#i am a very ignorant uninformed person

[vicsuragi]

.

[pablitogavii]

can you do an image where Gavi and you have a kind of private relationship like where your friends and family know about you guys together but you never show affection infront of people and then one day after barca win the league he’s all affectionate and his family or friends are all cooing at you guys and you are all blushing and shit. Sorry if it’s too specific <3

Privacy

Pablo was a very private person especially when it came to his relationships with people outside of football.

He wasn't much of a talked and in private was very shy to show affection in public because he didn't want it plastered all over the internet..he wanted to keep that between you and him behind closed doors.

His family and friends know just how affectionate he can be behind cameras and they always respected his wish for privacy when it came to your relationship.

"If they all know, they will make you hate me.." Pablo said to you one night after making love together and just cuddling together and loving on each other.

You knew Pablo struggled with his quickly acquired fame and he was fearful of loosing his ground and people he loved because of it...that's why he was careful with everything he does publically.

Everyone knew you were in a relationship but you still controlled what you did in front of cameras..you kept affection to the minimum and instead saved it all for when you were alone. Some fans even hated on him for 'not being a good boyfriend' for not being affectionate to his girlfriend which is completely false..they just don't have the whole picture.

Today was a special day for Barça and Pablo himself winning his first title with the team of his dreams and you were in the stand with his family of course there to support him.

"Vamos hermanita!" Aurora grabbed your hand while you walked through the crowd towards the pitch to meet with Pablo and the rest of the team with your family passes on your neck.

Paparazzi were everywhere shooting pictures while reporters were pushing to the front asking questions and pushing their mics into our faces to answer.

"How do you stay with Gavi when he doesn't treat you right!? We don't see any affection from his part?" was one of many questions commenting on our relationship that they knew nothing about and that made me sad..people were so quick to judge and hate on him for no reason. Aurora on the other hand grew angry from all these false accusations.

"Mi hermano loves this girl like a queen that she is! And for you to suggest otherwise only shows how ignorant and uninformed you are!" she was yelling at the microphone being pulled back by her mom who knew the reaction was what these vultures wanted.

"Lo siento hermanita! I couldn't help it.." she said knowing that Pablo asked her never to comment on his relationship because he didn't want your pictures plastered on the internet in various blogs and magazines. You were a normal girl and wanted to keep being that even after starting to date Gavi.

"It's alright Rora.." you said knowing she only wanted to protect her younger brother which was completely normal.

Pablo was standing on the edge of the pitch seeing and hearing the whole thing clenching his jaw and being down with all of this bullshit!

When you arrived, he walked up to you raising you off your feet making you snake your thighs around his waist while he spin you around happily. All of his family, friends and yourself were shocked with his actions..he was never this public with his affection towards you!

"Pablo? You're holding me..in public?" you whisper to him when he put you down but still keeping his strong grip around your waist while high fiving all his friends and kissing his family.

"Yes, I am!" he said like it was the most normal thing in the world and you felt your cheeks blushing as cameras flashed pictures of the two of you hugging from every side of the pitch.

"Want to take a picture with the cup princesa???" he said when it was his turn to grab it and you felt so proud to see him hold it in his hands knowing how much he deserve it.

"Um..just us?" you said still little taken back by his sudden display of affection in public that happened for the very first time. He nodded with a proud smile on his face.

"I want to show them you're mine..and that I treat you right because that's all you deserve mi vida!" he whispered into your ear making your face even more red at his words.

"A..and aren't you scared how that will affect our relationship??" you remind him of his fears seeing that he had new determination on his face..when you challenge Pablo Gavi, get ready to loose!

"I am..but I trust us to survive anything together..I know we love each other and it's time we show that to the world mi amor" he said leaning down and kissing your lips which made the whole crowd go crazy and your family and friends clapping and cheering loudly.

"Now let me take a picture with my two trophies!!" he said and you smiled with blushed cheeks as you stood together numerous pictures taken of you. Pablo kissed your head, lips and cheek while flashes were capturing every affectionate moment you shared.

"Gavi! Gavi! Can we have an interview with you and Y/n???" they asked and Pablo sighed grabbing your hand and wanting to get this over with finally.

You were never by his side when he gave an interview so you felt very nervous about it but feeling his tight hold, you were reassured that he was right there besides you.

"You're such a beautiful couple and many have doubted you because of the lack of affection they saw between you??" was the first question and you felt tense until Pablo started massaging your hips reassuring you that he was alright with answering this.

"I am a very private person and I like to keep my affection to when we are alone..to when I'm not overwhelmed with cameras.." Pablo answered and you smiled at him knowing how anxious he is talking for cameras feeling proud that he was still explaining himself.

"So why did you decide to change that today? We saw some beautiful moments between you two while taking pictures with the cup?" she asked and I felt my cheeks blush.

"Hearing people say that I don't treat her right really hurt..because I was raised to treat woman with love, respect and kindness..she is my girl and I always make sure to treat her right even though it's not caught on cameras" he answered and you smiled nodding your head in agreement.

"Anything you would like to add Y/n?" she asked and Pablo turned to look down at me with a soft smile on his handsome face.

"Yeah..Pablo is really the sweetest boyfriend to me..someone who always takes care of me and loves me softly. It makes me sad to see people hate on him and spread false information. Nobody knows about our relationship but the two of us and our families.." you said feeling Pablo kiss the top of your head lovingly.

"You certainly shut up the haters today and we hope you continue enjoying your love freely. Congrats to both of you!" she said and you smiled walking back towards your family holding your hands and smiling brightly.

"I'm glad we can do this now.." you said turning around in his arms and placing your hands on the back of his neck as he leaned down and kissed your lips then resting his forehead against yours.

"I'm sorry I haven't shut them all up sooner mi vida...I'm sorry you had to deal with the hate because of me.." he said and you cupped his cheeks shaking your head and pecking his lips one more time.

"It's alright, cariño..these things take time and I always knew how much you loved me even when you didn't show it publicly" you said and he smiled nodding his head.

"From now on, I want the whole world to see how much I love mi anjo precioso!" he said raising you up again carrying you to where his family and friends were so y'all could celebrate together.

I hope you enjoyed reading it! <3 Thanks for the request!!

[phantomonabudget]

We need to talk, Pham. Stop shaming Christine Daaé.

I have seen this behavior consistently for the 30+ years I have been a Phan. What's worse is that I see A LOT of it from grown women. I see posts calling her foolish for leaving Erik. Slut shaming her or calling her a gold digger. Calling her stupid, weak, or unworthy because a "real woman" (presumably the women posting these absurd notions 🙄) would have loved him better and been worthy of his awesome talent and capacity for love. 😳🤮

It's disturbing, disheartening, and disgusting. And it needs to stop.

First off, none of these characters are real, so perhaps let's take things a little less seriously in general. It's a fictional story. I get it: we all love it, and probably love the Phantom's character. That's fine....I've made a 20+ year career dressing as the dude, for crying out loud. 🤣 Maybe we all identify with Erik/The Phantom to some degree. Regardless of the version of the story, if the actors or authors do their job well, we *should* feel pity and compassion for him. But feeling compassion and completely ignoring the character's dangerous and abusive behavior are two very different things. It has the potential for some severe consequences in the real world.

By shaming Christine for leaving Erik at the end, you are potentially telling young people that staying in abusive relationships is the right thing. You make them think that if their significant other is talented, misunderstood, been abused themselves etc, then they should stay and love them into a healthy relationship. That if they just love their abusive SO harder, sacrifice themselves a little more or for a little longer, or keep putting that person's needs above their own, that the relationship will suddenly become this wonderful, euphoric experience. It won't. As a survivor of longtime abusive myself, I can tell you from experience: it doesn't happen that way.

Celebrate healthy relationships and enforcing healthy boundaries. Stop shaming Christine for fighting for and winning her life and saving the man she loves.

And please stop calling this a romance. It's the antithesis of romance.

I am sick of members of this Phandom completely ignoring Erik/The Phantom's behavior to justify their blind adoration. Erik is an abusive and dangerous character, and extremely toxic. He lies to and manipulates Christine using her trauma from her deceased father. He kidnaps her, multiple times. Threatens her and her colleagues. He extorts hundreds of thousands from the business managers. He endangers dozens of people with the chandelier crash, and effectively holds hundreds hostage for months or years at a time with his reign of terror at the Opera.

Then there are the murders. Several of them. Probably been at that for awhile so we can assume it's far more than the two we see in the show. We don't know his actual body count, but we do know he's adept and comfortable taking human life.

And yet, I see some mature phans out here completely ignoring all those things and still shaming Christine for leaving him. Why? Because he's "sexy" (author's note: PLEASE go re-read Leroux. Please). And he's talented. And has so much love to give. And is misunderstood. And society was terrible to him...so it's all fine. 😳🤮 She should have just stayed and loved him like he deserves to be loved. 🙄

Recently I saw a post shaming Christine and the justification was that Raoul was so much worse. He isn't. Is he a perfect character? No, not at all. Does he make mistakes and try to use Christine? In some versions, yes. Does he run around extorting, manipulating, threatening, and killing others? Also no.

Pleasw don't ever use LND!Raoul's character assassination as some kind of justification, because he's still the most sane, normal human being in that show, and Erik is still 1,000 times worse than Raoul in LND. Also, using LND as justification for anything makes for a very weak and uninformed argument.

"Hurt people hurt people." Ever heard that phrase? Abused people sometimes abuse others, especially if they haven't done the work to heal themselves. Their previous abuse does NOT entitle them to abuse others. That is always a deliberate choice and those choices have consequences. The dangerous, disgusting rhetoric I see in the Phantom community basically excuses toxic behavior because Erik was previously abused and nothing is his fault. That is simply not true. Those that abused me were previously abused. Didn't make my abuse hurt any less. And I made the choice to do the work so that the abuse stopped with me. Previous trauma is a reason for the behavior, but it is NEVER, ever an excuse.

And don't let the fact the dude can sing or that he's a snappy dresser blind you to his toxicity.

We can all enjoy the Phantom character's complexity and love him, while still acknowledging his flaws and holding him accountable for his deeply inappropriate choices.

We talk a lot more these days about trauma, toxicity, and self care. And yet, as a community, we still shame the character of Christine Daaé for doing the healthy, correct thing. The ONLY thing. And in doing so, we set a disturbing precedent for our young or vulnerable Phans who now might think that staying in toxic relationships in the real world is okay.

Please do better, Phandom.

[venelona]

Hey! Big fan of your art!

I have a question:

You’re a big shipper of frans which gets a lot of hate online from people who claim it to be “problematic” or “pedophilia” and I’m curious: How do you deal with these people?

A lot of the time these people have the intelligence of a paint can, and the personality of a rusty pipe. They come in many forms: sometimes they just follow mob mentality, sometimes they think they’re the “good guys” and are fighting against “problematic” stuff, sometimes they’re just uninformed and too stubborn to listen, and sometimes they just hate to hate. These things all mean that they can’t really be reasoned with.

So I’m curious as to how you deal with them and what the best strategy is (I’m planning on getting into ut writing, so I wanna be prepared).

(Thank you!)

Hello, thank you!

Your observations are very on point - a lot of people who send frans hate (honestly, its not even just frans issue - it can apply to any not-canon ship) are quite narrow minded, stubborn, like to play a morally superior 'hero' and do not like to listen to any reasoning

I deal with it by simply not being that person. I keep open mind and respect even ships that I dislike with all my soul, because at the end of the day this is fiction, hobby, for fun. And that's what I tell people who try and sling hate at me - you really have a problem with a person's choice of fictional character romance? Even if its problematic (when it comes to frans, as long as Frisk is an adult I do not even consider it problematic), exploring a problematic ship does not make a person awful, as long as they are and the audience is aware that it's supposed to be problematic. Like, yunno, people who write murder stories are not killers

When engaging with the hate comments (which I usually do when I receive any - when I was still in the toxic pit that is Instagram when I wasn't in the best mental space I'd just delete hateful comments, only for those people to come back and point fingers at me for it, which means they were monitoring a post they actively dislike... honestly, those kinds of people just have too much time in their life) I usually try to respectively describe my point of view, and sometimes even engage in conversation when I try to talk with them through their points in an effort to show them that there doesn't need to be hate like this, and how usually it's hypocritical in comparison to other ships, maybe world in general, or just that it's kind of a waste of time to talk about this because this is for entertainment purposes of a person you do not know but choose to hurt and can hurt

I do not owe this to those people - I probably don't even owe them politeness I try to extend, but I choose to act this way because usually those people are young, and if my words have even a slight chance to change how they choose to act and view things, it's worth it in my eyes to try. Though, I do this if I'm in a good mental space, which I usually am, but I get wore down also. If I'm too tired, I just ignore it, or leave a shorter comment

Honestly I've been very fortunate not to receive a lot of hate over the years - I was too unpopular/not worth it at first and later too big and intimidating to attack later lol I'd never want for people to attack someone on my behalf, even if they attacked me, but having friends you can vent to if something did get to you is very nice.

Most of the time people don't really change their point of view, but sometimes they do. I got a couple call out posts on twitter last months, and commenting on them and talking to people who made them made them delete them, because they were made by teens who got scared that the person they ragged on saw this, asked them why they were gossiping, and explaining how their 'heroic unmasking' posts could lead to a person receiving threats and having their mental state crumbling (I was in good enough mental space so I didn't think of it much, but I worry for those who may receive same type of treatment and handle it worse). Those teens said they won't make posts like this again, which doesn't mean they changed as people or changed their perspective, but hopefully means in the future there will be less people hated, and less people will embarrass themselves by targeting people in hopes of being a 'hero who brought awareness to this person being bad' when the person didn't do anything to deserve this

In conclusion... Do not listen to hateful comments - there's no shame in deleting them or blocking the people outright. I always leave blocking as last resort, but it's a personal choice. Sometimes for your mental health and mood it's really better just to yeet that out of your sight tho, complain to your friends and move on to have a nice day

Good luck with writing! If you start getting any ship hate you're always welcome to dm/tag me, and I'll try to help you ✨From personal experience, Tumblr doesn't have much haters though - even if you catch their attention, you can always turn off anon asks

[themuppetarchives]

A note, since some of you seem to be taking it personally that I am being selective in which asks I respond to:

I have very few boundaries and, even if I should find something personally distasteful, will still share or post it if I feel it presents a relevant viewpoint or possibility for discussion.

That being said, there are some things that I consider off limits, and for my own ethical and moral reasons will not be engaging with. Examples of these include (but are not necessarily limited to):

1. Making a joke out of someone's genuine trauma, regardless of how "silly" or unserious you may think it is. I have known people who are triggered into complete meltdown by the smell of bug spray, or a certain children's cartoon character. We cannot pick and choose the things that hurt us and the associations our minds make when we experience trauma. You don't have to "understand" why something upsets someone, but it feels like common decency to respect their experiences.

2. Wild speculation as to someone's health, including attempting to diagnose them based on very limited information. I feel this is irresponsible, especially if it comes across as trying to influence a vulnerable person into aligning themselves with a diagnosis or disorder that may ultimately cause them more harm. Someone's health, mental and physical, should be a discussion between that individual and their healthcare provider, not a topic of debate for uninformed strangers online largely basing their conclusions off of unfounded pop science and blatant misinformation. That is not the purpose of this blog nor will it ever be.

3. Invalidating, mocking, or otherwise being disrespectful about someone's relationship with their gender identity and sexuality. I'm not sure at what point this became an ok thing to do within the queer community but I will be having none of it here. It isn't hard to respect people telling you who they are and how they wish to be treated. This should, frankly, go without saying. You don't get to ignore someone's identity because you feel they aren't performing up to your standards.

I hope that clears some things up. I am not obligated by anything or in anyway to entertain things that cross boundaries. Please, and I say this with all the sincerity in my heart, get a new hobby and leave me alone.

[drop-dead-dropout]

hey if you feel comfortable explaining publicly, why are you a proshipper? i don't feel strongly one way or the other and i'm just wondering what your perspective is. no pressure and i don't mean to be invasive or anything like that! just curious :)

It's alright! I personally don't really participate in ships most people would consider "problematic" (unless we're counting enemies to lovers), which I think is part of the reason why it took me so long to even bother investigating the issue and forming an opinion in the first place. "Proship" just means I don't believe in things like lolicon or incest fic or whatever most people agree is gross or bad irl (though irl it would be pedophilia not fetish which is completely disgusting and assault to be absolutely clear) should be wiped off the Internet.

Why do I believe this? Well, for one, lobbing accusations at fic writers hurts real victims. I won't go too heavily into the mainstream watering-down of terms like "pedophile" and "rapist", but it's been especially bad in the past few years, even outside this kind of discourse that most non-fandom people don't even know about.

Also, many rape victims, especially those assaulted as children, suffer from intense "taboo" sexual urges and/or distressing intrusive thoughts (especially compounded by things like OCD). Most therapists would agree that fanfiction is a good place to explore this! As long as it's properly tagged, you have a very low chance of hurting anyone else, and thoughts like this don't just "go away" if you ignore them, no matter how much antis would like that to be the case.

Okay, but not everyone who reads this type of stuff is a victim, right? Some of them are definitely just doing it to get off. You are absolutely right to think that! As I said before, I'm not a part of these "problematic" incest or shotacon or whatever communities, but even I, "uninformed" as I am, wouldn't make such an obviously false claim. So, here's the way I think about it:

1) first and most importantly, there is no evidence-based link between reading incest or loli/underage whatever to being an actual abuser or rapist in real life, as of the last time I checked (like a few weeks ago). If any antis are hiding some sort of peer-reviewed study I'm not aware of, I'd be happy to talk about it, though. You can say "it's common sense" all you want, but personally, I'll take the scientific process over that any day.

2) like exploring trauma, fanfiction (and, to an extent, things like animated hentai or whatever) is most likely the safest space to BE if someone is truly "attracted" to lolicon or shotacon. It's the only porn that's guaranteed not to be exploitative, because only one person (the author) is involved in making it.

Oh jeez, this is already a bit long-winded. Hope this answers any questions you have, and I'm happy to answer more asks from you or anyone else!

[yourtoradorasextendedwarranty]

So I understand that I have a tendency to politics and rage post quite a bit and while I'm scrolling through my feed I like to go through and kind of mix things up with cute videos of animals and just wholesome things.

But the reason things have been picking up with me posting in general is because I have a bit too much free time recently and my work is a delivery job currently. Now as to what I'm about to talk about it is going to be me bitching. And it's because there is a demographic in the country that I can't tell whether or not they are just stupid, ignorant, or malicious. Though there is a possibility that it's a Venn diagram and that there's overlap or potentially a perfect circle.

Now the video that I'm about to share before I get into this topic is going to feature a person that I am aware that a lot of people don't like for a variety of different reasons. Having said that however I find man on the street videos pretty optimal for testing the general climate of people in general. Having said that here is the video.

Now if you decide to not watch the full video that's completely fine because my response is mainly only to the first and third person that are interviewed. And this is a broader conversation about Democrat voters in general. So I am going to put a read more tag under this because it will probably be long but if you end up giving it a read I appreciate it.

I don't know if it's because of mainstream Media or pundits or talking heads but Democrat voters in the United States seem to be heavily uninformed to a point of sheer ignorance or just general stupidity. And if you are honestly asking me I can't tell if it's again, ignorance, stupidity or maliciousness. But the first guy in this interview basically literally talked about forming a totalitarian government even if he's not implicit about it that's what he wants. Because he very much said that he didn't want to stack the supreme Court and then said that yes he actually wants to have full power of the house the Senate and the presidency so that they could stack the court and then prevent Republicans from ever getting that kind of majority so that they could keep power.

Because even if all of that wasn't explicit he very much made that clear in what he implied. And between him and the third guy who both claimed that people are misinformed the irony is palpable.

As to the third guy I don't think that he's malicious I think that he's ignorant and bordering on stupid and I don't say that to be crude. I actually say that because I believe it to be the case in this instance because of how he talks. This seems like a guy who un-ironically watches CNN and MSNBC religiously. And then literally only repeats the things that he hears. Because he talks about a stalemate when it came to the border bill. A border bill in which didn't actually do much of anything. The bill itself allows 4000 illegal immigrants in throughout the day and after the 4,000 mark they are supposed to halt illegals from coming in. Part of the bill was also an aid package to Ukraine. Now if you look at it from both of those angles it sounds pretty clear to me that it really doesn't do anything about the border. Actually if anything it codifies illegal immigration into our country.

Then there is the supposedly banned books. The actual definition of a book being banned is an instance in which societally and often governmentally a book is removed from circulation from all means. In other words society and the government say you can't publish this book anymore owning this book is literally forbidden and we will imprison you or file charges against you if it is found in your possession or if you are found to be distributing it. That is the actual definition of what banning a book looks like. Meanwhile what was actually taking place in a lot of instances where that a number of books were being looked over for their potentially inappropriate content in regards to children. And they were not being banned. They were being removed from elementary and intermediate schools and an instances some high schools. Why? Because a number of them have explicit sexual content in them. And the only reason that they were functionally allowed was because the only sexual content that Neo progressives want in schools is LGBT sexual content. If you asked quite a number of them if they thought that Playboy or any other number of publications that do dirty smut stories featuring straight people they would freak out at the prospect in some cases.

And so I'm sorry to tell you Mr number three but yes if you have literally no issue with LGBT sexually explicit content in schools just say it. But in all likelihood he doesn't know. He just heard some talking head at the New York times or MSNBC or CNN telling them that the stories were just about LGBT people and did not actually feature anything bad. Despite the fact that one of said books actually features essentially a how-to on giving a blowjob and it's depicted in a picture, and another of the books teaches you how to use Grindr but it is not locked behind a hint hint, wink wink, of if you are under the age of 18 don't read this next part. Yes because a person who buys a book is not going to read everything in it if they bought it with the intention to read it regardless of their age. What's more there are a lot of people who will still argue to this day that drag queens are not explicitly sexual. To which I respond with 99% of all forms of drag performance have historically been sexual in nature in some way shape or form. But it asks a broader question of why is it only that drag queens want to read in front of children and literally no other groups? You never hear about drag queen story hour for old people you never hear about drag queen story hour for you know community viewing. It's always intentionally aimed at children often small children. So I would say yes there is very much an agenda there. And the agenda is to normalize sexual depictions of people in explicitness as well as degeneracy.

Now understand something. Functionally speaking most of the people I know are filthy degenerates. But most of them know where to draw the line. Societally speaking most people do not. And that's part of the issue. Because most instances of drag queens are explicitly sexual and drag shows themselves are often if not always explicitly sexual. You would not be stripping at a drag show and dancing in a sexually provocative way if it wasn't meant to be sexual. Performative or not it is meant to be sexual. And for a lot of drag queens it is a sexual fetish. Because they get sexual gratification from it.

Which leads me interestingly to a point that I did not think I was going to talk about but seeing as this is kind of a rant I'm going off script. People need to understand that kinks and fetishes are fundamentally sexual in nature. And the reason that I say that is because you don't call your likes of something a kink or a fetish unless the implication is that it is for sexual gratification. And there is a very specific reason why. I do not call my love of seafood a kink or a fetish. I don't call my love of anime a kink or a fetish. I don't call the fact that I enjoy going on Long scenic drives a kink or a fetish. And the reason is because they aren't. I've had a lot of people recently try to draw this weird distinction between sex and sexual stuff and also can kink and fetishes. And most of you seem to be ill informed so as somebody who has experience with those specific communities let me weigh in with age old wisdom. If you like something then it is a like if you like something and it gives you sexual gratification it is a kink or a fetish. And it is probably about time that we stop pretending those things aren't related to sexual gratification.

Having moved that out of the way however, I can kind of get back to what I was saying having made that statement. When you see amen on the back of a truck strapped to a sex cross being flogged in public while nearly completely naked that is a form of actual degeneracy. And the specific reason as to why is because it is intentional public showing of things of an explicit sexual nature. Mind you I don't know if this was last year or the year before but that very instance was featured at a pride parade.

But back to the video because it is important the third man interviewed seems to be wildly actually misinformed when it comes to what is going on in the world. No the economy is not good. Any look at prices of restaurant food or store-bought food would very much showcase that is fact. Gas prices would actually be almost $4 if not north of $4 even in places like Texas if not for the fact that Biden is literally emptying out our reserves right now to artificially lower costs. And then you have groups and communities who are very much upset with the current state of illegal immigration into our country because it is very much taking its toll on not just our economy but also culturally.

It's weird because when you talk to Democrats, and yes this goes both ways but it's not nearly as bad, they have this stereotype in their head of what someone on the right or who is Republican is. Which is a dumb redneck who sits on his ass does nothing but watch sports drink beer while literally plugging his brain into Fox News and then going dig ditches or something. While making Facebook posts about how he wants to bring the KKK back and how he wants to hunt down all the gays.

99.99% of people who would vote Republican do not even remotely embody that stereotype. Then again extremes on every side in every culture in every faith in every political party will always exist. Because extreme people will always exist. But when it comes to voters who are Democrats I am unable to truly process how there are so many things that they don't know. It literally makes no sense to me. And what's more interesting is the fact that black voters are starting to actually realize that the Democrats don't actually give a damn about them. Which I'm excited to see. Because it was funny watching Texas and Florida and other states, send illegals to New York Illinois New Jersey and other places. Because prior to now a lot of those people had never truly understood what border states deal with on The daily basis.

Me personally? I live in texas. And I have steadily seen the population of Latino people grow exponentially over my time growing up. But unchecked Mass migration has gotten so ridiculous over the years there are areas in North Central Texas around Dallas where there are 10 to 15 mosques within 10 to 15 miles. Which is absurd. Now I don't have any problem with mosques existing in any cities or states. But I will say one thing specifically. When you are seeing mosques overtake churches in the United States and you have enough of a population of a different culture(s) that you need 10 to 15 mosques in that range? It's pretty much safe to say that you are functionally being replaced. And you don't even have to take my word for that. Cuz if you listen to a lot of the people in the Bronx and other areas like Chicago and what not where there are currently illegal immigrants taking over hotels and homeless shelters, as if their rights are that of free things provided by taxpayers in this country. You are seeing a lot of them talk about the fact that they are being replaced. And I actually believe that they are. Because people Mass imported into this country will be added to the census. And if the Biden administration has anything to say about it he will get them identifications and voter IDs before the election comes around. Because recently over a million new registrations of voters have come out of Texas tens of thousands of whom have been dead. We had a similar phenomenon in Missouri I believe. And the way that this was found out, was through a program that is specifically meant to be used for new voter registration not in fact to clean voter rolls. Never you mind the fact that Biden has been selling us out to other countries by moving all of our stuff over to other countries. And the only positive thing that he has done was something that Trump had already been planning to do in the first place. Which was the chips act. More or less to start producing silicon here because it is better that we bring a lot of our manufacturing back to the United States. Especially when we are perpetually at economic war with China.

Democrats in my opinion feel incredibly uneducated. And for some God forsaken reason they think the going to school magically grant them an education. But then you listen to them talk and it is clear they have absolutely no clue what is going on with the world around them. They literally just repeat things that they've heard. Which honestly doesn't shock me. However it doesn't make it any less sad if you consider the fact that they're allowed to vote while literally not knowing anything about what's going on in this country.

Never you mind the charisma scandal with Joe Biden and Hunter biden. Never you mind the fact that Joe Biden used his position as vice president to protect a company that his son was working for that belonged to a foreign nation. Never you mind the Joe Biden used his power as vice president to get his son, or try to get his son lucrative deals in the energy sector in China. We have found out so many things that the Democrats lied about. The inflation reduction act which actually increased inflation. And had more to do with the green New deal then literally anything to do with reducing inflation. Then there was the LIE of the don't say gay bill. Which convinced a lot of people you could no longer say gay in schools or some people believe that you could no longer say the word gay in the state at all. Despite the fact that the bill was called the parental rights in education act, and it's entire goal was that teachers were required by law to tell parents when issues were arising with their kids. And that they could not have extracurricular discussions about LGBT topics in schools. But see here's the fun caveat. the law The Way it was written also prevented them from talking about cisgendered topics. In other words it barred teachers from using class time to explicitly discuss sexuality or gender identity. As teachers jobs is quite literally to teach academics in particular subjects related to what they've been briefed to teach. So if you are a math teacher, your job is to teach math. Not to talk about how your wife is Polly lesbian Ace and how she just got a train ran on her at a fetish community event that was pro LGBT. (No I did not hear about this being an actual thing that happened but it is an extreme case of what was happening. IE: teachers talking about their romantic and sex lives openly to their students and prompting class time discussions about LGBT topics that had nothing to do with what they were allowed to teach in the first place).

The fact of the matter is so much of the things that the Democrats have put out via the news and other sources have been bald-faced lies. And most of that can be proven generally. But the problem is the news are not going to tell on themselves. Which makes things frustrating because when cnn, msnbc, the New York times, abc, the guardian, the daily beast, and many other outlets outright lie they all align democrat. And so they are not going to tell on themselves or tell on each other unless there is absolutely no choice but to do so. We saw a member of Congress intentionally set off a exit/fire alarm in order to delay proceedings. But guess what he had a D in front of his name so he got away with it. Hillary Clinton destroyed evidence of malfeasance, gross negligence and possibly maliciousness, by having her staffers destroy cell phones with hammers and use bleach bit software on servers to remove the fact that she had sent dozens if not hundreds of classified documents to foreign entities. Never once prosecuted because of course she has a D in front of her name Rachel maddow almost cried on live TV whenever they said that no Trump was not in fact linked to Russia. And that Russian gate was a hoax as a whole.

Moderates left of center people and people on the right seem to have a far better idea of what is going on in this country rather than run of the mill liberals. And they certainly know significantly more about what's going on in this country then neoliberals. Under Trump the economy was good. We had no new wars. There was an actual attempt to bring our soldiers home had many generals not lied about how many soldiers we had in foreign countries. Remain in Mexico was great policy for mitigating immigration. And the easiest way to understand why the media hated Trump is one very specific instance. The one time that Trump specifically opted to use military force explicitly in a very specific drone strike. Many of the dem aligned media opted to call that particular act presidential. Even though technically what they said was finally Donald Trump starting to act like a president. Donald Trump fired Bolton. Yes a little too late, but the fact remains that he did. So if I were to take a wild guess as to why the media hated him it wasn't because he was a fascist. It wasn't because he was a dictator. It wasn't because he was going to form gay hunting parties. And it wasn't because he was trying to reform the kkk. It was because he was a threat to their power. And while certainly there were more powers granted to the deep State under trump, we had significantly more victories generally speaking as a country because of trump. Specifically the Abraham accords. The fact that under Trump no new wars did start. The fact that Donald Trump without security walked into North Korea as a symbol of good faith. Something no other president has ever done. Trump held up an LGBT flag that said gays for Trump in front of the rnc. And the RNC clapped for him. I grew up around Republicans, and I can tell you with absolute certainty that The stereotype that constantly gets put on to Republicans is functionally false in most cases.

Meanwhile the Democrats consistently claim that they want to help minorities and that they are trying to protect democracy. Except one, we don't live in a democracy. We live in a constitutional republic. And two, Democrats are literally the party of the KKK. And contrary to Democrat messaging and several Neo progressives messaging no there was no broad party switch. Almost every form of legislation passed by democrats has negatively affected minorities in some way shape or form. It is consistent. And it is frequent. Democrats as they are and have been for the past 20 plus years are in my opinion a malicious organization of evil autocrats. Or more accurately a group that seeks to be autocrats. No having said that I will say one thing. This is a post specifically about democrats. However I will concede to the fact that there are Republicans who very much are no better. But I think the scales are functionally different. And imagine the scale like this. You have one scale with 30 lb on one side and 5 lb on the other side 30 lb is the evil rot of the Democrat party and specifically The crazies. Be 5 lb are the same people. Where as Republicans you are looking at a 30 lb weight on where as Republicans you are looking at a 15 lb weight on one side and a 10 lb weight on the other side. The 15 lb is the neocons and the actual unit party assholes. The 10 lb are the decent Republicans regardless of whether I disagree with how they do things. And you might think by me saying this that I am a republican. Except no I'm not even conservative. Mind you, it is my obligation to tear the party that supposedly is supposed to support me to shreds because they are malicious snake oil salesmen who do not actually care about this country. And are frequently doing everything that they can to bankrupt the American people, flood this country with people that they can buy off, and sell us out infrastructure and all to foreign entities specifically China.

Speaking of which. Let me just mention one thing because it's insulting to me. China is currently in the midst of genociding Uhygur muslims. Which includes forced sterilization. Forcing them into labor camps. And having Han Chinese men rape the Uhygur Muslim women. And based on the reports multiple times daily. I have seen more people harass random Jewish people and any company that could theoretically be linked to Israel then I have seen any backlash against China whatsoever. The reason this is so extraordinary to me is because I have seen vtubers and celebrities get literally harassed and dog piled because they wanted to buy something from Starbucks but because something something Israel all of a sudden Starbucks is on this "evil blacklist of companies controlled by the evil Jewish state". Meanwhile I have heard zero pushback or boycott for any extended period of time against China whatsoever. You arrogant f**** are all still using tick tock. You're still buying stuff off temu, which is actually worse because guess where your products are made from that website? Oh yeah right Uhygur Muslim labor camps. A video on that here-

So. I have gone completely off script at this point. And I understand that this is long and effectively a rant. But it boggles my mind that even when confronted with actual reality people will continue to vote for Democrats because they've literally bought into the lie that they are the party of love and tolerance. When they have done so much more damage to varying communities including minority ones. Fun fact about things like affirmative action. All they actually do is make other people hate you for getting a job based on your skin color. And nothing anyone can say will prevent anyone from viewing it that way. Because you have quotas to meet under affirmative action saying you have to have X number of insert demographic here. Which means that if you only have 50 spots that you have to hire for you are legally obligated to save positions for people based on the color of their skin. Rather than first come first serve. Then you have DEI bullshit. In which even people who thought that DEI had a different definition soon realized that it was actually making people more racist. Which honestly shouldn't shock anyone. And then you have the welfare state. And which you can survive pretty decently off of welfare up to and including social Security and food stamps. And it is actually easier to survive off welfare then it is off of a job paying between nine and twelve dollars an hour depending on where you live. What's more they make these benefits particularly lucrative for certain demographics of people. Meanwhile other people get the shaft. Because a group depended on the government will always bow to the government. And those in power are very much aware of this. And if you really need any more actual proof look no further than california. Where it is been a constant that they have been trying to "fix" homelessness and clean up the city in general. Only for people like Gavin newsom and others to say that it was impossible to do in a short period of time and likely would not improve. Only for Gavin newsom's communist hero Xi decided to come to a conference and he got the city very clean very quickly and kept it such until the man left. Not to mention has forwarded several different forms of legislation that have made life worse for people in california. That $20 minimum wage that you thought would be so great? Yeah 10,000 people lost their jobs over it. Color me shocked. Oh except for the fact that Panera bread didn't have to abide by this because they donated a s*** ton of money to Gavin. So it was never about helping the people. It was literally just placation. Or maybe you could look back at the legislation where he tried to repeal the part of the California Constitution that says you can't discriminate based off of XYZ protected classes. Which means he wanted to allow discrimination based off of those things. Or there is the ever so present fact that it is no longer a crime much less a felony to intentionally and knowingly give your partner HIV.

Are there uni party republicans? Absolutely. There are also RINOs. As well as warhawks. But almost all of them fall right in line with the Democrat establishment. Because for all of them it is war money and power. Now I'm going to wrap this up a little bit by saying this. There are quite a few decent Republicans that get a bad rap because of mainstream media who exceedingly have a Democrat bias. And yes there are a few although not many Democrat politicians who are not evil assholes. But that shortlist is in fact a very short list.

*Rant Finished

[mrsbsmooth]

U need to stop talking about US politics. Ur so unintelligent and ignorant about it, it’s crazy. Ur spreading misinformation and it’s gonna get us in danger. The wrong person is gonna see this and vote for him. Stop. Ur not special just cause people kiss ur ass. U don’t get to do shit like this. Stop.

Vote for who? Biden?

GOOD.

Yeah he’s a piece of shit and doesn’t care about Palestine but you know who actively supports Israel and is trying to cement himself as the MOST pro-Israel candidate because it appeals to his evangelical voter base?

Ding ding ding it’s ya boy, Donny T.

You know what’s gonna get you in danger? Voting for someone whose sole agenda is to get back into the Whitehouse so they can seize control and NEVER LEAVE AGAIN.

It is beyond me that y’all could support someone who literally supported and invited domestic terrorism and almost started a full blown civil war. It is beyond me that he could split your country in two, encourage his followers to start an insurrection, to storm the capitol building and demand the execution of world leaders and American citizens— And you still call him a PATRIOT.

The rest of the world are HORRIFIED. And look, I know American media and education doesn’t expose you to the history and context behind fascism and dictatorships. The shit y’all get on TV is often extremely biased one way or another, because having an agenda sells far better than objectivity. I’m not saying the Australian system is much better but seriously, if you aren’t absolutely terrified by the idea of Donald Trump getting back into power, then I don’t know what to tell you. If you’re not convinced at this point— well, friend, I hate to tell you, but there isn’t much I can do for you. I won’t speculate as to the possibilities as to why you might like him but I’ve got a pretty good idea.

That man has proven time and time again that he HATES America. He hates its laws, he doesn’t respect its constitution, and he thinks it would be a better country if he and he alone ran it without any other forms of government. As a dictatorship. And I know the word is massively over use these days because I don’t think a lot of people actually understand what it means to be in a dictatorship.

Call me uninformed all you want. Call me ignorant. I am neither of those things. I don’t need to explain my qualifications to you. The entire point is that you go and do some research that involves more than reading tumblr posts. Even the information on here is biased. I have an inherent bias that I can’t escape either.

All I’m saying is the rest of the world were willing to stick up for you guys once, saying you made a mistake and you didn’t know what you were doing when you elected him- you couldn’t have possibly known that he would do what he did to your country.

But if you put that man back in the White House, and he makes good on his promises and destroys the very foundation on which the United States was built?

I hope to God our countries aren’t stupid enough to come to your rescue. 

[rollercoasterwords]

i always find the discourse about wlw rep in the fandom sk interesting. like. i’m not gonna lie and say that it isn’t something i haven’t agreed with and gone “yeahh i do want wlw” “yeah omg why is there an attention on mlm”. it’s frustrating sometimes. esp when i was younger i distinctly remember being freshly new out of the closet (and by that time i was alr reading mlm ff) and then going to look for wlw and being kind of. disappointed. being older now, and interacting with a lot of other ppl, and understanding things more i wholeheartedly agree with ur points abt this. it’s true. it makes sense. but i can see why it’s so hard for ppl to grasp. and i understand why ppl are always always bringing up this discourse. before i had someone point it out to me in that sense like “look ff is different than the main media we consume” i hadn’t rly made that connection, bc to me, it was just media. it was entertainment, it was a silly little story just like so many id read before. and like. obviouslyyy now i see how while it may feel like it’s all the same to me, it’s not and it warrants a different type of behavior and attitude almost. but it can be hard to get to that point, even after someone points it out. and it can hard to let go to that way of thinking even after you know it’s “wrong” (i say this in quotes bc i don’t rly think it’s wrong per so but like. uninformed. or ignorant almost). there is a very fine line between the mainstream media we consume and ff but that line is hidden under layers and layers of ideas and concepts we alr have (and it’s hole only dug deeper with things like tik tok, where you see multiple multiple videos telling you every day that “we should demand more wlw rep” etc and considering it’s an app that doesn’t encourage ppl to think critically at allll) so yeah idk where i was rly going with this, but it’s just always smth i think abt when i see this discrouse.

and like side note, that’s not to say that there isn’t wlw there are so so so many great fics out there, and like you said, if you want it so desperately just simply do it yourself etc etc, but in the context of this, i think ppl cling to the idea of wanting a mega popular everyone’s read it this is the fic™️ fic for wlw abd they want the same kind of discourse and tik tok popularity and attention that mlm fics get yk? that’s why a lot of the times, the need snd incessant screaming for that drowns out the voices alr there.

yeah i mean i understand where it's coming from when people say they wish there was more "wlw rep" in the fandom and i do think that the people who act as if they need to Crusade for more wlw fic are mostly coming from a place of ignorance re: the way fanfic functions as an inherently different form of media from books, movies, etc. and i'm sure that part of it is coming from a place of wanting to feel like u can make some Real Change in the media u consume. however i do think a large part of it is also coming from wanting to virtue signal for brownie points and also knowing that stirring up controversy and acting as if u are Crusading on behalf of a Good Cause will get u more likes and views. and at the end of the day regardless of where it's coming from it is all equally annoying and equally harmful in the way that it seeks to drag fanfiction into some sort of internet profit economy. so! it's like...do i think that many of these people are just misinformed? yes, absolutely. but i will be honest and say that personally i am running out of sympathy for people who are just soooooo sad because they want more wlw fics simply because. well me myself and i when we looked around the marauders fandom and thought "hmm this could use some more lesbians" we simply wrote fanfiction about lesbians. and it's like well yes i understand that me myself and i are an immortal being with godlike power who is better than everyone but these people could still at least TRY to get on my level like c'mon now....this is perhaps one of the only forms of media where u actually have direct control over what "representation" u can find. and complaining that "there's no good wlw fic" is insulting to everyong who writes good wlw fics. not very #feminist methinks!!!

also to ur sidenote--i think this is so true! in my little foray into the tiktok comments on all these discourse videos over the last like week or so i have seen over and over and over again people going "we need an atyd but for the girls!!!" and it's like....why. PAUSE for one second. rewind. think about why u feel that it is necessary for there to be One Big Viral Fic in order for a ship to Officially Have Representation. what does that say about the way you engage with fandom. what does that say about your definition of "representation." what does that say about the metrics u are using to like....assign value to fanfics. because personally to me it signals that u have been so sucked into this weird tiktokification of fanfiction that u only think fic is worth engaging with if it's reached a certain level of virality on tiktok, which is half of what's giving way to this whole "representation" issue in the first place, because the problem isn't that people aren't writing wlw fics, it's that you aren't seeing them because they aren't one of TikTok's Top 5 Most Popular Fanfictions and you refuse to venture outside that corner of the fandom. and the snake eats its own tail once again </3

[schraubd]

The Most Important Voter is the Uninformed Voter

For the first time in awhile, my representative in Congress is a Republican -- Lori Chavez-Deremer.

One of the very few bright spots of the fact is that I can call my congressperson to complain about Republican shenanigans without it feeling moot or preaching to the choir. Telling Barbara Lee that I oppose this or that GOP abuse felt a little pointless. But Lori Chavez-Deremer is a Republican in a swing district -- I can help put a bit of well-earned fear of god into her.

Anyway, today I decided to ring up her office to talk about raising the debt ceiling. But before I did, I had a thought: would it be better to play a little dumb?

Maybe I'm overthinking this. But my logic was that if I came out loaded for bear with facts and talking points and analysis, it'd be pretty clear I'm a high-information voter with strong views on the subject. And if I were the representative's staff (and the person I spoke to, for what it's worth, was perfectly polite and seemed quite intelligent), I'd correctly deduce that I'm probably not talking to an actually-persuadable voter. Even in swing districts, Rep. Chavez-Deremer is no doubt aware that there are plenty of voters who didn't vote for her before and are never going to vote for her in the future, and so their existence and their votes for her 2024 opponent are already baked into the cake. That someone like that is unhappy with her isn't really germane information.

By contrast, if somebody who doesn't seem to know a lot about the issue calls with concerns, that suggests that there's a problem seeping into the soft mushy center of low-information independents. And those voters absolutely are persuadable, which means if they get it in their head that the Congresswoman is causing a problem, that absolutely can make difference in 2024. If I was Chavez-Deremer's staff, I'd be far more concerned if uninformed voters who sound like they just read a couple of Facebook memes started complaining about her conduct than if informed voters did.

So I decided to go with that. I spoke in general terms about things I had "heard", I fretted about how "reckless" it seemed to be to just decide not to pay our bills, I worried about the effect this chaos would have on my retirement accounts, I insisted that the issue seemed simple (just raise the debt ceiling! Why is she making this more complicated than it is?), and I finally said that if we do drive over this cliff I won't blame Biden for it, I'll blame Chavez-Deremer.

I don't know if I make the most convincing uninformed voter. But it was a kind of fun, getting to be ignorant and obstinate and just go down the "I am constituent and I'm mad and you need to fix this" road. Life's little pleasures.

via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/qBHiWaA

[teal-bandit]

My (unsolicited) thoughts on Auraki

Disclaimer: I am by no means an expert on Jeanne-Marie, and am going solely by what I've been able to glean from her Wiki and what comics I have read

So, let's start with the obvious: these two as a couple were shoehorned into a comic that was filled with ableist, biphobic, and racist rhetoric and done so in a way that was unnatural for both characters, arguably because the writer didn't understand the characters she was writing (other members of the cast were touted as being ooc by their fans, and I trust the fans over most comic writers). For this reason, as well as reasoning regarding Akihiro's "redemption" through a romantic relationship (esp. a het-passing relationship with a white woman), I can understand why fans may not like the couple, or may be wary of the ship as a whole. I was one of them, but the more I learn and the more I think about it, I feel like they do have potential.

Regarding the two as separate characters, they have a lot of similarities that would build up the relationship in a more natural way than the (unoriginal) "I find you attractive" route or the "I find you attractive and I'm going to show you I'm dedicated by becoming an accomplice in murder on your behalf" (Which is a much more Daken thing to do, but clashes with his characterization through the rest of the series).

Both Aurora and Akihiro have struggled through abuse, parental neglect/absence, loss or skewing of a sense of "self" due to their upbringing, attachment insecurities, and a strong, if sometimes rocky relationship with their sibling(s). While I would much rather have a relationship borne of an interesting dynamic between two people, I do feel like these shared experiences would help the two of them relate to each other on a deeper level than what you might get otherwise.

In x-faqtor, their relationship read as very surface-level, which wasn't aided by the short duration of the title. Looking at a cast of people with a lot of trauma in their lives, the overall tone of interaction between the characters was one of apathy if not outright hostility--something I'm seeing repeated in other X-titles by Williams. By all accounts, the two shouldn't have ended up together at all, except that both have been known to make uninformed or hasty decisions in their other relationships, but even with that acknowledgement, there really wasn't any lead up into it at all. Through his time on the team, Daken was largely distrusted, teased, and unvalued up until the last third of the series. Aurora hardly had any characterization at all; we got no sense of who she is as a person, what sort of role she fills on the team, or what her role within Krakoa is outside of the team. Outside of physical attraction and the fact they were on a team together, there was no reason at all for the two to even talk to each other; Daken had more on-panel interaction with Jean-Paul and David, who were both openly hostile to him through the first several issues.

Williams shows glimpses of understanding how abuse changes a person--referenced by the sequence of the other team members talking about the isolating mental and emotional abuse Siryn was experiencing at the hands of the Morrigan while showing the mental and physical abuse the Morrigan was dishing out on Akihiro. As sympathetic as Aurora has been written recently by writers like Orlando, I have a hard time believing that she wouldn't be drawn to him, or at least be one of the members of the team to treat him like a person and not a collection of problems to be solved.

I feel like it's also worth mentioning that these two characters have been repeatedly and extensively ostracized and shamed for their sexuality, and have even (at the very least canonically in Jeanne-Marie's case) had people completely ignore their desires and dignity by being seen as hardly more than sexual objects. Seeing both of them in a (semi-) healthy, happy, consensual relationship with someone who understands their vulnerabilities and respects their autonomy is a bit of a breath of fresh air. I enjoy how they're being written recently quite a bit better; you get a better sense of their dynamic with each other and how much they care about each other.

Which brings me to another point: Akihiro being written as ignoring his sisters in favor of Aurora.

Not only do I think this is a huge misinterpretation of his character; he went to Manhattan with a defective healing factor to support Laura during her fight with the Kinney Virus and gave a part of his soul for Laura to have protection against the Muramasa blade. That does not, in any way, read as a man who would sacrifice his relationship with his sisters for anyone, lover included.

Not only do I see that as a misinterpretation of Akihiro, I also see it as a misinterpretation of Aurora. I realize that she and Jean-Paul have had their share of problems, even in relatively recent comics, but I don't see Aurora allowing Akihiro to ignore his sisters in favor of her. She, of all people, has to realize how important having family is, and as I understand, would probably be Akihiro's biggest champion in spending more time with them (not in seeing him as a bad influence on them, but more in seeing them as a positive influence on him).

In short, while the relationship between these two has it's issues and continues to grow from the practically non-existent roots it had in x-faqtor, I enjoy seeing them together, and think they have potential to be a power couple in their own rights. There is something inherently romantic in the recognition of the self through a partner, and learning to be gentle with yourself through them.

[maidofmetal]

under the cut: cw for mental illness drug addiction alcoholism injury and suicide

earlier today someone reblogged discourse that i didn’t wanna participate in and said if someone attempts suicide and fails n results in chronic pain they are not disabled because of the suicide attempt but because of their chronic pain

as someone who has dealt more with mental illness, alcoholism and drug addiction i wholeheartedly disagree. and i think it downplays how debilitating and destructive mental illness in all its forms can be. mental illness and addiction are very complex and taking that away is ignorant and downright dangerous. we have already faced so much abuse from society, our doctors and our families we do not need other disabled people ignoring how destructive mental illnesses can be

if someone who is an alcoholic or an addict gets into an vehicular accident, their addiction was the cause of the accident. they know this whether they can admit it or not. whether they experience chronic pain or mobility issues because of the accident cannot be disconnected from the fact they are an alcoholic. if you’re arguing that the vehicle caused their physical disability you don’t understand anything about alcoholism or drug addiction. (i am not saying the person is responsible because again addiction is fucking complex n i don’t think there’s a simple answer for that. but that’s a conversation for another time)

if someone has such severe panic attacks they throw up quiet literally all day long for years and years and end up burning the shit out of their stomach lining and esophagus and need to take medication or have procedures to treat it why does it matter that it was caused by chronic mental illness? they’re still going to struggle with pain and treatments and not to mention how fucking shitty and traumatizing it is to throw up from fucking untreatable panic attacks. if several people are talking about their severe acid reflux and the damage it did to their stomach lining or whatever and the panic attack person pipes up and they figure out they take the same medication to protect their stomach lining why does it matter that one is because of panic attacks and one is because of acid reflux ?

if someone who is suicidal attempts suicide and let’s say…loses their leg due to their attempt. they are an amputee because of the suicide attempt. it is beyond cruel to deny that they are disabled because of their suicidal behavior. it ignores the very context of the accident and the pain and suffering that person would have gone through both BEFORE and AFTER THE ACCIDENT it ignores the trauma of being mentally ill and the trauma of being physically disabled because of a mental illness.

it’s invalidating and ignorant and dangerous to disconnect mentally ill people from there mental illness. we are not always in control of our actions or behaviors and this is always super important to consider. the alcoholic may hate drinking and the person who they become but addiction isn’t a choice despite what y’all think. there is so much fucking guilt surrounding mental illness, addiction and suicide attempts. and saying someone who tries to kill themselves n results in being physically disabled isn’t disabled because of their suicidal ideation at best uninformed at worst cruelly ableist.

(this wasn’t an attempt to create discourse amongst physically disabled people. and you will get blocked if you try that shit)

[tea-with-evan-and-me]

I am 🤏 this close to leaving evan twt (not fandom just this part of the app) bec of dumb tweets like this

https://twitter.com/partyhardyren/status/1749351384120692754?t=ml6NJQKje3Az72RLBvjydA&s=19

Of course Evan isn't racist, but this tweet makes US look like we're racist, saying you can't be racist if you have poc friends 😭 and most people are dragging the poster but so many people think he's getting canceled for something and this is their way of defending him

Like...

https://twitter.com/sullibible/status/1749485592713257179?t=a8_qJp0PJ5WUvJEBAUtBAQ&s=19

https://twitter.com/alonaokay/status/1749495014550347944?t=gqdyj4g81h3YoHbiTzyusQ&s=19

https://twitter.com/StephyBx_/status/1749480605694234872?t=KeQtJpquU7_Ra4fSwL-Cxw&s=19

i've received a bunch of messages about this, but because i don't want to dogpile, i'm just going to respond to this ask. thank you for not immediately jumping to be a jerk.

i hear you and i completely understand. i don't believe this person is ill-intentioned at all, i think they genuinely believed they were showcasing that evan would never mistreat someone due to their race or look at them as less than. but it's a naive viewpoint on racism and how it affects black people and people of color as a whole. outside of the very worst people, every racist you'll ever come upon and will use the first line of defense, which is that they have black friends, or friends of whatever ethnic group they're being accused of racism towards. it means nothing, and using these people they're ''friends'' with as a shield against criticism is incredibly offensive.

the general problem here is that people hear talk of racism and immediately think that discrimination and hostility looks like someone spray painting nazi symbolism on someone's car or yelling out racial slurs, and most of the time that's not what anyone is arguing about. every single person on the face of this earth has unconscious biases we've acquired in life (not just about race - it could be looking at a homeless person and thinking all unhoused people are just lazy bums who didn't work hard enough, or that a female doctor is less competent than a male doctor) that manifest in some way or another, even if it only stays inside your head as a thought you brush away because you know it's wrong. what sets good people apart is that we can recognize these things, acknowledge them and put in the work to change our mindset and challenge stereotypes that have been impressed upon us.

i'm only saying all of this because it's not helpful at all to see someone who is displaying ignorance to a situation and immediately attack and alienate them when their intent was not bad. if i'm going to criticize, then i will at least attempt to educate you on why what you're saying is counterintuitive to the cause. the truth is that most white people don't think deeply about racism because they don't have to, and they flat out don't understand the complexity of discrimination, they don't see the routine microaggressions black people and other POC deal with on a daily basis. they will casually contribute to unhelpful narratives and think they're doing something good. in this situation, it's enough to say that evan peters is not racist because there is, quite literally, zero indication of this regardless of what uninformed and reactive people on twitter say. no black person has ever came out and said evan treated them poorly, and evan has never said or done anything indicative of this. it's not appropriate to show him happily in the presence of black people and use this as proof that he isn't racist. this reflects poorly on the fandom and evan by proxy, bringing attention to this non-issue which can only be negative and make people feel suspicious of him. for that reason, i hope they delete the tweet and everyone moves on.

ETA: i have reached out to ren directly about this and won't be speaking on it further until we've had a chance to have a civil conversation about this tweet, and hopefully removing it. at this point, that's the best case scenario.

(i'll be back later to answer everyone else's unrelated messages, i just wanted to address this while i had a free minute)

[thecurseisinourblood]

Have a super messy write-up of some of my more recent thoughts. @murroyilodel and I are always brainstorming to further flesh out and develop the nuances of our muses. Despite my publishing very little of it, things seem to grow and change every week. Be warned that ahead will include some things quite personal to mun. All of this is regarding my modern interpretation of Frollo.  A trigger warning for child abuse and substance abuse ahead.  I determined long ago that I wanted my modern interpretation of Frollo to experience rather severe child abuse. Initially, this was an uninformed choice, understanding little about how that can affect one’s behavior long term. But I began to do more and more research and came to the conclusion that this could contribute to his aggressive behavior and his more solitary lifestyle.  Years after that, I realized just how much I gleaned from my own personal struggles while writing for Claude. How much pain and distrust of others I was pulling from myself to write him. Unfortunately, I was one of those ignorant people who thought my punishment as a child never affected me. Only recently have I put together that my whole life began to change after my parents’ punishments became more severe. I remember distinctly that my dad told me they stopped using the belt on me when they figured out that humiliating me in front of family members or putting me in time out in a public space was far more effective. Over the course of these faded memories, I do remember how anxious and insecure I became. Projecting my own pain, insecurities, jealousy, anxiety and distrust through Frollo really helped me when I was younger to work on my emotional intelligence and try to be more confident. Even now, I still have these struggles, but at least I am not as much of an asshole anymore.  That being said, I’ve learned more about attachment styles. I believe that Frollo has a dismissive avoidant attachment style, especially when he was younger, but as he has aged, and with certain people he began to fall into fearful avoidant.  As the first one implies, they are more dismissive of others’ feelings. They were forced to become self-reliant. Have trust issues. A negative view of peoples’ intentions. They repress their needs and emotions. when they feel hurt or angry they withdraw entirely. Becoming too close with others makes them feel trapped. Being independent is the most important thing. <-- this is all disney Frollo btw and with Frollo’s very intimate relationships, he leans toward fearful with some anxious tendencies. He is often afraid if he gets too close, they will leave. If he makes too many mistakes or disappoints them, they will leave. disappointing his family at all brings him an overwhelming amount of shame, embarrassment, and self-loathing. He will withdraw when feeling rejected or overwhelmed. There will be a time with Esmeralda where he flees for months, then upon his return, potentially suggest they break up in a fit because he thinks she wants to break up anyway. He works very hard to avoid intimate conversations. The few times his loved ones have serious talks with him, he shuts down completely. Feels like it is the end of the world cuz he’s not perfect.  Besides Lucy and the Judges, Claude managed to screw up every close relationship he has had, and fully believes it is just a matter of time before people grow apart/abandon him. IF my Claude were not a virgin, my Claude would most likely be a compulsive sex-addict. The dysregulation of emotion, the lack of respect for others’ feelings, the impulsive tendencies when he’s feeling depressed, turning to alcohol abuse and pill abuse etc, all lead me to believe there would be no stopping him. The lack of real intimacy and the fear of real intimacy, yet the craving of intimacy would lead to the cycle of fucking anything he could. Which would also lead to more alienation, shame, and believing he is unlovable. Meanwhile his brother Jehan is dismissive avoidant as well, except for when it comes to Claude. Claude is the only person Jehan feels even more anxious avoidant than fearful avoidant because of Claude’s neglect. For the most part, Claude is confident in himself, his work, his worth. However, over time he is made aware of how different he is. As an INTJ, my modern Frollo tends to pride himself on his independence and logic. Although he can be charming and witty if he wishes, there is little, to no emotion in his day to day. Everyone is laughing and he can’t laugh with them. It’s not always about being stuck up or uncomfortable, he just can’t feel the same way as them. He cannot partake. These doubts also extend to his personal relationships. Claude knows he isn’t fun, or the life of the party and doesn’t think he could contribute or relate to these kinds of social gatherings. Claude dated a lot in his 30′s and was confident and uncouth, but no one was able to catch his interest.  His status as a confirmed bachelor, his brilliance, and his inability to relate to those around him have convinced him that he is an oddity that no one understands, particularly in his 40′s.  By the time Delice comes in, Claude wants to lose his virginity. He finds her charming, smart, engaging, and beautiful. He likes that she is a snob like him. She makes him laugh. She knows how to tease him and talk to him and repartee. Despite not wanting a woman to fuck him for status, Delice was the one girl who made him think it would be worth it. She wanted him and she wanted to marry him. She was the solution to his problems. Companionship, sex, and most importantly, no intimacy. That’s right. Frollo got stars in his eyes because he knew the nature of their relationship would not be intimate. There would be no love. It would be like an arrangement. It would be business. It would have mystery. No hard conversations, no way to get hurt. (except he doesn’t think at that time how she could hurt him. Which essentially is just her never wanting to sex him ever again, being passive aggressive, condescending, humiliating him, and cheating on him. but anyway) However, Lucy and the judges are very confused. Delice is a horrible person and Lucy eventually puts an end to their flirting period. Claude is super humiliated and upset that he didn’t make his own mistakes. He wanted that fuck up for himself and he resents Lucy for it for around 6 months.  This event made him snap at Lucy for wanting him to go on yet another date. Frollo’s tired of new beginnings, he’s tired of trying. After they don’t let him fool around with Delice, he is convinced he won’t like another girl. He’s upset and reluctantly accepts that he will never experience a partner.  No one in the family understands why Claude would even look at her. They’ve introduced him to plenty of great women, and he picks a snobby bitch who would divorce him for his money. Having no idea the reasons behind Frollo’s feelings, they often all still worry about Delice or tease him about Delice, which causes Frollo to become very upset, but he hides it well. They think it is a joke, but Frollo feels overwhelmed and humiliated every time.  By the time Esmeralda arrives, Frollo is more cynical, jaded, and sexually frustrated than he has ever been. Having a superiority complex over women already, he thinks very lowly of her, which bites him, since Esmeralda has managed to woo everyone in his close circle of friends. Yeh, so Frollo’s lust and anger are out of control for about 6 months until he realizes he’s in love with her. Completely in love. Which makes him even more depressed and spiral even more.  ~End

[thejellyjester]

As Jane Austen summer turned into autumn for some, but was suspended for others I present my draft on Northanger Abbey. This was written one hot August night, in the midst of my Austenmania. I hope my fellow readers enjoy!

Northanger Abbey thoughts

We can rest assured that this 200-year-old novel has been discussed in a lot more comprehensible, thorough and superior ways than what you are about to read. These trivial reflections are, therefore, purely for the enjoyment of Austen Summer participants. 

Northanger Abbey is said to not be on the same level as the other five Austen novels, however I can’t help but find some aspects of the book very endearing. Even though this novel lacks depth of later works by Austen it makes up for in feeling  particularly youthful and passionate. What makes this book notable among the rest is the addition of gothic elements and first person narration. 

The melange of genres was my favourite part of the book. Even if the gothic fiction elements felt underdeveloped in the end, they created a new atmosphere and feeling, not usually present in any Austen books. It also served greatly for the characterisation of Catherine.

The heroine

Admittedly, one of the most intriguing aspects of the book. The very first sentence tells us that you wouldn’t expect a girl like Catherine Morland to be a heroine of a Jane Austen novel. Catherine is naive, ignorant and uninformed, the opposite of Elizabeth Bennet for example. To me, Catherine is the ultimate idealistic teen girly. She gets lost in literature and can’t always tell real life and fiction apart, always seeking to find the romantic nature of literature in real life. Her affinity for gothic fiction helps paint her as…, but ultimately pokes fun at her naivete. While it is easy to recognise oneself in many Jane Austen’s heroines it is particularly Catherine's romanticised view of the world, her search for fantasy and secrets as well as general fondness for antiquity that makes her so endearing to me. That being said, I can find no reason why Henry Tilney would marry her.

The romance

Yes yes, I love Henry Tilney and I love Catherine Morland, but the two of them together…? They are quite plainly the opposite of one another. Mr Tilney is witty and sarcastic and Catherine simply does not know what sarcasm is. Catherine is open and honest and Tilney is subtle and witty. Of course, being completely in agreement on all points is not necessary for marriage but I cannot foresee much felicity for this couple. Eventually, one will get tired of not being understood or the other of not understanding. Worst of all, Austen seems aware of this. In the final chapters she quite literally says that they get married because Tilney is grateful for Catherine’s affection? I fail to see how this is grounds for an Austenian marriage. Hopefully, I am currently unable to see some aspect of this that could explain my confusion. That being said, my opposition to this pairing did little do diminish the enjoyment of the courting. I have to admit that I was kicking my feet when Mr Tilney arrived in Fullerton (by the way, how interesting and fun was the use of Mrs. Morland’s POV for that moment?!).

The conclusion of this book falls in line with others of Austen, meaning it takes a chapter and all story lines are generally tied together. This particular conclusion felt even shorter or more forced than the other ones. Why was there suddenly a love interest for Elinor?

...

[the-autistic-casual]

y’know what i find funny?

i’m the kind of person bigots and uninformed people like to make fun of. of course there are my individual identities and diagnoses, but also the fact that i am all of them.

i am an aromantic graysexual bisexual transfem autistic ADHDer with an anxiety disorder who also accepts going by just queer and have such a lengthy and complicated relationship with my gender that “simply a woman” does not do it justice, yet i am simultaneously 100% sure i am a woman and nothing else.

and of course there are many jokes ignorant people like to make about these identities separately or the fact that many people have so many labels. but most, if not all, of them center around one simple theme, subtle or not: “That is silly”

“Look at that person with all their labels. That’s really weird right? Very silly”

“That person is so many things. It’s so silly that humanity has gotten to this point”

of course because 99% of these people like to think they’re making super smart and intelectual statements, they never actually phrase it that way, but at their most basic level, one could break them down to that

and you know what? they’re right! it’s hella silly!! i collect labels like i did Pokémon cards in elementary school! it’s so insanely silly to me that i can simultaneously be aroace and aroallo, and extra silly that my relationship with gender is super complex and took years to decipher, but i’m also comfortable with just explaining it with the word transfem or trans woman. it’s super silly that i think that my autism has a substantial effect of my views on all of those labels tremendously. and it’s even more silly that i am all. those. things. at once! i admit it!! it’s really silly!!

but you know what’s also silly? at least to me? the word burger. yet we use it all the time without thinking about it. i mean i can’t repeat the word burger twice before it stops sounding like a word. and that may be due to my juvenile sense of humor but that’s silly too!!

humans are silly too! i mean if you stop and think about the fact that we have hands and fingers, the concept is very silly

fish are hella silly! their faces can be so adorably derpy. and so are many animals

the world is super silly! everything is silly!! trees are silly, the clouds are silly, everything can be broken down to pure absurdity if you try to look at it from an outsider’s perspective! and you know what?? THAT’S COOL!

the world always has been, always is, and always will be very silly. including this sentence!!! so go collect labels like Pokémon cards or refuse to have any or mix and match to your hearts content. be silly!!!!

side note that i couldn’t really fit with this whole thing but wanted to mention:

ignorant people label people like me “confused” and i find that very ironic considering i can list, detail, and recite exactly when, how, and why i identify with each one and can prepare a lecture explaining all the intricacies of my relationships with them. i am very confused actually, but not about this. not one bit!