#how to use archetypes

[inbabylontheywept]

Soviet Birds.

The secret facility that I work in has holes in the ceiling. We don't know how to get them fixed.

We tried asking the government to fix it, once. We told them that the holes in the older parts of the facility had gotten large enough to fit birds through, and that birds were getting through, and that, perhaps, a Soviet Spy could fit through as well.

After all, it is well known that Soviet Spies and pigeons are approximately the same diameter.

Our hope was that that this vague and nonsensical threat would put a little fire under Uncle Sam's feet. If the fed couldn't be bothered to give a shit about the giant gaping holes in the roof of our facility, perhaps they could be persuaded to give a shit about... Soviet Spies.

This attempt at manipulation 100% blew up in our faces.

See, the government does not need to be persuaded to give a shit about Soviet Spies. It still wakes up most nights, drenched in cold sweat, terrified and confident that a Soviet Spy is hiding in their nightstand. If it sees a rock on the ground, it flips it over, pistol drawn, ready to shoot the Soviet Spy it fully expects to slither out from underneath. Which is to say: The government is crazy. So when we dropped those two words - inflitration risk - in the repair request, they came in guns-a-blazin'.

Does that mean that they fixed the roof? Of course not. Don't be stupid. No, instead of performing basic maintenance, they installed a state of the art alarm system throughout the facility - lasers, sonar, the works - and told us to always be on the guard. Because of the roof holes.

Then they left.

So now we had an extremely good alarm system... and birds. Which have combined in incredibly obvious and predictable ways to produce an unending fountain of problems.

For Example: About once a month, someone gets called in by the local airforce dispatch because AAAAAAAAAAA a Spy is in the Rad Lab! We're all gonna die! Except every time, it's a bird. And I get why we have to check, but every time, the dispatcher is panicked and the person going out has to be like listen, listen: It's a bird. It's always a bird. It's been a bird every month for the last fifteen years. It will be a bird next month. All this stress? Bad for your heart.

Second Example: Sometimes, birds get in while we're actually working. And when it's in the morning, you know, it's a nuisance, and it stops testing (we are not going to risk irradiating a bird) but it's not an all-hands-on-deck situation because it doesn't take ten hours to get a bird out. But surprisingly often, the bird gets in riiiiight at closing time, and in that situation, everyone goes feral because nobody can leave until the alarm is set, and we cannot set the alarm while the bird is there, because the bird would immediately trigger it and then we'd have to stay another 4 hours to confirm that it was not a Soviet Bird.

So in order to go home, everyone's top priority is Get That Bird. And we have a system for it.

Step 1: The test stands tend to be located in rooms with 30+ foot ceilings. We can't catch birds in places like that - so we have to lure the bird into the relatively low ceilinged (8 feet only) upper offices.

We do this by turning all the lights off in the test rooms, then putting floodlights by the exits. I don't know why this works - some kind of evolutionary brain fragment shared by both Bugs and Birds - but work it does. The birds almost always follow after the lights. From there, it’s just two guys moving the floodlight and a third guy to turn off the lights.

Step 2: Everyone else has been waiting for this step. There is this long stairway up from the basement level into the offices, and in the final stage, the floodlights are brought to the base of the stairwell to bring the bird up. At the top of the steps there will be a group of tennish people, waiting for the signal. The light guys will set up the final transfer, everyone will tense, and then, swish...a bird will flit up the stairs and into the offices.

It's like watching werewolves on a full moon. Before the bird cometh, we are engineers. Nerds. Pale and skinny things, trembling under the fluorescent lights. After the bird, we are beasts. Feral, gnawing things, glowing under the orange sunrise of the 70's halogen floodlights.

And like all beasts, we cannot help but give chase.

Step 3: The were-engineers begin the hunt. The goal at the start is not really to catch the bird - just exhaust it. So the pack simply does not relent. Because the stakes are going home on time, the group is basically given free reign to go anywhere in the building. If someone's door is open, and the bird goes inside, they're going to have to deal with ten sweaty panting maniacs leaping around their office. They don't get to say that they're busy, or remark on how all this movement is a terrible distraction. They are allowed to sit in silence during the chaos, and perhaps thank the war party for chasing the bird while they sat comfortably on their ass. This has been explained several times, and it will continue to be explained until cooperation is achieved.

Anyway.

The chase can go on for quite some time. Sometimes, the bird will get tired and find a crevice to hide in, where it can then be reached through standard cornered-bird catching techniques.

Other times, it will slow down enough that someone can actually yoink it out of the air. But this will go on until someone catches the bird and triggers Step 4.

Step 4: The Finale. This is the get-the-bird-out-of-the-building stage, and it requires someone to adopt a specific role: To Become the Sacrificial Vessel of Bird Removal.

This job is both coveted and feared. It's coveted, because holding a wild bird in one's hands is a precious thing. To feel how small, and fragile, and scared it is, only to free it from the building? That is what it's like to be a benevolent God. But the cost! Oh, the cost. The entire time the Vessel is in motion, the bird will be biting the hell out of their fingers. And I cannot emphasize enough just how painful bird bites are. Their entire face is a set of needle posed pliers, and they know tricks the even the cartels haven't figured out yet. So there's always a little hubbub about who shall be The Vessel while onlookers, stranded outside The Office of Bird Capture, can only look on. Quiet arguments and pleas are heard, little fragments of fear and pride and glory trickling out of room like the silver dust left behind in a bag of well shook quarters. The sound of concensus is silence, and the argument will go on until that's all that's left. And then, from the darkness of the final office, the chosen sacrifice will step forward: Hands gently cupped, tears streaming down their face, fingers trembling from the pain of the ongoing bird chomps.

And this scene is what organizes people. Not leadership, not truly. No one can think and coordinate a crowd while their fingers are being attacked with a combination nutcracker/ear piercer. But the crowd sees the suffering of their annointed, and it is driven to do everything poossible to make the process flow. People instinctively flair out, finding the fastest path outside. Doors are held open. Paths are cleared. Someone, somehow, always knows the way forward and can describe it to the sufferer. Left, left, forward. Corner closet. Yep, there's a hall in there. Forward. Two-hundred more feet man, you're doing great. Just hold it together a little longer. You're killing it.

Then the final door swings open, and the bird flees out into what remains of daylight. And yet, even here, the deed is not yet done. I cannot explain it in words, but the crowd that helped is never content until they can see and speak on the Bird Vessel's wounds. They all have to pull the fingers back and see what was given. Estimate the price: One day to get better - No, three - No, a week! Are you blind? Do you see that blood blister? -Yeah, that's not going away anytime soon - Damn, can you believe how feisty those things are? Like wolves without teeth.

(They cannot help but touch as they go. It has always been this way. Even Thomas was not content until he felt the wounds in Christ's hands.)

Only when the last of the helpers has seen, and commented, and commended, will the engineers scatter. It is their return from the underworld that announces to the sun living surface dwellers that they too can go home. (@somerunner tolja it needed to be a post.)

[cap-sweet-and-salty-sadness]

Not only there was most of an episode focused on a gay couple, but an older gay couple. They loved each other very much and took care of each other and lived a domestic life until the end. That's so rare to see in media, considering hollywood's ageism and homophobia problems, and on the current most popular HBO show on top of that.

[possamble]

do you have any particular thoughts regarding marcille being a half-elf? its interesting to me considering the fact that she seems self-conscious about being a half-elf, but denies it when its brought up

i remember marcille looking visibly uncomfortable over laios simply asking her how old she is, which i think the only reason she might feel nervous about this is because it might reveal her as a half-elf to him.

she's never corrected anybody whose called her an elf either.

never mind the circumstances of the reveal, in which thistle goes on about how half-elves are inferior and accusing her of wanting to become full blooded elf, she seemed particularly upset like he struck a nerve-

i wish the half-elf thing was built upon more. also, underrated marcille line:

okay so i revisited this sequence just to make sure I could back myself up and it's just... man. there's a lot going on.

the first reaction we get from Marcille is this huge panel that takes up half of the page

she is viscerally affected. flushing to the tips of her ears with the intensity of it. and we see it again, a few pages later

so it might seem like she's embarrassed about it and lying to herself, but... I really think it's just that Thistle is accidentally hitting sore spots. If you really look at what he says to get these reactions

"you'll live out your entire life [...] and die that way too"

"a hundred years from now, nobody will be there"

Hear me out. I think, if he stuck to harping on about her inferiority without bringing up how terrifyingly long-lived she is, she wouldn't have been as bothered. But right now, Thistle is accidentally hitting all the marks on Marcille's deepest fears-- and this is after the Winged Lion promised her that her dreams could come true in an extremely vulnerable moment, so it also hits her slightly guilty conscience as well.

I do truly believe that Marcille isn't bothered about being a half-elf the way that people assume she'd be bothered by it. To her, the biggest problem with being a half-elf is that it's isolating.

On one hand, it's not hard to imagine why she'd distance herself from elves in the west. A lot of them can clock her as a half-elf on sight, unlike other races, and therefore she's always branded with this weird stigma of being Othered -- I would even say that she considers herself lucky for being born outside of elven culture instead of having to grow up in it. I mean, just... look at the way elves talk about her.

Skipping past the uncomfortable implication of what 'not tolerating the existence' of half-elves would actually entail, this is incredibly fucking annoying. You can see why she wouldn't want to be around elves much. You see a lot of Marcille reacting badly here, but honestly, almost all of it can be attributed to her freaking out that her bluff completely failed. She's honestly more paying attention to Izutsumi's footsteps and trying to coordinate an opportunity to escape.

And in the end, you see her built-up frustration at being asked if she wants to be a full-blooded elf like 2-3 times in a row.

Yeah, yeah, "the lady doth protest too much," and all. But we know Marcille. We know that she's a lot more embarrassed and horrendously unconvincing when she's being prodded about something she's actually self-conscious about.

Moving onto the flipside of things, it might seem weird that she "pretends" to be a full elf around other races, but it's not really that strange if you think about it. Again, people are weird about her being infertile or whatever, and a lots of them don't even know much about what sets half-elves apart from everyone else. I mean, look at how uncomfortable Laios is just asking her about it

and look at how exasperated and resigned she looks

And like... she's right. Where would that come up in normal conversation? Why would she go out of her way to tell them? She's functionally a normal elf to other races anyway -- got the ears, the abnormally long "childhood", and the huge mana capacity. Unless it's directly relevant or important for people to know, I don't think it's all that strange or indicative of insecurity that she prefers not to bother with it.

(This combined with her sense of being an "outsider" to elf culture also explains why she thinks elf superiority is embarrassing. She sees the way elves treat short-lived races from the "outsider" perspective nonetheless, and thinks it's obnoxious; especially more so because she usually has to play the elf around short-lived races and deal with the reputation of arrogance that elves have built up.)

The sad thing is, this all means that... she doesn't actually fit in anywhere. She doesn't like going out West much because of how elves treat her. But she's also an outsider in the continents she was born in, treated like this exotic long-lived alien choosing to live among short-lived races for some reason. She is always an outsider, the Other, no matter where she goes. Add in the fact that she'll live longer than literally anyone she knows, and it's honestly kind of heartbreaking.

And I think that's the crux of it. Marcille really doesn't act like she's at all self-conscious about being a half-elf because of any feelings of inferiority or being half-made or whatever. She considers herself a perfectly legitimate being and might even, in some ways, consider herself superior to normal elves because she's not blind with elf supremacy or whatever. (And whatever "elven biases" she displays, all of them are born more out of the fact that she's kind of bad at conceptualizing how other races age and mature compared to herself, not that she actually considers herself better or more mature simply for being an elf.)

I think that whatever self-consciousness Marcille has about being a half-elf is, instead, related to terror and loneliness. The reminder that it ensures she'll never truly belong anywhere for the rest of her very long life. The reminder that, in truth, even she's not actually sure how old she is by other races' standards (hence the discomfort when asked how old she is). She doesn't want to not be a half elf, or be a full elf or full tall-man-- in her ideal world, she's still a half-elf. She just gets to live out her life at the same pace with the people she loves and doesn't have to say goodbye again and again and again until she dies.

and one last very important panel, right after Mithrun tells her that all her desires would be devoured

In her ideal world, she's still a half-elf and reality magically starts marching at her pace. But failing that, the second best thing is that she's still a half-elf-- but one who is able to accept reality and let go of her fear.

(But the rest of the story pans out the way it does because, to Marcille, taking reality apart and reshaping it was less scary than simply and fully reconciling with it.)

[milkbreadtoast]

looking back at the yjh webtoon screencaps i have saved and giggling... hes so cute... moe... my pookie ^___^ 🥰🥰 poor little meow meow woof woo- *eliminated where i stand*

also these poses are sooooo... 꺄아악🖤🫣🫣🫣🫣

[friendofthecrows]

As always, (no pressure) reblog for more votes, etc. <3

[greenerteacups]

Hermione, in both canon and often in fanon, seems to have predominately male friendships and kind of difficult time building strong relationships with women (Lavender, Fleur, etc.). Even initially with Luna, Hermione was particularly skeptical and had a rocky start.

What's your theory on why this is?

Hermione, especially in the early books, is written by an author who treats her unfemininity as a quality that makes her different from, and superior to, other girls. Hermione is self-serious, intellectual, and decisive, which are classically masculine virtues, which Hermione (and the author) are aware of; and so Hermione eschews femininity in any number of ways. The other girls at Hogwarts, meanwhile, with the exception of Ginny, are often portrayed as shallow, vapid, flirty (count the number of times Lavender or Parvati "giggles" or goes "oooh"), hyperemotional, and boy-obsessed. Meanwhile, Hermione is intense, driven, and oblivious to other people's feelings — in many respects "boyish." Not until the later books, when both the characters and their writing starts to mature, is humanity offered to people like Cho Chang or Fleur Delacour — and even then, Lavender's arc in sixth year is this remarkably mean subplot where a sixteen-year-old girl becomes the butt of endless jokes because she has the audacity to... act silly around her crush. (If you think "Won-Won" is a bad nickname, you need to go see what actual teens in relationships call each other, because I'm telling you, Ron has it easy.)

The narrative wants you to know that Hermione is special, and her specialness is underscored by her difference from other women. In canon, she buys into that specialness, which leads to a degree of disdain for other girls that's fueled by a superiority complex and internalized misogyny. I say this as someone who adores her, and adores her in her complexity: Hermione has trouble forming friendships with women because she believes that she is Not Like Other Girls, and her author agrees with her.

[tacosaysroar]

Me: What fresh horrors await me today, I wonder.

Work: Oh my god, SO glad you asked . . .

[rearranging-deck-chairs]

they shouldve made the next 13 doctors women too just to see what happens

[ohmerricat]

just gotta wait 16 years, hang in there 🤞🤞

[skunkes]

i need to play DQB2 again malroth...save me. Save me malroth. Save me builderoth.

[goodsniff]

To address the big grey, candy corned horned elephant in the room. Yes I am a homosuck fan. I'm still mildly amused that people are so shocked that the nerds making animated shows, are into animated nerd shit? I've already been asked a few times so I've written out below what I think the Heeler's classpects would be.

HOWEVER unfortunately for all of you I am not only into Homestuck but am also a huge textual analysis nut for it. So before you can have dessert I'm going to use this as an excuse to lay out some of my fav pieces of writing regarding it. They sum up why I still have an immense reverence for this stupid piece of shit better than I could ever explain.

@hampermarketplace Why I can’t understand Homestuck

@some-triangles I’m trying to figure out why I like Davepetasprite so much.

@optimisticduelist2 & his wonderful YT channel

@mmmmalo is a never ending stream of interesting and intricate theories and I like to pretend I'm erudite enough to understand even half of them

There's too many artists still out there posting up and drawing extremely hard HS pics that I love to list out, but fruitegg has got to get a mention. Everything I attempt to do in my art when it comes to capturing the energy and attitude of living Aus she does far smarter and far funnier. It rules I have somehow fooled her into being my friend.

______

Alright done, here's what you wanted

Bandit: Bard of Hope Chilli: Mage of Hope Bluey: Knight of Void Bingo: Page of Light

Bandit & Chilli are straight forward enough. The thinking behind Bluey & Bingo is as follows. Doing a close reading of them as kids you could easily argue they're Breath/Hope players BUT. There used to be a few working theories around Hiveswap characters mistakenly imitating the wrong classpects. And though I don't think the girls are doing that, it feels to me like their youth is masquerading what their classpects would actually be.

As they're very clearly delineated active (Bluey) passive (Bingo) and so close as sisters, I reckon they'd be a full classpect pair. As much as I think Bluey would really suit Knight of Blood, there's ways Knight of Void would act as a perfect compliment to Bingo's Page of Light. A helpful, positive Knight of Void who protects her friends from despair, and is socially intelligent enough to weaponise people's unawareness/ignorance to her and her friends own advantage seems like a really exciting angle to analyse her through.

Finally, the only classpect I would bet my life on is Muffin being a Mage of Rage. 🤡

[starbuck]

Was thinking earlier about “People are not stupid, Ives.” “Really?” and how Ives’ self-centered misanthropy is so important within the larger thematic context of American Imperialism. Imperialists prioritize their own interests over all others since they believe that those they have deemed “others” are unworthy of human consideration. On an individual level, this comes down to believing that you are better than other people, more worthy of life and happiness. 

This is how Hart ends up working with Ives as a willing coconspirator… Even before Colqhoun’s arrival, Hart clearly looks down on the other residents of Fort Spencer. He describes them so uncharitably to Boyd that it isolates Boyd from everyone before he’s even met them. Hart hates his job and the life he lived that got him there and he copes by believing that he is, at least, a superior type of person to everyone under his command. 

In that way, Hart killing his former comrades in cold blood doesn’t come out of nowhere. It’s the logical conclusion of his superior, misanthropic perspective pushed to the extreme. He’s better than them, so why SHOULDN’T he kill and eat them? Don’t you understand? You have to KILL! to live! You have to KILL!!!!!!! 

[sexysilverstrider]

as time passes by and the older i get i really do not give a fuck. i love and appreciate fire emblem if for what it is. the storys fun messy the characters are lovable and dramatic and stupid and the tropes are what i eat for BREAKFAST. age gap. siscon/brocon. gap moe. surprise cousin incest. faux incest. being able to woo a shota/loli. being able to woo old men who literally watched you grow. camilla va sawashiro miyuki. Fire Emblem If (2015) you will always be my top 3 favourite fe game

[thorarms]

Been getting really into thinking of thor as less of a character and more of an archetype of masculinity whose various depictions reflect cultural norms and expectations of manhood and masculinity and more specifically how he mirrors various authors personal views of said cultural norms lately

[randomnameless]

Fates unironically did the "muhritocracy" schtick better than 3H lol; the vast majority of the playable Nohrian characters are commoners who got into high-ranking positions in the Nohrian army due to being exceptional soldiers and getting rewarded as such, whereas the only commoners on Adrestia's side that aren't turncoats (or fodder soldiers that are stated to exist only in throwaway dialogue from faceless NPCs) are Ladislava (non-character with no screentime, personality or even feats to support that she did anything to help the Adrestian army in any significant way), Fleche (slightly more of a character, still does nothing to help Adrestia), Randolph (does nothing to help and isn't even particularly well-recognized or rewarded for his skills, if him being jealous of his superiors is any indication), and Dorothea (only got to a high-ranking position due to prostituting herself in order to get into Garreg Mach, befriending the crown princess of the Empire, and being made into a general of the Adrestian army due to nepotism from that same crown princess).

What makes it even worse is that Nohr rewarding merit for anyone and everyone, regardless of social class or status, is an irrelevant bit of background worldbuilding, whereas Edelgard wanting to reward commoners' merits is one of her most consistently-repeated ideals, but the only non-nobleborn CF playable character only got so far in life due to (literal) peepee-sucking and nepotism, and even the NPCs are either featless non-characters (Fleche and Ladislava) or complain about not being recognized enough despite his skill/is recognized enough and Edelgard just decided a power-hungry, immoral dumbass was meritant enough to be made into a general in her army (Randolph); shouldn't the order have been reversed? Like, the game where one of the main characters' principle ideals is to recognize and reward anyone who's skilled should be the one to have most of her allies be commoners, whereas the one where the concept of merit is completely irrelevant to the story, themes and characters could have just had the characters be mostly nobles instead of consistently making them commoners just for subtle worldbuilding? It's weird.

Want to see an upstanding posterchild of Nohrian muhritocracy?

Chaos will always topple the ones who don't earn their status. It's folks like you and me who rise to the top. And the way we do that is by cutting down all our enemies.

I won't stop at captain. I will keep on climbing!

I'll be a king someday. I'll make it happen—you wait and see.

More seriously -

It's all about the what is actually rewarded.

I've already joked a bit about it, but basically Randolph and Nopes!Caspar want to demonstrate their muhrit by... invading countries, killing refugees or randoms who returned in their home after being ousted by the Imperial army.

Much muhrit, very uwu.

Take Whodislava, as you mentioned, bar being a named NPC who as less screentime than Kronya and is supposed to be a sad casualty for war, while being the posterchild of Supreme Leader's muhritocracy, we don't a thing about her. What has she done to be granted the rank of general? What are her achievements?

At times I'm pretty sure TS was partly written to laugh and mock FE16, but Avlora is basically in the same situation, save that Avlora has more plot relevance and exists bar being a sign the devs hold that's written "please feel bad about this character you've never interacted with and only has 5 lines of dialogue and is only here to garner sympathy when she dies I mean even Fates!Candace had more presence than her".

Avlora was an orphan, trained under Groma - a famous general - who continued to train even when Groma retired, became Adre- Aesfrost's top general and defeated Maxwell in a duel. We have her story - she came from nothing - her feats - she defeated the strongest warrior in Glenbrook - and the entire meritocracy angle sticks : Avlora was a nobody made general because she kicked asses.

The meritocratic Adrestia NPCs?

Randolph... tries to get muhrit, but fails as we protect people and only laments about his status in his House (as he is fucking killing people to gain more status, like dude, priorities?) - so in way, both Randy and Flèche are imo, counterexemples of Supreme Leader's muhritocracy : Randolph kills peons and invades an orphanage to demonstrate his "muhrit" because, otherwise, without any muhrit, iirc it's implied he and his sister will be demoted to randoms in House Bergliez (even if Flèche is supposed to be younger than Cyril iirc? Like how the frick do you want a kid of 12 to demonstrate her muhrit, else she'll be kicked out of her house?).

Whodislava... dies heroically, at least that's what we're supposed to get from her very "please cry" cutscene when she dies in front of Supreme Leader in Tru Piss - as Rhea and her family + knights tried to retake their ancestral home and she prevented them from doing so - or it's the same nonsense as "we killed Ferdie professor :(", we are supposed to feel bad about people who were fighting alongside a demonic beast when, in FE16, we fucking know what they are.

Since the FE5 banner released earlier this week, FE5 paints "honorable" Reinhardt as a pitiful man, because no matter how honorable or kickass or kind Reinhardt was, when it came to defect to protect children from being kidnapped or stop the general nonsense the Empire was pulling in Thracia... Reinhardt refused to do so, pretexting remaining by Ishtar's side, and when that became impossible, he choose death over rescuing toddlers. His situation is supposed to be compared to his sister's Olwen, who, when she discovers the truth of what is happening in Thracia, ditches the Empire to help Leif rescue the children - and, imo, Amalda (who's not in FEH yet!) who is also, basically, a commander who plays a larger Camus role as in, she tries to appeal to her Lord to stop the child hunts, her Lord tells her to eat shit, and when asked why she still fights and why she doesn't defect, Amalda says if she does so, her knights will be killed + Amalda appears as a NPC allied unit in a map to hunt bandits to save a village.

So, compared to those ladies who defect or try to protect whoever they can protect - their soldiers AND civilians who are being trampled by their own army - Reinhardt who doesn't do a thing and picks "death" is, as Olwen's ending puts it "pitiful".

Back to your ask anon, even if I disgress from the meritocracy angle - Flèche, Whodislava and Randy are such non-entities compared to characters with 6 lines from FE5 that even if they try to pull the "I have to do this for my family" or the "I came from nothing and still help my emperor because I am thankful to her for having raised me from being a commoner to a general", our Adrestians NPC feel very, very flat.

Are we supposed to cry for Hans's failed dreams of becoming a king when we kill him? No, but Randy and Whodislava's deaths are overplayed with so much pathos that the game is basically telling you "and here you should feel bad because they died" but... what is more important, the fact they tried to unlock a lot of achievments to demonstrate their "muhrit", or what the hell they were ready to do to unlock said achievments?

As for Doro needing to befriend people to enter Garreg Mach, remember that Doro, being touted as another example of the muhritocracy Supreme Leader's Adrestia aims to be, had to engage in sex work from a young age, to reach the diva status - which has very disturbing implications, that are glossed over because that's FE16 for you. Are we supposed to believe Doro "worked hard" to be able to catch the eye of some deranged fucks when she was a pre-teen to become a diva - or, as Manu puts it in a support that cannot be achieved in Tru Piss, muhrit alone doesn't work to become a diva, and it's actually a pretty font to hide the "dark" deeds young singers in Mittelfrank have to do to reach the "diva" status?

Minor tidbit though, Doro is famous enough for being Supreme Leader's dearest friend but she isn't promoted to "general" in Tru Piss, she's only BESF who's not, at least in her bio, a general Post TS.

Imo the question you raise is actually relevant to how empty Supreme Leader's muhritocracy's ideal is - in both game Ferdie has to remind her that to build "muhrit" or for commoners to be able to gather "muhrit" as nobles do, they have to start at the same lever, and receive education as nobles do.

IIRC, in Supreme Bullshit, despite their feats, Hubert tells Barney they're only a commoner - not even a worthy commoner like Doro - but a fucking random - when muhrit wise, Barney should at least be named general!

In both games, Linhardt is a general... but we don't see anything from him, bar his tropey "i want to study crests and nap and i dgaf about anything else" traits - if that's all there is to him, how and why the crap was he made general??

Why, it's almost as if "muhrit" is a smokescreen to hide the fact that the one who chooses/picks who gets to be important from who isn't does it on their own terms just like irl

What is merit, really? Who gets to decide what is merit from what isn't? Or who is the "best" at doing things, from another?

It's another instance of, imo, Fodlan's artificial feel, the game raises a question/issue, and starts some smoke about it, but without tackling said issues seriously we're left with "I agree and think starvation shouldn't exist anymore" milquetoast and cliché opinions that give the illusion this game is "very deep" when it's just, a puff of smoke.

[justletmeramble1701]

I want to write an essay about masculinity in My Adventures with Superman, specifically how Clark is presented with traits that would traditionally belong to a feminine love interest, but I feel like I will need knowledge on anime romantic archetypes and yuri tropes.

Can anyone help me find resources so I can talk about this in an informed manner?