#discourse again. sorry

[crimson-nail]

sorry but i will just never understand people who read the ending of trimax as bleak

[wombpala]

i'm sorry for showing you this but one of the options being sam "technically abandoned two different dogs" is the funniest thing I've ever seen.

[evansbuck-ley]

the thing is, buck coming out was suppose to be the wonderful, joyful experience okay. here is this character who has spent his whole entire life searching for something, this missing piece that he couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was. he felt misplaced, unwanted and unloved. he was literally born to be a spare part and nothing more. he spent seasons looking for the key of happiness, looking for a place for him to belong.

and when he figured it out, when it finally fell into place for him, the look of relief on his face was so fucking beautiful. his eyes were so bright and smile so wide. and it’s been ruined and tainted by a certain side of the fandom that are so fucking cruel and spiteful because he kissed “the wrong guy”. and they continue to be cruel and spiteful, because to them bi buck only matters if it results in bddie.

saying it with chest but you are not an evan buckley fan if you can’t be happy for him and his storyline outside of shipping.

[obsidianpen]

PSA: if you are not interested in reading about ‘fandom drama’, please skip this post. You are responsible for your internet experience. If, however, you care about exposing bullies and POS in fandom spaces (specifically the tomione fandom in this case), carry on.

I’m posting a document here that was recently shared with me. It’s about Greyana (if you don’t already know who this is, you’re not missing out, and I encourage you to ignore this post). Specifically, it’s about what a horrible person Greyana is in the fandom. I did not write it. I didn’t know about most of this until it was shared with me, including the parts where she attacked me specifically. I won’t go into all the details of what’s in this, but the short version is: Greyana has a history of harassing other writers, using alt accounts across multiple platforms to promote her work, employing bots to promote her work, using generative AI to write as much as she has in the first place (which means she has stolen from other writers to do so), and more. There is a reason she exists (as herself, anyway) only on specific platforms. Tumblr users didn’t put up with her shit and called her out, so she left. I therefore know I’m sort of speaking to the choir here, but I wanted to put this document out there. I probably should have shared it sooner, I just really didn’t want to get involved because she doesn’t deserve my attention. Now, however, I am, and I’m giving it to her… because this is about more than that.

I don’t like bullies. I don’t like malicious hypocrites, I don’t like liars, I don't like thieves, I don’t like people in fandom spaces tearing others down when we should be building each up and supporting each other, and I don’t like when it is painfully obvious that someone only cares about stats, about being ‘the best’ and about monetizing fanfiction in whatever way they can get away with (such as via TikTok). This isn’t about ‘fandom drama’ at this point. It’s about setting the precedent that this kind of deplorable behavior isn’t acceptable anywhere; that being abusive, deceptive, and malicious because ‘it’s only fanfiction’ does not make it tolerable.

The point in sharing this is simply to let people know. I’m not asking or telling anyone to do anything specific, although I encourage you strongly to not support her and people like her. These are the types of people who ruin fandom spaces. Who make other writers stop writing and feel good about themselves when they succeed in doing so. Actually, here’s something I’ll ask: if you like Voldemort/Hermione as a pairing and have considered writing it, now would be a great time! Because she has recently started spamming her volmione fic as though it is the only one worth reading, as though there simply aren’t any good ones out there (this is going to shock you, but there are), slamming those other fics, etc. 

Here is the link to the document again. It’s also posted below. It’s public. And keep in mind, this is only the shit that people thought to capture in screenshots before she deleted things. 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Y4v_kUHBapUyqUqc4yOkD1TjduIO8pBk/view?usp=drive_link

[atopvisenyashill]

people will be like “elia isn’t central to the narrative it’s crazy she’s so popular” and meanwhile not only is ned stressing out about her murder and what it means for jon snow every three to four business days, but her daughter’s angry black cat is quite literally haunting the red keep and someone claiming to be her son is about to land on westeros. it’s almost like the ghosts of elia and her children are in fact central to the narrative and she’s popular for a reason.

[sloasis]

Notice how Buck didn't flinch when Eddie grabbed his shoulder and pointed a finger in his face . Notice how much he trusts him . He knew Eddie wasn't going to fucking do anything but just yell in his face a little bit . He knows Eddie , he KNOWS he's not violent , or would hit ANYBODY he loves when he's upset . Because he WOULDN'T . He would NEVER and WILL never . Plus Buck LET him do that , to let him let it all out . That's what Eddie really needed , and Buck knew that . Think about that for a second you dumb fucks who are saying Eddie's abusive and will physically hurt Buck or anybody else he loves . And don't even bring up the illegal fight club shit because that was NOT about just fighting and hurting people , it was about hurting himself and his grief . His grief canonically manifests itself in anger directed towards himself that also outbursts to other people when he feels cornered . You simply just do NOT know Eddie Diaz , so stop fuckin speaking on him . Also , not everything deserves an on screen apology btw , yes in an ideal world an apology is always the first step but if you just use your brain , bringing back Chris and having dinner with Aunt Pepa with Buck WAS the fucking apology . They are best friends , best friends have fights , best friends make up , AND they love each other , whether it be platonically or romantically , that doesn't matter because it's still true . If you love someone you will forgive them , if you love someone you would let them show their emotional vulnerability even if it is an outburst , if you love someone you let them make it up to you . Clearly some of you people on here have never experienced this . Now , I'm done lmao . Just my entire dash today has been this fucking discourse over this one scene . How about we understand that every character is flawed , they ALL have their outburstive angry moments and it's dramatic on purpose , and move on . Nobody needs to always share their unnecessary fucking opinions on every fucking thing this show does . Enjoy the show or don't . These characters ( buddie ) know each other to their fucking core , so if you don't like that and want to villainize one of them to fit your narrative of him being some kind of evil fucking guy , simply fuck off and go watch something else dude . Go watch some my little pony , there's no evil Hispanic-Scandinavian man there for you to hate on for absolutely no reason .

[lacystar]

it wouldn't even matter if he did "shit on you behind your back" when you "never say anything back." the thing it absolutely boils down to is that you knew him when he was a minor and he has come forward saying that because of your influence and power, he felt uncomfortable around you. any POSSIBLE comeback other than an apology ends there. slur or no slur, any other response to that is bad. or, is it just that someone underage you've hurt in the past telling the truth about you only scares you when you know they have the public influence to protect themself?

[basket-of-radiants]

Why were you so disappointed by Rhythm of War?

This has been sitting in my askbox for years. I've taken several cracks at answering, only to get frustrated with the subject matter and burn myself out every time. I didn't like Rhythm of War. More than that, I didn't like it in a way that tainted my enjoyment of the entire series. And despite what it may seem, I don't actually enjoy discussing things which I don't like. I always want to talk from a place of good faith. Which is why now that my feelings towards the series are a little more positive, I think I can finally answer this.

I'm going to try to stay away from specific plotpoints and story beats for this post, because my goal isn't to nitpick (if for no other reason than it would take a week to write this post), I'm just looking to talk about my overall impressions. I think that might mean the only spoilers here will be structural? idk, if you haven't read Rhythm of War yourself then you should probably do that before looking for other people's opinions anyway. 

I liked Way of Kings when I first read it. I didn't love it at the time, but I liked it. Certainly enough to keep reading once I'd finished. One thing that made me a bit uncomfy, however, was the war against the Parshendi. They were this unknowable enemy which the book was not interested in knowing. An inhuman army. Their main purpose was to kill Kaladin's friends, or else be killed by Dalinar's armies. And yet the Parshendi, and the parshmen in the form of Shen, did show hints of personhood. And so it bothered me how Dalinar spoke so casually about how the Alethi had decimated their numbers, how the others used the war as a means to amass wealth and power. (It didn't bother me in a "this is a bad book" way but in a "these characters are bad people" way.)

One of my foibles as a reader is that when a book is very clearly treating one side of a conflict with more humanity, I tend to be a bit predisposed towards the other to account for that. And with the Alethi clearly being the invading party and superior military force, there was also some underdog favoritism. I didn't really like how the book treated the Parshendi. This is to say that going forward, the singers would be more important to me than any other through line.

So imagine my delight at reading Words of Radiance and meeting Eshonai, one of the Parshendi, who even gets her own point of view sections! They were no longer being treated as a faceless mass, we were getting to see things from their perspective as well. And it became plain to see the damage the Alethi had done to them. I couldn't really bring myself to root for Dalinar or really any of the humans against the listeners. I couldn't even bring myself to like most of these characters. I still enjoyed the book but once it became clear there wouldn't be a peaceful conclusion, let's just say that I wouldn't have wept for Dalinar and Adolin if Szeth had managed to off them. Like everyone in the book, I assumed that going forward all the parshmen would be turned into evil voidbringers in the everstorm and that the listeners were mostly dead. Except for Rlain, and Eshonai because I'd read or been told that book 4 would be Eshonai's book and thus had assumed she was fine. (Oathbringer spoilers, she was not fine.) So ultimately it was still a bit of a downer way to end the book. 

So imagine my delight at reading Oathbringer, where for the first time singers were being treated as people, full and real people, and where the human characters could no longer ignore or dismiss them. We met Khen and the others, common singers who were sympathetic and just wanted freedom from bondage. We see Venli grapple with the loss of her home. We see Leshwi and Moash connecting with and understanding one another. We learn of a history where singers were the original inhabitants of the planet. Parallel to this, Dalinar is having a truly excellent character arc about confronting one's past actions and acknowledging them to move forward and do better. I loved Oathbringer, for some years it was my favorite book, and I was excited as hell to see what came next. At the time, it seemed to me that there is a clear direction the story is going. Two books about needless war, and then a third where the main cast is forced to acknowledge the personhood of their enemies. This was so cool, all of my feelings from the previous installments were being validated, the characters were going to have to face what they've done in the past and outgrow their militaristic mindsets, I was so sure of that.

Imagine my disappointment when that does not even remotely resemble the direction the story went in Rhythm of War. RoW presented a clear, straightforward “us vs. them" narrative, where every character was totally fine with killing singers. Characters aligned with the singers were either flattened into wholly evil versions of themselves (Moash) or were expected to turn on their side in favor of the humans (Venli.) Because clearly there was no reason good people would be on the side that's all former slaves trying to stay free. Maybe there's some sort of accord or understanding between Navani and Raboniel that I might have found meaningful if the seeds of mutual understanding weren't already there in Oathbringer and then apparently ignored for a year by all the characters.

I have a lot of issues with how the listeners are handled in these books. (Here's some elaboration.) Following OB, I had thought that all my concerns were going to be addressed. Following RoW, I knew they never would be. 

Which is my main complaint, because that's the thread that matters most to me in this series.

I have a lot of other Things as well. Gonna just talk about a few big ones. 

One outsized source of disappointment that may seem a little petty, and which probably is, is that I felt mislead by the premise of the book. It had been announced that this book would center Venli and Eshonai, and I was unbelievably hyped for that. That did not really turn out to be the case. The purpose for their backstory chapters felt less about exploring them as people and contextualizing their arcs, and more about filling in gaps of world history. In the main plot, Venli was a POV character and she certainly played a role, but honestly not a very important one overall. To me she felt like a side character in her own book. I don't think it's controversial to say that the main character of RoW was Navani. A lot of people really like Navani and are happy about that. Unfortunately I'm not one of those people, and I found it all the more difficult to enjoy her when it felt like it was coming at the expense of some of my favorite characters. 

This particular gripe somewhat comes down to preference, obviously everyone prefers to read about characters they like more than those they don't, and it can go both ways. (For instance, on a craft/technical level RoW is probably the superior book to W&T, but I liked the latter a lot more because of my stupidly outsized attachment to Szeth and Nale.) But I do think there's something of a real criticism in how the book would rather focus on the feelings of a queen rather than those of a genocide survivor, and how the former's are given significantly more weight and import. It ties in with my main criticism, I think. 

And then there's how human/human racism had also been wholly cast aside as a plot point. Jasnah fixed slavery so that's resolved, and the only person who still cares about structural racism is the evil bad bad evil villain Moash/Vyre, who is now wholly irredeemable and who you're allowed to totally write off because he's sold his soul to Odium. I've already talked a lot about this. Other people have already talked about this, probably better than me. The writing was actually on the wall for me in OB, but again, RoW was when I fully accepted that this was never going to be addressed. 

There's something else that probably deserves its own discussion rather than being quickly tacked on at the end here, but here we are. This book changed how the series approaches war. 

In WoK, war was very clearly portrayed as a bad and inglorious thing. It was brutal, it was painful, those at the bottom died cruelly and unceremoniously and pointlessly while those at the top turned a profit. Every day was a new horror. The enemy were never evil, they were always just more people forced to go through the same thing. Through the next couple books, it felt to me that even if the characters had accepted war as necessary, there was still a tragedy to it. Conversely, in RoW (and W&T) war is basically a series of boss battles, in between which our protagonists can kill dozens of footsoldiers with barely a thought in the same way WoK had criticized.

Final note on all this, it sucks how we have no perspectives from the former-slaves-singers demographic. Those guys are really thrown under the bus, and seemingly get no self-determination now or ever. It was a glaring problem to me in RoW. Conscripted and enslaved humans and singers probably have just as much ground to form mutual understanding as a fused and a queen. (In fact they already had. In Oathbringer.)

In essence, RoW disappointed me because it left me with the distinct impression that none of the series's most important through lines (well, most important to me) were going to be resolved well. I liked W&T, but I haven't revised my opinion very much about the overall handling of these topics across the series. Maybe one of the reasons I was able to enjoy W&T so much more was because I no longer had such high expectations.

[v88sy]

Every time I venture into the Bucktommy ao3 tags without filters, for curiosity and to check numbers, I remember why I have my filters so strict.

[tevanbuckley]

piss on the poor levels of reading comprehension aside, “Well there’s statistically more queer firefighters irl than dead ones” is a fucking wild gotcha when not to be blunt but

🟩 queer - 3

🟥 dead - 1

it’s not like gay!eddie is a statistical make or break here guys.

[yoinkschief]

Every time I finally start feeling some sort of blissful about the Eddsworld fandom and how cool it is Hargreaves starts hating on the fandom again

[adhdevankinard]

its kinda scary how the show keeps nailing in the fact how bddie might not ever be a thing, getting increasingly toxic just to drive the point home and Still the fans are like “oh wow. romance!” like how

Personally, I don’t think the show is deliberately making their dynamic toxic to put off shippers. I think the writers don’t know what they’re doing with Eddie as a character.

Because they’re not letting Eddie have any character development. The consequences don’t matter and that’s a failure of storytelling on the writer’s part. It’s not just Eddie — having consequences has been a problem for the show for a long time. I mean, that’s the reason they decided to kill off Bobby. They needed the characters to finally be faced with a long-lasting consequence. Yet, they still haven’t learned, apparently, because Eddie is still not developing as a character.

And to touch on the romanticization, I think what makes it so difficult for me to personally understand is that the show is presenting it as Buck and Eddie being on equal footing when it’s not. And people who are romanticizing it are imagining a relationship dynamic that is not on screen. Like there’s fanon and there’s what’s on screen.

Because as it stands now, Buck is the narrative punching bag and Eddie is always forgiven even when he doesn’t apologize. So I just don’t understand how people can think that is basis for an equal romantic relationship. It’s not even interesting, lol.

And I’m not saying that complex power dynamics can’t be explored in media. I have mentioned Interview with the Vampire — I also love that show and it is full of toxic relationships and grey characters. The writers of Interview with the Vampire know their show is about toxic relationships — the writers are not going to have Lestat be cruel to Louis but at the end of the episode have it all be forgotten and everything is fine and not have an eventual confrontation about Lestat’s words and actions. 911 is not Interview with the Vampire — these are not morally grey characters. Eddie and Buck are supposed to be best friends. But the writers of 911 seemingly are unaware, again, of not giving the characters something to be confronted with. And are unaware that their relationship is so unequal.

Sorry this kinda went off on a tangent but I had so many thoughts that needed to get out!

Thank you for the ask!! ❤️❤️❤️

[blobbei-art]

Back on my OC bullshit so these are the only decent Bedman doodle's ive done over the past couple months

Bedsiblings playing cards with the bed, Dungeon Meshi inspired Bedman chimera and Input Bedman(tm)

[welcometogrouchland]

I'm going to be so real I do not understand tim & steph shippers who feel that Steph dating Tim again would save her character. You can make an argument that giving Tim a more compelling love interest would be beneficial for him! And you can at least make an argument that the fujo mischaracterization of Steph would stop. However she'd still, inevitably, be treated as a prop character/extension for someone more popular 😭 it also wouldn't make her appear in more books! Tim doesn't have many frequent appearances at the moment either! You can just say you like the couple and want them back together without acting like you have some kind of moral stance

[imjunebitch]

ik that people have stopped talking abt this as much but there's smth about the whole jk rowling shit that I wanted to discuss. I'm sure others have said it better, that's ok, I still wanna say it regardless.

basically, stop interacting with harry potter if you like trans people existing. i didn't fucking know what the marauders was until about a month ago... don't interact with it either! the issue is us giving a fuck about "problematic themes in harry potter." genuinely who gives a fuck about problematic themes in harry potter??!! why is that the center of our discourse? it shouldn't be! but that was rhetorical, i know why.

my dad read me the Harry Potter books when I was a little kid. i have crazy nostalgia for them, and I get why people love them. and i think, while harry potter is immensely flawed, and influenced by racist,ableist, and explicitly fatphobic views, theres a reason these criticisms mostly picked up after jk rowling started making a transphobic ass of herself. it wasn't enough to stop interacting with a franchise we loved because the creator was using the profit and attention to do terrible things. we needed to hate the franchise too. so all these (definitely real) faults were obsessively observed, categorized, derided. so we could hate the books themselves.

but something got lost in translation. people started thinking the problematic themes were the main issue, and they never were! the main issue is the woman utilizing our attention and profits to cause widespread harm to trans people! but some people decided it was okay to interact with sanitized fanwork, devoid of those problematic themes. folks. that isn't the issue. that was never the issue. don't "cancel" jk rowling and continue to interact with a fandom based around her work. have some moral fucking backbone and let the ip die.

[qiu-yan]

sensitive topic incoming

not a haterpost i promise.

sect leader yao is not a reliable source

further explanation/hypothesizing:

it happened exactly as sect leader yao said: self-explanatory. the version of events preferred by jiggy antis

he mercy-killed rusong: maybe rusong was already showing signs of a life-altering disorder as a result of the incest. or maybe jiggy just felt that, if the incest information ever came out, rusong would be doomed to a life of suffering in a heavily prejudiced society. jiggy himself had spent his entire life suffering and getting kicked around due to his own proximity to society's pariahs/taboos, so perhaps he felt that he could not subject his son to the same miserable existence. thus, jiggy gave rusong a more peaceful end, before (in jiggy's mind) society could force rusong to suffer.

he allowed rusong to die through inaction: this is really only a "kill" under a utilitarian moral framework. by this explanation, maybe jiggy found out in advance that someone was planning to kill rusong; however, for any of the other reasons listed here, jiggy decided to do nothing and allow the assassination to happen. thus jiggy would consider himself guilty of allowing rusong's death to happen through inaction.

he did it to justify eliminating an opponent of the watchtowers: maybe the advancement of the watchtower project, which jiggy knew would make society a safer place, had hit a deadlock because of a particularly stubborn opponent. so jiggy killed rusong and framed the opponent in order to engineer a situation in which his annihilation of the opponent would be entirely socially sanctioned.

and here is where the utilitarian arguments come in. perhaps jiggy knew that the watchtower project would improve the lives of millions of people and would make society as a whole safer. and he saw that one political opponent as the final major barrier. and jiggy could think of no other way to get rid of this guy. so jiggy weighed the lives of those millions of people against his one son, and concluded those millions of strangers were weightier; his son became his iphigenia.

of course, this is still a rather unhinged plan to just come up with on your own, so perhaps a better explanation of events is this reasoning paired with the "he allowed rusong to die through inaction" series of events.

rusong was killed by political opponents and jiggy blamed himself: now we reach the "he didn't do it" section of the potential explanations. jiggy has a habit of claiming kills he didn't strictly perform himself; so long as the chain of cause and effect can somehow be traced to somewhere near him eventually, jiggy will claim credit for someone's death. this is how jiggy takes credit for the death of jin zixuan: even though [novel canon] no one forced wei wuxian to lose control of wen ning and no one forced wen ning to attack jin zixuan, jiggy still acts as if he can call himself jin zixuan's killer, simply because he sent jin zixuan to wei wuxian's location.

jiggy, in pursuing the watchtower project, aroused a lot of public anger. jiggy made himself, and by extension his wife and his child, the political enemies of many, and thus political targets as well. thus, if an enemy targets the life of jin rusong because they are jiggy's enemy, jiggy is entirely justified in feeling as if rusong's death is his fault. after all, if he hadn't pursued the watchtower project, then maybe rusong would still be alive.

jiggy said "he had to die" as a Cope: losing your son sucks. perhaps jiggy, in the despair following his son's death, tried to cope with the new reality by telling himself that rusong would have had to die anyways, because he was an incest baby. if rusong was always slated to die, then the fact that rusong is now dead can now be survived. thus, "rusong had to die" becomes an emotional coping mechanism for jiggy.

no, jiggy himself is uncertain if he allowed rusong to die through inaction: this one is a a bit fanciful but bear with me here. on one hand, jiggy loves his wife and son. on the other hand, jiggy is horrified by his marriage with his wife and by the existence of his son, because his wife is also his sister and his son is the product of incest. jiggy lives with not only this horror but also the constant fear of exposure, because if this information ever got out, the lives of himself, his wife, and his son would all be over.

rusong's growth thus becomes a source of dread, not hope: every day lived brings the possibility of rusong developing some disorder or condition that eventually proves the incest. is it not possible that jiggy, living every day under such fear, might come to believe that things would be better if rusong stopped growing older? if rusong died--then gone too would be the evidence of the incest, would it not?

now along comes the political opponent who assassinates rusong. jiggy does not see it coming and jiggy is thus unable to stop it. but afterwards, upon beholding the corpse of his son, what does jiggy feel? rage? despair? no--relief! he feels relief! though he also grieves, the constant fear shrouding his entire life has, for once, lifted!

but if jiggy is relieved by the death of his son, what does this imply? can jiggy truly say, with full confidence, that he did not see the assassination coming? can he really say, with heaven and earth as his witnesses, that his failure to stop the assassination was not to some degree a choice? is there truly no small part of him that did in fact see the assassination coming--yet, knowing it would be so relieving for him, simply chose to do nothing?

but if jiggy did not see the assassination coming at all--if rusong's death truly cannot be pinned on jiggy at all--then what does that say about jiggy's power? about jiggy's safety? jiggy being innocent of killing through inaction means that jinlintai really is somewhere assassins can penetrate into. then jiggy's son really was killed by a force jiggy had no way of stopping. then, in this situation, jiggy really was powerless.

you can remove the ambiguity and argue the case either way: jiggy knew about the assassination and let it happen, jiggy legitimately knew nothing and could not have stopped the assassination. but the ambiguity makes this scenario more interesting to me. jiggy lives for the rest of his days uncertain if he chose to allow his son to die through inaction, or if he really was just weak enough to fail to protect his son. maybe jiggy's memories of the incident even manage to start distorting after a while, implying either one or the other depending on jiggy's own mental situation.

thus, when jiggy says "rusong had to die," he's uncertain if he's justifying his actions or delusionally coping with a reality he had no hand in making. when jiggy says "i killed my son," he's uncertain if he's even telling the truth or not.

ah well. this is basically original fiction at this point. it's just a potential scenario.

anyways, these are just a few scenarios based on various meta and fanfics of this subject ive read over the past few months. you can probably come up with all sorts of explanations. whatever you come up with, though, should be better than just blindly taking sect leader yao at his word.