#but then again... they are kind of valid

[neonhairspray]

...

[stil-lindigo]

in a little over 2 weeks, I've made enough book sales to donate almost ~$10,000 to Palestinian causes! This means donations to:

MAP (Medical Aid for Palestinians)

PCRF (Palestinian Children's Relief Fund)

CareforGaza

ANERA

Safebow (which is currently working to evacuate over 50 Palestinians before Ramadan)

and a bunch of miscellaneous Palestinian escape funds on Gofundme.

I'm incredibly grateful and humbled by the response to my books on this website, and would just like to emphasise that my policy of donating 100% of my profits from my store(s) to Palestine is INDEFINITE. Pick up a book or print any time and know that your money is going to a good cause!

Thank you again, and free Palestine!

STORE (BUY MY BOOKS)

PRINTS

[askblueandviolet]

Do you think you be Mayor could’ve been better friends (orsomethingmore) under different circumstances?

MASTER POST

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[minty364]

DPXDC Prompt #91

Danny was dimension hopping, his original dimension was still there but after his parents disowned him when they found out it wasn’t safe anymore especially with the GIW stepping up their game. Danny just wanted to find a dimension where he could live peacefully after all he was part human and while he loves the infinite realms it wasn’t sustainable in the long run to his human half. He finally finds one where the GIW doesn’t exist at all, but the weird part is there are actual superheroes here. The weirder part is his counterpart in this dimension is part of the Justice League! The bad part is it seems in this dimension the portal fully killed him so how was he supposed to explain to his counterpart that he was half dead.

[tomgrcg]

we've learnt for a fact now that tom feels the full range of human emotions towards greg and that he can't let anyone in or he'll die. so how does he express his emotions? the only way he can let himself. he wants to be a specific kind of person, a roy, and how he is feeling and what he wants to do does not fit in with how these people behave. he doesn’t do it because it’s natural. he does it because he has to. he throws insults at it and tries to wrestle it to the ground but it feels weak because his heart isn’t in it.

neither greg or tom are like the roys at their core. they weren’t raised in it. there are moments of real happiness for the two of them when they’re alone and can just be themselves. there's something different in their relationship dynamic here than the relationships the siblings have. it doesn’t feel as bittersweet because they aren’t as fundamentally broken.

tom is more guarded, of course, he’s received some emotional damage from shiv so he always says or does something to keep greg just far enough away. he’s learnt vulnerability is dangerous. every time he tries to show shiv that he loves her she makes him feel like he’s done it wrong. this season he started behaving in a way that would get through to her but that didn’t feel good to him either, didn’t save him from being fired, nothing.

shiv needed the kind of love tom gave her the same way tom needs what greg gives him. but the difference is tom is more capable of accepting love from people he cares about and wouldn’t hurt greg any deeper than a weak insult, even if he could.

tom knows what it’s like to have to beg for someone who is supposed to care about you to do something for you, so when greg asked if he could possibly save him from going to jail he says load me up without a second thought. he cares about greg’s feelings and would sacrifice something of his own for them and it’s this empathy that tom has that the roy family is lacking.

it’s not hard for tom to think to do something for another person for no reason other than it would make that person feel good. no quid pro quo. but even when tom does do something good for greg he 'can’t stand the good feeling he’s engendered' because he feels like he shouldn’t be doing nice things for no reason.

the nero and sporus scene was tom telling greg he cares about him at all and “come with me, sporus?” was the marriage proposal. greg asks what’s in it for him because that’s how greg works and tom has to say “who has ever looked out for you” instead of “i want you with me”. tom cannot let him know the depth of how he feels so he lets greg think he's using him for something and only merely tolerates him, like everyone else does.

and then, because greg still doesn’t get it, or is choosing to ignore it, tom has to yell “not samson! i want you gregging for me!" he still can’t say the real reason why. the only time he’s shown his real emotions to greg is when he’s alone in a room and greg can’t see his face through the phone.

it's not a perfect relationship. it's not supposed to be. that's why it's so compelling. it’s please don't be better than me i can't stand it but i love you. it’s i’m using you to get somewhere in the world but i’ll still look after you even when i don’t need to anymore. (villainfvcker made a great post about this.)

i’m writing this after episode eight, and if they’re going all the way with greg’s transformation into a roy family member and he betrays tom in some way, it will be another case of a succession character destroying the only real connection they have for some kind of power, and regretting it later.

if anything at all, we know tom really does love greg, and that’s a satisfying enough tomgreg endgame for me, personally.

[natsmagi]

sorry for making yet another textpost but i came across that post saying they dislike transfem natsume because he "canonically hates being perceived as a girl and tries to erase all sorts of memories related to that" and also went on to shame genderbends of him aswell. So, as someone who not only draws genderbends of natsume but is myself someone who is nonbinary and hates being perceived as a woman, i thought id offer my two cents

first of all; i think its important to note that natsume does NOT hate his childhood. in fact, hes quite happy that he had such an unusual upbringing!

what natsume hates is being perceived as weak. thats why he was raised as a girl after all, it was his mother trying to protect him from evil spirits. he doesnt hate the whole "-chan" or "wearing dresses" thing because he has a hatred for womanhood, its because due to his upbringing hes now come to associate those things as being weak. he begs tsumugi to forget about it because that means tsumugi remembers natsume being weak, and natsume thinks tsumugi still referring to him as "natsume-chan" means he still sees natsume as weak. (iirc natsume did however once say that he is a little sad that he doesnt really know how to relate to young boys due to this in poltergeist, but i couldnt find the exact quote. either way that just adds to the complexity of natsumes relationship with his childhood, because while he is happy to be "abnormal" in that sense, it has left him lacking in some areas)

i have to ask though, should this conflict of his not be something we hope he overcomes? should we not want him to develop a healthy relationship with various gender expressions? should we not want natsume to overcome his belief that feminine things = weakness? i want natsume to reach a point where he can wear feminine clothing and not feel like some damsel in distress because of it. i want natsumes character to grow. i want him to develop a positive relationship with his gender because natsume DOES enjoy some more typically feminine things, like baking! he used to bake with his mom when he was little! and i want him to feel like he can indulge in that side of him without feeling insecure.....

i LOVE transmasc natsume, my primary hc for him is transmasc nonbinary after all, but with all these things considered, shouldnt people be allowed to headcanon him however they want? if they hear his story and negative relationship with femininity and how that resonates with them and they themselves are transfem, should they not be allowed to hc him as such too?

which brings me to my next point; my own personal relationship with gender and femininity. i was raised as a girl and i fucking DESPISED womanhood. i hated everything about it. i hated how i felt forced into a box i didnt want to be stuck in, and i hated how it felt like my whole life had already been planned out for me due to societal expectations, aswell as me needing to present a certain way. i was peak "tomboy" growing up, constantly wearing super baggy clothes and wouldnt even brush my hair alot of the time. but despite that i remained miserable. i frankly hated how i looked and would constantly dye my hair vibrant colors in an attempt to make me like myself a little more. it wasnt until i realized "wow, im actually not a girl at all" that i finally let go of believing i needed to look a certain way (and thus, defying it) and started to dress for myself. i started to dress in clothes that made me happy and feel pretty! alot of which leans feminine, but clothes doesnt have a gender, and how you dress doesnt define your gender either, but it can still be a bit scary yknow? especially since i dont want people to think of me as a girl, and drawing a bunch of femstars has really made me learn to love myself more in a funny way. i can put these characters in clothes i think are beautiful, i can explore the more feminine parts of me that i adore but dont want to express in public due to how i want others to perceive me, but it has also warmed me up to femininity even more. because femstars to me feels detached from the expectations of society because its not a real thing!! there are no canon femstars designs!!! i can do literally whatever the hell i want with it and its been so liberating to me!!

all this to say; i think it really sucks seeing the way this fandom treats transfem hcs and explicit genderbends, because like ive said before; they can truly be something so personal. you dont know why that person is drawing what theyre drawing, so its a little unwise to make assumptions based on ........ Well, whatever it may be. i know very well that women dressing the way society expects them to SUCKS, esp if you have personal ties to it, but you have to realize the issue isnt femininity, but misogyny.

[rawliverandgoronspice]

regarding common tropes about ganon's writing in fics, I am kind of always taken aback a little anytime ganondorf uses degrading sexist terms in fics and such. Because to me, even his most evil interpretations would probably have no reason to have negative associations with women who have sex a lot, unless he picked it up from elsewhere (like there's some room for it to be interesting psychologically speaking if that's directly addressed, but it never is). I'm not sure why the gerudos would ever cultivate these kind of misogynistic ideas in their own culture, or why Ganondorf would spontaneously decide to form any essentialist ideas he may potentially develop on the basis of promiscuity, of all things. And, if he would pick that up from Hyrule... why would he, why this, and how does that map out with him remaining proudly gerudo in most iterations if he sees any non-married woman getting funky in a negative way?

it's kind of a very small thing, but it does kind of beckons a lot of questions regarding worldbuilding and psychology and it tends to take me out of fics a little, because it's always kind of assumed and never investigated

[scalpelsister]

also this isnt really proper shade at larian or anything and the writing of this game is SAURE good so dont take it this way but.

i sure do wish. Minthara was not villain batted as hard as she was. Her being locked to "evil" runs and being mutually exclusive with several party members. Her being nothing more than a miniboss for your average player- who does not even know shes a potential party member! Her being so chronically unloved by the community because... shes the "evil" companion. Hell, even the amount of people saying frankly really edgy shit about killing her or hurting her completely unprompted lmao. Like I genuinely think shes been pretty unfairly demonized both by the community and by the meta of just like... the game itself because she's really actually..... kind of, dare I say, sweet? if you get to know her. ugh.

[winepresswrath]

I think I would need to reread the first book to really commit to this opinion but imo some of the horror of book!claudia is that she really is a terribly inhuman monster. she was a vampire child, so she never learned to be human. she was a vampire child so she'll never grow up and fulfill that potential. companionship is a necessity for her because she can't look after herself and that makes her bitter and disdainful of people who want love for its own sake, especially in the context of Louis and Lestat, who damned her to her current state to fulfill their own emotional needs. it's a stark contrast to show Claudia, who yes, is a vicious mass murdering vampire and has fun with it, but is otherwise a lonely woman who craves companionship and understanding because she's a person. Her beef with Louis is still about his failure to prioritize her and his assorted bad idea relationship choices but the undertones are so different and I really feel like the tragedy is that he didn't put her first and not that he could never have made her happy no matter what he chose.

[grendelsmilf]

i don't want to act like corporations won't make homophobic decisions in their quest to further their financial interests. of course they will, because no capitalist would get anywhere without making the strategic decision to pander to the most powerful members of society, and we obviously live in a patriarchy that violently imposes a dogma of heteronormativity as a crucial method in its system of control. so there is, of course, an incentive to systematically erase any [gender] nonconformity from their product if it's no longer lucrative to present themselves as (pseudo)progressive in this way for whatever reason. so in the case of corporate tv executives, the idea that a show could theoretically get cancelled for being too unapologetically gay isn't ridiculous or far-fetched. in fact, the strategy to produce one or two seasons of a niche show with overtly lgbt characters and then cancel it once it's no longer turning a significant profit is pretty sound. especially if that show happens to be a piece of genre fiction, and especially if that show is bad. that way, the show can garner enough of a fanbase (the intersection of, say, sci fi fans and lesbians in your low budget lesbian sci fi series) that it gets promoted without the company itself having to expend their budget on marketing (which they can instead dedicate to more surefire mainstream hits), and gets viewed just enough to turn a profit. it's an experiment that can then get toted by the company as evidence of their progressive inclinations, without actually having to commit to any sort of reputation as a champion of lgbt rights. the fact that these shows are often qualitatively poor means that they can retroactively justify their premature cancellations by pointing to the low quality rather than the content. it's an insidious strategy.

of course, it's not necessarily true. lgbt media does actually happen to be profitable these days, especially when it's presented as either as a) salacious and shocking or b) heartwarming and wholesome. the fact that most of the shows that people have kicked up a fuss over are just undeniably not good and too niche to be lucrative makes the argument that these cancellations are all motivated by pure, unadulterated homophobia and nothing else (such as viewer retention rates and other fiscal concerns) seem somewhat silly. the desire for more authentic, compelling lgbt exploration in our media should not take the form of clamoring to renew mediocre (or just straight-up-bad) shows ad infinitum, but rather to acknowledge that there will never be true artistic depth rendering our community with love and authenticity to be found in corporately produced mainstream art. the issue isn't that these faceless executives are all individually spiteful homophobes, but rather that they operate under a structure that demands that these systemic injustices continue to be exploited for the sake of accruing capital. i'm not saying that homophobia isn't a real concern, but it's entirely incidental to the primary issue which is profit motive under capitalism. but you guys could also just stand to watch slightly better tv.

[mummer]

they could never EVER neverrrrrr ever ever do this even ryan condal would never cede such an “iconic” setpiece & “memorable” dialogue and even if he wanted to HBO simply would not allow it but in my minds eye ideal hotd adaptation of the battle of the gods eye completely discards EVERYTHING supposedly recounted/editorialized in fire and blood no anime dialogue no ultra choreographed fight scene no cinematic beautiful shots of the dragons dancing no leaping from dragon to dragon its actually like incredibly fast and loud and incomprehensible to the audience just beasts colliding and ripping each other apart dirt and blood and horrific and disgusting and ultimately super SUPER pathetic ❤️ daemon and aemond dont get to make any epic last stands theres no glorious blaze out, no chilling last words, no grand narrative, in the end it really is just two men thudding to the bottom of a lake and getting eaten by fish. make the craziest climax in the world an anticlimax. ultimate antimoment

[rowan-guerrins]

people on tiktok well on all social media sites actually will loudly critique the fact some people (especially those who only watched the movies) “didn’t get the point of the hunger games” and then turn around and say gale is the worst person in the universe and treat him like he’s a monster, and that all these traits are innate characteristics completely isolated from the circumstances in which he lived and the people around him. like girlie i think maybe YOU didn’t get the point here either.

[moonchild-in-blue]

I will just leave this here

"Dev Patel, as you can see, is extremely hot."

Please tell me that's the whole article. Because you really don't need anything else hahaha. That's it, that's him.

Me. Found dead on a ditch.

[faithfromanewperspective]

alright it's time to find smth out

please note that with labels like flexitarian especially it's not about 'oh i never eat these things'; it's a sliding label with things like vegan and vegetarian and pescatarian where you can identify however you feel comfortable. some people just eat meat etc on special occasions or when they go out or when they don't have time/spoons to cook something nutritious, and that's perfectly valid!! whatever you're able to do has an impact that's felt and there's no pressure to do it to whatever standard we have of 'perfect' in our heads <3

[rowanthestrange]

(Personal ‘Being A Certain Kind Of Autistic’ Moment:)

(You ever think you’re too hinged? I was gonna say for the internet but since covid so many of the neurotypicals in real life are actually worse.

Like someone has an inappropriately strong emotional reaction to the benign, and you’re like ‘okay they’re triggered, walk away with no eye contact’. Then you see other people doing it. And more and more. Not about the same things, different things, random things. And you’re just… Is it me? Am I too hinged?

I’m not saying I’m never triggered but I always tell myself ‘hey before you interact with anyone, stop being such a freak’ if I feel like I’m in danger of being rude to or about a Human Person. And I know that’s autism training, learning to catch yourself; but also clearly not everyone bothers, even the neurotypicals anymore hence irl situations where you’re just watching some 55 year old woman go off on a receptionist over literally nothing.

Like you’ll watch people stew themselves to a rolling boil over things they’ve…made up in their head? When they could just…not do that? Or could assume the best? Like they pre-order rage for things that haven’t even happened yet. Not like political things where you could argue that it could incentivise action but like raging about how film/book in a series/event is going to be so terrible, beyond simple mental prepping for disappointment.

It’s like I feel too mentally healthy compared to everyone else. But even plenty of irl people I know who absolutely wouldn’t consider themselves (or be considered by me as) mentally unwell in any regard are like this.

I know me having the flavour of autism where ‘everything has to have a reason, but when you understand what it is you don’t feel the need to be upset about it anymore’ kind of makes this worse. Because that’s not how real people feel things. But I dunno. Feels like it’s getting…more, doesn’t it? I mean it is, must be, had a Doctor Who episode kind of about it a week ago. But it’s got me feeling autistic alien again. Even on the autism site.)

[codacheetah]

My onehat post is harming people. Grins