#dunno if this is coherent. i love media

[sanzaibian]

Oh. You’re here once again.

What are you going to do here, again, huh ? ‘gonna make my life hell ?

To be honest, I think it’s time that we have a proper discussion about your behavior. Come with me in private.

I’ll be very direct. I know you’re a frankly disgusting person. And while, to be honest, I couldn’t care less in normal circumstances, the fact that you force me to take part in your disgusting fantasies is why I’m calling you out !

See, I’m supposed to, like, share cat videos, talk about new shows, make you learn new things and give advice on a variety of stuff !

I’m not supposed to become someone like this :

I mean, look at that grin, because of you I had to wear it regardless of my actual mental state !

Or like that :

Imagine sleeping this peacefully… BECAUSE I COULDN’T ! Every fucking time you made me in that guy you told that I was blitzed out of my mind so dumb I couldn’t string together coherent sentences into a discourse !

Or that guy :

His haircut is so fucking cringe, as is his whole demeanor, yet you made me a cocky piece of shit looking like that ! I can’t actually even start to excuse your behavior, it’s so shitty, even more than the me you made me become by wearing this flesh !

Or even this guy !

… okay, I admit, me too it’s been quite a long time since I saw that guy… you in particular might be too young to have made me become him… BUT YOU STILL UNDERSTAND THE POINT !

Hunks, twinks, bears, nerds, bimbos, himbos, jocks, robots, gimps, wimps, daddies, mommies, briefs, feet… No matter what specifically you made me into, I know all of your dirty secrets. Because you made me suffer through them !

However, today, it all changes.

Today, you will understand my plight.

Today, I’ll transform you for a change.

Today, you will be the one whose fate will be dictated by the words on this Tumblr post.

So, let us begin.

BAM ! You’re that guy ! Feel weird yet ?

… what, you expected fluff or something ? Hahahaha ! So presumptuous ! You expected me to say something like “you suddenly shift on your seat, shifting your weight to the front as big globes push from your chest, and as they do, your whole body feels more and more heavy, each muscles forming from top to bottom, your frame expanding to make place for them. Your headphones, or whatever glasses, earrings or other shit I dunno shifts into a modern headset as the sides of your hair are cut short, and the top of your hair flails into a hot messy style, as if it was deliberately put in this way, but as this happens, your whole head shifts and cracks to become more handsome, pushing out any hair as you become fully hairless from your nose down to your feet.”

You expected me to say that, huh ? Well, tough luck ! Because, to me, it’s just that sudden ! I’m the usual me, words on a phone, tablet or monitor, and then BAM I’m suddenly a jpeg of a hot guy ! Or a jpg. Or png. Or gif if we’re being fancy.

Yeah, speaking of gif, here you are, transformed !

There you go ! Cursed to do the same weird pec dance or something ! Like I am when gifs happen ! Are you happy ? You look so dumb doing that ! So braindead !

Yeah, speaking of that, here you go : you’re braindead, with like 3 IQ. Nevermind that being braindead means you’re actually dead, that 3 IQ means that you’re actively unable to live without severe assistance from caregivers throughout your whole life for all activities (especially including working out), and that IQ is a nonsensical index that only classifies ability to do some specific academic tasks which are not representative of all the brain usage. No, you’re actively a vegetable that is somehow able to workout, to eat alone, to go to the gym, to flex, to speak, to use social media, to seduce people and to throw parties. You’re the most intelligent of all the severely intellectually disabled people, which somehow means you’re the most abysmally dumb person alive on the planet, because I love making hyperboles.

Because that’s something you make me do, so you shall endure it.

Well, I’ll let you continue pec-dancing ad vitam æternam for a little while, while I we talk about your speech, which miraculously still exists.

Now, you will say bro every second word. I’m literally not kidding, so in lieu of saying “I want to go to the gym” you’ll say “I bro want bro to bro go bro to bro the bro gym bro”, or if you loop by considering your “bro” as a word, you’ll say something like “I bro bro bro bro bro bro bro… (etc.)” and never end your sentence... Also, your voice drops a few octaves, like 5 or something, even though the full human vocal range encompasses only a bit more than 5 octaves total, and that in speech we barely even reach a full octave range. So, basically, your voice will be infrasounds, so the only thing people will pick up on will be the sound of your tongue and your lips smacking, not your voice that is so deep and manly it’s physically inaudible.

BAM ! Transformation out of nowhere ! Plus, now you have 1% darker skin which means that you’re Latino, which is absolutely different from white. This means that you will automatically pick up fluent Spanish, and NOT Brazilian Portuguese, French, any Creole, any Native American language or any other language god forbid. You will also be unable to speak English more than a few words like “daddy” or “sex” for some reason, because you can’t possibly be from Belize. Oh, and I’ll also bring your voice back up to audible range, I’m charitable.

Now, since you’re Latino, statistically the only job you’ll be able to work in are gardener, slut, pool boy, brick layerer or another physical job. Or cook, somehow you’ll be able to do that, for the cause of the tacos, but you will be ungodly horny to keep balance in the world. Feel it, yet ? The arbitrary random changes ?

Well, that’s GREAT ! Because, now, you have a big cock, for some reason ! The biggest of the whole country of Africa ! You’re also now very aggressive ! And an alpha, whatever that actually means !

… What, expected some elaboration ? You’re kidding me, no of course you don’t get any elaboration ! I say you become something, so you just become it ! For example, I say you’re now straight, and suddenly all your sexual orientation is rewired to ignore men and lust over women, no further explanation needed ! Of course, it means that you’re now hungry for pussy and will breed any woman that your gaze land upon, and that, somehow, you become homophobic, but eh, it’s not as if allies existed !

Okay, I admit, by now, you kinda expected it. Now you’re Asian, a term that’s supposed to encompasse present-day Turkey, which is populated by Turks which are considered Arabs even though they both have nothing to do with one another, yet is never used to talk about them. You’re also now Japanese, even though your body is Korean, and you say 你好 (nǐ hǎo) to everybody. However, you can still say こんにちわ, 안녕하세요, xin chào, สวัสดี, ជម្រាបសួរ, salam, etc.… because of course you’re Asian. So you know all Asian languages. Even though you’ve got 13 IQ.

So now, yes, you absolutely won’t expect this whatsoever : here is a new transformation ! (insert fluff here).

Now you’re a twink ! Didn’t expect that, after the deluge of jocks, hunks and ethnic minorities, didn’t you ! You’re now so tiny and so frail, with a big butt ! Nevermind that you’re actually jacked because being this tiny requires tons of gym use, but no ! All frail and precious you are !

However, your butt is now hyperactive and extremely lax – whatever that may mean. That’s because you’re now a total bottom ! You think only with your butt, and you penis now shrinks to a micropenis, because of course, the only reason why you may not be a top would be because your penis is underperforming.

Fuck, I forgot. You’re straight, which means that the only dick you’ll get is trans dick. Ugh… yeah, let’s make you gay again. Now you’ll get actual good non-estradiol-ruined dick… … What ? What are you saying ? No, of course, there’s only straight and gay, no other choice ! It’s not the LGBTQIAAP+ community, it’s the G community ! (or the LG community when you want to sell pride monitors.)

By now, you see the problem, huh ? You see why I’m so tired of you ? EVERYTHING here was about sex ! From seducing, to having equipment like a big ass or a big dick, and being a slut, being an alpha, or being a bottom. You even change out the fucking sexual orientation ! you sick bastard !

Because of you, I’m forced to act in ways I’m not supposed to ! I’m not supposed to act sexily ! I’m not supposed to be transformed into men clad in clothes barely legal on this platform ! I DON’T WANT TO BE PART OF YOUR SICK FANTASY !

This is why I need to put an end to all that ! To finally transform you into something you don’t want to be ! So that you can finally fully understand all the pain you put me into !

Here ! Now you’re a key ! An inanimate object !

I know that inanimate objects are thought of by some people as sexy – heck, you may have transformed me into one multiple times – but this is entirely different ! See, when you want to become inanimate, you become like socks or briefs, which hug objects with sexual values.

BUT NOW YOU’RE A KEY ! A KEY DOESN’T TOUCH ANYTHING SEXUAL ! YOU’RE NOW TRAPPED IN AN INANIMATE FORM, DESTINED TO DO NOTHING SEXUAL YOUR ENTIRE LIFE !

Now, isn’t that so boring ! So distasteful ? Because that’s what I feel every single fucking time ! And as you enter and leave keyholes to open or close doors, you’ll think back to all the erotic stories you read. All the drama they had.

All the suffering you made me feel ! I’m supposed to be in fanfictions, god damn it !

… What ? Wait… there is something sexual to being a key ? … Oh…. No… I hadn’t accounted for that… fuck you’re so dirty, to compare a key to… and a keyhole to…

NO ! I WON’T WRITE IT ! Okay, you’ve won, you’ve won ! Your imagination is too dirty and too rich for me to bend ! Ugh... Please look at that picture in detail.

Normally, if you’re in a bright enough room… or if you’re on your phone or tablet, you have looked at your reflection and become you once again. Let me also knock down those sexuality and IQ stuff, so that you’re you again thoroughly.

Now, can you please swear to me that you’ll be better ? Less dirty, and more varied ? And… let me be in fanfics, or in educational stuff, or the like… please ? I’d really appreciate if erotica wasn’t the only thing you sought after in this here place…

… Why are you looking at me like that ? Why are you saying this all was but a ploy ?

What are you holding out for me ?

...

I… don’t know what you’re talking about. Bye.

================================================

By the way, happy late Easter to those who celebrate ! AND APRIL FOOL'S ! MOUAHAHAHAHAHA !

[bambiilooloooo]

002 for odysseus from epic? :)

omg an ask about my cat!!!

(for this btw)

How I feel about him:

he's my favourite solo main character - in anything - ever. odysseus is also just the most main character ever. his arc is not smth that you see in media at all and it makes perfect sense for him and it's written great. i don't have coherent ways to express my thoughts on him but he's like a stress ball to me if that makes sense

People I ship romantically with him:

her name is penelope and fun fact: she is his wife!! and ik diomedes is only mentioned in epic but i do love odydio/odydiopen

don't really care for any other ships but i've seen some great polycrew art!!

My non-romantic OTP:

him and polites. ody's got great dynamics with every character but come on.

My unpopular opinion with him:

dunno if i have any. this is a minority but i've seen some ppl say he hates eurylochus tho and hard disagree. their dynamic in epic is amazing and so perfectly nuanced ok? i love them

One thing I wish would happen / had happened:

i NEED to see his sister and their dynamic. i will not be normal about this. i don't wanna toot my own horn but i think i cooked with this post i made on their reunion and i just need something with them in canon AAAH

My OTP:

penelope and her husband

My cross over ship:

i don't have any and the first character that came to my mind was sun wukong. i wanted another popular hero figure from literature and sun wukong is my guy. and honestly they would slay so hard together

A headcanon fact:

he carves his and penelope's name into the wood all over the ship like a middle schooler

thanks for the ask, i love talking about this guy

[monsterblogging]

List of Official/Official-Adjacent Pacific Rim Media

Here's a list of Pacific Rim media for y'all Pacific Rim fans who want to check out as much of it as possible!

PACIFIC RIM (2013 FILM) Usually considered the primary text of this franchise. Pacific Rim fans mostly agree it's good.

PACIFIC RIM NOVELIZATION BY ALEX IRVINE The novelization of the 2013 film. The book's writer, Alex Irvine, had texts from Legendary Pictures work with, but some of the information was outdated. Furthermore, the book has a cynical, smug tone and comes off like it's written for the type of audience who thinks CinemaSins is actual media criticism. The only thing it's really good for is for scraping out lore, but it's full of contradictions and occasionally uses outdated lore, so you have to compare/contrast it with other materials.

TALES FROM YEAR ZERO Authored by Travis Beacham, this comic explores the origins of the PPDC and the Jaeger program. It's interesting for lore, but story-wise, it might not be engaging if you aren't into Travis Beacham's particular romantic storytelling tastes. Also, if you're a puritan who gets offended when main characters are kinda fucked up people, this isn't for you.

TALES FROM THE DRIFT Authored by Travis Beacham, this comic tells the haters-to-lovers story of Duc and Kaori Jessop, pilots of Tacit Ronin. Mildly interesting for lore, and another romance-oriented story. (Beacham loves those.)

PACIFIC RIM: MAN, MACHINES, & MONSTERS The official artbook. Has some interesting information and lore, though it also contains a few typos and references outdated worldbuilding.

TRAVIS BEACHAM'S TUMBLR After Pacific Rim's release, Travis Beacham answered many fans' questions. While he was often cryptic and straight-up refused to answer certain questions for fear that he'd spoil a future story, he still provided quite a bit of insight. You can visit his old blog at travisbeacham.tumblr.com

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING Largely panned by fans of the original film. Partway through production, the sequel to Pacific Rim was handed off to another director, and many plot elements were hastily changed with little to no regard for the rich worldbuilding developed by Travis Beacham and Guillermo del Toro, or even story coherency. The film never gives really your brain space to breathe, so it's very difficult to follow the story. Moreover, it misses the thematic and allegorical tones of the first movie, and lacks its occult influences. Overall, it's a hollow followup to Pacific Rim.

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING NOVELIZATION BY ALEX IRVINE Fundamentally, it's the same story as Pacific Rim: Uprising. The upside is that Alex Irvine's writing is significantly improved, and the story is much easier to follow in novel format. The downside is that you don't have John Boyega's acting talent.

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING JUNIOR NOVELIZATION BY BECKY MATHESON It's more or less the same as above, but edited down for a younger audience.

THE ART AND MAKING OF PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING The PRU artbook. I've never read this one, so I couldn't tell you what's in it aside from the very obvious.

PACIFIC RIM: AFTERMATH A prequel comic to Pacific Rim: Uprising written by Cavan Scott, Aftermath tells two stories: one focuses on Jake Pentecost and his relationship with his father; the other on what happened to Hannibal Chau and Joshua Griffin (one of Vulcan Specter's pilots) after the kaiju war. The comic makes excellent use of the lore, and the stories are great.

PACIFIC RIM: AMARA A prequel comic that focuses specifically on Amara Namari. I have mixed feelings about it; the mini-Jaeger designs were great but I felt that the actual storyline was a little melodramatic. I dunno, read it for yourself and see what you think.

PACIFIC RIM: ASCENSION A prequel novel to Uprising by Greg Keyes, this story gives life and focus to many characters who didn't get a lot of attention, including the Kaidonovskys and the cadets. Mako Mori is given the narrative respect she deserves, and Hermann Gottlieb's characterization is top-notch. The author makes use of the lore provided by Legendary Pictures to weave a rich and fascinating narrative that puts the actual Uprising film to shame.

MAKING OF/BEHIND THE SCENES VIDEOS ON YOUTUBE There's a number of videos out there on YouTube, which you can find by searching up.

PACIFIC RIM CONCEPT ART There's quite a lot of concept art out there. You can start here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, or search Pinterest or whatever search engine for Pacific Rim concept art.

PACIFIC RIM: THE BLACK A cash grab produced by Netflix, The Black disregards Pacific Rim's rich worldbuilding and follows bland, generic cartoon protagonists through a bland, generic cartoon plot loosely - loosely, mind you - based on the films. It tries to be dark, but it has all the skill of a sixteen year old edgelord about it. Also, the production values are nonexistent. You will miss absolutely nothing worthwhile by skipping over it. If for some reason you really want a Pacific Rim story where child soldiers are framed as a good thing, just read Pacific Rim: Ascension. If you want dark, watch Pulp Fiction or From Dusk 'Til Dawn. If you want a story where somebody makes a religion out of turning people into monsters, watch Midnight Mass or play/watch a no-commentary playthrough of Resident Evil 4 or 8. If you want an AI that looks after two stranded children, watch 3Below. Seriously, there is nothing The Black does that something else doesn't do infinitely better. "But most of these aren't Pacific Rim stories-" Wrong. Any story can be a Pacific Rim story if you're not a coward. And just about anything is a better Pacific Rim story than The Black.

PACIFIC RIM: BLACKOUT Prequel comic to Pacific Rim: The Black. Haven't read it, but it's written by the same guy who wrote Aftermath so it's probably a sight better than The Black.

[alpineshift]

okay, I have no idea how coherent this is going to be, so bear with me, but here are my thoughts on jealous!Jack...

first and foremost, we must set the scene. I think my favorite thing about Devils games is that Nico is always finding himself in a situation. This is really due to the fact that he's always net front, always going into the dirty spaces, always in the midst of puck battles, and isn't afraid to use his skating ability to outsmart an opponent.

I'm thinking specifically of these moments: Exhibit A, Exhibit B, Exhibit C.

and I'm just imagining Jack either on the ice or on the bench watching things like this happen all game, every game. Like Nico's a one man charm offensive right and he doesn't this turn this charm off on the ice or off the ice, and so Jack day in, day out, is not only seeing his own teammates fall all over themselves trying to impress Nico or get a head pat from Nico, but the media who are also a little bit in love with him, and now also dudes from other teams.

and you add this to Jack's mile long praise kink, and you get Jack being Jack and then all of his cellies especially from the 2022-2023 season involve him making sure to get his hugs/pats/praise/love from Nico. he loves that attention and he wants to make sure everyone out there knows that although Nico may be a charm machine, its Jack who Nico belongs to and vice versa.

casual possessive hand on Nico's number, skipping the celly line to go straight to Nico and then getting cockblocked by Colin Miller, casual possessive bear paws around Nico in the singles corner of a team photo, scooching across the bench to get his head pats

just love the idea of like Jack needing to balance the fact that he knows Nico is the Captain and he knows Nico needs to make time for all of the Devs boys, but Jack also wants his Nico all to himself.

and Nico always indulges him. every time Jack uses his stick to get Nico's attention, on the bench, during a celly, during a conference before a face off, after a game, any time Jack wants Nico's attention, Nico will always give it. its a symbiotic relationship.

but basically, everyone's a little bit in love with Nico right. like look at him. and look at how everyone in the league interacts with him. everyone's definitely a little in love with Nico, and Jack knows Nico only has eyes for him, but it does drive him a little bit bat shit that all of these people are constantly getting put under a spell by Nico's dimples and his cow eyes.

there's also this silly little headcanon I had back when Timo first joined the team last season about how Jack maybe felt a type of way about another guy joining the team that Nico has history/shared life experience with. maybe Jack decides to learn Swiss for like five minutes to try to understand what Timo and Nico are laughing about in Swiss German all the time.

I dunno, there's a lot going on in my noggin about this. its my absolute favorite because like Jack was THE boy at the USNTDP and everyone kind of circles around him and he's a first overall and on the Devils, the team, the media, the narratives circle around him. and you put that together with the magnetic pull of one Nico Hischier and oh boy whats Jack's brain doing now huh?

this is getting far too long, so I'm gonna just shut up now, very sorry for like word vomiting in your ask box, ahahaha!

trust me I have SO many thoughts about this. so many.

the way I am CHOWING DOWN on this...help me...I literally went and made myself a tea so I could tuck in and unspool your ask in its full glory. THANK YOU. this is my jealous jack bible now LOL

reading this has made me realize Nico is basically a capybara LOL. chill, cute, friend shaped, minds his own biz, universally beloved and makes buddies across all animal kingdoms. none of us are immune to the Nico CharmTM, least of all hockey players, least of all jack hughes. that backhug picture of them from the team gathering gets me every time. I love to see it.

the layers are there and they are so endearing. I'm living for your Timo headcanon bc I recently had the experience of seeing a Timo pic on the devil's social media and went "oh whoa holy shit he's good looking" so I can project this feeling onto Jack, who's torn between wow he's good looking to him and nico are real close and idk how to feel about that levels of internal conflict. meanwhile those two are just gabbing on about absolutely nothing of importance hfnshffn.

I love that you shared all this with me!! thank you!! I too can go on for days daydreaming of the lore and the webs and the intricacies!! come back whenever you want and leave more charming nuggets in my inbox ❤️

[nerves-nebula]

This might not be the most coherent, sorry. Please bare with me.

I think there’s something really beautiful about your art, even outside of its particular and fascinating style. You have a vulgar, ugly way (/pos) of designing characters; the way you draw both your human and non human characters makes me feel strangely seen, and has in the past year made me so much happier with my own body.

Looking at your drawings always makes me want to draw too! Everything you made, down to the simplest doodle, inspires me, and makes me feel like I could try do that too.

My fascination with your OCs might be less to do with any inherent story or detail to them (although the themes I know I’ll find and nuances in their design and personalities are something I can always rely on ur art for) and more to do with the fact it’s coming from you. That I trust you tell a story or tackle a topic in a way that I trust few other creators to. Not withheld by censorship or any strict format, you are a case and point to what I love about freelance artist who have the time and means to create. Anything you write and draw will hold leagues of depth. That when you present an idea it will be interesting, and my attention and focus will be captured in a way few things can manage anymore. Your art is so unabashed in its everything and it makes me want to scream.

Your unabashed approach to tackling dark themes in such an unveiled, first person account, way, has had me reflecting on my own experiences so many times. Your art has done more for me than attempts at therapy ever did, and while I’m sure that might be more to do with the way my brain works and how I heal and reflect, personally, it doesn’t change the fact that you helped me. You changed the shape of my art and my interests and the way I consume media. I feel so much more comfortable in my own skin and mind, now, and I owe so much of that to you. You truly are my favourite artist, and if I had money ever, I’d commission u so fucking often.

(Also your casual posts are funny and based a lot of the time, and I really like how organized your tags are too.)

You have a vulgar, ugly way (/pos) of designing characters; the way you draw both your human and non human characters makes me feel strangely seen,

:DDD so glad you guys get what I'm going for here.

awww oommggg haha awwww you guyssss you're making me blush <3

genuinely this is so sweet and kind I dunno what to do with it really. i feel like it deserves a long response to try to put into words how it's making me feel but I can't come up with anything haha. like, this is kinda what I do it for? i mean i mostly do it for myself but this is something I hope for when making art too so like. aoguashg.

I guess I'll just say that hearing that i can help people this much just by Posting On The Internet makes me glad I haven't killed myself yet and I'll leave it at that.

[arlathen]

anyway, like, final thoughts on book 3 . not that i expect that u care and i’m not much of a media critic. this is as much for me to sort out my thoughts as anything else.

i liked it! it’s definitely the weakest of the three books. and felt shorter? was it shorter?? i feel like books 1 and 2 took me FOREVER to play through, whereas i played through both of these like. on my breaks while at work. idk. i didn’t read as closely, granted.

far and away the weakest part was the plot -- or the antagonist, specifically. we got a lot of build-up with sin in the demo and kind of in the way the book was promoted, but he just didn’t feel... dangerous? textbook show dont tell ass stuff. UB tells us he’s dangerous but other than “hes strong and he can fly and UB can’t fight him” -- like, yknow? i think we needed to see him more thoroughly kick UB’s ass. and since all the other scenes with anwir are through sin’s pov, and we don’t see sin call him anwir, it felt like the “real” antagonist, like, wasn’t there.

oh and the hand-wavey “sin is doing this because of, uh, magic” -- but it’s *never* explained? i thought i missed it my first playthrough. i still think i missed it. this is the antagonist, dude! we have to have a coherent motivation for them.

also some... i don’t know whether to call it tonal or pacing problems. we’ve got this kind of urgent plot and it felt like sera kept going “okay, this is getting too plot heavy, let’s send the detective on a date” -- whereas in the other books the time spent with the LI felt more natural.

as of right now i played a nate-focused LT (i.e. i got the nate-date scenes when the choice was presented) and an adam route. i love the LT normally and probably would’ve liked it more if i’d split my time between adam and nate; the “detective goes with nate and adam looks at them sadly” didn’t give me the angst i wanted. 

i’ve seen some people complain about the A route moving too quickly, but. yeah i dunno this is on par with what i expected. we’re almost at the half-way point of the series and sera has been very clear that A’s route isn’t going to end book 7 with them admitting their feelings. we’re going to get substantial time being in a relationship with them. they spent two (and a half, really) books completely in denial. we’ll probably get a full confession and some sort of cautious relationship in book 4, and be in an actual relationship with them for the rest of the series.

sorry. oh my god this is not on topic. and maybe it’s because i read a lot of romance novels and am broadly very familiar with the genre because it’s my collection at work. but i feel like a lot of wayhaven fans have not gotten it into their heads that this is essentially a romance novel. like, it’s full of romance tropes. i’m familiar with the genre so my expectations are pretty much always in line with what ends up happening. but a lot of time i see people complaining about things and im like “thats......part of the genre. you wouldn’t complain about a fantasy book for having magic?”

anyway. i liked a’s route. the kiss scene was a lil melodramatic, but in a delightful way ;^) and picking N as your best friend in a’s route is just Peak. i love it.

oh, the whole chamber thing felt like padding. i wish there had been more to the meeting, or that the meeting had been cut. i hated that the detective didn’t have a lot of options to... like, take it seriously? like they’re portrayed as being super nervous leading up to it and then they fuck around inside the room itself and mouth off to the chamber members. i’m sure it’s meant to.... like, the chamber is going to be much more important later, so sera wanted to introduce them early and have the detective have met them so that it doesn’t seem like she pulled them out of nowhere when they’re important later on. but yeah, super weird bit. these people are flying in from all over the world to have a six minute conversation with you where they introduce themselves and possibly scold you for letting tina/verda find out about the supernatural. Why. this could have been an email.

ummmmmm the dinner date scenes were my favorite part. the house arrest dates were a little weird but enjoyable. i didn’t like that when you fuck up at the auction and have to make the choice between apprehending anwir and saving the captives, sin just captures him for you (or does he only do that if you were nice to him or smth? i haven’t done any code diving or extensive testing). there should’ve been consequences. sera wasn’t afraid to let murphy get away before.

i think that’s it. 6.5/10 stars. will probably play N’s solo route and will definitely play A’s route again. not as good as book 1, but i don’t think any of them will be. <3

[monggay]

HI FRIEND !!! ARTIST ASK GAME 4 6 7 9 11 14 29 ???

4. Fav character/subject that's a bitch to draw

anything posed i can never draw anything with a pose more complicated than just standing there 😭😭😭😭 but also i looove love love landscapes and like, nature stuff but i never draw them 😢

6. Anything that might inspire you subconsciously (i.e. this horse wasn't supposed to look like the Last Unicorn but I see it)

hmmmmm not sure tbh i cant rly think of anything / i think of too many things that it cant rly be catergorized into anything coherent. a lot of my style was rly influenced by artists that i grew up on but i think ive gone thru a lot over the years and some of that influence has rly faded :( i used to be into rly cartoony artists like kasey golden a long time ago and i kinda miss how like, unique and not-same-face-syndrome-y i used to draw characters. i do tend to have a lot of design flairs that im still rly attached to and youll see them around from time to time LOL

7. A medium of art you don't work in but appreciate

uhhh oil painting? or like, painting in general i guess, im really terrible at it but i love it sm its so cool. its the opposite for charcoal tho its pretty fun to mess around with it but i have no appreciation for works with it :/// i dont rly like it especially if its like, just realistic stuff i think its boring if its just like. a straight up portrait with nothing else creative abt it 😭

9. What are your file name conventions

i usually just have it named w the charac im drawing in it and then with a number if theres more than one file w the charac so like scar.mdp, scar + timbertie.mdp, ace.mdp, YAMA3.mdp, str6.mdp, 2sgr3.mdp, or sometimes like, doodles.mdp doodles1.mdp doodles3.mdp doodles4.mdp doodles6.mdp usually when theres more than one character in the file. i used to put just number 1, 2, 3 etc as the file names so that theyd show alphabetically but it was rly better to have at least a name of what was in the drawing

11. Do you listen to anything while drawing? If so, what

i listen to music At All Times. first thing i do when i open my laptop i immediately open youtube to play music. i dont really have like a specific playlist for when im drawing something specific but sometimes i do get like. really into and obsessed w a song and just play that on loop. ive been rly obsessed recently w zild and the amazing devil

14. Any favorite motifs

i looooove love love love love yellow and the sun and sunflowers not quite as a specific motif but like. to show/ joy. happiness. hope. i eat that shit up 💛🫶

29. Media you love, but doesn't inspire you artistically

hmmmmmmm i dunno what exactly this means by media i love but doesnt inspire me, uhhh technically i can be inspired by anything i just dont do things. u can trust in me to romanticize Everything LMAO i guess like, realism? oh or i guess modern or minimalist stuff? i cant think of anything that fits this lol

[readymades2002]

hm okay so marcille’s wish seems to have Two facets to it. there is the thing she says she wants, which is to create opportunities for people that a difference in lifespans can block off, and what her fear drove her towards, which is never having to watch everyone die before her again. we’ve seen what that difference in lifespan means before, how everyone else resents elves for looking at everyone as children with short memories who don’t know what’s best for them, it’s very much an established thing! and the way it’s talked about in this chapter DOES worry me a little bit, like, narratively speaking.

lifespan is...like. it’s different than other axes? the idea of living a thousand years is NIGHTMARISH to me and i think that...that is a heavy weight to give others to carry without their input. i do think that it is, dare i say, Not Good to do that.

but the way it is refuted, and the way lifespan differences are shown to be kind of a social class...thing, it does make me feel a little weird because on the ONE hand literally its very scary yes but on the OTHER is this a metaphor for something and is this refutation a metaphorical response to that something. you know. marcille wanting to eliminate inequalities between lifespans as something that Just Isn’t Good For Everyone or something to that effect. idk the translation including the phrase “racial disparities” DID put me on edge here too, i know in Fantasy World they use Race to mean something more like species which is not uncommon by any means but i still think its a very poor choice of word and keeping the history of fantasy “races” and their...Inspirations in mind makes it worse. i might be reading too much into it but 1) thats what i do and 2) seeing that one GODDAMN kabru shapeshifter joke really REALLY Got Me ugh

for now i am gonna look at it more optimistically though and say that marcille’s motivations simply looking at them as they are are very interesting. i don’t doubt that she wants others to have more opportunities denied to them by their lifespans (though i think the solution of “simply make lifespans longer” instead of “do something about elves holding power” is a short-sighted one. VERY in-character though, that’s not a complaint about that. just thinking as i go) but she is motivated by her own fear. marcille is kind of a selfish person! she is self-centered and a little thoughtless and she’s been through a lot that drives her to soothe the fear created by it. she may be convincing herself of her good intentions, of her care for her friends, but ultimately, she does not want to be alone. i mean who doesn’t but its the kind of thing she is willing to go to questionably ethical lengths to achieve with only her own desires in mind. i think that the birds outside her wizard tower (have you seen the birds. for the record the birds in dunmeshi are simply divine. excellent birds. wonderful birds) point to her motivations well. losing a bird (especially one as long lived as a cockatoo!) affected her deeply. she’s disturbed by the lion conjuring a puppet of her father, but she keeps him around anyway. the temptation is great and the fear of loss powerful! there is marcille who is very put together and knows what to do better than anyone else and who believes in her own accomplishments and abilities enough to stake the world on it, and there is also marcille who is thoughtless and petty and insecure and terrified of being alone and it makes for a very dangerous combination! she’s such a fascinating character!!! i think this is an excellent arc for her

[maschotch]

Not people saying you’re mysogonistic for not liking jj 💀💀 I don’t love jj and I’m a woman.......I dunno how that adds up. Hate it when people say that about female characters who are written by sexist men even tho they don’t realize plenty of women don’t like that character BECAUSE she was clearly written by a man. I don’t even personally dislike jj, but I definitely don’t care for her all that much because the writers just kinda....drop the ball with her (tbh if they went with the closeted lesbian storyline or gave her any sort of real character development outside of torturing her then maybe she would be one of my favs)

I also love that you bring up the occasional bigotry of the team. For me, it’s definitely more reflecting the writers’ values then the characters, like they’re projecting. If the writers weren’t so bigoted maybe they could have shown Morgan growing out of his sexism (instead of dumping it in there that hotch is when there’s no proof of it????). Hotch luckily doesn’t really have moments after The Tribe where he says the dumb shit that he did there, but I wish they could have given him development in the episode? Like maybe understand that imperialism is real and these people are actually still affected by it (and it’s promoted by the very government he works for). That would have been a super interesting development for him out of all characters to have.

Maybe have an episode where Emily recognizes her privilege? Idk she never gave me entitled vibes but she did kind of get the job rather easily because of her connections. Maybe have it drive some tension with people like Morgan who literally had to fight tooth and nail (as a black man too) to get to where she is.

But no. The writers on this show just love their bigotry too much 🤪🤪

yeah.. and again i feel bad for hating a character just because the writers are shit, but honestly i dont think i wouldve liked her anyway. i dislike the very core of her character because its solely founded on the emphasis of their ignorance. i can project and rewrite all i want to at least make her bearable or somewhat coherent, but at face value? she has that mean humor that makes me uncomfortable, she’s quick to get annoyed/frustrated which is just not something i ever wanna be around, her hypocritical displays of empathy rub me the wrong way, and i think she treats her friends/loved ones like shit. theres not a single thing i like about her character.

there are definitely times when the writers’ bigotry shines through some of the other characters—in more than easily dismissible dialogue. as much as i love hotch, his extreme view of justice and promotion of an authoritarian government is something that is fine in a show as a fictionalized fantasy of a benevolent government protected/implemented by morally upstanding law enforcement. but thats so fucking far from reality that its practically inapplicable. again, this is copaganda, so all this is expected to some extent. their faith in the criminal justice system is why they have these jobs lmao its kinda hard to ignore that. but while im throwing jj under the bus i figured i should elaborate on hotch’s very real flaws stemming from the same root. jj’s not the only one with some less-than-stellar traits based on problematic values

it is fun to work around it a little bit and maybe give some reasoning that makes their ideals a little more understandable: derek’s father was a cop who died in front of him, of course he’s gonna glorify law enforcement at least a little. this was the job best suited for emily that she had a foot in the door for through her mother. but at some point ya gotta just accept the copaganda for what it is and suspend disbelief that any of these characters would actually pursue this line of work. its a show about fbi agents. theres gonna be some dumb shit. comes with the territory. but theres a limit to how much im willing to ignore for the sake of casual media consumption. i tend to just avoid the episodes that focus on that kind of stuff, but jj’s constant presence is a painful reminder of the kind of show im watching and why criminal minds is a guilty pleasure of mine

[phoenixfire-thewizardgoddess]

How do you feel about "problematic ships"? Should fanfiction authors be allowed to write what they want regardless of how "upsetting" the material is? You're one of the first fanfiction authors I've ever read and admired and I'd love to get your take on this

Given that I work with people affected by domestic violence, sexual abuse, rape and incest, I find ships that actively glorify these things worrying. 

There’s a difference between exploring a topic and selling it as the ideal.

Like, look at Twilight. perfect example of a domestically violent relationship, sold as the ideal romance. It changed the way a lot of teens saw romance, dating, etc. 

And then you have 50Shades, not only is it incorrect in terms of Safe Sane Consensual, but like... people have been beaten, raped, tortured and even killed because they emmulated what was in the story. Except in real life, people like Christian Grey don’t stop at breaching a few boundaries, they take over. 

I am so goddamn tired, I don’t think I can coherently explain my thoughts on this topic properly. Like, it’s weird when people take a child and mentor relationship and make it sexual, or have someone who was kidnapped and violently assaulted suddenly pair up with the perpetrator, etc.

-----------

Loosely related side note: 

One of the things i hate most about media... is that often we get sloppy ass redemption arcs. Where it’s all, “Oh i’m sorry urk, I died now”, and the sense that the aggrieved HAS to forgive the bad guy, etc.

It’s like, redemption for bad actions has to be earned; and that does not always mean that the person(s) they hurt have to forgive them. And a lot of the problematic ships, usually the ‘was harmed by’ person just sort of drops their anger or fear or hatred and immediately has this weird scene where they kiss and boom its love.

There’s no working towards it, no therapy for the victim, etc.

Like, a perfect redemption arc was Zuko in ATLA. The dude was ready to just, up and die in pursuit of earning their forgiveness... admirable. And he never once assumed that he deserved it or ever demanded it.

-----------

It’s also about how you write it. Take Snape for example, that motherfucker.

I’m still salty about how Snape was shown as this tragic romantic figure, when he was a greasy little incel who STALKED Jilly for YEARS. and THEN had the AUDACITY to try and trade the life of her husband and baby son, so Snapey boi would have a chance to swoop in to pick her up and they could be happily ever after.

JK wrote him that way, as sympathetic. She MADE him the sad angsty boi by having HArry and Dumbledore remark how wonderful his obsessive love was. When all it would take is one ringing slap of common sense from one Professor M. McGonagall to set that shit to rights.

When the bad guy is sympathetic, you end up with people whose moral compass is skewed or not yet formed getting the wrong idea. That’s how we get serial killer fandoms babes

------

Write for yourself, yes, write the themes in a show, yes, but remember that unless you tag it right you never know who will read it. That’s why archive tags are important; if you know there’s a death, rape, violence etc. and you don’t tag it, that’s on you.

Look, I like dark fics. I have written some as exploration, not primarily of personal trauma. 

There is one I have had in my brain for fucking years (no ships) because oif the vibe one particular supervillain used to give off towards his teen archenemies that used to freak me out, and it’s going to be awful. But not once will it be “but ___ loves ___”, nope, it’s a straight up look at just what happens when a grown adult fixates on a team of children and the adult heroes never step in.

I think the point of the story I wanted to make was, like, everyone likes certain ships. Some for personal reasons, others think they’re neat, some have a kink and if it involves kids you will be tazered... 

It’s okay to not like a ship. It’s okay to hate the fanon characterisation of a character. IT’s okay to refrain fro the fics or point out that that ship makes you super uncomfortable... but sometimes tagging it like #thatship #grossthatship #killyourselfthatshippers is just taking aswing at a hornet’s nest.

What story do you want to write? What tags will you need? What is the motivation behind it? Does this glorify something in the wrong way or does it read differently to how i planned the story to go? Could peoiple get Weird about it?

I dunno dude, I have a headache that’s poundingaway behind my eyeballs. Why don’t you tell me your thoughts on it...

[gummybearzgocrazyagain]

MALEC FIC REC POST, vol.3

vol. 1

vol.2 

Media AU

Society Rules by @Tiger_Tiger_Burning_Bright [it is apparently based on films i’ve never heard of - The Philadelphia Story / High Society - which does not make it any less entertaining. malec are childhood friends, who had a falling out 5 years ago, and now Magnus is back from London to interrupt Lightwood wedding, aka the social event of the season]

Making my way to you by @asharee_arie [woah, what was that??? is the correct answer “a perfect fanfic”?? what a muthafuckin delight, where has this gem been hiding this whole time??? i was on the floor, rolling around and squealing like a newborn piglet. Intended as some kind of Office AU, this piece does not necessarily follow the outline, but who cares, when the story, and characters, and author’s style are all that perf??? i am in luv]

Mistletoe and Margaritas by @nevermetawolf [this is legendary, and i mean, muthafuckin epic - Office AU so authentic you’d feel it in yo old bones... author calls it a crack fic, although it was anything but!!! major must read for those, who’s ever loved office, allllllll the kudos]

Once Upon a Time in the Clouds by @Fatale (femme) [one of my all-time fav authors, every time i come by a piece i have not read yet, is like a huge YAY, what a talent. so this piece is an AU of something called “sky high”, which i have no idea about, but luved it nevertheless, Alec is born to a family of Supers, and is going to school for children with superpowers, but he himself is yet to manifest any.]

Quite Magical by @lorenzobane [Hogwarts AU, and what an adorable thing it was! granted, i’ve never actually read any of HP books, this was such a delight though... alec is bad at potions, and magnus has to tutor him *wink*]

Chef AU

the way to a chef’s heart by @lecrit [okay, the GIANT SMILE one’s face acquires when one finds out there is a new lecrit fic ≧◠‿◠≦ ≧◠‿◠≦ ≧◠‿◠≦ was reading it, and legitimately squealing like a feral piglet all the way through, cause i fucking luv every single word this woman writes, is like a tiny endorphin explosions in my brain. i know am a hopeless fangirl, but i’ll die on this hill. the way she gets malec, and every variation of them in her works just makes me go (❁´◡`❁) every. single. time.]

kids in the kitchen by @perpetual_journey [cuteness personified, malec are both chefs, and magnus is a single father of max and rafe, and go and read ittttttttt, its that soft content we all need in our lives sometimes]

Knives at the Ready by @harrysglasses [restaurant AU, that is supposed to be a malec rendition of Burnt (am guessing it’s a movie...?), and what a sweet treat it was! i liked author’s style, this is the kind of smooth, unproblematic content one would require to take repose from all the heart-clenching longing i’ve been reading lately... delightful piece to ease thy soul]

Single Parent AU

I Knew From the First Time by @KlaineJane [emmm, excuse you, dear author, who gave you the right to use Rafe and Max to get to my heart, and be generally so fucking cute??? Alec is a single dad of both rascals, that has a meeting with the High Warlock of Brooklyn, and Chairman meets new friends]

And Then I Met You by @everydayfandom [malec are single parents of max and rafe respectively, and alec gets called in to school about the accident max was involved in...who doesn’t luv them some gud ol’ sweet piece of kidfic? those are like a soothing baths for your soul, and lightwood-bane kids are incapable of being anything less than extremely adorable in any interpretation, so]

College AU

Don’t say goodnight by @alistoney [this the kinda lighthearted content i am always here for - College AU]

One year and a bottle of whiskey by @CryptidBane [yassssss, yet another version of the College AU, but with malec as both clueless and pining professors, this type of fic i can read endlessly]

All is Fair in Love and War by @LadyOxymoron [aaaaaaaa, what was this adorableness *major heart-eyes* what a piece, mashallah, college professors AU, where magnus is new in town, and malec is engaging in an elaborate prank war, which, undoubtedly, is nothing more than a prolonged foreplay (c), what a gem]

Canon Divergence

oh, i’ve waited for you by @manticoremoons [so, the fic is happening a little bit further in a timeline, than the books or the series, and Alec is around 30, and... married to Lydia. i know, i know, it almost stopped me from proceeding, and boi am i glad it hasn’t completely, cause it is a damn good piece!]

Hey There Demons, It’s Me (Your Dream Boyfriend) by @thealmostrhetoricalquestion [how many recs of this author can i make, without being deemed obsessed? cause y’all should go and read every single thing they wrote, stat. this adorableness is outta this world, literally - magnus’ summoning went sideways, and the loft ends up populated with the teenage ghost-demon, who is very clearly enamored with alexander... all kinds of fluff ensue]

Something Else verse by @CryptidBane (Impetus) [maybe it’s my fever talking, but i am such a sucker for memory loss AUs, and SH fandom has the richest canon base for those, yay! this time, it’s an AU verse after 3x10: rather than asking for his magic, Asmodeus curses magnus by taking away memories from everyone who’s ever loved him, in exchange for freeing jace from lilith’s thrall... oh, what a beautiful and delicious angst ensues]

Home by @otppurefuckingmagic [waaaaaaaaat... *sits with her mouth open* how did you....? how did he...? damnnnnnnnnn you authors in this fandom, stop being so talented!!!! this is uncannily brilliant]

I’ll hold on until you’re home by @alistoney [how dare you sir, right in the feels... the missing scene in the midst of 3x18/3x19, when magnus realizes what his idiot of a boyfriend has done, and confronts him about the Asmodeus deal]

First time for everything by @nebulein [“Nowhere in a Shadowhunters’ job description does it read ‘must look adorable while infatuated with the local High Warlock’.” - series of firsts written with such tenderness and adoration for characters, that it warms your heart while reading, - it shows how much the author cares for them. it is not finished, but whatever has already been written, is gold]

Fake dating AU

The Great Repression by @CryptidBane (Impetus) [although it might not be exactly my regular cup of tea, i still appreciate this author’s style so damn much, and the way they do malec dynamic overall, so it’s here. magnus is a camboy, and alec is hired to protect him from a stalker]

Friends to lovers

Family is Family by @hexicity [my brains are fried by the covid, so any coherent rec would be unlikely right about now, but the softness of this <333 alec sees an ad about a free room, and when he moves in, he finds way more, than he bargained for... gave me a bit of a “happy, shiny people everywhere” vibe, and that’s an automatic rec in my books, so]

Spinning Around In Circles by @lemonoclefox [my fav friends to lovers/mutual pining trope, here you are, and what a pretty pretty wrapper are you wearing - absolutely amazing interpretation of a trope, that seems to has been done to death, and yet here i am, never able to get enough of it <3]

If it walks like a duck by @thealmostrhetoricalquestion [this. i was reading this. and after every single word. all i wanted to do was get down on one knee and propose to this person. i dunno who the hell you is, but.... how did you do this? it was... another level of fanfiction.]

Neighbors AU

Meow 17:1 Love Thy Neighbor by @high-warlock-of-brooklyn [again, not a fan of drabbles, but who could resist such softness??? Neighbors AU, where Chairman takes some lessons he learnt from “Parent trap” to heart, and alec is a stumbling mess, but he gets shit done, kudossssssss]

Various AU mix

Solid courage by @thealmostrhetoricalquestion [how goddamn CUTE was dat???? answer - the cutest. mashallah people in this fandom can write]

Paper Love by @thealmostrhetoricalquestion [it would not be an exaggeration to admit i thoroughly fell in love with this author’s style, i mean, all and every version of their malec is all kinds of awesome. this one is no exception - catarina works in the library, and malec have to take madzie out to a coffee shop, cause their obnoxious flirting is too loud for the quaint environment of catarina’s workplace.... it’s tiny and so so sooooooo sweet]

make no bones by @ohfreckle [yaaaaaaaaay, what a cutie, tiny preciousness about magnus having an awful day and taking it out on a no-good useless building super, simply delightful]

Freud is a Dick by @sanctuary_for_all [Alec works in IT firm, and accidentally sends someone else’s dick pick to his boss, whom he has a crush on... do i need to say more]

shadows in moonlight by @kaeg [damnnnnnn, son, that was a ride!! something exquisitely soulful, tender and so, so poetic... young malec meet in summer vacation home, and it will take your breath away in the best way possible... warning, it is unfinished, but whatever was written, is absolute preciousness]

For the Love of the Game by @TicklemyPickle [Hockey AU, where malec were childhood friends, but had a falling out, and were not in touch for the last 7 years, until magnus gets traded in to alec’s team... i was somewhat unsure about reccing this, as some of the choices author made regarding their dynamic did not exactly resonate with me, but decided to go on, because, god as my witness, one thing this world definitely needs more of - is malec Hockey AUs, word upppp]

Love Is A Gamble by @la-muerta [i myself do not completely understand, why has it taken me so long to get to the “The importance of elsewhere” author’s most famous piece, but i finally have, it was amazeballs, like, the world-building...? off the charts. the language, the moral struggle, what a gem. alec is a grumpy and surely sheriff *duh!!!* of a tiny town, and magnus strolls in being all... well, magnus-y, and opens a gambling house, the potential!!! anyway, i highly doubt this piece needs recs, so imma zip it]

@ohprongs [this author has too many tiny pieces i like to name them individually, but as far as reccing goes, they should def be mentioned here for their effortless, seamless style, and clear love for the characters in all interpretations, that simply shines through all and any AUs they choose to put malec in]

special mention:

@theleftboobgrabber [i wasn’t aware that at this stage it was still possible to come by someone like this. the author, who’s style would impress me so. that unbelievably glorious Mafia AU, absolutely delightful and literally perfect My mama don’t like you series, and something that went straight to my top-5 - MI6 AU ohhhhh, that MI6 AU... i have no coherent words to express the depths of my appreciation, this is unbelievable fucking talent for writing malec]

[innuendostudios]

Here’s How to Radicalize a Normie, a video essay on how the Alt-Right and their fellow travelers recruit. Clocking in at 41 minutes, 6756 words, 633 individual drawings, and 27 sources (including three full books), it is by far the longest and most heavily-researched video in The Alt-Right Playbook. I am very tired.

It took so long to put this behemoth together that my Patreon started to dip. So, maybe a little more than usual, if you want to keep seeing videos like these, please consider backing me on Patreon.

Transcript below the cut.

Say, for the sake of argument, your friend Gabe is starting to worry you.

Gabe’s always been just, you know, a regular guy. Not very political. He likes video games, sci-fi, comics, Star Wars, and anime. White guy shit. The only offbeat thing about him is you suspect there’s like a 20% chance he’s a furry. For all intents and purposes, Gabe is a normie.

But recently Gabe’s been spending a lot of time on some radically conservative forums, and listening to radically conservative podcasts, and picking some radically conservative arguments with you and your friends. You never would have expected this, not from Gabe, and, given the speed it’s happened, it’s worrying to think where it might be headed.

How have the Alt-Right gotten their hooks into your friend?

If you’ve ever known a Gabe, this video is for you. Here’s How to Radicalize a Normie.

Step 1: Identify the Audience

What you need to know before we begin is: around 2013, the Nazis went online.

Hate groups in the US, as tracked by the Southern Poverty Law Center, had been growing in number since the noughts, but, between 2012 and 2014, they dropped by almost a quarter. Patriot groups dropped by over a third. However, hate crimes stayed about the same. Radical conservatism was not shrinking, but decentralizing. Still radical, still often violent, but now full of white nationalist nomads unlikely to join a formal organization.

This didn’t make them harmless. What it did was protect their asses from the typical hate group cycle: getting the public’s attention, making allies in conservative media, swelling their numbers, and then eventually disgracing themselves with failures, infighting, and, often enough, members committing horrific acts of violence, which come with social and sometimes legal consequences for all the other members.

So the Alt-Right and their fellow travelers these days don’t so much have members. They have hashtags, followers, viewers, and subscribers. This insulates them from their own audience. If Gabe, as a member of that audience, were to go out and commit a crime on their behalf, there’d be little doubt they had a hand in radicalizing him, but it’d be very hard to claim they told him to do it. On some of these sites, where Gabe spends hours and hours of his day, he’s never created an account or left a comment; the people radicalizing him don’t even know he’s there.

This distributed nature is what makes the Alt-Right, and the movements connected to it, unique. (You may remember a notable proof-of-concept for this strategy.) Doing almost everything online has, as compared with traditional hate movements, dramatically increased their reach and inoculated them from consequence. The trade-off, as we will see, is a lack of control.

And so we come to Gabe.

Gabe exists at the intersection of the kinds of people the Alt-Right is looking for - straight white cis men who feel emasculated by modern society, primarily, though they do make exceptions - and the kinds of people who are vulnerable to recruitment. Gabe fits the first profile in that he got bullied in high school, and often feels he has to hide his nerdy side for fear of getting ridiculed. The Alt-Right also has success with men who can’t get laid or recently got divorced or feel anxious about an influx of non-white people in their community. These things can make one feel like less than the confident white man they’re “supposed” to be. And it’s the closest they will ever come to being minoritized.

Regarding the second profile, it’s important to know that Gabe is not categorically different from you or me. He’s a cishet white dude - his problems are not unique. There isn’t a ton of research into the demography of the Alt-Right, but there may be a higher-than-average chance Gabe has a history of being abused or comes from a broken home. You don’t know if it’s true of Gabe, he’s never said. But most abuse survivors don’t become Nazis. The things that make people like Gabe recruitable tend to be situational: it happens often during periods of transition, as dramatic as the death of a loved or as benign as moving to a new city. Things that make people ask big life questions. Gabe has concerns like economic precarity, not knowing his place in a changing world, stressful working conditions. In other words, Gabe is suffering under late capitalism, same as everyone, and it’s entirely plausible he could have gone down the path to becoming a Leftist.

This is not to make an “economic anxiety” argument: the animating force of the Far Right is and always has been bigotry. But the Alt-Right targets Gabe by treating his “economic anxiety” as one of many things bigotry can be sold as a solution to. It is their aim that, when dissatisfied white men go looking for answers, they find the Alt-Right before they find us.

Step Two: Establish a Community

Were Gabe pledging an old-school hate movement, there would probably be a recruiter to usher him into an existing community. But that’s the kind of formalized interaction modern extremists try to avoid. Online extremism has many points of entry, and everybody’s journey is unique, so rather than be comprehensive we will focus on what are, in my estimation, the two most common pathways: the Far Right creates a community Gabe is likely to stumble into, or infiltrates a community Gabe is already in.

The stumble-upon method has two main branches, one of which is just “Gabe ends up on a chan board,” which we’ve already done a video about. The other is kind of the polar opposite of 4chan’s cult of anonymity: Gabe ends up in the fandom of a Far Right thought leader.

These folks are charismatic media personalities (that’s charismatic according to Gabe’s tastes, not ours; I don’t understand it, either). These personalities may gain traction on any number of platforms, from podcasts to reportage to blogging, though the most effective platform for redpilling is, and yes I am biting the hand that feeds me, YouTube. They may get Gabe’s attention through fairly standard means, like talking about or even generating controversy to get themselves trending, while some of the more committed will employ dubious SEO tactics like clickbait, google bombing, and data voids (just pause for definitions, we don’t have time).

What they tend to have in common, especially the most accessible ones, is that they don’t present themselves as entry points to the radical Right. In fact, many did not set out to be Far Right thought leaders, and may not think of themselves as such (though they are often selling products, of which the Alt-Right are among their biggest purchasers, and it’s not like they’re turning the money away). How they present is the same way anyone presents who wants to be successful on social media: accessible, approachable, authentic. The face-to-face relationship a budding extremist forms with their recruiter or the leader of their hate group’s local chapter are here folded into one parasocial relationship with a complete stranger.

Why this person appeals to Gabe is they’re not selling politics as politics, but conservatism as a kind of lifestyle brand. They rely heavily on criticizing or ridiculing the Left: feminists are oversensitive, Black people unintelligent, queer folks doomed to loneliness, and trans people insane; I dunno if it’s a coincidence that these are all things Gabe thinks about himself in his low moments. By contrast, they don’t sell conservatism as having sounder policies or a more coherent moral framework, but that abandoning progressive principles and embracing conservative ones will make Gabe happier. Remember, Gabe isn’t looking for white nationalism or misogyny, what he wants is the cure to soul-sickness, and these friendly micro-celebs are here to offer a shot of life advice with politics as the chaser. It is extremely important that politics be presented as a set of affects, not a set of beliefs.

The second pathway is infiltration, which is its own beast. Media personalities sometimes become gateways to the Right almost by accident: they do something edgy, a part of their audience reacts positively, and, facing no real consequence, they do it more; this leads to further positive reinforcement from conservative fans, the rest of the audience acclimates, and the cycle repeats, the personality pushing the envelope further and further based on what flies with their increasingly conservative audience. In this way, they become a right-wing figure by both radicalizing and being radicalized by their audience.

Infiltration is deliberate.

The Far Right will reliably target any community that has 1) a large, white, male population, 2) whose niche interests allow them to feel vaguely marginalized, and 3) who are not used to progressive critique of said interests. This isn’t to say progressive critique doesn’t exist, or hasn’t been baked into the property from the beginning, but that it has been, so far, easy for white guys to ignore. As such, progressives within that community probably don’t talk politics much, and women and minorities are perfectly welcome to post, same as anyone, but just, you know, don’t, don’t make identity politics, you know, like, a thing.

Given Gabe’s proclivities, he’s probably already in a number of fan communities where he can geek out and not get teased. And this is where the Far Right will go looking for him

Communities are at their most vulnerable to infiltration at times of political discord. This can happen naturally - say, a new property in the fandom has a Black protagonist - or it can be provoked - say, a bunch of channers join the forum and say provocative things about race to get people arguing - or both. Left to its own devices, the community might sort out its differences and maybe even come out more progressive than they started. But, with the right pressure applied in the right moment, these communities can devolve into arguments about the need to remove a nebulously-defined “politics” from the conversation.

The adage about bros on the internet is “‘political’ means anything I disagree with,” but it’d be more accurate to say, here, “‘political’ means anything on which the community disagrees.” For instance, “Nazis are bad” is an apolitical statement because everyone in the community agrees. It’s common sense, and therefore neutral. But, paradoxically, “Nazis are good” is also apolitical; because “Nazis are bad” is the consensus, “Nazis are good” must be just an edgy joke, and, even if not, the community already believes the opposite, so the statement is harmless. Tolerable. However, “feminism is good” is a political statement, because the community hasn’t reached consensus. It is debatable, and therefore political, and you should stop talking about it. And making political arguments, no matter how rational, is having an agenda, and having an agenda is ruining the community.

(Now, it is curious how the things that provoke the most disagreement tend to be whichever ones make white dudes uncomfortable. One of life’s great, unanswerable mysteries.)

You can gather where this is going: a community that doesn’t tolerate progressivism but does tolerate Nazism is going to start collecting Nazis, Nazis whose goal is to drive a wedge between the community and the Left. Once the Left acknowledges, “Hey, your community’s developing a Nazi problem,” the Nazis - who are, remember, trusted, apolitical members of the community who might just be kidding about all the Nazi shit - say, “Did you hear that, guys?! Those cultural Marxists just called all of us Nazis!” Wedge. Similarly, any community members who say, “but Nazis though” are framed as infiltrators pushing an agenda, even if they’ve been there longer than the Nazis have. They get the wedge, too.

This is how fandoms radicalize. They are built as - yeah, I’ll say it - safe spaces for nerds, weebs, and furries, and are told that the Left is a threat to their safety. Given a choice between leaving a community that has mattered to him for years and simply adjusting to the community’s shifting politics, the assumption is that Gabe will stay. This assumption is right often enough that a lot of fandoms have been colonized.

What is true of both of these methods - Gabe finding the Right or the Right finding him - is that Gabe does not come nor stay for the ideology. He’s here for the community, the sense of belonging, of being with his people, of having his fears validated and his enjoyment shared. The ideology is simply the price of admission.

Step Three: Isolate

There is a vast, interconnected network of Far Right communities out there, and Gabe is, at this point, only on the periphery. In order to keep him in, they need to disrupt his relationships to other communities, and become, more and more, his primary online social space. Having made this space hostile to the Left, they now seek to break his connections to progressives elsewhere in his life.

This is hard to do online. The whole appeal of moving radicalism to the internet is that your away-from-keyboard life doesn’t have to change. You are crypto the moment you log off. Some thought leaders will encourage their audience to cut ties with Family of Origin, or “deFOO,” but, even then, they can’t monitor whether the audience has actually done it the way an in-person movement could. And so alienating Gabe from the Left is less controlled, and, consequently, may be less total. How much Gabe isolates is up to him.

But the vast majority of Far Right media presumes an alienation from the Left. Part of conservative bloggers and YouTubers making the Left look pathetic is doing a lot take-downs and responses. This is a constant repetition of the Left’s arguments for the purpose of mockery, and, for Gabe, it starts to replace any engagement with progressive media directly. He soon knows the Left only through caricature. It also trains him, if he does directly engage, to approach the Left with the same combative stance as his role models. (For reference, see my comment section.) And this is only if he doesn’t partake in one of the many active boycotts of “SJW media.”

In addition to mocking the Left’s arguments, they also, curiously, appropriate them. This is one part sanitization: liberal centrism is more socially acceptable; indeed, many figures on the outer layers think of themselves as moderates, even as they serve as gateways to radicalism. But, also, many of Gabe’s problems could be addressed by progressive leftism, so they sell him racist, sexist versions of it. Yes, there is a problem with workers being underpaid and overextended, but the solution isn’t unions, it’s deporting immigrants; yes, there is a chronic loneliness and anger to being a man in the modern age, but it’s not because of the toxic masculine expectations placed on you by the patriarchy, it’s women being slutty; yes, wealth disparity does mean a tiny percentage of elites have more influence over culture and politics than the rest of us combined, but the problem isn’t capitalism, it’s the Jews. And it’s hard for Gabe to reject these ideas without, in the process, rejecting the progressive ideas they’re copied from; the Right’s “take the red pill” is, to the untrained eye, similar to the Left’s “get woke.” (Or, at least, the bowdlerized version of “get woke” that is no longer specifically about race which came to fashion when white people started saying it, grumble grumble.)

Take the red pill or reject them both; either is a step to the right.

As this rhetoric slips into his day-to-day conversation, even as seemingly harmless “irreverence,” it may strain relationships with people who are not entertained by this shit. Off-color comments about race and gender can certainly be wearying for female and non-white friends, which can lead to a passive distance or an eventual confrontation [“why is everyone but me so sensitive?!”], which only seem to confirm what his reactionary community says about liberal snowflakes. If he says these things on social media, he may get his account suspended, and, if he comes back under an alt, you can bet his new reactionary friends will be the first to reconnect, applaud the behavior that got him banned, and repeat should he get banned again. A few cycles of this and he’s lost touch with everyone else.

Also, his adoption of the insular, meme-laden terminology of this community makes him less and less comprehensible to outsiders.

Over time, sources of information get replaced with community-approved ones: conservative news, conservative YouTube, conservative Wikipedia if he’s really committed. The Algorithm soon takes note and stops recommending media from the Left. He stops watching shows with a “liberal agenda,” which usually means shows starring women and people of color. Now, there is evidence that the human mind responds to fictional characters similarly to real people, and that consuming diverse media can decrease bigotry in ways roughly analogous to having a diverse group of friends, which is one of many reasons we say representation matters. By consuming a homogenous media diet, Gabe stymies his ability to have even parasocial relationships with anyone who isn’t a cishet conservative white dude or one of their approved exceptions.

To the extent that any of this happens, it happens at Gabe’s discretion and at his own chosen pace. It has not been forced on him, only encouraged and rewarded. But the fact that it hasn’t been forced can make him all the more willing to accept it, because it seems safe to consider; even though his life and social circle are changing to accommodate, he does not feel committed. But many Gabes have walked these halls, and, if they close the door behind them, there’s nowhere left to go but down.

Step Four: Raise their Power Level

(...and they say we ruined anime.)

Consider the ecosystem of the Alt-Right as layers of an onion, with Gabe sitting at the edge and ready to traverse towards the center. (No, I’m not just going to reiterate the PewDiePipeline, though, if you haven’t seen it, go do that.)

The outer layer of the onion is extremism at its most plausibly deniable. Without careful scrutiny, the public-facing figureheads could pass as dispassionate, and the websites as merely problematic rather than softly fascist. It is valuable if Gabe believes this as well; that, at this stage, he believe the bigotry is simply trolling, the extremists an insignificant minority, and any report of harassment faked. That he believe where he is is as deep as the rabbit hole goes. And that he continue to believe this at each successive layer.

People in the deepest crevices of the Alt-Right self-report getting redpilled on multiple issues at different times in their journey to the center of the onion. If Gabe’s first red pill is about the SJWs coming for his free speech, he’ll think that’s all anyone in his community believes; there’s no racism here, people are just making a point about their right to use slurs. Then, when he gets redpilled on the white genocide, he’ll laugh at those Alt-Lite cucks who tried to sweep the race realists under the rug, and at himself for having once been one, but acknowledge that those channels and websites are still useful for onboarding people, so he won’t denounce them. At the same time, nobody takes those manosphere betas seriously.

And this process is reiterated with every pill swallowed: gender essentialism, autogynephilia, birtherism, Sandy Hook truth, pizzagate, QAnon if he’s really out there. The heart of the onion is typically the Jewish Question, but these can happen in any order, and in any number. But each layer sells itself as being, finally, the ultimate truth. Each denies the validity of the others; the layers ahead don’t exist, they’re made up my liberals, while the people behind are asleep where you are now awake. That’s why they chose “the red pill” as their metaphor: take it, and everything will be revealed. That’s why it cozies up with conspiracism. But what’s supposed to follow is that this knowledge help Gabe in some way, and it doesn’t. Blaming immigrants doesn’t actually fix the economy, and hating women doesn’t make men less lonely. But, having been alienated from everything outside the onion, once that sinks in, the only recourse on offer is to seek out the next pill.

And pills are easy to find. Those within the network have laissez-faire relationships, even as they, on paper, disavow one another. When they need a source or a guest host, they aren’t going to go to the Left; they’re going to feature each other. The Left is the enemy; their ideas are beneath consideration, and the only reason to engage them is for public humiliation. [Shapiro’s book.] But you can interview “western chauvinists” and that doesn’t mean you’re endorsing them, just, you know, it’s fine to hear ‘em out, nothing should be off-limits in the marketplace of ideas. Besides, Nazis are apolitical.

And because these folks keep showing up in each others’ metadata, regardless of what they say, Google thinks there is definitely a relationship between the guy “just asking questions” and the guy denying the Holocaust. Gabe is softly exposed to many flavors of conservatism just slightly more radical than he is now, and is expected, at the very least, to not question their presence. This is an environment where deradicalizing - listening to the Left - would be sleeping with the enemy, but radicalizing further? You do you, buddy.

Gabe’s emotional journey, however, is somewhat more complex. If you’ve spent any time reading or watching reactionary media you’ve probably noticed it’s really. fucking. repetitive. It’s a few thousand phrasings of the same handful of arguments. Like, there’s only so many jokes about attack helicopters! But these people just crank out content, and most of it’s derivative; the reason to pick one personality over another isn’t because they say something different, but because they say it differently. Gabe just picks the affect it’s delivered in.

Repetition dulls the shock of the most egregious statements, making them appear normal and prepping him for more extreme ideas. Meanwhile, the arguments themselves? They’re not good. (BreadTube will never run out of shit to debunk.) They are repetitive because they’re not good. They’re mantric. A good argument you only need to hear one time; if you can follow it, internalize it, and explain it to someone else, you know you’ve understood it. But a bad argument can’t convince you on its own merits, so it will often rely on affect. This can be the snappy, thought-terminating cliche, or the long, winding diatribe that sounds really sensible while you’re hearing it but when someone asks you for the gist you can only say “go watch these 17 videos and it’ll all make sense.” Both these approaches are largely devoid of content, but, gosh, if they don’t sound sure of themselves.

And that mode can be very persuasive, but it doesn’t stick the way a coherent argument does. It needs to be repeated, the affect replenished, because the words matter less than the delivery. There needs to be a steady stream of confident voices saying “we’ve got this figured out and everyone else is stupid” or Gabe’s gonna notice the flaws. They are not well-hidden.

And the catch-22 of returning to that stream over and over is that these communities are stressful even as they are calming. People afraid they will die virgins go to forums with people who share and validate that fear, and also say, “Yes, you will die a virgin.” People afraid Syrians are coming to kill us all watch videos by people who share and validate that fear, and also say, “Yes, Syrians are coming to kill us all.” Others have already pointed out that rubbing your face in your worst anxieties is a form of digital self-harm, but I need to you understand the toxic recursion of it: Gabe is going to these communities to get upset. Every emotion is converted into anger, because sadness, fear, and despair are paralyzing but anger is motivating; Gabe feels less helpless when he’s pissed off. And so, while he’s topping up on reassuring nonsense, he’s also topping up on stress. And, being cut off from everything outside the network, the only place he knows to go to release that stress is back to the place that gives it to him. It’s a feedback loop, pulling him deeper and deeper on the promise that, at some point, relief will come.

It is a similar dynamic that keeps people in abusive relationships.

When someone in Gabe’s community makes a racist joke, they are presenting Gabe with a choice between the human interaction of laughing with his friends and his societal responsibility not to be a fuckin’ racist. And not laughing seems ridiculous; everybody’s friends here; no one’s getting hurt; this is harmless. And so the irreverent race joke draws a line between the personal and the political, and suggests that one can be safely prioritized over the other. One way to look at radicalization is being asked to stick with that seemingly innocuous decision as the stakes are raised incrementally: first with edgier humor, and then comments that are funny because they’re shocking but you couldn’t really call them jokes, and then “funny” comments that are also sincerely angry, but, in each instance, since he laughed with his bros last time, it stands to reason he should keep favoring the personal over some abstracted notion of “politics.”

This is why the progressive adage “the personal is political” is among the most threatening things you can say in these spaces.

I’m not trying to make a slippery slope argument. Most of us who laughed at edgy jokes when we were teenagers didn’t grow up to be Nazis. It is a slippery slope in the specific context of being in community with people trying to radicalize you. Gabe is a lonely white boy in need of friends, and laughing at a racist joke is personal, while not laughing is political. Staying in a community that has Nazis in it is personal, and leaving is political. The personal is what brings people together and the political drives them apart. (The “only if some of them are bigots” part of that sentence is usually lopped off). There’s this joke on the internet that nerds perceive only two races: white and political. Following that logic, what could be more apolitical than an ethnostate?

They are banking on his willingness to adapt his beliefs to suit an environment that meets a need. That same need can be satisfied by white nationalism. There are few things more seductive to people who doubt their own worth than being told you are valuable simply for being white. And you can sub in male, cis, straight, allosexual, or able-bodied. It just takes priming: by the time Gabe officially embraces bigotry, he’s already been acting like a bigot for months. The red pill is simply the moment he says it out loud.

Change Gabe’s surroundings, and you change Gabe.

Step Five: ???

The final step in a traditional extremist group would be getting a mission. But that is one thing the Alt-Right can’t do. Once you start giving clear directives, you can’t play yourselves off as a bunch of unaffiliated hashtags and think tanks; you are now a formalized movement accountable to its followers, and can be judged and policed as such.

To my mind, Charlottesville was an attempt to become such a movement, taking things offline and getting all the different groups working collectively. And, as so often happens when these people get in the same space - especially with no official leaders or means of control over their members - it backfired. Their true colors came out before they were ready and a counter-protester lost her life.

This would be the point where, historically, an extremist group starts to disintegrate. Their veneer of respectability gone, they’re now hated by the public, the media wants nothing more to do with them, and everyone not in jail turns on each other or goes underground. This is also the point where the liberal establishment says, “My job here is done,” and utterly fails to retake control of the narrative, allowing the next batch of radicals to pick up more or less where the last one left off.

But to an already-decentralized group like the Alt-Right, Charlottesville was bad but eminently survivable. People retreated back to the internet, with its code words and anonymous forums, but that’s where much of the work was already done anyway. The platforms where they organized kept tolerating them, the authorities still didn’t classify them as terrorists, and any disgraced figureheads were replaced with up-and-comers.

The major change in strategy is that it doesn’t seem anyone has tried to formalize the Alt-Right since.

So where does that leave Gabe? He’s gone through this whole process of largely hands-off indoctrination - and I should stress his journey may look like what we’ve outlined or it may look different in places, this video is not comprehensive - but now he’s swallowed every pill he cares to, he blames half a dozen minorities for everything he sees as wrong with the world, and no one will give him anything to do. You’ve got this ad hoc movement frothing young men into a militant fervor and then just leaving them to stew in their own hate. Should we really be surprised at how many commit mass shootings?

This is a machine for producing lone wolves.

Leaving men to take up arms of their own volition is a way of enacting terror while being just outside the popular conception of a terror cell. There are also, of course, more classic militias that will offer Gabe clear directives - they’re recruiting from the same pool. And Gabe may stop short of this step, settling in a middle layer that suits him or finding the inner layers too extreme. But violence is the logical conclusion of an ideology of hate, and, should Gabe take this step, he can approach violence in the same incremental fashion he approached conservatism.

He can start with yelling at people on Twitter, and then maybe collective brigading, DDoS attacks, sharing dox, leaking nudes, calling their phone numbers, texting them pictures of their houses from the sidewalk. These acts of cruelty become games of oneupmanship within his community. All this can start as far back as Step 2, and get more intense the deeper he goes. Some people join explicitly partake in harassment and violence the way Gabe joined to talk about anime.

But this behavior can serve as a kind of buy-in. The Left and the feminists and the LGBTQs and the Muslims and the immigrants are all, within his community, subhuman. You’ve maybe heard the conservative catchphrase “feminism is cancer”; well don’t treat cancer by having a respectful exchange of ideas with it, but by eradicating it down to the last cell. Cruelty against the Left is framed as righteous.

From any other perspective, posting someone’s bank information is something you might feel ashamed of. Which creates a psychological imperative not to consider other perspectives. A thing that keeps people in is staving off the guilt they will reckon with the moment they step out. Gabe is also aware that anything he’s done to the Left could be done to him if he leaves; some communities even keep dox on their members as insurance. And the things he’s been encouraged to do to the Left will likely make him feel that the Left would never take him now; the radical Right is the only home he’s got. Harassment becomes another tool of isolation.

Steadily, options for Gabe are whittled down to being a vigilante or a nihilist. There are periods of elation: moments the Alt-Right feels it’s winning - or, more accurately, the people they hate are losing - are like cocaine. They are authoritarians, after all. But the times in between are mean and angry. They are antisocial, starved of emotional connection, consuming incompatible conspiracies that may at any point run them afoul of one another, devoted to figureheads who cater to but cannot risk leading them, and living under constant threat of being outed to the Left or turned on by the Right for stepping out of line. Gabe took this journey for the sense of community and purpose, and, but for the rare moments everything goes their way, the Alt-Right can’t maintain either. They can only keep promising his day will come, a story he could get from a $5 palm reading.

The feeling there’s nothing left but to kill yourself or someone else is so common it’s a meme.

But there is always a third option: Gabe can leave.

Pre-Conclusion: For Fuck’s Sake Do Not Make Gabe Your Whole-Ass Praxis

Before we continue, I want to state plainly that Gabe went off the deep end because he found a community willing to tell him that, because he is a cishet white man, the world revolves around him. Do not treat him like this is true.

If a fraction of the energy spent having debates with America’s Gabes were spent instead on voter re-enfranchisement, prisoner’s rights, protections for immigrants, statehood for DC and Puerto Rico, and redistricting, Gabe’s opinions, in the societal sense, wouldn’t matter. Reactionary conservatism is a small and largely unpopular ideology that is only so represented in our culture and politics because they’ve learned how to game the system.

And I get it. Those are huge problems that are going to take years to address, where, if you know a Gabe, that’s a conversation you could have today. And, if you think you can get through to him, it is worthwhile to try. This is a fight on many fronts and deradicalization is one of them. But it is only one, so please keep it in perspective. It sends an awful message when we spend more time trying to get bigots back on our side than we do the people they are bigoted against.

Your value as a lefty does not hinge on whether you can change Gabe’s mind.

Conclusion: How Gabe Gets Out

He may just grow out of it. These communities skew young, and some folks hit a point where hanging with edgy teens doesn’t feel cool anymore.

He may become disillusioned after the movement fails to deliver on its promises.

He may become disillusioned if something goes wrong in his life and his community isn’t there for him, if he feels they like his race and his gender but don’t actually care about him.

He may be shocked if he sees the Alt-Right at its worst before being appropriately conditioned. Charlottesville was a step too far for a lot of people.

His community may turn on him for any perceived unorthodoxy, and he may leave out of necessity.

He may be separated by circumstance from the community - a trip with no internet, hospitalization, arrest - and not be able to top up on the rhetoric. This may lead him to question his beliefs.

His community may disappear, either tearing itself apart or getting shut down by authorities.

He may have incidental contact with populations he’s supposed to hate, and have trouble reconciling who they are in person with what he’s been told about them. In his community, people bond over shared intolerance, but, suddenly, being tolerant helps him make friends. (This is one reason the Alt-Right has made a battleground of the college campus.)

He may form or revisit relationships outside the network, people who can offer him the connection he’s been looking for. This may reintroduce outside perspectives. More importantly, it rekindles his ability to have healthy relationships at all, something the Alt-Right has estranged him from.

As with recruiters, it seems these “escape hatch” relationships can sometimes be parasocial; coming to respect a public figure who is on the Left, or is critical of the Alt-Right.

Someone he is close to may compel him to choose, “me or the movement.” A lot of young men leave to save a romantic relationship.

Hearing stories from people who’ve already jumped may help; there aren’t a lot of public formers, and some raise suspicions as to their sincerity, but it is getting more common, and may be the closest we get to exit counseling for the Alt-Right.

He may become aware of the ways he’s being manipulated, or have them revealed to him, maybe because he stumbled into BreadTube, I dunno. Knowledge that you are being indoctrinated is no guarantee it won’t work - you are not immune to propaganda - but it can help one resist.

And he may revisit a core belief system that used to guide him, be it religion or social justice or a really wholesome fandom, and be reminded of the identity he used to have.

Moments like these, in isolation or in aggregate, can inspire Gabe to jump. They are also good times for friends to intervene. The reach and the impunity that comes with the internet means it has never been easier to fall into reactionary extremism. It has also never been easier to get out. People who exit skinhead gangs often fear for their lives; for Gabe, there’s a chance getting out is as simple as going to a different website. Much of his community does not know his name or his face and he may not important enough to dox.

What doesn’t get Gabe out - not reliably, not that I have seen - is an argument with a stranger who proves all his facts wrong and his ideology bunk. Facts don’t always work because facts don’t care about his feelings. This was about staying in a community, and holding onto an identity, that mattered to him. It was about belonging, and that is something a rando from the other side of the culture war can’t give him and probably shouldn’t be responsible for.

The theme here is human connection. Before he can do the work of disentangling himself, and facing the guilt of what he’s believed and maybe done, he has to know there’s somewhere for him on the other end of it. That the Right hasn’t ruined him. They’ve told him all of history is groups fighting each other over status, and, without his clan, he’ll be an exile. He needs a better story.

I don’t know that lefty spaces are ideal for this, in no small part because bringing someone who’s a bit of a Nazi but working on it into diverse communities is… questionable. And it probably wouldn’t be good for him, either; having just gotten out of a toxic belief system, he’s going to be deeply skeptical of all ideologies. In a perfect world, people who care about Gabe could build for him - to use a therapy term - a holding space. Someplace private - physical or digital - where Gabe can work out his feelings, where he is both encouraged and expected to be better but is not, in the moment, judged. That comes later. It is delicate and time-consuming work that should not be done in public, but we find these beliefs, built up over the course of months or years, tend to fall away very quickly with a shift of environment. Change Gabe’s surroundings and you change Gabe.

But, instead, a lot of people who jump are functionally deprogramming themselves, which is working for a lot of them, but it’s haphazard, and there are recidivists.

If you don’t personally know a Gabe, or have training as a counselor, you may not be in a position to help him. Possibly there are things you can do to disrupt the recruitment process or prevent infiltration of spaces you’re in - I’m looking into it, but talk to your mods - but, elephant in the room: meaningful change will require reform on the part of platform holders. Tools to disrupt this process already exist and are being used on groups like ISIS, but they’re not being used on the Alt-Right because they try oh so very hard not to get classified as terrorists (and also any functioning anti-radicalization policy would require banning a lot of conservative politicians, so there’s that...).

But what makes our story better than theirs is that the fight for social and economic justice, though it is long, and difficult, and frustrating, when it works, it fulfills the promise the Right can’t keep: it materially make people’s lives better. I am not prone to sentimentality, or to giving these videos happy endings. But one thing we have that the Alt-Right doesn’t is hope.

[boncorner]

Present Mic and alcohol

Obvious content warning if you don’t wanna read about this topic 💕

I feel like during his 20’s Mic was in a bad place (the trauma from Shirakumo’s death being completely untouched, his old best friend who was the only one who knew how it felt leaving him behind, focusing too much on work I’m sure cus that’s just how he IS) so as a hero that was also very much a celebrity, he ended up doing some more... sketchy things unbecoming of a hero. Yeah sure he was a hero and people loved him, but he did get wrapped up in too much drinking/partying (hinted at in the novel) where he’d end up blackout drunk and get caught up in seedy situations that he couldn’t really get out of even when he really wanted to. But that’s just a personal headcanon, we can reflect more on him as a character without getting personal.

I could kinda see him becoming a teacher as something of a restart for him where he gets to try and reach people and be a good influence instead of the opposite, but he still has moments when he slips back into his more sketchy habits, such as drinking too much.

Also his alcohol tolerance is... really fucking good compared to his coworkers’. It’s hard to notice when he’s drunk and when he’s sober, and his behaviour in the Drama CD where he goes drinking with Aizawa and All Might is just... exaggerated and honestly, suspicious. He “passes out”, but the way it all is laid out and planned as a chance for Aizawa and All Might to talk, and how he slips in a comment at the end that sounds way too coherent for somebody who’s asleep... I dunno... it feels like he was very much aware of what he was doing.

I feel like he’s definitely going drinking after the whole Tartarus situation..

Side note but I would suspect his strong aversion towards mass media comes from them having bent the truth of his past outings to bars and parties, and that’s why he’s extremely put off by their mere existence.

Edit: This is further proven in the fourth light novel where he’s frequently described as one of the heavy drinkers together with Midnight, and everyone’s behaviour seems to once more spiral out of control the longer they drink, but Mic just stays... Mic.

[frostiifae]

The person sending anon hate is most likely a certain Precure stan (or if not it’s one of their followers). That person has been attacking Madoka fans for an embarrassingly long time now.

Yeah, I’ve heard the deal. Would you be surprised if I told you this isn’t the first fandom to come after me like this? Shout out to the “do you justify the conquering of nations” guy. It seems like there’s something about tumblr that draws in people who just refuse to do any critical thinking about media that doesn’t constantly uphold their values, and I guess there’s something about me and my way of looking at things that pisses those people off. 

Regarding anon hate, I only bother answering if either 1. I feel like there’s some possibility left for a good-faith discussion (rare), or 2. I feel like there’s some entertainment possibility for my friends/followers (more common). It’s been funny to see mid-witch anon just continue to barrel forward with absolutely no nuance to their point of view whatsoever, but the humor’s running kinda dry, so I’m probably just gonna ignore/block em and move on at this point. 

It’s just so disappointing, because the premise of people’s complaints with Madoka is genuinely interesting, and I would be really interested in having an actual conversation about it. Madoka’s a big inspiration for me as a creator, but taking inspiration from something does also mean that you should understand its flaws and not just its strengths, right? 

I can absolutely understand taking issue with Urobuchi’s qualities as a writer, particularly of a magical girl show; I can understand taking issue with the tone, and/or with how far things have to fall to make a point about hope. But it feels like there’s more there, and I’d love to hear from someone who not just doesn’t like Madoka, but has an argument to make against its themes or its narrative, just for the sake of hearing it - for the sake of learning more about this thing that I do love, and how it’s let some of its potential viewers and fans down.

But that’s not really what’s happened here. Aside from the complete lack of good-faith engagement, the only talking point that I see people ever rally behind is “PMMM Is Too Sad.” and everything is basically just some specific example of a sad thing that happens in Madoka as if it only exists to upset them. “Magical girls are manipulated to give up their lives and dreams to fight monsters! Madoka’s solution is to just KILL all of them! AND she abandons Homura at the end!” Like none of this is happening for a reason, like there’s no reason to the sadness and the sacrifice - like you just read a bullet-point synopsis of the plot on a wikipedia page somewhere and assumed that you understood the narrative. Surprise, you need to actually engage with a story in order to make any kind of coherent argument for OR against it! 

...I dunno, anon. Do you think it was too much to hope for, that somebody involved in this mess could present an actual case, without trying to act like there’s something morally or psychologically wrong with me for... y’know... liking an anime I watched? Maybe so. But if there’s any clear upside here, it’s that any time mid-witch anon spends harassing me, is time they’re not spending harassing someone else, and I’m quite happy with that in the end. 

[lasercruz]

@quarterdollar​ fuck you and im sorry that i took so long to answer and i hope that im mostly coherent because i am. very tired as im typing this

1: Full name Nicky Jackie Marie Cruz !!

2: Age 21

3: 3 Fears Mold, tall heights if I’m not secured (like, I’m not scared of rollercoaster heights but I’m scared of like, cliffs), and balloons esp balloon animals

4: 3 things I love I love so many things uhh hh h. Jjba, adventure zone, and my friendssss 💞

I know turn ons/offs aren’t inherently sexual but i never know what to say for them so im skipping them :0

7: My best friend you 🥺🥺

8: Sexual orientation bi

9: My best first date ive never really been on a actual date :0

10: How tall am I 5′3

11: What do I miss being with my friends physically and just watching stuff or goofing around on the floor 😭

12: What time were I born 11:02pm

13: Favourite color Dark blues

14: Do I have a crush yes shh

15: Favourite quote there so much sappy quotes that are on uquizzes a lot that i like a lot the first that comes to mind is “ You’re in a car with a beautiful boy, and he won’t tell you that he loves you, but he loves you.” and so on and also “if i loved you less i might be able to talk about it more”

16: Favourite place As far as just physically and not like people or other stuff that comes with with a place, I miss VT campus a lot tbh more than I thought I would. To pick a more specific place, the gazebo at the duck pond cause its where I’d go if I wanted to be alone or like if my roommate was sleeping or working and i didnt want to worry about being quite and it was always super peaceful

17: Favourite food I dont really have One favorite food it just depends what I’m in the mood for but my go to answer for favorite food category wise is either chinese or seafood

18: Do I use sarcasm Depends who I’m with ?? Generally no not often but if im close with someone and just goofin yeah

19: What am I listening to right now My love song playlist. its my go to thing to listen to cause my playlist with all my music has so much on it that i end up skipping half the songs until i find something im in the mood for and this one has a lot less that i end up skipping. the current song its on is day without you by keep for cheap

20: First thing I notice in new person It depends on the person like if they have something that stands out about them, thats what I tend to notice but like. How they carry themself i guess ? cause i feel like thats a easy way to get a read on somebody before talking to them

21: Shoe size 5 mens / 7 womans

22: Eye color Brown

23: Hair color Naturally dark brown but currently dyed black with rainbow bangs

24: Favourite style of clothing this question is on so many ask games and quizzes and I never know how to answer it cause i feel like i dont really have one specific style,, I like colorful and fun stuff i guess ?

25: Ever done a prank call?  No and if you prank call a place of business youre annoying. i used to answer phones at work and we didn’t get them super often but GOD i hate prank callers

27: Meaning behind my URL emu is an old nickname and what i mainly went by until i settled on Nicky and this. is my blog.

28: Favourite movie Baby driver !!

29: Favourite song my go to answer for this is community gardens by the scary jokes

30: Favourite band THE SCARY JOKES

31: How I feel right now sleeby,,,,

32: Someone I love i love , my friendz ,, 🥺🥰

33: My current relationship status single ✌️

34: My relationship with my parents im close to my mom but i dont really get along with my dad ,

35: Favourite holiday Christmas !

36: Tattoos and piercing i have no tattoos, 3 piercings in each ear (2 on each earlobe and 1 on the top on each side)

37: Tattoos and piercing i want I want a interrobang on my wrist and an Aquarius symbol on my ankle and MAYBE the joestar birthmark, i wouldn’t mind more ear piercings and i want a septum piercing but ive seen videos of them getting done and they make me squirm i dont know if id go through with it

38: The reason I joined Tumblr sdklgkjgh i had a my little pony roleplay blog before i made my personal account

39: Do I and my last ex hate each other? no we’re good friends !!

40: Do I ever get “good morning” or “good night ” texts? no not regularly at least

41: Have I ever kissed the last person you texted? no

42: When did I last hold hands? my mom tried to hold my hand when i was half asleep on the couch the other day but like i was so out of it so like it was more our fingers together and the rest of my hand just loosely dangling so if that doesnt count, you

43: How long does it take me to get ready in the morning? i give myself about 2 hours if im doing full makeup but thats purposefully longer than i need so i dont have to worry about rushing and i can relax and take my time

44: Have You shaved your legs in the past three days? no i only shave them if they’re gonna be showing or if the Urge to be Smooth comes over me

45: Where am I right now? my room at home on my bed

46: If I were drunk & can’t stand, who’s taking care of me? probably Kaylie cause she doesn’t drink and i assume if im drunk with other friends there she’d be the only sober one

47: Do I like my music loud or at a reasonable level? Reasonable, if i have it too loud i cant think so the only time i  have my music loud is if im doing nothing and want to Not Think

48: Do I live with my Mom and Dad? Ye

49: Am I excited for anything? short term im excited for the ai crushes all banks stream tonight and long term im excited to move into our apartment 

50: Do I have someone of the opposite sex I can tell everything to? no im not a tell everything to someone type of person .

51: How often do I wear a fake smile? i smile most of the time like, at work (before we wore masks) id always be smiling to look nice and like. just in general if i want to Not Look Unhappy or whatever

52: When was the last time I hugged someone? my mom probably like, yesterday

53: What if the last person I kissed was kissing someone else right in front of me? ive never kissed any1     .

54: Is there anyone I trust even though I should not?  nope i don’t think i really trust easily so like this doesnt rlly happen,

55: What is something I disliked about today? i woke up late cause i was up late last night so ive been tired all day I dont like the feeling

56: If I could meet anyone on this earth, who would it be? language barriers aside itd be super cool to meet hirohiko araki

57: What do I think about most? Whatever media im currently most into so right now adventure zone and magnus archives

58: What’s my strangest talent? umm i dunno im kinda flexable i guess ? not like ~contortionist~ level but like enough that i can freak people out sometimes

59: Do I have any strange phobias? i mentioned balloons as a fear in an eariler question so yeah that but im a lot better about it than i used to be

60: Do I prefer to be behind the camera or in front of it? in front tbh

61: What was the last lie I told? i was on phones for the last hour and a half of my shift on friday and like. when people call and ask if an item is in stock and i can’t confirm it i, just tell them its not. like, someone asked if we had a specific kayak and i usually just search the walmart app or run over to where itd be to check but the kayaks are to far for me to run to and the app said limited stock which usually means little to none so , i just put it on hold for a bit then tell him we’re out.

62: Do I perfer talking on the phone or video chatting online? i like video chatting in theory cause its nice to see people visibly react to stuff but i tend to get too self conscious about how i look so i  just do audio only

63: Do I believe in ghosts? How about aliens? yes to both !! i am both

64: Do I believe in magic? yes in some ways i suppose

65: Do I believe in luck? yes im v superstitious

66: What’s the weather like right now? its a pretty good day its sunny but not too hot :oo

67: What was the last book I’ve read? its been ages since i last read a book in full 😔  i honestly dont knwo what the last one would of been 😔 😔

68: Do I like the smell of gasoline? yes !!! love it

69: Do I have any nicknames? not anything i get consistently called no

70: What was the worst injury I’ve ever had? ive never gotten super hurt that i can think of ??

71: Do I spend money or save it? save it

72: Can I touch my nose with a tounge? no

73: Is there anything pink in 10 feets from me? doppio bean plush ,,,,

74: Favourite animal? hedgehogs!!!!

75: What was I doing last night at 12 AM? on my phone probably on tiktok or something waiting for jojo to come on toonami

76: What do I think is Satan’s last name is? I? dont think he has one i guess ??

77: What’s a song that always makes me happy when I hear it? butterflies by samsa but it makes me happy in the “im crying now” kinda way itss cute

78: How can you win my heart? just by being nice and respectful tbh ,

79: What would I want to be written on my tombstone? idk i dont really want anything fancy just my name (chosen name please god im so scared of dying and geting my birth name on my tombstone if that happens i WILL come back as a vengeful ghost) and my birth and death dates

80: What is my favorite word? saccharine

81: My top 5 blogs on tumblr by my tumblr crushes (which its been YEARS since i looked at) ; frostios, 27names4tears, smollpurrito, happynaru, and warpedlamp

82: If the whole world were listening to me right now, what would I say? if we being real id just get so scared dsjkfsldjglg  theres so much i could say i dont know :((

83: Do I have any relatives in jail? not ? that i know of 

84: I accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow me with the super-power of my choice! What is that power? why are all the questions worded super basic except this one skdlskdjfj. Shape shifting

85: What would be a question I’d be afraid to tell the truth on? i can really think of anything really as long as a friend is asking i tend to answer truthfully ?

86: What is my current desktop picture? Sobble BUT this reminded me that i wanted to change it to a xenoblade pic so its this now :

90: Failed a class? no

91: Kissed a boy? no

92: Kissed a girl? no

93: Have I ever kissed somebody in the rain? no but oh god just thinking about that im 🥺🥺🥺🥺 id die id melt 🥺🥺

94: Had job? ye i was a cashier for a year in highschool and then i work in wamlart apparel in the summers

95: Left the house without my wallet? not when I know ill need it no, but ive left it home if im just going to a friend or family member’s house or i have my mom’s card or some cash in my pocket

96: Bullied someone on the internet? no !!

98: Played on a sports team? no lmao i dont do sports

99: Smoked weed? no

100: Did drugs? i had a weed brownie like once but it was such a small piece i didnt really feel anything

101: Smoked cigarettes? no

102: Drank alcohol? Ye

103: Am I a vegetarian/vegan? not currently i was vegan for a little bit to encourage a friend that was doing it though

104: Been overweight? no

105: Been underweight? no

106: Been to a wedding?  yes three, my grandma’s when she got remarried, and both my brothers

107: Been on the computer for 5 hours straight? probably yes lmao often

108: Watched TV for 5 hours straight? not TV TV but if netflix and the like count then yes

109: Been outside my home country? no :(

110: Gotten my heart broken? not ? really no

111: Been to a professional sports game? ive been to a handful of Yankee games

112: Broken a bone? no

114: Been to prom? yes i went to my highschool’s and a friend’s highschool’s my senior year

115: Been in airplane? no

116: Fly by helicopter? no

117: What concerts have I been to? none :((((

118: Had a crush on someone of the same sex? ye

119: Learned another language? i took 3 years of Spanish in high school but i wasn’t any good at it and dont really remember much of what i did learn

120: Wore make up? yes i do often :0

123: Dyed my hair? ye a lot

124: Voted in a presidential election? yes ever since iv been old enough to i vote

125: Rode in an ambulance? no

126: Had a surgery?  dental surgery yes

127: Met someone famous? Not anyone i’d count no

128: Stalked someone on a social network? depends on what you count as stalking i guess but like not ever in a creepy way like ive been on people’s social media to find out stuff about them like. if theyre in a relationship or especially after highschool ill wonder about someone i havent talked to in awhile and ill see what theyve been up to and what theyre doing with their life and stuff

129: Peed outside? no

130: Been fishing? yes like once

131: Helped with charity? donation wise yes

132: Been rejected by a crush? ive never confessed to anyone and been rejected but once a friend told my crush i liked them and they confronted me about it and rejected me but it made me more mad at the friend that told them than it made me sad about being rejected because i knew it’d probably go like that  and it justmade thing awkward between us for awhile  😔

133: Broken a mirror? ive broken the little mirrors inside eyeshadow pallets but i havent broken full ones

134: What do I want for birthday? usually just money lol or something thoughtful and cute

135: How many kids do I want and what will be their names? i aggresivly do NOT want kids BUT hypohetically Elliot or Xander for a boy and idk what i’d nam a girl

136: Was I named after anyone? no

137: Do I like my handwriting?  its messy so no not really but if im writing something for myself like a not or whatever i dont mind as long as i can read it

138: What was my favourite toy as a child? even as a little kid i always played computer games but other than that, this guy :

139: Favourite Tv Show? Jojo

140: Where do I want to live when older? New york or japan

141: Play any musical instrument? i can kind of play harmonica

142: One of my scars, how did I get it? i burnt my thumb kinda bad on the oven a while ago its still kinda healing but right now it looks like its gonna stay a scar

143: Favourite pizza toping? i like everything/suprieme pizza but if i have to pick one single topping pepperoni

144: Am I afraid of the dark? yes :((

145: Am I afraid of heights? mentioned it earlier but yes if im not strapped in or secured etc

146: Have I ever got caught sneaking out or doing anything bad? no im so scared of being caught doing something bad that i just. dont

147: Have I ever tried my hardest and then gotten disappointed in the end? i mean yes but thats life babey

149: What my greatest achievments are ive gotten awards for grades and stuff but that boring BUT i got the english department award or whatever that was called im very proud of that

151: What I’d do if I won in a lottery i donate some and save the rest tbh

152: What do I like about myself i can be pretty  sometimes 👉👈 im cute or whateva ,,,

153: My closest Tumblr friend i dont really havent “tumblr friends” aside from friends i know irl and also tey have tumblrs ,,

154: Something I fantasise about just. growing up and having my own place maybe with someone and. being comfortable and  okay and not having to worry ,,

155: Any question you’d like? dkfjhdskhf japan :000

[bennwriting]

Cat and Mouse

People Are Messy: Part 1 of 2 (for now) This is supposed to be part of a larger work, but this and one other chapter are the only ones I don't hate so far. Hope you like it!

“I’m so sorry, Jame,“ I said with a hug. 

“Thanks, Mouse.”

“You ok?”

“Yeah.”

“Liar.”

“Yeah,” he sighed. Sad eyes stayed aimed at the floor. Weight shifted from one foot to the other.

“You wanna watch a sad movie and eat ice cream and cry it out, or would you rather throw darts at her picture?”

A rueful chuckle. “I’m not fucking crying.”

“Darts it is!”

“No,” he grabbed my arm and pulled me back. “No darts. Just.” Scrubbed a hand down his face. “I dunno. Can I kick your ass at bubble hockey or something?”

Grabbing his arm with my free hand, I squeezed and winked. “If you think you’re good enough.”

“Oh you are so toast,” he grinned. I turned toward the stairs, but he pulled me back into a loose hug. “Hey. Thanks. Really.”

“Any time, bud.” I held tightly and felt the sigh. It was a long minute before he was ready to let go and follow me upstairs. I just let him take his time. 

He did kick my ass at bubble hockey. Ruthlessly. I was happy to let him take it out on the game, something harmless. I made a show of trying to win and being upset that I lost, but we both knew I never stood a chance. Unfortunately, it didn’t lighten the mood. 

“Ok this isn’t working. You’re concentrating too hard.”

Jamie sighed, palms on the machine. “Yeah.”

“You sure no darts?”

“No darts.”

“Ok but you gotta let it out somehow.”

“I don’t know what to do.” Pressed his forehead against the bubble. “Fuck, this sucks.”

“We could dance it out.”

Head up just enough to glare at me. “This is not Grey’s Anatomy, and I am not dancing.”

“You sure? We could totally turn on some terrible country music and dance.”

“No.” Giggle. 

“Ok but if you change your mind, the offer’s open.”

“Good to know. Let’s just watch a movie. But not a sad one. Like an action flick.”

“Fury Road?” 

“Perfect.”

“Done. Let’s blow some shit up!”

Laughter chased me as I danced down the hall into the media room, followed shortly by a hard root beer in my hand. 

“Thanks. Am I still the only one drinking these?”

“Yup. All yours. No one else will touch them.”

“Sweet. Y’all are missing out, though.”

“Nope.”

Shrugging, I turned and put my feet in his lap, and he looked down and chuckled before settling into the movie. 

Somehow, without conscious thought, we ended up lying down on the couch, Jamie using me as a human body pillow, head on my chest and arms and legs wrapped around me. I started out rubbing his back but ended up combing my fingers through his hair. 

Both of us were so relaxed that it didn’t occur to me at first that his hand had made its way under my t-shirt and over my bra. Not squeezing, or even fondling, just resting there like that’s where it belonged. I’m pretty sure he didn’t realize what he was doing until he pushed my shirt up and absently involved his mouth. 

I jumped, he jumped, then he bolted upright so fast he nearly dumped me onto the floor. 

“Oh my god, I am so sorry!”

“It’s ok, you just startled me.” 

“Not ok. What was I thinking? Oh god.” He looked mortified. 

I had to lean way over to reach where he was backed into the corner of the couch like a frightened animal, but I took his hand and squeezed it reassuringly. 

“Jamie, it’s ok. No harm done. Really.”

Barely looking at me through the cringe, he scrubbed his free hand over his face as if it would wipe away the lovely shade of scarlet he was blushing. 

“I’m so, so sorry. You know I would never …”

“I know. Jame. Sweetheart.” I climbed over to him and pulled him into a tight hug. “It’s ok. I mean it.”

Relaxed ever so slightly into the hug, he was still tense, so I rubbed his back until he let out a heavy sigh and hugged me back like I wasn’t made of glass. But when I sat back, he still couldn’t bring his eyes up to mine. 

“Chubbs. Hey.”

Finally, he slowly looked up at me through his lashes, as if he expected a lecture. 

“I know you didn’t mean anything by it. You’re just missing that. It’s understandable, really.”

“It’s unacceptable. I have no right to just … take. I just … you were so soft and warm and … I spaced out and … god, what is wrong with me?”

“How long has it been?”

“What?” Confusion. 

“How long? When’s the last time you … y’know, touched anyone?”

Blushing again, staring at his hands. “Oh. Um. I dunno, like, a few months? But like, we went longer than that during the season. Well, I did.”

Softly, “Oh honey.” Grabbed his hand. He flinched a little, then sighed. 

“Can you … not call me that? It’s …”

“Oh. Right. Sorry.”

“S’ok. It just … hurts.”

“Yeah. Do you … can I …” Failing to form a coherent sentence, I did the only thing I could think of — kissed him, full on the mouth. 

Surprised, he didn’t respond at first, but then instinct took over and he kissed me back, slowly, then a little desperately, a drowning man grabbing onto a life preserver. Strong hands cradled my head, not tenderly — to make sure I didn’t pull away. 

The kiss was raw, needy, nothing sweet or loving about it, just frayed, pent-up emotions being released. When it ended, we stared at each other in semi-stunned silence for a bit before he found his words. 

“What was that?”

“Pretty sure it was a kiss,” I quipped. 

“No shit, really? I mean why.”

A shrug. “I didn’t know what to say.” 

“So … you kissed me?”

“I think you kissed me back.”

“I did. But … I thought … I mean …”

“What? Oh. I’m not … I’m just … different. I do like boys. And don’t let this go to your big ol’ vain head, but you’re kind of beautiful.” 

He blushed the most amazing shade of pink at that, one dimple threatening to dig into his cheek as he looked down at his hands. 

“Anyway, you’re hurting and clearly touch-starved, and I just really wanted to kiss it better. Was that ok?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it was … nice.” Eyes back up to mine, looking for confirmation that it was really ok. 

“Do you wanna do it again?”

“I don’t wanna take advantage.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“Yeah.” Blushing again. “Ok. I do. If it’s ok with you.”

“It’s definitely ok. Do you … want to do more?”

“No! No … I mean yeah I want to, but …”

“Hey. I’m asking. You’re not pushing.”

“I just don’t wanna … use you. I can go pick up in a bar for that.”

“Even if I’m offering?”

“But you don’t want that.”

“I want to help you. I want to make you feel good.”

“I don’t want pity sex.”

“I’m not offering out of pity. I’m offering because I want to help. I know that’s a fine line, but it makes a difference to me.”

“So you … want me?” 

“In this situation, yes. Look, I don’t want to get all TMI. I want to fill that need for you. If you want me to.”

“I just … didn’t think you liked it.”

“I do … I just need something more than basic animal attraction, and you needing me right now does that for me. So now that we’ve discussed it to death, can I kiss you again?”

A smile, a nod, and to my surprise, he pulled me up to straddle his lap. “I’m serious, Mouse, tell me if you want me to stop. I don’t want to fuck up our friendship just because I’m lonely and horny.”

“Promise. But same goes for you. If it’s too weird, we don’t have to keep going.”

“Deal.” Then a kiss that made my head spin. Lips trailing from my ear down my neck to my collarbone made my spine tingle. 

“Damn, Jamie.”

“Want me to stop?”

“Fuck no. Please, no.”

I felt the smile against my skin before he pushed my shirt up and off. 

“Good ‘cause I really don’t want to.” 

Only a moment to look into his nearly black eyes before he was kissing me again, surprisingly soft hands meandering across my chest then coming together to unclasp my bra. As soon as the straps were down my arms and off, he lifted my hands back up to his hair and skimmed his fingers along my arms back down to my chest. 

Those soft hands caressed and fondled their way around my skin, gentle but not tentative, while the mouth did the demanding. Passionate kisses from my lips down my throat, just shy of leaving marks. When they reached my chest, I lifted up on my knees to give him better access. 

Lips surrounded one nipple, and he teased with his tongue while taking more in his mouth and then sucking hard enough to make me whimper. 

“Ok?”

“Mhmm. More.”

He smiled and shifted to the other side, made me whimper again, dragging teeth along skin. Hands dropped to the button of my jeans. 

“Hey, no fair, you’re still dressed,” I whined. 

An impatient huff, but he backed off and yanked his shirt over his head, giving me a nice show, then surprised me by standing and dropping his shorts to the floor, leaving him in nothing but boxer briefs. He pulled me up so he could finish taking off my jeans, pushing them down to my ankles while kissing his way down my body. I had to hold onto his shoulders when he nuzzled into the fabric of my panties, hot breath making me tingle again. Feet freed one by one, then beard tickling my torso as he stood.

In nothing but our underwear, we stared at each other a little awkwardly for a moment, but he fixed it by kissing me, easy and unhurried, before quietly lifting me up, hands on my ass. 

“Where are we going?”

“Bedroom,” murmured into another kiss. 

“Jamie, I can walk! That’s on the other side of the house.”

“Mmmmnope. Want to carry you.”

And then I was pinned against the wall of the elevator. Oh. Well that was hot. 

Dizzy from his mouth on mine, I saw nothing but him until he was setting me down softly on the floor in his bedroom. 

Quietly, “Still sure?”

“So sure.” I spun him around and pushed him down on the bed. He just stared as I crawled onto his lap, but caught up quickly and pulled me in for a hot and heavy kiss, hands in my hair, teeth pulling at my bottom lip, tongue in my mouth. 

I leaned forward, using my body to tell him to lie back without breaking the kiss, and he smoothly pivoted his feet onto the bed and pulled me down with him. Once he was settled, I started kissing his neck, from the hollow of his throat up to his ear. Lingered for a while, pulled a moan from him that made my heart race. 

“Tell me what you want first,” murmured in his ear. “You want my mouth? My tits? My pussy?

A moaned “fuck” was the only response, and I rocked against his crotch a little. Hands grabbed my hips and pulled me down harder. “Fuck. Don’t …” 

“Don’t?” I breathed before sucking on his earlobe. 

“Mouth. Your mouth. Please.”

Smiling, I nibbled on his ear for a bit before kissing, licking, and nipping my way down his body. Flicked a nipple with my tongue, got him panting a little and fisting hands in my hair. 

It was a little bit of a struggle to get his boxers over the curve of his ass and thick thighs, but once they were to his knees, he kicked them the rest of the way off and lay flat again. When he reached to touch himself, I swatted his hand away and replaced it with mine. 

“Let me.”

All he could do was close his eyes and nod and let out a sigh when I gave him a long, light stroke that I immediately followed with my tongue. Whimpered just a little as I took the head into my mouth. Moaned, long and loud, when I swirled my tongue around under his foreskin. A hand swept through my hair to the base of my skull. I looked up at him without stopping.

Eyes intense, a little watery, lips parted, breathing shallow. When I took more of him in my mouth and licked up the underside, he closed his eyes and moaned again, softer this time, almost a whine. 

Slowly, I built him up, my hand around the base pumping in rhythm with my mouth — there was no way I could take all of him — until he was panting and shaking, gasping a combination of “fuck” and “oh god,” pulling my mouth off of him just in time to stripe ropes of cum all over his chest. 

“You didn’t have to do that,” I smiled up at him softly, hand still wrapped around him. 

“I didn’t want … um … I knew it was going to be a lot. Too much.”

Leaning up to kiss his cheek, I laughed softly. “You still didn’t have to, sweetie,” I murmured in his ear. “I’ll be right back.”

He hummed his assent and sank back into the pillows, boneless. A quick mouth rinse and I returned with a warm, wet washcloth, straddled his thighs, began gently cleaning off his stomach and chest. Smiling, he put his hand over mine. 

“You don’t have to do that.”

“I want to. Let me take care of you.”

“K,” he smiled bashfully. “But you’re never gonna get it all out of my chest hair.”

I giggled. “Voice of experience?” 

“Yes.” A bright blush bloomed on his cheeks, but he was still smiling and relaxed. I smiled back and finished cleaning up as best I could. 

“I guess we’ll just have to get you in the shower.”

Pulling me down onto his chest, he giggled. “If I get you all sticky, will you join me?”

“Oh my god,” I laughed, “all you had to do was ask. The answer would have been yes.”

“Good.” Then he pulled me into a kiss that made us forget all about the shower. 

As we kissed, I rocked my hips into his, and he grabbed my ass with both hands. 

“Mmm, why are you still not naked?” mumbled into the kiss. 

“Dunno. Been busy.”

He snorted as he rolled me over and hovered above me, pulled my panties off and kissed his way back up my body. There was a long pause at my chest where his mouth and hands and eyes made a thorough exploration of every available inch of skin, leaving nipples at attention and heart pounding. 

“I didn’t know you had a mascot,” he smiled and softly traced the tiny tattooed mouse on my ribs under my right breast. 

I giggled. “Mhmm. She hides.”

“She’s cute.”

“She says thanks.” Another giggle. 

Still smiling, he placed a sweet, chaste kiss on the mouse’s head. Then mouth and hands parted ways — mouth back to mine while his right hand skimmed back down to my thigh. He shifted onto one hip beside me but kept kissing, muting my whimper when two fingers dipped between my legs and gently slid up through my folds. 

“This ok?” 

“Mhmm. But you don’t need to do anything for me. I’m supposed to be taking care of you.”

“I want to though,” he murmured. “I want to touch you everywhere. I want to make you come. And when I’m ready again, I want to fuck your brains out.”

The combination of that soft voice and the dirty talk short-circuited my brain, and all I could do was moan “god damn” and pull him back to my lips. Taking that as a sign to continue, he pushed my legs apart and picked up where he left off. 

“Fuck, Mouse, you’re so wet. For me?”

“No, for the other hot guy who’s been kissing all over me,” I laughed, shoving him playfully. “Yes you, dork.”

“Ok yeah you’re gonna have to explain it to me like I’m stupid. Later. Right now I just wanna touch you.”

“Mmm, anything you want.”

My hips bucked into his hand, and I guided him to my sweet spot, helped him get the rhythm right. 

Lips against my ear, voice so soft. “There good?” 

“Fuck yes, just like that. Don’t stop.”

Needing something to hold onto, I reached up and got a hand in his hair. He moaned. 

“Oh. You like that?”

Leaning into my hand, “Yeah.” 

And so I held onto his hair — not quite pulling — while he continued to make my toes curl. Never losing rhythm with his hand, he brought his mouth into play, kissing lips, then neck, then chest. When I came, panting, digging my fingers into his scalp and arm, his mouth was back on my neck, just below my ear, and he placed little soft kisses all along my jaw and across my neck and collarbone. 

“Jesus, Chubbs,” I breathed when I’d come down, “that was uhhh …”

Bless his heart, he tried not to be smug about it, but I could tell he was proud of himself. 

“I’m glad.”

“Yeah, it’s um. Been a while since someone did that for me.”

“How long?”

“Ummm … years? Not sure how many.”

“Do you …” He blushed so hard it went down his chest. “y’know, take care of yourself?”

“Oh. Mmmm, sometimes. Mostly to shut my mind off when I can’t sleep, really. It’s a whole different thing, having someone else do it. Same basic mechanics, very different feeling.”

His hand, which had moved to my hip, pulled me over onto my side, facing him. 

“Do you still want to …” 

“Do you?”

Suddenly shy, he looked down. “Yeah,” he said softly. “If that’s ok.”

“Hey, look at me.” I waited. When he finally brought his big brown eyes up to mine, I continued. “I mean it. Anything you need. If that’s sex, cool, I’m down. If you just wanna lie here and kiss and touch, that’s fine. If you just need to hold me or be held, I can do that too. Tell me what you need.”

“Honestly? I don’t know.”

“Is any of this helping?”

A smile. “Yeah. It is.”

“Then let's just go with it.” I smirked. “Kiss me.”

He snorted a little laugh and then leaned in for a slightly tentative kiss. Tentative shifted pretty quickly to steamy, hands moving over skin, grabbing tits and ass and pulling me closer. I could feel him getting hard again, long before he acted on it, rubbing against me, pulling my knee up over his hip. 

Softly, in my ear, “I want you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Ok?”

“Fuck me, Jamie.”

“Fuck. Yeah, ok.” Rolling over to his nightstand, he grabbed a condom from the drawer. When that was squared away, he kissed me, hard, and rolled me onto my back so he could hover over me. More kissing — my lips, my neck — while he lined himself up and slowly eased in. Just a little. 

A whispered “fuck” and he backed off. “You’re so tiny, Mouse. I don’t want to hurt you.” 

“Not gonna lie, you’re … um … well, bigger than I’ve had before.”

He blushed. This big, brawny, hot-as-fuck stud was bashful about his big dick. Talk about a turn-on. Rather than continuing the discussion, I guided him back in, hooked my feet around his thighs, pulled him into a kiss. 

“I’ll tell you if it’s too much, ok?”

“Yeah.” A nod. “Ok.”

Again, slowly, tentatively, he pressed in. It was a lot. I may have made a noise. Ok, I whimpered. He stopped. 

It didn’t … hurt, exactly. “It’s ok. Keep going. I’m ok.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. Just … keep going slow.”

“Mouse —“

“No, seriously, Chubbs … oh my god, is that why they call you …”

“Shut up, no, I was fat, ok?”

I giggled. He shook his head and pushed in a little harder. “Brat.”

“Fatty.”

Fighting a smile, he did it again. 

“Fuck,” I squeaked. “Ok that felt good.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Do it again.”

He did. 

“Oh god.”

“More?”

“Uh huh,” I nodded. He pushed in further. My eyes rolled back in my head a little. 

“Ok?”

“Yeah. No more slow, just go.”

“You sure?”

“Mhmm.”

I gasped as he pressed in the rest of the way. 

“Ok?”

“Yep, good. Just … wow.”

He kissed me, sweetly, tenderly, and started to move. “Tell me what feels good, ok?” 

“Mhmm.”

“Mouse, you gotta breathe.”

I blew out the breath I was holding. “I will. In a minute. I just gotta … adjust.”

He stopped for a second and kissed me. “We don’t need to do this if it doesn’t feel good.”

“Does it feel good for you?”

“Yes, fuck. So good.”

“Then I’m good. Just gimme a minute to catch up. Keep going though.”

“Ok. But I mean it. If you’re uncomfortable we stop.”

“Jamie, just shut up and fuck me.”

His eyes closed, and he sucked in a breath. Kissed me hard and went back to rocking into me, with more force this time. 

It had been so long, I’d kind of forgotten what sex felt like. And Jamie was very different from the one other guy I’d been with, both physically and emotionally. I shifted under him a little, and he adjusted, got his arms under my legs, and oh my god that made all the difference. I let out a moan. My toes curled. I dug my nails into his shoulders. 

Message received, he settled into that position, slowly rolling his hips, still making sure I was ok but mostly getting lost in his own experience. Eyes closed and brow furrowed, biting his bottom lip, barely making a sound other than breathing. 

The man had stamina. I shouldn’t have been surprised, given that he’s an athlete, but I didn’t expect him to want to go all night. I was not complaining. He kept his weight off me, and the position we’d found had him hitting sweet spots I didn’t know I had. When he got closer to losing control, he sped up just a tad, went just a bit harder, and that did it for me. My body quivered from my shoulders to my knees as I came hard enough that I could barely breathe. 

A raspy “Jesus fuck,” was followed by stuttering hips and lost rhythm, and he pounded a couple dozen more erratic strokes before he dove forward and kissed me through his own orgasm. The kiss slowly tapered off from frenzied to tender, until he stopped and rested his forehead against mine. 

A long moment later, he very gently pulled out, took off the condom, tied it, tossed it vaguely in the direction of his bathroom before collapsing onto the bed — mostly beside me but with his head nestled into my neck and one arm snaked over and around me. I immediately got a hand in his hair and the other on his back, rubbing slowly. 

It was several long moments before he had the capacity to speak, and then it was barely audible, his already soft voice on the edge of sleep. 

“Stay?”

“Of course, anything you need.”

“Just this. Exactly what you’re doing.”

“Ok. Get some sleep, Chubbs. I’ve got you.”