eden means: once you catch wind of something, you want to pursue it until you're satisfied. curiosity kills the cat.

and what john is up against is fate itself. something that isn't supposed to be messed with, something that's supposed to be unavoidable. so trying to thwart it is tricky business. he has to be careful.

i think working under that logic his response makes sense, even if it wound up being a self-fulfilling prophecy anyway—sam was always going to find out, and sam was always going to pick. there was nothing john could do in the end to stop it, and trying to keep sam ignorant only made him that much more desperate to know. but that's the great tragedy of it all: john was given an impossible choice, and he's a deeply flawed character. he did what he thought was best, and it only made things worse.

i like this interpretation because it ties all of john's choices together really well; it explains a lot about his character and gives a nuanced and rather reasonable explanation for why he did what he did: a dad who wants the best for his kid does what he believes will set him up on the path to success. when the first innocence is gone, you can't stop—so john does his damnedest to keep sam innocent, even to his dying breath.

the problem comes down to that someone's damnedest isn't always good enough, and that sometimes someone's damnedest ends up benefiting the enemy instead.

[heliotrope155]

Found it fascinating in the Djinn vision that John was dead in this idyllic little paradise. And I suspect it's because Dean "my parents marriage was only perfect after she died" Winchester knew in the back of his mind that had John and Mary lived, they'd have been a normal, but painfully terrible couple that had frequent arguments, still parentified Dean (to a much lesser extent) in looking after Mary when John upset her, probably divided the brothers, as Sam would've still wanted out and retreated from the bickering and Dean would've tried and gotten involved. A happy but deeply complicated and strained family that never ended up getting anything remotely like a divorce and made it everyone's problem.

[corfisers]

love when he just Lies

[controlaltdelete-my-existence]

i know i rag on light a lot but the big monologue hits different

[giftedpoison]

watching my sister outwardly preach morality and right vs wrong, not only to me in arguments about things that have nothing to do with her, but also on her social media page where she is very aggressive and vicious towards people who don't share her views or who she perceives to be inherently malicious, and rather than treat them with kindness she treats them with aggression.

meanwhile she has never done a deep reflection on what right vs wrong is, and clearly has a very black and white mentality about it that is inherently distorted because nothing is black and white.

and i refuse to even engage with it anymore because i'm not going to stand there and let someone scream at me and tell me she hopes i die for merely trying to point out her own hypocrisy.

like pick up a book on philosophy i beg of thee. and just sit with it. don't take it as a metric to lead your life by but take it as a theory to mull with and play with. for fucks sake watch The Good Place or The 100 if reading philosophy isn't your thing. or read the Vicious duology by V.E. Schwab, or read Tokyo Ghoul by Sui Ishida. or No Longer Human by Dazi or read anything that remotely discusses the complexities of feeling like a monster or being alienated in society/media about good vs evil. (my examples in media are thin, despite it being my favorite narrative device because i genuinely am blanking)

like learn that right and wrong is fluid and to not condemn people because they do something you personally wouldn't do. it is not your place to dictate how others live, and if you want people to grow to share your opinion you can't force them with vitriol and you most definitely won't be the deciding factor in why someone might come around to your belief system.

[quietwingsinthesky]

obsessed with the idea of the doctor and the master standing together in opposition to gallifrey post-end of time. less in it being the reality of the situation, and more in it being what the master perceives it to be in the immediate aftermath of being. well. told he was going to be disposed of. the combination of that rejection with the doctor choosing him, the way that sets them up with a common enemy. but where that enemy for the master becomes gallifrey in the abstract with the council as the face of it, the doctor never sees it that way, never thinks of it as the two of them against their own world. the doctor, crucially, kept count of the children. when he saves gallifrey, it isn’t about the master at all, not to anyone but the master themself. because how are they supposed to take the doctor choosing gallifrey over them as anything other than a betrayal.

[britneyshakespeare]

if i were george duke of clarence and you were my assassin you would really feel something while i'm pleading for my life right? if i were george duke of clarence imprisoned on my brother the king's suspicion and my other brother richard duke of gloucester sent you to murder me for rich reward, you would at least think of not killing me right? you'd hesitate forsooth? which of you if you were a prince's son being pent from liberty as i am now if two such murderers as yourselves came to you would not entreat for life? a begging prince what beggar pities not?

[blujayonthewing]

Indigo will tell people he lost his eye wagering it in a poker match with a sea hag (bullshit) but has never told anyone that the crystal inside his false eye was a gift from the ancient dragon who personally taught him magic and astronomy at the top of a mountain (completely true)

[age-of-moonknight]

“Soldier,” Vengeance of the Moon Knight (Vol. 2/2024), #3.

Writer: Jed MacKay; Penciler and Inker: Alessandro Cappuccio; Colorist: Rachelle Rosenberg; Letterer: Cory Petit

[deathbind]

Dear god I put one toe in the tags and immediately had to yank it back like there were rabid piranhas

[lanaevyssmoved]

i hate how prevalent the use of AI has become in the modding community especially for bg3, there's even mods that replace the narrator's voice with AI generated ones

it's never gonna reach the level of skyrim ai modding, which has gone so far that you can have ai conversations with npcs and ai can generate entire quests for you as you play, but it is definitely quite popular and it is disappointing.

unfortunately the amount of people who find ai to be a fascinating tool that changes the landscape of well... everything entirely will always outweigh people who understand how dangerous and irresponsible it is. the average view of it is 'wow this is amazing' and they will always outnumber us.