#engage in critical thinking

[mobliterated]

I implore you all to not get all of your political news from this website and other social media only

[itwaslegendary]

Taylor Swift's interview on CBS Sunday Morning; 25/08/2019

[elizareed]

every day I log onto tumblr dot com and I have to see people claiming charlotte bronte wasn't a feminist unlike their totally unproblematic fave jane austen and I am physically unable to grab them by the shoulders and giving them a good shake and it makes me real sad

[caeslxys]

I’ve mentioned this elsewhere but it feels relevant again in light of the most recent episode. Something that’s really fascinating to me about Orym’s grief in comparison to the rest of the hells’ grief is that his is the youngest/most fresh and because of that tends to be the most volatile when it is triggered (aside from FCG, who was two and obviously The Most volatile when triggered.)

As in: prior to the attack on Zephrah, Orym was leading a normal, happy, casual life! with family who loved him and still do! Grief was something that was inflicted upon him via Ludinus’ machinations, whereas with characters like Imogen or Ashton, grief has been the background tapestry of their entire lives. And I think that shows in how the rest of them are largely able to, if not see past completely (Imogen/Laudna/Chetney) then at least temper/direct their vitriol or grief (Ashton/Fearne/Chetney again) to where it is most effective. (There is a glaring reason, for example, that Imogen scolded Orym for the way he reacted to Liliana and not Ashton. Because Ashton’s anger was directed in a way that was ultimately protective of Imogen—most effective—and Orym’s was founded solely in his personal grief.)

He wants Imogen to have her mom and he wants Lilliana to be salvageable for Imogen because he loves Imogen. But his love for the people in his present actively and consistently tend to conflict with the love he has for the people in his past. They are in a constant battle and Orym—he cannot fathom losing either of them.

(Or, to that point, recognize that allowing empathy to take root in him for the enemy isn't losing one of them.)

It is deeply poignant, then, that Orym’s grief is symbolized by both a sword and shield. It is something he wields as a blade when he feels his philosophy being threatened by certain conversational threads (as he believes it is one of the only things he has left of Will and Derrig, and is therefore desperately clinging onto with both bloody hands even if it makes him, occasionally, a hypocrite), but also something he can use in defense of the people he presently loves—if that provocative, blade-grief side of him does not push them—or himself—away first.

(it won’t—he is as loved by the hells as he loves them. he just needs to—as laudna so beautifully said—say and hear it more often.)

[bigskydreaming]

Imagine if you were a gay or bi man who tried a certain firefighter show because of all the attention it was getting for one of its mains having a later in life bi awakening.....and between seasons you ventured into its fandom in search of material to tide you over til the next one. And you're greeted by a deluge of posts and fics that are just cheerfully homophobic towards one half of the newly out bi character's canon relationship on the basis of 'well he's not the RIGHT gay guy' and pushing the idea that actually its fine to cheat on him because Reasons and he's sexually predacious based on......behind the scenes implications people have divined like they're reading fucking tea leaves.

But don't get it twisted....this fandom, like all fandoms, really cares about representation!

Sorry not sorry, but we really need to kill this idea that fandoms are welcoming and inviting and inherently progressive when they're frequently insular and reductive as fuck. Every single fandom I've been in has had major trends of people doubling down on their own headcanons and fanon interpretations of the characters and willfully enacting trends aimed at running off people who like the 'wrong' characters (usually characters marginalized along one or multiple axes), like the characters in the 'wrong ways' or other bullshit.

Scott is a Bad Friend fics overtaking Teen Wolf fandom was not incidental, it was a FEATURE of the fandom, because the vast majority of that fandom did not want to share its space with anyone who had the nerve to like its main character. Survivors complaining about or criticizing the prevalance of rape fics in a certain fandom has in my experience always led to a reactionary UPTICK in those fics, with gems like 'this character can, will, must be raped' in the tags making it crystal clear that some of these fics exist because how fucking DARE anyone try and push forth a narrative not agreed upon by Fandom Main.

I could cite examples for so many other fandoms, with the commonalities always being that vast majorities in these fandoms are explicitly reacting defensively to being asked to be more mindful of fandom trends revolving around or exacerbating racism, homophobia, transphobia, rape or abuse apologia, ableism, etc....

With the most prolific fucking rallying cry across countless fandoms being "No the fuck we will NOT be doing that," because lolololol.....

Fandom is an inherently progressive space, didn't you hear?

[kinaaaard]

“tommy is going to side with Gerrard” are you a fucking moron

[godsfavoritescientist]

I've been seeing a bunch of people adding disclaimers to their billford posts clarifying that they have critical thinking skills about abuse and abusive relationships, and I 100% understand that impulse. When I first made this blog I added disclaimers like that onto nearly everything. But, if it makes the folks adding those disclaimers feel any better: after I stopped writing essays trying to prevent people from taking my billford posts in bad faith, absolutely no one got mad at me in my inbox or on any of my posts, and I've been posting about billford for years now. In my experience the majority of people who are uncomfy with this ship nowadays will simply block and move on. Some folks will disagree no matter how many disclaimers you add, and that's ok

[buggachat]

I know I've said this and many variations countless times before, but just a reminder:

responding to fandom analysis posts of a show with "haha or it's just bad writing 🤣", "wow the writers must have written this by accident because they're bad 😛", or "wow one interesting thing managed to happen despite how bad the writing is 😆" is... grating.

I get it. You don't like the show, and no matter what happens in it, you'll never change your opinion of that. So why are you even interacting with analysis posts? What do you get out of it if you think literally everything in this show is written by accident? Why do you think the OPs of these posts want to hear about how much you don't care and don't want to even try to engage with it at all?

Make your own post. And tag it with the appropriate salt tags so I can blacklist.

[mihai-florescu]

"Fiction isnt reality itself, but it does affect reality, so you have to be mindful of your own consumption and how you interact with it after, especially if you're going in a fandom setting" is not a crazy statement to understand, and yet it feels like it on the internet

[sluttypatrickstar]

reading smut is not a substitute for a personality

[teeth-cable]

As a short person, seeing both the fandom and critical side infantilize the hell out of Niffty, when the infantilization in the show is a little suspicious at most, is infuriating to say the least.

[sunnibits]

not to sound like the most annoying cunt ever but I do think it’s really funny that I’ve seen multiple people since the new clip dropped being like “wow I never even considered fang/izzy until now but they’re really cute!!” bc like,, bitch I’ve seen the Vision™️ since day fucking ONE. ever since I saw THIS fucking image for the first time vvv

this has ALWAYS been the vision besties. they have ALWAYS been here. not my fault y’all are blind as fuck lmao

[halfusek]

oopsie

so the stream was a flop (ill need to solve that problem in the future but that was very weird cuz these settings worked with batdr before and i doubt batdr was easier to stream performance wise) but yall didnt miss out on anything cuz uh

basically in 15 minutes i was done with the part of the. "game". that was. actually kind of looking like one. you know i didn't expect any polish to this, it was free and all. that was the part with gaskette, it was. fine. i did not find it interesting but at least it wasnt what the rest of the game was

but you know what, i get it. finally i get it

they, or maybe just mike, but its released under their company so i will say they,

they hate theorists

they hate dataminers

alright, point taken, i guess

just push away the fans who were the most interested in playing your games, cuz that's smart

it's sad really but oh well have it your way

[ruelpsen]

I think it's funny how much some of my kinky thoughts and fantasies conflict with the kind of person I am otherwise. On one hand, I'm a serious academic who loves to learn and explore a range of complex subjects, mostly in STEM and the humanities. But on the other hand, I regularly find myself fantasizing lately about living a fully kinky life where my only concerns are eating, burping, and fucking, existing only to be a fattened fucktoy for someone else. Something something the duality of man...

[rhaenin-time]

If you reread the Dance portion of Fire and Blood after spending near any amount of time reading about how Empress Matilda was written about — not about Matilda herself, not the history, but specifically the historiography about how chroniclers and historians constructed narratives around Matilda — the story, Rhaenyra's story, becomes a lot less "ambiguous."

GRRM doesn't just know history, he knows historiography. He knew what he was doing. And it's a shame, and a little troubling, that so many people — including the writers of HotD — don't see it.

[t4tails]

What's wrong with Rocky Horror? Not defending it just genuinely curious

dr frankenfurter is a transmisogynist caricature (look in the notes of that rhps vs bound poll i rbed for more details) and the creator, richard o'brien, has some fucked up things to say on trans women. ill punctuate this with that im not saying rocky horror has no worth, historical or otherwise, but the way people bring up said worth when trans fems dare to bring up their discomfort with the show, is disgusting and just one example of many when it comes to a lot of tme people not actually wanting to discourage transmisogyny in queer scenes.