#i mean- top/bottom discourse is funny in general

[sweetbananachips]

top/bottom discourse in the Good Omens fandom is so funny because

1. they’re immortal beings who have been alive for 6,000+ years— they are bound to switch

and 2. how do i know one of you isn’t michael sheen???

[mars-ipan]

gotta say i've been in quite a few fandoms but i don't think any of them are quite as unabashedly queer as the gomens fandom is. it's very comfy here

[pynkhues]

I think the top/bottom discourse is especially funny because Louis is the only character we ‘see’ topping (w/ Armand) and is implied to top Lestat in s1x02 and most likely s1x06. The other times with Lestat are only kind of positionally suggesting that he’s bottoming. I believe that’s what we were supposed to get in the pilot but it’s ‘just’ blood drinking in that scene anyway (according the script iirc?), and the other scene where Claudia is talking to Louis in his head could be literally anything at that point.

Sometimes I get the impression that people assume Lestat is topping because they’ve associated his worst behaviors with a sexualized or romanticized dominance. Which is kind of funny to me because some of those traits in Lestat are the ones he isn’t in total control of and lead to his worst actions against people he loves- and I would argue aren’t really sexual at all for him- and I also think they’re the ones he’s most ashamed of. And then sometimes I also think there’s a weird idea that a bisexual man is “more masculine” than a gay man and masculinity must equal topping (I’m bi myself and feel like I’ve seen this idea before).

I do think the show has pretty specifically implied that Louis and Lestat's relationship was vers, but I also agree with you that the most explicit depictions of sex in this show outside of the pilot broadly have generally featured either Louis topping or it being vague enough to be interpreted any which way.

And yeah, I mean, I agree with you on the rest of your points too. I think this dynamic in particular has kind of become this weird annex point for a lot of capital-S Stuff around misogyny, homophobia, biphobia and racism that I don't even know how to begin to unpack. It's just a Lot, and the fact that nothing seems to be off limits with people arguing about it is wild to me. It's interesting to have conversations about on the one hand, but I don't know. This fandom seems especially prone to sort of like - - an aggressive take-up of particular readings?

It's been interesting to witness even in my little corner over here to say the least.

[kimievii]

1, 2, 3 for the choose violence ask!

(Any ship/fandom you feel like talking about)

ooooh thank you so much anon!! 🥰

I didn't expect to get any tbh!

I'll chose SVSSS for my answers then lkhgj

🔥 choose violence ask game 🔥

1. the character everyone gets wrong

Shen Jiu I believe ;;;

I don't even want to elaborate but... Before I got into SVSSS I was told it's the chillest fandom for MXTX's works, without drama and people being generally nice to each other... (I was naive and thought it was true because it's definitely a smaller fandom compared to MDZS and TGCF)

It's not. The amount of drama and discourse about Shen Jiu lfkjh I'm too old to care about drama and discourse in fandoms and I just plainly ignore it. That doesn't mean I haven't witnessed the violence existing around the way to interpret this character =")

I think I understand why that is but, people, please chill ;;;;

2. a compelling argument for why your fave would never top or bottom

To be fair I don't go there glhg I firmly believe that if you prefer "X" or "Y" to bottom or to top has more to do with how you perceive a character and a ship and your own personality, preferences and life experiences than anything else.

Which is why people can never agree on these and also why it is very much a question of personal preferences.

That being said (lol) Shen Qingqiu (Yuan) is a bottom and no one can convince me otherwise =')

I know many people want him to top LBH and I perfectly understand this because LBH would like that too, but I can't see this happening... I think SQQ would be way too self-conscious to take charge in bed, plus he's terrified to hurt LBH again. It would take immense work on himself, lots of communication, reassurance and to change the way he sees LBH to get there and I'm not saying it's impossible but even then I think he would hate it. He would only do it if LBH insists but I don't think LBH minds all that much whether he's a top or bottom with SQQ, as long as he's with him and feels loved. Of course all of these are personal HC.

Honestly that's the tragedy of my ships... many of them are made of bottom x bottom (service top) =")

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you’ve seen on tumblr

I have seen way too many bad takes on tumblr to think of one ='D

I always found it funny that many people claim to be fans of SVSSS or MDZS yet fail to understand they are the exact people MXTX is depicting as the villains of her stories even though the story clearly shows through their actions and the consequences of their actions the reasons why their behavior is not one to reproduce. The way the point of a story can fly over some people's heads is very flabbergasting sometimes. If I were MXTX I don't know if I'd want to laugh or cry lgkhj

[pileofpawns]

Intro post!!! Wauuugh! Finally!

I have been meaning to make one these for ages but I've never gotten around to it lmao

Hi there, I'm Plum! I'm 17 years old and my pronouns are she/her (though idc if you use they/them on me either). I'm a disabled aroace cis girl. Nice to meet ya! This is where I tip my brain contents into - Consistency does not exist here! I mostly post about my interests (which can change very rapidly), but also make generally nonsensical shitposts and rarely post art I make.

Misc info about me:

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[musclesandhammering]

(I typed a whole giant reply to this and then deleted the whole thing, fml 😭. This is from my notes app, so it’s super long and choppy, lol)

I completely get what you’re saying about how people treat bottom!loki. It’s always presented as a fun ironic thing, but you can usually tell when people are saying it because they secretly want to emasculate him (which is stupid because bottoming isn’t emasculating but… that’s kinda the problem right?) I lurk on Loki twitter every now and then and I look at sylki posts too (because I actually don’t mind them in certain contexts), and the number of sylki fans insisting that Loki would carry their baby is.. a lot. Which is great! I’m cool with loki having his gf’s baby! But then you look at the rest of their posts and they’re all listing reasons why sylvie is better than loki or trying to convince people that she’s stronger than loki etc etc- and suddenly the pregnancy thing starts making more sense.

I see loki as a bottom because he loves attention and is secretly very clingy and soft. Also, being as chaotic and defiant as he is, I think he’d love the idea of challenging gender roles in that way. Queer sex is supposed to feel empowering. But I’ve seen people saying he’s obv a bottom cause he’s such a loser or calling him a dumb slut in ragnarok whose only good idea was sleeping with the grandmaster and like…??? Yall think that’s empowering?? I’m not one for kink shaming at all, write porny headcanons however you want. But it’s obvious that it’s not even about kinks, some of them just dislike his character and don’t want to say it.

The thing about Sabrina Carpenter is sooo true. I think it also relates to some of the discourse about loki’s bisexuality too. A lot of younger people in fandom (or just in general) do sex negativity and call it progressive, which is just annoying. When they mentioned loki having both a male and female love interest of when the article came out saying he was supposed to have a big sex montage in s1, everyone called it biphobic. And, as a bi person, that irritated me! For bi characters in general, I get that. But you can’t just say any bi character having multiple partners is bad- you have to take their individual personality into consideration. And Loki is very flirty and very hedonistic. Him having lots of sex/more than one love interest makes sense. And at least then, it wouldn’t have felt like they were pandering to heteronormativity with the sylki pairing.

Anyway, you’re so right about some shippers not liking the idea of a male character being “in charge” of the fav female character. I think it’s also why a lot of people HATED when the composer implied he slept with sif (I loved it!). I mean, it’s totally valid if you just don’t see them getting together or whatever, but half the people I saw were saying things like “you really think this badass confident warrior would sleep with that little loser??” or “she could get Thor, why would she settle for Loki?” etc, and then that turned into “well maybe SHE fucked HIM”…. because only the superior person can be on top apparently. (Disclaimer: I also think sif pegged loki but because it seems in character, not because she’s better than him! 😭)

Season 1 sylki was essentially Waldron’s oc fantasy loki latching onto the only person he felt could understand him in completely unfamiliar and traumatic circumstances. Sylvie took the dominant role in most of their interactions because a.) Loki was fucking around and not taking things seriously, b.) she knew way more about what was going on (the TVA, variants, apocalypses, etc), and c.) he had JUST been snatched from his timeline and was still trying to adjust to the situation and was uncertain/confused/disoriented/etc. None of it was because she was the superior version. It’s shown over and over that that’s not the case. So it’s awfully funny that fans were ok with that dynamic- but when things changed in s2 and Loki became more familiar with what was going on and more focused on the mission than Sylvie, fans got mad that he wasn’t acting like a simp anymore. Hm.

I did love that even though Loki still tried to convince Sylvie to help with the loom, after he initially showed up and she made it clear she wanted nothing to do with him, he never once tried to get romantic with her again. I know shippers were pissed about it, but I think it’s a really great character moment for Loki. Showing that he respects boundaries and isn’t a creep. Also, like you said, that even with all his self esteem issues, he does have some self respect- enough to not beg someone to be interested in him.

Oh that’s so accurate about Odin and Frigga 😭 surprisingly, I think Thor would be the most accepting out of the three of them. He still wouldn’t get it, like you said, but he’d call Loki whatever pronouns he asked him to regardless. Oh the thought of Loki having to express himself in small unnoticeable ways to avoid further bullying just broke me 😭 I saw a post a couple days ago about Loki’s shoes when they’re chasing down Brad having little heels and I like to headcanon that this was a version of that (also, he ran that man down with heels on, I’m even more impressed fr).

I typed this all fast asf and I haven’t reread any of it so if some of it makes no sense, just ignore it 😂. This topic is so frustrating and interesting though, I love seeing your takes on it.

I really hate to use this word but I guess there's no other way to put it, but I feel like some fans are obssesed with emasculating Loki 😬

I think it's interesting that some people preach "badass fem Loki" and at the same time think that masc Loki is a "pathetic loser" (affectionate), like, doesn't it make more sense for Loki to not have a sudden personality change when they shift through genders?

Why can't fem and masc Loki be badasses? This reminds me of the s1lki shippers who would say that Loki would be the one getting pregnant in their relationship bc silvie was "too badass to carry babies".

In the comics Loki remains the same personality wise when they shift (pls correct me if "shift" is not the correct term for that), the only big difference we can see is their looks, so why can't it be the same thing with MCU Loki?

Someone said on twitter that some people aren't comfortable in openly liking male characters bc of the bad things associated with the masculine figure nowadays and I agree with them, maybe people like to take away masculine traits from characters they enjoy bc it makes them more comfortable with the idea of liking men, even if they're fictional

And don't get me wrong, I totally see Loki as someone who doesn't fit in the traditional model of masculinity, I'd love to see his genderfluidity and feminine side being explored in other projects, but I always get puzzled when I see people almost trying to deny his masculinity, like why??????

Also, I'd loooove to see a male presenting pregnant Loki, but not because their partner is too cool or badass to carry babies, simply because Loki is comfortable with their body and gender identity, I don't want to hear that Loki is the one with child because he's a pathetic simp male wife or something like that, it's exhausting and I'm tired of it

And don't get me started on the implications of saying someone is too badass to get pregnant and their "pathetic" partner wil be the one carrying the child bc they're a loser or something like that, are we okay with treating pregnancy as something derogatory to the pregnant person now? Istg some people just love gender stereotypes in a different package

I also think this is the reason why some people were so upset that Loki is more built in the show, there's still people saying that this should be the only body tipe Loki is allowed to have bc muscles and Loki don't match somehow, they're repulsed by the idea of a more masculine Loki and I don't get it, what's so wrong about it?

All of this makes me wonder if Loki faced people in Asgard questioning his masculinity as well, how humilating it might've been for him, to have even that questioned and probably mocked by others simply bc he's different

@musclesandhammering I'd love to read your thoughts on this, I'd like to have a broader conversation about this in the fandom but I'm scared people will call me conservative, reactionary or something like that lol 😭

Ofc, if you don't have a formed opinion on the matter you don't have to answer anything at all! Feel free to add your thoughts on this if you want, the topic just reminded me of what you were saying about people and their hcs of their fave characters being the bottom in the relationships they have lol

[epitome-of-an-openbook]

The prevalence of male character feminization is really high in the ST fandom and I’m not sure how to feel about it. It can’t just be the hanky thing (that costume designer has no idea what they’ve unleashed!) and I understand that it’s a kink and I’m not going to shame that. But as you say, it seeps into lots of fics where it’s like people think that’s how a bottom acts.

I wondered if it was the huge influx of tik tok teens that came with S4, who might (MIGHT) be eager to just run with their own thoughts rather than following canon? I mean, a small but significant proportion of Steddie fans readily admit haven’t even watched previous seasons. A couple of authors have even said they hadn’t watched the show at all, and only know it from tik tok. Now, they’re allowed to be in the fandom. All are welcome. It’s just an interesting phenomenon. It would explain some of the poor grammar in some fics. I’m not talking all fics/all young authors, some of them are brilliant. But with dialogue, some seem to think you put a period wherever a comma would normally go, and that’s something I’ve never seen in any other fandom. And then there’s your/your, the past tense of to lie/to lay, peek/peak/pique, queue/cue, bear/bare…I could go on for ages.

But that’s beside the point. Back to feminization: another consideration is the fact that many authors write their favorite characters as a self insert of sorts. Not just fanfic authors, either: Stephen King does it all the time, and other authors too. So that means some (again, not all) female authors will write Steve (it’s usually Steve, let’s be honest here) that way because they want him to be loved the way they want to be loved, whether that involves kink or not.

I’m not a fan of it, personally. I like Steve how he is in canon, and a lot of traditionally ‘feminine’ tropes don’t fit him. When he’s written as a coy or coquettish, or someone who cries all the time, for example, it’s not to my taste. Kinda throws me out of the story, tbh. But it clearly is appealing to lots of other people.

That’s not to say that Steve doesn’t have some ‘female’ traits. I find the babygirl Steve meme as funny as anyone else, and of course he has been given the reluctant babysitter role. In S3 he was so prettily styled it was crazy, and he was the one receiving creepy facial caresses from the Russian general when any other show would have had that happen to Robin. But he can be written as he is in canon - that same pretty boy who’s also a jock, who can take a punch like a champ, is an adorable doofus and a recklessly courageous protector - and still be a bottom.

I also have no idea where it really comes from. However, the feminization for the purpose of making one character in a mlm gay relationship 'the man' of the relationship and the other 'the woman' of the relationship is a widespread issue across most fandom spaces tbh, and I know that everytime it comes up its just cycled discourse that's been talked to death - but the fact of the matter is that gay men in fandom spaces have repeatedly told us that it's harmful. There is a tasteful way to have Steve (or Eddie or whoever) explore a more feme gender expression, but it becomes very clear in fic when the feminization is being used as a way to fit a gay relationship into heteronormative gender-roles and/or fetishize the pairing. It is all very "so who wears the pants in this relationship?" imo - which really sucks. A metalhead nerd and a prom king jock can be in a relationship with each other without having to sacrifice the masculine aspects of their personalities. It is so rare in gay relationships for one person to always be the bottom or always be the top and sometimes the top is the tiny femme one and the bottom is the big masculine one. And sometimes neither has any particularly femme qualities and sometimes neither have any particularly masc qualities.

Also, on another barely related note - what is with people exaggerating their heights to fit this idea, one of the first indicators I have for "this fic might not be for me" is if one of them is suddenly towering over the other despite the fact that Joe Keery/Steve is just barely an inch taller than Joe Quinn/Eddie?? Idk if that's just a personal preference thing, and I don't always hate it but it's another thing that I feel sometimes gets used to enforce het-gender roles.

IDK if my points came across all that clearly, but the issue isn't necessarily "Stop Babygirl-ifying Steve" so much as it is "Stop Babygirl-ifying Steve in a way that's fetishizing gay men" and that can get kind of lost in the discourse I think - imo it's pretty easy to pick out when it's done well and when it's done harmfully and everyone can read what they want to but I personally am going to try and stay away from the latter.

[insecateur]

i can't write so here are some thoughts

i feel like my philosophy re: top/bottom n ship order is biased by like. my feelings regarding OTP. bc outside OTP or even outside lysandre i just don't rly have strong feelings about it. like i have my general preferences (liking sub top n Dom bottom, liking subverted expectations, liking big subs n big bottoms with smaller Doms n smaller tops) and there are ships where i have strong D/s preferences (whether actual D/s or like. dynamic. vibes. who is Calling The Shots in bed even if it's a casual thing and not a whole BDSM affair) but i just can't get myself to care about who puts what in who. like this just feels completely divorced from like. The Dynamic. to me. and i know that for a lot of people it is Not divorced and top = Dom (similarly whether actual D/s or vibes) but i just cannot subscribe to this. it is beyond me

it's funny when thinking about OTP bc inside me are two creachers and creacher1 wants lysandre's hole to be obliterated and creacher2 wants augustine to call the shots but creacher2 recognizes within himself that augustine sycamore would also want his hole obliterated so sub top lysandre needs to be in the equation. which is how i actually end up writing lysandre topping more ‼️‼️‼️ lysandre would simply want to make his Dom happy above anything else ‼️‼️‼️ who am i to refuse him this

the funniest thing to me tho is that the way my preferences work constantly contradict like the appeal of prfr is the subverted dynamic but also augustine is older. whereas for example in tachio the subverted dynamic is that tachibanana is younger but oda is his loyal dog who will do anything (some restrictions may apply) for him and i want that dynamic to also follow them into bed which means that in this case the power dynamic is actually Not subverted it's just unusual to begin with. does that make sense

anyway in closing if i could never cross paths with t/b discourse ever again it would be too soon but alas i am a glutton for punishment. among other things

[castielscarma]

I think part of why ppl think Destiel shippers are just fujoshis who want to see two guys ba*g and are on the same level as win*est shippers is the sheer amount of ppl who call Jensen and Dean tw*nk who would never top. Like, even if so posts a gif of Dean slamming Cas against a wall and made a funny remark, ppl comment how Dean is just playing and is a bottom. Calling so bottom coded is really offensive. They're both guys, why would Dean not use his ***? Reeks like por* fantasy to me and others

Hi Nonnie This is answered in two parts, I think.  1. It’s really nothing new that people think that Destiel shippers are just mad about the finale (specifically) and that shipping (generally) is to see two dudes bang. It’s been a longstanding view specifically with those outside shipping communities (who are mostly queer, or female) that this is some sort of fetish or women being thirsty for porn (like if women wanted to see two guys f*ck, we know where to look, we don’t need to suffer through 200+ episodes of a hunter pining for an angel and barely get a handholding). 2. The bottom/top discourse. I’ve seen queer people claim Dean is a top or bottom or I’ve seen straight people do the same. While I do think there are tells that Dean is a *submissive* that in no way, shape or form means that Dean is a top or bottom. Those are fundamentally different and I think people who conflate the two... have had porn as their sex education or no sex. education at all.  But yes, generally, outside of shipping where people stumble upon this kind of language, that Dean is such a twink, etc it does send the message that people ship (talking Diestel specifically, they are literally the only (well second which was from a cartoon) thing I’ve ever shipped) only because we want to see them f*ck. And I do think the vast majority ships Destiel because we see the connection these characters have, they have mindblowing chemistry, that they are good with each other, that they love and care for each other, deeply. (no idea what fujoshi mean...)

[xhxhxhx]

~ show us your big discord posts ~ UwU

some oy my Discord posts, partially cleaned up:

On Conservatism:

secular social and cultural conservatism is about maintaining traditions and hierarchies, so it should always appeal more to older folks than younger ones, right?

like, if you're at the bottom of the pole, as you are when you're a kid, it's hard to see the appeal of the hierarchy, right? you might not have found it that hard, sure, but it'd always be easier if you were at the middle or the top.

if you've lived with a set of norms and traditions for decades, you have, well, a reliance interest in them. but it's hard to turn them into a propositional political package, something you can teach as doctrine, because its appeal is ... informal? lived?

you could socialize people into it, through example, but ... the evidence for it is implicit, tacit. you're not usually going to have a special revelation that turns you into a committed conservative, or a striking argument, at least not one that turns you into a secular social or cultural conservative.

but then, you’re an American, and American conservatism was always a little bit of a special case. there's no ancient aristocracy or clerisy to point to, not generally; the political-cultural traditions that most American conservatives point to are barely a few decades old.

because the core is a special kind of ... propositional liberalism: the Founding, the Constitution, a society of ordered liberty and free exchange, the rights reserved to the states and the people, the freedom of individuals and families. 

so maybe the dynamics are different in American conservatism, such that you can learn and adopt it as a set of propositions, which would make the age gradient less sharp than it is elsewhere

On Dynasties:

[i have never seen a meme about how we need a democrat's child to take up that president’s mantle]

the national Democrats seem to have a good number of ~dynasties, and I don't think it's unique to any faction or ideology

it's an information cue, a heuristic, and given the low levels of information most voters have, it's going to be a pretty powerful one. (you can only keep so many bits of information in your head!) you know what "the Clintons" are, you know what "the Kennedys" are, you know what "the Bushes" are, here's another one

it's especially important in candidate-centered regimes, rather than party-centered ones, like in places outside the old Northeast belt, where party machines are weak and candidates have to prove themselves in open primary contests.

(although maybe the effect is too small to detect and the patronage-style regimes of the party-centered contests would look the same, dynasty-wise)

On Liberalism:

[I heard that the right is much more unified than the left?]

yeah, but the right is just much less divided on demography and policy than the ~left. the right is a coalition of the "normative", whereas the left is everyone left over, so that makes for odd company, like the Blacks and Dixiecrats of the midcentury

the left is a coalition of interests, whereas the right is an ideological coalition, which makes Democrats more ideologically divided than Republicans. see Matt Grossmann and David Hopkins’s Asymmetric Politics (Oxford, 2016):

lmao

"Republicans are not only the more ideologically homogenous party, but are also more likely to conceptualize politics as an ideological conflict over political principles between the left and the right. Democrats instead prefer to think of politics as a contest among social groups competing with each other for influence over the government. Each party therefore maintains distinct criteria for judging policy proposals and outcomes, with Republicans prizing compatibility with ideological doctrine and Democrats emphasizing the protection or advancement of group interests."

I guess it's ironic that I pair my ~informal, ~group-centered understanding of conservative formation with a ~propositional, ~ideological understanding of conservatism as a movement

On Identity and Ideology:

[interested in if this changed recently with trump doing a thicc "white identity politics" thing]

enh things generally don't change all that quickly. you would have to check to see, but those long-term trends -- and this has been going on at least since the 1950s, when these surveys started -- don't get wiped out in one or two cycles, even if they might ebb. 

[how does this relate to like the Southern strategy?]

the Democrats understood white Southerners as a set of interest groups, whereas Republicans understood them as a set of would-be ideological conservatives?

like, the conservative appeal to the white South is, like, "you were conservative all along, join the conservative party" and, if you don't understand yourself as "a conservative" yet, then "our ideology preserves what you find valuable”

[conservatives hint at black people sucking tho? it seems very thinly veiled behind talk of values to me]

maybe? it's a trade-off between appealing to people's self-understanding of themselves ("I'm a good person") with useful heuristics for leaders ("you can tell I'm racist because I'm saying the racist thing, so vote for me, you racist")

so the more sophisticated the electoral environment, the more flattering the appeal, and the less sophisticated, the more vulgar. although you can apparently get a lot of mileage out of being vulgar, as our current president shows, so our discourse was probably set at too high a level before. we needed to dumb it down a bit.

[i mean that thing where some bush ran an ad with a big burly black guy criminal saying democrats were bad because they were lenient to him. or "inner city welfare queens", which is basically a meme at this point]

but I think those messages get a lot more mileage and replay on the left than on the right, because they offend the group-centered identities of the left. 

"this is offensive to a critical member of my coalition; friends, please pay attention to how offensive the other party is being," rather than, like "you're a liberal, so vote for the liberal party"

[i guess i'm confused whether you are claiming conservatives actually care more about values than libs?]

I think part of the story here is that the white South was just much more educated by the 1980s than it had been in the 1950s or the 1930s, so the appeal had to be more ... sophisticated

take Lee Atwater, George H. W. Bush's campaign manager:

You start out in 1954 by saying, “Nigger, nigger, nigger.” By 1968 you can’t say “nigger”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “Nigger, nigger.”

I think Lee Atwater is talking about how political discourse is increasingly ideological as the white South moves from a Democratic stronghold in the 1950s to a competitive two-party system in the 1980s and ultimately into the Republican stronghold that it is today

"you're getting so abstract ... all these things you're talking about are totally economic things ... [and] "We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing," where "abstraction" signifies a move from group-centered talk to ideological talk

and like, at some level all ideological talk should be rooted in something you find valuable (tradition, liberty, white supremacy) but part of its value is that you can reason with it, discourse with it. you can hold a coalition together with it, with a sort of political minimum: small government, low taxes, states' rights.

and you can hold together people who are explicitly or implicitly white supremacists with people who wouldn't think of themselves as at all "anti-Black", because you can say "we're talking about taxes, not race.”

so the Democrats are at once advantaged -- because they're the bigger tent, and can make special appeals to one group after another, and don't even have to think of themselves as ideologues -- and disadvantaged -- because there's something grubby about being a coalition of "special interests", and you can ding them for it.

[it's always funny to me that rural whites and economic elites don't count as "special interests"]

it's a difference in how liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans talk about things!

conservatives don't say "I'm doing this for rural whites and economic elites", whereas liberals do say "I'm doing this for African Americans, Hispanics, the poor, the LGBT" etc

alright I'm gonna leave to watch some anime

[pluckyredhead]

Ooo, what about Jason?

How I feel about this character: BIG LOVE. It’s funny, literally until *checks notes* this March I was like “I haven’t really read a lot with Jason but I bet I’d like him if I did” and then I read a lot with Jason and...yeah. I love Bad Robins.

All the people I ship romantically with this character: Rooooooy. That’s...that’s it, really, my monoshipper heart is like “HE HAS NEVER LOVED ANOTHER” (though I enjoy the idea of him having fun hookups with Rose).

My non-romantic OTP for this character: I love his dynamic with Tim, and I wish there was more of him interacting with Steph and Damian because the Bad Robins are my Bat-faves. Also Kory, of course!

My unpopular opinion about this character: I...am not a fan of the autopsy scar headcanon, insanely hot Nick Robles art aside. It doesn’t really make any sense and is directly contradicted by canon (they don’t do an autopsy if the cause of death is clearly “exploded,” and Bruce hushed up Jason’s death as much as possible). Give him scars everywhere! Just not that one. I also don’t have strong top/bottom feelings about him but I’m not into that discourse in general.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: I mean, we might be getting it now that Lobdell’s leaving, but I want his book to be...good? I’d love to read Jason as written by a woman, honestly, I think that would be so interesting. (Also just assume I want all characters to be canonically queer.)

[once-and-future-alaskan]

Saints Row The Thirds Backlash, Nine Years Later.

Going back into Saints Row 3 for the first time in at least 5 years I was unsure what to expect. Despite preordering it immediately after it was announced, owning every dlc and addon, and putting a likely horrifying number of hours into it I didn’t have the same warm nostalgia for it that I did SR2 or the fondness of it that I do for 4. I remembered enjoying it but my memory of it was otherwise limited and I feared my opinions had been tainted by the discourse surrounding it after launch and in the following years. 

On the one hand, I wanted to believe that a lot of the heavy backlash it got on launch was just the result of people being resistant to change and who were misremembering what SR2 was really like. 

On the other, I believe that in most non-antifeminist gamer backlashes there’s at least a kernel of truth to the complaints even if they are blown out of proportion or co-opted by bad actors. 

Having now completed SR3 two times in a row in the span of a week I can safely say that yes, the backlash was definitely a lot worse than it should have been but it wasn’t entirely undeserved. Things like the constant bitching about how they “ruined” the clothing customization by removing the layers system and instead going over to pre-made tops and bottoms were clearly the result of people not having played 2 in long enough that they forgot that the game had maybe 5 shirts to choose from collectively and all of them were ugly. 

The real problem with 2 wasn’t so much one of simplification, which was really just good streamlining, but of tone and confusion. I’m not going to shit on 3 because I do genuinely enjoy it but I did find when I was writing notes for the review most of them had to do with the confused mess of the story. 

Johnnys’ death feels like it’s completely forgotten after the destruction of the bridge and like the only one who’s actually effected by it is Shaundi which is just bizarre considering they barely interacted in 2. If anyone should be thrown into an unending violent rage by his death it should be The Boss! The Boss had known Johnny since the first game and he was essentially their best friend. But because the boss was written as a male with no strong emotions beyond rage and cheekiness, regardless of player gender, they barely talk about it beyond when it’s prompted by others.

Meanwhile, the game is incredibly immature, and I mean that by this series standards which features a minigame where you spray literal human shit all over city blocks with a septic truck to lower property values. Shoving dildo bats in the player’s face, centering pretty much all of the Morning Stars missions on prostitution and kink, Zimos’ whole thing, etc, but it all feels incredibly unearned. The games general treatment of and attitude towards sex workers, dismissive at best and a punch line at worst, just feels really really gross and several of Zimos’ missions just gave me really bad vibes.  

Something no one really talks about is that the game feels like it was designed with the idea that the player is supposed to be male, situations like disguising yourself as the cardinal don’t make any sense as a woman. Enemies and multiple cutscenes refer to the player by male pronouns, it starts to feel like the girl boss was an afterthought. This is made even worse when you realize that 2 was actually *really good* at keeping the Boss gender-neutral which never left either gender feeling excluded.

There are more issues, of course, the poorly aged attempts at being wacky and funny, STAGs clearly being an allegory for the Invasion of Iraq for…some reason? But I didn’t set out to shit on this game and I’ve gone on long enough.

My point is that Saints Row 3 has very real problems, it’s still a fun game but it’s unequivocally the worst of the mainline Saints Row games. That being said, I believe if 3 hadn’t been a tonally inconsistent and kinda sexist mess that tried way too hard, then 4 would have been a much worse game. 

TL;DR: 3 stumbled so 4 could run.        

[thedeviljudges]

Man, I feel like with the top/bottom 'discourse' in the fandom, that artists caption is kind of deliberately provocative. Sort of, like, this is my stance and you aren't allowed to read anything else into the artwork. I get that its their piece but the work isn't really a depiction of that. Are we signing off our top/bottom preference under everything we post now?

truth be told, i just don’t care. if that’s how they want to view it, if that’s how they want people to see their stuff, then fine, whatever. who cares. it’s anyone’s choice whether to be upset over that artists’ preference. even if they’re being deliberate about their stance, who cares. just know that at the end of the day, you can still view that work the way you want. you can still like your preference regardless of what someone else prefers.

and while i’m at it, i just have to say that this discourse nonsense is ridiculous to me. where did it start? i’m not saying that there wasn’t a post or comment that started this whole thing, however, what i’m seeing is this-

one post is made about their preference - or whatever the fuck the post was about that kickstarted it.

everyone sees it or a handful of people see it so then let’s say, three new posts are made with the argument about how it shouldn’t matter. like what you like.

then people who see those three posts will generate their own, which leads to let’s say, another three or four posts.

it’s a tree and branches is what i’m getting at.

meaning, this whole ass discourse wasn’t even discourse to begin with. everyone had to chime in with their ‘it doesn’t matter’ and ‘like what you like’ posts which escalated the problem and made it seem bigger than it actually was.

one small, insignificant comment or post blew up due to people posting their version of their view, which has all pretty much been the same response.

i’m also tired of people reblogging posts that specify who tops or bottoms and then clarifies in the tags that they’re vers but this was a good post. like, jfc. i’m not gonna defend myself and neither should anyone else. i keep seeing that on my gif set inspired by a funny post where it “suggested” steve was a bottom. like, the gif set was meant to be funny. it doesn’t specify my preference. it wasn’t meant to specify other people’s preference either. just reblog it and enjoy it for what it is while also knowing that you enjoy vers without defending yourself to other people.

i’m rolling my fuckin eyes. and this isn’t at you specifically, anon. i’m just tired of reading posts about how who tops/bottoms shouldn’t matter. i’m more annoyed with that than someone who states what they likes at this point.

just food for thought??? just something to think about. the so-called discourse isn’t just fueled by one party. it’s started bc ppl jump on the bandwagon to talk about how it shouldn’t matter - granted it’s with a good heart, but like. if y’all don’t touch it, it dies. yay.

[myfriendpokey]

GARBAGE DAY!

a bunch of scrappy shorter pieces to clean out my drafts folder for the new year!

***

A videogame will tend towards exhausting every possible variation of a design space whether anyone wants it to or not.

Videogames and duration - if something is good it should continue being good however long you extend it. You don't really encounter the idea that something can be good for a little while and then be evil.

***

Works of art are "in conversation" with their audience, with materials, with history, with each other. The aim of an artwork is to start, or add to, "the conversation". "Conversation" sort of edges out the older tic whereby art "examines" or "explores" something, which always made me think of a big magnifying glass being propped up for the benefit of some eerily calm 1950s scientist. But now that sounds too chilly, and perhaps sort of sketchy in the power dynamics it implies. "Conversation" is much warmer, informal and more fluid - "conversation" is the assurance that any given power dynamic can be dissolved away in the warm glow of basic, mutual humanity. Let's talk it through! My door is always open! Whenever there's a complaint over labour conditions or harassment it's nearly de rigueur to also quote the wounded-sounding HR lackey, upset that people didn't talk to them about it before going public. Why would anybody deny the friendly, outstretched hand of the respected opponent and their entirely in-good-faith quibbling about word meanings, personality and tone? Why don't we have an honest conversation about the "honest conversation", that numbing discourse cloud sprayed out like formic acid to neutralize a threat, to melt any unsettling edges or contraries back into the familiar gloop of the private and the personal.

***

One of the pleasures of videogames is that of an infinitely repeatable, always identical procedure. Pressing the button makes something happen, and by pressing it again it will happen again in the same way. So there's a kind of abundance or excess built into the system - like partaking of a fruit which will never be depleted, and in the process taking on in your own actions something of that same infinity. You can temporarily identify with the self-identical, eternally reproducing action that you are performing. I think one of the difficulties of videogames is that as you get (slightly!) older, that immortal quality becomes more visibly alien, harder to align to your sense of self. That these mechanics act like black holes, able to absorb any amount of your life without ever being satiated, becomes a terrible curse rather than an unexpected gift. That endlessness now seems eerie and artificial, a horrible parody of life rather than the highest version of it. 

The dadification of vgames has gone much remarked. But as well as a demographic shift I think this reflects a certain anxiety about the centrality of these immortal entities, these endless loops, within the culture. As reward for your fealty to the Mario brand you get even more Mario games, which by now you may not have time or energy to actually play. The VG dad (or even the buff, single pseudo-dads of the superhero movies) is eternally exhausted with the genre that he’s trapped in. We hear him groan and complain as he painfully slogs through the motions. The gratuitous loop is redeemed by the finite human suffering of the dad, as he manfully does what it takes to keep these things going forwards to the next generation, so that the next set of children may be able to actually take pleasure in them again. But the attempt to symbolically re-integrate these things into human life by casting them as a family drama never quite works: their ultimate indifference to that life shines through. A blind, eerie deathlessness is both their charm and their authority.

***

That saying that when all you have is a hammer everything else looks like a nail - similarly, when all you have is willpower, everything looks like an obstacle to be pounded into submission by that same willpower. 

Laziness is a good thing in that it means stepping back from this idiot insatiability of the will. If you're lazy you have to pay more attention, because you're more aware of both your own limits and the limits of your material. 

I think there can be value in suspending a formal problem rather than building an exhaustive system to solve it forever. That way it's still something you have to think about, something that still throws off and reroutes the normal workings of your awful private fantasy machine. Dropping text strings into the game as elements to spatially encounter is not ideal technically but does force you to be more responsive and exploratory with how you use that text. Robust systems can be cool, but can also really homogenize everything - now "text" is just the miscellaneous stuff within the all-purpose "textbox" at the bottom of the screen, cementing its role as filler content.

The funny thing about really systemic, open-world type games is that their very robustness tends to suffocate exprience before it happens. We know nothing will happen which will significantly impact this camera POV, this dialogue system.. anything can happen except for anything which would require a fundamental change to the underlying inventory system. But maybe the whole pleasure of the open world game is just being able to hold those experiences in suspense.

***

Mostly the characters voicing my own opinions in my videogames are explicitly malign and sinister - which is a corny device for me to vent without worrying as much about browbeating people with my opinions. But it's also a way of having those opinions without allowing them to overdetermine the rest of the game, or be fully in control over the more ambivalent and drifting work of "putting together different pieces on a screen to make interesting spaces". So in that sense my own ideas really are the enemies, and any plot role they serve in the game is a dramatisation of the effort to create a space where they lack controlling power.

***

RPG Maker is a collage machine, you get a set of pictures and start placing them around until they start to form some kind of charged and interesting space.

I think the collage aspect is a lot of what I enjoy about making these things, which is why games with more polished or consistent art styles frequently leave me cold. For me the greater the discrepancy between different objects on screen means a greater effect when they're combined. 

How does gameplay etc tie in? For me gameplay can divert the interest but never truly capture it. For decades games have had the problem of effectively being able to train you to do something, but having no idea what that thing should be or why it would matter. They effectively move your attention around without being able to settle it because their inner logic is basically always the same ahistorical, mechanistic void. But this can be a good thing - the permanently restless and unsettled nature of videogame attention can't illuminate itself, but can do so to other things in passing. 

Distraction becomes a way to examine surfaces, rather than being sucked into depths or settled to one fixed meaning. And the drift of unsettled consciousness is ultimately what animates game collages, the spaces that shift and react as attention plays across them, revealing or withholding. And so from this perspective, the answer to why I make videogames is: because I don't trust myself to look after an aquarium.

***

Design is managerial aesthetics - a mode of expertise framed as meta-expertise specifically because it scales up so well to systems of mass organisation and production. It's a universal discipline insofar as the task of removing any obstacles to the frictionless flow of attention and of capital is now also a universal chore. In this context a designer is like the MBA who can be dropped into any business to improve it, without ever having to know just what product they make – because the ultimate goal is always the same, the same tools can always be used. 

The cutesy books about the design of everyday life and so forth exist in the same vein as the ones that tell us there's nothing wrong with marketing because ultimately isn't all human discourse and activity some form of marketing? Isn't everything "design"? The strange top-heaviness with which these things outgrow their host categories parallels the unstoppable expansion of executive salaries within the businesses themselves. The task of managing other people's labour becomes ever more grandoise, ineffable, cosmic and well-paid as that labour in turn is framed as a kind of undifferentiated slop which exists for the sake of being shaped by creatives.

***

tragedy / comedy:

Generalizing hugely I feel like tragedy is about an event or experience so powerful it changes everything - for the characters involved, for the people in that world, for the audience watching - while conversely comedy is the idea that no event or experience can change anything. Oedipus dies and there's a big announcement and everyone has to sit through the awkward two-minute silence before getting back to work, while trying not to fart or itch too noticeably, and the next day somebody's selling Oedipus commemorative pens which run out of ink five minutes after opening, and the pen cap gets lost and the cat starts playing with it. 

In comedy the tragic can still happen, it’s just never strong enough to escape the constraints of the inert material universe which we find ourselves in – all that which remains so stubbornly intractable towards the higher instincts. I can talk about the dignity of man but there's still a risk that my pants will fall down or that someone will hit me with a ladder, causing my head to get stuck inside a bucket of paint, etc. Or my voice might be ridiculous or I might have a stutter (old comedy standbys!), or someone might hear part of my words out of context and assign them a different and unintended meaning. Comedy is consciousness imprisoned within a cumbersome matter which it can't completely do anything with, but also can't exist without. 

Taken as a worldview, this sort of risks congealing into the kneejerk reactionary things-can-never-change, whatever-moment-of-human-history-i-was-reared-in-is-eternal-and-inviolate radio DJ / South Park mindset. And of course somebody's view of what constitutes a tragic, life-changing event depends greatly on whether it's happening to them or someone else. But as exaggeration, in its neurotic overemphasis of the inescapable material, i think this approach still has interest and use. Many of my favourite writers have a kind of comic understanding of consciousness: consciousness becomes a churning material process with its own independent momentum which has to be examined and accounted for as part of any real reckoning with the world. In this light comedy becomes a way to think about opacity and limitation, both in physical matter and in our own selves.

I think many people have made the point that vgames are generally comic, intentionally or unintentionally. The rhetoric around them still tends towards the tragic: make the choice which changes everything! Deal with the consequences, accept your fate! But in practice those moments feel less visible than the clumsy material layer of GUIs, inputs, mechanics and representations that contain and constrain them. The opacity of the black box is one inhibition: was that meant to happen? Was it scripted or a glitch? Maybe I should reload my save and try again. Another is the inertia of the various game systems and loops themselves - [x] character may have died but you still need to collect those chocobo racing feathers if you want the Gold Sword. The numbers in a videogame "want" to keep going up, whatever happens: there's an affordance there which exists independently to any merely human wants and needs, and so tends to act as a gravity well for distracted consciousness as it wanders around. When people talk about tragedy in videogames it's usually with the implicit rider that it's within a game, or set of game conventions, which have become naturalised enough to become invisible. Which also tends to mean the naturalisation of a form, of inputs, of technology, of distribution mechanisms and assumptions, which however arty we can get are still inherently tied to the tech industry. Every art game is to some extent an invitation to spend more time internalising the vocab of your windows computer.

I've mentioned that the materialism of comedy can tend towards unthinking reaction. But the insistence on certain limits inherent to the human body – requirements like clean water and clean air, food and shelter, actual bathroom breaks and not piss jugs and also not having to live six feet beneath a rising sea level - can be helpful at a point when all these things are regarded as negotiable impediments to the pursuit of future profit. Maybe it’s a good thing that some materials can still be so insistent about refusing to be absorbed into the will.

***

I think what I most enjoy about art is the sense of a game with moveable stakes: where you never quite know the value of what you're playing for, which now appears absolutely trivial, and now appears to stand in judgement of the whole world, etc. I think this is also the Adorno idea of the aesthetic as really the extra-aesthetic, that which can step outside or threaten to step outside the limits of the merely aesthetic. It's why "just make a good game / pop song / comic / etc" never quite works, in rhetoric or in practice: the really good pop song is never that which just gives the enjoyable three minutes of listening we might consciously assign to be its remit, it's what overflows or undercuts that category, that which however briefly seems at risk of stepping outside it and into the realm of everyday life.

I grew up on pop culture so I don't have to feel positively towards it. Who am I meant to be defending it from? The handful of surviving WASPs reared on Brahms who get the ostentatiously-fussy-culture-review posts at print newspapers looking to pick up a slightly higher quality of margarine advertisement? The best thing pop culture ever gave me was its own critique: that of containing artists and moments which couldn't be squared with what the rest of it was saying, which seemed  to call the whole enterprise into question and in doing so broadened the sense of what was possible. Pop culture was never quite identified with itself, the value it has is in containing elements which make that self-identification impossible. So it always throws me off to see people celebrating "pop culture", like it's a self-produced totality, when that totality was only ever good for kicking.

Pop culture survives through a negativity it can never properly acknowledge.

[images: Tower of Druaga, Detana!! TwinBee, True Golf Classics: Wicked 18, Microsurgeon, Dark Edge]

[prynnehesters]

i feel like the levels of fandom go from like, 0-10

0 is a person who just consumes the media and does not interact w the fanbase

3 is a casual fan. might lurk around the fanbase but does not interact fully 

5 is a person who interacts w the fanbase and participates in it

between 5-10 are the most “dedicated” fans, like the prominent ones in the fanbase. they write a lot of fanfic, draw a lot of fanart, do amazing cosplay, etc. but then this is the bad territory as well, filled w gate keepers and the ship war ppl. also they are ppl who frequently interact w the fanbase

10 is the ‘diehard’ fan. they’re like those ppl w all the merch, ahead on all the news, fandom is their life basically

and then, we get into stans, who are on a different level than fandom in general. fandom can be about anything, standom is like, for celebrities and real ppl because i feel like you cannot “stan” a fictional character, that’s more of the problematic/unproblematic fave/cinnamon roll thing, although those terms can be applied to real ppl as well

idk i feel like “stan” goes above and beyond this list. like, the top are the “diehards” the bottoms are the “casual” or “non-attached” fan.

so stan is like, on a level from 11 to 15 

11 is the ppl who defend ppl on twitter no matter what and engage in pointless discourse 

12 are the ppl who send death threats and also those creepy sounding thirst tweets

13 are actual stalkers  

14 is the ppl who buy hair or sandwiches bit by the person (allegedly) of the celebrity off ebay or whatever 

15 is the guy who killed john lennon, or like jodie foster’s stalker who tried to kill ronald reagan   

i hate the term “stan” because its original meaning has been skewed because it is truly, “stalker fan” and i know it’s cute and hip and whatever now (i think it regained popularity in 2017) and replaces “love” or “idolize” now but i hate it and standom is worse than fandom because i can see fans of a movie/tv show/book/podcast/play loving the thing w/o interacting w the creators but then when you start to attack/defend/fight for the creator and expect something from them, it’s not funny or cute, it’s annoying and creepy and you need a life

like, there’s a lot of celebs i admire, but i mean, usually i don’t care abt them in a year’s time or like, i don’t interact w them or try to interact w them. im an awkward person and i don’t care

[ryki]

Katsucon 2017 Report!

So this was my first Katsucon -- my second convention overall -- and let me just tell you how much I loved it.

Friday I was Phichit from Yuri! On Ice. Saturday I was Lance from Voltron. Sunday I was Hinata from Haikyuu!!

I’ll break it down into things I remembered and loved, and things that I had problems with!

Positives!

The people we roomed with were -- for the most part -- a real pleasure to be around. They didn’t judge and were actually very kind about complimenting my first cosplay that I made -- granted, it was really only the jacket I made from scratch but they were so nice about it, giving me compliments and saying it looked good. ;; It made me feel really good that people thought my first cosplay was good and it gives me so confidence to keep going.

I would totally room with most of the people we roomed with for next year, and I hope that we made a good enough impression to be allowed back into the room next year, too! ; w ; Hopefully between now and then, I can work harder on making my cosplays better and getting better at make-up so I can show off more.

Most people were really sweet and kind to us and were more than ready to help us in the AA/DR and be patient with our requests. We had to wait a while for some AA booths but that’s expected considering that they had a lot of fanart for popular series! The artists as well as other con-goers were really patient and understanding when we had to leave booths or making way for us when we came to a new booth so it was really nice just having so many people be kind to us. 

I really liked the Voltron shoot, too! It was just-- it was so nice being around so many people with the same interests and feeling a part of something, like-- not to quote the show, but feeling like I was a part of something bigger. Everyone was so kind, for the most part, and it was just fun being able to meet and adopt people into our group. 

We adopted a Pidge or two and adopted them into our group (we were only missing Shiro, d’aw!) so it was really nice to meet them and they were such sweethearts and adorable that I’m glad we swapped handles so I could be friends with them. I can’t wait to be able to cosplay with them again, they really helped boost the fun!

The Voltron shoot was just so much fun in general and even if there were obvious disagreements (age, discourse) no one was disrespectful about it, at least not out-right. For a meet, the maturity of everyone was really good, so I’m really glad my first fan shoot went as well as it did. The rules were to keep it discourse free and I’m so glad that everyone stuck to that or I wouldn’t’ve enjoyed it like I did.Everyone was really mature and I’m so thankful that I didn’t feel self-confident at all.

(I’m still not over the time we did a cheerleading pyramid to actually ‘form Voltron’ where I shouted, “THIS ISN’T WHAT I MEANT WHEN I SAID I WAS A BOTTOM!” or something like that. Wait, I think it was, “THIS IS NOT HOW I WANTED TO BOTTOM!”-- Something as equally as dumb, LMAO. I made everyone laugh. [Heart eyes.] Boost my ego, pls.) 

We also had a really pretty Princess Peach (I believe that’s what they were!) ask my fiance and I to take a photo of us and I was so happy!! (We were Klance and Klance was their otp, heck yeah.) That was the first time someone who wasn’t always cosplaying Voltron asked for a photo of us and it made me feel so proud and happy. To the point we even asked them if they wanted us to pose, LOL. I hope they enjoyed the photo, they really helped boost my confidence as a cosplayer and I can’t thank them enough for it. 

We met a lot of adorable individuals, too. Logan, Jem, Britany, Robin, Rebecca, Jensen and a few others. They really helped me feel better about my cosplay and everything. It was just so much fun being able to actually spend time with our friends at a convention and actually feel like we were part of a group. 

(Anime Fest 2016 was great but it was mostly us following our friends’ friends around and not feeling part of the group, always being neglected -- though to no fault of our friends, we understand that people enjoy their cosplays and they have a friend group that’s closer to them but it was just... a lonely convention and we didn’t branch out much because we had no one to branch out with. Katsucon was different because we felt like we were a part of something. ;; I really adore everyone I’ve met through Kat.)

And it was so nice to meet old online friends (Nikita and Ash!!!) and being able to plan for next year’s convention to do group shots and everything, I just really loved feeling like I had friends (I mean, I do have friends but it’s different feeling like you can actually meet up with them, take pictures, hug and stuff than just online things. ;;) and loved that I could make plans with people and have hopes for next year.

There was a moment during dinner that Kieran noticed our rings and istg, it was exactly like that moment in YOI when realization dawned on them, LMAO. (Which is funny when you remember Kieran cosplayed Phichit, too!!!) 

We got a lot of merch this time too, and we even cried over our wallets for it. But it was so worth it. +w+ A lot of stores sold out on Friday and Saturday but we managed to get most of the stuff we wanted to get, which was really great. We didn’t get everything we wanted because of money and out of stock but we definitely picked up business cards to hopefully buy stuff later. All the artists and their friends were so precious.

There was one booth that was the mom of the artist and she was so sweet and cute, and really nice and accepting. She was a blast! I’d totally want to support her and her child again in the future since she was so sweet. ;-;

Negatives!

The bus ride, definitely, is my top negative!

This convention was really big so it was awfully crowded but people were really understanding if you bumped into them by accident or needed to rely on their tables (AA/DR). So when I was struggling walking in my Lance cosplay, they understood perfectly that I needed to a break or I was having issues. But it was really crowded and at some points, people got really pissy/rude.

Like the Reinhardt for example-- yeah, the really tall one that everyone’s fawning over. They were in the AA and if you were there, you knew that crowded places with small walk-ways (probably fits three people at most between booths) are not the best places for massive cosplays. But this person, lord give me strength, was so rude about bumping into people. They bumped into me while my back was turned into them and almost knocked me over if I hadn’t grabbed on to the artist’s table we were visiting. He turned around and, so rudely, said ‘ExCUSE me.’ as if I was the one who bumped into him. And I’m still pissed off about that. 

If you’re going to do giant cosplays, for the love of shared interests, don’t bring them into the AA or the DR unless you know you’ll have enough space to get around without bumping into people. And don’t be rude when you knock people over, jfc. What if the person you knocked over was an older person or someone with anxiety or fears or injuries? You don’t own the damn place, so don’t act high and mighty just because people fawn over your cosplay, jerk.

Another problem I had with this convention was bathrooms. Which, I get this all the time when I use the restroom. I’m not male passing but I’m still male, and just because I’m trans doesn’t make me any less than a man -- but some people don’t understand that. There were some people who were good about apologizing (I’m still sorry for being rude, D!) and acknowleding their mistakes, but to the jerks who literally tried to block me off from the bathrooms or who loudly stated, ‘Why is there a girl in the bathroom?’ -- Fuck you. 

You’re at a damn convention where people are cosplaying, crossplaying, crossdressing or trying to enjoy a safe environment without judgement based of their gender, you have no right to be discriminative or rude because you assume this or that about me.

There was also this one person who kept latching on to us and making me really uncomfortable; all they would do is talk about themselves and their interests while following us around and -- I understand it’s nice having shared interests but if the only conversation you have to offer is about yourself, what you spent, what you have, what you did, then I’m sorry but I’d rather not wander around with you. Especially if you keep touching us without permission, I don’t care if wasn’t inappropiately but please keep your hands to yourself. (It took us a good 20 minutes to find a perfect oppurtunity to ditch them.) 

Overall!

That’s all I can think of for now but!!! I had a total blast, despite everything and it was so much fun just being able to hang around with my friends and everyone. ; w ; We’re definitely going to be more active in the con area because of how rewarding it felt and how much fun it was. We might try to go to local conventions, too, but it all depends on our finances! (It was so fuuuun, I cry. ;; w ;;)

Thank you everyone who made this convention a good one for me, despite everything, and for your kind words and help. Y’all are the best, y’all are what make conventions fun, and I hope that good things come your way for allowing me to feel great, even if for a few days.