#have we really moved so far back

[catsbootleg]

not people getting mad over an amazon prime commercial just because a lady has facial hair

god forbid people have hair (a perfectly natural, human thing) on their bodies, am I right?

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

End of Empathy (time for violence)

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[jaguarys]

For the record I don't think the Sannin had some sort of dramatic falling out. I think they grew apart in a way that they almost didn't notice. I think they found different interests, different people, and no matter how much they told themselves they were still as close as they'd always been they weren't. And I think it was a process of continually realizing these people aren't who you idealized in your mind; that they are maybe, kind of, sort of bad people; that they have done things you can't ignore, and that, maybe, they are your enemies. But there's no closure there. There's no sense of relief to be gained. Because you love them. You love them more than anyone in the world–– more than your students, more than your spouse, more than your family, more than your village. They know more about you than anyone ever will or ever could. They hold pieces of you, not only in your knowledge, not only in your youth, but in your soul, because they are one-third of it. You know them more, and less, than anyone could, and definitely more than you should

[waitmyturtles]

Your post about your upcoming Bad Buddy meta got me thinking about Bad Buddy (again), and I remembered one particular thing that had an impact. Apologies if this is long and rather incoherent, I wrote this past midnight.

In the final episode, the part where we see Ming and Dissaya turn a blind eye to Pat Pran's shenanigans really struck a chord with me.

[I'm an Indian, born and raised, and queer, but it's well worth mentioning that my experiences are not universal- in fact, they may be the exception rather than the rule; I'm not quite sure.]

What it reminded me of was, that asian parents tend to come around eventually- in particular mothers. We've seen time and time again in series' that deal with difficult/not accepting family members; Bad Buddy, GAP, Wedding Plan, maybe even Double Savage (haven't watched this one but I believe the dad feels bad in the end?), that even if the parental figure(s) doesn't agree with their children's choices, they learn to compromise. Because the difference in opinions isn't worth losing their children over. Obviously, for every parental figure that comes around there's one that the children cut ties with (Wedding Plan remains a good example), but I think it's something worth seeing.

It made me think of how I was never scared of coming out to my mother, because I knew that, despite the difference in views, and her prejudice, she'd accept me, no matter whether she thought it was a phase or not.

Do I know what the point of this ask is? Not really, I was rather nervous sending this ask, especially not on anon, but I'd love to know what you think of this, since I've come to really enjoy reading the thoughts you have on these shows.

Ohhhh, wow. @starryalpacasstuff, come 'ere for a big mom hug! HUGE HUGS!

I'm gonna unwind a little randomly; I hope this is coherent. A ton of what I write about on my blog vis à vis Asian dramas are the unique characteristics of Asian families and an Asian upbringing. Parental conditional love, competitiveness, our unique experiences with intergenerational trauma. I write a lot about how Asians, in our cultural expectations of life, accept pain and suffering as an assumed part of our existences. The reason why I watch Asian dramas exclusively is that, as I'm Asian-American, I just connect far more easily to the Asian cultural experience of growing from a child into an Asian adult, than I do the experience of white Western folks growing into their adulthood. I grew up intimately with Asian cultural practices and expectations; but I also grew up with racism in my external American world, and came to my adulthood in a society that still values white Americans above all other demographics.

But one thing I'm cognizant of, that I don't think I write about enough, is that many of these characteristics of the Asian cultural scopes of life are indeed similar to those that a fully American person (for example) might experience. It's not like intergenerational trauma doesn't exist in the West. It's not like homophobia in families against a child doesn't exist in the West.

However. As an Asian-American, one thing I note about many (not all, of course) Western families and family systems is that very often: Western adults will give up their agency to be loyal to what I might call a "higher power" -- a philosophy, a political preference, a religion. If a queer person wants to come out in a conservative American family, that queer person may very well be risking cutting permanent ties with their family.

That, of course, also happens in our Asian family systems. But I think you're onto something, @starryalpacasstuff. While divorce rates are sky-high in the West -- there is also a paradigm of family systems being and looking different in the West than they do in Asia. Asian family systems still don't accommodate for divorce and blended or chosen families as they do in the West.

The Asian family systems and paradigms that you and I grew up with as Indians absolutely still value a heterosexual two-parent household -- and I'd posit that our past generations, our grandparents and great-grandparents, put HUGE, HUGE pressure on our parents to keep the two-parent family systems together and whole. And to keep the children close. It's a huge value in our Asian cultures to have whole and complete families. The West has become far more accommodating, culturally, on this issue.

And, so. I totally agree with you, @starryalpacasstuff. I think we do see the beginning of a coming-around on the parts of Ming and Dissaya. And that coming-around is certainly something we can relate to. Our parents will likely accept us for our differences. I fucked a lot of shit up with my folks when I decided to live independently of their desires -- and I don't think things really healed (and I still carry tremendous traumatic baggage) until after I had my own kids, and expanded all of our families. Because in the end, the value in our Asian cultures is that keeping the family complete and close still matters more than any one's individual biases or desires.

Ming and Dissaya are remarkably traumatized people. Ming was traumatized by the expectations of his father. He screwed Dissaya over, and literally handed his trauma to Pat on a silver platter, for Pat to embody for most of his life. And Pat flipped that platter over in his father's face and ran away. Ming, at the end of the series, is passive-aggressive with Pat, despite Pat's efforts to try to work with him. And yet -- Ming still sips Pran's scotch.

To your point -- does time heal everything? I'm not so sure in the West, with the Western predilection for Christian/Puritanical/conservative values to supersede reasonable family resolutions. But I think, because of the value that Asian systems put on having complete families, that you are right -- that there may be more room in Asian family systems for eventual acceptance of a child's "differences," despite us living in collectivist societies. This is definitely not an absolute. There are environments in which it's still dangerous to come out. But the value that Asians put on family does indeed give us a tiny bit of comfort that our cultures can move the needle on acceptance in different ways over time.

[dayurno]

[lecliss]

Sakura gets a second point for being the first to complete the tree climbing at being better at chakra control, but at the same time it just feels like she was made good at it so no extra training segment time would have to be put into her getting good at it and it can be all about Sauce and Nart. Idk that feels too pessimistic but also could totally be true.

[running-in-the-dark]

ooooh. we got an apartment!!!

the house isn't completely finished yet so we can't move in until April. we'll have to figure that out. but that's fine. it's in the town where my husband works! which is amazing.

[unmanageably]

im off the thought that most of these warriors losses are due to coaching decisions (wrong lineups) and bad luck (injuries, dray out so no defense, random nba players turning into steph curry on the 3 line— grizzlies 3rd unit hitting TWENTY 3s on them today????) but today’s loss was just so indefensible and bad that its actually hilarious. the silly and stupid and pathetic 18 turnovers, icing out klay completely— just no one at all on the warriors trying to find him i mean 5 attempts until the 4th quarter are you serious— and then sitting steph and trying to run a “save us klay” lineup with 6 minutes left in the 4th when he’s ice cold due to your own offense choices its just very very hilarious. TJD butter fingers and Podz too many attempts not enough shots and a shit ton of fouling lol not their best game but i also think theyre just rookies and honestly have put a lot on their shoulders due to just. everything thats happened this year lol.

there’s things out of our control that we could be mad about (our lack of calls as usual and the 5v8 i mean the amount of FTA the grizzlies got esp considering we got to the paint more than they did so thats just ridiculous lol) but at the end of the day they didnt play hard enough and severely underestimated the grizzlies due to their injuries which was just. so so pathetic like whatever this loss the warriors truly did this to themselves

[moshieee]

Is mosh-mosh going ti stay around on the blog?

Oh yea definitely

I've been having a lot of fun drawing mosh-mosh in no small part because what they represent for me

It's a bit uhhh, personal and is mostly relevant to my mutuals and other friends I made...

so I'll put it in the tags Incase you don't want to read

[01tsubomi]

i'm taking the jlpt this sunday and had a stress dream last night abt it bc it sort of snuck up on me and now it's kind of a question of how much my actual japanese abilities will carry me (versus if i should've been cramming on flashcards this past month) but the listening portion is far simpler conversation than my coworkers and i have so. i think that maybe instead of "damn i should've been studying japanese" my perspective should just be "i speak japanese"

[the-physicality]

.

[mwagneto]

okay google how do i move out of eastern europe but stay in the eu but go somewhere i speak the language but somewhere that has healthcare and somewhere where i dont need to become a construction worker and also somewhere that is not germany. thanks

[harmonizewithechoes]

It’s my middle child’s 3rd birthday today 🥺

3 years ago my partner was deployed overseas and couldn’t come home for the birth because the military didn’t want to spend so much time quarantining their soldiers. Fortunately I had help as my parents were watching my son (at the time just a month shy of 2) for a few days before my due date and we had moved across the street from my partner’s parents when we found out about the deployment. So I had his mom with me at the hospital holding up her phone while we got to have a rare video call with my partner as we welcomed our daughter into the world after a very quick labor. I then had two months with our two very little kids by myself before he came home. It was an incredibly hectic time and I’m still not quite sure how I was able to get through all of that but here we are with the sweetest little 3 year old (let’s call her C) we could have asked for 🥰

C loves to play dress up and she has specific characters she’ll play as where you can’t refer to her as her name or she’ll get mad. She’s not C she’s Dr C or Baby or Baby Kitty or Princess Bucket (this was her first character and yes she does put a bucket on her head as a crown). Her favorite game to play is hide and seek and she loves dance parties and drawing and she’s obsessed with her 1 year old sister. We love C so much and I’m so excited to see how she grows and changes and learns over this next year ❤️

[nachosncheezies]

Thinking about season 8 (my beloved 😍) and something in how the awkwardness and trauma and DISTANCE after resurrection was a perfect tool to keep everyone themselves. Mulder could've been overprotective, overbearing, overinvolved, borderline obnoxious about the whole pregnancy thing. I think that if he was there the whole time it would've been a very fine line to walk, story wise, to do that without taking away from Scully as an individual. Scully in the field, Scully being a rebel, Scully doing whatever the fuck she feels like. Not to say it wouldn't have been interesting if they had successfully navigated that interaction between his guilt complex/overprotectiveness and her fierce independence. But the tension between Mulder saying 'Scully no' and Scully saying 'Scully YES' and mulder saying '...okay Scully you are my partner I support you' but watching her like a damn hawk was something they had kind of resolved and moved on from after the cancer arc and esp after Emily. By taking Mulder out of the picture she was only mother henned by people she would always have said 'thank you for your concern, get rekt' to. They set her up to go through most of it without the one person she MIGHT listen to hovering beside her, and sidestepped trying to figure out who desk job Scully would be in a world where Mulder is still chasing monsters. They didn't have to figure out who monster chaser Mulder would be in a world where he wouldn't call his partner for backup when something really cool or scary was going on. Scully didn't take a desk job or play it safe. Mulder only had to go fetch her and send her home once, and it was after she had already conceded to her doctor (but then, just like we'd expect from either of them, she went back to the lab to help save her [other] partner. And he knew recognized it and recognized that this was her and said okay I'll get it done. It was good for a one-time. Probably not good for a whole season) We never had to watch them have that fight.

[the-acid-pear]

the more i think about kris the more my insanity increases tbh there's just so much nuance with not only them but also the player and their relationship and it's layes upon layers of them and i keep tryin to peel them off inside my brain and its going to turn me into a dc villain or something

[nerdie-faerie]

Been trying to move my stuff out of my friend's flat since Monday and have had no such luck. We were hoping to finally get it sorted today but that doesn't seem possible so now we gotta try wait until Saturday unless we want to carry on moving everything box by box on the buses