#for no real reason. no 'moral' or 'problematic' reasons just. they are annoying or boring

[angelsdean]

there are a few side characters i just find so boring, uncompelling, or only relevant in the era they exist / only enjoy from my personal interpretive lens but if you express any of that some people will act like you've committed a murder. but sometimes a side character is just a side character there to fulfill a specific narrative purpose! and that's fine. like i don't hate any of them, but i also don't particularly care abt them beyond their narrative purpose ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[cherrymoonvol6]

.

[hannigramislife]

I’m really curious on your thoughts on Chuuya/Dazai VS Kunikida/Dazai. Why do you like the latter more?

(this is just curiosity! I don’t ship either, and I kinda think he has a similar dynamic with both of them so I was wondering what your thoughts are?)

Hello friend! Thank you for the ask!

I wish I could give a detailed and valid analysis on this, but ultimately, I cannot. Mainly because I deeply dislike Dazai, therefore I don't feel the same emotions as his fans do when he interacts with Chuuya or Kunikida. So I guess I will just explain my personal preference.

Now, I like Chuuya a lot. I like his personality, his character, his design. No special emotional connection to him though, so it's not like I hate skk (though the way the fandom makes Beast about them does fill me with rage enough to not want to encounter skk sometimes) for any reason like "Oh, Chuuya deserves better" or "Dazai is shitty to him!" or whatnot. To me, it simply doesn't feel like their relationship now has any more room for improvement? Or surprise? Like, there's no real tension between them (I mean problematic tension, not sexual, we all watched Dead Apple).

They don't really hate each other, and they both know it. They work well together, they understand each other, they make each other feel human. Nothing has really changed between them since I've started the show. The dynamic is very constant, so it's a little boring, for me. I don't feel any yearning between them, or unresolved past issues. Like, Chuuya didn't feel betrayed when Dazai left. Dazai doesn't feel any guilt. Emotionally, I get nothing between them that's interesting to me, as an audience.

With Kunizai however, I'm wide awake and watching. Because they're such different people with such different morals and boundaries, they're instantly more interesting to me. Yes, Dazai annoys Kunikida the way he did Chuuya, but Kunikida is less likely to relent to Dazai's ways when the situation calls for it. Chuuya feels like he's resigned to Dazai's omniscient nature, knowing what to expect of him, knowing he's likely playing right into the other's plans when in a fight, but Kunikida is very willing to grab him by the collar and ask, "What the hell is wrong with you?!"

I also feel like Kunikida taught Dazai a lot without even knowing. About kindness, and how to be human, just by being himself. Kunikida cared, so Dazai also learnt how to care. Plus, the fact that he reminds Dazai of Oda??

They feel softer, but like there's room to grow. It's something new. It's Dazai stepping into a new world than he was used to and finding a companion that reached a hand out without judgment or fear. It's two ends of the spectrum; a person who wants to die and a person who wants to make the most out of life.

[epicspheal]

So something that's been popping up on Twitter about disliking Carmine, Kieran and/or Nemona...and I'm going to at least address the Carmine and Kieran plotline later in an analysis But I just wanted to say that the community needs a friendly reminder that people can dislike any character of a franchise. Not every character is going to be everyone's cup of tea. Sometimes they may remind them of an experience IRL and that sits with them. Maybe they wanted different from the character's arc. Maybe that character archetype just doesn't vibe with them And it's okay Yes, there are numerous instances of characters being hated because of bandwagons or having massive double standards and stereotypes heaped on them as justification for why they're disliked. No one is denying that. And yeah sometimes people dislike the characters because they weren't paying attention to their story line at all. Or maybe they didn't care for the character but chose to make a bad faith "this character that isn't actually problematic, is actually very problematic" take to justify their dislike of the character. These are all very real things that happen in fandom, and it will unfortunately eventually happen to character you dearly love. And it sucks to see, trust me I've been there. But also sometimes none of that is the reason. Sometimes people have reasons for disliking a character that aren't steeped in bandwagon hate or double standards. And maybe they did pay attention to the story line and understood and still didn't like the character or story because it really isn't their cup of tea. And they just simply dislike the character without going into bad faith takes. This is also very true, and way more common than people like to admit when it comes to dislike of their faves.

Trying to make every instance of dislike of a character "nitpicking", "media literacy", "contrarian" or "double standards" doesn't do discussion of characters any favors and is a bad faith assumption of people to just go straight to that every time you see an instance of people disliking said characters. Yes it's good to push back at certain narratives to offer a different perspective especially if certain narrative perpetuate harmful stereotypes or are in bad faith. That's one of the reasons this blog existed to begin with, but that I doesn't mean I don't recognize that someone could look at the points I talk about with various characters and still come away not caring for the character. And I get, it hurts to see dislike of comfort characters, or characters you identify with, especially with the latter as it can feel more personal (if they don't like this character, then they won't like me). But also you have to realize that with 8 billion people in this world...we're not all going to vibe with each other. Obviously some people we're not going to vibe with because of pure differences in morals...and sometimes we find certain people flat out annoying, or boring, or awkward or whatever and it's not that these people are morally bankrupt we literally just don't vibe. And it's okay. There's always other people who will enjoy you and your comfort characters the way you/they are.

I just had to put this out there before I even touch the Kitakami sibling discourse because I want to make it clear that I am sympathetic to people who dislike either character (even if I personally like both of them) because while yes there are some absolutely wild takes on them, also there's been plenty of valid expression of negative views that are just getting lumped into "HATER" territory. And if seeing someone dislike a character you really like gets to you...you can always block them. I cannot stress curating your fandom space enough and if you deeply resonate with a character and seeing the takes (no matter how mild or wild they are) gets to you it's okay to not engage with those people.

[alittlefrenchtree]

My problem (mine, my personal opinion) is when a fandom has to behave like a cult otherwise you are immediately labeled as a hater and as a person who wants to prevent others from being happy (who's stopping you? seriously), when you have to have the same opinion as everyone or you're a hater, when you have to swallow any product that's passed to you just because that actor is there and you have to show hype otherwise you're a hater, when you can't have half an opinion on certain things because you are a hater.

It's also absurd that every time we express an opinion on something regarding Nick we have to make full-page disclaimers specifying that we are not haters that we love him that he is very talented otherwise it seems like we are attacking him, this too is becoming very annoying for me in this fandom. I love Nick, his first film I saw was Cinderella (better if I don't say what I think of that movie or they will think I'm an hater) but he's not (objectively) an untouchable Hollywood actor and this glass bell they're dropping on him is annoying.

For me, The Idea of ​​You is a problematic film, I'm sorry, not so much for the story of the older woman who has a relationship with a young boy plus the daughter's musical crush (even if... Imagine it had been with reversed roles and it was a adult man and a young girl.. Today they would be canceling that film as if it were a crime) but it is problematic for the background of the story and it is problematic that it is all clearly inspired by a real existing person (from whom they also copied movements and clothes from when he was a boy as well as being inspired by a relationship he had when he was 17 and with a 40-year-old woman) and unconsciously or consciously continuing to use his name for this promotion.

It's not Nick's fault, although I doubt over time he didn't know what was behind that story and I find it ridiculous to sell it as the "film of the decade" (it was literally written in a review) and think such a thing is even possible? That's where objectivity is missing. Have fun with two hotties having sex (and when I read that the cinema was screaming with such scenes I felt a shiver of horror) but at least the objectivity of admitting and accepting that it will definitely not be the film of the decade ☠️ You can be fan of someone and being objective, I swear.

I'm obviously too snobbish and boring to close my eyes and watch anything just because the actors are beautiful, but give others the opportunity to express different opinions without getting angry as if someone had offended your family member.

Thank you for answering with your own words. I won’t share much more on this topic I think because it doesn’t make much sense to post it on my blog when I’m just a spectator of it and mostly because it comes back to the same thing:

Find your own people. Plenty people who love Nick have no problem not loving every single work of his. Well, even most of them won’t even mention Purple Hearts because they hate it so much, so you know, people with their own contradictions. Fandom is no unity and all Nick’s fans aren’t sharing the same opinions about everything.

About the Idea of You — I might not entirely agree here. I agree on the gender switch and double standards on age gaps but. Just because the thing it was inspired by something that might be perceived as problematic doesn’t mean the movie is problematic. The book (that I didn’t read) was already something different from reality and the movie is different from the book so I’m not sure how much the problematic label can still stand. Hayes isn’t 17. Real people with real stories that aren’t all morally above reproach inspire art all the time. Most of the time, you just don’t know about it because fiction changes and mixed things and make them different.

I’d take "the film of the decade" with a pinch of salt but for reasons that seem different than yours. In other words, not because TIOY can’t be that but because the concept itself doesn’t mean anything. The film of the decade according to who? Based on what? Grades from audiences? Grades from professional? Box office money? Streaming numbers? Awards? So called objectivity?

What would be the movie of the decade then? Dune? It won’t be the people who won’t see it or who won’t like it. It won’t even be for all people who saw it and loved it so how do you decide what is a potential contender to be the movie of the decade? I don’t see the point of asking people to admit anything, even more when they aren’t the ones who have written the words. It’s a fun movie, people are having fun with overly enthusiastic reviews because the premiere was a fun night for them. Most people know that already. It’s no big deal. Like it's no big deal if you don’t like the movie or think it will be trash.

Turns out even if I agreed with some of the statements you made previously, I don’t agree much with the development of some ideas.

[hella1975]

hella idk what to send to you for aftg im either bored or annoyed and I don't wanna just say bad things about it 😭 like that's just rude and yall obviously like it I DONT WANNA BE SOME DEBBY DOWNER MDMWKEM

I looked at the anti aftg tag too to see if I could intermingle there and last I checked it was a mix of fans obsessed with the series and haters being just a tad harsh imo, so i couldn't even do that RIP. I'm so lonesome in what is maybe a whole group of people gaslighting me 😔👊

honestly ive said this before and i always have to tread a very fine line with it because this isn't me saying it's OKAY or like. promotable. but i do think to an extent that aftg's problematicness is actually an aspect of what draws people in a lot. like the characters and their reactions to things feel real for who they are, what they've been through and the environments they were raised in if that makes sense? and then you go in the anti-aftg tag and it's just again and again 'they said THIS thing and acted THIS way in response to THIS scenario and it was PROBLEMATIC' and like. yeah. outside of the internet bubble you're in people do actually do that. like that behaviour exists. it IS problematic, well done. you pointed at a wall and called it a wall. but like? in real life people - PARTICULARLY deprived, traumatised people that typically don't ever get therapy or community or someone telling them why something is bad - DO act this way. ive said half of my love for andrew is literally just because he took an awful backstory and let it make him a complete cunt and ive NEVER seen a character do it as shamelessly as him before. and yeah there's the argument for how it's never resolved in the book where nora ties it with a bow and points at the bad behaviour so the readers can go 'see, this is wrong' and we all clap, but idk it just for me feels that when people point at the aftg characters and go problematic! problematic! problematic! it's like they're missing the point a bit.

the point being? that we need to be putting WAY more heat on the author. i really dislike her and a lot of her writing choices and her insistance of using slurs that aren't hers to reclaim and just because it happened to make the characters feel just that bit more authentic i can still acknowledge that she CLEARLY wrote it without characterisation in mind and just added all that problematic shit anyway. like i never get why there's so little focus on nora's writing decisions and thousands of posts just fucking CRUCIFYING the characters themselves and 'let's explain in detail why this behaviour is Morally Reprehensible and they should be Locked Up Forever'. like if u want to focus on the characters so bad and pretend they're the sole reason why aftg is Problematic and Bad then why is it so hard to acknowledge that someone raised the way they were might have some misinformed, ignorant beliefs. idk lol

[lord-squiggletits]

Do you like continuity cross MegOP? Like TFA Optimus x TFP Megatron and the sorts? (That's the most popular pair, it seems. Unlikely but I can see their point)

Not at all unless it's for a joke pairing, like IDW OP/IDW2 Megatron for both being jocks that like jumping off things or something.

I'm someone who very much feels that characters are a product of the world/story they're written within, so blending continuities or just ripping a character and putting them in another continuity makes it feel very disjointed imo.

Plus, one of my biggest MegOP pet peeves is the fact that the AO3 tag is proliferated with fics that are basically IDW Megatron/G1 or TFP or some vague continuity soup Optimus, because I hate IDW Optimus erasure.

Tangential hot take below the cut about a particular crossover MegOP pet peeve of mine, IDW Optimus, and the MOP fandom's treatment of him in general. If you don't like bitching, this is your disclaimer to not read.

Also. I really really hate how people will erase IDW Optimus and ship IDW Megatron with literally any other Optimus besides him, because for me it's incredibly boring and cowardly lmao.

Like, people can handle the fact that Megatron is a bad person (I mean honestly some people write him as if he has no flaws and doesn't need to apologize for anything, so maybe they can't handle Megatron being a bad person considering they refuse to acknowledge that he is/was idk) but they can't handle the idea of Optimus being morally gray? Megatron is allowed to be a complex pacifist-turned revolutionary-turned warlord-turned regretful Autobot, but Optimus has to be frozen in some G1/TFP mishmash where he's just an innocent librarian/dockworker whose main personality trait is being a nice dad completely erased of anything that makes him "problematic"?

You can't even argue "oh IDW OP sucks because he's a cop and cops are bad in real life" because 1. the story agrees with that and Optimus constantly faces the consequences of his pre-war alignment 2. people have no problem with the fact that Megatron was an imperialist technoist, and imperialism and racism are both bad in real life. And 3. if people had an issue with him being a cop, they could just write IDW OP's personality but give him a different job, except no one writes IDW OP's personality at all. For some reason people will excuse all of IDW Megatron's shitty behavior/beliefs away (or just pretend they're not canon) but viciously attack IDW Optimus's personality and the occupation he only had for like a fifth of his total life? It's really disappointing to see such favoritism and bad takes from MEGOP SHIPPERS who are the people you would expect to like BOTH Megatron and Optimus, but this fandom has an overwhelming amount of Megatron favoritism where people write him as having all the initiative and Optimus is just some oaf that doesn't understand why the war happened.

If people want an Optimus who's conscious of his role in perpetuating social inequality and contributing to the civil war, while still having relatable depression and having some moments of humor, IDW Optimus is literally right freaking here waiting for people to read his huge and interesting story.

Plus, half the people who bitch about IDW OP and say they hate him either haven't read the comics or completely misread/misrepresent what IDW OP actually does in the comics. If you want IDW OP to be "called out" or criticized then he gets called out and criticized all the fucking time. People just want OP to be a happy dad or a sadboi or an uwu twink and refuse to accept that since IDW is a darker story, Optimus needs to be dark and problematic along with it or else he doesn't fit within the context of his story.

This fandom's tendency to whitewash IDW Megatron while villainizing IDW Optimus is one of its most annoying qualities, and frankly I find it boring and childish lmao. Accept the fact that IDW Optimus is written like an actual person with flaws that can become ugly when he's put under the immense pressure of everything he's dealing with. Real people don't go through all the trauma and guilt IDW OP went through and remain perfect saints who are always nice and never snap out of anger/frustration. IDW Optimus is too interesting and cool for the people who just want unproblematic happy dad Optimus lmao.

And MegOP shippers shitting on IDW OP for things he didn't do or things that were understandable in context, while acting like Megatron did no wrong and should have everyone else apologize to him, is literally the reason why I don't read any MOP fics outside of my circle of friends/mutuals any more. It's just not worth reading fanfic when my favorite character is constantly erased and excluded from having stories written about him.

[funkymbtifiction]

Fi / Attachment Types

I just want to talk a little bit about being an ENFP and an attachment type (6). I was listening to the Big Hormone Podcast last night talk about attachment types and their struggle to decide anything, because there’s a “yes/no/maybe” internal reaction going on, and I have to say that’s true. It’s like simultaneously wanting to say yes, and be attached, and say no, and remain free of attachment. I’m not really sure how I feel most of the time, which makes my Fi kind of hazy.

Since I get asked this over and over (what is Fi? Am I an ENTP or an ENFP?), let’s talk about Fi. It’s a self-referencing system, where you go away from everyone else to decide how you feel about something and measure it against your inner self. It’s the need to live in accordance to your conscience, and it’s a thing inside you that tells you if this is okay, not okay, or “I don’t care.” With me, some things are automatic. I knew when I saw the trailer that I hated the Robert Downey Jr. version of Sherlock Holmes. I didn’t need to see the film, I just hated it. When I did see the film, Ne didn’t change my mind. I still hated it. I even got offended when my friends likened me to Irene Adler. I’m not sure if they meant temperament or vibes, but that annoyed me, to be “likened” to something I hate.

This reaction was instinctive and irreversible. It’s not rational; it’s a value judgment with me as the standing judge and jury: I. Hate. This. I have the same visceral reaction whenever I see a historical figure being maligned, because they can’t defend their reputation. I hate it. This is what Fi is like. It’s an unconscious NOPE that you cannot explain, that makes sense to nobody else, and that is immediate and abstract and you don’t know how to put it into words except NO. I won’t stand for this!!

(Including a gif, because I have a sense of humor about it now.)

This happens to me on and off, here and there. It’s not all the time, and I don’t let my inner responses override my intuition. In other words, I can give someone a fair trial in my mind (seeing their point of view) instead of dismissing them, even if I disapprove of their behavior. Superficial Fi judgments are immediate and fixed, if I can just see or hear something and respond to it… but when it comes to REAL emotions, everything is up in the air. They’re not a Yes/No. This whole argument about Dean being ISFJ or ISFP has sparked some stuff in my past, because I identify with Rory at times in terms of the “I don’t know what I want” aspect of her behavior. I’d never cheat on a boyfriend with someone else, but I’ve been in that place where I don’t know what I want, really, or if I want this friend in my life, and if not, how do I get out of it? I can’t even decide if I want to ask a friend to go somewhere this weekend with me, because I don’t know if I want to go to that place in the first place, or if I’m just being nostalgic. It has become this whole debate in my mind, because I don’t know how I feel, or if it matters, or if the drive would be worth it. And that is how I live my entire life. Of not being sure what I want most of the time or how I feel.

I know this can be incredibly annoying to other people, and that’s one reason I haven’t sought any close friendships in person for a long time, because I know I do the “yes/no/maybe” with them. They’re never quite sure how I feel about them or where I stand or if I’m in this friendship for the long haul or not. Because I’m a reliable person, I stick around, but there’s often giant question marks over my head about how I feel about them. Being a 6, I keep them at a slight distance while also needing them around. I wish I were a gut type, because then I’d just know by how people make me react to them if I like them or not, but instead, it all goes through my head. It sparks endless questions. I don’t listen to my heart because it doesn’t scream at me very loud. My brain is much louder.

Most of the time, I don’t know how I feel about something. I’m going through a slump right now and I’m not sure why, but nothing is holding my interest. I don’t want to do anything. And figuring out what the cause of this is hard, because Fi can’t tell me through the haze of being an attachment type. All I can do as a 6 is ask questions about it – over-think it, like usual. Does my loss of interest in this mean I am tired of it, doesn’t want to do it, or is this just a temporary slump and will I feel differently next week? Would I be happier if I dumped this? Is that what I want? I’m trying to figure out, from a logical place what my emotions are doing, which is impossible, because Fi isn’t rational, it’s subjective and based in the moment. Things happen, and it reacts. All I know today is, “I don’t care about this.” Being a responsible person, an attachment type, I will do it if it needs done anyway, because I am not a quitter. But a very large part of me wishes I could just be “irresponsible” (to my own mind) and slack off on everything. Just dump people and walk away. Just delete things when I’m bored with them. But I can’t, because Fi says “that isn’t who you are. That would make you feel miserable and unhappy, to be someone who just abandons things/people like that.”

So it’s a catch 22 most of the time. How do I feel? Does it matter? Should it factor into this? Am I just being sentimental here? Do I want this person in my life? Do I care about this hobby? Can I understand that point of view? What would I do in their shoes? Can I relate? It’s a life of never-ending questions, combined with a very real need to always be growing and moving forward and when I’m not feeling like that is happening, I get restless and frustrated. Determining Fi isn’t a case of “am I emotional or rational?” It’s very much a sense of, “Am I being the best possible person I can be, in order to live with and LIKE myself? Can I live with myself if I make this decision? Is this who I am?”

Sometimes you can’t, and that’s more difficult than you can imagine. Every place I have let myself down is like this huge, glaring sign of regret hanging up in my mind. You didn’t live up to yourself, you caused pain, you knew you couldn’t live with it and you did it anyway… Fi is about looking at the past, identifying what you did wrong in that situation (whatever makes you feel the worst or like you failed yourself), and then trying to use it as a guideline going forward. AKA, this made me feel like crap, so I never want to do it again. I’ll never just stand there and listen to someone insult my friend… I’ll never not defend what I think; next time I know I have to do something about this…

So I guess, just cut the attachment types in your life a break. They don’t always know what they want, and it’s as confusing and annoying for them as it is for you if you’re not one. And don’t vilify Fi as being selfish or idolize it as being more moral than Fe, because it isn’t. It’s subjective, abstract, hard to understand even for the Fi user (hence the needing to go away and think deeply about how this is making you feel in order to figure it out), and doesn’t make any sense half the time, because it’s just based on “yeah, nope, and I don’t care.”

One time a friend found out I’m not close to my sisters and said she was sorry, because she loves her sisters. I honestly said, “I don’t care.” I didn’t. I don’t. I don’t know them, so why would I care about not being close to them? But that surprised her, and in turn, it made me ask Ne/Fi-related questions: is a lack of caring an implication that I should care? Am I missing out on something? I can’t force myself to care, can I? Should I try to care? Why??

Fi isn’t “do I make emotional choices,” it’s “Do I care and is this me?” and it’s continuous, a sort of “self-focused” determination in all things, through all questions, to find out Who I Truly Am. And it’s much easier for IFPs to do this than EFPs, because IFPs ask this all the time, instantly. EFPs think, well, I need to either find out who I am through direct action and experiences (do things and react to them - Se) or through intellectual debate (ask myself philosophical questions and react to them - Ne). ENFPs have an extremely difficult time self-typing because they are so “heady” in terms of Ne that they often don’t realize how many of their choices are determined subjectively according to their internal reactions. It’s not a logical Ti process in terms of “how does this work,” it’s more about “how do I work?” Who am I??

I should also add that being a 6, I don’t take on too many hobbies or interests that I take seriously, because the double-thinking that Ne and 6-9 do together is emotionally exhausting. I don’t have the mental energy to double-think 900 things, so it’s easier for me just to say no to things that I know automatically will be an energy suck. This is problematic in the long run, however, because without a variety of interests and new information, Ne gets bored. So I need to keep my Ne fed with enough new information and hobbies that it’s satisfied in thinking about things, without introducing the need to make “decisions” with that information, which would cause me to over-think and stall out.

[13tinysocks]

I wanna see some anti fanfic rec plspls

You asked for it. May I present, a creepypasta x reader anti-reading list.

Quick Disclaimer: No author names will be dropped nor fic links or sites they’re on. I dislike these works but I don’t want anybody to be harassed. Don’t go after people, holy shit. These works are only here because of some heavily disturbing content. One of them just makes me super mad because of a few circumstances. These are purely my opinions. I am not writing Jesus nor do I write the cleanest stories out there. Dark topics should be explored in fiction. However, some things just shouldn’t fucking be romanticized. Fanfic is practice, I’m not taking points off for wonky writing.

You’re allowed to like whatever the fuck you want. I’m not shaming you or the authors. I’m talking about media I dislike, which I am completely allowed to do. If your friend or favorite author’s work is in here, maybe don’t send this to them. I get it’s tempting but still, it could be upsetting. Again, don’t fucking harass anybody. 

This list is in order of - Pisses me off to FBI open up to whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck.

Content warning for: Rape, miscarriages, abortion, necrophilia, sexism, child grooming, multiple types of abuse, ablism, and meanie head criticism of popular fics. Seriously, this gets exceptionally bad at the final one. 

First up in our lineup a pretty popular. It’s the least upsetting and problematic. It’s a various creepypasta x reader mansion fic. This is more of an honorable mention because it’s frustrating to read over being super bad.

Recruited.

Summary: (Y/n) killed an attempted rapist and covered it up years ago. She is recruited into the cpp’s to be considered as a proxy along with two others. Follow her through a journey of no character development into becoming a proxy.

What’s wrong with it?

-Brian literally is a misogynist. He literally hates women.

-(Y/n) is an asshole. Not in an entertaining bad bitch way. No, in an unaware bland way. Points off for being a business major, girl you have no soul and it shows.

-She is treated like the voice of reason who is always morally correct. Thing is, if anyone is neurodivergent or mentally ill and ya’know shows symptoms of it, they’re cRaZy, evil, and an annoyance. 

-Yes, people creeping on or getting clingy can be shitty/annoying but sometimes the way (Y/n) acts is completely unjust. It left a bad taste in my mouth because the character felt okay to be shitty to people who weren’t like her.

-The endings are disheartening and make no fucking sense. Cody, who is clingy at worst, gets rejected Jack, who TRIES TO BREAK (Y/N)’S FUCKING LEG, gets with her. Can I get a HELLO?????? 

-(Y/n) also doesn’t get with Jeff who suddenly turned into her brother character after hundreds of pages of romantic tension. Again, Recruited is not inherently bad but it may be really disappointing to people who are here for 1-2 specific characters.

-Queer bait-y author’s notes and inconstant love interests. Author’s notes would read like “Teehee, maybe I’ll make (Y/n) have Jane and/or Natalie endings……” But that never happens after it’s teased multiple times. I get not wanting to add more to your plate but don’t suggest it if you don’t want to do it or only want to please heterosexual readers.

-They put Tim outside like a dog for being a bad boy. 

-Author’s notes and percentages fill in details for the reader that aren’t in the fic. I’m not going to read all of that. Put important information in the fic. 

-Lot’s of excessive jealousy. Painfully heteronormative. 

What about the good?

Readable. Dramatic like Big Brother. Can be an entertaining read if it’s your thing.

Conclusion

Left a bad taste in my mouth. I feel like the author literally hated half the cast and was annoyed while writing them. When you don’t enjoy writing something it shows. Also, her other work (pandemic! Reader X X-Virus) is super tone-deaf and I don’t recommend that either. Don’t recommend joining this fic’s Discord server either. Won’t get into details but in my and my friend's experience: it’s not a good environment with a lot of playing favorites. 

-

Next up on our list is a grossly popular Eyeless Jack X Reader fic.

My Imaginary Monster

Summary: Immoral monster, Eyeless Jack, sneaking into a 5-year-old girl's room. He gets attached, sticks around through her childhood. Thing is, he gets real creepy. Starts to catch feelings for a 16-year-old he’s watched grow up. He kisses a minor who reciprocates his feelings which is textbook child grooming. Nasty fucker runs away, there’s some drama from that. (Y/n) grows up, comes back to town, and Jack’s a’creepin’.

What’s wrong with it?

-Jack is a literal child groomer. 

-Do I need to say more??? Immortal adult kisses a 16 y/o. Gross.

-People in the comments are going gaga for grooming. Are you kidding me, he’s a pedophile.

-The OC’s take up more than half of the ~200 page run time. I couldn’t get attached to any of them even after the supposed significance. Which is fine but they took up so much of the fic that it got boring and annoying incredibly quickly.

What’s good about it?

I enjoyed Ben. He did the right thing and I can respect that. Trans and poluyamourus reprrensentation.

Conclusion:

No child grooming in my fucking lobby. I think the author was trying to paint it in a bad light. But the thing is, you can write a creepy stalker fic without making them a groomer. A lot of people are trying to escape their troubles through fanfic, including those who’ve dealt with sexual abuse. Don’t bring that into x reader spaces. Don’t put readers through that again. 

-

Last and absolutely least we got a Tim X Reader. 

BIG TW. FUCKING HUGE TW. MOST OF THE TW’S FROM EARLIER ARE FROM THIS ONE FIC. 

Pure Forgiveness.

Summary: (Y/n) is abused by her mom. Her dad killed himself and she’s all (Y/n)’s got in this world. Until Tim comes along and “saves” her. He takes her to the mansion and keeps her as a pet to torture. 

I’m going to get into all the nitty-gritty to satisfy your morbid curiosities so you don’t read it. 

What’s wrong with it?

-Chapter 1 opens with (Y/n)’s miserable life. Her mom hates her so much she has a fucking torture table for (Y/n).

-There’s an attempted rape in chapter 2.

- She’s taken to the mansion by Tim in chapter 3 because he’s “off his medication” and “acting nicer than normal”. Hi, mentally ill person here, that’s not how it fucking works you ding dong. 

-Mental illness is made out to we wholly evil.

-Also tic’s are made out to be scary. As a person with tics, don’t write tics as scary or super weird. Thanks.

-(Y/n) not being able to escape, fight back rapists, and other horrible shit is labeled as weak.

-At one point (Y/n) is dragged through the mansion, beer bottles and used condoms are thrown at her. Girl has to shower off cum.

-(Y/n) is tortured in various ways. Mostly beaten, berated, burned, cut, starved, etc. 

-She is drugged and repeatedly raped by Brian and Toby. These rapes are recorded and shown to (Y/n).

-Brian has black hair. Why?

-Toby and Brian give (Y/n) a forced abortion.  

-(Y/n) gets raped almost every fucking chapter.

-At one point Jack orally rapes (Y/n) to abort a baby. 

-Toby and Brian are necrophiles. They skull fuck a corpse at some point. It is graphically described how they like to have sex with dead bodies.

-Slenderman forcefully impregnates (Y/n) to “keep the (Tim’s) baby safe” whatever the fuck that means.

Why does this happen?

Because Tim wants a kid because his dad raped his mom and his mom was a prostitute. He’s soooo sad guys :(((

Feeling hungry? Here’s some things that are eaten by various characters.

-Hair 

-Cum (forced)

-Toby 

-Piss 

-A miscarried baby 

What’s good about it?

Nothing. Fucking nothing. Don’t read it.

Conclusion

If you like this fic you need therapy, I’m not joking. It’s like a car crash and Rob Zombie movie horribly mish-mashed together. It sucks. The comments praise literal abuse and berate (Y/n) for being afraid. Fuck this fic and everything it stands for. It’s shock horror and torture for the sake of it. It makes no fucking sense and it’s harmful. People think this is okay. It’s not. 

-

Thank you to my pals in the server for helping out and finishing some of these where I could not. Especially you Connie, everyone say thank you Connie she got through Pure Forgiveness. Absolute trooper legend. Again, don’t go out of your way to harass these people. I made this list so you can avoid these works because they have the potential to be upsetting. I’m not the police, I can’t force anyone to stop nor do I want to. Author’s are allowed to explore dark topics but some should be done respectfully or not at-fucking-all. I hope these people grow as writers and understand treating some things a certain way isn’t cool. You can enjoy dark fics, I do too, fuck I write them too, but Jesus God, some things are a no from me chief.

[make-me-imagine]

Hello love ♡

First of all, I want to congratulate you on your 5500 follower milestone! That's incredible♡! I love your writings, Mera, and I think that your ship celebration is a wonderful idea!

Could I please request a male matchup for Marvel, Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings/Hobbit? With the additional "What you did for your first date" and "Ways they show you they love you without words" headcanons for all three of them? I'm female, she/her.

To begin with, I'm full of contradictions, utterly boring, very insecure and highly complicated. I would say my strongest personality traits are my kindness, calmness and sympathy. It's almost impossible to scare or upset me, because I always see the good in a person and recognize where anger, frustration and despair come from. There's no cruelty in me at all. I'm open and impartial towards everything and everyone, without any judgment or prejudice. I also have a calming/grounding effect on other people and animals, which is great because I honestly love all sorts of animals (I'm also a vegetarian because I refuse to intentionally hurt any animal). I have a faszination for chaos and rebellion, but am quite submessive/timid and a clean-/control freak myself. I'm always well-meaning and there to help others. I despise people who enjoy the suffering of others, just because they have the 'power' to. I'm very open-minded and I think that every opinion matters and that whatever someone has to say is important, at least to them and therefore for me. I will never ignore someone's sorrows and suffering and I try my hardest to help and comfort as best I can. But, even though I see the good in everything, I'm very insecure myself and have little love and understanding for myself. I have a very bad self-esteem and not a particularly positive self-perception, which mostly defines my actions. It makes me believe that I'm a burden to others and that I annoy them. I feel like I'm not "worthy" of love/there's nothing lovable about me, that there are too many problems in contrast to the little good things. Nevertheless, I would never change myself for anything or anyone, I'm who I'm. For me, dealing and interacting with people is really difficult, because I'm so clumsy and nervous around them and easily feel like I'm making a fool out of myself. Another reason is that I fear to be rejected and thrown aside when someone sees how boring, problematic and annoying I actually am. You would be surprised how timid and reserved I'm; I'm sure you wouldn't notice me in a room full of people if it wouldn't be for my different appearance (I'm always wearing only black, have dyed my hair a little and two ear piercings). I almost never like the "typical" heroes and righteous characters. And somehow I have such a undergoing disdain for any figure in the police and law department. Because I'm easily sad and not a funny/joking person, I like and enjoy people who aren't too serious themselves. And I'm the most loyal person you'll ever find, once you earn my trust, I'll always be on and by your side, no matter what. I've always felt like I don't belong anywhere, like I'm the only cat in a room full of dogs. That's probably why I have a soft spot for the weirdos, outcasts, loners and "crazy" ones. Though, in my opinion, the definition of normal, crazy and real are very subjective. My whole life I've felt kinda judged, misunderstood and unwanted. People often falsely think that my unassuming nature is naivity and take my social-insecurity for aloofness and coldness. I'm also quite opinionated and aware of what I want, how I feel and who I am. I'm often questioning my surroundings, the traditions and rules and I have no problem challenging others, even authority. I'm a perfectionist, which often leads me to overthinking and that can be equally good and bad. I'm absolutely clueless in romance and totally oblivious to flirting because I'm 100% inexperienced in this stuff, but I'm a bit of a hopeless romantic.

-Luna 1/2

Hey Luna, I hope you like what I came up with. You provided a bit more information than was necessary lmao, I forgot the word limit for asks was extended. BUT, it was enough to give me a good feel for who to ship you with, so I hope you like them!

All ships are under the cut: 

Marvel: 

I ship you with Clint.

Clint was my immediate thought when reading your information. He is very loyal and kind-hearted and I think would be most drawn to those who are kind, loyal, and have strong morals. He would try his best to show you how great you are through your insecurities, he loves you for who you are and sees no flaws in you. He would be very good at showing his care and love for everything you are. He does not need words to know how you feel as he is very good at seeing through you and knowing what you feel without them.

What you did for your first date: 

You would have a fun yet casual day out date.

First you would go on a walk through a nearby park, talking and joking about everything and nothing. 

Then you would go to a musical instrument museum.

He loves music too, so this would be great for both of you.

You got to see the evolution of music and instruments and listened to various kinds of music.

You spent hours in the museum together.

To finish the date of you went to a restaurant, you chose the place to go too since he knew you were vegetarian and he wanted you to share your favorite place and meals with him. 

Ways they show you they love you without words: 

He loves physical touch as well, so he would often express himself through various physical actions. 

Placing a kiss to the back of your hand, or head. 

Hugging you close to him randomly. 

Wrapping you up in his arms on the couch when watching movies as he randomly kisses the side of your head or face. 

Best Friend: 

I think your best friend would be Steve. He is a very kind and compassionate person and would be very brotherly to you. he would never force you out of your comfort zone and would often check in on you. He can sometimes be a bit serious, but it never pushy towards you. He is very caring and helps you to accept yourself and things around you. 

-

Harry Potter: 

I ship you with Harry. 

Harry is a very encouraging and accepting person and I think he would see the best in you and would never stop showing and proving to you that you are worthy of love and compassion. He would find you to be beautiful and never sees the flaws that you try to convince yourself that you have. I think he would be one of the best people to show you that you matter and are beautiful. 

What you did for your first date:

You first met at Hogwarts, and since there was not much choice in dates he chose something simple that he knew you would enjoy. 

You left during dinner and took an evening stroll around the grounds.

You stayed out past curfew and sat on a nearby hill watching the stars together.

When you began to get sleepy you snuck back in and he walked you back to your room.  

Ways they show you they love you without words:

He brings you your favorite snacks and drinks randomly. 

Randomly drapes his cloak or jacket over your shoulders when you are cold. 

Will take your hand in his and rubs his fingers softly over your skin. 

Hugs you from behind randomly. 

Will play your favorite music throughout the house when he knows that you are stressed or sad. 

Best Friend:

Hermione. She is very good at making you feel better about the world and yourself. She is always open to going on long walks and listening to you rant about anything or just to talk when needed. She is good at giving advice and never lets you feel inferior to anyone. 

-

Lotr: 

I ship you with Aragorn. 

Out of everyone, I think Aragorn would be the best suited for you. He is kind, and patient and sees the best in everyone. He would see the best in you and is very good at showing it to you too. He will always make you feel wanted and needed. He does not let anyone take you for granted and will always stand up for you. He loves that you love music and will sing for you when you are stressed or having trouble falling asleep. 

What you did for your first date:

Aragorn being Aragorn, woud take you on a horse ride to a beautiful forest.

You would go exploring and walking through the meadows.

He would share his knowledge of various plants with you and pick you flowers along the way, making you a small bouquet. 

Once it got late, you two sat on the top of a hill and watched the sunset, waiting for the stars to come out before making your way back. 

Ways they show you they love you without words:

Surprising you with flowers randomly. 

Holding your hand as you walk through town on a quiet evening. 

Bringing you various plants and taking care of them for you.

Planting you a garden with all of your favorite plants and flowers. 

Hand-making you a special pendant to wear or hang somewhere in your home. 

Best Friend:

Out of everyone, I think you would form a bond with Eowyn. She is caring and quiet, and is very easy to get along with She is very good at making people aware of their worth and of feeling wanted. She would never make you angry or disappoint you. I think you two would become so close that you consider each other family. 

xx

[emperorren]

abt the "kylo will be the next soft villain to be held against problematic villains": something ive noticed about loki is that he never did shit to redeem for commiting genocide and invasion on a planet, he just kinda got bored of it like one would grow out of a hobby and decided to be the annoying lilbro who just kinda hangs out w/ the heroes and because he is an amusing character now it is enough for tumblr folks to like him now. (...)

this proves antis where never about accountability or the real life implications of a fictional character's bad actions as they claim to be, they just use self-righteous moral reasons to justify hating any character they think is annoying.

he never did shit to redeem for committing genocide and invasion on a planet

no and he didn’t need to. What people don’t get is that in this kind of stories what really matters is the dynamics between the main characters, their love, their friendships, their tragedies, their compassion. Everything else is just window dressing. These movies aren’t huge political statements, for fuck’s sake, they’re fairytales. If they aim to teach anything, it’s to show kids how to be human on a small, domestic scale level---how to be friends and siblings and boyfriends and girlfriends and sons and daughters. In the end, Loki repaired his relationship with his brother and redeemed himself in his eyes, and it’s all that matters. No grand gestures of “universal” atonement were needed for the general fandom---including the former naysayers---to sympathize with him.

[concerningwolves]

Art’s Rules for Character Building

Obviously when writing, there is a need for characters, and a subsequent need to know your characters. My writing has been incredibly character-driven in the past, and they’ve always been the source of most of my positive feedback. It’s time to branch out and work on other areas of my writing, but I figured that I would share with you the best selection of the nifty tips and tricks I’ve learned along the way. Here ar four:

Seasoning with details: it’s just like socializing with your co-workers!

 Detail, detail, detail. I knew the things you needed to know, like how they would react in certain situations, their favourite foods, their morals and beliefs. But I also knew how they liked their tea, or their coffee; I knew how they sat, how they rested, slept, reclined; cat or dog person, or maybe a reptile; could they cook, did they love rubbish food, or all of the above? Half of the trivia I knew about them was irrelevant to the plot- probably more than half- but it gave me a clear sense of who I was going to be working with for three books.

 After all, why do you need to know your co-workers? You’ve got to work with them. Your characters are your co-workers: the people who will be helping you (and sometimes hindering you) in getting stuff done. Without them, conflict is hard to build and conflict goes towards plot; nature needs someone to go against, those corrupt agents need some poor sod to catch, person A needs a good reason why person B is the love of their life.

 If you know them well, the work will be smoother. Yeah, maybe you won’t need all of the information, but you never know. That isn’t to say spend all your time finding out what Hogwarts house they are in or figuring out their Starbucks order, but do understand them in the same way you would understand a friend, or even a close peer. You can use these facts and odd knowledges as the salt and pepper of your project- sparingly for flavour, that is. Too much of either can be overwhelming. Not enough (as I often find) is still tasty, but something is definitely missing.

If the devil is in the details, why is the devil there?

Little details are the key to characters. I’ve said that, but, the details need to have purpose.

Let’s take the classic trope of the bady guy cleaning his nails with a knife. Cool, huh? Eh. It gets boring. You have to wonder why he does that, surely it’s dangerous, it achieves nothing but showing how cool and intimidating he is. The character who will use anything to clean his nails because he is annoyed by all the dirt, and so takes a hairclip from a friend, on the other hand- that is interesting. That’s a little quirk. We can assume then that this character has vain traits, or that he likes to take pride in his appearance, or worries about how others will judge him. Take that detail, ask yourself why it is there, and incorporate it into the narrative flow so that your readers get the information about the character that they need, and keep being interested. Example:

Aaron flexed his fingers and pushed onto the balls of his feet, a tremor in his fingers building and building and, God, he had to stop clutching the napkin. His knuckles were white. That woman. Was she looking at him? He checked his hands, splayed them on the tabletop, made them flat. Neat, almost. His nails were filthy.

“Can I borrow that?” He pointed at the bobby pin in Samantha’s hair. She raised an eyebrow, but passed it to him anyway, holding the loose curl of hair just out of her face. They both smiled at the waiter as he passed, plastic smiles, Sam’s hand cupping her face in an over-casual way.

“Don’t bend it.” She said as he cleaned under his nails. “Not for nothing, anyway. They don’t care.”

“I care.” He had to fight to keep his voice small inside his throat. 

We don’t know why he’s there, but we can guess it’s to meet someone. This is important to him, suddenly. It conveys anxiety. Is he anxious, does he need to be? Or is this vanity? Questions, questions... you need to get your readers asking them.

So, details pinned-

know where they came from, and where they’re going

This is a funny one, because generally a character doesn’t have their entire life crammed into a story. You get a nice chunk of events within their life, and the events are, assuming that character survives the plot, resolved within that chunk. They could wind up an architecht in London, drinking a dram of whisky every night before bed, twenty years after the curse is broken and the evil bloke dead- but your readers don’t know that. They might wonder about it, but they don’t need to have the answer.

That’s the readers though. You do. You absolutely, absolutely do. What are your character’s dreams? Do they achieve their dreams? Do their dreams change- when, why, how, who for? Do they regret it? You need to know how they grow in order to understand who they are when you put them through your book. Children? Career? Or are they unemployed, do they fall through the cracks? Does the storyline you put them through leave them traumatized (and I mean that in the literal sense, not a hyperbole. Never hyperbole.) and they are too proud, or too far gone, to find help? Or maybe they don’t have anyone to help. Why? Do they push people away?- oh, that’s good. They do? Great! You can use that!

You also need to know if they are resolute, or changeable. Does something happen to them in their story that changes their minds? Or, in the simplest form of this rule: knowing that your character is going to end up alright is a way of putting them through hell.

As for where they come from, that’s backstory. We all like a nice bit of backstory. Just, for the love of Lady Word, don’t give everyone a miserable childhood, two dead parents and a curse. As problematic as she can be, JK Rowling did this very well in the Harry Potter books. Ron has a great, ramshackle, sprawling family; Hermione has her muggle parents; Harry’s are dead; Luna has her dad; so on and on. It’s backstory, not sobstory.

Backstory doesn’t always define where a character is going- trauma is not a road map to be followed; a picket-fence family doesn’t secure a nice life- but sometimes it does, and you need to know the events that shaped their lives, personalities and dreams. Nature/nurture is something that springs to mind. Knowing the beginning and the end is how you give the character depth and dimension within their little stretch of stage time.

So, finally

variety is the spice of life, and there is such a thing as too spicy (at least in writing)

This last is a culmination of all of the above. Not everyone has to be wild, funny, quirky, neon, bursts of life on a dull day. Some characters can be mundane; actually, you need them to be. Partly to bring out the brighter characters through contrast, but also to stop your readers becoming de-sensitized to the overwhelming nature of too many vibrant people. In a population, everyone is different. People are quiet, people are loud, people like Queen and others like the latest pop. Some people don’t want to be the change they would like to see in the world. Some people just like pizza, netflix, and really hate change. I think TV soap operas do this very well, by presenting us with a cast of real characters that are true to real life, but still relatable, still easy to emotionally invest in. Not that your book should be a bad soap opera, but, siphon off the lessons you need from them and run with what it gives you. Have some characters to soothe the pallet, to make the story easy to swallow and, most of all, have their personalities work together. They don’t have to be friends- but if they hate eachother, why? What kind of personality or ethics or morals clash has caused it? You choose, but please, don’t make all of your characters the carbon copy of one another, based off of something just a touch mary-sue. This is why details are so important, because that is what sets them all apart. Happy writing!

[teenguyen92]

Why Friends With Benefits Are the Best Relationships

Just a nice article to read. It seems true to me though.

In a few days, I’m going to Cuba on vacation with a guy I’ve been sleeping with for eight years, but whom I've never once called my boyfriend. We live on different continents, but inevitably, a few times a year, we find each other somewhere in the world, have a few days of romance, and then go our separate ways. This arrangement would generally be called a friend with benefits, or a fuck buddy, or a romantic friendship, or perhaps even a relationship—with “no strings attached.” But let’s be real: There are always strings, aren’t there?

It was while planning this vacation that it hit me: The two longest relationships of my life have both been with men who I was never officially dating. Boyfriends and girlfriends have come and gone, but my friends with benefits have stood the test of time. I mean, eight years. That’s longer than I predict my first marriage will last. And while I can’t imagine being with my Cuba date “for real”—I mean, he’s a low-key homeless anarchist who once took me on date to his Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous meeting; there are red flags—I still value our relationship immensely. And he actually knows me better than a lot of my partners ever did. So what is it about the friends with benefits dynamic that is more sustainable, and often more transparent, than an actual relationship?

People are skeptical of fuck buddies. They’re like: How can you have sex with the same person, again and again, without falling in love? Or at least, without getting super-jealous and Fatal Attraction–esque? Some assume that one of the “buddies” is always being strung along, secretly hoping that the fucking leads to something more serious. Others dismiss fuck-buddy dynamics as just being compulsive sex that’s devoid of emotion. But why do things have to be so black and white? Surely it’s possible to find a middle ground between eternal love and zombie-fucking a stranger: a place where you can care about someone, have good sex, and yet not want to literally implode at the thought of them sleeping with someone else. Right?Case in point: The most significant romantic friendship of my life was with an ex-editor of mine, whom I’ll call Malcolm. We started “a thing” five years ago and have yet to end it. When I met him, he was 45 and charmingly grumpy, and he would always tell me: “Sex is so perfect. Why destroy it with a relationship?” I’d go over to his apartment for a couple hours in the afternoons, we’d have sex (soberly, which meant I could actually cum), and then afterward we’d drink tea and complain about stuff. It was the best.

There were times when we saw each other frequently, and other times when things dropped off for a while, usually because one of us had a partner. And sure, when he would get a girlfriend I would be a little bummed out—I’m (unfortunately) not a sociopath—but it didn’t cause me to spiral into an emotional cyclone the way I would have if I’d been cheated on by a boyfriend. After all, disappointment comes from expectation.Over time, Malcolm and I became really close. It felt like we had entered this secretive bubble of transparency—we were emotionally intimate, yet free of the burden of jealousy and ownership. We could spill our guts to each other because we didn’t have anything to lose. I told Malcolm about my previous relationships, my fantasies, my heartbreak. Once, he told me this long, complicated story about an affair he had with his cousin, adding, “That’s not something I tell most people.” Probably wise on his part, but I loved that story, as problematic as it may be, because I loved knowing something about him that no one else did. Sometimes it feels like we are more honest with our friends with benefits than we are with our partners.This paradox always makes me think of that Mad Men episode when Betty seduced Don at their kid’s summer camp, well after they had both remarried. Afterward, when they’re lying in bed together, Betty says of Don’s new wife, “That poor girl. She doesn’t know that loving you is the worst way to get to you.” Harsh. But sometimes, romantic friendships can offer a type of intimacy that committed relationships can’t.I was curious to know if Malcolm felt the same way I did about all of this, so last week (for strictly journalistic purposes), I paid him a visit. “Having a friend with benefits is great because it’s just—it’s just less annoying,” he said, smoking a cigar and dressed in an inexplicable beige silk onesie. “It’s more of a low-intensity intimacy. It’s not encumbered by obligations, which just lead to resentment.”He then gave me that look—the one that means he’s about to admit to something despicable and blame it on humanity. “We are all selfish—we all live in this Ayn Rand–ish self-centered world, whether we like it or not,” he said. “When you’re in a friends with benefits situation, you don’t have go to the other person’s awful friend’s birthday party. But if you behave like that within a conventional relationship, it causes problems.

“With [FWB] there’s no illusion about the carnal aspect,” he went on, “so you can be really literal about it: You are two people who like and respect each other—and you like to fuck. There’s beauty and freedom in that honestly. And you can be playful. You can have your sex-power persona, or you can play the super-misogynist pig, or the bimbo, and it’s okay, because you’re not being judged. But if you change that dynamic into being a real relationship, then those games might not seem so sexy anymore.”In other words, your fuck buddy gets all the good stuff about being in a relationship—the wild sex, the cuddles, the juicy dark secrets—minus all of the boring, would-rather-die activities that go hand in hand with commitment, like having to help assemble your boyfriend’s IKEA bed, or having to watch your girlfriend stab at the ingrown hairs on her bikini line while she watches the Kardashians. (That’s me—I’m the girlfriend who does that.)Essentially, you’re taking a relationship and removing the creepy ownership of another human being, which leaves more room for hedonism and sexual exploration. Like, who do you want to bring to the sex party—your boyfriend or your fuck buddy? It’s a no-brainer. I’ve done so many things with fuck buddies that I never would have tried with partners, because I was too much of a jealous monster. (Like once I let Malcolm tie me to a dresser while I watched him have sex with my best friend. Unsurprisingly, it was literally awful, but now at least I can say I’ve done it?)One of the most masterful fuck friends I know is my friend Casey, a 26-year-old Ph.D. candidate in English, who until recently had a FWB for 12 years. It started when she was 13, with a boy whose family spent every summer in the same beach town as she did. (Cute alert.)Over martinis at Cafe Mogador, Casey told me, “When I’m dating someone, my immediate impulse is to be like, ‘Let’s lock shit down! My anxiety will decrease if I know you want to marry me in six years from now!’ Which is crazy and not hot or sustainable. But my longer romantic friendships have been a safe space. They’ve helped me figure out how to relate to someone romantically without the immediate trigger of, Where is this going?” In other words, having a fuck buddy is a great exercise in non-possessiveness.

“The thought of my boyfriend fucking someone else makes me want to wear his skin like a goddamned wetsuit,” she said, eyes bulging. “But with my fuck buddies it’s been like, ‘Oh, my God, tell me more.’ There’s almost a level of titillation to sex stories when it’s somebody who’s not your boyfriend. But why is that? I wish I knew, so I could bottle it and never be possessive ever again.”For all the benefits of fuck friendery, it’s still possible for this dynamic to screw with your emotions. “At different points in our relationship,” Casey recalled, “it was hard to respect the line between friendship and flirting when he started dating someone, because I’d known him more intimately than his new partner. It’s like my morals were thrown out the window, and I felt this gross egotistical sense that I should come first, because I’ve been around longer, like, ‘Girlfriends come and go, but I’m forever.’” Sometimes it’s hard to accept that these dynamics usually have an expiration date, which tends to be when one person gets into a committed relationship. And, unfortunately, not only do you lose the benefits, but you sometimes lose the friend, too.We are taught that all relationships that don’t end up in marriage are failures (because, ya know, hetero-normativity and patriarchal narratives or whatever). But subscribing to that belief ignores the fact that romantic friendships can be extremely fulfilling, enlightening, and straight-up fun. Of course, I’m not dismissing the benefits of committed, long-term, loving relationships. But both dynamics are valuable in their own right. And perhaps the reason romantic friendships are often so sustainable is they lack the soul-baring vulnerability and intense emotional investment.Maybe the coolest thing about the fuck-buddy economy is that it allows women to actually enjoy sex in a casual way, without having to enter an old-fashioned ownership contract. It celebrates female sexual autonomy. It’s a chance to explore ourselves and other people. And in the interim, we can discover who we are and what we like, instead of committing to a pseudo-marriage we aren’t ready for.

[cassandraclare]

on the rights of women to own their own work. crummy crabapple speaks!

Yes, this stuff is still going on. I was hoping it would have ended after this, but it hasn’t, and being called a bitch whore murderer gets wearing fast when it’s based on nothing.

Look, frank talk about this stuff on Tumblr is often discouraged — when you have a small but pretty active group of “haters,” as happens nowadays to most successful creators, especially women, the general rule of thumb is not to talk to or about them. Blocking them on twitter excites them: it’s attention. Replying is pointless, explaining is deliberately misinterpreted, the truth is a lie, lies are truth, up is down, winning is losing. You can’t win in this situation, anyway: nobody can or does, everyone loses. The creators, the fandom, those caught in the middle (actors, etc.) Everyone.

This business about me killing Alec isn’t a rumor. It’s a lie. A purposeful lie told to make a point: that I am a bad person unworthy of my creations and that if I am a bad enough person, it’s okay to say they don’t belong to me, that I didn’t create them, that there is essentially no value in the act of creation, especially when it is done by a woman.

As we all know but mostly don’t talk about because If You Speak It They Will Come, there is a small group of anti-TMI-book fans who believe the books and the show are at war.  (They are not the show’s fans. They are something else entirely. I talk to perfectly nice show fans all the time: these are less people who love Shadowhunters than people dedicated to the idea that if they scream about it long enough, the show will cease being based on this particular book series: an ultimately doomed goal that nevertheless leaves them plenty of opportunities to annoy the rest of us.) Instead of being able to accept that art is partly subjective, they are in a constant battle for an imaginary moral high ground in which they are the keepers of a version of the Mortal Instruments that has been objectively purified of all problematic elements. 

The problem there being, of course, that there is no such thing as perfect, unproblematic media. Art comes from humans and humans are flawed. If you expect perfection you will be bitterly disappointed every single time: I’ve watched it happen over and over, as the this showrunner is a gift tag turns into the This showrunner is not a gift tag,  and many of those who last year spoke glowingly of wrapping Ed Decter, their unproblematic hero (who once said to me in wonder, “You really worked a miracle with Malec, you know, people care about them as if they were a normal couple”), in cotton wool and fuzzy socks, now refer to Todd Slavkin as “Toad.”* Plenty of articles about the problematic elements of Shadowhunters have now been written and plenty of posts posted. (If Ed hadn’t been fired, he might have stuck around long enough to get called Ediot; these things are, after all, just a matter of time. (i get called “Casserole”, seriously, I am not kidding you, you cannot make this shit up.) ) 

To clarify: I am definitely NOT saying that a (potentially problematic) work should remain uncriticized to spare the feelings of the creators because they are flawed humans like everyone else. Criticism is valid; criticism is useful; criticism is important. What I am talking about in this post is not criticism. Telling a creator that her creations should be taken away from her because she “doesn’t deserve them”: not criticism. Making up funny names and mean hashtags for creators you don’t like: obviously hilarious for some, but definitely not criticism. And to some extent everyone knows this – so if it’s important to you that a creator be denied the right to claim ownership of, and pride in, her own work, it has to be because she is not just problematic but corrupt, evil, and cruel. She has to be morally bankrupt such that removing her from the narrative of her own creation is a moral good.

And so the lie that I’m planning to kill Alec (framed within the true narrative that killing off LGBT+ characters is a serious fucking problem in media) is a natural development: because wouldn’t that be awful and mean the books were morally very bad and wrong and shouldn’t creators who create bad wrong things have their creations taken away from them? Which would be just another Misogyny Tuesday on the internet except for the fact that it’s exploiting the fears of a vulnerable group of people (LGBT+ fans for whom Alec means a lot, in whatever format -- fans who have seen over and over LGBT characters die for nothing, for shitty reasons, for straight people, on TV and in movies and in comics and in books and are therefore in a place to be incredibly hurt by it happening again), to score a point in what is basically a ship war. And that is really shitty.

And yes, it’s a ship war.

There was really a “salty casserole” joke in there begging to be made. Missed opportunity!

So, why am I salty, you might ask? There is this belief that I must be Upset With The Show because people care about Malec on it more than Clace: my friends, the field where I grow my fucks is barren on this topic. I made up both couples. I don’t care which one you ship more, especially in a format where their story is not being told by me and for all I know, the showrunners don’t even want you shipping Clace at the moment. They seem into Climon and oh God, I have bored myself with this tangent.

I invented Clace and Malec. I’m writing a trilogy about Malec because I love Malec and have a story in my head about them, despite being offered three times the money to write one about Clace, as they’re “more marketable.” I do not have a favorite. Maybe writing works that way for some people but I doubt it. I’ve always said I don’t ship in my own books, and that is precisely what I meant. 

Moving on: Are there things that have upset me about the show and the way it was developed? Yes — being told my mostly-female audience wasn’t a desirable one because they’re female; the fact that the female artist of color who created the runes has never been paid or credited for their use; being told Isabelle was “tits and ass”, being told Alec being gay was “a strike against his likeability”, contractual shit you will never know about because that stuff isn’t public — but for some reason I’m supposed to give a flying fuck about who ships what canon couple on the show? For viewers, as it should be, this is a TV show: for me this is part of my brand and has real-world consequences for my life. Unsurprisingly I care about those, not some imaginary ship war.

I was thrilled Shadowhunters won a GLAAD award for Magnus and Alec.  (I was thrilled when the movie of Mortal Instruments got a GLAAD award nomination for Magnus and Alec though there was so little of them in the movie, it served to really underline the paucity of LGBT+ storylines in major film and tv.) I congratulated Matt and Harry on twitter; the comments below mine are something of a primer in why female creators are fleeing the internet in greater and greater numbers.

https://twitter.com/cassieclare/status/848497330999369729

The message is overwhelmingly: “Shut up, bitch, how dare you open your mouth and remind us that this show exists because your books do, even though you didn’t actually say that but you see, we like to pretend you’re dead and it’s inconvenient when you speak.” I’d imagine every one of those commenters would tell you they were a feminist, too. The idea that nothing is gained by shutting up women or denying that their intellectual property has worth or value is apparently one that seems good in the abstract, but falls at the first hurdle of but I don’t like her.

The abstract often does fail when it comes into conflict with the concrete. Being a feminist ally means being an ally even to women you don’t like, because being an ally only to people you like requires no effort and less thought. That doesn’t mean never criticizing women or their work. But it does require interrogating what’s going on in your own head. One of the most unpleasant haters I see on twitter, who viciously loathes me though we have never met, has read all my books; she has Malec in her username, and a quote from the books in her bio. She has Cassandra Jean’s art on her twitter page, and Valerie Freire’s rune designs in her text and background. That’s a lot of mental and artistic real estate devoted to the work of three women she refers to as 
“garbage trash.” (Though I think Cassandra Jean and Val are mostly garbage trash because they associate with me and should instead have waited ten years for the TV show to come along so they could draw pictures of it or something. I don’t really understand it: the cognitive dissonance that allows to you dedicate your life to “Malec” while crapping on the person who created both characters and their relationship is so enormous that I can only follow it so far and no farther. I understand thinking that the show version is better, but not whatever warped fantasy tells you that if the books had never been written the show (now called “Evilchasers” perhaps) would have heroically found a way to invent the  story of a gay demon-fighting warrior and his biracial warlock boyfriend anyway because that very specific story was floating around the ethereal planes waiting to be discovered by the psychic powers of Disney and it is only by great misfortune that I got to it first.) Point being: if your username is “Bubbles loves Malec” yet your twitter is dedicated to spewing venom at the person without whom the thing you love would not exist, it might be time to ask yourself some questions about cause and effect, and also, what that hate of yours is doing for you, psychologically speaking.

Look, I am going to get a lot of shit for this post, but whatever — the upside of being constantly screamed at for things you have not done (slut-shamed Isabelle, planned to murder Alec, thus contributing to the fucking awful homophobic trope of killing off gay characters, "stabbed the actors in the back”, promoted incest, poisoned the earth’s water supply) is that you no longer bother worrying about being screamed at for things you did do. I won’t do set visits or conventions since coming back from NY Comicon to stuff like this:  

I’m not going to comment on the specifics, save to say they represent a massive and almost hilarious (though probably deliberate) misinterpretation of literally everything that happened on that panel. (If the network didn’t want book fans there, asking me questions, they wouldn’t have brought me there. I was there to do promotion for the show by talking about the show and the books — I am the author, and what the literal fuck else do you think they brought me there to talk about? The history of Belgian cabinet-making? They don’t think attention paid to the books takes away from the show: only a small group of asshats think that, and it’s weird that the OP never paused to think that if they didn’t want me there talking about the books, they could simply NOT HAVE INVITED ME. Also did it seriously never occur to them that panelists are asked to speak at certain junctures or in reference to certain questions, or gestured at to do so, we don’t just randomly interject? Lord.

I will admit it was extreme of Harry not to leave me lying there on the floor or maybe drop a chair on my head while no one was looking. He should reconsider his choices.)

But that’s the thing: posts like this one are the reason I haven’t gone back to set, or gone to another convention, or promoted the show. Would you go to a convention if you knew people like this were going to be feet away from you in the audience? I’m a grown-up, I can take being called Crummy Crabapple (did the whole kindergarten class vote on that one or was it a decision by fiat…?) but the sheer hate that underpins the silliness of the post makes the idea of being near people who think like that fairly shuddery. 

I gathered a few such posts together to show to FF, and the network’s never blamed me for not wanting to go out and physically promote again. The sad part of all this is that mostly I pretend the show doesn’t exist because the downside of mentioning it is being screamed at for days by asshats (Let me be very specific what I mean by “asshats” = people who send threats, who use insulting gendered language, make anti-Semitic slurs, and repeatedly tell me I should not be allowed to own my own work — if this is not stuff you do, I’m not talking about you. Criticism of the books is fine and irrelevant.) 

We all know these asshats exist — and we are all sad about it: me, the network, the actors, the showrunners, because the net result of them existing is that I don’t talk about or promote the show, and that’s a loss for a show that could really use that outreach. Losing me, my online audience, my worldwide publishers, as potential promotional partners is bad, not good, for a show that these people theoretically love. Losing the book fans the show depended on as viewers, but who can’t stand the toxic atmosphere, is bad, not good, for the actors and writers they claim to support. Screaming “INCEST FREAK!” at every twelve year old who comes online and timidly asks when they will see Chairman Meow is not going to raise the show’s ratings. If someone is more interested in driving away the show’s potential audience because they regard them as moral degenerates than they are in getting it renewed, that’s their bliss to follow, but the reason I’m mentioning these people at all is 1) I’m disturbed by the narrative women shouldn’t be allowed to own their own work and 2) many many posts have now been made about what an awful place the Shadowhunters/TMI fandom is, and that sucks for everyone. Sadly, it doesn’t take that many people to ruin an online space.

The idea that the books and the show are at war for kibbles is a fannish one (most people, including my publisher, regard TV shows based on books as advertising for those books because from a book perspective that’s what they are) seems to come out of the fact that fans argue about which they like better, something that has happened since the dawn of adaptations. I remember it from when I was in the Harry Potter fandom: Alan Rickman understood Snape better than JKR, the movies gave Draco more depth, etc and so on. Looking back now I can see the irony of people with usernames like Lupinfan talking about how Lupin was sidelined in the books but not the movies, but distance gives infinite perspective, I suppose. If you like Malec better on the show: awesome. They still exist on the show because they were invented in the books. That statement will be interpreted as the height of arrogance, but it’s just flat fact. They matter in both formats to a lot of people. There will never be a hand of God that reaches down from the sky and declares either one better. It will always be a matter of taste and opinion. The fact that art is subjective is something we all have to live with.

This is what I mean about the “killing Alec” lie: it has become part of the justification for my unworthiness to claim to have anything to do with my own characters. Killing Alec would be a bad thing to do to Alec (and Magnus); thus I would be terribly maltreating Alec (and Magnus); thus I don’t deserve to have anything to do with Alec (or Magnus). Thus it is okay to tell me to get the fuck out – how dare I even open my bitch mouth to congratulate the actors playing my characters if I would do something so terrible to them, after all? And who cares if it’s a lie and no one can source it? (Come on now, be real — no one tried.)

Whether I deserve Alec and Magnus is somewhat beside the point: I invented them regardless, and there was a large and profoundly intense Malec fandom before the show ever aired, whose existence is in fact directly responsible for the fact that Malec are a thing on the show at all. (Initially, neither of them appeared or were even referred to in the pilot.) Reality doesn’t really intrude into the fantasy that Magnus and Alec and Isabelle and Jace descended, pre-created, from a sky cloud, though: the fan/creator ownership dichotomy has existed since before Arthur Conan Doyle was bullied into bringing Sherlock back from the dead. Fans and creators don’t always agree and creators aren’t always right. What they are, however, always, is creators.

(In case I had forgotten that I am not, in fact, a hot dude actor. ASTONISHING INFORMATION.) It is mysterious to interpret congratulating actors as taking “credit for Matt and Harry’s hard work”;  I neither need or want that anyway because I am not an actor; I am already credited on the show as the author of the source material, which is what I am. (I’ve won plenty of book awards but would be very puzzled to win, say, a Nobel prize for chemistry.) I congratulated the actors knowing I’d get a raft of shit for either doing so or not doing so: I chose to do so despite the inevitable annoyance factor because I like Matt and Harry; I wanted them hired; I like how much they love the characters, and I’ve always found them to be kind people who would loathe and despise the kind of tweets these folks are sending on their behalf.

Ironic, that.

But yeah, I also sent it because I’m proud of Malec. Deal with that. Women need to be allowed to be proud of their work sometimes without that being considered a deep evil. I don’t think the Magnus and Alec I created are perfect (by which I mean my writing of them, not their endearing flaws ;) but they represent years of work and love, and like any author would be, I’m thrilled to see the screen version of them acknowledged twice as something special. That’s very normal: for the GLAAD win, I got flowers from my publisher, congrats from the network and from my agents at CAA, because why wouldn’t you congratulate an author on something good happening to an adaptation of their books? The idea that when discussing an adaptation of their work, an author should reel back in terror screaming “I AM UNWORTHY TO BE MENTIONED IN THE SAME SENTENCES AS THE CHARACTERS I CREATED!” is so bizarre to most people that if you tried to explain to them that some women, not all women hahaha of course, but SOME WOMEN JUST DONT DESERVE TO BE ALLOWED TO TALK OR CLAIM THEY CAN “OWN” THINGS AMIRITE, they would back quietly away muttering that they had an important appointment to get their hedgehog dyed blue because they would literally think you were probably a serial killer.

This situation is not unique to these books, to me, or to this show: however, there is a special angle to this particular situation. Many commenters on all this have noted that the books are a female creation, the show a male one. Ed, Todd, Michael, Matt, McG, and Darren are all men, and in many ways, people find it much more comfortable, much easier, and much simpler to give uncritical admiration to men. They’re men, and therefore they have authority I don’t, and my continued existence as the author of the source material of Shadowhunters is seen as even more horrible because it makes it a girl thing, and “girl things” are less serious and less worthy. One of the things I often see the haters say is that the show is “older”; in fact the audience of the show is statistically younger than the book’s audience (I’ve seen the numbers) but I think it’s hard not to want to dismiss something so imbued with lady germs as being inherently inferior (and what’s more inferior than young women? It’s trendy to bash YA, which is seen as the province the young and the female – surely preferring men’s work makes you, you know, a more serious person? And surely if I had the sense God gave a weasel, I’d stop writing, give the book rights to some guy, and retire in shame? GO FORTH HARLOT AND WRITE YA NO MORE.)

Feminism does not mean you cannot criticize works by women. I’ve said that before, but I’m saying it again because it’s so easy to dismiss essays like this by saying “She’s hiding behind feminism and claiming we can’t criticize her because she’s a woman!” Nope. (Though it does mean you look for patterns. It’s kind of interesting there’s this small group of people who believe these characters/storylines really came alive when control of them was handed over to a series of ever-changing white middle-aged men. I mean, coincidence perhaps, but…?) I haven’t addressed criticism here really because it’s not the point: there is a huge gap between writing a bad review of a woman’s book and crusading for the idea that she shouldn’t be allowed to own her own intellectual property. Men taking away, literally taking away the money made from and authorship of women’s work is an ugly part of history (“Colette and [her husband] separated in 1906, although it was not until 1910 that the divorce became final. She had no access to the sizable earnings of the Claudine books [she had written]—the copyright belonged to him”) and it’s disturbing to see a group of primarily women argue that it should be repeated.

If the idea that a woman created Magnus and Alec, or any characters or world, is so horribly, terribly bothersome that you have to make up lies that, in your mind, render her unworthy of her own creation so that it’s all right to “take it from her” by discounting her role as a writer, her ownership of her own intellectual property, her right to exist as a person and to stand on the same stage at a convention as the “gem-like saint” male actors playing her characters —  maybe think about why?* What does screaming that I’d better not think Alec and Magnus have anything to do with me get you, really? Except the knowledge that if, one day, you write or create or draw something people love, you’ve helped create an environment in which it’s a veritable certainty you’ll get treated like you’re a piece of shit for doing it?

*And “bitch” is “bitch”, friends. It doesn’t matter what letters you take out, it’s still misogynist and still shitty. You know what you’re saying, and so does everyone else. Try asshat, really. I recommend it.

[arctic-urpo]

Cyrus and Ceri pls??

Absolutely, thank you for asking nonnie!!!!!

For Cyrus:

Full Name: ★CYRUS POFFINGTON★ - THE STAR PRINCE (His real name is a secret (bc his background is a secret to the other players) so this is the name he goes by and everyone knows him)

Gender and Sexuality: A guy, and a 100000% homosexual.

Pronouns: He/him

Ethnicity/Species: He’s an aasimar (in DnD aasimars are like, humans with celestial blood so kind of like half-angels)

Birthplace and Birthdate: Birthplace is a ★Secret ★ and while idk how timelines work in DnD universe, I’ve put him down as Sagittarius so somewhere around November-December

Guilty Pleasures: Gods, lots. He likes cheating money out of people in card games, he likes to flirt with people who are in love with him just for fun, he befriends people for their pets… 

Phobias: He doesn’t really have any specific ones left. He used to not like heights, but for his magic shows he wanted to do tricks relating to high places so he just practiced the tricks until his fear went away, for examples. Anything he’s afraid of he’ll just, get rid of as soon as possible in not-so-good ways out of impatience

What They Would Be Famous For: He’s already a famous magician so!! That lol

What They Would Get Arrested For: Gods, swindling people probably. I mean, he only swindles from people he deems ~bad~ (like from abusive and actually morally corrupt people to people who are just “Super Mean :(((” or he just disagrees with their moral standards) but that kind of vigilante justice doesn’t really go according to law lol

OC You Ship Them With: We haven’t yet started the game so I can’t say if there’ll be someone, haha~ But for now, no one! 

OC Most Likely To Murder Them: Gods, as said the game has yet to start but I feel like one player’s character Vivi is already a candidate, because she’s the bodyguard for another character Selena, and Cyrus tends to play around with her a lot (play around in like the, pick her up and spin around to make her dizzy kind of way) and Vivi Does Not Approve

Favorite Movie/Book Genre: He’s not that into fiction! But I think he’d generally love stories about animals 

Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Doesn’t really have one~

Talents and/or Powers: Uhm he’s a Bard, so even now on first level he has the magical power of actually hurting others by insulting them :’’’D But yeah he’s a mage so there’s that, but he’s also skilled in playing the violin, flute and lute, and also he’s skilled in magic tricks! Some of his magic tricks do include actual magic and some are more our world kind of magic tricks.

But really, the magic shows are more about the show and glamour, and entertaining people. Which he is great at. 

Why Someone Might Love Them: He’s a charming young man, who can be really sweet and make you laugh and smile any day of your life. There’s not a boring day with him, really

Why Someone Might Hate Them: He’s… super annoying, selfish and makes assumptions and judges people without really even knowing them. He’s also a perfectionist about his shows so gods if something goes wrong he’s going to be so upset and whine abt it

How They Change: Well, that remains to be seen! Only thing I know that will change in his life is that he’ll get a puppy after our first mission bc the GM promised me he’d give me enough money and an opportunity to get the lil darling~ It’s gonna be a Toy Pomeranian and his name will be★ FLUFFY POFFINGTON★ - THE STAR KNIGHT

Why You Love Them: He’s, so dramatic and fun, I feel like I’ll have a blast playing with him because he’s so lively and energetic! He’s also really pretty and I would die from being gay if I actually met him, lol

For Ceri!

Full Name: Ceri Davies

Gender and Sexuality: Male, and a gay demisexual!

Pronouns: He/him!

Ethnicity/Species: Idk, some kind of human bean

Birthplace and Birthdate: He’s also from the Mystery Country that most my OCs live in, and he was born September 6th

Guilty Pleasures: Idk if this counts as guilty pleasure but he tends to annoy people on purpose, just to see if they get upset with him if he’s difficult or uncooperative and when they do he’ll cry and turn it around to say they’re bad for getting angry at him. He keeps doing this even though he hates doing it. He also has a lot of shitty coping mechanisms

Phobias: Being abandoned, being hated, never being loved, being alone….. You get the picture

What They Would Be Famous For: He’s not really the type to be famous…. unless for like, bad reasons. Like the answer of the next question…

What They Would Get Arrested For: Murder of a lover. Like, no question abt it.

OC You Ship Them With: Salal!

OC Most Likely To Murder Them: He doesn’t really have anyone close enough for this other than Salal… I guess his family goes for this though, especially his shitty older siblings

Favorite Movie/Book Genre: Romance

Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: Like, you know the trope where character A is about to like, get married to character B and then A’s old sweetheart C comes back into their life and they fall for them again and end up dumping B for C? Yeah, Ceri hates that. And any other kind of cheating/breaking up tropes.

Talents and/or Powers: He’s an extremely little-better-than-mediocre in many things, like web design. Although he was very studious and hard-working, and did get straight A’s when he was in elementary to high school, and then got into university when his mental health finally plummeted from the abuse at home. Now he lives in sort of a daze, and many of his skills and knowledge has kind of… deteriorated bc he stopped. 

He still managed to graduate well enough and get a job with the skills he had already acquired, but there’s little hope for him to get actually better and ahead without like… getting actual professional help for his mental health…

//EDIT: ALSO I GUESS HE’S SOMEWHAT CAPABLE OF BLACK MAGIC like geez that fact might be relevant somewhat to his character arc

Why Someone Might Love Them: Uh, that’s a good question. He’s hardworking and, when he’s actually stable he’s witty and funny, and I think he’s the type to have a really cute laugh. All in all, he is a sweet person underneath, who just got treated like shit by the world

Why Someone Might Hate Them: I mean, he’s like, Problematic ™ so it’s easy to see why. If someone even tries to befriend him, he either turns them down until they give up or he’ll demand their absolute attention and care and when they of course wouldn’t be able to provide that he’d dump them out of his life. It’s all of course because of a mental illness, but, he is really abusive and has given up on trying to be better (he thinks that it’s “too late for him to be good”) so… 

How They Change: I think he’ll eventually realize that he can change and will seek help, and will at least to some degree start to interact with other humans again. 

Why You Love Them: I mean, of course the obvious “I love yanderes” part, I think what I love him about the most is the fact that he’s a bad person without a like, justification. There’s a reason why he’s like that, and he’s not completely a lost case or irredeemable but still, he’s not good. He yearns to be loved and cared for but he doesn’t know how to go about it and ends up summoning a demon in his desperation… Idk, I really love thinking about his personality and how he ended up being like this, and what goes on in his head. So ultimately, I love yanderes and have endless interest in that kind of thought processes orz