#from what i heard its more of a social factor for them

[vacalimpia]

i have no idea how people enjoy beer... sometimes i choke on my meds so i need to drink something fizzy to get them unstuck from my throat, and everytime it has happened the only fizzy drink we have at home is beer

i am very biased for multiple factors when it comes to beer but i genuinely will never understand what is the appeal😭 the second it hits your tongue you immediately have this awful taste... I only take a sip for me to stop choking on my meds but a sip is way too much😭😭 how people drinking cans of it

[messyoungie]

HABITS TO DROP WHEN GETTING YOUR LIFE TOGETHER

➝ CREATING UNAUTHENTIC & UNINTENTIONAL GOALS

the biggest mistakes you can make when creating goals is making goals that aren’t true to you and making goals for the sake of making goals.

it can be so exciting when you decide to get your life together. I mean, of course it is! there are so many possibilities! but when you start planning, don’t just write down the goals you see circulating on social media. what works for someone else may not be what works for you. don’t make your goals and habits based on what’s trending or popular in the self improvement community.

think about what you actually need for a minute. what is actually necessary? your goals and habits aren’t here to be glamorous, they’re here to help regardless of how simple or small they are. the point of thinking up new habits is to improve your life, so be intentional with your goals. what will practicing this habit or achieving this goal give you?

when you’re first starting out, your goals don’t have to be anything too crazy or intense. for example, let’s say you want to become a pink pilates girl and get into fitness. you shouldn’t jump right into it and say your goal is to work out for 2 hours 5 times a week. let’s consider some factors first. have you been living a completely sedentary kind of lifestyle? then try looking for exercises that’ll wake up dormant muscles. your goal should then be to repeat those exercises for how ever many times a week. then you’ll work your way up from there. (it’s important we don’t harm the body, so be mindful with your fitness goals.) what about your schedule? how much time can you actually give to working out? can your body even endure working out for that long?

anyways, hopefully you see what I mean. when creating goals, it’s not about having the “aesthetic” habits and goals that you may see on tiktok or tumblr. it’s about doing what is actually good for you and what’ll help you the most with where you are now in your journey. so please put some thought into your goals and where they’ll take you. creating unauthentic and unintentional habits will also mean you’ll be less likely to keep practicing them after a few times. at the end of the day, that doesn’t help you achieve anything and you’re left with a broken promise you’ve made to yourself. which leads me to my next point…

➝ NOT KEEPING YOUR WORD WHEN IT COMES TO YOU

let me start off by saying this— if you don’t even listen to yourself, why should anyone else? (harsh, ik)

a HUGE reason as to why people have no self confidence is because they don’t listen to themselves or keep the promises they’ve made to themselves. if you have no self trust, how could you have any self confidence?

now, building discipline can definitely be a challenge so if you want to start somewhere easy, nip your false promises in the bud and stop yourself from making them. that’s what I did when I was first trying to stop this habit. when my addiction to tiktok was at its peak I would always tell myself the usual “ten more minutes and then I’ll stop scrolling.” when I wanted to stop making false promises, I knew I had no control or discipline so the only thing I could do is be real with myself. I’d cut myself off when I heard myself say “five more minutes” because I knew it wasn’t going to happen. if I wasn’t going to quit my bad habit, then the least I could do is be honest with myself.

the things that you are constantly telling yourself, whether they’re mindless or intentional, matter.

so, stop telling yourself seemingly harmless lies. unnecessary false promises that you know are false will only fill you with tension.

➝ SEEING FAILURE AS AN INVITATION TO GIVE UP

this applies to so many things.

you wanted to be consistent with your reading goals but haven’t read a chapter in a week? dont give up. don’t tell yourself that being consistent is too hard for you, that since you missed a week this habit isn’t for you. make your goal a bit easier or give yourself another chance.

you wanted to spend more time doing art but it’s not turning out how you expected? dont give up. dont give yourself the title of a “bad artist” and never pick up a pencil again. move forward, give yourself another chance.

you wanted to quit your Instagram addiction but after a couple days you went back to scrolling for hours on ig reels? Don’t give up. dont tell yourself that this addiction isn’t gonna go away, don’t go back to the bad habit because you slipped up. give yourself another chance.

I think a lot of us (myself included) tend to give up at the first sign of failure, instead of reminding ourselves to keep going. it’d be wonderful if you could get it right on the first try. if you could read ten books a month right away after not reading a book in three years. if you could watch hours worth of tutorials and sketch the perfect portrait on the first attempt. if you could uninstall instagram for good and never feel the urge to go back. that would all be so amazing, but it’s not always the reality. expect the best from yourself and do the best you can, but also give yourself some compassion. keep in mind that you won’t always do things perfectly right away and that’s one thousand percent okay. when you feel yourself slipping up on your brand new goal, don’t end it there at the first failure. allow yourself to move forward, because the only other direction to move is backwards.

[ceescedasticity]

Okay okay so.

DCU Batman canon Court of Owls (1) is waaaaay too similar to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and (2) doesn't make sense. In so many ways.

If it's so entwined with Gotham's upper crust, how could Bruce Wayne never have noticed it? If they've been controlling Gotham all this time, why is Gotham so out-of-control? If unscrupulous rich people who spend a lot of time in Gotham can have people assassinated for free, why haven't they gotten rid of any of the Rogues who make life dangerous/really annoying and/or interfere with business? What even is the deal with that supposed "nursery rhyme"?

It's possible to rationalize answers for at least some of those questions, but it would just be propping up this way-too-similar-to-real-and-dangerous-conspiracy-theories thing, so why bother.

So what could it be instead?

Under the readmore, a lengthy discussion of how I would do it if I were to write a fic including it though anyone else can use it if for some reason they want to.

(tl;dr: a secret society too up their own asses to try to take over the country club much less the world, but still plenty dangerous to the vulnerable, and unfortunately they have a manual on creating superhuman assassins)

The Court of Owls can still fulfill most of its narrative purposes — certainly fulfill most of its fanfic-frequented narrative purposes — if it's stripped down into just a cult. They could be murdering, kidnapping, creating utterly loyal assassins, and planting agents in politics for no other reason than that they're a comic-book cult and they're Evil. They're presumably getting their money from somewhere but it doesn't have to be associated with Gotham's elite. Boring, but it does the job for Talon creation.

If we wanted a little more flavor, though—

It could be not a conspiracy but a "secret society" — something more along the lines of Skull and Bones, except obviously not restricted to college years. Add a dash of Bullingdon Club and the old Hellfire Club(s).

We get a bunch of rich people who want to LARP as Illuminati and behave transgressively without facing any consequences. Its members benefit from it socially/politically/economically because of the networking opportunities.

That is what most people who have heard of the Court of Owls think it is — solid networking and some wild parties, but also embarrassing, decadent, and likely to have covered up some manslaughters at some point, hopefully not recently but who knows; sex workers are leery of them. Probably "the Talon" is what someone dresses up as during one of their cringeworthy "ceremonies".

That is also what most members think the Court of Owls is. They do their networking and their partying and their LARPing, and don't pay much attention to how their hefty membership fee is spent. They think the uppermost echelons of the Court are full of those who get a bit too into the LARPing, which isn't even wrong. Being really into the LARPing is one of the criteria for being brought into the innermost circle.

Before I get into the innermost circle, let's discuss the "nursery rhyme":

Nursery rhymes as a rule are probably not actually coded references to real events. (Wikipedia on nursery rhymes — see Meanings section.)

I think if you want there to be an actual children's tradition of repeating this rhyme, there are two ways to go:

(1) It's an old rhyme and it's associated with a game. One kid is the Talon and they tackle anyone who speaks, something like that?

(2) It only dates back to the 20th century, where it's a song featured in a locally produced cartoon TV show or maybe a radio show. Maybe it's a cartoon about anthropomorphized mice and it's the anthem of the menacing owls. Whatever. Written by either a non-innermost-circle club member who wanted to enhance the intimidation factor or a non-club-member wanting to make fun of it.

Anyway.

The very innermost circle of the rich-people-club Court of Owls — I can see two directions to go with this.

First one is that the very innermost circle actually knows about an associated Evil Cult.

Second one is that they're sort of functionally a cult, but not exactly — they aren't trying to bring about the end of the world or anything. There isn't some god they're trying to serve or appease. They aren't trying to control Gotham or the world any more than they already control it. They're still networking and having fun by being Wild and Edgy and Occult.

Just, they're so Wild and Edgy and Occult they're turning people into Talons as an initiation rite/club activity.

—On second thought I'd prefer a little more intentionality, but imagine the extreme: a Court of Owls which is a student secret society with extremely fucked-up traditions and initiation rituals. Their frat house has a really high power bill because of all the Talons frozen in the basement.

A little more intentionality: They're old money and extremists, and we can tie in them being obsessed with Gotham's leading families though not synonymous with them — they're into eugenics, mostly but not entirely in that pre-scientific way where it's about Good Breeding and specific family lines rather than race as such. They want to Breed Better Gotham Rich People because… reasons. I said more intentionality, not well-reasoned intentionality.

They make Talons because (1) the Court of Owls has always made Talons; (2) the idea of having a superhuman assassin at their beck and call is really cool; (3) it makes for a killer initiation rite; (4) occasionally they can all agree someone is a threat to the Court and may be disposed of; (5) even more occasionally someone gets permission to use a Talon for personal grievances or advantage; (6) they're creepily into the power dynamic. Being into that sort of thing is one of the criteria for induction into the upper echelons, after all.

—Oh wait what am I doing with Talons.

Fanon Talons (a.k.a. what I've encountered like. 99% of the time in fanfic) are thoroughly brainwashed and deeply dehumanized. Their memories and identities are suppressed or just gone.

Sometimes the mental condition is partially or fully reversible, or may be reversible at some stages; more rarely the physical process is partially or fully reversible. (Usually this is the case when Dick is made a Talon.)

I haven't run into this as much, but sometimes the condition is not only irreversible but Talons are described as essentially already dead — destroying them is not killing.

(Optionally the Owls may abuse them for fun, but if you give an unscrupulous and cruel person total control over someone else that's not an unlikely outcome.)

From what I can tell from the wiki, canon Talons are (usually) loyal and devoted and follow orders despite any previously held scruples. This suggests some level of indoctrination/conditioning. We also know their training is brutal.

However, most seem to retain their individuality — they bear grudges, request assignments, take pride, and now and then go rogue. I get the impression from the wiki that they generally remember their pasts.

(The wiki does not mention pronoun usage. I have no idea if the third-person-it way of speaking is canon.)

Canon Talon recruitment looks like it aims for older teenagers. Most of it also seems to be nominally voluntary. They agree not knowing what they're getting into, and maybe under pressure from an authority figure, and they're not allowed to quit later, but they do initially agree.

The physical condition is reversible via Lazarus Pit, which probably means other methods would work as well.

Durability of the mental conditioning seems to vary from person to person. Some remain devoted and very concerned about failing the Court, however: One guy deserted entirely when he realized he'd been ordered to kill a two-year-old. Another broke away after feeling kinship with vigilante opponents and eventually making a friend. Clearly whatever they are doing is not very durable on at least some subjects.

An advantage of the fanon-style total dehumanization over the canon situation is it explains why they don't have a hell of a lot more desertions.

Maybe: Recruitment is usually targeted towards those who would enjoy being a superhuman assassin enough that they wouldn't care who they worked for. Maybe: There are actually a lot more desertions and loyal Talons spend 90% of work hours hunting down disloyal ones. Maybe: They're convinced the Court is doing good and important things. Maybe: There are other perks.

With a Court that is more a secret society than a conspiracy or a cult, it would be harder to convince anyone the Court is doing good and important things. Other perks are possible. A mix of targeted recruitment and eliminating a lot of failures is possible. The fanon approach is also possible.

The canon approach is much more compatible with a Haley's Circus that is, while sketchy, not evil. There's very little outright coercion and some recruits even stay in touch for a while. Everyone has plausible deniability and they keep desperately needed financial backing. —Of course you can make the circus evil if you want but I wouldn't go that way because it feels… disrespectful to Dick? As much as that makes sense.

The canon approach also works much better for William Cobb. —Sort of. Cobb's whole character is clearly someone who has an identity, who has aspirations and grudges. But it doesn't make a lot of sense that he'd get screwed over twice by Gotham's elite then turn around and become utterly loyal to an organization virtually synonymous with Gotham's elite????? Was that supposed to be a demonstration of the effectiveness of the brainwashing?

But with the secret society version, the Court of Owls isn't synonymous with Gotham's elite, and probably doesn't include the particularly stuffy elite like whatsisface Crowne. —It also works fine if the Court is just a cult.

In my opinion either cult or LARPing secret society version of the Court also works better with using a circus as a Talon farm anyway, because while some circus-honed skills could be useful to an assassin they're neither necessary nor sufficient. It's a weird choice for a conspiracy which actually accomplishes things.

(…Alternate Joker origin story: Court of Owls snagged a clown for a Talon and things went horribly wrong? —Actually I like that as much as any other origin I've heard.)

I'm seeing a couple of ways to go with this.

Option one: Fanon Talons. Haley's Circus has no intentional connection and very little knowledge of the situation; William Cobb was there before being picked as a Talon for whatever reason (maybe Whatsisface Crowne is in the Court and wants to get rid of him), and whoever decides Cobb's descendant will be the Gray Son decides the bloodline needs to incubate in the circus for some reason. Most Talons are picked from Gotham's lower classes. —Maybe the Court has a Thing about Cobb and goes for circus performers when it can get them?

Option two: Canon Talons. Haley's Circus is involved with plausible deniability. Cobb is probably the one who decides to incubate his bloodline there. Potential Talons are chosen based on how much they seem like they'd like it but there is still a high rate of attrition; cooperating Talons don't get a totally bad deal but non-cooperating ones usually get dead. In this model Talon!Dick would be dead if he was anyone else, but they're really invested in the Gray Son thing and keep trying to break him.

My inclination is generally to stick closer to canon unless I have a reason not to, so — I guess it would depend on what story I wanted to tell.

(As for the whole "Gray Son of Gotham" prophecy thing, either it was delivered by an associated cult OR it's some bullshit that came out of nineteenth-century occultism and then got taken seriously because the inner circle of the Court of Owls has delusions of grandeur.)

(Another note on the circus: I was going to say that one advantage of the "Court of Owls is a powerful conspiracy using Haly's Circus as a Talon farm" thing is that it does explain why this increasingly anachronistic circus is still operating, but it turns out it's not as anachronistic as I thought, I just live under a rock I guess. Traditional circuses still exist. Circus elephants were only banned in New Jersey in 2018. We don't need to have the Court of Owls intimidating regulators — though it helps if they're pouring money in!)

So that's Talons — not settled, but hopefully adequately considered.

(…If I wanted I could get super creepy with the intersection of the Breeding Better Rich People goal and the Pursuit of Perfect Specimens for Talons goal. That's optional though.)

Anyway.

I think this works pretty well at clearing up the questions.

Why didn't Bruce Wayne notice earlier? He made the mistake of taking what he thought was a weird social club at face value. He knew members might be up to no good and dealt with that in whatever arena they were acting in. Maybe he extracted people who were caught up in their parties. But he didn't realize they were engaging in human… not experimentation, they know what they're doing. They're engaging in Talon-making and stockpiling assassins even though they very seldom use them for anything but stopping other Talons. If their enemies die mysteriously they are assumed to have hired one of the universe's innumerable other assassins.

If they've been controlling Gotham all this time, why is Gotham so out-of-control? They've never controlled Gotham any more than any other rich people, they just like to play-act like they do.

If unscrupulous rich people who spend a lot of time in Gotham can have people assassinated for free, why haven't they gotten rid of any of the Rogues who make life dangerous/really annoying and/or interfere with business? Because using Talons for anything other than controlling other Talons requires a quorum of the innermost circle, and there's always disagreement about if it's the right time, and they can't decide anything and nothing gets done.

(Am I actually going to use this? I don't know! Maybe. Probably? I have some batfic ideas but I've decided not to post anything until I finish it or I finish Unforsaken, so possibly my energy will fizzle out first.)

[jcplaceholder]

Gensokyo through a Sociological Lens

Gensokyo. A metaphysical place where humans and youkai live together in symbiosis. A delicate balance must be held between the two species, or else it will cease to exist.

...You must have heard some variation of this phrase at least once. I mean, this is Touhou—Gensokyo is the main setting of the series after all. There’s some very interesting worldbuilding that’s been constructed over the course of many, many years.

Frequently, the community will analyze the inner workings of this place and try to explain why things are the way they are. Things are often overcomplicated by fans, however. Details get overinterpreted, and admittedly, explanations on the lore can quickly become convoluted. Concepts like “the balance of Gensokyo” or “the roles humans and youkai play” may seem quite confusing, especially since there’s nowhere in particular that functions exactly like it. And yes of course, there isn’t any specific place in the world that is a one-to-one equivalent. But that doesn’t mean Gensokyo can only be defined within its own little bubble of fiction.

How about we take a step back? Let’s just look at this world from a wider, objective perspective. Let’s view everything through a sociological lens.

Table of Contents:

What’s Sociology?

What is a Social System?

How Does Gensokyo Work?

Gensokyo as a Social System

1. Introduction: What’s Sociology?

Before we define what a social system is... What is sociology?

Just from the word alone, you can deduce it as “the study of society.” Like how society functions, how people behave, stuff like that. Which yes, is technically correct. But there’s more to the spirit of the field than that. Let me ask you this instead:

What is the point of sociology?

Most people don’t understand why this field is so important. Society... why bother studying something that we already notice everyday? We talk about it all the time, hear about it all the time. We’ve probably discussed social problems and social structures in other academic environments, such as our history or English classes. It’s just a collection of people, right? “We live in a society.”

However, when we just rely on our default mode of thinking to explain society... we run into some issues. For example, take the problem of cheating in school. Why do students cheat?

“They don’t like or don’t understand the class.”

“They either don’t like studying and doing homework, or they just forget to do them.”

“They’re just lazy, dumb, and/or dishonest.”

“They don’t care if they cheat or not.”

“They’re not trying hard enough at school.”

Well, sure. Those things may be true. But think deeper. Are there more reasons why people would cheat in school?

“They want to pass, but they’re afraid of academic and social consequences.”

“They don’t have enough time to do homework and study.”

“They assume that since other students cheat, it’s okay for them to do it too.”

“They feel like they can’t ask for help, because they either feel like no one’s there to support them, or they’re too ashamed to reach out.”

Now you’re thinking more like a sociologist! While the first list may just appear as common sense, our default judgments can often be short-sighted because we’re used to thinking individualistically. It’s easier for us to say that someone’s problem is their own fault. Even if we admit that maybe there were factors they couldn’t control, we conclude that it’s ultimately their job to deal with it.

However, these judgments lead us to blame the individual person for what is fundamentally a systemic issue. Problems don’t just begin and end with individuals; there are far larger forces at play.

This isn’t to say that individuals have no agency or impact either. Reducing problems to “The System is puppeting everyone around” ignores the fact that at the end of the day, we’re all still participants of society. We play a part in it, too.

Essentially, society is not just a collection of people, but a collection of people who exist in relation to one another.

People and systems are connected; they influence and interact with us, and we do the same with them. By recognizing this interplay, we can understand the greater social context behind the decisions we and others make.

This unique mode of thinking is what sociologist C. Wright Mills named “the sociological imagination.” This is the kind of mindset sociologists have to think in before analyzing social problems and getting to those “one in four people” statistics. Sociology is a major area of scientific study precisely because it concerns itself with a foundational aspect of the world we live in. Through this bird’s eye view, we’re able to discover further possible answers about not just what society is, but also why it is and how it works.

—

2. What is a Social System?

There are three main theoretical perspectives, or paradigms, that sociologists take into account when analyzing social phenomena:

Symbolic Interactionism

Functionalism

Conflict theory

For the sake of keeping this post focused, I will primarily examine things through aspects of functionalism. Still, keep in mind that the field is incomplete without the other two perspectives, and I will discuss them in further detail at a later date.

Through the lens of functionalism, we can define a social system as a collection of people, positions, and ideas. Social systems are everywhere and we’re always participating in them.

The important thing about social systems is that they bind people together on the basis of collective participation. In the functionalist view, society is like a living organism. The way an organism needs all its parts to function in tandem, a society needs all its people to collectively perform their roles.

Sound familiar?

It should.

—

2. How Does Gensokyo Work?

(I will state it through bullet points to get straight to the point of what it is)

Let’s summarize:

Because of humans starting to view youkai as just superstition, youkai were no longer a necessary part of human society. Youkai need fear (belief, their purpose) to exist, so their existence would cease to be. To counteract that, the sages created Gensokyo. (Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 48) (Wild and Horned Hermit, Chapter 9)

Gensokyo exists within the Hakurei barrier, the border of common sense. The Hakurei shrine and the shrine maiden exist to maintain the barrier. (Perfect Memento in Strict Sense, Reimu’s Entry)

Humans and youkai exist in Gensokyo and live in a symbiotic relationship (Cage in Lunatic Runigate, Chapter 5)

Youkai need humans to fear them while the humans need youkai to protect the village from disaster. Without the support of youkai, the village can’t exist. Without the humans to fear them, youkai can’t exist. (Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 48) (Wild and Horned Hermit Chapter 9)

Because of this relationship, the humans and youkai can live content and relatively peaceful lives. This is the balance of Gensokyo, it’s the status quo. (Perfect Momento in Strict Sense, monologue)

If the balance were to be disrupted or if the barrier were to cease to exist, Gensokyo would be no more. (Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 19)

—

3. How Does Gensokyo Work?

The basics:

When you view Gensokyo through a sociological lens, the human villagers, the youkai, and the shrine maiden are statuses people are organized under in Gensokyo as a social system. For Gensokyo as a social system to function, everyone within it has to participate by fulfilling their roles. If no one were to fulfill those roles, Gensokyo would not be able to function. 

(Cage in Lunatic Runagate, Chapter 5)

(Perfect Memento in Strict Sense, Reimu’s Entry)

People make social systems happen. But do you remember what I said about the sociological imagination? Social systems shape people’s lives at the same time. Again, individuals and social systems simultaneously interact with each other.

Gensokyo greatly exemplifies this concept. The collective participation from the human villagers, youkai, and shrine maiden is what makes Gensokyo happen. However, their lives are also shaped by Gensokyo. 

(The Forest and The Trees by Allan G. Johnson, page 17)

When I say “shaped”, I’m referring to how social systems lay out paths of least resistance. This term refers to the path of action that would receive the least amount of pushback by society, the thing you’re expected to do of your status within a social system.

In other words, why do we keep behaving in the ways that we do? Why don’t we just do whatever we want?

Well, it’s because of social expectations. Naturally, we would rather act in accordance with them than have deal with the consequences of ignoring them. Going to work, doing your homework, laughing at a friend’s joke (even if it wasn’t very funny), etc. We follow paths of least resistance everyday.

And just like in real life, the human villagers, youkai, and shrine maiden all follow paths of least resistance laid out by their social system: Gensokyo. By doing what’s expected of their status, by performing their roles, they participate in said system.

Can you see how linked individuals and systems are with each other now? This back-and-forth relationship is clearly portrayed in Touhou.

Anyway, you may have noticed that I use the word “status” instead of just saying “them.” People are individuals, while statuses are the titles of the roles they occupy. So think about what defines the status of a human villager—what expectations and ideas are associated with it?

To put it briefly, the human villagers are expected to fear youkai because they’re far weaker in comparison and can easily killed by them. They have to stick together to survive.

Now, what are the expectations and ideas that are associated with the status of a youkai?

Youkai are meant to attack humans. They are the enemies of humans and need to be feared by them to exist (i.e. to survive).

And of course, where does the shrine maiden fit into all of this?

From what we know in Touhou, the shrine maiden is expected to exterminate youkai and protect the villagers. Her responsibility is to maintain the balance of Gensokyo and the Hakurei barrier.

These statuses will still exist if no one occupies them at the moment. Again, remember: people are not statuses and statuses are not people. I am not an employee, for example. I occupy the status of employee, meaning I exist outside of that status. The status of employee will still exist if I were to quit, and it will be occupied by someone else eventually.

Ultimately, the individual occupying the status doesn’t matter. What actually matters is that the roles associated with said status are being fulfilled.

(Silent Sinner in Blue, Chapter 20)

(Perfect Memento in Strict Sense, Reimu’s entry)

Elaborating on societies:

Social systems are everywhere, and they can exist within and next to each other. In this case, Gensokyo is a social system that contains smaller social systems within it, and within those systems exist even smaller ones, and so on.

Let’s take a closer look at this. For example, the human village itself is a social system. Within the human village there are families, shops, bars, etc., which are social systems too (yes, things like families and businesses are technically considered as such).

This idea of social systems exists with youkai too. On a micro scale, we have tengu society. Tengu society lies within the Youkai Mountain, which itself resides alongside the Forest of Magic and the Bamboo Forest of the Lost. And youkai society encompasses all of them. On the macro scale, we have Gensokyo. All of these things are social systems. And for clarification’s sake, we’re not just talking about these things as places—we’re talking about them as groups of people.

Here is a diagram I made which generally illustrates how the social systems in Touhou are organized (note: not everything is depicted here, this is just an example)

(Diagrams of social systems)

Since social systems can exist within other social systems, that also means people will occupy multiple statuses.

I’ll use myself as an example here. My family, my school, and my country are some of the social systems which I participate in. In those cases, I would be a parent’s child, a student, and a citizen. I hold various statuses at the same time, and each one is associated with a separate set of ideas and beliefs.

A resident of Gensokyo would be no different, since this concept would apply to them too.

Let’s take Aya for instance. Aya exists within three primary social systems: Gensokyo, youkai society, and tengu society. Within each of those social systems, she occupies a distinct status.

In Gensokyo, she is a youkai. Specifically in youkai society, she is a tengu. And even more specifically in tengu society, she is a crow tengu.

Each of these statuses she occupies is associated with a certain role. The status of youkai is associated with the role of attacking and scaring humans. Moreover, the status of tengu is associated with the idea of causing great winds. Last but not least, crow tengu are defined by their role of writing and distributing newspapers.

The statuses of youkai, tengu, and crow tengu have different ideas attached to them. This eventually leads to the formation of distinct types of relationships, which are defined by those idea (e.g. what a relationship between a child and their parent would look like compared to a student and their teacher; I’ll get into this later). You could say there is a wide variety of people just as there is a wide variety of youkai. 

This may ring a bell. That’s because this is exactly what Aya describes in her conversation with Kosuzu in Forbidden Scrollery. According to Chapter 49, she says, “It seems that to humans, tengu are just one of many kinds of youkai, but to the tengu there are plenty of different kinds of humans too.” She then adds, “And we have different feelings about each of them, which gives rise to entirely different relationships.”

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 49)

Remember how I said social systems weren’t just places, but groups of people? ...So why in the rest of this page is Aya describing a human’s status according to specific locations? Instead, shouldn’t it be something purely conceptual?

Well, that’s because we participate in a variety of systems. So logically, we would occupy different types of statuses.

There are statuses that we are just born into such as race, gender, and family. There are also statuses we attain as we move through life; “teacher,” “student,” “scientist,” “manager,” and “parent” are all examples of this. And there are other statuses that we don’t occupy all the time because they exist only in particular situations.

In his book The Forest and The Trees, Johnson uses the ideas of a pedestrian and a bus passenger as an example. When he steps off the sidewalk and enters the bus, he exits the status of “pedestrian” and enters the status of “bus passenger.” He then assumes the role attached to being a bus passenger. 

Many statuses have to do with who, what, when, and where. In short, it’s situational.

Aya describes this when she says, “Even you, for example. It’s one thing to meet with little Suzy in Suzunaan, but if I met you outside the village, I’d treat you very differently.” Basically, she’s talking about how her relationship with Kosuzu would be different depending on the situation: inside the village versus outside of it. In this case, she talks about the “where.”

But how does this influence their relationship? Aya assumes the status of a newsdealer when she enters Suzunaan, so her status as a youkai is no longer relevant in this context. With Kosuzu, she has the status of employee in Suzunaan: someone who lends books. Yet when they leave the village, they assume different statuses: one of a youkai, and one of a human outside the village. They are fundamentally entering a different social system.

In this context, Aya’s status as a newsdealer and Kosuzu’s status as an employee of Suzunaan are irrelevant because they are no longer under the social system of Suzunaan or the human village.

If I were to enter my school for instance, being a “sibling” wouldn’t be as applicable as being a “student” in that environment because I’ve entered a social system where the latter status is of greater importance. In school, I’m expected to perform the roles of a student. Siblinghood becomes practically irrelevant in this setting.

Here’s another example: let’s say a friend and I are coworkers. Would I interact with them the same way inside of work as I do outside of work? Not really, right? Our relationship would just be different. ...But why would our relationship be different? Why do I feel compelled to act differently even though I’m interacting with the same person?

That’s because our relationships with other people are affected by the roles we perform through our given statuses. There are certain cultural ideas, beliefs, values, and norms attached to them, which in turn shape what kinds of roles we play. Naturally, they would have an influence on our behavior.

In a similar vein, the shrine maiden’s role in relation to a human villager differs from this same role in relation to youkai. The shrine maiden protects the human villagers, but she exterminates youkai. Naturally, this makes the status of the shrine maiden above both of them, and thus her relationships to one or the other will follow this premise (think of how Reimu acts as Kosuzu’s overseer in the beginning of Forbidden Scrollery, versus the end where they are now equals).

Despite the relation between statuses and roles remaining constant, the contents of the relationship will vary from one individual to another. A teacher’s relationship between various students will be different from each other, yet the status of teacher and student and the roles associated with those statuses are still the same. Likewise, the shrine maiden’s relationship from one youkai to another will differ from each individual, but the roles in relation between them will remain constant (e.g. exterminating youkai, fighting the shrine maiden).

On culture and beliefs:

Every social system has a culture. Basically, culture consists of symbols, values, and ideas which shape how we think and see the world around us.

Symbols can range from abstract concepts to physical objects, such as:

Love

Money

Gestures

Colors

And celestial bodies (the sun, moon, stars, etc.)

By naming things, we create a relationship with it by making it have something to do with us.

Take thunder for instance. What thunder ‘is’ is what we say it is. It has always existed—we just came up with a name to describe the phenomena. What makes the word “thunder” have its meaning anyway?

(Perfect Cherry Blossom prologue)

The world is not what ‘is’, but what we think the world is.

Things have always existed before we had names for them. Therefore, when we name things, we aren’t literally making it real. When we name things, we make them culturally real.

What I’m getting at is that we constructed what reality is through culture, and it provides words and ideas to help us make sense of the world around us.

Culture constructs what is considered true and what is considered false. Notice how I’m using the phrase "what is considered’ instead of ‘what is.’ This is because what would be considered true in one culture may be considered false in another, and vice versa.

In Touhou, youkai are considered real in Gensokyo, but considered false in the outside world. The idea of constructed reality is taken to the most literal sense in Touhou.

(Kanako’s profile from Mountain of Faith as an example)

You could argue that youkai are literally real in the world of Touhou and if people saw them, they would simply believe that they exist.

But this is a misunderstanding on how belief works.

We tend to think:

We see things, then believe in them.

When it’s actually:

We believe in things, so we start to see them.

If people really only believed from seeing things, then everyone should hypothetically believe in the same thing. Yet, we have multiple religions, different political views, etc. The world itself is proof that there is no “one truth.”

Youkai are real in the sense that they literally ‘are,’ but the outside world's culture does not consider them to be real, therefore they do not exist.

It’s belief that provides answers.

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 48)

In Chapter 48 of Forbidden Scrollery, Akyuu explains the idea of reality being constructed to Kosuzu. The way she uses the word “truth” is evident of that.

“The truth that youkai are the enemies of mankind is the one that’s best for the village. so it’s our truth.”

She’s talking about truth as something unobjective. We believe in things because they serve us in some way.

She states beforehand, “If the world is made up of the infinite, there are infinite truths as well.”

Remember, what’s considered “true” and what’s considered “false” is formed from culture, and since there is vast diversity of cultures, there isn’t such a thing as a “single truth.” We like to think we’re objectively observing the world around us, but our experiences are filtered through our own subjective lens.

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 48)

I’ll only briefly touch on Kosuzu’s conflict here to explain why Akyuu is talking about beliefs (I’d like to make it its own separate post).

Kosuzu’s conflict near the end of Forbidden Scrollery is about how the world is seemingly contradictory and more complex than what it made itself out to be.

Youkai are the enemies of the human villagers... yet they need them.

And Mamizou, someone she admired... ended up being a youkai.

Later on, she figures out that Marisa and Reimu had already known about Mamizou's true identity, but for some reason, they never told her about it.

If Marisa and Reimu are on the side of humans... then why would they do that?

This is why Akyuu is talking about how truth is not an objective thing. Belief is not “what is true” and “what is false”; it’s what’s considered true and false. We say what reality is from culture.

When Kosuzu acknowledged this and saw how her view of the world was clouded by the culture she lives in, she leaves to seek out a truth that’s more true to herself. The ending of the manga follows this idea.

As far as I have gathered, the interpretation that Kosuzu’s inner conflict is about becoming less afraid of youkai is really just an oversimplication of the story’s thematic depth, and it frankly misses the point. It doesn’t relate to what Akyuu is talking about at all (not to mention how she’s clearly afraid of Mamizou and how Aya’s conversation isn’t talking about not fearing youkai in Chapter 49).

Really think about why “truth” is repeated on the last page of Chapter 49, and what the point was for her to talk to different kinds of people with differing perspectives. What’s the story trying to say?

Truth is a recurring motif in the narrative for a reason.

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 49)

More on the path of least resistance:

At any given moment, we can do an infinite number of things, but we usually don’t realize this. Values, beliefs, and norms lay out what the path of least resistance is, which narrow down the range of our possibilities.

To put it simply, “the path of least resistance” defines what we typically should and shouldn’t do. Say, what’s stopping me, as a student, from throwing my pencils at the teacher or kicking down my desk? These are just things that you don’t do as a student.

Going against the path of least resistance is met with apprehension and, well, resistance from society. If I were to do what I had just said, I would most likely be suspended or scolded—social consequences. It’s easier to go along with the path of least resistance even though there may be times when you’d rather not (I’m not talking about the example above, I wouldn’t throw pencils at my teachers lol).

The human villagers, youkai, and shrine maiden performing the roles they are expected to do is what the path of least resistance is within Gensokyo. I’m reiterating on this point again because it’s not strictly a good or bad thing to do. It’s just... a thing. This applies to everyone, including youkai.

I could say it’s wrong for youkai to act the way they do. But remember, this is a social system that’s entirely different to the ones we exist in. Our values, what we think is good and bad, are influenced by the social systems we participate in.

....Which, unlike Gensokyo, exists under late-stage capitalism (e.g. when Rinnosuke and Sumireko talk about currency in Chapter 36 of Curiosities of Lotus Asia).

(Curiosities on Lotus Asia, Chapter 36)

If I were to look at the US as a social system or any capitalistic society in general, It’s not a crime to want to gain money if that’s the path laid out for me as a person existing under capitalism. Disregarding how I personally feel about it, I’m just “playing the game” in the end.

If I were to disregard money or give it away for no reason, I would most likely be seen as weird for not valuing it the same way everyone else does. It’s seen as an illogical thing to do. That’s because the system defines “what the game is about” and I would be going against that.

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 49)

(Wild and Horned Hermit, Chapter 9)

Following the path of least resistance is comfortable, basically. If I were to strip my identity of every status within the social systems I belong to... what would I even do with myself? What am I if I’m not any of those things (as a student, as an employee, etc.)?

Commonly, people feel lost in life if/when their position is disrupted or stripped away from them. By performing what society expects from the statuses we occupy, life takes on a predictable shape. It's what’s known to work, so why fight against it?

(Flavor text by ZUN for the human village from Gensou Narratograph)

Norms in relation to the path of least resistance:

Similar to values and beliefs, norms establish expectations and boundaries on how people should act. But what makes norms different is that they can result in either reward or punishment. They’re essentially “rules” that are enforced through social consequences, creating a boundary of what is and isn’t acceptable in society.

A rather infamous example of norms in Gensokyo would be how human villagers aren’t allowed to turn into youkai. Reimu exterminates the Fortune Teller for breaking this norm.

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 25)

Norms help keep social systems together. Social systems are dependent on people’s relationships to function, and relationships consist of the expectations we have for one another. At bottom, those expectations are enforced and defined by norms, which tell us how we should act in the first place. So without norms, social systems would cease to be.

The norm that human villagers shouldn’t turn into youkai follows this idea. If Gensokyo is reliant on the collective participation of the human villagers, youkai, and the shrine maiden, then Gensokyo’s norms are meant to enforce the expectations the residents have on each other—their roles in relation to their status with social consequences. By not allowing the human villagers to turn into youkai, the expectations placed upon the human villagers is enforced.

Youkai are not exempt from this either, since they are part of the system, too. The belief that youkai are the enemies of humanity serves the same purpose because it enforces the expectations of youkai.

If these expectations were not maintained and upheld, Gensokyo would fall apart.

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 19)

In Chapter 25 of Forbidden Scrollery, not only does the Fortune Teller reject the roles of human villagers, but he also rejects the roles of youkai as well. This is told to us when he states, “I will reside far from the village. I have no intention of doing the humans harm.”

The problem is that he doesn't understand that youkai also have a role to play in Gensokyo, which is why he's confused about Reimu exterminating him despite his vow to not harm the human villagers. He goes against the norm that youkai should attack and scare humans, and faces the social consequences for breaking it (as well as for breaking the previous norm).

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 25)

Following the same thought, this is why Reimu believes Jinyou would destroy the balance of Gensokyo. Gensokyo relies on the collective participation of people to function, just like any other social system. By not playing by its rules, the social system is put into danger.

This idea is repeated throughout the manga whenever the balance of Gensokyo and the duty of youkai and the human villagers are mentioned. If all of the human villagers decided to become Jinyou, no one would be fulfilling the roles of the human villagers, which would stop Gensokyo from functioning.

Something to reflect on is why this doesn’t happen often. Think about it this way: what would happen if every single teacher at a school decided to stop working one day? What would happen if every single employee at a company suddenly left?

But at the end of the day, people aren’t machines. What do they get from performing the roles associated with their status? What if someone is unsatisfied with their life having to perform those roles, even though they exist under a status that guarantees safety? (*cough* Fortune Teller *cough*)

(Forbidden Scrollery, Chapter 25)

—

Conclusion

Throughout my post, I've been repeating that social systems need people. But it goes the other way around, too.

People need social systems. It's impossible to know what life would be like without them; they influence our perspective on the world and connect us with each other. They may change or get replaced, and they aren't perfect by any means. Regardless, they'll always exist in some form.

Part of the reason why I’m making this post is to clarify what these sociological concepts are. People in the Touhou fanbase either describe them but don’t know the proper terms, or they don't have a full understanding of them and end up saying something silly (like blaming Kasen for participating in Gensokyo as if it’s a choice, or that the humans should overthrow the youkai).

Honestly, I think it’s much easier to understand how Gensokyo works when you analyze it sociologically. It just comes down to making that connection to real life.

—

Afterword

Thank you for reading! I would like to thank my sister @juyendraws for being my co-author and editor, and just generally helping me out with this. She’s the one who first introduced sociology to me and recommended the book The Forest and the Trees by Allen G. Johnson, which is the book I’ve been using as reference. She’s currently working on her own project analyzing the lore and stories of Project Moon games. So if you're interested in those games, check her stuff out when they release!

By the way, I’m a little surprised no one's connected the inner workings of Gensokyo with sociological concepts, considering how long it's been discussed in Touhou's lore. It's as far back as Perfect Memento in Strict Sense. It's even more obvious with Cage in Lunatic Runagate where Yukari’s talking about how the Eientei residents don’t quite fulfill the role of youkai or human. Yukari in the same conversation states, “the humans in the outside world have roles they must fulfill, too; learning, working, and being a part of society, including paying taxes. Gensokyo then adds dealing with youkai to the list.”

I recommend rereading this part of Chapter 5 with sociology in mind because she is straight-up describing Gensokyo sociologically. You can't get more blatant than “the humans in the outside world have roles they must fulfill.”

That is textbook sociology.

I'm guessing people have been missing the forest for the trees, so what was said here was either misinterpreted or glossed over.

(Cage in Lunatic Runagate, Chapter 5)

In regards to Kosuzu’s story in Forbidden Scrollery, I’d like to make it its own post. It’s going to take me a while to write it, so I’ll just mention this: it’s both simpler and more complex than what people make it out to be. I’d also like to write about social deviance in relation to Kasen. Those posts will definitely be much shorter (hopefully).

Anyway, thank you again for reading. I hope my ramblings were coherent enough.

[canete16]

About Act 2

Hello everyone!

If you’re reading this, I imagine you’re also aware of our latest project and its current progress — around 50% of the main adventure has been publicly available for a few days now. If not, you can always download it from this link → https://pastebin.com/z5H5ze2Y, or keep reading and leave it for later. Whatever you prefer :P

I’m suuuuper happy with how the story is unfolding and with all the help and support I’m receiving practically on a daily basis. I feel like, besides myself, there are many people deeply invested in the development of Seven Symphonies, even outside of the dev team.

Testers, artists, players... along with all those who share their impressions and thoughts about the hack while we work quietly behind the scenes. To each and every one of you, a billion thanks. You are an incredible emotional and motivational support, and there’s nothing more beautiful than trying to give back all the love every time we release new content to rekindle your passion and excitement to keep sharing and inspiring others.

But the truth is, I don’t think I’ve lived up to expectations this time — I feel like I’ve let you down. Working silently, as comfortable as it may be, comes with consequences. Consequences we’ve paid for as a team, but above all, you’ve paid for them too.

The post announcing Act 2’s release got significantly less visibility than we expected compared to previous ones. There are several external factors that would be easy to blame (parallel releases, a smaller exposure window without Fangames Direct, 2nd parts are never as successful…), but doing so would mean missing out on the lessons we can learn from this (beyond better timing and respecting the ranks :S). A few things came together, but I prefer to focus on the ones that are within my range of action.

That learning centers around something that’s entirely my responsibility as the person managing the project’s social media: I needed this bump in the road to realize that it’s not enough to be consistent with what truly drives me — creating — but that it’s even more important to be consistent when it comes to sharing.

Since Act 1 was released, I’ve neglected our main showcase, the Twitter account, for various reasons. It’s been inactive for too many of those days, and I’m now very clear that this can’t happen again, especially with Act 3 and the final release coming up. Since I like to take things philosophically, I think it’s actually a great stroke of luck that this scare happened now and not when it truly matters.

Which is why I now have a question for you:

What kind of content would you like me to share/post through the Twitter account while the project continues to develop in parallel?

Would you like weekly scans of individual scenes while keeping spoilers to a minimum, like other fangame accounts do? Would you prefer I don’t reveal anything at all and instead post content related to the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon universe? Or even about the Pokémon world in general?

I already have several “section” ideas that could help not only keep the account active, but also highlight the work of others in the community — something I feel I should be doing much more of as well. Please share with us any suggestions or ideas you have — they will be heard and taken into account, no doubt.

Maybe I’m being overly dramatic with all this, and it’s just a mix of coincidence and unnoticed cause-and-effect. But believe me when I say the sheer brilliance of the project we’re shaping — both technically and narratively — deserves all the care and concern I can give. I have full confidence in the artistic superiority it will ultimately hold over its older sibling, and I intend to give it every tool and space it needs to shine.

Therefore, by the time this post is published, the Twitter account name will change to PMD Seven Symphonies / SE0, and the @ will now be @Canete_PMD. I think Special Episode 0 has already given us a lot — its premise was flawless, and even today it spreads like wildfire. From now on, we’ll focus where it’s needed most and try to make it easier to find both the project and us. It hurts a little, but I trust it’s the right decision (the @ change, though — yeah, it was time to get a normal one xD).

And with that, I’ll sign off. To you, who made it this far: there are incredible things written in your Destiny. If you don’t believe me, just wait till you can keep climbing ;)

Thanks for reading — truly, with all my Soul. And with all my big ass Ego, too. <3

[mizuki-foreshadowing]

Mizuki's Name

This is something that's been bothering me for about as long as I've been in the fandom. It's the idea that, because we the fans lack a deadname for Mizuki that she is not trans in the way that we understand people as being trans.

I want to clear something up. Mizuki is a girl's name. It's a feminine Japanese given name. We've got both Wikipedia and Behind the Name saying about as much; Wikipedia cites it as being "unisex" yet in the given names section for real people, 14 of the 17 people listed are women, and Behind the Name suggests just one spelling for Mizuki and it's the same kanji Mizuki's own name uses (瑞希) and catalogues the name as being feminine. Of the 17 real people listed, only two of them spell their name the same way that Mizuki does (瑞希), which means A). Mizuki is a versatile name that can be given multiple meanings, and B). No matter how you spell it Mizuki is generally heard as a girl's name, other spellings still being girl's names.

Perhaps there exists some narrative where Mizuki's name originally used different kanji to make it masculine and she changed the spelling, and this isn't necessarily out of the realm of possibility! I could never have a chosen name even remotely similar to my birth name, much less identical phonetically, but one of the most common ways to select a chosen name is choosing the other gender's variation of your same name. I've even felt vicarious dread from someone selecting a name with the same nickname as their deadname. So, perhaps this is the case, but I think the far more likely situation is, Mizuki, however you spell it, is heard as a feminine name, and a trans girl being named Mizuki implies this is the feminine name she wants.

That brings us to the next point, whether Mizuki is a girl in the first place.

I need to preface this with saying I'm not here to step on anybody's nonbinary headcanons for Mizuki, because it's always good and meaningful to feel seen in a work of media! And obviously people who identify as nonbinary don't need to fit themselves into some sacred androgyny to be nonbinary; it could be as simple as a signal divorced of any different presentation, that you yourself consider yourself as having some alienation with your assigned-at-birth gender while not having qualms about still borrowing its presentation, because gender is a social reality even as it's a social construct. That's a thing and it's wonderful. It's also not what I'm talking about here.

For censorship reasons, Mizuki can't ""identify"" as anything; her identity must be textually inferred. If she were a real person who adamantly refused to define herself, that's a thing and it's beautiful, but this is first and foremost a work of fiction subject to censorship and we can't forget that. First and foremost, the text tells us Mizuki is, for lack of a better term, AMAB. I don't actually think anybody's in disagreement about this; it's just too implicit in the text. But it still needs to be said anyway. So, the question is, is Mizuki a girl specifically.

Since the character, unlike a real person, is actually prohibited from telling us or even thinking about it in her own internal monologue, how she identifies, it falls to us, the human viewers, to do something one should always be cautious about doing with a real person; using a person's presentation to infer how they identify internally:

Mizuki dresses unambiguously femininely. She goes over the top with lace and pastels, she has long pink hair tied up in a girly ribbon, she and An are implied to have swapped the tie and the bow from their Kamiyama High uniforms. Mizuki is not only very girly but perhaps, her own very ideal of girly. In fact, Mizuki's style could even be considered 'lolita' which, disregarding other factors, goes for overperforming femininity.

Mizuki has a personality affect that she puts on around people now, one she doesn't exhibit as a child even with her sister; her chosen personality can be described as 'obnoxiously cute'. She's always punctuating things with cutesy English and saying things in ways characteristic of overly girly characters in anime, which she very much spends a lot of her time watching. She teases her friends, is always bouncing around and energetic, is never downcast, always upbeat, and doesn't get serious. She loves the idea of being the kid sister /best friend side-character in an anime, and first of all, hell yeah! The joy of finally having a social niche you feel happy to own and play into and explore is part of gender euphoria.

Mizuki is written as always having girly interests from childhood. While I don't think this is necessarily The Truth about being transgender, it is the most respectful and the most kind way to write a trans character, and, no matter what a trans girl's childhood interests were there's always some alienation from boyhood that'd been the case for her for a long time. But, Mizuki loves cute characters, cute clothes, and cute accessories. She loves all things cute; her first card's epithet is Obsessed With Cuteness. It's her defining characteristic. Akiyama Yuuki is a little eccentric in her own right, but it's implied she wasn't responsible for this but rather that she saw it was what makes her sibling happy and she let it flourish because of that.

Mizuki very clearly has history with -kun, an unambiguously masculine honorific. Yes Rui is weird, yes Rui being unknowable is the whole point, but Rui uses -kun for everyone roughly his age, with exactly one exception, Mizuki, who he uses no honorific for. Mizuki and Rui had a one-year break in their friendship while Rui was busy getting expelled from a much nicer high school, and the next time the two met, Mizuki was already very much Mizuki. Now, Mizuki has worn her sister's creations happily to school and gotten mocked relentlessly for them, and she's tried her hand (very successfully!) at making clothes for herself like her big sister does, and gotten mocked relentlessly for it, to the point of closetting herself and directing her creative passion for customizing cute things toward making AMV's in her room, herself reverting to using masculine presentation. Rui would already know Mizuki is a social outcast for having a socially-forbidden love for girly things and that Mizuki has a history of being met with unforgiving bullying and ridicule for it. That's something Rui relates INTIMATELY to. To Rui, Mizuki doesn't have to be a girl to be Mizuki; this is just another kindred spirit the world can't allow to be themselves. That's their entire bond! In Kamiyama High Festival we see Rui using -kun for Mizuki in the flashbacks no problem, contrasting sharply with him using no honorific for her in present-day scenes, ones outside of flashbacks. This further contrasts with Rui using -kun for girl characters, one of the less-weird things about his character. There was some implied conversation when Rui met his old friend who was fully embracing the fashion sense Rui has always known that person to possess, and Rui using the same address like old times again, and Mizuki suddenly feeling dysphoric getting hit by it. Characters use -chan for Mizuki and she seems to like it, and characters use no honorific for her and it doesn't seem to bother her, Akito just says Akiyama (and has also heard, if not taken part in, the rumors about her; Kamiyama High Festival again) and it doesn't appear to hurt her (but they have a bond I don't quite understand), but nobody else in the game uses or has used -kun for Mizuki and it looks like there was some conversation where Mizuki wanted Rui to stop doing it too. I can't imagine how the conversation went, but it may have been something like Mizuki wanting the genderflipped still-familiar/friendly Mizuki-chan and it just not meshing for Rui this idea that Mizuki is compromising her weird self to conform with society, and Rui being unwilling to, yet Mizuki not liking the idea of Rui just calling her 'Mizuki', and Rui's exaggerated compromise of offering to use -chan for no one and no honorific for just Mizuki. Anyway, the point is Mizuki is clearly implied to feel uncomfortable with -kun.

So, in total, if we the players are forced to infer how Mizuki identifies, somebody who's actually not allowed to tell us, then Mizuki may be read as being implied to be a trans girl, that it most closely matches the narrative we're presented for her. This brings us to us getting flashback scenes from various points in Mizuki's life where people, her sister and other students, all equally call her Mizuki.

And I could dive into every individual example that we have, but this isn't a case of proving it, but of showing there's no alternative. What we know is that Mizuki has tried presenting more femininely as a kid because it makes her happy, but that she overhauled her look between her last year of junior high and first year of high school, to what we know and love today. We don't know when she took on asking people to call her by a girl's name, which, again, is how 'Mizuki' is generally heard no matter how it's spelled.

Let's imagine for a moment, we get a new event that digs into Mizuki's past, and there are flashbacks where people say her deadname. People in-game would use a name for her (that she'd answer to) that we've never had for her before. It'd be bad! It'd be bad for the fandom to have that! Even well-meaning people might feel the need to attach it in some way when they talk about Mizuki. It'd make her (already well-navigated!) trans identity fully explicit at the cost of being cruel to Mizuki's character and of alienating trans fans who always knew that Mizuki of course has a deadname. One thing Project SEKAI does really well is helping people who think there aren't stories written about them to feel seen and feel loved, and teaching us Mizuki's deadname goes directly against that.

So, what are the alternatives. A lot of trans media does this fun thing of redacting a trans character's deadname, potentially with the word 'deadname', with blacked out text, or with a glitch effect, and yeah this game could try running with something like that, but I think the only other alternative is to redact Mizuki's deadname WITH 'Mizuki'. It's still Mizuki being referred to in the flashback so it's not going to call her something else, even though it's obvious to the reader that the name being spoken in-universe is, of course, not 'Mizuki'.

Anyway, thank you for reading!

[dpimagines]

Hot Date (Blind Date pt. 2)

First and foremost, I want to thank everyone for the amazing show of support for Blind Date! I've never received so much support and appreciation for a fic, EVER! Words cannot express how grateful I am.

SYNOPSIS: Your second date with Wade went well, so now it's time for the third. (And what could be considered the fourth.)

WARNINGS: Smut, reader has been cheated on in the past, everything else is standard Deadpool antics.

Your second date went just as well as the first — most of the words you asked for him to provide were swear words, hilariously enough. It’s not that you’ve never heard them before, though. You lose words if you haven’t heard them in a while, not to mention how loudly curses are often said. 

Now, it’s time for date number three, known in popular culture as the make-or-break date: you’ll agree (or disagree) to be exclusive, it’s socially acceptable to start having sex, all that fun (terrifying) stuff. You’ve had some casual coffee and lunch hangouts between your second date and now, but tonight will be your third official date.  

He doesn’t have any expectations, of course. He could tell from what you said on the first date that you’ve been hurt in the past.

 Who could bring themselves to hurt you? Wade thinks as he daydreams about your shy smile, your variety of laughters to offer him, your soft cardigans and sweaters, the silly faces you make at babies in public, and the sharp glares you give strangers when they stare at him for too long (oh, and the ones he gives them when he catches them staring at you.) 

He even finds his thoughts wandering to the way you speak to him — sure, you can’t pick the tones of the words, but your choice of them is all yours. You’re kind, clever, and honest in your words, in everything you do. 

Oh, shit, he realizes, his stomach dropping. I’m in love. 

You’d insisted on planning your date this time around, since he’d planned the previous two. You told him you’d be having a picnic and to make sure he dressed warm since fall is on its way and the nights are growing colder. He assured you that his healing factor made him run hot, but you insisted that he at least bring a jacket. 

He texts you, confirming you’re still on for dinner. You reply positively, but reading your text only has him missing your eclectic voice, or, rather, voices. Over the past few weeks, more and more of your words have been taken from him, but he still loves to hear the random country or British accent, the occasional shout… 

Your suggestive exclamations have completely faded from your vocabulary, interestingly enough. Wade may be softening up a little due to his relationship with you, but his more perverted side can’t help but wonder if it’s because you’ve started to prefer your imagination over what videos on the internet have to offer. Do you think about him? He definitely thinks about you, especially his hypothesis on the way you’d sound. Low, masculine grunts shifting to high-pitched, over the top whines and back, all for him.

Someone smacks him upside the head. 

“You’re daydreaming again. Why don’t you just go see her? She’s just as sickeningly obsessed with you,” Ellie complains, coming around the couch and plunking down on the opposite end. 

“Really?” he wonders. You’re super nice, sure, and you’ve agreed to continue seeing him despite, well, everything about him, but…

She rolls her eyes, smacking her gum. 

“Dude, yes. It’s annoying. She’s working right now, but I bet she’d appreciate the company. You remember where her office is, don’t you?”

Wade nods, getting up and taking off towards it. He has to keep himself from running, he’s so giddy. 

He knocks on your office door. 

“Just a minute,” you reply from inside. 

You open it, smiling once you realize who’s come to visit. 

“Hi, Wade,” you greet him. 

“Who’s that?” he asks. The voice with which you said his name is entirely unfamiliar. 

“Oh, I’ve been experimenting with AI voices,” you explain. “I figured it’d be WEIRD for you to keep hearing Ellie and Yukio say your name when it’s me.”

“A little weird, yeah, but it doesn’t bother me too much.”

You turn a little pink, your smile widening awkwardly. 

“Oh, you meant-! Yeah, no, that’d be kind of uncomfortable. I appreciate the effort. Sorry to bug you like this, I- Well, speaking of Ellie, she caught me daydreaming about you and told me I should just come see you.”

“Remind me to thank her later,” you reply. “It’s nice to see you.”

“It’s nice to see you, too, I mean, of course it is, or I wouldn’t have come, well, um…” He’s gotten better about talking around you, but he still trips all over his words. “Yeah. What are you up to?”

“I’ve actually had some down time today, so I’ve been working on-” You stop, grimacing as your happy blush deepens to an embarrassed one. You’ve lost the words. 

“Wanna show me?” he asks, grateful for the excuse to learn more about what you do. You nod, leading him to your desk. You sit down in the office chair and roll over, leaving him room to stand beside you. He looks back and forth between your monitors – on the one off to the side, a video of one of the Xavier’s School classrooms with subtitles by you; on the center monitor, a document with notes and practice questions. 

“A study guide,” he realizes, reading the title of the document. 

“Yes, a study guide,” you repeat. “Thank you. I noticed a lot of the students struggle when school starts up again, so I thought I’d take the time to put one together for the classes that don’t already have one.”

“That’s so awesome! Seems like you’re pretty busy, though. I’ll see you later, okay?”

“Okay,” you agree. 

And later, you do. Wade wanders around the courtyard looking for you, finding you sitting on a blanket with electric tealights spread all over it. The sun is just barely starting to set, but the extra light is nice nonetheless, not to mention how adorably romantic it all is. 

He jogs over to you, sitting next to you and finally taking in what you’ve put together. It has to be every kind of cheese known to mankind, like, eight different kinds of deli meat, and an insane amount of Club crackers, not to mention the strands of juicy green grapes curled in the corners, avocado slices, and even a pomegranate! 

“I’m sorry if it’s a bit much,” you tell him. “I was inspired by our conversation the other day about charcuterie boards and how we wish we could just eat them as meals. I also remembered what you said about your healing factor and how hungry it makes you.”

“No, no, this is perfect,” he breathes. No one’s ever done something so nice for him before. “Uh, there’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about.”

Your face goes pale, eyes widening. You’re bracing yourself for something, but what? Oh, no. You think this is going in the exact opposite direction from where it is. 

“No, it’s good, I mean, maybe. I just wanted to know if you were cool with the idea of us being exclusive. Y’know, not seeing other people? Going steady?” His elaborations get weaker as you stare at him, still wide-eyed. You lips part, and you…

You cackle wildly, gasping for air. You try to stifle it, holding onto his shoulder as the laughter completely overtakes you. Is the idea of being with him so humorous to you?

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you say once your hysterics wind down. “Wade, do you really think I’d be seeing anyone else?”

“Well, you’re very pretty… And nice… And funny…” he explains. “Why wouldn’t you be?”

“Well, one: I really like you. I’ve never felt so strongly about someone before. Two: you are the only one interested in me.”

“I just can’t believe that. Either thing,” he replies. 

“You better believe it, because my answer is yes, Wade, I’ll be your girlfriend.”

“Awesome, that’s… Awesome. Cool,” he stumbles over his words. He wants to say more, but you’re smiling so widely that he’s concerned for your cheek muscles. You’re even more beautiful to him when you’re happy.  It puts a lump in his throat. How can you possibly be interested in him? You’re not just devastatingly beautiful, you’re a good person. He tries to be, but he feels like the scum of the earth next to you. 

“I’m starving, let’s eat!” you playfully scold him, gesturing to the board. He takes in the platter once more, and finds his eyes watering at the amount of thought you must’ve put into this. “Well, you can’t eat with that thing on. Come on, it’s just us, and…” You trail off.

“Need help?” he offers. You shake your head. 

“Just feeling shy,” you admit. 

“No need to be shy around me, I’ve seen and heard it all,” he assures you. 

“I guess that’s part of the reason why. I can’t say the same,” you reply, your cheeks turning a little pink as your smile becomes sheepish. 

Wade finally takes his mask off, figuring it’s an equivalent exchange for your show of vulnerability. You grin, scooping some brie onto a cracker before adding a chunk of turkey and passing it to him. He gratefully accepts it, pulling you closer to him and pressing a kiss to your temple. He leaves his arm around you, and you adjust your posture, getting comfortable in your place by his side. You put together a cracker of your own. 

The two of you go on like that for a while, creating combinations of cheese and meat on crackers, some bordering on sacrilege, before he finally finds his words again. He always seems to be at a loss for words when faced with you. 

“I don’t mind, y’know,” he starts. “I mean, that you haven’t been in a lot of relationships and all that entrails. Sorry, I meant entails. I usually talk more about entrails.”

You giggle. 

“Are you sure? I just don’t want you to be bored,” you reply. “You’ve had a very exciting life so far. I like the simple things… Like picnics at sunset.”

“I’m learning to appreciate them a lot more. Don’t get me wrong, there’s definitely going to come a day when I drag you onto a beach vacation, or to an even swankier restaurant than De Luca, or whatever… But I like this, too. I like it a lot.” And I love you, he thinks. It’s way too soon to be saying something like that, isn’t it? “Besides, exciting doesn’t always mean fun. When we’re together, I have fun.”

“Me, too,” you agree bashfully. “What I was wanting to say before was that I think you’re beautiful. I like your face and your hands.”

“Kinda specific,” he remarks, trying to avoid the compliment. 

“They’re all I’ve seen. Well, other than your voice. I like that, too.”

“It sounds better coming from you,” he deflects once more, but you don’t fight him this time, instead blushing. “I like your voice. I know you don’t feel like it’s yours, but it is to me. The way you speak tells part of your story, just like an accent does.” He’s tempted to admit hearing your words in his voice satisfies his possessive streak, but despite how cute you are when you’re nervous, he doesn’t want to frighten you.

When you don’t respond, he’s worried he’s somehow done it anyway. He looks up from the platter to see your hand clamped over your mouth, a tear rolling down your cheek. 

“Fuck, Y/N, I didn’t mean to upset you, I’m so-”

You shake your head fervently. 

“That’s the nicest thing someone’s ever said to me about my voice,” you clarify, sniffling as you awkwardly chuckle, trying to laugh it off. “I’m sorry for getting emotional.”

“Never be sorry for that,” he insists, squeezing you closer to him. “The only thing I dislike about what you just said is that no one’s ever said something so nice to you about one of the things that makes you… You. I love you, so that really bothers me.”

Your mouth falls open, and once he realizes what he said, he wants to stick his foot in his. 

“I’m-”

“I love you, too,” you tell him. It’s all in his voice. 

Wade can’t help but kiss you. When it comes to you, he normally tries to be a gentleman and ask first, but the adoration in your eyes, the red tint to your cheeks, the hint of a smile on your parted lips… It’s all too much. You kiss him back just as eagerly, your lips moving against each other until you’re on your back with him slotted between your legs. You cling to him for dear life, your hands clutching his hoodie like if you let go he’ll float away. 

He can’t believe how good your body feels against his, his hands laced in your hair as your chests press together like your hearts are trying to touch each other. 

The two of you break for air, both with awestruck smiles and flushed faces. 

“Do you… Want some help with that?” you ask, face turning redder. He scrambles to sit up, suddenly aware of his pre-dick-ament. You sit up, too, though much more gracefully.

“Have you ever..? Sorry, I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable. I just want to do right by you.”

“Fair enough… I have, but only once. It didn’t go well. After that, it was just-” You pause, but he doesn’t offer to help this time, not wanting to rush you. You blow air out of your mouth. “Until I gained some self-respect and broke up with him.”

His jaw drops.

“Well, that’s not entirely true. He cheated on me and then I dumped him.” 

“Someone cheated on you?! I guess what they say is true, then – it doesn’t matter how gorgeous you are or what all you do for somebody, if they’re a cheating piece of shit, they’re a cheating piece of shit.”

Your smile is bittersweet as you respond: 

“At least I know I’m good at-” You blow air out of your mouth again. “Even if I don’t have practice with other things.”

“I believe you, but I’m not taking you up on it this time around. First time’s definitely going to be all about you. You deserve it,” Wade informs you. “And, uh, I think I want to wait a little longer before that,” he adds, surprising even himself. “Not that you’re not totally hot – I really like you and Little Wade does, too, but…”

“You don’t have to give me a reason. We should wait until we’re both ready,” you assure him, putting a comforting hand on his knee. He kisses you again, more chastely this time. 

“Thanks,” he says.

“I’d like some advanced notice, anyways, so I can make sure I’m adequately stocked,” you reply– flirtatiously, but in an intentionally goofy way based on the way your eyebrows waggle –tapping on your neck in the general area of your vocal cords. He can’t help but laugh at that, and you join in, making his volume double. 

“Don’t worry about that. I mean, if it’d make you more comfortable, go for it, but… I don’t need you to do that, seriously,” he insists. 

“Well, I’d rather not wail just because you kissed my neck and that’s the closest thing I have to an appropriate sound.” 

“Fair enough,” he concedes. “Now, let’s polish off the rest of this charcuterie board.”

“I can’t eat another bite. Have at it, I’ll just cuddle with you if that’s okay.”

“More than,” he assures you. You lean on his shoulder as he finishes it off. He babbles throughout, but eventually your lack of response becomes concerning. 

Wade turns his head to find that you’ve fallen asleep. He’d sit perfectly still all night just to make sure that you weren’t disturbed, but you had a point earlier. It’s pretty chilly, you could get sick if you slept out here without anything but your jeans and sweater to keep you warm. 

“Y/N,” he hums, stroking your face. You stir, face scrunching in distaste for being awoken. He giggles. “It’s time to head back in, cutie.”

“Fuck, you’re right,” you groggily grumble, though your tone doesn’t reflect that, reaching for the basket as you sit up. 

“I got it,” he says, gently batting your hand away. “Go on up to your room, I’ll meet you there once I’ve got this picked up.”

“Are you sure?” you ask. 

“Yeah, hon, I’ve got it.”

You get up from the blanket, ambling back to the house sleepily. Wade tosses the grape stems to the treeline hoping some bird or something will enjoy it before he pushes the board off of your picnic blanket. He folds said blanket, tucking it into its matching basket. He carries both the board and the basket back to the house, eventually catching up with you due to your slow pace. 

You open your door, and he follows you in. 

“Where do you want them?” he asks, looking around. Your room is cluttered, but not necessarily dirty or messy, just filled with things: pictures, curios, crystals, dried flowers… Pretty things. Fitting, he supposes, because it’s your room. 

“Where ever is fine. I’ll deal with it in the morning,” you answer. “Thank you.”

“Goodnight, Y/N. Thanks for dinner, it was great.”

“You don’t have to go. Just because we’re not sleeping together doesn’t mean we can’t sleep together,” you offer. “It’s late.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to intrude,” he says, kicking himself for giving you an out and appreciating himself for it at the same time. 

“Very sure,” you assure him. “I have some- Some tee shirts a man can wear.”

“Men’s?” he offers. You nod gratefully. 

“It’s what I usually wear to bed,” you explain, tossing him one before pulling another out of your dresser, shucking your pants and taking off your sweater while still turned around. Wade yelps, turning around himself. “It’s nothing you haven’t seen before,” you remind him. He swiftly gets into the tee shirt you offered him, feeling the heat in his cheeks. Even your back is pretty, goddamn it. 

“Haven’t seen you,” he says as he turns around, eyes still downcast as he joins you under the covers. 

“I didn’t think it’d be that big of a deal for you, I’m sorry.” 

“Didn’t you hear me earlier when I said I love you?” he half-jokes. 

“Yeah, I did, which is why I’m insisting on cuddling,” you declare. “I love you, too, and I want cuddles in exchange for it.”

“Is that so? I like sleepy you. She’s demanding, I’m into it.”

“Oh!” you squeak. “Not too demanding, I hope.”

“Not even a little,” he assures you, pulling you into his arms. 

It’s the easiest time he’s had falling asleep in a long time. Possibly ever. 

When he wakes, you’re still beside him, but you hover, propped on your arm as you gaze at him with downright eerie fascination. 

“Your scars move,” you say. “I didn’t notice it before, but it’s faster when you’re sleeping.” 

“Yeah, part of the whole cancer constantly fighting itself thing,” he mumbles, sheepish under your scrutiny, no matter how gentle it is. The next thing he’s hyper-aware of is the pain in his groin. 

You follow his gaze. 

“You weren’t exaggerating,” you remark, a smug, pleased look on your face. “Are you sure you don’t want any help with that? It doesn’t have to be a big deal.”

“How about tonight?” he offers. This is the second time you’ve offered yourself to him, so he doesn’t want to turn you down. It’s not that he feels pressured, though. Rather, he’s coming to terms with the fact that you really want him like that – not even just that you’re attracted to him, but you trust him that much despite being hurt so badly before in what was clearly a long-term relationship, maybe even your only one. “Is that enough notice?”

“Plenty. It’s a weekend, so I have all day to listen to-”

“Don’t wear yourself or your vibrator out,” Wade cuts you off, excited to inform you: “I happen to think of those as teammates, not competition.”

You smile, blushing. 

“Understood.”

“Is it alright if I go ahead and head out? I’m supposed to meet Logan and Laura for breakfast.”

“Of course. What time do you want to meet up later?”

“Do you want to get dinner first?”

“Shit. I’m supposed to have dinner with Ellie and Yukio, Yukio’s dads are in town and- Well, I guess that means I don’t have all day. How about seven, to give me time?”

“Sure, but-”

“I know. I want to, it’ll make me feel better.”

“If you insist. See you later, cutie.”

“Later,” you echo. 

Later rolls around and you have your headphones on. 

“Fuck me harder,” the voice actress whines. 

“Fuck me harder,” you echo, biting your lip at how illicit it sounds. Hopefully he likes it. You practice the little moans and gasps you’ve heard, making sure they sound right and aren’t too different from each other. 

There’s a knock at the door. Surely it’s him. You stop the audioporn track, setting your headphones and phone aside. You peek under your skirt at the black lace-trimmed panties you’re wearing. You don’t have much red in your underwear collection, so hopefully he’s happy with the mismatched set you’re wearing, your previously-mentioned black bottoms with a red bralette. 

You answer the door. 

“Wade,” you say, unable to hold back the grin on your face. He’s quickly become your favorite person with his outrageous sense of humor, his constant stream of new words for you to say– one of your favorites is chucklefuck, you even repeat it to yourself when you’re alone just to make sure you don’t lose it –his textured skin, his radiant smile, and… Oh, crap, he’s been talking, hasn’t he?

“I’m sorry, I got lost in thought. What were you saying?” you ask, cringing at yourself. 

“I was just saying that if you’re starting to psych yourself out, we don’t have to do this. Guessing I was right.”

“Not at all. I really want you,” the last bit comes out as a moan, and you remember the exact context in which you heard it. Maybe Brat Begs for Her Master’s Cock wasn’t a good decision, it was especially wordy – you’re probably going to have to sort that out of your vocabulary for the next week. You just wanted to make sure there was enough kink in your repertoire – Wade’s reputation precedes him. 

“Well, if you’re sure… Let’s get to it, I guess.”

“Are you sure?” you ask, concerned. He nods, and you pull him into the room, closing and locking the door behind him. “It’s been a while, how exactly do we get started?”

“Hm, a little something like this,” he hums fondly before pressing his lips to yours. You love the way he kisses, it’s so overpowering that it feels like nothing else exists, just him and you. You melt in his hands, needy little whimpers forcing their way out of you as they caress your jaw before wandering down to your waist, a few teasing, curious touches along the way driving you wild. 

His lips trail down to your neck and you gasp as his tongue swirls against your skin. 

“Not too long,” you warn him, the last word in breathless excitement.  

“Of course,” he assures you. “Can’t have a few hickeys ruining your reputation.”

You nod, and he places his next kiss in the curve between your neck and shoulder. He carefully introduces his teeth to the equation and your knees almost give out as a high-pitched whine leaves your lips. You clutch his back for purchase, and he leads you backwards into the bed, the two of you laying there together like you were yesterday evening. He’s right there between your legs and you can feel his excitement growing as you paw at him, needing to be even closer than you already are. 

He unbuttons one button of your blouse before looking to you for permission to continue. 

“Yes,” you agree, and despite the tone itself being over-the-top, he only smiles as he reveals your body to him. 

“Red,” he murmurs. “Just for me?”

“Just for you,” you concur, only the last word being a moan due to his interference. “You were supposed to let me say that,” you half-heartedly complain. He chuckles. 

“I kinda like it more when it’s in my voice. Reminds me that you’re mine.”

“I’m yours,” you agree. “I’m all yours.”

“You spoil me,” he replies fondly before pressing an open-mouthed kiss to your breast. He takes his time, not even pushing one of the thin cups aside until you’re whining and rocking against him. He flicks his tongue against your nipple and the sensation sends sparks through you. You arch into his mouth with the same high-pitched moan as before. He chuckles, switching to the other. 

You’re already shaking and you have no doubt that you’re embarrassingly wet. Hell, even last night’s makeout session, which hardly qualified as one, left your underwear damp. He urges you up, helping you out of your shirt. He goes to take off your bra, but you stop him. 

“You wanna stop?” he asks, his hand quickly making its way to cup your face comfortingly. 

You shake your head, nudging him off of you so you can take off your skirt. 

“Just for me?” he asks again, looking pleasantly surprised. 

“Just for you,” you repeat. 

“You’re so thoughtful. It’s one of the things I love most about you,” he informs you. 

“You can take it off now. Or them, whatever you choose.”

He snickers. 

“Let’s start with the bra for now,” he decides, reaching behind you for the clasp. He fumbles around, looking for it for a bit until you’re both laughing. You pull the bralette over your head for him. It then hits you then that you’re mostly naked and he’s mostly clothed. You pout, batting your eyelashes as you look him up and down. 

He gets the message and huffs out another laugh, getting off the bed to take off his shirt and jeans. 

Holy fuck, he’s ripped. If you weren’t bright red before, you are now. You should’ve expected it, what with his metabolism and super-strength and all that, but… Wow! 

“That bad, huh? I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“No,” you quickly disagree. “You look amazing.”

“You, too,” he replies, his eyes lighting up at the erotic tone of your last spoken word. 

“Come back,” you urge him. It’s getting to the point where every other word or so is a moan. He doesn’t seem to mind, if anything, he likes it. 

“Say it again. ‘Come.’”

“Come,” you reply, unamused. “You forgot the rules, didn’t you?”

“Oops,” he says with a giggle. “That’s alright. ‘Cause the next time you say that word, it’s gonna be because of me. It being in my voice will only be a reminder of that fact.”

You shudder, leaning back and opening your legs up a little more as a reminder that he should really rejoin you in bed right now. His nose twitches and his eyebrows furrow. 

“Wade?”

“I have… An enhanced sense of smell.”

“Oh, is it… bad? I mean, I took a shower and drank water and all that, but-”

“No, baby, you smell so good, just… Really strong, like...” He presses his hand to your most private place and you can’t help but squeak – between everything he’s said and done, the content you were consuming before his arrival, and how long it’s been… You’re unbelievably sensitive. “Baby, why didn’t you tell me?”

“What?” you ask. 

“You’re so… I like foreplay, sure, and you deserve it, but aren’t you getting frustrated? If you need me, you should tell me.”

Once you get over your breathlessness at the last thing he said, you explain yourself:

“I like what we’re doing. Why would I stop you?”

“Aren’t you aching down here?” he wonders, pressing his hand firmer against you for emphasis. 

“Oh, fuck, yes,” you tell him, a little embarrassed at the variation in your moans. 

He smiles, though, caressing your thighs in a teasingly gentle way.

“Then maybe I should go ahead and show you the real reason they call me the Merc with a Mouth. You’re not the only one who knows how to give a blowy.”

He hooks his fingers in your panties and drags them down your legs with your attempted assistance as you try to move them in helpful ways. He props your legs open before finally rejoining you in bed, this time with his mouth… Oh, his mouth, it’s…

A symphony of pleasured sounds flows out of you, some cheap and overexaggerated and some a little more realistic. 

“Good girl, tell me how much you like it,” he says, before returning his lips and tongue to you just as swiftly as they left. 

“I fucking love it,” you reply, gasping for air. “No one’s ever done this to me before.”

He’s got his face buried between your thighs, moaning and groaning as he tastes you. When your eyes aren’t clenched shut from pleasure, you see him grinding his hips into the comforter for friction. Holy shit, he really likes this, doesn’t he? 

Your legs are trembling uncontrollably as fire courses through your veins and you feel yourself getting higher and higher.

“I’m close, Wade, I’m gonna- Gonna come,” you tell him. He holds onto your thighs, keeping you right in place as you unravel, forcing you to take what he’s giving you. The sounds you’re making are chaos, you think, but you realize as you come down that that’s what he thrives on. 

“It’s too much,” you whine as you start to get overstimulated, when it feels so good it hurts. He hesitantly pulls away, panting a little himself. 

“How was that?” he asks.

“Amazing. Couldn’t- You- Tell?” 

He grins. 

“Wanna keep going?” 

“Fuck me,” you implore him. “Please.”

“Yes, ma’am! Let me see here…” he fishes in the pockets of his discarded jeans, finding a condom. He holds it up, and like a magic trick, the interconnected packets fall down, leaving you both with a whole ribbon of them. After tearing off one, he tosses the others onto the bed beside you. “I doubt we’ll go through all those tonight, but I’d appreciate it if you kept the rest in the nightstand.”

You nod, still catching your breath from the previous round as he rolls it on. 

“I’m gonna use my fingers first,” he informs you. You nod, your breathlessness now in anticipation of what he’ll do next. He gently pushes one inside you. It feels bigger than it really is as he carefully slides it in and out before curling it right against-

He smiles in response to your pleasured exclamation. 

“You sound so pretty, honey,” he hums, “Ready for another?” 

“Yeah,” you agree. He repeats the same motions as before but with a second finger. “Holy fucking shit, so good.” 

“We’re barely getting started,” he reminds you, but he doesn’t seem displeased with your eager sounds as he adds a third finger into the mix. 

“So full,” you moan. “I don’t know if I can take it.”

“You know just what to say, don’t you, baby? I know you can take it, though. You're such a good girl, aren’t you?” 

“I try,” you reply. 

“You succeed,” he confirms. “Do you still want-”

“Yes, please, I’m ready,” you cut him off, starting to get impatient. His fingers feel absolutely incredible, but you want more, you want all of him. You’ve never been so greedy before, but you just can’t help it. Just as you're his, he’s yours. No one’s ever really been yours before and you want to experience it for all that it's worth. 

“Alrighty, then. You should be careful, though — I’m trying to be all nice and gentlemanly and all that, but if you keep looking at me like that I might lose control.”

“Would that really be such a bad thing?” you half-flirt, half-wonder, propping yourself up to look at him once he removes his fingers from you. He’d never hurt you in a way that you didn’t want him to, not intentionally. Would it really be so bad for him to give in to his baser urges and just pound you until you cry and then some? You don’t think so.

“Oh, I get it, you’ve been holding out on me. I guess I should’ve known, the geeky types are always total freaks in the sheets,” he remarks. 

“I wanted to be gentle with you, too,” you explain. “I know you’re just as nervous as I am, just for different reasons.” 

“Not that different,” he admits. “Are you really sure?”

“Mhm,” you hum, trying to meet his downcast eyes. “I want you. Really… I’ve really never felt this way before.”

“Me, either. Don’t wanna fuck it up.”

“Then fuck me instead,” you tease, knowing he doesn’t like to linger on the deeper subjects for too long. 

“Sounds like a plan to me,” he agrees with a smile, lining himself up with your entrance. You’re really glad he used his fingers first, because there’s no way his member would even be close to fitting inside you if he hadn’t. He eases in, checking every inch or so to make sure you’re still comfortable. 

You're still propped up on your hands, your eyes flicking between his face and his dick as it sinks further and further into you. You lift one hand and bring his forehead to yours, your labored breaths intermingling as he enters you. You keep your hand on the back of his neck, stroking him — you’re not sure if the motion is supposed to comfort you or him, but it feels good. 

“Is it okay for me to move?” 

You nod into him, worrying your bottom lip with your teeth. It feels so good to connect with someone like this, to connect with him like this. 

He slides back and forth, it’s mind-boggling to watch something so large disappear into you. 

“You feel so good, baby, fuck,” he groans.

“You feel so good,” you echo, eyes scrunching shut as he picks up the pace. Your other hand rises from the bed and now you’re holding onto him as he thrusts, hitting that amazing place deep inside over and over again. You’re once again making mismatched sounds of ecstasy, his own grunts and groans working their way into your lexicon and making them even more diverse. 

He wraps an arm around you, helping you to stay balanced. 

“Touch yourself for me, sweetheart, I wanna feel you like that, please, please make yourself come all over my cock,” he nearly begs. 

“Yes, sir.” You remove your hand from where it was bracing on his neck, leaving the other draped around his shoulders as you start to stroke your clit. 

“Oh, fuck, shit, you-“ You feel him twitch inside of you. “Just a second, I… Oh, god.”

“You weren’t kidding,” you reply as he carefully pulls out, tying off and disposing of the condom before getting another one ready. 

“Honestly, I was, but- I mean, the refractory period is legit. I am so sorry, seriously, you- You just pushed a button that hasn’t been pushed in a while, goddamn, I- Say it again, please, if- If it’s not too much to-”

“Sir,” you repeat, grateful that he remembered the rules this time so you can elicit the right response from him. 

“There we go. Right as rain,” he says, jostling his re-hardened member in his hand comedically before rolling on a new condom. “Still-”

“Please,” you cut him off. “Please fuck me, Wade.” It’s all in his voice. You love the sound of his voice, but damn him for talking so much after you put all that effort into making sure you had a good catalogue for tonight! 

He cups your face and kisses you once again before entering you once more. You touch yourself as he thrusts in and out of you, no longer able to watch as your eyes clench shut — it’s everything you need and it’s too much. Fuck, it’s too much, you feel like he’s gonna break you, or you’re gonna break yourself. 

“That’s my good girl, you feel even better when you do that, squeezing around me just right,” he pants, continuing his erotic rambling. Every word gets you closer, even the ones you can’t process due to just how good this feels. 

“It’s- I’m- Come, gonna come again, oh, fuck, ah, please, Wade…” Your voice is steadily becoming more from him than what you watched earlier, but that only increases his fervor. 

“Love it when you talk in my voice, love the way you love me,” he replies, just as locked-in. That’s how he sees it? It almost brings you to tears in the best way, you’re so touched.

“Oh, god,” you murmur, just as he did before, but you really wanna scream it as you claw his back, desperate to cling to something physical as you reach the pinnacle of bliss. 

He stills as well, pushed as deep inside of you as he can go as you come down. You fall back into the bed, thoroughly worn out. 

He pulls out once more, repeating the same actions as earlier when taking care of the condom. He takes the unopened packages from beside you and tucks them into your bedside table. 

“Wanna go again?” he offers cheekily. 

“We don’t all have healing factors,” you remind him with a sigh. “Fuck, that was… Amazing.” 

“Was there anything you didn’t like?” he asks.

“No. What about you?”

“Getting overexcited and- Well, y’know.”

“I thought it was sweet,” you reassure him. 

“Anything you liked in particular?”

“What you said about when I talk in your voice,” you admit. “You?”

“I meant it,” he quickly says, like he’s scared you thought it was just pillow talk. “I could list a lot of things that I liked in particular, but I really- I loved it all.”

“Me, too.” you reply. You hold open your arms and he eagerly takes his place there. 

The two of you take a while to fall asleep, giddiness and excitement still buzzing in the air at your newfound love, but eventually you make it there.

[dcdreamblog]

The All-Star Squadron included heroes who came from a wide array of professions, social/economic classes, regional cultures (which was a much bigger deal back then) and ethnic backgrounds. And while most of them were cishet white men, some of them weren't. Likewise, many of them held religious/philosophical beliefs other than "mainline" Protestantism. Now, they were all heroes, dedicated to the common goal of fighting for justice, and etc. so I have absolutely no doubt that all of them were able to get over any prejudices they may have had and do the job, but we are talking about people who were mostly white cishet American men who were born in the first half of the 20th Century; I cannot imagine that none of them had prejudices, and that these prejudices caused friction. Can we talk about that?

You're right and I wish I had better answers to give you. But a few factors keep me from offering up a lot of clear or worthwhile examples.

The Squadron's members were really opaque, and their actual thoughts came AFTER the war through Tarantula's book "Altered Egos". He's one of the few heroes where we have a distinct and purposefully kept war journal of his thoughts and the thoughts of some of his comrades during and after the war. Most of the other heroes were really concerned with their secret identities and didn't write these things down for posterity, especially not their own bigotries and stumbling blocks.

The War gave everybody an incentive to face front and close ranks. Public schisms in the Squadron's membership basically didn't happen and arguments that occurred behind closed doors stayed there.

The Squadron was, for its age, a deeply, RADICALLY liberal organization.

(A propaganda poster of Will Everett Sr, The Amazing Man, punching Hitler in the face. Circa 1943)

It accepted a black man into its ranks without a single public disagreement. From its FOUNDATION a large chunk of its membership were women. The Squadron even intervened in the Detroit Race Riots in 1943 where Amazing Man publically eviscerated an android supervillain calling himself "The Real American".

I could sit here until the sun came up rattling off all the times that Squadron teams or its individual members smashed pockets of the Klan or the American Nazi Party, or the German American Bund and then dragged their ass in front of the papers to call bigotry and intolerance UnAmerican and damaging to the war effort. The Young All Stars publically celebrated a Japanese American member during the era of internment.

Any bigotry in the organization was imposed upon it from the outside. The biggest example I can think of is that Wonder Woman spent the war years officially listed as the JSA's "secretary" because the Society's membership was more heavily scrutinized and it wasn't possible for her to take what was technically a military position in what was technically a combat role.

What stumbling we do have evidence for is very, VERY slight. The Sandman voices some homophobic opinions during a case that lead up to his confrontation with the Phantom of the Fair. But by the end of that case file we read about Dodds going through an active epiphany about homosexuality because of that case.

The widest spread "bigotry" that seemed to be present in the Squadron was patriarchal language directed at its female members who were always in a position to safely and openly give as good as they got. We have a collection here at the Perisphere that is JUST photos of Liberty Belle elbowing Johnny Quick in the ribs!

It sounds absurd. It sounds too good to be true. It SOUNDS like a lot of things. But there it is, in black and white.

If you want me to undercut your heroes from the past, I would for the sake of intellectual honesty. But I can't.

The JSA are the superhero community's North Star.

Not just because they were the first. But because they have always been like that.

The only time I have ever even heard a RUMOR of UNCLE SAM cursing is a couple years ago when the modern Ray came out as gay and people started talking bad about him online.

The modern Shining Knight started identifying as Bigender and Sir Justin has gotten into fist fights over it.

Please just. For your own sake. Believe in them, they are maybe the only figures I can't bring myself to mistrust these days.

[unpredictable-easty]

Stree 2 From Feminine Gaze

Bollywood has always been known for its Masala movies. Though there has been a slight turn towards more serious topics these past few years, it is refreshing when one of these entertaining, silly, music-filled movies makes a presence in front of us. 

As a person who likes to dissect a show or movie scene by scene, Stree 2 is a good study. Though it can be classified as another Bollywood masala with a mix of horror thrown in for good measure, there are factors to it that my feminine gaze has caught, scenes that perhaps, if we delve deep into it, would show the societal position of women.

I am sure I would have missed a lot more things than I caught but I would still like to put focus on the scenes that have caught my attention.

Scene 1: In the beginning of the movie we listen to the conversation between the characters where they talk about how women have been leaving their small town for better opportunities. Though at first I thought it was normal but when we delve further in the movie, we find out that the women they are talking about, have supposedly left the town without informing anyone about their intention, they disappeared overnight and nobody heard from them after that.

This scene rankled me. It also shows a significant truth about society. Girls with ‘modern thinking’ somehow become this other creature in our society. They somehow become the enemy of society and their life or well-being becomes an unnecessary thing. So many girls disappeared in the middle of the night and the only conclusion drawn was that they left themselves, without any investigation or even a try at contacting them. 

This problem, when considered for longer, can show why crimes against ‘modern women’ may be dismissed so easily, as if they were not done against a living breathing human.

Scene 2: The scene when they get to know only women with ‘modern thinking’ are getting kidnapped and all the household ladies argue that they would be safe from the monster because they are not modern. 

Pankaj Tripathi points out that if women had social media if they were educated or they went out, all these things also make them modern.

This argument brings out the age-old situation of women themselves not realizing how they have benefited from feminism. Every generation there will be women who will scoff at feminists fighting for rights and they will not realize that whatever freedom they have at the moment came from feminists before their generation. And thus the cycle continues.

Scene 3: The biggest thing to watch for and observe is the way the monster ends up controlling the male population’s mind and makes them revert back to the thinking that is centuries old. 

Here’s a comparison to be made, in the first movie we can see that Stree haunts the village, that she takes away men in dark, she calls their names and if they turn, she takes them. At no point in time is there a difference in men’s societal position, no women tell them to stay in their home the whole day or lessen their importance in their household. While the first thing done to women when the monster controls their minds is just that, control over women in every aspect of their life.

 We can’t blame the male population over it of course but it's the symbolism of it all. One can always argue that the monster was created in that way but we have to remember that what happened in the movie reflects the real life that so many women still live.

It also reflects how women's freedom eventually ends up being an illusion and how it can be taken from them if they don't constantly fight for it.

There is another incident that made me laugh a lot. When JD says to Varun Dhawan, ‘You’re a werewolf, don’t behave like an Animal.’ I don’t think it will take a genius to guess what this was in reference to.

At the end, I would just like to say that this movie not only proved itself entertaining but it’s subtle nuances make it clear that the writers, directors, and the whole production team put a lot of brains behind its planning and making sure that there were a lot of messages that should not be missed. Perhaps if we had more movies like this, the old spirit of Bollywood would be back and we could be entertained while being aware of the social spirit that art should always carry.

[liquid-bonhomme]

wonder if its lily's racism showing through that one of the only middle eastern characters she has (tolrah thire) is a rude prudish bully whos only narrative purpose is to be mean to her poor little white sisters :(

Yeah, so, maybe I should explain this a little further-- the cultural context here. Because you're more on the money than you might realize, and I had no idea about this (I really can't stand combing through Lorch's fiction myself.)

Canada's Islamophobia's got some layers to it.

Brown people bad in general, of course.

9/11 was a bit of a bug deal here, too. We didn't go full "war on terror," but the suspicion and fear over what them spooky middle easterners might be up to.

Specific more to francophone culture (though it permeates a bit through to english Canada aswell a bit) the Islamic views on modesty are seen as offensive. French culture can seem . . . "Sexually liberal" even compared to english culture in a way anglophones have historically misunderstood as a tendency to sexual promiscuity. (See: Lily thinking we ACTUALLY kiss each other on the cheek, and we don't just peck the air two-three inches away from the face as a greeting.) When, it just isn't. Active acts of sexuality ARE considered sexual even in French culture, it's just, a lot of passive ones in other cultures aren't. Breastfeeding in public is not considered nearly as scandalous, for example. On top of that is just general cultural projectionism that permeates fracophone politics both in places it is very much justified, and places it isn't. And though, I personally agree with the French perfective that certain things shouldn't be sexualized in the way they are in other cultures, I think telling women how to dress period is too far. Hijabs and burkkas are banned in Quebec, and I do feel that's deeply wrong.

You may have heard Canada is considered a "mosaic" culture? Well, the extremes of that were tested in the early 2000s when, during a now infamous legal battle in Canadian history, honor killings were argued in court to be a part of Islamic culture that should be protected. Now like, as someone who deeply values the mosaic culture concept, I don't think this is actually a rebuttal to that idea in any degree of good faith. The mosaic culture concept is predicated on a "live and let live" social order, and very obviously, inflicting harm and murder is entirely not conducive to that. The girl herself did not want to be honor killed. Duh. This is a non argument. However, this was how it was characterized in the press. And in the time period Lily and I went to school at least, this was a talking point they'd bring up in Social Studies class even.

All of these factors combined just deeply ingrained a viewpoint of Islam and Muslims as anti-western, anti-freedom, bigoted, prudish, religious extremists. And over time it just fucking expanded due to ignorance, as prejudices tend to do.

[thecoffeelorian]

Writing Test Run...

//...I would like, if possible, to get a slight peek into others' interests and preferences when writing a short story about vampires/Midwestern Gothic/minor pandemic horror, so.

Here is one rough draft of my short story's introduction, of which I hope you will rate in the poll below for my research purposes.

Thank you.//

Okay, first things first—I’m not gonna bite anybody as soon as I meet them. Not only is that the calling card of the Old Carpathians, but I also don’t share their ideology thanks to my beliefs being a lot more complex than mere “vamp supremacy”. So, if you can remember to keep from putting my name into any sentences with those nutjobs as the subject, I’d really appreciate it. Especially in the days to come. Second, by now, you’ve probably heard all of the stories about recent events, both the ones containing cold hard facts and the ones more along the lines of anti-social media rants. As I don’t exactly host my own conspiracy-theory laden podcast or support a single person who does, I’m not gonna give a shred of legitimacy to the stories that sound a lot more like tabloid fodder, let alone a lot less than actual news bulletins. Those are total bunk no matter what those Mortals insist upon, so I won’t think about them one moment longer. What I will do, however, is recall as many facts as I can so that others don’t have a problem figuring out what’s true and what’s false... so here goes. Yes, there was a virus that affected the clotting factor of the average person’s bloodstream, because not only is that same virus still ongoing as I write this, but I was also one of those previously infected. I can also say that yes, a high percentage of the global population—namely, an estimated 66.7% of all humans from 0-99 years of age—passed away from it before any significant research about treatments or cures could begin. We will mourn their loss, but not without celebrating their lives. For the ones still alive, however, I have this to say—no, not only are the Vampires among us NOT spreading this virus by feeding on the human race, but as of this day forward, any and all members of the First Communal Hall are hereby off limits to any dumbass looking to make a name for himself by trying to hunt them down. I say this because we’re currently working on vaccine development in a few secured locations in order to stop this thing in its tracks, so if you don’t want a front-row seat to the collapse of society, please remain calm, keep your weapons in storage, and kindly allow us to do our jobs. If you’re going to keep on being foolish, on the other hand, and have already decided to stir up a little trouble for whatever reason you've cooked up in your brain—let me say this. I’ve just learned how to defend myself, as well as my immediate social circle. I’ve also just learned how another person can be found dead in an alley with what will easily be written off as “normal animal bites” as their official cause of death. And if it ever comes down to having to act as a piece of toothy life insurance against anybody who comes after me and mine, please be warned in advance: You try to sink any of your teeth into me, be they long or short, I will not hesitate to do the same to you. After all, once a certain handful Vampires decided to band together and use a little of their own blood as an experimental treatment against this virus...something really interesting happened to me. I became one.

[monsterxmade]

@2kyears (Maurice) gets a starter based off this post.

Hunting solo was not Anya’s preferred way to feed (she much preferred family meals with Maurice or Celeste to accompany her) but it was a convenient skill to have learned, giving her a bit more freedom to hunt whenever she wanted without the touch of guilt that accompanied when she had to pull her parents away from tasks they seemed really preoccupied with. That little nagging guilt was why she didn’t ask Celeste to come when she decided she was ready for her next meal. She seemed pretty busy, at least to Anya. And Maurice had already left for work, wouldn’t be back until sunrise when it was too late. So, she set off on her own.

If only it were just social reasons that made Anya prefer to hunt with a partner instead of on her own. In a large part, it was. In fact, Anya considered it the main factor. She wasn’t used to having people to spend her time with and she liked to soak up as much of it as she could get, a part of her still half-convinced it won’t last, but also being out here by herself…it was still a little unnerving sometimes. Back when Anya was human, she roamed the streets alone for weeks after escaping her father. She’d wandered Columbus specifically for straying to procure enough supplies to make it to the next town on foot, always moving so her father couldn’t catch up with her so easily, picking a random direction each time so there was no predictability or pattern to her movements. She had been alone when someone else had caught her, cornered her, killed her. Vampirism had made everything sharper and clearer, just different enough that most nights she could ignore senses of familiarity but sometimes, she still felt like that little human girl when she was alone - helpless and terrified, lost and alone and unloved.

Tonight wasn’t one of those nights either though. Tonight just felt…off. There’s a low level of anxiety that churns in her gut, not unlike that which too often invades otherwise peaceful moments or keeps her up into all hours of the day, but it’s more…distant. Foreboding. A feeling she doesn’t know how to place. Briefly, she thinks about turning back. There’s nothing stopping her from changing her mind, from going back home and either interrupting Celeste after all or settling with a glass of cold blood but…no. She’s being ridiculous. It’s nothing. It’s been nothing since the moment she woke at the Tousaant’s mansion. If she ignores it, it’ll go away soon.

It doesn’t take her too long to find her prey and secure her meal, to glamour away fear and sink her teeth into soft flesh and supple veins. A quiet moan escapes her lips as blood coats her tongue. Anya never liked human food the way she likes blood, though the quality of her meals had always been a far cry from say, Celeste’s. Maybe she would have liked it more if it had been made with the same attention. She’d never know so she did a pretty decent job of not caring either.

Anya’s only about halfway done with the young woman she caught closing up a late night diner when that odd feeling of something wrong builds. Footsteps sound a little too close for comfort, something about them too familiar. She never heard these with vampire ears before, each noise so notable, but there’s a familiarity to the gait.

“Look at you.”

Instantly, her heart seems to still its beat, muscles pulling tight against her bones. Blood seeps from the corner of her mouth as it continues to spill but she fails to drink. Adrenaline makes her head spin, her thoughts fog over. Panic seizes every part of her. She doesn’t even notice when her blood sends that panic out along her bloodline like a beacon.

“When I let you continue on this little venture of yours, I never thought it would have such promising results. I simply wanted to see what you would do.”

Her head swivels in a quick blink of movement, unwitting and dazed meal forgotten, and fangs bare in an instinctual warning but as he takes steps forward, fearless, Anya takes steps back, trips, falls. She can run. She can fight. With vampire blood in her veins, she is stronger than her father now, but in his presence, faced with his quick approach, she forgets it. The eyes she sees in the mirror every day lock onto their match as a fascinated grin spreads on Aris Calwyn’s thin lips. Suddenly, she is not Anya Calwyn-Toussant, blessed or cursed with vampire speed and strength and formidable even in her own right. Suddenly, she is just Anya Calwyn, three years old and gripping a knife in both hands just to keep ahold of it, watching tears fall as cracked lips whimper their steady pleas. She is five years old and every breath hurts as she’s left alone to heal from the punishment her first attempt at escape bought her. She’s seven. She’s nine. She’s twelve. The scars on her skin grow in number and the blood on her hands is thicker and thicker with each victory she claims in order to keep herself alive. She can’t fight because her father will always win and the pain he will inflict is more than she can bear. She cannot run because no matter where she goes, he will be there. Fourteen years of experience has carved a single sentiment deep in her heart: there is nothing she can do to stop her father.

He kneels in front of her, takes her jaw in his fingers to look at her fangs, and all she can do is stare as crimson tears blur her vision.

“Amazing. But playtime’s over now, my little monster. It’s time to come home.”

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Sarah Prager for LGBTQ Nation:

One hundred years ago, queerness was illegal in just about every way in the U.S. There were laws against cross-dressing and sodomy, being trans or queer was classified as a mental illness, and it was legal to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity. At the same time, there was a thriving underground subculture of balls, drag shows, and salons.  During the Harlem Renaissance and blues craze, queer people were open in their own circles, but organizing politically for equality was not in the collective consciousness. The community centers, groups, and newsletters that would become the foundation for the fight for equality wouldn’t come around until the 1950s.  

In Berlin, however, where there was a booming queer scene, Magnus Hirschfeld began the official movement for LGBTQ+ rights. He founded the first organization for LGBTQ+ rights in the world — the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee — in 1897 and the world-renowned Institute for Sexual Research in 1919.  A man who would follow in Hirschfeld’s historic footsteps was born in 1892 in Bavaria, and in 1913 he emigrated to Chicago, where his name became Henry Gerber at Ellis Island (sources disagree on his birth name). He would go on to found the first gay rights organization in the United States after being briefly institutionalized for homosexuality in 1917.

Gerber returned to Germany from 1920 to 1923, when he served with the U.S. Army in the wake of World War I. There, he was in contact with Hirschfeld and learned more about what gay rights advocacy could look like, including subscribing to some of the first LGBTQ+ publications. He returned to Chicago determined to start a parallel effort in the U.S. He spent a year recruiting founding members, and on December 10, 1924, he filed with the state of Illinois for the incorporation of a nonprofit organization called the Society for Human Rights. The state granted him a charter on December 24, officially marking the first LGBTQ+ rights organization in the United States. Sodomy remained illegal in Illinois until 1962 (when it would become the first state in the nation to repeal its antisodomy law), and Gerber and his group could not claim they were advocating for crime. As such, the stated purpose was broad: “to promote and protect the interests of people who by reasons of mental and physical abnormalities are abused and hindered in the legal pursuit of happiness which is guaranteed them by the Declaration of Independence and to combat the public prejudices against them by dissemination of factors according to modern science among intellectuals of mature age.”

Gerber began to publish the first known gay publication in the country, Friendship and Freedom, which only had two issues. Dissemination of queer content through the postal service was illegal under the anti-obscenity Comstock Act, so readers were limited. But Hirschfeld did receive a copy, as did Harry Hay, who would go on to co-found the gay rights organization the Mattachine Society in 1950. Hay said receiving that publication directly contributed to his creation of that group, which was the first openly LGBTQ+ group in the country. There were seven founding members of the Society for Human Rights, including the group President John T. Graves, a Black clergyman. The vice-president, Al Weininger, ended up having an inadvertent hand in the organization’s swift end.

Weininger was married with two children, and one of his family members (some sources say his wife, others his daughter) reported to a social worker that he was part of a group of “degenerates” just seven months after the organization formed. Police arrested Gerber, Graves, Weininger, and others. Other than Gerber, the fate of the rest of the members has been lost to history.  Gerber was released after spending his life savings on his defense across three trials and losing his job as a U.S. postal worker. The police confiscated all of his papers, and zero copies of Friendship and Freedom exist today. 

America’s first gay rights group was founded by Henry Gerber in 1924, and it was named Society For Human Rights. Gerber also published the first gay publication in the USA, called Friendship and Freedom. The publication’s distribution was limited under the Comstock Act.

We are learning more and more about the pre-Stonewall-era of LGBTQ+ history in America by the year.

[dearweirdme]

https://www.tumblr.com/dearweirdme/757099430517309440/when-i-said-earlier-that-this-shows-promotions?source=share

Hahahahahah! Sure will scold if it reaches to that. Just kidding but point isn't only about jokers. It's aslo about armys in general. We are really expecting rational thinking from people which I'm sorry to say is not a cup of tea for everyone. Leaving aside a few, don't ask but observe how fandom responsonds to these two ships and these three in general. This may offend some people but majority of fandom is sheeps here. If company shows them taekook are not longer close they believe it, no one bothers about weird angle and set captions. It's not even about believing them as couple but if such a beloved pair seems distant on screen and together backstage there must be something wrong with what is portrayed. Right? But all of these are cult talks for them. Company tells them jkk are always together, share cars and stuff, now this narrative floats and people think it as nature's law. But there is another factor i.e. Taehyung. He is shown to be aloof and not caring of members especially Jungkook. Remember wings tour and JK's injury. Perfect set up for hate. See these things may look small and insignificant but the consistency affects you subconsciously. Result is Tae is most hated and gets the harsher treatment, Jungkook is always hyped but can't get above BTS and Jimin is an angel who needs to be protected.

It's not like JKk became this cult in a day. They were as normal as any other ship (obnoxious yes, but normal). In fact at a time, it was tkkrs who went beyond limits trying to prove their ship when content was lacking in comparison. But this subtle but constant feeding by the company created this cult what we see today. Why do you think most armys prefer Jkk and can come out as Tae anti. Nobody joined fandom deciding this. Now, how does this effect beside member getting hate? They will always move for someone who think is a victim. It affects others image outside fandom, affect charts and opportunities in the long run. Now in this case you decide who is their perceived victim. Why do they do this? Because they want to feel good about themselves. Classic psychology 101.

You may say but a large part of the fandom is not on social media and stan Twitter are more voiced but sorry to say in today's world most voiced is most heard. No one has time for truth. The way armys are working for Jimin they should have worked for everyone. If someone comes and tells me, but every member gets hate, yeah, but not like Tae, I am sure everyone has seen the demo recently.

My whole point is no one gets bersek, they are made like that when they are promised to be fed which company always been doing it and unfortunately Tae will be set up for more hate. I also understand your point that it is an individual responsibility to check themselves but people really understimate external influence and mass opinions.

Sorry for the long text wall but I just wanted to keep my point how company is marketing without thinking of consequences it brings for some of its members or maybe knowing that (who knows with them).

P.S. I don't know if you have ever read works of Daniel Kahneman. He got nobel prize for theory of irrationality which sounds obvious but people understimate it.

Hi again anon!

Let me preface this by saying I am fully convinced that Jk and Jm are genuine close friends. I've gotten a lot of asks from Jkkrs and neutrals (presumably neutrals...?) talking about how us mentioning company content is automatically undermining Jm and Jk's friendship. It is not. Everyone who has watched reality shows (outside of bts fandom) knows how a narrative can be created. Everything we see in offical content has been a choice, even backstage footage we've seen has been a choice. To think that BH isn't aware of that, or chooses to not follow those tactics is naive. There's things they want us to see and there's things they do not want us to see. They show us more Jkk because that is what they want us to see, they show us less Tkk because they don't want us to see.

So I agree with you that there's a certain idea they wanted to get across. I am pretty convinced the company wanted us to believe Tae and Jk were distant. I am very convinced that they never were. I'd even go as far as to say the company is glad that Jkk balances out Tkk in a way. I'd not go as far as to say they want people to actually believe Jk and Jm are together.

The way I've always seen it is that I think they company gives the incentives, and lets fandom take over from there. They pair Jk and Jm up, they focus on them, we get a lot of JmJk moments.. so it's easy for Jkkrs to build on that. I don't actually feel that Jk and Jm have a romantic feel about them, and I think outside Jkkrs people would agree. So basically I think the company just counts on Jkkrs to do the hard work here.

I do blame the company for how it turned out. I think it's safe to say that the extreme hate Tae gets comes from how they've handled this. Tae is called an attention seeker, a leach, a queer baiter.. all sorts of things, and that comes from people believing Tae and Jk aren't actually as close as they are. I think people hating on Jm also comes from the same root. Because Jm does get a lot of hate from Tkkrs who have picked up on how hurt Tae got by seeing Jkk at times. It is certainly unfair and I think it has caused a lot of damage. It is no wonder that Jk is so protective.

I agree that the company wants this ship to thrive. It's good for business. They have a duo with great, genuine chemistry... and they definitely make use of it. I agree that they should have put more boundaries on it though, because I think at this point it has gone too far and it actually hurts Tae, Jm, and Jk. I'm not sure if they can put a stop at it though, unless they would say to Jm and Jk.. no, you can't do this and you can't do that, because Jkkrs have to be put to a hold. I think Jm and Jk wanted to do the travel show, and I do not want them to hold back because of some insane part of fandom. I believe Tae, Jm and Jk would have talked about things like this, and I think they put their friendship and freedom to interact as they want before fandom. Imo, that's how it should be.

Having said that, and yes I'm being glass half full here, I fully expect the travle show to have continueous debunking moments. That is basically what we always see. Jkkrs are going to brush over it ofcourse. But I fully expect to see mentions that point out how Jk and Jm are just friends. Close, connected, cuddly, caring friends.. but friends indeed.

[prettyoddfever]

hi! there’s a poem that brendon supposedly posted in august 2008 on “dylan’s myspace” that a lot of fans call “the summer poem” and i was wondering if you could confirm if he wrote it or not. i know you touched on the fact that there were a lot of fake accounts made around that time, but this specific poem has always felt more genuine than other posts and the writing style fits his tone. i’ve always really liked it, but i was never 100% sure of its validity. thank you!

ok so I had to google this to see what the "summer poem" was and I found this tumblr post, which had this link at the bottom:

and that links to the dilloncornbreadandchicken myspace as the source of that poem, which explains everything.

So towards the end of the Honda Civic Tour (and shortly after Pete Wentz got married), one of Pete's dog Hemingway's supposed extra myspace accounts posted a bulletin that said “it would make me happy if you would add my buddy dillon. here's his myspace" and linked to the dilloncornbreadandchicken account. The fact that Dylan's name was spelled wrong and she was misgendered was a little weird. Also, Hemingway's real account didn't post anything about this. (Side note: Yes, Panic's myspace got hacked around the end of the Honda Civic Tour, so even the legit myspace accounts could occasionally do something unusual. Also can I please just complain that the hackers could have posted some highly entertaining stuff "from Adam" on Panic's myspace if they'd had any imagination. Like we all know what's going on, so why not just do something absurd for a laugh).

But the dilloncornbreadandchicken account seemed questionable on its own anyways. Keep in mind that a lot of fans were obsessed with the idea that Brendon & Shane were dating... like a lot of the Ryden enthusiasm got channeled there in 2008 because at least it still implied that Brendon was into guys.

Some random things that seemed odd to me:

Several of the pictures on that myspace were absolutely not Dylan. Similar looking dog, but definitely not her.

One of the songs that played on Dillon’s profile was “Ur So Gay” by Katy Perry.

The account said things like "yea i have 2 daddys... out of the ordinary? daddy brendon and shane both take excellent care of me.”

Many girls had convos with the “Shane and Brendon” who ran that myspace. That account was also very active with replying & commenting on other's profiles. June was still a busy month for the real Brendon, who was finishing the Honda Civic Tour (and doing a lot of publicity/media stuff) and then getting ready for Europe.

In July (while the band was still in Europe), fans asked Shane about Brendon's comment to Kerrang about how the last time he cried was when he heard that Dylan ran away for a few days. Shane explained that Dylan was living with his parents while Panic was on tour, and that she'd run away on a nearby golf course to chase rabbits for a few days. Shane also apparently seemed confused when a fan at the Astoria show told him she was friends with Dylan on myspace.

There were a ton of fake myspace & facebook accounts for everyone in PATD over the years. Some of them even managed to spell Brendon's name right. But Brendon just would not be talking to fans on myspace like that (or even be on myspace at that point period). The band had stopped doing even basic journal updates by 2008, but even in 2006 Brendon & Ryan had put a lot of distance between themselves and fans, and we heard from them less & less. The guys didn't even run their band's social media in the Fever era. This whole episode reminded me of how in late 2006 many middle school girls swore they'd been talking to Ryan on AIM and he'd shared secret lyrics with them, and I was like omg common sense please.

The person who wrote that "summer poem" sounds like a school schedule still factored into their awareness, and they're possibly trying to make a subtle connection to Brendon's old part_time_lovah livejournal account. I stopped paying attention to the dilloncornbreadandchicken myspace after seeing so many big fans similarly conclude that it was fake, so I don't remember much about the poem. I'll only say that it should be regarded with some suspicion... even just posting a poem anywhere online like that would have been very out of character for Brendon. (For context, that poem was posted while Brendon was busy being a tired, sick, sweaty mess on tour in Asia and the band was heading to Australia next).

[nailsandkeyclicks]

The Hidden Struggles of Mood Swings

Mood swings are sudden changes in a person’s emotional state. These shifts can be triggered by various factors, including mental health issues and physical conditions, affecting both males and females. It's ironic how society has evolved in its perception of such issues. In the past, they were often ignored, but today they are widely acknowledged and even joked about through memes and social media.

While it’s easy to find information about mood swings online, is it really that simple to address them? About 90% of women experience some PMS-like symptoms before their periods, with the severity of these symptoms varying from month to month. These symptoms can worsen or improve with age.

Hormonal shifts play a significant role in mood changes, particularly in females who experience these shifts more frequently during menstruation, pregnancy, and menopause. These changes can lead to significant emotional fluctuations, impacting daily life and interactions.

Personally, I believe that while 90% of women suffer from hormonal shifts, only 10% can comfortably express their feelings about it. I’m among those who struggle. As a 20-year-old woman, I deal with the challenging cycle of menstruation and mood swings, which affects not only my well-being but also my relationships. I often have negative thoughts about myself, my present, and my future. Despite trying various methods like healthy eating, exercising, meditating, journaling, and opening up to close friends, nothing has significantly helped. In some cases, these efforts have even strained my relationships. I've been stuck in this cycle for 2-3 years now.

Experiencing hormonal changes for at least three weeks—before, during, and after a period—is honestly dreadful for me. Women are often more emotionally vulnerable compared to men and tend to overthink, which can lead to feelings of insecurity and under confidence. This impacts both our professional and personal lives, creating more anxiety about our goals and achievements. This anxiety fuels overthinking, perpetuating the cycle.

I don't want to ruin any more relationships or overthink random, improbable situations. I just want to live a normal life, present in reality, enjoying the small things, and noticing the little moments that make life beautiful. I want all the hustle and bustle in my mind to stop because it has started to hurt me internally. I will never stop striving for peaceful happiness, having fun, and not missing out on the things that bring me joy, want to desperately fix my relationship. Writing helps me feel heard and understood, even if anonymously. It is a step towards finding inner peace and enjoying life’s simple pleasures.

Being from India, finding discreet solutions to this big issue is very challenging. Seeking help without anyone knowing or judging is difficult. I am not well aware of the available resources, nor do I have the privilege to seek professional help. However, what I can do is write about it and express myself anonymously, knowing that I have shared my feelings somewhere with someone.

I am just a girl!