#did this person think this was a public forum?

[pencap]

.

[homophyte]

man i havent seen like anybody talking about it--probably because i do my level best to block every transphobe i can find and purposefully avoid twitter as much as possible--or else i wouldnt say anything but the sophie from mars situation seriously has been breaking my brain. i dont wanna be the exact guy i would criticize in this situation and shift focus from the victims but i truly thought she was one of the most incisive political commentators on youtube, i actively looked forward to her perspectives & shared them with so many people around me. its hard on some level to not feel shocked and blindsided particularly because she was someone who consistently and articulately spoke about abuse and exploitation.

[malereadermaniac]

Arranged Marriage ~ Byakuya Togami x Male Reader

The Togami's never get a choice in their partner, the choice is made for them to the benefit of the family; whether that be for more heirs to be made, or to join forces with other families Partially inspired by 'The swan princess' - 'This is my idea' Regular, non-despair au - Top!Byakuya x Bottom!Reader word count: 1.3k Sfw & Nsfw (headcannon form) / MDNI ~ amab m!reader / FDNI

You had known Byakuya since you were both very young. Everyone knows of the affluent Togami's, and most people know that arranged marriages are common for them; however you wouldn't expect the arrangements to start so early. Ever since the age of seven, your summers were either spent within the Togami's main mansion, or the Togami's spent their summers in the (l/n)'s mansion. Your parents (the powerful, yet less than Togami, (l/n)'s) had done everything in their power to ensure that you were to marry into the Togami's via Byakuya; from suggesting a powerful alliance to his parents in meetings, to outright proposing that you two boys wed. Shockingly, Byakuya's parents were very open to the idea - your family was the next most powerful in the country, and it would not only benefit the Togami empire but also the family's face in the public eye; a gay marriage within the mostly traditional Togami family would surely uplift their image. So, every single summer since you two boys were seven has been spent together; whether you like it or not!

And good lord did you both hate spending time together. Unlike the BORING Togami heir, you had a bit more pep in your step - which inevitably led to you annoying the hell out of the affluent progeny. You would try to convince the blonde to play some game with you but ultimately get ignored in favour of whatever book the boy was fixating on that day, or Byakuya would play along with your game but make fun of you the whole time! And as the two of you got older, your relationship stayed the same - mutual dislike, for changing reasons however...

At the age of 14, Byakuya found himself still annoyed by you, yet not due to the sound of your voice of your obnoxiously high levels of energy, rather because you were one of the few people on his level! In fact, you were above his level most of the time. No matter what the young blonde would do, you would one-up him constantly; you have won almost every game of cards the two of you have played, the two of you have always tied on your 'over-summer' academics, and the affluent adolescent could never impress you with his riches due to your parents buying you things to try and impress the Togami's! Byakuya had grown up with the idea that he needs to be above everyone else in all facets of life, so you coming along and beating him at everything made the rich teen see RED. However, every night, of every summer you two were spending together, Togami's parents would remind him that the two of you were pre-destined to be together, and that the blonde 'must accommodate for his future'.

Later, at the age of 18, your presence annoyed Byakuya for different reasons. This time, for reasons he chose not to think too deeply about. It was a known fact throughout the entire country that as you two young boys had grown up, puberty had done you both very nicely - tabloids and online forums wouldn't stop discussing how dashing the Togami heir looked in recent photos, and many times you were also discussed. Your perfect skin, your lips, your body, your hair, your personality; you were praised and adored more and more everyday. Byakuya wasn't jealous of this though, he'd get hit on constantly at events and other such things. What specifically annoyed the blonde was the fact that people acted on their liking of your looks; and worse, that you responded to advances. Again, Byakuya would never analyse his emotions too much, because he'd realise that he was in fact jealous that other men were getting your attention, however he would feel irked and pissed off whenever he saw you flirt/be flirted at by staff. The heir has fired many body guards of his and house staff due to them taking a liking to you, and Byakuya has also been a dick in passing to staff at your own home which flirts with you. But again, Byakuya's jealousy of others receiving your affection isn't something he dwelled on, very rarely would the handsome man think about his feelings late at night and spend hours spiraling about the possibility of him actually liking you!

At the age of 20, it fully dawned on Byakuya just how charming you truly were. Sure, you were the heir of an inferior family, and an annoying man at that, however during the summer you had both turned 20 the blonde truly couldn't deny his feelings towards you. Byakuya had come a long way from when you were both young boys, he had gone from his father forcing him to kiss your hand every time the two of you met to kissing your hand voluntarily. Byakuya was awe struck by you; not just by your looks, but by your kindness to others (something he'd never though he'd cherish or admire), and also due to the way you complimented him so nicely - like two pieces of a puzzle, you and Byakuya just fit together, not overlapping but rather harmonising. The smug look on both your parents' faces was enough to make you two men want to argue once again, just to wipe the satisfied looks off of their faces, however you simply couldn't. The summer you two turned 20 was the first time the two of you didn't mind spending time together. Byakuya had finally put down his books in favour of talking to you and getting to know you, and you couldn't deny just how attractive that was from him; the handsome, rich man was interested in you, and not even sexually like other men you had sneaked around with, but rather he was interested in speaking with you.

At the age of 22, the time had come for you two heirs to fulfill your responsibilities; via inheriting your places as heads of the family, and by marrying each other. But unlike how you'd thought your wedding day would go as children, you cried tears of joy rather than of frustration - Byakuya spoke his vows with truth coating his tongue and lips, and you both celebrated the day rather than giving fake speeches and smiles. And the night of your wedding was well spent as well; don't you worry!

As you'd expect, Byakuya is so god damn DOMINANT

His body is also sooo perfect - slim, muscular, tall, he's really just made to ooze sex appeal

The blonde barely has to even speak in sentences to have you on your knees at the foot of your (now) shared bed

His dick is average, a nice fit; skinny and a little veiny, 6-7inches, and his pubes are perfectly trimmed and well kept

Byakuya loves to always feel in control, his masculine fingers threatening through your hair to control your pace as you suck his dick with surprisingly good skill

He also really likes to eat you out, the small noises you make egging Byakuya on as he pushes his warm, wet tongue into your hole along with two of his long fingers

This man is also so into dirty talk, calling you nasty and whorish for enjoying his dick ramming into your ass

But the moment Byakuya lays his eyes on you as your back arches up off of the bed and your dick twitches as you shoot your load..? all the sexy man can say is 'pretty'

Exhibitionism is also something your HUSBAND enjoys on the low - your poor staff!

Seriously, Byakuya loves either getting walked in on as he's wrecking you in doggy, or he really likes to call staff in when they need something, making them watch as you keep sucking his dick under his desk/ as he cums inside of you/ as Byakuya makes out with you desperately as the two of you dry-hump into each other

But in summary, Byakuya can't get enough of you, he'd never thought that he'd be able to say that: he fucking loves you...

[todorokis-girl]

All on up Stream - Kenma Kosume

Part of my Haikyuu confession series!

Masterlist

Kenma's fingers moved with practiced ease across the keyboard, navigating his character through the intricate virtual world of his latest streaming session. The soft glow of his monitor illuminated his focused expression, a stark contrast to the chaos of the chat scrolling endlessly beside the gameplay footage. His audience was lively tonight, sending a constant stream of comments and questions that he occasionally glanced at between intense moments in the game.

Amidst the flurry of interactions, a familiar username caught his eye: "LoveStruckFan123". A donation accompanied the message: "Hey Kenma, do you have a special someone in your life? 😏"

Kenma's cheeks flushed faintly, his fingers momentarily faltering on the keys. He wasn't used to such direct inquiries about his personal life during streams. He chuckled nervously, trying to deflect the question while keeping his composure. "Uh, well, that's a pretty personal question," he muttered, refocusing on the game to distract himself.

But the chat was relentless, and more curious comments flooded in, pushing him to address the topic. "Okay, okay, I'll answer. But just this once," he relented with a soft sigh, his voice barely audible over the game's soundtrack.

"There's... someone I've liked for a really long time," Kenma admitted, his tone softening with introspection. He glanced briefly at the chat, seeing the flood of emoticons and excited messages. "Since we were kids, actually."

The chat exploded with curiosity and excitement, words scrolling so quickly that Kenma struggled to keep up. Despite his initial discomfort, he found himself smiling faintly as he thought about Y/N. They had been a constant presence in his life, a source of comfort and understanding that went beyond mere friendship.

"They've always been there for me, you know?" Kenma continued, his voice growing more contemplative. "Through everything. They're amazing, and I've... I've been in love with y/n the entire time"

The confession hung in the air, the weight of his words sinking in as he realized what he had just revealed to thousands of viewers.

The before the realization settled he saw the screen of his phone light up, notifications had been muted for stream. ‘Y/n 🥰’ the only thing he could see. When the screen when dark, it happened again, and one last time.

Panic surged through him like an electric shock, and he instinctively reached for the mouse, fingers trembling as he struggled to regain control of the situation.

"Uh, I—I think that's enough for today," Kenma muttered hurriedly, his voice betraying his anxiety. "Thanks for watching, everyone. See you next time."

With a quick, frantic click, he ended the stream, the screen fading to black. Kenma slumped back in his chair, his heart pounding in his chest as he stared blankly at the now-dark monitor. He couldn't believe he had let slip such a personal revelation in such a public forum.

Moments later, his phone buzzed yet again with a notification. He glanced down, feeling a jolt of nerves as he saw a message from Y/N.

‘Ken’

‘Ken, are you serious?’

‘Ken’

‘Please… can we talk…?’

He swallowed hard, his fingers hovering over the screen before typing a shaky reply. "Sure. When?"

‘Now… 5 minutes’

A few minutes later, Kenma found himself standing outside in the cool evening air, his thoughts racing faster than his footsteps could carry him. When Y/N arrived, their presence was a grounding force amidst the whirlwind of emotions.

"Kenma," Y/N began softly, her voice filled with a mixture of concern and curiosity as they stepped closer. "Did you really mean what you said? Was it an accident?”

He nodded slowly, unable to meet their gaze at first. "Yeah. I did, it was an accident, yeah, but I mean it.” he admitted quietly, a mix of embarrassment and relief coloring his tone. "I'm sorry you had to find out like that."

To his surprise, the reaction he got was not the one he expected. He felt her warmth all over his body and he could feel her lips against his neck, pulling herself even closer to him, tightening the hug. “Me too dummy”

Kenma's breath caught in his throat, disbelief mingling with a joy so profound it left him momentarily speechless. He wrapped his hands around her, and angled himself to attempt and make eye contact, you allowed her pulling her face away, meeting Y/N's eyes, seeing the sincerity and affection reflected back at him.

"Really?" he managed to ask, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Really," Y/N confirmed with a nod,

Lacking restraint he grabbed both sides of her face and stared into her eyes, giving her a second to pull away if she needed; when she didn’t, he pulled her closer crashing his lips into hers; years of love present in the interaction, escaping through every nook and cranny of their souls as if a flood had opened.

As they stood together under the fading light of the evening sky, Kenma felt a weight lift off his shoulders. This unexpected turn of events had brought them closer together in a way he hadn't dared to hope for. It was the ending of their friendship, but the start of their future.

[implausiblyjosh]

RIP Cohost

Cohost is shutting down because... well, of course it is. Cohost shutting down is the most "writing on the wall" shit for the last several months. The wealthy friend/funder ghosted them at one point in the last 12 months. Despite Anti-Software Software Club saying they were a "not-for-profit software company", they were just a regular LLC paying themselves near 100k/yr for their four FTEs. When they got new funding, after being ghosted, a stipulation of that funding was for them to be consistent in posting public financial updates, which they missed almost immediately. I cannot believe it lasted this long.

That they're still saying that "eggbux", the tipping and support features, fell through because of Stripe policy changes, something that seemingly did not happen, is wild. Can't even be honest at the end. Like... Cohost's early ideas started as a Patreon alternative. They've been working on "eggbux" as a concept basically since inception of Cohost. But up until the last year they were still working on this idea of being this Patreon/Ko-fi alternative without understanding the policy of Stripe and how that would work. I don't think it can be stressed enough how weird cohost's framing of the Stripe Policy Issue is. Nothing meaningfully changed about Stripe policy, ASSC just thought they could be Patreon/Ko-fi on a whim and then realized that's not how it works and had to stop dev on that.

Also, there was always this undercurrent of "Uber reinvents cabs and busses" to the whole thing. The Artist's Alley thing was just Project Wonderful, but was being pushed as a wild new thing for user-supported ads. And, like Uber, it was a pretty rough implementation of a thing that already exists because you had to click to a specific area that was just ads!

As much as I had enjoyable moments on cohost, I think it's silly to paint the site as anything it wasn't. I mean, one of the last big culture issues on the site was staff refusing to delete racist comments on a staff post until publicly shamed for their cowardice! Cohost was clearly not good for everyone who posted there. Someone got ran off the site for linking to cohost's official feature requests forum too often to ask for accessibility features, and popular people on cohost waxed poetic about how deserved it was that the person got ran off the site for being annoying. There were near-constant issues with racism not being handled well at all from a culture perspective, especially when people would criticize how white the culture of the site was. Hell, I saw someone be extremely bigoted on bluesky, then run to cohost for sympathy and get it. Even when people pointed out how bigoted they were on bluesky, with screenshots and everything, they justified it and had loads of defenders helping justify the bigotry!

I think teeing cohost up as some sort of "good sites can never exist unless it's corporate sludge" point also doesn't make sense since the site never had a plan for profitability. You can't be funded by a wealthy friend forever. There never seemed to be a plan, which is fine for a hobby but not fine when you're begging for cohost plus subs every month or so to fund your near-100k salaries. It never made sense in the long term, their own reports said so, and people were shouted down for pointing these things out.

No webbed site is perfect, and that includes cohost. It had issues up until the very end. It does no one any good to ignore the bad or pretend it was perfect, regardless of how much the site was good for you personally.

Sucks that a lot of cool people put their eggs in that posting basket, and I hope they find a different place that scratches similar itches.

[xf-cases-solved]

i am aware that this is likely not a new take at all, and i'm not like, claiming it as mine, but i never had the chance to have this opinion (or hear other ppl have this opinion) on a public forum before, so i just want to take this opportunity to say to another person, possibly for the first time with the exception of mb my mother, who is no longer here to agree with me, that "existence" came out when i was 8 years old, i watched it live, and literally the day i watched it i remember thinking to myself "why did they have a boy named william? they should have had a girl named samantha. OF COURSE they should have had a girl named samantha," like it felt so obvious to me

and tho i couldn't rly articulate it this clearly at the time, my little muddy 8 year old thought process was that the entire story of the xfiles starts with samantha, right? mulder has his beliefs bc samantha was taken; he says so in the very first episode. the whole reason he even thinks aliens are real to begin with is bc of samantha. the person he spent his whole life searching for was samantha. he MET SCULLY bc of samantha. samantha is the thread that ties the whole story together, so then how beautiful--how narratively perfect--would it have been to tie THEIR story--their love story (bc xfiles is, at the end of the day, a love story, fight me) up with a bow, where the beginning starts with samantha getting lost, and then ends with samantha there in their arms, finally found, just in a different iteration. (instead of naming the baby after mulder's dad who he doesn't even like? or scully's dad. or scully's brother. or mulder's middle name, which is after his father ik, but still, why are there so many fucking williams??)

like, imagine it. rly sit there and take a moment to imagine how the end scene in "existence" would have gone if mulder had said, "what are you going to name her," and scully had said, "samantha"

not only does it get the "ding ding ding, you're the dad!" point across, but how fucking Touched would mulder have been to have the woman he loves--the PERSON he loves--more than anything on earth honor the sister who took up so much of his soul for so long? who always will take up part of his soul, just in a healthier way. it would be scully saying, "we know she's gone from this world now, but she's not gone from our hearts" emphasis on OUR hearts, bc mulder's pain is scully's pain; mulder's quests are scully's quests. she never met her sister-in-law (they're married, fight me), and will never have the chance, but by naming their child after her, she would be saying, "i love her anyway. i love her because you love her, and because anyone you love deserves my love as well, bc we are intertwined at our core. our fundamental values, our suffering, our joy, it is felt in us both concurrently, bc i am your person, and you are mine, and together we made a whole other person who is a literal representation of our combined selves, and we are going to call her SAMANTHA, bc that little girl you watched get stolen from you however many decades ago has been the pillar that has kept us going as a team for the last eight years"

or maybe it would have been even simpler than that. maybe she would just be saying, "your sister is IMPORTANT, mulder, even in death, and her memory isn't held only by you. it is unrelenting, and preserved forever in our child"

i wanted that scene. i wanted to feel the heaviness of mulder's grief mixed with his elation and gratitude and love. i appreciate william for who he was in the scheme of things, but that moment in the bedroom, with their baby between them, shouldn't have been lessened for me bc they chose a name that made me pause and go "his dad was named william? oh yeah! forgot about that guy, it's been a few YEARS since we saw much of him, and what we did see of him wasn't like... awesome. but sure, name your baby that ig, if you must"

that scene should have hit so much harder, and if that baby had been a samantha? it could have hit like nothing ever has, and for all the mishaps that show took after that (and there were MANY), i think the thing i will always have the most resentment for is the fact that i felt robbed of something that would have meant so much to me as a viewer who had followed their journey from the start (or, well, almost start. i was born the year it came out, so i didn't start watching until 1998, when my brain came online, but i'd seen the past stuff at least)

anyway! that's all to say, 8 year old me was salty as hell about that, and ykno what? she was RIGHT and should have been able to say it. but, again, 2001, 8 years old, not old enough to participate in fandom, so that thought has just festered and rotted away in my brain like a piece of old, putrid meat. but! finally i can give my 8 year old self some catharsis by letting her bitch and bitch and bitch to her heart's content about how "existence" should have been the series finale, and how that baby should have been a girl named samantha, and how i climbed onto that hill 23 years ago, and how i will die there with my heels dug down deep

ty, internet, for coming to my extremely overdue tedtalk. somewhere in the past there is a small child (who definitely shouldn't have been allowed to watch xfiles as young as she did, but what can you do?) finally has a weight off of her chest. it's just a tv show, and in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't matter, but also, it's a tv show that i grew up with in my formative and unfortunately very traumatic years, and it genuinely feels like a loved one who has always been there to comfort me, and so yeah, it doesn't "matter," but the truth is, it Matters so incredibly much

that's all

-diz

[quasi-normalcy]

I feel like a lot of left-wing commentators are way too willing to take at face value claims made by Google and Facebook and the like about the power of their algorithms to predict and manipulate the behaviour of their userbase.

Like, okay, back in 2012, Facebook published a study on an experiment that they nonconsensually conducted on 12 million of their users to see how they reacted to subtle changes in how the algorithm conveyed politics to them; it showed a statistically significant effect.

Okay; right now you should be asking: why did Facebook publish this study? The answer is: because they wanted to sell advertisers on their platform; they wanted to make advertisers believe that they had an omniscient tool of public manipulation. This of course should raise a few more questions, like:

How many similar studies did Facebook conduct that didn't yield a statistically significant result?

Would Facebook have published these studies, given that their aim was to sell advertisers on their platform?

How would you go about reproducing the results of this study if you, personally, do not own a massive social media platform?

Given that Facebook has evinced an absolute willingness to lie through its teeth about just about everything else in order to make a quick buck, what are the odds that their data is on the level?

How would you check, given that their data is proprietary?

And perhaps most importantly,

If Facebook was so goddamn omnipotent at manipulating public opinion in 2012, why does everyone hate them and think their platform is shit now?

Like, don't get me wrong. It's bad that these megacorporations control the dominant public forum of the 21st century. But let's not humour their claims to omnipotence.

[vimbry]

long transcript below

JF: you know, I was on- on twitter last night, and uh, you know occasionally when, you know, people leave... posts that are impossible to comprehend, you actually have to seek out, you know, who posted it? and the person who posted it wrote that they were: "shy AF". [audience laughter] and I still don't know what that could possibly mean. [more laughter]

JL: it's "auto-focus". it's a photography term. [laughter]

JF: it's all circling back to (JL: yes, to photography) just what we were talking about a moment ago. so, d- you uh, you just slept today. you slept, you did nothing?

JL: um, you know. I- I lay exhausted, next to my wife, and we- we had one of those conversations where you're just like, "(slurring) yeah, so uh-tha- that was weird. there we were on tour... and we were in... Sa-... Saskaphone, I think it's called?" [laughter]

JF: I, uh, I presented my wife with our very first piece of taxidermy. [laughter and cheers]

JL: yeah, how did- we discussed this earlier in the tour. you were not sure how Robin was gonna go for it?

JF: it's definitely one of those "take it or leave it" things? you know, I mean, taxidermy, come on, people. it's kind of- it's sort of a horrible idea. [laughter]

JL: yes. and yet, how endearing. (JF: yeah) and wonderful.

JF: so, I went to this, uh, antiques (junk) store, and found this very small piece of, uh... I'm not sure what actual animal it's supposed to be. it looks just like a tiger, if a tiger was this big. [laughter] and uh, we have determined that it will, uh- there's a special nook at the top of the stairs in the basement, where it will reside. [audience and JL laughter]

the big problem is that, if you get something like taxidermy, you either, like- you're either gonna lose the friends you have [laughter], or you're gonna have to move on to all new friends, who might... might be a little bit creepier than your current friends. [more laughter]

JL: right. but you could- you could taxidermy your old friends, so you still get to keep them. [loud audience laughter and applause] have all your- everything. keep it all.

JF: ... John, it's that kind of outside thinking that keeps this band fresh! [loud cheers and applause]

JL: think about it. problem solved!

JF: what's a little bit of cannibalism among friends! [laughter]

JL: (laughing) I didn't say- (quietly) I just said- (normal) I just said stuff them.

JF: (laughing) oho, I'd say- I'd say eat them! with a delicious--

JL: -- see, that's where--

JF: -- béarnaise sauce, I would say! [whooping]

JL: that's the basis of our collaboration--

JF: -- I would, I would, I would--

JL: -- I say "taxidermy", you say "eat". (JF: yes) (unintelligible). [laughter]

JF: I would say pair that with a nice white wine from the Loire Valley. [quiet laughter] ... so people, we got 2 sets! [cheering] but only- but only 1 epically long conversation at the beginning of the show. [laughter] so, we're gonna just, uh, you know roll up the uh, taxidermy chat, and say this was another episode of "inappropriate things to say in a public forum" (JL: yes). [cheering]

[antihumanist]

Random Trivia/Facts About Pekka-Eric Auvinen:

He liked to go swimming, taking walks, and riding his bike for exercise

He never knew how to drive a car

He originally wanted to get a Glock but the police rejected his application because they thought a 9mm was too powerful for a starting firearms owner

He wrote in his diary he hoped to use a shotgun but obviously he never obtained one

He had been interested in things like history, political ideology, philosophy, etc since he was about 12 years old

When 9/11 happened, he was sad that it happened because at that time he admired America. He was still playing with Legos and would rebuild the twin towers over and over again

In the summer of 2006, he found a job working at a farm, but he left this job as soon ad summer ended. He also worked there with a friend from school if I remember right. It's not known what exactly he did at the farm

He was afraid in 2007 to find work because of his anxiety

Since a young age, he dressed formally/dress-like, which was one reason why he would get bullied at school. It's not clear if he wore things like button-up shirts and slacks because he wanted to or if his parents made him wear them.

He took school seriously, and wanted to try his best in all of his classes at Jokela High School. He usually got average to above average grades and was said to have been in above average intelligence compared to his classmates

When he was 14 years old, his social studies/history teacher remembers he was really opinionated about left wing and right wing ideologies, which was something he had never seen before In a student

When he was 17, in 2006, for a class discussion about North Korea, he told the class he thinked dictatorships were good because human beings didn't deserve rights at all

Even his parents say he was opinionated and stubborn, his mother said if you would try to convince him of an idea/ideology/viewpoint, he would go the opposite way of what said idea believes in

After graduation in 2008, he said he planned to go to a university to study either history, philosophy, or social psychology

He admired Hitlers leadership abilities and how he made the Third Reich a superpower, but he did not agree with Hitler ideologically

He hated racism and thought racism was stupid

In May of 2007, he and his English class watched a documentary about the Columbine Massacre (it's not known which documentary), classmates remember he was smiling and enjoying the documentary, he had already knew about Columbine by this point

He once asked his mother to go the library to get him a Finnish translation of the Unabombers manifesto Industrial Society And It's Future, but the library did not have one

In the few months leading to the Jokela Shooting, his grades had been dropping and was attending his classes less often

He got his computer in 2005 (iirc)

He took Lexapro but gradually stopped taking them by the time of his death

Whilst he may have had a few friends at school (although there is some debate of whether his in person friends were "true friends"), he probably felt he could relate and bond more with his online friends, so in a sense he was still a loner

He would blush whenever girls would say hi to him at school

Girls however, would sometimes take part in his bullying too

He once was a member of a forum called "SovietEmpire.com" but the site has since shut down

On the day of the shooting, he was supposedly seen on a supermarket CCTV riding his bike to the school but it was never released to the public

He had a knife on him, but he never used it. It was given to him by his grandfather

He was sad about the death of his grandmother

He had a mentally handicapped uncle, whom he cared about and loved

He had been accused of being a Nazi and a communist by his classmates

Somewhere around the ages of 8 to 12, he introduced himself by his name and that he loved democracy to his class on a first day of school

[stardustndreamsofsilver]

Inferum

Prologue

Jake x OC (f)

Warnings: possibly spooky subject to some, talk of human remains

Quocumque ingrederis sequitur mors corporis umbra.

My story begins like any other I suppose. When I was small and staying with my Grandma Julie, as I did most weekends, I saw my first fantôme, ghost. As I lay sleeping, I woke to a woman sitting at the end of my bed. She was old, her red hair reminded me of a poodle and the way she dressed seemed out of place, even to a five year old. She lounged at the end of the bed, legs crossed, one arm draped across her lap and a cigarette in the hand of the other. Up until then my little mind had not thought to be frightened, just confused. 

Then, she took a drag of her cigarette and slowly faced me. She stared at me, unblinking. My heart began to pound and I could feel my throat begin to close from the sheer terror that coursed through my body. I wanted to scream, jump up and run to my grandmother, anything! But I was frozen in place. All I could do was screw my eyes shut and pray for her to go away.

The next morning, I told Grandma Julie about the woman in my room. She, like most adults, thought nothing of it and figured the woman was an imaginary friend I’d conjured up. That is until I began to describe her. As I recounted the details of the woman, from the color of her pants to the pattern on her sweater, my grandmother’s face slowly began to fall.

“Oh! And she had funny looking hair. It was red like yours, but looked like cotton candy!” I’d said.

All color drained from Grandma’s face. Her hand slowly raised and covered her mouth. Tears welled in her eyes and she whispered, “Oh, God!” I later learned that the person I’d described had been my grandmother’s mother, Ava. Not only that, but the way I described her was how she’d looked the day she told Grandma Julie that she had lung cancer. 

Since that day, I’ve never stopped pursuing the paranormal. It started with me asking my parents– or rather any adult– about ghosts. Were they real? Had the woman I’d seen just been in my head like my mother tried to convince me? As I got older, I would read any ghost story I could get my hands on, be it fiction, reddit forums; whatever form they took. Some would say that I was/am obsessed, but I’d like to think that I’m on a lifelong pursuit of knowledge. Albeit niche. 

Which brings us here, to Paris.

Paris, the city of love, the city of light, the city of the dead. It should be clear as to which name brings me here. The city of love… Ah, who am I kidding? I’m here for the Ossuaire Municipal de Paris, otherwise known as the Catacombs.

The Catacombs are steeped in mystery, the macabre, and stories of the paranormal. Which, how could they not be? They hold the remains of an estimated six million people. Not only that, but most of the remains were exhumed from their original resting place and dumped into the then abandoned limestone mines. 

But then there was good reason for this, as the cemeteries of Paris were overflowing by the mid to late 1780s. It was so overflowing and “unpleasant” to live near that it became a matter of public health and safety. So, the bones of millions began to be moved and continued to be until 1814 and then began again in 1840. 20 years later, the interment of remains officially and finally stopped.

Now, the remains weren’t left undisturbed during this time. Just before the Ossuaire Municipal de Paris was opened to the public, a man named Héricart de Thury was charged with heading the “decorative rearrangement” of the bones, that up until this point, were just pushed in the massive piles along the walls to utilize as much space as possible. So, Thury was the man who planned and executed the macabre and morbid designs and art that you see today within its walls.

These two things, the mass exhumation and further disturbance of the remains, are said to be the catalyst for the haunting of the Catacombs. Which in turn has brought thousands of urban explorers, paranormal investigators, and lovers of all things supernatural to the city. There are so many stories and urban legends told by those who have braved the uncharted parts of the catacombs. I’m sure they could fill a library's worth of books. 

This particular excursion of the city of the dead will fill mine.

taglist: @peaceloveunitygvf, @edgingthedarkness, @jakekiszkashangnail08

If you would like to be added to the taglist for future installments, let me you 🖤

[max1461]

Here's my other problem with tumblr discourse: even when I make the context/intended interpretation of a post really explicit, people ignore this context and respond to it in like... for lack of a more charitable term, a discoursebrained way.

So a while ago I made a post about some ethical intuition I had, and at the top I put a huge disclaimer which said something to the effect of "this is just an expression of my feelings, it's not meant to be a philosophically airtight position, please don't take it as such", followed by a readmore and then the actual post. Why did I do that? Because I figured that if I didn't, people would nitpick it in various technical ways that missed the basic point. Lo and behold several people still did that, and when I replied basically restating the disclaimer, one of them said "oh I didn't even see that. Well I think if you post a half-baked thought online I retain the right to nitpick it".

I guess that's true. My blog is public. But the point is that I want to use my blog for certain things and not others, right, that's what I'm attempting to do. And people seem actively resistant to my attempts to guide the discussion on my blog in certain directions, which makes blogging less enjoyable. Of course some people will always do that, that fact doesn't bother me, but it feels like the irrelevant/point-missing discourse so often overshadows the meaningful discourse that I start to feel less of a desire to put in the effort.

Like, the point of issuing that disclaimer was to say, as explicitly as I could manage, "I am trying to have a discussion about feelings and intuitions here, I am aware there might be ways these intuitions are not fully consistent, but that is not the discussion I'm trying to have". But even so explicit an attempt to specify a conversation topic does not work; the discourse machine demands a certain kind of engagement and that is the engagement every post will get no matter what.

I don't want to put the person who missed my disclaimer on blast: it's honestly an error that anyone could make and on its own it's no big deal. If said person is reading this: you didn't do anything wrong and I am not mad at you, to be 100% clear.

It's not a one-off mistake that bothers me, it's the fact that this is how discussions on here so often go that putting in the effort to discuss things productively often feels wasted.

Another example of this that... if you go through my #society tag, you will see a lot of uncertainly in my phrasing. You will see me say a lot of "it seems like we should..." and "we should find some mechanism to..." and so on and so forth. Why? Because, as I've mentioned before, I've gotten a lot out of political discourse on here. When it's good, I actually find it quite good. But it's good when it has a constructive or collaborative tone, when I am bouncing ideas or thoughts back and forth with someone. Generally I am trying to invite this kind of discourse.

Sometimes, again, I say it really explicitly. I don't have them off the top of my head, but I know there are quite a lot of #society posts where I've said something quite straightforwardly to the effect of "here are some niche social/political issues I've been contemplating, does anyone have any ideas for how to respond to them". Obviously there's a spectrum in how explicit I am about this, but even when I'm really clear, most of the responses I get are still "discoursebrained", in the sense that they seem antagonistic and generally more interested in saying "X guys are cool and Y guys are lame" than in productively engaging with a set of ideas.

Even if you disagree with my claims or my premises, there is a way to state that which adds to a conversation instead of shutting down a line of inquiry. I am always trying to invite this type of mutually-productive discussion, and I so rarely achieve it.

Over the years my methods have changed. I come from a background of like, forums for specific nerd interests. Those places are plenty contentious, full of plenty of drama and disagreement. But ultimately, I always still felt that productive discussion was valued above destructive discussion; that because we were all united in a common goal of [doing our nerdy hobby], a comment where you build on someone's idea to say something useful to others or to introduce a new insight was generally valued above one where you just said "you're wrong for such and such reasons, hah!" or even "you're right for such and such reasons".

Coming from this background, I assumed this would also be the case on tumblr, and that I would not have to put in any extra effort to invite this sort of discourse. Alas, this was not true; even long and thought-out replies from respected discoursers often just amount to "here are the guys I agree with and here are the guys I disagree with, for such and such reasons". This is lame and boring and not appealing to me.

So over the years I've tried to be more and more explicit about what types of discussion I am trying to have, I've tried to tee up the sort of interactions I want as much as possible, but it hasn't really worked.

The problem is not strictly the quality or measuredness of the responses or their tone or anything like that. These are the things most people focus on when they critique the discourse, but I think they miss the point. The problem is that most responses don't seem to be intended to advance a mutually-productive discussion, they don't build on the base of what they are responding to, they just make various assertions and statements of allegiance in the vicinity of the material they are responding to and call it a day.

Maybe this is too harsh. I'm sure I do this too. And it's not always bad. Sometimes I use someone else's post openly as a jumping off point to elaborate my own ideas (although I try to be careful about this, and also make it somewhat clear that I am doing it), and this can be productive. I do actually want to hear people's ideas. It's not any single instance of these things I'm complaining about, it's just that discoursey responses seem to drown out all other types of discussion, even when you are really clear about what type of discussion you are trying to have.

So that's my complaint.

[playmiya]

chapter eight: i just get so passionate about feminism previous ⎯ masterlist ⎯ next

You're peering over the edge of a railing on the roof of your rendezvous point, watching people mill about like specs of colour when you hear the familiar whoosh of wind that signals the arrival of Tokyo's arachnid saviour.

"Spider-Man," you speak, and he shoots you a timid wave. "Vigilante."

This time, you study him even more intensely than before, trying to gauge his height and cross-check with the Reddit post. You struggle to find any identifying markers, since his suit's practically stretched taut against his body, red and blue appearing glossy in the moonlight.

He'd always been cautious, even at your last two meetings when you'd been brainstorming ways to flush out the serial arsonist that had recently hit another shopping complex in Ginza. Constantly standing a couple of feet away from you, speaking in a thick dialect that sounded like a cross between Tokyo and another district you couldn't quite put your finger on. If it weren't for your doomscrolling through forums piecing together a digital footprint, and the lifesaver of a Reddit post, you'd be hitting your head against a wall right now.

Instead, you play nice.

"Did the police manage to salvage the footage?", you ask, leaning on the edge of the cool metal bars as he surveys you from a distance, scanning the perimeter not very subtly.

"They're tryin' to. I know we agreed to me handling the cops, but d'ya think you could run by the Ginza scene around 10 in the morning to get the footage? I got this unmissable appointment around then."

Unmissable appointment. That could be anything: a birthday party, a doctor's visit, or a training session.

You cringe inwardly at a run-in with the police, again, and that too during your Behavioural Econ class. Still, Spider-Man sounds sincere enough, and you suppose he's been doing most of the public lifting in this op anyways, so a quick visit to the crime scene should be the least you can do.

You sigh, relenting. "Fine."

You can hear the relief in his tone. "Thanks. I owe ya."

"I'll hold you to it," you grumble under your breath, and then, remembering a hunch that'd hit you like a brainwave while studying all three crime scenes in Shinjuku, Ginza and Minato, you add:

"Can we get a list of all the shops that'd been hit in these three places? I think it's time we begin making a suspect list."

"Sure," Spider-Man replies, shrugging. "I can get that info off the net and I'll bring it to ya. Same time tomorrow?", he asks, and you nod, unsatisfied and frustrated with how little personal information you've been able to extract from this meeting.

"Cool. See ya," he declares, flicking his wrist in the direction of the building behind you and whooshing past the railing in one swift motion. You watch him, swinging across the skyline of shiny glass and lights, until he becomes a tiny blob of blue and red, heading towards the curved roof Ariake Arena.

taglist: @diorzs @egoistars @she-lovesmyheartshapedsunglasses @dailyakira @giocriedpower @southernfrogprincesd @iiwaijime @punkhazardlaw @dazqa @loverlunaire @milesmoralesluvs @thiisisntlovely @kuroppiii

[kidicarusheritageposts]

I'm kind of curious about something and I'd need some older members of the Smash/Kid Icarus fandom to help out since I just joined the fandom around the time Smash 4 came out.

What was the general public reaction to Pit being in Smash Bros Brawl?

I'm searching for reactions and I've seen a couple articles/blog posts by old-school Kid Icarus fans who were excited, such as this one and this one (which were both written by the same person) and this thread from a star wars forum of all things??? where people seem pretty hyped. And of course there's also the classic Awkward Zombie comic that jokes about Pit replacing Roy. However, outside of those things I didn't find much.

Were people upset about Pit joining over some of their favorites? Were they confused or excited? What did people think of his redesign?

[palomahasenteredthechat]

https://www.tumblr.com/palomahasenteredthechat/760304167679098880/what-do-you-think-paloma-you-think-hes-a-bad?source=share

for the sake of discussion, I wanted to throw my take in the ring because i lean more towards bad person. first, i don't think this can be compared to relationships among us normies. DC's past is public and pretty egregious, most of us do not have that level of notoriety that is easily accessible. Most of us also do not have a PR team on payroll that can vet the affects of our decisions. This leads me into the my next point - intentionality. I have a very hard time believing Joe did not know about these things prior to agreeing to a pap walk/PR launch. At the very least, he agreed to be photographed with her and to be romantically linked to her. This is one of the most intentional actions he's taken in the public eye. To me, that speaks volumes above anything we may have assumed about him in the past no matter how much he may have implicitly contributed to it. Lastly, the subject matter is particularly troublesome. Many of Joe's fans are in demos that disproportionately experience sexual assault (female-identifying, LGBTQ). Unfortunately, many of us have experiences where we speak out against SA and are threatened into silence. DC has done this publicly and within the last year or two as a celebrity. Also any dalliance into white supremacy is troublesome and she has multiple - neo-nazi shirt, incel forums, and public raceplay. Like the fact that i have to type any of this in a discussion about Joseph Quinn is an issue.

thank you Paloma for always providing a safe place for discussion, even when it came at a personal cost.

Thank you Nonny for capturing how so many feel.

I didn't know anything about her except her songs. After Joe was seen with her, I googled her and read a couple of articles and her Wikipedia, and even by that cursory knowledge I was really taken aback.

Look, man wants to hit it. But to make it public? On purpose? When it's clear he can be invisible when he chooses? You are correct - it was markedly intentional, especially since he's been so private about everything else, even the most innocuous things.

I think he hooked up with her and it became more than casual, and people around them both decided to make it public because might as well monetize the relationship, right? Use the notoriety. Get your name out there.

His team might have not been as down, but he either insisted and they agreed, or they insisted, and he said okay, and none of them thought for a second about any potential consequences.

Or perhaps they did and shrugged their shoulders. 'He'll finally be rid of them.' Them. You know, us weirdos. We all know the stereotype of a typical Joe fan, and all the hurtful terms that are hurled in our direction. I don't have to write them, because they are already in your mind.

When people are othered and then there is jostling for improved status, significance and approval (I'm not like them, I'm a cool fan, because x y and z) well gosh, doesn't it remind you of other internalized thought patterns related to oppressive systems?

Then when people express their valid feelings like dismay or shock, they are name called, told they need to 'get over it', they are parasocial, weirdos, etc. etc.

Look. Don't follow him down the street and film him from behind. Don't hang around his hotel. Don't post on his family or friends' social media pages, or god forbid, his hookup's. Don't make up shit about him and spread it as gospel. Please for the love of God.

Take your frustration and anger out on your own pages or spaces where it's okay to share your thoughts.

But you absolutely have the right to think them, and to have those thoughts color your perception of who you thought he was.

I go back to the original question. Is he a bad person? No, I still don't think so, but I believe he has behaved like a thoughtless and entitled one.

[yourtoradorasextendedwarranty]

No. It's not Cancel Culture.

I've seen a lot of people recently saying that the right is embracing cancel alter. Which is actually kind of funny to me because that's never what cancel culture meant.

Long story short cancel culture as a topic or rather, as a phrase was basically invented for one very specific purpose. Cancel culture was invented to a culture of taking stuff from people's past, digging it up by going through various different social media websites blogs or other things, and then posting it online in a very public forum and then demanding others share that to that person's workplace.

"Are you in your 40s - 70s now? Well did you ever do blackface once upon a time when it was not seen as an absolutely atrocious thing to do? Well guess what we are going to do everything in our power to get you fired from your job. Ruin your life. Make sure that you can never make income ever again. And we're also going to try to get your family removed from their livelihoods as well."

"Are you a race car driver? Did your dad say the n-word once before? Did he do it before you were ever born? Well we're going to remove your sponsors and make sure that it is harder for you to have a life because the sins of the father are the sins of the son".

"Do you have an opinion on LGBT things that we don't like? Are you one of those gay people from the past who think that it should have been called a gay partnership rather than gay marriage? Well we are going to make sure that your life going forward as an absolute living hell and that you are not considered part of the LGBT community despite the fact that you were probably there fighting for the rights to be considered normal before any of us were ever born."

Those things generally speaking are what we refer to as cancel culture. Digging things up from 3 to 5 years ago or longer and then bringing them to people you know are absolutely willing (and often incited) to call businesses and jobs and other things and get that person removed from polite society as an entirety.

However, cancel culture is not posting something publicly to a social media site as a way to inform (yes there's a difference. The moderates don't incite. You all do) With no calls to action. Just saying "hey these people exist", and yes there people taking it on themselves to tell businesses that their employees advocate for violence. Because fun fact about speech. I am for freedom of speech under the laws of the Constitution. However calls to action are not free speech. Truth is, a lot of the people who have been fired should have actually been arrested. Because it's not a joke when you tell someone to try it again or to do it again or saying "next time" knowing the implication.

Because if that same exact thing had happened with Joe Biden and you had a bunch of Fringe lunatics on the right saying "next time don't miss", they would be in solitary confinement for the rest of their lives because the justice system leans heavily in favor of democrat power. So, the right is finally learning their lesson. Which is that if a person doesn't support your rights to speak you don't defend theirs. And I know that there are going to be people who don't agree with that. They are going to say that that's not moral or not principled. But you know why I don't care? Because I'm not on the right. And because I actually support free speech. But here's the problem.

If you willingly defend the rights of people who would take your rights away at a heartbeat that's not being called principled that's called being a moron. Because if you were to save someone knowing they would willingly kill you in the same given situation you're not winning any victories. You're not doing yourself any favors. Have some semblance of self-preservation.

Because I can promise you, there is no point in having morals or principles at all if they are only going to be utilized as a weapon against you. Am I saying that you should forsake your morals or forsake your principles? No. I'm saying that if there are other people who value living in polite society the same as you and they would defend you if you were in need then you can defend them when they are in need. You can still have morals and principles. I'm not saying don't.

But stop letting it be a weapon against you. Because when you let it be a weapon against you, all you do is tie yourself down to be beaten. Your morals and principles will mean nothing if you're in a gulag or you're dead. So, forgive me if I am not apologetic towards the people who asked for an act of extreme violence to happen again. Because what was it that the leftist used to call it? Not "cancel culture" but "consequence culture". If a business does not want to keep you employed with them because you publicly express violent rhetoric, that's their right.

Because what was it that Destiny said whenever people got banned when they said learn to code? "It's a private company they can do what they want". Well guess what Destiny. Kick banned you and they can do what they want. Twitter demonetized you and they can do what they want. If you can't stand up for other people's rights whenever you have power you do not deserve to have people who actually value those rights stand up for you when you're not in power anymore.

[gettiregretti]

I think once we start seeing fictional characters as equal to real people who are oppressed or perpetuate oppression, then we place a morality onus on creators that isn’t their responsibility. “You have to write it like this or your work is problematic. And you have done something ethically wrong by writing it or enjoying engaging with it. You have to get better.”

I disagree entirely.

Kallus isn’t real. The Lasat aren’t real. If you want to make him a sweet little baby boy who never did anything wrong in his life, that’s completely fine. If you want to make the villain of his story (Saw and his merc) completely irredeemable, that’s also fine. The empathy we extend to living victims of oppression is not appropriate when using a character and can be put aside; they are a dead thing. They are a stick of wood or a Barbie doll. They have not oppressed nor been oppressed.

If you hate reading that, that’s also okay. If you don’t like that interpretation of Kallus or the merc, that’s fine. We all encounter things in fics we find distasteful or upsetting. It’s completely fine to think it’s a case of bad writing or misunderstanding a character. It’s okay to leave the fic and never read the author again.

But it’s not okay to suggest there was anything ethically dubious about that fic in a public forum. If you want something more in line with your preferences, you need to write it yourself or commission someone you trust to write it the way you want it to be written. Suggesting anyone has to create in only one way requires more control than you have over other people. No one should have that control. And I’d argue that guilting people into complying is worse than writing the most depraved little story man can think of.

Creators have no responsibility to create things in ways that cater to you, or don’t upset you. You have to be in control of what you consume and your reactions to that yourself. It’s a you thing. You can’t grasp for a morality club to beat people with just because something makes you uncomfortable or disappointed.

And, because ‘say you like waffles must mean you hate pancakes’ is the rule of the internet: This is not the same as discussion about how, for example, Black characters are treated in fandom, or cases where marginalised creators are ignored. This is about the fictional content you are creating/consuming for fun not being capable of telegraphing or morphing your personal morals.

Brought to you mostly by people yelling at me on Twitter and people having a discussion on how to write this pairing here on tumblr. My respect to you all but I deeply disagree with these takes. Example below.