#i can't believe i forgot to post this edit

[deadpoets]

(x)

[seventh-district]

Making Incorrect H:SR Quotes Until I Run Out of (hopefully) Original Ideas - Pt. 3 - Random Screenshot Edition

[Pt. 1] [Pt. 2] [Pt. 4] [Pt. 5] [Pt. 6]

[skrunksthatwunk]

thinking about how eiji's a pole vaulter and how ash talks about eiji "flying" and how eiji's associated with bird imagery and how eiji's free (unlike ash) and how eiji comes in on a plane and leaves on a plane and how ash cannot fly, ash cannot be free, how nyc is ash's prison, and how ash is the leopard who dies climbing the mountain, unable to live at such elevation, how he was trying to reach the sky and be free but was always stuck to the earth, how he chose to die instead of climbing back down, how he chose to die where he could see the sky and hope and freedom almost like a bird with eiji's letter right in front of him rather than letting everything go wrong and ruin it once again, how eiji's a failed pole vaulter anyway, how a bad fall ruined his career and grounded him (physically and emotionally), how it took flying to america and meeting ash and needing to save him and skip for him to try flying again, how he landed hard and harsh and still the thought of that escape compelled ash to protect eiji at all costs because if he could fly that means something to him, even if he doesn't think he can fly, how eiji is the manifestation of his hope and how when he breaks and asks eiji to stay with him a while he folds himself over his legs and weighs him down and traps him and grounds him, how ash fights like hell to keep eiji alive not because he thinks he can be like him (hopeful, flying, innocent), but because he makes him forget the gravity of his situation, and so he can see eiji fly again. how he wants to see him escape. how eiji is a bird and ash is a wildcat and how ash never once saw eiji as prey. how eiji never saw ash as a predator. how it is eiji's naivete that first endears ash to him, how it is his freedom and flight and removal from darkness and his ability to leave that darkness that really roots eiji in ash's blood as something essential to him keeping on living in this hell of nyc. how it is that distance from the violence and that hope for the future that ash chooses to surround himself in as he dies. how ash dies in a dream because he feels more than anything that he can't fly like eiji, that he can never leave. how his violence is a part of him and will be forever, how it weighs him down. how he wants to enjoy the view from the mountainside rather than looking up from the ground below. as if they can both fly. as if he is with him up there and not grounded. eye-to-eye with what he can't have, seeing eiji's homeland: the sky. how he dies trying to reach the top because he couldn't take retreating and trying again. how ash, tired and tired and tired and convinced it will go on forever if he crawls back down the mountain, chooses to close his life deluged in eiji, in eiji's insistence that they can fly together, in eiji's hope for him and for them, in eiji's beautiful dream. how ash dies without trying to realize that dream. how ash, in dying, destroys it.

[valiantstarlights]

[royalarchivist]

undefined

Tommy: Did you know that you have rights? Constitution says you do. I believe that every man, woman, and child is INNOCENT!

Niki: Yo Chat! CHAT! WE HAVE RIGHTS!!! WE MADE IT! We made - we f**king made it. Women’s Rights, let’s f**king go, lets f**king go! We made it. We made it! That’s amazing, thank you so much Tommy Innit. [...]

I was the only woman in this recording. And all they did was talk about their fore.skin *tries not to laugh*. I just wanna let that sink in for a second. This is why I am the w- the victim. This is why I am the victim. This right here. [...]

*reading chat* “Guess you didn’t get women’s rights after all” *laughs then puts her face in her hands* Oh my god Chat. *laughs*

[absoluteminimum]

Maybe they should kiss....?

[rinbylin]

friendships as marital ties (and other notes on relational ties) in mlc

this is sort of a third installment in the series of meta on 'mlc as an exemplar of constructing queer narratives out of chinese ideological frameworks' (1. jianghu as queer space and 2. how it manifests in li xiangyi) - focusing on the nature of relationships in it. (which I've briefly mentioned in the first one and finally actually getting to it!!)

-

I would like to first call attention to chinese ideological frameworks as a premise of queer reading in mlc. the goal of chinese philosophy is to explore the becoming of human, taking two broad paths of the (mainstream) secular vs. escaping the secular. (these two paths are not a strict dichotomy, and rather, are ever in flux and in conversation with each other.) as said by @markiafc too, chineseness is so much about the rigidity of structures, and in equal part, a desire to break out of them. thus, chinese ideological frameworks can very much offer a rich reading of queerness - that mlc, a story very deliberately structured based on chinese ideologies (more accurately, with good reasons for me to believe that it is as such), has managed to materialise.

if the conceptualisation of queerness is premised on a defiance against mainstream norms, then a reliable way to read queerness in chinese ideological frameworks can be to deconstruct it by the mainstream confucian frameworks.

in mlc, this is implicitly set up with its stage of wulin/martial jianghu. then it is further broken down by asking, hey wulin jianghu is still closely related to the hegemonic values and the mainstream structure of authority (historically, 侠 xia being politically involved says a lot about this), so what is the true meaning of jianghu? what does it then really take for jianghu to be a queer space offering comfort and freedom to those who have escaped to it - to be the space that allow the transcendence of rigid roles and labels? mlc took a step further to resist the proxy to mainstream values that wulin jianghu has become.

this is why there can be a very strong buddhism reading of mlc (suggested here, expounded in the A+++ meta by @markiafc here and here, and also what I've seen discussed by cnet as well), given that buddhism is one of the 'extra-secular' ideologies, alongside (philosophical) taoism. I've also touched on a taoist angle in this meta. both schools are articulated in different sets of languages, but ultimately convey a same ideal of what it means to be human and how to live well - that is, to resist the roles and labels defined by the norms.

so, back to confucian frameworks.

a lot can be discussed about mlc with it. but in the context of this meta about relationships in mlc, it's specifically drawing on how confucianism conceptualises social relationships with familial ties as a cornerstone, and how these relational ties are inextricable from the conceptualisation of the 'self'.

as such, one of the things about mlc that has fascinated me is how deliberately it seems to ignore and reject the conventional familial ties (the kind by blood and marital ties). I've joked about how it is a miracle for me to love mlc as much as I do, as a prime dysfunctional family story enjoyer, despite none of its main characters struggling with any complicated feelings about their (biological) parents. but on closer examination, mlc is also making a comment on the model of familial-based relationships that dominates mainstream society - but through the absence of it.

with this, I want to talk about 1) how mlc rejects the conventional ties; and then 2) how it repurposes these ties in its own ways.

-

the five relational ties in confucianism:

father and son 父子有亲 - (natural) affection between father and son

ruler and subject 君臣有义 - righteous relationship between ruler and subject

older and younger brothers 兄弟 (长幼有序) - this is actually about seniority within the family; the order between older vs younger family members

husband and wife 夫妇有别 - differentiation between husband and wife (demarcated by the 内外 spectrum of gendered inner-external spheres)

friends 朋友有信 - trust between friends

logically inferred, all these ties are hierarchical and familial-based except for the last one: friends. ruler-subject is sort of an extension of the natural familial ties, while friendship is the inverse space of 1-4 (ie. you fall back on 5 to define a social relationship outside of the familial sphere that cannot be qualified as 1-4). while all are premised on mutuality, it is only no. 5 that is defined by a sense of choice and equality.

on the surface, 1-4 don't quite exist in mlc in particularly meaningful ways to the narrative or are even outright overlooked, and friendship is the relational tie most valued by mlc. we can tell it's true just by looking at the most meaningful relationships in mlc of difanghua. but at the same time, it is more nuanced. we can take a closer look at how the story plays around with most of the ties as part of a broader queer narrative.

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1) how mlc rejects the conventional ties

mlc's rejection of mainstream relational ties can be best seen in fdb escaping from marriage. and it was not just any engagement with anybody but an engagement with the imperial family. he struggles with the prospect of being married to princess zhaoling, but generally, it's about the idea of complying to mainstream conventions and expectations that includes compulsory heterosexuality. all these point not only to a defiance against amatonormativity - the resistance of the traditional husband-wife tie, but also an irreverence for the ties of ruler-subject (the engagement being an imperial decree) and father-son (matters of marriage being sole decisions made by parents).

of course this is on top of how fdb's own biological father is a p-o-s, and the narrative gives fdb minimal struggles in this aspect, allowing him to sever this tie without looking back (I love it, yeap). along the same line is how lxy is an orphan, who came to gain important relationships that are built on natural compassion among people rather than innate, blood-based ties - even as llh. the sense of defiance from the narrative is especially stark to me considering that he could have a completely different familial-based life - as a son, brother, and ruler, if his biological family was still around. the narrative also deliberately treats his biological brother as a phantom, replaced with an older brother who he was bonded with neither by blood nor marital ties. on dfs's front, absolutely nothing is to be known about his biological family. his childhood history with the toxic patriarch of his life - who is not even his biological father - was afforded a clean break and closure.

we can keep going on, but that's pretty much the point.

ritualisation is one of the most important things of the confucianism school, especially to the honoring of these social relationships (and the officiating of social roles). the one ceremony/ritual we saw in mlc involving the main characters - or more accurately speaking, came closest to seeing - was the imminent wedding ceremony of dfs and jlq. even in that case, it was premised on non-mutuality with dfs being the unwilling, passive party. (fem-coded dfs? 25 marks.)

and that brings us to the next part.

-

2) how mlc repurposes these ties

that particular wedding ceremony gets hijacked by dfs and lxy/llh, and gets turned into an important milestone in their relationship. they consummate - what is on text - their friendship after a long time being more enemies and rivals than friends. it is a clear establishment of the trust they have for each other. and here it is where I circle back to the subject of this post: friendships as marital ties.

in this article, as a part of a feminist, egalitarian reframing of confucianism, there is a proposal for spousal relationships to be reframed as a friendship tie. (this aligns with the interrelatedness of the five ties eg. the ruler-subject mirrors father-son dynamic, with the confucian belief that rulers have an obligation to their subjects alike parents to their own children.) by doing so, it removes the functional, gendered differentiation assigned to marital ties, and shifts it to something equal, and independent of gender. you exalt the value of trust between spouses, instead of basing marital relationships on gendered roles. as such, spouses become more like friends, and conversely, friends can also become more like spouses. (romance not a prerequisite. it has never been about romance anyway.)

given that mlc has repeatedly applied marital motifs to llh and dfs's characters in their joint narratives, this opens up a reading friendships as a marital tie. seeing marriage as a bridge for strangers to become family, marriage in mlc becomes a metaphor for the chosen commitment and mutual trust put in by strangers/friends (non-familial ties) into the becoming of family. the blurring of lines between marital ties and friendship encourages a genuine space of queer experience that goes beyond any pressure for strict labels - of sexuality, and relationships as romantic, sexual, etc etc.

(note: despite the borrowing of a feminist concept, I strongly hesitate to call mlc a feminist story. it's a whole discussion - or debate - on its own. nevertheless, it is definitely a gender-conscious story that lays foundation for a strong queer and egalitarian reading.)

-

it is to be noted that it is intended - and also beneficial to take the confucian framework of relational ties beyond face value. the framework offers what it believed to be the most fundamental social relationship dynamics, and sees room for extension and matching to other kinds of relationships (all if not, most). a relationship such as teacher-student, which is outside of the five ties stated, can also mirror the affection of father-son ties, albeit not in a literal and identical way.

speaking of which. fdb and lxy/llh.

indeed they're known by others to be good friends. fdb thinks they're good friends too - insists on it, and puts his best efforts in keeping it that way. but does it really go both ways? if it does not, then can it really still be friendship? my humble take is that, ultimately - weighing in with llh's perspective - this is a relationship that is not so much based on trust, and rather, based on an innate affection that is only unique to family. (in this case, not blood/marital-based but one that was chosen and built aka lxy's relationship with sgd.) in other words, less of a friendship, more of a familial one.

it is a lot clearer considering their relationship from llh's point of view: some brat you never wanted in your life came barging in, and whether he was going to bring any positive effect to your life was secondary to the tranquility - which you have carved for yourself in the past decade - that is so integral to your personhood. no way. but the moment you hear that he's family? well, that changes the game completely. even before learning about fdb being sgd's son (then beginning to take initiative in showing greater acceptance), it is apparent in llh that there was an instinctive resonance with fdb as his shixiong's nephew. (eg. he remarked to his shifu's grave about how alike fdb is to himself.) this is unlike with dfs whom he had taken a much longer time to build trust with. you do not apply trust - aka the quality of friendships - to family. family is something deeper, more instinctive than that. if fdb was never family, I find it hard to imagine given llh's personality, that he would have let some brazen, bratty stranger intrude for that long. (boy invited himself to llh's home, sat himself down eating the owner's dinner and nosing in his cooking abilities!!! ily bb but that was uncalled for 😭)

of course there are many more layers in their relationship. there is a substantial degree of their history as (unwitting) teacher-disciple: fdb is still healthy and alive all thanks to the existence of lxy as a spiritual teacher role model in his life, regardless it being one-sided or not. there is also indeed some part of friendship in it, especially from fdb's point of view. he sees llh as a kindred spirit who he could enjoy a life of freedom with for life. but llh never reciprocates. he knew this was short-lived. and so ultimately, the hierarchical layer of their relationship overpowers the equal one, where llh's treatment of fdb as a nephew/小辈 younger family member and a disciple is the one that sealed the fate of their relationship.

if (blood-based) familial ties are irrelevant in jianghu, then the closest proxy to a father-son relationship in the martial world would be a teacher-disciple relationship. lxy and his shifu are a clear, indisputable example. for fdb and llh, their teacher-disciple tie is murkier and not consistently applied. they were also never ritualised as teacher-disciple, and thus are not teacher-disciple in any official capacity as far as confucian ideas are concerned. yet in crucial moments, it is invoked by llh as a card of authority over fdb to get out of sticky situations with fdb. and there was their final scene together: in a moment of sincerity, llh gives the approval to fdb as his disciple - then entrusting fdb with the secret manual of his techniques, up until his final letter in which fdb was recommended to dfs as a successor to his martial abilities.

in an imperial setting, this would have been the relationship of an emperor and his crown prince that straddles both ruler-subject and father-son ties aka a tag-team of disaster. the teacher has an obligation to nurture his disciple as a successor to himself, and love him like a son too. on the flipside, he holds the final power in their relationship - withholding knowledge and feelings from the younger one. they are only equals in a way a parent-child can be. they are only equals as much as the parent allows. and this is how fdb got left behind in the dust of llh's departure. he was the child treating his parent like a friend, supporting him emotionally and begging to be loved back the same way he loves his parent - but the parent had a lifetime way ahead of him and stayed out of his reach, physically and emotionally.

llh and fdb operate with the trapping of a friendship but have always been family in the core. llh had known that way before fdb did, just like everything else he had known and put out of fdb's reach. because. fdb did not have to know. fdb is different and will forge his own path. and that's a kind of love llh has for him that nobody understands (in fact not even fdb himself) - one that is on a different plane from friendships.

by repurposing the framework of relational ties, mlc showed that the essence of familial relationships aka its intimacy and closeness can be independent from biology and formalised rituals. and it is important to myself for stories to say that people can build close ties and deeply meaningful relationships even without being born or ritualised into any.

-

then back to how these relational ties are inextricable from the conceptualisation of the 'self' in confucian worldview: the roles you play in these relationships are intended to define you. there is no 'self' independent from it. while the concept of a social, relational self is fully rooted in reality, being locked into social roles can be a painful way to live - a way that llh has experienced as lxy the sigu sect leader. so, in order for lxy/llh to realise a sense of self that exists outside the norms, it inevitably points to another way that requires a cut from these relationships. that is then the buddhist (or taoist) answer of looking past attachments to the world such as the confucian idea of relationships defining your being. only with a dissolution of a sense of 'self', can there be true liberation.

[elvisqueso]

Pocahontas (1995)

[maximura]

[lurking-loaf]

The two Suns I drew during @daycarefriendpickup's Magma this past weekend. This was my first time doing an event like this and it would not have been possible without the encouragement of the faz-errific @littlechinaaru and @lil-lemon-snails. The second picture is my part of the collaboration I did with the two on Sunday (you can see the hands they drew on the left and right respectively). Check out the official posts by the dfpu tumblr to see both drawings in full.

[dilfchart-deathbattle]

can i submit my professor?

No

[crystalkitty1220]

Man I wonder where the leader of the fear realm could've gone, it's alMOST LIKE NEVIN HAS AN

[piracytheorist]

The subtle truth that bleeds through...

[ethtyn]

I GET TO INTRODUCE SOMEONE TO THE WONDERS OF ETHO CONTENT SO HERE'S A POST.

i'm going to preface this by saying i adore Etho. i love him with my whole heart and soul actually. but i have also been watching his content for Literally A Decade so i have probably forgotten some of his classics. if i did, PLEASE CHIME IN!

with that disclaimer out of the way, onward! to the New Ethowatcher Primer Post™!

i think Etho is arguably best known for his Minecraft singleplayer let's play, but at the time i'm writing this post, he's uploaded 571 episodes. that's intimidating! so in my opinion, a good primer for this series is his episode 550 world tour. it's 2 years old at this point, but catching up on 21 episodes afterwards is nothing compared to almost 600, and gives you a great reference point for everything that's been accomplished in the world so far - and if you like the world tour enough, you can go back and watch from the beginning!

he was also a member of the Mindcrack SMP. Mindcrack was to people then as Hermitcraft is today; everybody wanted to be a member. a good place to start with his Mindcrack series is season 4. that being said, if you only want to watch a single episode, try episode 10 king of the ladder (the origin of "Ladders" as a nickname for Etho) or season 3 the trial ("why's he got chocolate on his knees?") for wacky hijinks, season 3 final tour for the builds he did that season, or season 4 end of season 4 for the same reason.

he is currently a member of Hermitcraft; due to personal reasons he had to stop uploading in the middle of season 8 and has uploaded only sporadically during season 9. therefore most people usually recommend his hermitcraft season 7 as the best place to start, and for good reason. he builds extremely weird shit (The Monstrosity my beloved), experiments with doing noteblock covers of popular songs, plays ridiculous amounts of Decked Out (trust me. his runs are so fun to watch), participates in a resistance even though he has no idea what's going on (him being a Lorephobe™ means i had no idea Hermitcraft did Lore™ until season 9), makes a business purely to scam people...it's a classic for a reason. oooooo you watch to watch Etho's Hermitcraft S7 so badddddd

he also does modded series occasionally! his project ozone 2 series is a CLASSIC and i highly recommend watching, specifically for Taxes (you'll find out), but also because it is SO enjoyable watching a man be incredibly technical about a modpack even though you have no idea what he's saying most of the time. (i fully zone out during full episodes of this series sometimes. but still rewatch it every couple of years or so. it's chill.)

his original terrafirmacraft series is also one i remember fondly. this modpack is essentially Minecraft, But Hard Mode; more realistic physics and crafting make things much more difficult for the player and it's super interesting, in my opinion. he was also doing a series in an updated/forked version of the pack, called terrafirmapunk, but iirc his world for that series was corrupted and he was unable to restore it, so he had to discontinue it. RIP Chester ):

his current modded series is a modpack he collated himself. unfortunately due to the personal issues mentioned above he's only uploaded a few episodes here and there, but he seems to be really enjoying it and hopefully once things stabilize a little more we'll get more episodes!

he's also building a PVP map in Minecraft! just...slowly. introducing battle bane! we get an episode approximately every year or two or four. he recently built a simplified version on the Hermitcraft server for their recent charity stream and they played a round at the end!

of course, you're always welcome to just...watch his stuff from the beginning if you're a weirdo completionist like me (/derog /j). however, be warned that he is (affectionately) known as Your Favourite Minecraft YouTuber's Favourite Minecraft YouTuber for a reason, and has been on the platform for almost a decade and a half at this point. his early content is therefore much different than his current content and sometimes hard for new watchers to enjoy. i really feel like he's hit his stride in terms of talking to viewers in the last five years and it's much easier to jump in on his newer content, BUT that's just my opinion. ymmv!

i'll add episodes or clips to this post as i think of them or as they're mentioned, so again please don't be afraid to chime in with your opinions on things you think i should have added!

and above all else: ethogirls unite 😌

--

EDIT: HOW COULD I FORGET TEAM CANADA AND BDUBS. thank you @butterflycrafting for the reminder & the recommendations! further edits are going under the cut so as not to completely overtake your dashes with this post :')

Team Canada is comprised of Etho, PauseUnpause, & VintageBeef. they're all, as you might be able to guess, Canadian! they all played together on Mindcrack as well as doing series together. some faves:

pranking OCD Zisteau is an oldie but a goodie. Zisteau logs in while they're pranking him.

their sky factory 2.5 series is great. it's been awhile since i've personally watched it but their banter is always fantastic so i'm recommending it anyway.

watch them escape the Nether, but watch pause's video because it's unedited and you get the full experience that way.

i personally LOVED their capture the monument series back in the day. it's been long enough since i've watched them that i don't remember which one was my personal favourite, but here's the first episode of diversity 3 to see if it's up your alley anyway.

edit: MORE TEAM CANADA GOODNESS courtesy of @catmaidetho - [Etho voice] labyrinth of puzzles! it has, again, been a Hot Minute since i've watched this series but also i Know it's a solid rec so it goes on the list.

edit: @catmaidetho & @fartherlands suggest team canada r.a.d.! either i never watched this one or i watched it long enough ago that it has been erased from my memory, but i trust my mutuals. do the thing.

Bdubs (BdoubleO100) and Etho ALSO met on Mindcrack and now play on Hermitcraft together. i don't have any specific videos to share (feel free to suggest some!) but in my opinion Etho is the black cat friend to Bdubs' golden retriever friend. (that made more sense in my head, probably.) Etho is responsible for Bdubs' big eyes skin.

---

a nonnie wants me to tell y'all that Etho's hearthstone videos are worth a watch! there are five videos: just a random video, slow druid arena, consistent inconsistency, the arena dream, and beggku hunter. if you watch them, let me know - this is a series of videos i never did end up watching because hearthstone was a game that didn't interest me at the time.

funnily enough, anon suggesting non-minecraft videos reminded me that he'd done terraria is EZ with Zisteau, another Mindcracker. i remember them having a lot of fun in that series so definitely give it a try!

[vicompte-de-latarteaucoing]

Some of my favourite villains from ''Les aventures de Blake et Mortimer'' ...but a handful of years younger 😅 because why not ?

[star--anon]

your post ab minho when thomas is sick inspired me,, imagine thomas when minho is sick. the chaos that would ensue?? i feel like thomas is somehow more panicky than minho??

oh my god yes

it's kinda funny because I was writing another post about this exact thing lol

Seriously, while writing the Minho post, I realized that Thomas would be everything Minho was, but dialed to 11

Thomas just picks Minho up like a cat, literally taking Minho as a hostage, and refuses to let him go until he's feeling better. Carries him everywhere, constant cuddles, etc. etc. Minho so much as sniffles and Thomas is running them to the hospital at 250 meters per second

(Genuinely though, Thomas panicking at first and doing everything he can to help Minho, and Minho getting more and more restless because he loves being taken care of but also wants to do things himself. It takes them a while to find the balance between Minho not overworking himself and Thomas not over-coddling Minho. They do still cuddle for hours though. Minho swears up and down that cuddling helps his headaches go away.)