#how to change language in facebook

[mokubetech]

Want to change the language on your Facebook account? In this video, we'll show you step-by-step how to change the language settings on Facebook. It's super easy!

[lucifer-is-a-bag-of-dicks]

hey 12 Angry Men is free to watch on youtube rn (hopefully everywhere and not just in my country) and I recommend every single one of you watch this piece of cinematic history because it is. quite frankly. fucking alarming how relevant it still is

it's also just an absolute banger of a film

if you've never heard of this gem, it's about 12 jurors deciding the fate of one young man who is accused of killing his father, 11 jurors believe he's guilty, one juror thinks it's possible he could be innocent, what follows is an hour and a half of one compassionate man gradually breaking down racial and class prejudice to change the minds of everyone in this room one by one

this is a movie from 1957 that if made today would be considered Aggressively Woke

the rants of the most ornery and small minded characters could be quoted word for word on a racist relative's facebook page, their language has not changed in almost 70 years, and it's treated as absolutely abhorrent by the narrative

each of the 12 jurors is a unique character with a distinct personality and their own reasons and perspectives for their choices to vote innocent or guilty and each have to be convinced in different ways to change their mind, they may be prejudiced or ignorant or just completely indifferent, some are easier to sway than others, some stand by their choice for logical reasons and some by pure stubborness

if you have an hour and a half to spare, I cannot recommend this movie enough

[pagesfromthevoid]

Spirit Week | b.b. | 2

Bradley Bradshaw x librarian!reader

Word Count: 3.2k

Warnings: Brief mentions of past abusive ex's (not graphic), language, alcohol use

Author's Note: I yapped a bit in this. And also wrote the cringiest Facebook post for the sake of it. Idk, part of the TGTU (Top Gun x Teacher Universe)

Masterlist | Talk to Me! | Coffee?

“Can’t I change first?” She whines, motioning to her outfit today. It’s Surfers vs. Skaters and she obviously went for surfers with her flip flops, Hawaiian shirt and Hurley tank top underneath. This was her staple outfit in high school, minus the Hawaiin shirt and bermuda shorts. Usually it was a hoodie and way too short board shorts or cut offs. “And why are we going out on a Thursday?”

“Because they got a day off tomorrow. Plus, I called off tomorrow,” the counselor explains but she is not dressed up like the spirit day theme. “And you look cute –did you bring those shorts I told you to bring? Trust me, going to the Hard Deck in your work clothes is weirder than showing up like you’re going to the beach.”

She sighs and nods, fishing them out of her bag, holding them up. They are not cut off shorts, but they’re still better than the bermuda shorts she currently has on. With the school day over finally, she’s able to quickly change into her other shorts and slip out into the parking lot without too many students giving her weird looks. For some reason, the kids act like their teachers must not do anything outside of school hours –like they just live at the school. 

“I’m not getting drunk enough to call off work tomorrow,” she counters, giving her a look of mock disappointment.

“I’m not calling off because I’m getting drunk. I’m calling off so I can spend the day in bed with my boyfriend.”

She gags jokingly, fishing her keys out of the bag as they approach her car.

“Rooster is going to be there,” the counselor comments like it’s just a casual thing to bring up, opening the passenger side door. Jake dropped the counselor off this morning solely so they could drive together tonight. “Could call off to hang out with him…,”

“I’m not calling off work,” she says again, rolling her eyes as she starts her car. “And I know. He texted me last night, actually, asking if I wanted to come out. I told him you asked me first, but that you’d probably bail on me for Hangman eventually.”

“I will not bail on you,” her friend promises, but she knows that’s a lie. “I am not like Floyd and her husband –the night I met Jake, she had disappeared with Bobby for like half an hour. I would never do that to you.”

“Yeah, we’ll see,” she teases, grinning as she pulls out of the school parking lot. 

She’s not one to desert her friends because of a man, but she is kind of hoping that her friend does find herself distracted by her boyfriend tonight. If Bradley is actually going to be there like he says he is (and why wouldn’t he be? His squadmates will be there), she wants to see him again. They’ve been texting sporadically since he came to the school on Monday, and he’s been flirting hard with her –at least, she thinks he is. Bradley’s always been a bit of flirt; it’s just sort of his natural state of being. 

Her ex had made a comment about it at the ten year reunion. Saying something about how Bradley needed to learn to not flirt with women with engagement rings on. She tried to explain that he wasn’t actually flirting, and that’s just how he was. But her ex had just huffed and that started a fight later that night when they got home.

She probably should have known that was the beginning of the end.

“Wanna pregame in the parking lot?” The counselor asks suddenly, pointing at a liquor store down the street. 

“I thought your bartender made Jake pay for everything?” She asks, but then she’s pulling into the parking lot anyway.

“Maybe I want him to save some money for my ring.”

If she rolls her eyes any more, they’re going to pop out of her head.

Bradley is sitting in his truck, staring at his phone. He’s spent the better part of thirty minutes stalking her Facebook page, after finally having made one and added her. Social media isn’t really his thing, if anything because it’s not like he can post anything about what he does or where he’s at at any point. He just never felt the need to have one. 

But he’s nosy and wants to know what happened to that guy she was engaged to. Did she get married? Did she get divorced? Or god forbid, was she widowed and he had no idea? He almost asked Hangman if he had any idea from his girl, but then he decided asking Hangman anything was a stupid idea.

Her Facebook –which is full of shared social commentary posts, educational ideas, and wishlists for the library –is not half as helpful as he’d hoped it would be. He’s gone back about ten years already, through pictures that she’s posted. There is one photo of her and the guy –Max –that he’s found and she’s got an engagement ring on her finger in the photo, but it’s just a family photo of her with her parents and siblings. It’s not anything special.

Then he goes through her “Life Events” section and she did get married –a year after their ten year reunion. But then there’s nothing else posted about them. Nothing. It’s like she went through and scrubbed her page of him entirely.

So Bradley does what anyone that’s normal would do:

He finds Max’s Facebook. 

And this guy doesn’t have anything set to private. He’s an open book of shitty memes, bad takes on dating, and life updates that get one or two likes maybe and comments asking if he’s good. And that’s when he finds the post that confirms the end of the relationship between Max and her.

Two years ago, Max posted what seems like his most interacted with post:

Life Update (Not that anyone cares): Well. I guess she finally did it. My wife walked out. Packed her bags and left without even trying to fix things like an adult. Said she “doesn’t feel safe” and “can’t live like this anymore.” All because I got upset and punched a wall. Yeah, I punched a wall. Not her. Not even near her. But somehow I’m the bad guy? I’ve explained this over and over –sometimes emotions build up and need a release. At least I didn’t bottle it up and have a heart attack, like my dad. But no, apparently showing emotions “aggressively” is abuse now.  I only did it twice. Maybe three times. It’s not like I meant to scare her. I always apologized. I begged her to go to therapy with me –she never would. She just kept saying “you need help” like I’m some kind of monster. Sorry I’m not some soft-spoken yoga guy lighting candles and crying to Coldplay. I worked, I paid the bills, I stayed loyal. I gave her my whole damn heart. But I guess some people just want perfection or nothing. I’ll be fine though. I’ve been through worse. Just sucks that in today’s world, men can’t even feel anything without being labeled toxic. 

He had to read it a few times, to really understand that this guy actually thought this post was the right idea. When he opened the comments –because Max seems to be dumb enough to really not lock his shit down –Bradley is only slightly relieved to see that absolutely no one took this guy’s side. 

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters, closing out of the app and pocketing his phone. He feels like he needs to wash his hands after reading any of that for some reason.

Inside the Hard Deck, it’s loud already –anyone with a day off tomorrow is there, getting an early start to the weekend. He comes up beside Maverick, who’s making eyes at Penny while she works, and knocks on the bar. Maverick forces his eyes from her and looks up at him with a brow raised as Bradley takes his shades off, looking around the bar for her.

“You’re late,” Mav says, though he knows the captain doesn’t actually care. “The rest of the team is back at the pool table.”

“Have you seen her?” He asks, looking back at Maverick again. When he gives Bradley a confused look, he says her name and Maverick looks genuinely surprised.

“I didn’t know she was around,” he admits, looking around the bar now himself. “Wow –I haven’t seen her since you guys graduated high school.”

“Yeah, she’s the school librarian,” he explains, turning and leaning back against the bar. “I ran into her on Monday there –she’s friends with Hangman and Bob’s girls.”

“And you invited her here tonight?” Maverick jokes, giving him a pointed look. “That school is a better matchmaker than any dating app out there.”

“Technically Hangman’s girlfriend did,” he explains, glancing down at Mav with narrowed eyes. “You act like I’m tryin’ to ask her out.”

“Aren’t you?” Maverick counters, brow raised. “If I remember correctly, you tried asking her out several times when you were younger and chickened out every single time.”

“I never chickened out,” Bradley quickly argues, rolling his eyes. “I just…never found the right time.”

“Didn’t you make her a mixtape and she told you it was bad?”

“I told her it was for someone else, in my defense.”

The bell on the door chimes, and Bradley immediately looks to see her walking in with the counselor close on her heels. He’s barely registering what else she’s wearing because he’s distracted by high waisted shorts and how long her legs look in them –and the jellyfish tattoo that’s wrapped around her thigh, just below where the shorts stop. 

“Look at that,” Maverick says, shaking his shoulder some and Bradley can just hear that smirk in his voice. Doesn’t even need to look at him. “You two match.”

He blinks once. Twice. Then realizes they do, sort of. She’s wearing a Hawaiian shirt similar to his –though hers is a faded blue while his is his usual orange. But she’s wearing a white tank top underneath just like him, and he can’t help but grin some as he pushes off the bar and walks towards her. 

The counselor is pulling her towards the pool table where Hangman and Phoenix are arguing. He’s half aware of Hangman’s girlfriend making some comment about Jake’s inability to admit when he’s wrong. If Bradley wasn’t set on getting her attention, he would have chimed in but his focus is solely on her as she laughs, covering her face as she does. 

“Now don’t go hiding that pretty smile of yours,” Bradley says as he comes up behind them and he’s reaching out to tug on her button up with a grin. She turns and looks up at him, dropping her hand to her side. It takes her a second to process what he said, and she glances between him and her friend before she finally settles on him, looking him over. “You good?”

“We match,” she points out, reaching out to mimic how he’s touching her shirt. The smile on her face is definitely not a sober one, and Bradley realizes she’s already been drinking –and then he wonders how the hell she got drunk between coming here and leaving work. “I think this shirt is yours, actually,” she admits with another laugh. “I found it buried with all my surf stuff –I think I stole it in high school.”

“Probably doesn’t fit me anymore. Looks better in you anyway,” he reassures, but he realizes she’s right: it is his shirt, and that…is a lot to take in at the moment. “Are you drunk already?”

“We may have stopped at the liquor store on the way,” she admits with a sheepish little laugh, but she waves it off. “I probably won’t drink anymore though –I didn’t call off work tomorrow like someone did.”

“And who’s taking you home tonight?” He asks, and there’s a double meaning there. He knows it. And she does too, as she cocks her head to the side.

“I guess we’ll see what happens,” she says with a shrug. Then she’s turning to walk back to her friend –but the counselor and Hangman are walking out the back door. She throws her hands in the air. “I fucking knew she’d do that. I literally said, in the parking lot at school, that I told you she’d bail eventually. It didn’t even take ten minutes.”

“Listen, Hangman works fast,” he chuckles, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and leading her towards a booth. “That’s okay though. You get to hang out with me now.”

She hums a little as she sits down, resting her chin in her hand as she leans on the table. “I’d be lying if I didn’t kind of want that to happen.”

“Oh yeah?” Bradley can’t help but smile at her admission, elbows on the table as he leans forward. “What if I told you I asked Hangman to distract her for me?”

“I’d say Hangman probably would have held out longer, just to annoy you.”

“Damn,” he laughs, leaning back against the seat. But he nods. “No, you’re absolutely right. He would have.”

They sit there for a little while, just talking nonsense. He asks if she’s still surfing, and she says when she has free time, which is rare. That tonight is the first time she’s gone out in a while, just because she’s so tired after work. Sometimes she goes before work, but it's rare she wants to get out of the bed early enough to do so. She asks when he got back to San Diego, and he explains he’s been given a long-term contract to remain on North Island until further notice; the squad has been back for a little over a year and half now. The only one that left is Bob, but she knows where he went with his wife.

He does ask about her ex, and admits that he may have stalked her Facebook. She just rolls her eyes and huffs a sigh, explaining pretty much what Bradley assumed from reading Max’s post. They were engaged for three years, and got married right before the fourth year. The first few years were fine. But he had no emotional stability, she explains, and didn’t know how to handle his anger. She promises that he never hit her, but that she just couldn’t live in fear that he might one day. So she served him papers, changed the locks on the house and put his shit on the porch. That was that. 

Making it even, she asks him about what happened between him and Maverick for him to pull his papers. Bradley explains a bit reluctantly what happened, and why. He can’t go into a lot of detail about how they reconciled, just because of where they were and why they were even together in the first place, and he apologizes for that. But she just says she’s happy they figured it out because she can’t imagine him not having Mav in his life. 

At some point, Phoenix brings over a round of drinks and winks at him like she knows he’s up to something. When Phoenix isn’t looking though, she pushes the beer towards him with a sheepish smile, and Bradley texts Maverick under the table, asking him to bring over water or something (“No, you cannot stay,” he’s sure to add). The bastard doesn’t waste a second making his appearance as he sets a bottle of water on the table with a smirk.

“Oh my god,” she gasps, nearly knocking the table over as she stands and hugs Maverick, who laughs and hugs her back. “I –don’t know what to call you –are you still Lieutenant Mitchell or –?”

“Most people just call me Maverick,” he reassures as he pulls away, crossing his arms over his chest. Bradley is staring him down, trying to subliminally tell him to go the fuck away. “But Pete is fine too.”

“I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to call you by your first name,” she admits with a sheepish grin. “Feels weird. But Maverick –okay. Wow –it’s been so long. How have you been?”

“Oh, I’m great,” he promises, but he’s knocking on the table. “However, I think Rooster here wants me to leave, so I’ll let you two finally figure out what’s going on here.”

“Mav,” Bradley groans, shaking his head. Maverick just smirks knowingly and saunters back to the bar, where Penny is rolling her eyes at him. 

When she’s sitting back down, she’s watching Bradley with a small grin on her face. “What’s he talking about, ‘finally figure out what’s going on here’?”

“It’s…nothing,” he promises, but he’s definitely blushing and now he’s significantly less confident than he was ten minutes ago. “He’s just annoying. You know how he can be.”

“Bradley,” she says softly, and she’s giving him that look. The same look she gave him when she’d ask him to be honest, when it was just them sitting on his porch at night. When they would talk about anything and everything as kids –the look that made him fall for her in the first place. “C’mon –I know it’s been a while, but I mean, we’re still us. Still friends. Right?”

“Of course,” he reassures as she reaches over and touches his hand. Friends. Always friends.

“So what’s Maverick actually mean?”

“Just…he wants me to ask you out,” he says, and that’s not technically a lie. Maverick does want him to ask her out. Though he’s wanted Bradley to ask her out since 9th grade. “And I am –you know. Right now.”

She laughs some, shaking her head some as she watches him closely. Like she’s trying to piece together what he’s leaving out. But she doesn’t argue, leaning back in the booth and crossing her arms over her chest with that same smile he used to dream about as a teenager.

“You think you can call off tomorrow?” He asks, and he can tell she’s hesitant. Like she doesn’t know if she should or not. But as Hangman and his girl come back inside, she looks at them then nods finally.

“Yeah, I think I can do that. But I do have to be back for the homecoming bonfire.”

“I can work with that,” he quickly says, smiling at her brightly. “I’ll pick you up at ten sharp.”

“You sure you wanna pick me up?”

“How else am I gonna take you out?”

“I mean, you did ask who was taking me home tonight,” she teases, slipping out of the booth as her friend approaches. Then she shrugs with a grin. “Maybe you don’t need to come over twice.”

He swallows hard, nodding as he slowly stands. Before the counselor can interrupt, he’s grabbing her hand and pulling her back to him, smiling down at her. 

“I can work with that.”

———

Taglist: @bowchickawowowww

[gansey-like]

Hey so this is super scary

Meta on Tuesday announced a set of changes to its content moderation practices that would effectively put an end to its longstanding fact-checking program, a policy instituted to curtail the spread of misinformation across its social media apps.

The reversal of the years-old policy is a stark sign of how the company is repositioning itself for the Trump era. Meta described the changes with the language of a mea culpa, saying that the company had strayed too far from its values over the prior decade.

“We want to undo the mission creep that has made our rules too restrictive and too prone to over-enforcement,” Joel Kaplan, Meta’s newly installed global policy chief, said in a statement.

Instead of using news organizations and other third-party groups, Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and Threads, will rely on users to add notes or corrections to posts that may contain false or misleading information.

Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s chief executive, said in a video that the new protocol, which will begin in the United States in the coming months, is similar to the one used by X, called Community Notes.

“It’s time to get back to our roots around free expression,” Mr. Zuckerberg said. The company’s current fact-checking system, he added, had “reached a point where it’s just too many mistakes and too much censorship.”

Mr. Zuckerberg conceded that there would be more “bad stuff” on the platform as a result of the decision. “The reality is that this is a trade-off,” he said. “It means that we’re going to catch less bad stuff, but we’ll also reduce the number of innocent people’s posts and accounts that we accidentally take down."

Elon Musk has relied on Community Notes to flag misleading posts on X. Since taking over the social network, Mr. Musk, a major Trump donor, has increasingly positioned X as the platform behind the new Trump presidency.

Meta’s move is likely to please the administration of President-elect Donald J. Trump and its conservative allies, many of whom have disliked Meta’s practice of adding disclaimers or warnings to questionable or false posts. Mr. Trump has long railed against Mr. Zuckerberg, claiming the fact-checking feature treated posts by conservative users unfairly.

Since Mr. Trump won a second term in November, Meta has moved swiftly to try to repair the strained relationships he and his company have with conservatives.

Mr. Zuckerberg noted that “recent elections” felt like a “cultural tipping point towards once again prioritizing speech.”

In late November, Mr. Zuckerberg dined with Mr. Trump at Mar-a-Lago, where he also met with his secretary of state pick, Marco Rubio. Meta donated $1 million to support Mr. Trump’s inauguration in December. Last week, Mr. Zuckerberg elevated Mr. Kaplan, a longtime conservative and the highest-ranking Meta executive closest to the Republican Party, to the company’s most senior policy role. And on Monday, Mr. Zuckerberg announced that Dana White, the head of the Ultimate Fighting Championship and a close ally of Mr. Trump’s, would join Meta’s board.

Meta executives recently gave a heads-up to Trump officials about the change in policy, according to a person with knowledge of the conversations who spoke on condition of anonymity. The fact-checking announcement coincided with an appearance by Mr. Kaplan on “Fox & Friends,” a favorite show of Mr. Trump. He told the hosts of the morning show popular with conservatives that there was “too much political bias” in the fact-checking program.

The change brings an end to a practice the company started eight years ago, in the weeks after Mr. Trump’s election in 2016. At the time, Facebook was under fire for the unchecked dissemination of misinformation spread across its network, including posts from foreign governments angling to sow discord among the American public.

As a result of enormous public pressure, Mr. Zuckerberg turned to outside organizations like The Associated Press, ABC News and the fact-checking site Snopes, along with other global organizations vetted by the International Fact-Checking Network, to comb over potentially false or misleading posts on Facebook and Instagram and rule whether they needed to be annotated or removed.

Among the changes, Mr. Zuckerberg said, will be to “remove restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are out of touch with mainstream discourse.” He also said that the trust and safety and content moderation teams would be moved from California, with the U.S. content review shifting to Texas. That would “help remove the concern than biased employees are overly censoring content,” he added.

[ramenwritesss]

outsiders modern AU head cannons

The gang would absolutely FORBID Ponyboy or Johnny to take an Uber or lift, they said they had to call one of them if they didn’t have a way home. It’s “Dangerous” to get into an Uber because it’s a stranger (I have a finished, unpublished one-shot about Ponyboy in this situation if yall want me to post it 🤭)

Darry refuses to get messenger or Facebook. He uses Life360 and the built in phone app to message Sodapop and Pony. He eventually got messenger so he could be apart of the group chat.

Ponyboy has several secret social media accounts. He posts on them and has quite the following, but has practically blocked every member of the gang so they can’t watch him.

Darry watches the news all the time unless someone changes it

Dally can’t count how many times he’s broken his phone

Two-Bit orders DoorDash just so he can get beers delivered. He also has to buy any soda of pony’s he drank

(Not really a modern HC but it’s a HC) Ponyboy actually HATES Pepsi, but he drinks it because people often buy it for him without asking what he wants. His favorite soda is actually Dr. Pepper, specifically the cherry flavored

Ponyboy used vapes instead of cigarettes to try and quit smoking. Steve was the one who found out and literally destroyed all of his vapes so that pone didn’t get sick

Sodapop uses instagram a LOT. He doesn’t have a huge following, less than pony has on TikTok, maybe around 5K followers? But he notices the pictures he posts with pony get LOTS of likes and views and he always gets so confused as to why

Johnny knows virtually every single TikTok dance known to man

Johnny and Ponyboy watch horror movies together (Johnny knows way to much about murder and scares everyone)

Ponyboy has a soft boy style while everyone else is literally leather jackets and jeans. He literally is the color in the gang

Two-Bit talks in TikTok language and that’s it. He will say stuff like “Chat” and “Cap” and Ponyboy is the only one who fully understands what he is even saying

[nervoussagittarius]

bikers backpack

matt sturniolo x biker!reader

summary: where matt’s girlfriend is a biker and at first matt is scared for her until he realizes it’s actually an attractive hobby, request

warnings: fluff, a little angst, language

“matt! guess what!” you exclaimed as you ran into his room. unbeknownst to him you had just bought your second motorcycle. your dream to own a kawasaki ninja bike had finally come true. you’d been saving up money from different odd jobs you’d done to be able to afford it.

“i finally bought my 4- stroke, six speed, metallic gray ninja 650.” you could’ve almost cried with excitement. matt knew this day was coming. he knew your love for bikes and as much as it made him anxious he couldn’t help but feel that twinge in his heart everytime you got this excited around him. in the two years you guys had been dating your hobby had only gone on in one of them.

your fascination for motorcycles steamed from the long line of harley riders you had in your family. growing up around the vehicles only made you want to learn to drive them more. on your 18th birthday you went out and got your motorcycle license it wasn’t until a year later that you got your first bike. it was a beat up motorcycle with over sixty thousand miles that you bought off of facebook marketplace, but it was your baby. you rode it everywhere and took such good care of it.

matt on the other hand hated the fact that you drove motorcycles. he was supportive in everything you did, as you were for him, but this was the one thing he couldn’t get behind. he was always a so worried about you because of how dangerous it can be. he barely liked being in a car. the idea of being on a bike with an engine made him sick.

matt looked up at you hesitantly. he didn’t want to make you upset, but he couldn’t find it in himself to jump for joy at your words like you did. “that’s cool, y/n. i’m happy for you.” his smile didn’t quite meet his eyes and you could feel the coldness in his words. you didn’t want to have another fight about the fact that you liked riding bikes, but you also didn’t want to feel like you couldn’t share your accomplishments or things you enjoy with your boyfriend. “can you at least pretend to care?” you questioned harshly. your words caught him off guard.

“i don’t care? really?” his tone changed. you could tell your words hurt him, but neither of you were ones to back down from a conversation like this. matt continued, “i care that 72 out of 10,000 motorcyclists experience a crash. i care that 80% of motorcycle accidents result in injuries or death. i care that california has the second highest number of motorcycle fatalities. i care about what matters so sorry if your upset that i’m not thrilled about your new purchase.”

choosing not to argue with him you simply backed out of his room and left his house. you felt like matt didn’t trust you. you knew the statistics but you were always so careful. you wore a helmet and protective gear. you never rode by yourself, you always had at least one other biker with you. you took all the necessary precautions so you didn’t know why matt wouldn’t listen to you about this. you would give him a chance to cool off and maybe bring the topic back up at a later time. you wanted him to know how you felt but maybe it was better to do it at a time where you both were more level headed.

later that night, after having a conversation with chris about how it’s your life and not his, matt felt like he owed you an apology. both you and chris were right. he was focusing on the wrong things. all he wanted was for you to be happy but him being negative wasn’t going to help you achieve that. matt made his way over to your house ready to talk, but as he pulled down your street he couldn’t help but notice you in your driveway ready to leave on your new motorcycle.

pulling up next to you, he couldn’t help but feel attracted to the sight in front of him. you were always beautiful, but for some reason his body gave him a different response to seeing you next to your bike. “what are you doing here?” you questioned as matt got out of his car, your voice barely above a whisper. “i came to apologize. i was wrong to get upset like that. i should’ve been more supportive because i know how much you enjoy this kind of stuff. so i’m sorry.” his words meant a lot to you. you had been feeling extremely discouraged since you left his house so you needed to hear this.

before you could even respond matt threw out, “also, i want to go on a ride with you.” to say you were shocked would be a complete understatement. “you want to go on a ride?” “yep.” you looked at him in denial. “a ride on a motorcycle?” he just responded with a nod and a smile.

“are you sure because you really don’t have to. i really appreciate your apology, but i don’t want you to do anything that’s going to make you uncomfortable or anxious.” you quickly said.

“no i want to, sweetheart. i think some exposure therapy would be good for me, and to be completely honest you look so good right now, you could probably get me to do anything you wanted.” he sent you a wink as he came over and put his hands on your waist. matt tilted his head down slightly so you guys were eye level before pressing his lips to yours.

you never thought you’d see the day where matthew sturniolo was putting on a helmet and was willingly getting on a motorcycle. not that you were complaining though. you put your helmet and gloves on, “are you 100% sure you want to do this?” you asked. matt flipped the visor of his helmet down and gently bonked his head against yours. “get on baby let’s go.” he said pulling you hand.

and with that you sat in front of him with his arms wrapped around you, and you went off on your memorized path to where you planned to meet up with some of your friends that also ride. it was safe to say that after the first couple minutes matt enjoyed himself. he took notice to you attention to the world around you, which he appreciated, and he was happy to know more about the hobby you loved so much. matt was now your personal backpack

an: this is shorter then normal but i haven’t written in a couple weeks so i need to get back into it. i thought this was cute though and i hope y’all enjoy

taglist: @maryx2xx @norr1ssturni0lo @recklessmatt @luvr4miya @hpyjw @unbruisable @watercolorskyy @elliewrites1 @rheaasturn @slxt4matt @mmay4ever @aurizp

[creatingblackcharacters]

Hello! Sending it here again:

I play an mmo game which recently had a big character model update, it's still not perfect but we're getting there! They're sharing behind the scenes work on curly hairstyles, for example, which just... weren't there for the longest time. Oh the beauty of scandinavian white-centering... (sarcasm)

anyway, I'm from eastern-central Europe, I play on eastern Europe servers. Seeing someone with a character that's not white is... pretty rare, honestly. So rare that when I do see someone using a character that's clearly meant to be a POC, they're very often roleplaying. Recently I saw a player whom I know for a fact is white, as I know them irl (we're not friends, don't even talk much but I know what they look like) and their character used to be white too before the big update.

So my question is, does that count as digital blackface, and what even is the consensus on digital blackface as a whole? I used to be in a facebook group about unlearning racism (used to because it got deleted after some admin drama, I think? If anyone knows a similar group, let me know please) and there, most Black members agreed that if someone is white, they shouldn't be using Black emojis for example (the topic of mmos never came up, I think). I don't remember the exact reasoning but I think it was the same explanation as actual blackface. But then there were some Black people saying it's going too far and we should be focusing on "actual issues" instead. I know that's to be expected, I'm trans and I know all too well that a community is not a monolith. But seeing the player reminded me that I don't actually know that much about it, and I've seen you educate people before. I hope it's okay that I'm asking you, I'd love to do some further research as well though (I love learning things, I just also don't yet trust myself to find actually good sources).

I hope this ask makes sense, english is not my first language and all. So if I wrote something wrong, please assume I meant well, as I still don't know how to word things properly in english sometimes.

Thank you for doing what you do, btw. I really appreciate having someone compile everything like you do here, it's one of my favorite creative blogs on here.

Okay so I sat on this one for a minute to make sure my answer wouldn't change.

1) there is no one consensus. White people don't agree on everything, neither do we 😅. This would just be my opinion.

2) I definitely don't think you should be using Black emojis if you're a white person, no. That's overt Blackfacing. DEFINITELY don't pretend to be Black if you aren't!!

3) for me, I think designing your characters as Black for online play can be okay in theory, as long as you're coming at it respectfully. Like, I'd have to trust that you actually wanted to learn how to play as someone that didn't look like you, that you actually cared about Black character features and presence in games as a whole. Especially on a game where you get to design the character, versus when you're forced to play as a Black person. It's hard to trust the intentions of white people online, especially when far more often than not the good intent is just... Not there 😅. So for me, if someone asks you why you designed your character, be ready to answer, answer truthfully and answer well! If you're playing as a Black character design because "big tough guy" or "big dommy mommy" yeah you're just digital Blackfacing amongst other racist issues. But if you actually have good intent, and are willing to learn, then you'll be able to stand on that when confronted.

And again- that's just my opinion! I would listen to other voices on it as well.

[so-i-did-this-thing]

hey, hope you're having a lovely weekend! i was wondering if you had any thoughts/advice on being confident to dress more historically/vintage, especially given how so many historical silhouettes and garments feel inherently formal in today's context. im a trans masc person who would love to wear more historical dress - specifically edwardian and 1920s - but the idea of wearing a suit, a sports coat, or even a nice pair of trousers, just to go to tesco feels really intimidating to me! i worry about looking overdressed, as well as a bit of regular trans shyness around drawing attention to myself in public. how did you navigate the emotional/confidence side of moving from modern clothing to a more vintage style? thanks so much!

Heya! I'll leave this open for folks to comment with their own thoughts, but for me, I would start off by:

1) Mixing and matching historic cut garments with more modern clothes. Sportscoats and jeans are usually easy to pair without a second glance from other folks and can get you comfortable with that layer.

2) Leaving off the neckwear. Ties communicate "formal" and that is usually the point of no return.

3) Joining online groups like Vintage Menswear on Facebook to see other guys rocking older styles.

4) Making sure your historic clothing fits well and is comfortable. If you're physically uncomfortable, it will be obvious in your body language.

5) Practice being relaxed. Move like you normally would (and get used to how historic clothing does change one's posture). I don't treat my vintage style clothes as delicate, and if I feel like jumping down some steps or jogging to my car, I do that. Basically, treat your outfit like clothing and not a costume.

Once you get more confident dressing up a tad and are ready to commit to a full vintage outfit (with neckwear!), consider the buddy system. See if there's a group in your area that does things like historic dress picnics. Recruit a friend to dress fancy with you and go to a local event or a museum or something.

Bottom line is, you will get looks and funny assumptions, but you will also get a surprising amount of compliments, often very shy ones from cis guys who wish they could dress like you, but aren't confident enough. Have fun!

[hungermakesmonsters]

Catch Me If You Can

Plot summary : When your friend interviews for a position at Anvil, you have a chance encounter with Billy Russo. He takes you for coffee and, by the time you’re done , Billy decides he’s anything but done with you.

Pairing : Billy Russo x Reader

Story Rating : R 

Chapter Rating : this one is pretty PG

Warnings : [This is a fic for 18+ only, minors DNI] Nothing in this chapter is warning worthy, but the story in general is going to turn pretty smutty from chapter 3 onwards and there will be strong language throughout. I’m not going to list all the different ways things get smutty unless I think it’s something that could be considered triggering. Please check the warnings on each chapter if you choose to follow this story. 

Word Count : ~4.5k

A/N : this started life as an original piece that I couldn’t finish, so I decided to make a few little changes and turn it into a fanfic. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a tumblr, so sorry if I fuck this up. The story as a whole is going to veer recklessly between cute fluff and some much darker things with themes of obsession, will-they-won’t-they, and running from past trauma. Both Billy and reader are messy AF.

CHAPTER ONE

You checked your phone for what had to be the hundredth time. A measly two minutes had passed but the August heat made it feel longer. You found yourself thinking about how you were going to kill your roommate for making you chauffeur her around in the height of summer, trying to ignore the way the sticky New York heat made your tank top cling to your body beneath your unzipped hoodie.

You’d given up on waiting in the car after the first ten minutes - the AC in the old VW was busted, making it even less comfortable than sitting on the hood of the car under the glaring sun. Still, the parking lot was nicer than some of the places you’d found yourself waiting for your roommate over the years. That was the thing with Tammy; everyone around her lived on her schedule, did what she wanted to do. And you were no exception.

Actually, this whole thing was your idea. A friend, albeit in a very loose sense of the word, had told you that ANVIL were hiring office staff, and you’d passed the message along to Tammy who’d - well, she’d turned her nose up at it at first, she’d even laughed at you. But Tammy needed a job and ANVIL had a reputation for paying well.

So, you agreed to drive her to the interview and even agreed to wait.

Every now and then someone would appear - honestly, it looked like a steady stream of models leaving the building, the sorts that Tammy fit well with - but, for the most part, it was just you, mindlessly scrolling Instagram, trying not to think.

Until you saw him.

He came out the door and just stopped. It looked like he was breathing a sigh of relief at being out of there, and you couldn’t help but smirk a little at that. Poor guy.

Despite the weather he was dressed in a suit, dark hair slicked back, tall and slender. You suddenly felt out of place, like you shouldn’t be there, like you shouldn’t keep watching him, but the longer it went without him noticing you, the harder it was to try and tear away your eyes. He answered his phone as you watched, even without being able to hear a word, you knew he wasn’t happy. When he turned you got your first glimpse of his face and -

Fuck. 

Your eyes dropped back to your phone, knowing that he’d seen you watching him. Fingers swiped across the screen, jumping from Instagram to emails to Facebook, looking for anything to reply to. Your eyes stayed fixed on the phone even as you heard the shuffle of boots on gravel moving towards you, trying to act like you hadn’t been staring at him even as his shadow fell over you.

“Do you make a habit of hanging out in parking lots or are you here to interview?” His voice didn’t sound quite the way you’d imagined - though you weren’t really sure why you’d been imagining his voice to begin with. There was an edge to it, something that sent a shiver up your spine.

“I’m waiting for someone,” you answered, squinting as you looked up and the light seemed to halo around him.

“Friend?” he asked.

“Roommate,” you answered awkwardly before shaking your head, “but, yeah, she’s my friend too.”

You weren’t expecting him to laugh at that, for him to smile the sort of smile that probably had women all across the five boroughs ready to drop their panties. (And that was another thought you weren’t sure you should be having.)

He didn’t move, for a few moments he just looked at you as if he was taking measure, and all you could think about was how there was a bead of sweat rolling down your back. You probably looked completely gross while he was standing there in what looked like a professionally tailored suit that probably cost more than you could make in a year, with not a hair out of place despite the oppressive heat. 

“Does she make you wait around for her a lot?” He asked as if it was the strangest thing he’d ever heard, like he’d never allow anyone to put him in your position.

“She doesn’t drive,” you shrug, “anyway, this is nicer than most of the places she drags me to.”

“Yeah?” he prompted with little more than a raise of his eyebrow.

“Tammy’s an actress - at least, she wants to be. So I end up waiting around while she auditions.”

The look he gave you was surprisingly sympathetic. “Actresses can be hard work.” You didn’t think to ask how he knew that.

“Yeah, I’m just glad she gets to keep her clothes on for this interview,” the words slipped out and you instantly grimaced but if he noticed that, he didn’t let it show. “Not like - I mean, she’s not doing porn or anything. Not that there’s anything wrong with women wanting to -”

You could see him fighting back a laugh the more flustered you got.

“I mean, it’s not the nudity that’s a problem - you should read some of the scripts, they’re just so bad.” You finally managed. “It’s like ‘oh no the serial killer caught me with his knife and now my tits are out’.”

Silence fell again and you watched him glance away, daring to hope that he was done with you. He’d walk away and forget all about you, and you’d spend the rest of the day replaying this moment in your mind, cringing at how ridiculous you are.

“I was going to grab a coffee, your friend is probably going to be another hour or so, so if you want you could always join me?” 

You quickly started coming up with reasons why you couldn’t, why you shouldn’t. But, it was just coffee, it wasn’t like he was asking you to leave the country with him. And, besides, you weren’t sure you could stand the heat much longer.

“There’s a place nearby that does amazing iced coffee,” like he was reading your mind. And that sold it.

“Yeah, sure, that sounds great,” you decided, sliding off the hood of the car in a less than graceful manner.

Once you were standing you could really appreciate the height difference between the two of you; you almost had to tilt your head to look at him. You pushed the thought away, taking a moment to check that your car was locked up, following after him when he started to leave the way.

As you walked, it dawned on you that you still didn’t know his name, so you clumsily introduced yourself.

“Billy,” he responded with a smile, realising that he’d made the same mistake you had, “come on, it’s just across the street.”

You both fell into silence as you left the parking lot, but it wasn’t long before it got to be too much for you in an awkward, uncomfortable sort of way. It struck you that he didn’t look uncomfortable though, in fact you were already pretty certain that he wasn’t the kind of man to get uncomfortable easily. 

“So, do you work at Anvil?” You asked him, wanting to fill the silence but also wanting to know a little bit more about him. You weren’t sure what he found so funny about the question but the smirk he shot you left you feeling like you were missing something obvious and he found your ignorance amusing. You started to fiddle with your sleeves, gaze dropping from his.

“Yeah, I work at Anvil.” And then silence fell again.

When you looked up again you were outside a little coffee shop that was so small and non-descript that you’d completely missed it when you drove by it earlier. He held the door open for you and let you slip inside before following, watching as you breathed a sigh of relief as the cool air from the AC hit. When you moved towards the counter, you realised he was only a step behind, towering over you almost possessively.

The girl behind the counter smiled at him first before bothering to spare you a glance.

“What would you like?” He asked. You quickly realised that he was intending to pay and that just unsettled you further.

“I can get mine,” you were quick to tell him. You didn’t need him paying for you and you’d never been the sort to accept drinks from men you didn’t know, not even coffee. So, you ordered your drink, your favourite iced coffee with syrup, before he ordered his, an americano with an extra shot of espresso. But before you could pay, he reached over and tapped his phone on the reader, flashing you what you could only describe as a darkly mischievous smile.

“You didn’t have to -” you started to tell him.

“I know, but I wanted to,” Billy shrugged, “besides, I owe you for keeping me company.”

The girl behind the counter shot you the sort of look that made you think that she would have been more than happy to keep Billy company herself and that she saw your presence there as an annoyance. You guess that was probably the effect he had on a lot of women.

“Here you go, Billy, just how you like it,” she smiled as put your drinks on the counter, leaning and fluttering her eyelashes at him, completely ignoring you. Billy gave her a muttered thanks and you had to bite your lip to keep from laughing as you reached for your drink. 

As you turned, Billy placed a hand on your back, leading you towards a table by the window, far enough from the counter that it felt a little more private. You sat on the edge of your seat, eyes nervously wandering towards the door for a second and, when you looked back, you found him watching you. There was a confidence about him that was getting harder and harder to ignore, he was clearly a man who knew what he wanted and exactly how to get it - so, what did he want from you?

Company? Or maybe you were being used to make the barista jealous? No, that didn’t feel right, he’d barely even looked at her, anything between them was obviously one-sided. Maybe you were there to keep her at bay so he could drink his coffee in peace? Though from looking at him you knew he had to be used to women fawning over him, with those dark eyes that looked right through you and the shirt that fit so perfectly you could make out the muscles beneath as he shrugged off his jacket. 

“What?” 

Shit. You realised that you’d been staring at him and your cheeks started to warm. He didn’t look bothered, in fact he was still smiling at you, amused, almost as if he wanted you to look.

“Sorry,” you apologised, dropping your eyes to the table, quickly thinking of a way to move the conversation along, “so how long have you worked for Anvil?”

“Too long,” he answered and, again, there was that little laugh, that little smirk telling you that you were missing something. Billy obviously didn’t want to talk about himself though. “What about you? What do you do?”

“Bike messenger, mostly...” you shrugged awkwardly knowing how guys like him looked down on people like you. You weren’t ashamed of what you did; it paid the rent, put food on the table, you just hated having to defend it to someone like him who probably made money in his sleep. He surprised you by not reacting - there was no look of superiority, no pity, just a nod of his head.

“Mostly?”

“What?”

“You said mostly,” 

“Oh, right, yeah. I do some work as a photographer. Just freelance and a couple of exhibitions,” you shrugged again, “it’s actually how I found out that Anvil were hiring.”

“Really?” It was hard not to notice how intently he was looking at you, like he was hanging on your every word. You started fiddling with your sleeve again.

“Yeah, sometimes I do work for The Bulletin if someone is out sick, and my friend Karen knew Tammy was looking for a job, so -”

“Karen? Frank’s girl?” 

“Yeah,” you’d never met him but Karen had been talking about him a lot since they got together, “we were talking and I guess I let slip that we might have to move to a smaller apartment if Tammy can’t find a job…” 

“High rent?”

You nodded. “Higher than either of us can really afford, but Tammy’s parents pay half and we split the rest.”

“Her parents still pay for her?”

“They’re loaded and I guess they didn’t want her having to live anywhere that might be ‘dangerous’,” you offered, but you knew how it sounded. You and Tammy were both in your thirties , it was strange that they still went out of their way to provide for her, but you didn’t fault them for wanting to look after their child, something that your own parents had never seemed inclined to do. The thought sent you down a rabbit hole and had you falling silent, wondering how he’d look at you if he knew the truth about you.

You took a drink, letting your eyes drift to the window and the street beyond. His eyes stayed firmly on you and you could almost feel him watching you. It made you tense and shift uncomfortably.

“What kind of photography are you into?” 

“Mostly candids, but since I moved to New York, I’ve been really getting into urban stuff and I’ve been playing around with architecture shots.” Billy listened, looking interested in everything you had to say in a way that had you smiling again.

“And you put on exhibitions?”

“Little shows sometimes, yeah.”

“I’d love to see one sometime.” He kept smiling at you, all his focus completely on you, and you found that you didn’t entirely mind it. It was nice talking to someone who seemed to care about what you were actually saying. “Did you study photography in college or -”

“No, I never got to go to college.” It wasn’t until you’d said it that you realised how much it gave away; that college wasn’t your choice, that you’d been stopped from going.

“I never went to college either,” Billy offered, as if he sensed your sudden discomfort. You nodded, eyes dropping to your fingers, tugging at your sleeve again. “Do I make you nervous?” He asked suddenly, pulling your attention back towards him. He was still smiling, still looking at you in a way that made you feel like he was taking you apart in his mind, piece by piece.

“What? No - that’s not -” you stumbled over your words, embarrassed that he’d caught on so easily. You took a second before letting out a sigh. “It’s not you, I just don’t do this a lot.”

“Which part?”

“The whole going for coffee with a random guy I’ve never met before.”

“Is that because guys don’t ask or because you don’t normally say yes?” He asked but didn’t give you time to respond. “Don’t worry, I’m sure I already know the answer.”

An eyebrow raised, unimpressed by the assumption; the situation might have been making you nervous but you weren’t going to take shit from a stranger. “Oh yeah, and how’s that?”

“You’re too attractive for men to ignore.” Billy shrugged and your eyes rolled. Yikes, what a fucking line.

“Maybe I’ve got a boyfriend,” you retorted, “or a girlfriend.”

Billy laughed. “You know that wouldn’t stop most guys, right?”

“Would it have stopped you?” You were pretty sure you knew the answer to that.

“I dunno, do you have a boyfriend?” He asked. “Or a girlfriend?”

“Do you?”

“Have a boyfriend?”

“Or a girlfriend.”

“Would you be here having coffee with me if I did?” He asked, turning the tables so effortlessly that it made it seem like flirting was an olympic sport and he was a gold medallist.

“Would you have asked me if you did?” You answered back, trying to fight back a smirk of your own at how ridiculous this was becoming.

“Do you always answer innocent questions with more questions?” It was obvious he was enjoying whatever this was, his dark eyes practically shining with excitement as he watched you from the other side of the table.

“You call that an innocent question?” You retorted, letting out a snort of laughter.

Billy let out another laugh, holding up his hands and signalling surrender.

“Maybe you should come work for Anvil, I bet you’re a pro at interrogations.” And that really made you laugh, and the sight of it had his gaze fixing more intently on you and his smile widening. 

“I don’t think I have the necessary qualifications to work somewhere like that,” you shrug, “besides, I like my job.”

“Really?” Usually his question would have pissed you off, but there was something in the way he asked that made it seem like he was genuinely curious to hear your reasons rather than it being some kind of judgement.

“Yeah, I get to see the whole city, there’s no office politics to deal with, and I get to listen to music all day,” you found yourself shrugging again, and his eyes were still fixed on you, like he was fascinated. So, it felt like your turn to ask; “what?”

“Nothing,” he sat back and lifted his mug, taking a long drink, “I think it’s great that you like your job, there’s a lot to be said for enjoying your work.”

“Do you? Enjoy what you do, I mean. With Anvil?” Whatever that was.

“Some days more than others,” he smiled at you.

“And today?” You asked stupidly, before considering the implications and how it might sound.

“Today’s definitely getting better.”

Your eyes dropped to your drink again, teeth running over your bottom lip. He wasn’t talking about you, he couldn’t be talking about you, but some part of you wished he was. But you wouldn’t have known even if he was, you’d never been good with those sorts of things, flirting and separating a little bit of fun from something more. Billy was an enigma to you in the same way that most people were, but there was something about him that made you almost want to break all of your rules, just to see what might happen.

“What do you do for Anvil?”

“These days I mostly deal with the bureaucracy,” and the look on his face told you just what he thought of that.

“So you don’t - I don’t know, go on missions, all Seal Team 6, kicking down doors?”

Billy let slip a laugh that was equal parts amused and offended.

“Seal Team 6?”

“What?” You laughed, awkwardly.

“You know a lot of Anvil are ex-Marine Corps, right? I’m an ex-Marine.”

“Is there a difference?” You knew there was though, honestly, you couldn’t remember exactly what it was, and the look on his face was priceless enough that you didn’t regret asking.

“Okay, wow, you’re really going to make me explain it to you?” You nodded in response. “Okay, it’s -“

Before he could start on whatever lecture he was about to give, your phone started to ring, loudly - loud enough to make you almost jump out of your skin. (You must have knocked the volume while you’d been frantically trying to look like you hadn’t been spying on him earlier.)

“Fuck, it’s Tammy,” you tell him before answering.

Moments later, you’d wish that you hadn’t. She was at the car waiting for her ride home and you were nowhere to be found, which was apparently so inconsiderate of you. You finished the call with a sigh and looked at Billy. 

“Guess her interview didn’t go well,” you took one final drink before pushing back your chair and getting to your feet. “I’ve got to go, if I leave her standing around out there I’ll never hear the end of it, it’s been -“ you stopped as he got to his feet.

“I’ll walk you back.”

“No, that’s fine, really, you don’t have to.”

“I insist.” His tone making it clear that he wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

“I’m sorry, she’s just -“

“You don’t have anything to apologise for.”

When you started towards the door, he was right behind you, again staying close to you. Outside the oppressive heat hit you again and it pissed you off; you’d been having a nice time and Tammy just had to ruin it. Now it was over and you’d never see him again. 

Billy didn’t say anything, even as you picked up the pace. You wanted to get this all over and done with, you wanted to drive Tammy back to the apartment and - you didn’t know. All you knew was that you didn’t want to be around her, you didn't want to have to deal with her bullshit, and you didn’t want to think about the man walking a step behind you. 

You didn’t see him frown at you, you didn’t dare look back because it just felt childish. You’d met him forty minutes ago, he’d probably forget you by the end of the day. 

You rounded the corner, about to cross the street when you felt his fingers around your wrist. All it took was one gentle pull and you were turning back towards him, stumbling into his arms. It felt like a moment pulled from some romcom; you spilled forward into his arms, your hands against his chest. And then you looked up, finding those impossibly dark eyes staring down at you.

Billy looked at you like he was trying to decide something, fingers still wrapped around your wrist. The, less than a second later, he was kissing you, pulling your body against his. And you let him. Later you’d tell yourself that it was shock but, in that moment, you wanted him to kiss you for no other reason than he was nice; you’d had fun getting coffee with him. It took you a moment to return to your senses, to use the hands on his chest to gently push him away.

“Billy —”

“Sorry, couldn’t help myself. I’ve been thinking about doing that for the last thirty minutes.” He grinned. “Go to dinner with me.” You couldn’t tell if he meant it as a question or a command, but it definitely sounded more like the latter. Maybe he was just that used to women doing what he wanted them to do.

“I think you’re supposed to ask that before kissing someone,” was all you could think to say with a nervous laugh.

“Well, now I’ve asked…” And a second later, his lips were on yours again, tongue running against the seam of your lips, desperately wanting to deepen the kiss, and you let him. For a few sweet moments, you gave yourself over to him - to a random stranger you’d known for all of forty minutes.

Finally, you pushed him again, taking a step back, out of his arms and back to reality.

“I can’t,” is what you told him once you’d managed to find your voice again.

“Can’t or won’t?” He dared to try and take a step closer, forcing you to take another step back.

“Does it matter?”

“It matters to me.”

“Why?” Honestly not sure you even wanted an answer from him.

“So I can figure out how to change your mind.” He explained, like he thought it would really be that simple

“You can’t.” But that just made him laugh.

“Sweetheart, you’ve got no idea what I’m capable of.” And there was something dangerous in that; you didn’t know what he was capable of. “And I can be very persuasive when I want to be.”

“I told you; I don’t do this.”

“This can be whatever you want it to be. I’m very adaptable.” He reached for you again, fingers brushing your cheek before you managed to pull away.

He looked ready to say something else, like he had some line on the tip of his tongue that he was sure would convince you, his lips even parted ready, but nothing came out. You weren’t sure why until a moment later.

“Oh my god, there you are! Do you know how long I’ve been standing around waiting for you?”

Tammy. You didn’t know whether to be glad of the interruption or pissed at the tone she was taking with you.

“Sorry,” Billy stepped around you, towards Tammy, “I distracted her.”

“That’s -“ and then the impossible happened. Tammy actually fell silent. You decided that it must just be the effect that Billy tended to have on women.

“I’m Billy,” he offered out his hand and Tammy was quick to take it, no doubt falling for his charms already. And Billy, well, obviously he’d managed to get over whatever momentary insanity he’d been suffering from when he kissed you and had moved onto the next victim.

Only that wasn’t exactly what happened.

“Oh, I know who you are, Mr Russo. I’m Tammy.”

“Wait… what?” If anyone heard you, neither bothered to respond. How did Tammy know who he was?

“I hear you’ve just been interviewing to come work for me,”

For him. Not with him.

Your stomach dropped, remembering something Karen had said about a Russo, about how Frank called him a pretty boy and Karen thought he was a bit of a womaniser. He kept talking to Tammy but you barely caught a word, too stuck on everything that had happened and how you’d let it. 

“Come on, Tammy,” finally, you snapped out of it and started to walk, “if you want a ride home we need to go now.” 

You didn’t even wait for an answer, you just let her say her goodbyes to Billy.

“Let me know when you’re free to go for that dinner,” Billy called after you, You chose not to answer, some part of you hoping that Tammy wasn’t going to follow because you knew what would come next.

Fumbling for your keys, you had them in hand before you got back to your car, not daring to look behind you. What had just happened? Your lips still tingled from his kiss, you could still taste him, could still feel his hand on your hip. And some part of you was inexplicably still annoyed that the moment was over.

Tammy followed behind you, calling after, barely making it into the passenger seat before you started the car.

“Oh my god,” she exclaimed and you steeled yourself for the oncoming argument, “you are the best friend ever.” 

There was no sarcasm, no anger - she was actually smiling at you. What the hell did she think you’d done?

“What?” Throwing the car into reverse and trying to ignore the fact that Billy was there, watching you as he made his way back towards the office building, his office building. There was something unknowable in his dark gaze as it followed you and, again, you found yourself thinking about how you had no idea what he was capable of.

“Flirting with Billy-fucking-Russo to get me a job at Anvil.”

CHAPTER TWO

-

END NOTES : if you made it this far, thanks for sticking around. Like I said, this is something that started out as an original piece and I was struggling to find the energy to finish it. I’ll be trying to release a new chapter at least once a week, though the second part will probably be up in a few days time because the first two chapters are really just to help set things up, and I know that’s not what people are interested in. I already have the first five chapters pretty much written, they just need some editing before going in the queue and, in total, I have around 20 chapters planned. I’ll be working on this through NaNoWriMo too, so how much I get done might change the posting schedule a little.

Likes, reblogs, and follows are appreciated, though this fic will be posted regardless of engagement because I just need to get this story out of my head once and for all.

Anyway thanks for stopping by, I hope you have a wonderful day wherever you are!

[purplepaigepurple535]

hey y'all, this is a research paper i wrote in my advanced research seminar... by popular demand im gonna post it because i think it ended up being really interesting. the books i read to do this were also so so good, like BG's autobiography and pat summitt's too. took me like a week to write but it was so so interesting. hope u guys like it!

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From Scrutiny to Stardom: The Media Evolution of Women’s College Basketball

Research question: To what extent have media portrayals of women’s college basketball evolved from the ‘Old Era’ to the ‘New Era’, when did this turning point occur, and how much have these changes contributed to the sport’s growing popularity?

IB Extended Essay Language and Literature: Category 3

3,990 Words

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Introduction

Women’s college basketball: the cultural phenomenon that floods social media pages around the world. It seems as though it came out of nowhere, materializing in the early 2020s and sticking around since. But the truth is, it's always been around. Sitting on the back burner, waiting for its time to shine, while men’s sports dominated the media, the fans, and the world. As recounted by WNBA Star Brittney Griner, it survived periods where it would only be mentioned as a side note regarding a player’s gender, sexuality, or race. It thrived in moments of unbridled competition and fierce opposition. A dynamic, exciting, emotionally stimulating game, women’s college basketball is a rollercoaster that’s been bringing fans on an thrilling ride for decades. 

Between 1990 and 2020 (the “Old Era”) the game was defined by big rivalries like UConn vs. Tennessee and UConn vs. Notre Dame, and ended up producing stars such as Diana Taurasi (drafted from UConn in 2004), Candace Parker (from Tennessee, 2008), Tina Charles (UConn, 2010), and Maya Moore (UConn, 2011). Powerhouse programs, like those which the game’s biggest stars played for, dominated the game both competitively and culturally. 

But from the resurgence of Geno Auriemma’s legendary UConn dynasty in 2025 to the short stint of Caitlin Clark and Lisa Bluder’s Iowa squad in the early 2020s, women's college basketball is changing drastically. The star-studded sport is making headlines, breaking records, and drawing in more viewership than it’s ever seen. Some think this emergence seems out of the blue, unpredictable even, but in reality it has been brewing for quite some time. Since being sponsored by the NCAA in 1982, the sport has seen hundreds of iconic, big-name players. 

Marking the transition from the ‘Old Era’ to the ‘New Era’ (2020-present), players like Taurasi, Charles, and Parker started to be replaced by modern legends like Breanna Stewart, Sabrina Ionescu, and A’ja Wilson. But, what makes today’s game different from the past isn’t just great players. It’s how much the world sees of them, their personalities, and their presence off the court. Though the problem was that, before social media, the only sources of information for fans would be heavily manipulated media narratives and expertly crafted headlines. Platforms like Facebook (started in 2004) and Instagram (2010) helped athletes to show their own personal styles and connect directly with their fans on a different level. Players’ hobbies, traits, skills, and sexualities have all become common grounds for healthy bonding with fans. More people celebrating their differences and appreciating their similarities, a major contrast to the judgemental and scrutinizing nature of the world before social media. This has come hand in hand with cultural shifts over the last few years, with the growing visibility of LGBTQ athletes and creation of online fan communities that have changed how enthusiasts engage with the sport.

Perhaps fueled by their well-earned “hype” on social media, the turning point in the sport’s popularity came after being blessed by the recruiting class of 2020. A group of electrifying, dynamic high school stars, the 2020 seniors were destined to have a major impact on their game at the collegiate level. They brought remarkable motivation and passion to the NCAA, taking their respective colleges by storm and playing hard through tremendous adversity. But even among incredible athletes like Angel Reese, Cameron Brink, Hailey Van Lith and Kamila Cardoso, two stars stood out above the rest. They became household names, cementing their identities as some of the greatest to ever grace the college basketball stage. Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers ignited the flame under the ‘New Era’ of women’s basketball.

Since Clark and Bueckers began to play in college, the sport is now fueled by social media visibility, cultural movements regarding gender and identity, and a new group of athletes who are just as famous and impactful on a ‘For You’ page as they are on the court. The surge in the appeal for women’s basketball today brings up an important question: To what extent have media portrayals of women’s college basketball evolved from the ‘Old Era’ to the ‘New Era’, when did this turning point occur, and how much have these changes contributed to the sport’s growing popularity? This essay will dive deeper into that transformation and conclusions drawn from it. As the world becomes more open and accepting of different identities, it seems as though the media has an important obligation to carefully and accurately represent female athletes, since the narratives that headlines build shape how the women are perceived.

The ‘Old Era’ Media Landscape

During the ‘Old Era’ (between 1990 and 2020), women’s college basketball was home to some of the biggest rivalries in sports. Even with the severely limited amount of media coverage allotted, most was taken up by such rivalries and the chaos surrounding them. Those rivalry matchups were often the ones streamed nationally, as opposed to standard regular season games. This era also saw the development of generational talents (for example, Taurasi, Parker, and Charles) who became household names and cemented themselves into basketball history. Some might think that the portrayals of those rivalries and athletes caused most media narratives to be straightforward, but that is far from the truth. This era in media was underlined by many cultural issues, which created a big challenge for anyone trying to represent the sport accurately. 

This section will dive deeper into the specific characteristics of women’s basketball media during the ‘Old Era’. Two main parts will be examined: first, the struggle for widespread media visibility, and second, the way players are portrayed in media, more specifically pertaining to gender and sexuality. Both factors can be used to show the inconsistent and unfair representation of female athletes, since women’s and men’s sports often competed for broadcast slots in a world where men’s sports were highly dominant. It is important to understand these dynamics and stereotypes if viewers want to truly see female athletes for who they are and not just what the skewed media narratives show them to be.

A main example of the men’s vs. women’s theme going on during this ‘Old Era’, is how women’s college basketball games often needed to fight for prime-time slots on major television networks. Even though certain games invoked what would be considered more than enough interest to be broadcast, networks were not able to turn that interest into broadcast priority. Very solid ratings were given to the most anticipated matchups, as explained in Jeff Goldberg’s Unrivaled. For example the 1994 UConn vs. Tennessee game, an MLK Day special, earned a 1.0 rating nationally . Tennessee star Kellie Jolly also talked about the buzz around the game: "People were excited about women's basketball. That was huge for our sport [...] no game was talked about like Tennessee-Connecticut." Headlines regarding women’s basketball though, showed how much the world doubted the sport and its growth. An example of this is a 1994 article in The New York Times, headlined, “COLLEGE BASKETBALL; N.C.A.A. Women Are Tipping Off In Untapped Areas”. By using words like ‘untapped’ and ‘tipping off’, the headline implies that the sport is entering an area that the world never thought it would reach. Although the wording might have been questionable, it did what was rarely done at the time: it acknowledged that there was in fact a tipping point and women’s basketball was reaching it. This, along with the attention on the 1994 MLK game, were major accomplishments for the sport, proving that viewers would in fact tune in to nationally broadcasted games. This was to the great pleasure of many ESPN network executives, but was particularly appreciated by Carol Stiff, a women’s sports content coordinator who eventually rose to the position of Vice President of Women's Sports Programming & Acquisitions . In Unrivaled, she notes, "You couldn’t walk away from the fact that [the Martin Luther King Day] game rated a 1.0, at one in the afternoon. I was pretty thrilled with that number. I would love to get that nowadays." After great successes like the MLK day game in 1994, “the NCAA and major networks signed a new contract in the spring of 1995, granting ESPN exclusive broadcasting rights to the women’s regional finals and Final Four beginning in 1996”. This created exposure and the sport began to gain more traction. 

The effects of this event, which seemed promising, quickly disappeared. Other networks took over the coverage of the main rivalry games, and their priorities were not always centered around women’s sports. As Goldberg explains, "the contract stated that the [UConn-Tennessee] game was under the SEC contract and CBS gets first choice.” Since they only needed to broadcast three regular season games, CBS would schedule them as triple-headers during the same time NFL wild card weekends. This caused the basketball matchups to go up against more popular football broadcasts. Stiff was upset about the situation, expressing how she didn’t think it was right that  "big marquee game[s] in prime time" were often "put up against the NFL playoffs.��  

These factors made the sport unable to reach a wider audience, causing rivals to play multiple times in a season just to gain viewership.

Tennessee legend Pat Summitt talks in her autobiography Sum It Up about a conversation she had with her greatest nemesis, UConn coach and 12-time national champion Geno Auriemma. She explains that one of the few things she and Auriemma had in common was their interest in growing the sport. Summitt agreed to Auriemma’s proposal for the ESPN game on MLK day, even though her team was clearly disadvantaged. Summitt stated, "I couldn’t say no. I’d always felt a tremendous responsibility to give back to the game... So I said yes. And we lost.” This decision she made, which prioritized the good of the sport over her own team, shows how most coaches were very dedicated to improving the visibility of the game. The stubbornness and blatant sexism of TV networks led coaches and players to react and make decisions they might not have otherwise made, simply to increase viewership.

Society in the ‘Old Era’ also put a lot of pressure on female athletes. Instead of just being appreciated for their talent on the court, they were examined and judged on other parts of their identities. The media compared things like gender, where women’s basketball players would be put up against their male counterparts, and their “femininity” would be questioned. Brittney Griner’s experience, as she documents in her autobiography In My Skin, serves as a way to understand the scrutiny faced by female athletes regarding their identities. In the book, Griner talks about the public obsession with her physical appearance, gender, and sexuality as a 6’9” gay woman. She explains, “My decision [...] fueled crazy conspiracy theories about me—how I'm secretly a man, and I wanted to avoid genetic testing at the Olympics." This created an environment where discussions about the physical appearance and gender conformity of the female athletes moved focus away from their true skill in-game. Instead of putting in the majority of their effort on improving their game, they needed to navigate a world where their value wouldn’t even be judged on it. Griner’s quote can be tied to the themes of “ignorance and hate” that Griner had mentioned earlier in her book, which emphasizes how societal biases played a main role in the invasive media narratives. This speculation about things out of Griner’s control undermined her achievements and forced viewers to talk about her personal identity instead. It exemplifies the added burden on female athletes during that period, one that made them defend themselves against public scrutiny, and one that was barely ever seen by men’s players.

The uncertainty and hate for LGBTQ athletes was way more constrained in the ‘Old Era’. Even though social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram were out at that point, there was still not much discussion or acceptance about or for LGBTQ athletes yet. Because of that, media coverage of players’ sexuality was often careful, subtle, or just completely ignored. Media sources avoided those subjects because of preexisting stereotypes that limited how information could be conveyed non-judgmentally. As research done by sociologist Michael Messner concluded, "women’s sports get much less coverage, claimed to be because of stereotypes or lack of enthusiasm.��� That lack of support and harsh environment meant that athletes needed to navigate their careers while also considering dominant societal norms. Thus proving why it was so important for the media to represent these athletes fairly and accurately, since any obscurities about their personal lives would be torn about and pull attention away from their game.

Evidently, the years from 1990-2020 made up a period where society not only judged women unfairly, but severely undervalued women’s sports and talent. A main cause of this was the pre-existing societal opinions of women and their abilities. Most media platforms were unable to keep up with the constant progression or inclusivity and acceptance, meaning that the sport was trying to grow within a society that wasn’t transforming fast enough. Because of that, the ‘Old Era’ of women’s college basketball was defined by its constant struggle to obtain prime-time media attention, in a world where any attention it did get would be consumed by judgement, homophobia, and other forms of hate. Broadcasting companies made decisions that proved to be detrimental to the sport’s growth and potential, as explained in Unrivaled and Sum It Up. This often forced coaches and players to make strategic decisions, for the sole purpose of increasing viewership. Instead of the thrill and skill of the game speaking for itself, attention was brought to the women’s basketball stage through the over-analysis of players’ identities and personal lives. The gender identities, sexualities, and races of players were all among characteristics that were scrutinized as opposed to those players’ skills themselves.

The Turning Point

Once players like Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers hit the women’s basketball stage, the sport hit what Malcom Gladwell refers to as “The Tipping Point”. This concept basically describes how "thoughts, ideas and behaviours spread like viruses... at a tremendous rate" under certain conditions. Players, media strategies, and growing cultural awareness combined to create the perfect combination of variables. The sport entered mainstream media, signaling the beginning of its increased popularity. 

Gladwell’s theory involves the idea of people playing the parts of Connectors, Mavens, and Salesmen. Clark and Bueckers took on these roles for women’s college basketball. As connectors, their rivalries and individual skill helped to turn a diverse fan group into a connected community. Their personalities attracted many people, from casual sports fans to the basketball obsessed. The generated social media attention and headlines made them unavoidable, therefore drawing a larger audience to the sport. In addition to their connections, they also played the role of mavens, or “[people] who possess extensive knowledge and expertise on a particular topic or product, and actively seek to share that information with others.” Their generational skill and talent brought in lots of discussion: fans watched their games, celebrated their records, and invested emotionally in their journeys, transforming what used to be passive viewership into engagement. Finally, as salesmen, their charisma, athletic personalities, and major voices “sold” the sport. Interest in them moved past the court, causing them to become cultural figures whose stories were told widely, converting skeptics into fans.

The three main components of the “Tipping Point” theory are what Gladwell refers to as the “The Law of the Few”, the “Stickiness Factor” and the “Power of Context”, with the last two being the most relevant to the transformation of women’s basketball.. The “Stickiness Factor”, or “the unique quality that causes a phenomenon to stick in people's minds and influence their behaviour,” played an important role in the rapid development of the sport. Moments like Clark’s threes or Bueckers’ clutch plays made games more memorable and resonated with fans emotionally. The two players didn’t just make highlights, but culturally significant events. They were replayed and discussed across media platforms proving just how much the two players affected the game. Bueckers and Clark’s large followings on social media (2.6M and 3.3M on Instagram, respectively, and 3.8M and 702.9K on TikTok, respectively) are prime examples of how big of a role they play in modern media. 

The “Power of Context” strongly affected the development of the sport as well. According to Ashley Crossmann of ThoughtCo, it’s “the idea that the environment or circumstances surrounding an idea, trend, or epidemic significantly influence whether it becomes widespread.” Luckily for women’s basketball, the modern cultural environment supported its growth and expansion. Society shifted during the ‘Old Era’, becoming more accepting of women in prominent roles. This ‘New Era’ built on those changes, setting the stage for the sport’s breakthrough, and pushing it over the “tipping point”. This ended up bringing in unprecedented viewership. For example, the 2024 Iowa-UConn Final Four game shattered records, becoming "the most-watched hoops game in ESPN history.” This isn’t just a statistic, but a tool that shows the major transition of the sport from a lesser-known interest to a popular phenomenon.

The ‘New Era’ Media Landscape 

This new, modern landscape in the “Post-Caitlin/Paige” era is characterized by bolder marketing, the challenging of stereotypes, and greater acceptance of the athletes’ true identities. A direct challenge to the historical under-recognition of the game came through the ‘Everyone Watches Women’s Sports’ campaign, beginning in late 2023. This was created by TOGETHXR, a company trying to "uplift the next generation of women in sports.” The company was founded by female athletes Alex Morgan, Chloe Kim, Simone Manuel, and Sue Bird, which in turn brings in lots of credibility and authenticity to the opinions they convey. The EWWS campaign in particular targets a large audience. The slogan is declarative and it was put on various types of clothing, signaling their mass-appeal strategy. The message, “Everyone Watches Women’s Sports”, is deliberate and aspirational. This rhetorical choice provokes thought and challenges preexisting viewership assumptions. The shirts were also first made in a simple black and white color scheme, which speaks to the simplicity of the message being sent. There are no designs to draw attention away from the words on the shirt. This could be speaking to the fact that the world needs to be upfront and steadfast when confronting issues like sexism, homophobia, and racism, and that those problems should not be romanticized in the media. 

Another example of innovative media campaigns is the “So Win.” Nike campaign, beginning in early 2025. Similar to the EWWS slogan, the simple “You Can’t Win. So Win.” message is not complex at all. The wording is straightforward, easy to understand by the general public, and is often displayed in simple white letters against a black screen. Also, it is important to note that the statement itself is paradoxical, which serves as a direct comparison to the current state of women’s sports media. According to Andrea Paloian of NYU, the “Female Athlete Paradox” “describes the internal conflict faced by women athletes who are expected to both excel in their sport (which often involves strength, power, and athleticism, traits traditionally associated with men) and conform to societal expectations of femininity.” The slogan conveys this implicitly, taking a dig at the doubters of female athletes. The “You Can’t Win.” section acts as a summation of the certain things said about female athletes and their abilities. If this phrase was left alone, it would serve simply as a motivational statement. Something that could be used to convince women, young and old, to beat the gender stereotypes and disprove societal norms. Instead, the slogan answers the question by saying “So Win.” It states that as though it is obvious, something that should already be assumed. The campaign implies that the standard for female athletes should be set higher, that the bar should not be set anything below what doubters think women can’t do. This sort of “underdog” trope is used often in modern women’s sports media as a way of encouraging young women to step out of their comfort zones and take on challenges that society thinks they are unable to face. 

The commercials for the “So Win” campaign mostly involved clips of different famous female athletes put together, while being narrated by grammy-winner Doechii. Those advertisements demonstrate unity between women and encapsulate the potential of women’s sports by using prominent figures in the sports and music industries. But Nike also made a commercial starring only one athlete: Paige Bueckers. Bueckers narrates and stars in the entire 14 second video, confronting the constant scrutiny over her off-court life, and daring those who question her methods to realize her dominance in the game. She narrates, “People seem to get upset that I’m everywhere.”, while the video cuts to pictures of her at various different events in the off-season. This directly addresses the claims made about Bueckers when she attended awards shows, fashion week, and other high-profile events. People seemed to think that she was not spending enough time in the gym perfecting her craft, and were expecting her senior season to reflect that. Instead, in a calm and collected manner, Bueckers opposes those views when she states, “That’s funny. I seem to upset them here too.” By saying this, she implies that the doubters were incorrect in their assumptions that her game was going to show the consequences of her off-season “world tour”. She also takes on a confrontational tone, emphasizing her displeasure with the narratives. Bueckers ended up having one of the best seasons in women’s college basketball history, winning the national championship and getting drafted No. 1 in the 2025 WNBA draft (Dallas Wings). Even though some media tried to skew the narrative and write her story for her, she tuned it out and played to her potential, serving as an inspiration for young women and athletes everywhere.

Conclusion

The portrayals of women’s basketball have not always been positive or uplifting, and have definitely not always been consistent. From the scrutinization of the game’s old legends to the more accepting, yet cautionary portrayals of players today, the game has seen its ups and downs. In a world where societal norms are constantly changing, the media has been forced to to the new ways people are looking at things. During a time of minimal cultural awareness about LGBTQ players and severe sexism towards women, the ‘Old Era’ media coverage reflected that. Narratives were pushed that were very far from the truth, and the hate and underappreciation of female athletes was at an all time high. After the introduction of platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, the widespread cultural awareness for the unfair judgements placed on those players started to seep into the media. Headlines changed from things like “Brittney Griner’s deep voice in viral video shocks fans, sparks new wave of gender rumors” to more accepting narratives such as “Brittney Griner’s story always transcended sport. She’s a real American trailblazer”. In a society where hate spreads like wildfire, media networks have become more aware of the messages they are sending. Players have now been granted their rightful freedom to write their own stories and choose the parts of their identities they wish to share. Frontrunners in the sport, like Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers, have taken advantage of this freedom and interacted heavily with their fan bases on social media platforms. They’ve drawn attention to their skills and playing styles by posting about their personalities, highlights, and service off the court. The effects are clear: women’s basketball grows when players, like Clark and Bueckers, work hand-in-hand with social media to write their own stories. 

As the cultural landscape of the world rapidly develops and society becomes more accepting of diverse personal identities, the media must adapt just as quickly. Narratives are built through headlines and front-page news, meaning that networks must exercise caution and be open-minded when representing figures as historically scrutinized as female athletes.

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thanks so much for reading, pls lmk your thoughts!! :))

[deathlygristly]

It's very weird online when you grew up in a bit of rural southern Appalachia in the 80s and 90s and when you see people talk about people like you there is absolutely nothing recognizable in what they say.

I get that my hometown has changed a lot in the 20+ years since I left. I get that social media destroyed so much. But it's just...

Like I'm reading the notes on a post about "speaking their language" in an attempt to get people to be less bigoted, and I do not remember people being extremely bigoted when I was growing up. I don't remember people hating some Other or getting enraged about whatever. I mean, honestly, I don't even remember anyone getting bullied at my schools. I hung out with people who didn't have many friends and I remember teachers being like I'm glad you took them on, but the thing is that I don't remember anyone actively being mean to them.

Like there was a little guy who was also One Of Us (neurodivergent, probably autistic) but less socially able than I was. I hung out with him and he developed a little crush on me, but honestly I don't remember anyone being mean to him. Not being close friends with him, sure, but no one was getting beaten up or harassed or having things thrown at them or hateful things spray painted on lockers or in bathrooms or whatever.

And of course there was the bit of weirdness with my best friend and a girl who liked a guy who liked me in high school, but it never got really truly serious and they both apologized to me on Facebook as adults.

Also pretty much everyone I went to school with and then found on Facebook was normal and not hateful and not MAGA brained. I deleted my Facebook account in November after the election results, but yeah. Also though while most people still live in the same state, very few of us still live in our hometown.

So people on the internet say "You have to speak working class Southerner to try and make them a bit less bigoted!" and I'm like "That is my native language and I have no idea how to do what you're telling me to do and I don't know anyone who thinks like you say we all do."

It's just weird.

The closest I can get to what the internet says my people should be like is the oldest of my two half-brothers, who I haven't spoken to in decades and who once held a gun on us in the midst of one of his episodes. He's currently living in rural New York with his extremely religious second wife, and his community there in a northern state sounds much more like what people on the internet insist my community is like than anything I've ever personally experienced.

[sooniebby]

hi! first time anon, but long time reader of your work (been here since the midoriya x bakugo's big bro fic). i wish you good luck in your finals and i hope you have a good break !

i read your motorbike prompt fanfic, i think the plot is really nice and tbh i think transmasc reader is really good for that story !! speaking as a thai person myself, i think transmasc rep is scarce here but that might just be me ??? 😭

tho speaking of which, there was smth that bugged me about the story, which is the part where the mysterious biker called the reader "nangfa (นางฟ้า)" not sure if you used google translate or smth else but by most interpretations, nangfa is fairy/pixie/goddess. i mean, it's applicable to angel, too, but it's not like... the most "right" ig????? if that even makes sense 😭💀 cuz i feel that thai language doesnt really have a direct translation for "angel" bc our language is derived/mixed from/with sanskrit, old khmer, pali, etc., which are languages heavily associated with buddhist scriptures. this is relevant bc in buddhism theres not really any "angels" rather than gods and goddesses (note that some sects do interpret them as angels but in mainstream/legitimized thai buddhism (Theravada) in thai language, they are called gods and goddesses), which means that the concept of angels doesnt really exist, but the closest to abrahamic angels we have are gods and goddesses. another thing is that nangfa has a feminine connotation, bc "nang" means mrs, so nangfa is literally sky woman. it might be a bit dysphoric since the reader is transmasc. tho i dont know the male equivalent of nangfa, never heard of one either personally even tho i lived in thailand for all of my life. mostly theyre just straight up called เทพบุตร (male gods) or เทวดา. also pretty sure mostly facebook incels flirt with girls using nangfa so that was mostly what threw me off 😭 if theyre not facebook incels, theyre just overdramatic, desperate, or old as hell (like 50+ 💀)

if u wanna change it after reading this (which u dont have to), there are some good choices such as "whanjai (sweetheart)," "baby (preferred by most younger thai couples)," "ที่รัก (thi rak -> my love)" ofc phi/p and nong are also good choices. if you want the reader/krist/mystery biker guy to have chinese ancestry (most common ethnic group in thailand), you can also use เฮีย "hiea" (older male) tho if youre interested in the usage of this word i can expand on that in another ask

ALSO I JUST REALLY WANNA KNOW, AT THE PART WHERE IT SAYS

“(Name) Opas Phanuwat, what do you think ‘stay where I can see you’ means?”

IF "OPAS PHANUWAT" IS THE READER'S WHOLE LAST NAME OR IF IT'S LIKE OPAS = FIRST NAME, PHANUWAT = LAST NAME 😭 flash banged, if i am reading this right as โอภาส = opas... cuz my dad's friend's name is that 😭 it's a really old name but it has a good meaning. also, again if this came from google translate, imo it should be fixed as "opad" bc opas is not the correct phonetic sound, tho it's up to you if you wanna change it or not cuz by "romanization" (not sure abt the proper term for this but i think this word gets the point across?) it is right, it's just not read as "opas"... this part, again, is js my personal preference because my name is constantly butchered bc the way it is written vs how it's pronounced is very different in both thai and english 😭 really dont wanna suffer again w this shi

tldr, nangfa as a choice bugs me and really curious abt the reader's name choice

i really like this concept overall and i think it's really interesting !! very happy that this place i call home is the setting of this one !! (tho i think they really didnt need to shut the highway in BANGKOK down 😭 (cries in ungodly traffic jam) cuz illegal races happen regardless but it's wtv) i cant wait to see how this story plays out and who that mystery bike guy is and learn more abt krist !! looking forward to reading your next work !! until then good luck with your stuff and supporting you from the shadows !!

just in case i do send smth again i'll leave off as mcyap anon 😭 sorry that this is like super long

!!!!!! YAY!!!! Thank goodness, I’m so glad you corrected me, please do it again if needed!!!!!! Anyway I’ll explain some of the choices cuz I did only use google translate for angel cuz I couldn’t find what type of pet names do Thai people use!

Thx for the list of choices, I’ll think a bit more on which one suits the biker. But could you explain heia?

For the last name bit, I got the last name from a real Thai actor lmfaooo, Opas Phanuwat was his full last name! But the romanization of it could’ve been wrong lol. I was actually wondering if I should do it how it works in Thai

The nickname first name last name, but I don’t know how many none thai people know that 😩 so I just left it at that, but I can see how it would end up confusing a Thai person fml.

Thx again, really, sure I’m learning more about Thai culture through dramas and readings—it’s nice to have someone actually check me!!

Oh and I’m curious, does this name I have for the biker make sense?

“เสือ” ธาวิน ชัยอริยะกุล — learning how last names work in Thai was a struggle, but the way yall names work is so cool 🙂‍↕️

[cleverthylacine]

The TikTok Migration to RedNote

On TikTok, I lurk, and now I'm lurking on RedNote. (I'm not searchable yet. Will let those interested know when that changes. Still figuring out the settings.)

A bunch of people got mad about the TikTok ban and decided that they would take their cookies and leave and go to an ACTUALLY Chinese app. I'm not sure why they picked RedNote rather than DouYin, but I think it was a good choice. I'm following other lolitas there mostly, because I don't need any Mandarin to like people's outfits. I did have a semester of Mandarin and am wondering how hard it would be to pick up some more, though, especially since I'm seeing all kinds of Americans from every imaginable background type doing so.

All over YouTube there are videos now of TikTokers on RedNote crying because we have been welcomed onto the app and treated kindly.

There is a lot of very expected anger about people discovering that no, in other countries it's not normal to pay more than half your paycheck for rent and half of what's left for food. Chinese people are saying that they thought it was government propaganda when they were told that Americans are expected to pay for ambulances, and healthcare, and that a $200 grocery bill for the week is not unusual.

I'm glad to see people getting radicalised about the class system in this country, but that's not actually the main thing I'm talking about in this post, though.

There are people who are deadass shocked that they haven't been insulted, trolled in a mean way, or been exposed to explicit unsolicited come-ons (there's one guy who posted shirtless selfies who is a little @@;; that he has 16000 gay male Chinese followers, but he's not getting spammed with raunchy photos).

So I value freedom of speech on political matters very highly, but there are two things I think are going on.

The first one is that yeah, a lot of Chinese people probably are better socialised than Americans, BUT

The second one is that Americans put up with a lot of shit in the name of freedom of speech that we shouldn't and after the changes on Meta last week I will only be using IG to communicate with Japanese brands and Facebook not at all, because they're going the other direction.

I think that if some chode did send me a nasty DM on RedNote and I reported it, something would be done about it. It's not that I don't think people will be nice and kind if they're not forced to be.

It's that chodes and Nazis and frankly racist and misogynist people will run everyone else off a platform if they are allowed to, and this app has somehow stopped that from happening, probably by not letting people be completely predatory bullies and assholes to one another.

English-language social media probably needs to stop letting people do that. It is not a violation of your free speech rights to tell someone they can't use a platform to be abusive.

I saw a video of a person of mixed race and unclockable gender who was wearing loose, oversized clothes sobbing because nobody was insulting them horribly, everyone who had commented on their post had been genuinely nice. Their experience of every other social media platform has been unchecked bullying everywhere. I don't know whether they'd ever been here, but we all know bullying does happen here, too, even if we're loads better than any of Meta's products.

People should not EXPECT to be viciously harassed every time they join a new site. That's horrible. It's also something I never really questioned before.

And I still think (always will) that you should be able to post any content that you want on AO3 in the works, but it's not okay to bully people in the comments.

[genericpuff]

You should watch Jack vs. Webtoons video on Lore Olympus before it gets wrongfully taken down.

His video pointed out something I wasn’t able to put into words until now. Lore Olympus has a real bad dialect problem. One second the characters are talking like they’re in a Shakespeare play which makes sense, sense they’re gods or what not. The next second you’ll have characters saying shit like “blue balls” “clout chaser” and “you’ve got a young wife with a fat ass”. It probably wouldn’t bother me if certain people talked a certain way like how Hera doesn’t use any slang and how Hermes uses some but all the characters vocabulary are the exact same.

Honestly I can look past the art and it’s inconsistencies but having dialect jump from regal to tiktok facebook slang makes my brain hurt more than glossy lipped Hades and bug eyed Persephone.

I checked it out, it's pretty great haha and yesss this is something that's been discussed before but I haven't really ever made a post about, the dialogue is CONSTANTLY flip-flopping between royal talk and "hello fellow teens" quipping. Sometimes it feels like it's trying to be like Marvel and then other times it feels like it's trying to be Bridgerton. I can think of no better example than all of the "pedigree" talk, it makes me squirm every time I read it because in the modern context of LO, it SCREAMS eugenics. The whole B-grade goddess thing made sense, until they started talking about Persephone like a poodle:

But then you ALSO get INCREDIBLY stiff dialogue that makes it seem like the comic is either being written by AI or Rachel is actually a real life version of Michael Afton post-scoop:

And yes, there is a tinfoil hat theory that LO is being written by bots at this point because I don't know how a single person could write something so tonally confused. That said, I do think the more reasonable explanation is that Rachel is likely copying dialogue from shows and movies she's watching and just tweaking it slightly before slapping it into LO. She's not observing why the dialogue works in the media she likes, she just knows she likes it and slaps it in there without any regard for context, tone of voice, or personality.

And that leads to, as you said, all the characters sounding the exact same, and that metric by which they all sound the same changes all the time. I think at this point the only reason we haven't seen Hera dropping TikTok language is because she hasn't been onscreen long enough for her to get the chance LMAO That said, we've definitely gotten some weird inconsistent dialogue with Hera as well:

(like she's essentially saying the exact same thing across both of these panels but one is being said by an adult and the other is being said by a teenager lmao)

I think the dialogue is definitely one of the most glaring issues with LO, among all of its other problems. It just never feels like it's being written by a human, there are problems with this even as far back as S1 but it's become especially apparent in S2 onwards.

To finish off this ask, here's one of my favorite dialogue mishaps in the entire series, from S1, in which Apollo literally adopts an askew English accent:

[neechees]

Signs that a scam might be run by Laura Deramas & her common behaviors:

So as we know, that despite making herself famous as one of the most deranged, notorious scammers & perpetual liars on tumblr, its likely that Laura Deramas hasn't actually gone away, and is likely running several scams at any given moment at tumblr, as she's admitted to running multiple (on both twitter AND tumblr) not long ago. With these, we've seen her frequently have the same patterns of behavior on pretty much all of her scams, be it when she's using her own name & face, or someone else's (& she frequently uses other Filipinos' info, but she has racefaked or pretended to be different sexualities/genders/ethnicities multiple times as well).

So with that in mind, in addition to the usual red flag lists for scammers (ex: new blog suddenly asking for money, spamming asks, turns off /hides replies, changes url multiple times suddenly, etc), below are some common red flags to look for in "donation" posts/blogs that indicate this blog is likely a scam and specifically being run by Laura for the following behaviors:

She tries to send you a video or photos of some kind of a flood, a fire, or an old house in poor condition, but usually there's no proof that this is HER or her family's house, that it's HER footage, that it's not old, or that she actually lives there, and she never shows her (or the posters', whoever she's pretending to be) face. This means that the footage is most likely stolen, she isn't actually affected by that situation, & she's trying to pass it off as her own footage.

Uses the phrase "please, sir/maam" a lot. And i don't just mean saying "maam" to women & then "sir" to men, I mean as in sending everyone an ask/message with the phrase, quote, "sir/ma'am" unquote regardless of your gender

Is new to tumblr but somehow knows exactly which popular users to ask to reblog their donation posts, and usually they're Black. They may also target people who were previously victims of Laura's scams.

The user asks you to talk off of tumblr, especially if it's facebook.

The user is reluctant to give out their paypal and doesn't list it on their donation post. They may also use a knockoff fundraising site.

She starts showing you photos of things like a sad family or broken down house unprompted (or on her sockpuppet scam accounts, she uses stolen photos specifically instead) and starts talking about how much she's "suffering", often even if you've never interacted with her on her blog. She does this to manipulate people into feeling bad for her and will often repeatedly harass people this way.

She uses the ❤😩 😭🥺🙏 emojis approximately 50,000 times every sentence. Obviously that's a bit of an exagerration, but her scams DO use these a LOT. Her tumblr asks tend to also use a combination of these specific emojis when asking people for money or to reblog their donation post/scams, especially the crying & praying emojis.

Asks you to make or boost a donation post for her on other sites like twitter or instagram

Will allege that she can't speak English very well, but is only using English for her donation posts. She uses this lil nugget a lot in her other scam personas where she's pretending to be someone else, including ones she's literally admitted to. Laura can actually speak English very well. She's also used this even for accounts where her scamsona allegedly speaks a language that is widely spoken & has their own large presence on tumblr (like French or Arabic), so it doesn't make sense that someone who apparently has a lot of trouble with English ONLY uses English for their posts and ONLY follows English speaking users, & will sometimes use a shitty google translate if soneone who's a Native speaker in that language tries to talk to her in that language.

Might say something like "if you have any questions, ask me!" But then as soon as you ask questions that question whether or not its a scam, even if you ask very nicely or don't outright imply you think she's a scammer, (or even ask like. ANY question at all), instead of answering any questions or addressing any allegations or proof she's not genuine, instead she'll redirect, self victimize, and say that you're "attacking" her, and never actually provide any answers to the questions she said she was open to answering.

If you call her out, she'll keep insisting she's not lying, even if you have very explicit, hard proof that she's lying and that you know where she's stolen the "proof" documents from (like vet bills or xrays) or that her information is incorrect. If shes pretending to be someone else & is using someone else's photos and you say you know its actually her (Laura), even if you show HARD evidence that it's a Laura sockpuppet scam account, she'll continue lying and acting as if she doesn't know what youre talking about. She's done this with scams she later admitted to running.

Below under the cut is tactics/behaviors Laura usually displays when she's either been caught, or she's openly using her own name & face. Her scam sockpuppet accounts might do some of these things too, but the ones below are a bit more specific to when she's been caught, has admitted to lying and admits she is Laura behind the account, and/or when she's using her own name and face.

Might bring up her neighbors if you catch her in a lie and say something like "my neighbors will kill me" or being afraid of her neighbors & using that as some kind of excuse related to the lie/scam

If you catch her in a lie, she might say some story about "the police" or something along the lines of "the police" raiding her home or being afraid they will, and she usually brings this up to beg you not to tell other people she's scamming (she's used this story at least 4 different times and she's never been arrested or had any run in with police.) She's counting on people not knowing a lot about the Phillipines or its geography unless you live there (& this is a predominantly American site), so if she makes some claim about a law in the Phillipines, and it sounds wild, look it up, there's a good chance she's bullshitting you.

she'll start begging you to talk to her family via facebook, and specifically facebook, to "prove" shes not lying (note that her family knows she scams & is in on it, and several of her friends are also scammers on here, so they're there to backup her bullshit, but in cases where she's pretending to be someone else, it's likely one of her scammer friends pretending to be the family members of her scam persona to look more legitimate). She doesn't do this as much on her sockpuppet accounts, but if she does also take it to be suspicious.

If caught and Laura admits to it, she might try to discredit scam busters, specifically me, Kyra45, or mangocheesecakes by saying something along the lines of us allegedly being "bullies" or "targeting her for no reason" or that we are "racist" & alleges we only accused her of scamming because she is Filipino (this is incorrect, we accused her of scamming because we have hard proof she is a scammer & has been doing this for at least 3 years, and mangocheesecakes is also Filipino. Laura being Filipino is incidental.). Obviously her goal in doing this is to victimize herself and demonize us with the hopes that people will not believe us, and will donate to her now or her future scams. You're free to be skeptical of us, but if not us then you can ask the dozens of other people Laura has manipulated, harassed, and tricked into helping her to see that shes a serial liar, scammer, and a bully.

[jackboxconfess]

Hi there, people who like to ship quiz killer with literally anyone without any common sence, because he is "canonically pansexual/romantic" or whatever. Im here to explain why i hate [REDACTED] (as a person, his character development is mid even bad if you please) and every ship with him.

TRIGGER WARNING!!1!

If you are reading it and REALLY into that kind of stuff and can get very defensive from some anon post on Tumblr in a CONFESSION blog, ignore it for your own sake. Im here to confess, rant, and let it all out. I warned ya.

also sorray for my bad english, its not my native language, deal with it, DUH.

Now lets begin.

Reason number one : an enormous canon facts dilemma

If there is some information about characters, and it mentioned anywhere, but not in a game — i have all my rights to ingnore all "silly random canon facts" from Facebook blogs, streams on youtube, etc. People may don't even have a clue about existence of that stream. That's BAD character development, and y'all ready to talk about it. I had headcanon that quiz killer is aroace evil spirit of darknes with developed psychopathy, who uses corpses as vessels for like 3 years and i won't change my mind.

P.S. Also i hate the way Jackbox devs do character writing if it even was planned. Some of them are just a designs without any personality, especially new ones. All that facts about god-blessed hosts with any backstory that hidden in voicelines are literally random. You can play YDKJ Full Stream and never get "Escape the Simulation" episode because IT IS RANDOM. All fanbase need "lore-accurate archive™" with all voicelines, subtitles and sources. But im getting off-topic and may post about it later.

Reason number two : daddy issues

"Im so sorry he had such a bad childhood i wanna beat up his dad >:((" ... U know what? F*-

That fact and other disgusting things happened with character can be a background for a childhood trauma, i cant disagree with that. But the way people in fandom treating that same fact as excuse to say "aww he is killing ppl because of it, so let's ignore the fact he is doing REAL CRIMES and sugarcoat it by comparing it with Pyro's POV from TF2 because he is so silly little meow meow". Nah-uh. Its a reason for a trauma development, but not a reason to justify all his actions.

I wonder how would you guys react if murdering and kidnapping would be simply replaced by sexual harassment or even more gross.

And there may be same people are judging other characters because of gags about violence, but simp over a serial killer. We all know that famous question section where Cookie cut a head of his assistant in half, but most of people believe it was a real thing, despite lack of demonstration. It all could be just part of scenario with audio, played by a soundpad. In Trivia Murder Party we always saw...how do i say ehh...killing process, i dunno. Think about it.

Reason number three : ship dynamics

That thing always contain "kidnapper/victim" + Stockholm syndrome in 90% of cases. If you unironically ship that sheet of peace with any host, who was kidnapped in TMP 1/2 or any dolls, using all that "he quit killing people for his beloved because of love at first sight"/"i can fix him"/"from victim to happy marriage" tropes or any lovey dovey mushy UWU tropes, thinking its cute, healthy and want same kind of bf - congratulations, you are crime/abuse-romanticizing freako who need to touch some grass 🎉🎉🎉

Shipping characters that never met is weird. I mean it has a ponetial, but not if people use tropes i already wrote about earlier.

Still, in TMP2 there is lots of details that showing IS LITERALLY WANTED. Would any person date a serial killer and put their life in danger by harboring a criminal, who can get rid of you easily because you automatically becoming a witness? Im afraid not.

Same thing to selfshippers. No, you wont fix a mentally ill person you never met in IRL with one hug or kiss. If you need to talk about problems - discuss it with people you can trust or a specialist.

PRO/COM/DARKSHIP sucks, guys.

okay! this is alot. the sheer length of this thing. there's somethings that i think need to be said:

some may find the "aroace serial killing psychopath" to be stereotypical or disrespectful, but i'm not aroace so do not take my word for it. it's just from what i've heard

please do not imply selfshippers are mentally ill, need help, or that they're not allowed to selfship with redacted; that is disrespectful. redacted is not real so of course they never met him "IRL." his crimes are not real and your interpretation of him isn't everyone else's interpretation. redacted is noted to have a girlfriend (in tmp1) and is shown loving his mom, so redacted CAN care for things. also please consider the fact a selfshipper may selfship as a coping mechanism. just be a little considerate please.

(on a much smaller note: cookie DOES murder his interns, as confirmed by an AMA (ik you think secondary evidence from anywhere but the games is dumb, but it's canon and you can't really judge otherwise))

i don't normally comment on confessions and i don't like to do it, but if a group of people is being disrespected in someway i WILL point it out.