#i want to be free from this capitalist hellscape lmao

[asiananeurysm]

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[pikapeppa]

15 questions for 15 friends

Tagged by @elveny and @johaerys-writes -- thank you, my loves!

ARE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? My mom. Apparently my dad really wanted to name me after my mom and she was like "ugh really fine" LOL. My dad is also named after his dad, who was named after his dad... REAL ORIGINAL. This is going to sound like a total humblebrag, but my mom and I are both published academic authors, so we have to use our middle initials to distinguish who published what 🙃

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU CRIED? Probably in therapy last Thursday LOL. Though I got a little prickly-eyed earlier this week watching the episode of ATLA where Zuko and Aang go on their lifechanging field trip to the Sun Warriors' secret village 😂❤

DO YOU HAVE KIDS? Nope! Childless by choice.

WHAT SPORTS DO YOU PLAY/HAVE YOU PLAYED? I played T-ball when I was 5 or 6 (hated it, cried so much that my parents pulled me out LMAO) and I was on the volleyball team in Grade 6. I'm left-handed and I had a habit of serving into the wall, unfortunately, and the habit got worse when I was nervous. During one game, they took pity on me so much that they paused the game until I got the ball over the net. I was fucking humiliated and have never played a team sport since then. 🤣💀 Re: other physical activities, I like dancing! I've taken a ton of different kinds of dance classes including swing, salsa, bellydancing, and Bollywood dancing, and loved all of them!

DO YOU USE SARCASM? No. Me? Never. 🙃🤣 Forreal though yes. All the time.

WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE? Uh...! I don't know if there's any one specific thing? I usually take in an "overall impression" of appearance. Vague, but that's all I've got. If the question was "what's the first thing you notice in people you're attracted to", that might be a different story 🤣

WHAT'S YOUR EYE COLOUR? Brown.

SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS? I am going to copy Johaerys's answer and say it doesn't matter to me, as long as the story was good. But also, who says scary movies/horror media can't have happy endings?? 🤣Haunting of Hill House, anyone? (Bittersweet, maybe, but it counts as happy to me!)

ANY TALENTS? Would it be wretched if I said I feel like writing might be a talent? Whatever, I'm saying it. 🤣😅

WHERE WERE YOU BORN? In a hospital in the same city where I currently live! Which I will chose not to reveal openly! 🤣

WHAT ARE YOUR HOBBIES? Writing! It takes up a solid 75-90% of my free time. Also gaming (which I might count into the writing time since it often becomes Research™ for the writing 🤣). I also enjoy baking and cooking, though I don't know that I'd count those as hobbies since they're necessary ADLs?

DO YOU HAVE ANY PETS? A cat named Meeko. She is my daemon. We can never be apart when I am home. Case in point, a photo taken in real-time while completing this quiz:

HOW TALL ARE YOU? 5'3".

FAVOURITE SUBJECT IN SCHOOL? Uhhh... what level of school are we talking here? In undergrad, I took an incredible linguistics/history course about writing systems, and that was probably my favourite class ever. I took a course during undergrad about different schools of psychotherapy that was pretty damned influential too.

DREAM JOB? I also loved Johaerys's answer here: "I don't think there's any sort of job anyone could do in this capitalist hellscape we're all currently living in that would be enjoyable enough to make up for, well... living in a capitalist hellscape." I'm lucky enough to work in the public healthcare system so I'm pretty safe from the worst of capitalism, I guess, though my job (speech-language pathologist) is one I chose more for practicality (certainty of employment) than because I was really passionate about it. If I could do something else and not have to worry about money, I would either want to be a fiction editor, or a sex therapist.

Tagging forward to @ranaspkillnarieth @iamcayc @heroofshield @fantasy-girl974 @hellas-himself @midnightacrobat @alyssalenko @vorchagirl @elinorbard @stuffforthestash @mwasaw @lordofthenerds97 @y0ureviltwin @ladyofthelake91 @perhapsrampancy @cha-mij and genuinely, anyone else who wants to share!!! Tag me so I can spy on your life! 🤣❤

[no-psi-nan]

LMFAOOOOOOO GOTTEMMMMMM!!!!!!!

Bestie first you need to evaluate why you're considering these things to be "disgusting" and "poison" and "nonsense". Like. Why are you shaming yourself for having fun blorbo thoughts? In this capitalist hellscape where we are supposed to spend every microsecond hustling in the worship of money, is it not an act of both self care and rebellion to think about fictional people having a nice time and live vicariously through them?

And it's not illegal to have sexual fantasies, it's a natural and normal thing for pretty much everyone! Let the soft animal of your body love what it loves, etc. If you had fun thinking of this weird fucking fetishy shit, then yippee! If you didn't, then it's another good topic for introspection. What about it appealed to you, what didn't appeal to you, what would you change to better suit your tastes? It is always a good time to learn more about yourself imo! Me n my homies are always having fun meta discussions about fetishy shit tbh, it's such a fascinating window into the human psyche.

Honestly I would recommend writing down that dream, as a way of processing it. Not to share with me, but just to have that as a record, and hopefully work through these negative feelings you're having about it.

Second you need to evaluate why you are following an anime brainrot blog if you don't want anime on your brain. XD it's February, you can probably find fanblogs about tax season if you want to be free from sin or whatever lmao. Glad my content is so banger that you're here against your better judgement tho! And I hope you let go of that shame and have a little more fun here in tunglr dot hell 💜

[champagne--father]

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[hellbentrapture]

I feel really bad that all I’ve been posting is my misery - but I am literally fighting to survive.

[CW/TW: depression, despair, anxiety, trauma, capitalist hellscape, poverty.]

I’m selling my Nintendo Switch. I’m selling my drawing tablet (not even a fancy one, just a USB one). Those are the most expensive recent things I own (apart from my computer setup). I will prob need to list my Xbox 360 and accessories this month or next month...which will make my more depressed than I already am because it’s the first console I ever bought myself at 16 - and I’ve been working since I was 15, buying my own groceries and paying some of my own bills.

I keep trying to sell my grad dress but no one is even looking at it. I have some nice goth boots I bought a bunch of years ago, I listed that too. I’m going to list all of my other boots and shoes I wear for going out or occasions. I may make July rent, but it won’t be enough for August rent. I don’t know what I am going to do.

I mean. I guess I can just start selling anything and everything in my home? The hard part is I am running out of anything of value, because almost all my furniture and things is stuff I acquired for dirt cheap or for free. So like. Not sure how much more I can actually sell and make it worth it.

It feels wretched because I guess I could sell my computer setup, but like. If I do that. I literally cannot go to school. It will remove remote work options. And I will be far more miserable than I can comprehend, probably a deadly amount.

Maybe I can try and find some remote work, but I have been struggling with my physical and mental health, I have no idea how I’m going to be able to work let alone find work. And if I do, I will likely need to withdraw from school for at least this term...which makes me really sad because I love this class. I’m struggling to get the work done for the class but I am barely managing, I want to believe I can get it done.

If I can just make it to September for student loans, I will be able to survive a bit better. In the meantime, I have to put everything together and get tests and wait to try and appeal for AISH.

I have nowhere I can go if I cannot pay my bills or rent. All of my family and friends are disabled and poor, if only doing better than I. And like, those who are able (physically, mentally, financially), I am not close enough to and couldn’t possibly ask to help me to such an extent or take me in. 

It’s so fucking st*pid. What will next Summer be like? Will I have AISH by then? Will I need to move next March? I can’t get income support while I am in school, they literally won’t let you. If I do leave school and go on income support, it is less than my rent, so lmao, what am I even going to do there. So I have to stay in school, I guess, and just do the best I can.

Selling things now is a very temporary measure - what will it change in the future? Do I just sacrifice all the little things I have that bring me any amount of happiness and joy just to make ends meet in the short term? And what about my cat? I can’t give her up...

What’s “funny” is, come September, my fall term won’t actually be that much of a financial improvement because any excess in loans will be entirely used to catch up on the bills I could not pay during the summer - which is what happened this time: I had to use excess from the winter term to pay for dental stuff, and then used excess from the summer to catch up on bills from the winter term. It’s a cycle and I am so. fucking. tired.

[gr0veyard]

Ooc.; also other stuff im giving my 2 Cents to, so skip if you dont care

[[MORE]]

Puberty blockers:

PBs are not irreversible lmao. They don't mutilate a minors body. They merely keep puberty on hold long enough for the minor in question to have time to make sure they want to transition. PUBERTY is what is irreversible. Imagine going thru puberty and growing into a body that at worst will make you wanna KYS and at best hate looking at yourself in the mirror. Do you know how expensive transition can be after puberty? PLEASE do more research before making asinine statements like PBs being comparable to mutilation. PBs only hold puberty as long as theyre being taken, meaning that if you stop taking em puberty will set in just as it usually would.

"Even hormone blockers and transitional hormones are largely untested when it comes to long term effects" is a baseless claim which a little googling can be disproven.

"One of my friends in high school medically transitioned, and it did nothing to help their dysphoria. It just made them even more depressed, and they later killed themselves." I'm sorry for your loss, genuinly. That really sucks. But as much it makes me look like an asshole for saying this, this is an appeal to emotion (aka not factually backing your other claims) and also circumstancial. If your friend's suicide was tied to their transition, their case is just that: theirs. One of the biggest contributors to trans suicude rates is the unattainability of affordable transition and dysphoria caused by the changes made by puberty, only topped by abuse from people towards trans people. By advocating for PBs to be prohibited or limited, you don't help. You make the problem worse.

Communism:

"I’m against Communist and Fascism as they’re both extremely Authoritarian systems that give the government complete control over how you live your life." Since I'm a socialist and not a communist I cant speak for communism, but most allegedly communist states today still basically operate on a capitalist core, where they have communist parties etc., but still have a free market for instance. China for example, but Russia too.

Capitalism amasses copious amounts of wealth on the backs of the lower class in a short amount of time but is ultimately unsustainable. Vaush on youtube has a number of videos on this I recommend you to check out.

Healthcare:

"You can’t have a right to the services and labor of another person, their own freedom is taken away by that." No one is saying that should happen. Ideally, the state pays for this healthcare and before you say anything about that: I'm from a country without america's privatized healthcare. It's never been an issue here, people aren't fucking terrified shitless to go to the doctor bc they could go into crippling debt. Sure, you gotta wait a lil longer than someone w a private insurance company (which still exists but isnt necessary to live) in the waitingroom but that's annoying at worst.

I went to america end of 2019 to visit my gf and I fell really ill there. I had to go to the doctor there and I nearly felt my soul leave my body when I had to pay 100 FUCKING DOLLARS HOLY SHIT. thats nearly a fourth of my monthly income bro, how can you claim this to be okay? Ofc medstaff still need to be paid but oh my gods this is not okay. If I had to live with this system for the rest of my life it's fair to say I'd never go to the fucking doctor. And that'd be worse for the docs AND FOR ME.

"If you die or develop incurable illness awaiting treatment for months, there’s nothing anyone can do. If you’re treated right away and unfortunately end up with loads of medial debt, it’s unfortunate, but you’re still alive. You can still try to fundraise money, get donations, or if you’re skilled, work it off. It’s really shitty, but necessary." N- no????? It reaLLY ISNT THOUGH??? As I've stated before, this is not an issue w public healthcare. It's smth that's an issue in general and it DOES happen in america right now. Where I live this doesnt happen to my knowledge. Why should it? The gov is gonna pay anyway so might as well get it done and get the next patient. You shouldnt have to go into debt to live. That's not humane.

"I don’t think the poor should die, I don’t want the suffering to be left to their fate." Contradictory to the part where you think going into debt is necessary. Being in debt IS suffering. *I* am in debt, and I suffer because of it everyday. And it's not because of healthcare.

When going into debt to heal is your only option as an alternative to possibly dying or suffering on, then making that choice is like having to choose between the black plague and cholera.

"Buy a gun, grow a garden, learn to build shelter, and make plans to invade a neighboring territory and become it’s technocratic warlord after your country collapses into an unlivable hellscape." Making a joke like this at the end of a post about serious topics like this is kind of trivializing the entire issue and a little disrespectful. Don't do that please. It's like you're comparing to Fallout 4 and I shouldn't need to point out why that's bad.

At the end of the day, Im not trying to change your mind bc thats futile and not my job. But I do absolutely intend to fact check claims I know for a fact are BS, or educate myself to make my own judgement, and so should you. If you want to know how truthful smth is, listen to multiple scources (centrist AND leftist) and crosscompare wether what you hear abt certain leftist ideas is in fact true or not.

Or dont and continue living in an echochamber. Your call.

Have a nice day.

[eldritchsurveys]

808.

this is a survey I made in fucking 2013 lmao. god

i. it seems that the average survey-taker is a white american female, aged 15-19, who has a car, a cell phone, and an extensive social circle. is this true for you? >> This is hilarious because I was complaining about this recently. Some things never change, I guess... Anyway, obviously it is not true for me except for the American part (not that it does me any favours). I do have a phone, though. (I didn’t back when I made this survey; couldn’t afford one.)

ii. xanga, unlike a lot of sites, rarely changes its layout. do you like this, or do you think there should be more updates? what do you think they should add (or remove)? >> Well, this question didn’t age well.

iii. have you seen any silent films? >> I haven’t. I’m not sure I’d be able to enjoy a silent film, to be honest. I’ve seen bits of silent films in modern cinema (there was a bit of one in the Watchmen show’s pilot, for example, which is what I’m thinking of right now) and the whole concept just looks obnoxious to follow along with.

iv. would you rather be an actor, director, or soundtrack producer? >> I wouldn’t want to be in show business at all, but I guess if I really had to choose a place to be, I think being involved with the music would be cool.

v. what is your favourite hue of your favourite colour? >> Gold is my favourite colour, which is already a hue, as far as I can gather.

vi. have you seen nbc's 'hannibal'? thoughts? (if you haven't, do you want to?) >> Heh. I’m still pretty obsessed with Hannibal, but it was a lot more fun when it was current and this website was inundated with good content. And memes, can’t forget the hannilols.

vii. on websites where you're permitted to change your username, do you do so often, or do you keep the same one for long periods of time? >> I used to have chronic shapeshifter syndrome on the internet, but I’ve mostly settled down into a few “canon” usernames/handles. It just becomes a lot of work after a while, and I guess it just... stopped feeling so important, to switch things up all the time. Don’t get me wrong, I still have a pretty malleable and mercurial identity, that’s just my nature -- but expressing every facet of that mercuriality on the internet has become less important. (Let’s see if that changes again in the next few years ;) as it goes)

viii. does your computer have a name? what is it? if not, what is your desktop wallpaper? >> Heh, this is definitely a “me” question. The computer I’m on right now is named Dorian Gray, and my gaming rig is named Azathoth.

ix. do you consider yourself an activist, or a supporter of any social-justice causes? why or why not? >> Nope. I don’t know. Maybe I’m just not compassionate enough. Maybe I’ve got some dead brain matter. I don’t know why I don’t have the same passion for activism that a lot of my peers seem to have. I mean, it’s certainly not because I’m particularly privileged (I’m really not) and it’s not because I don’t think my peers have the right of things. I just... don’t have enough emotional investment, I guess. I don’t know, man. But I also don’t have that kind of energy. Protests (most of which end up turning into bad-cop shitshows, apparently) and shit like that aren’t really the best place for my post-traumatic ass, you dig? Anyway, I think about this a lot (especially lately) but I have no clear-cut answers as to why I am not activism-oriented, when I clearly should be.

x. if you are non-religious, do you feel pressured to be religious or do you find that people often try to 'convert' you? if you are religious, how does it make you feel when others speak contemptuously of religious people? >> I don’t feel pressured to be religious, no. Who would even pressure me? Most of the people I know are full-on atheists, or pagans who just do their own weird thing and mind their business. Mostly.

xi. if you are religious, what is your religion and how do you observe it? if you are non-religious, do you find religion an interesting thing to study, anyway? >> I am intensely interested in religion. I find it one of the most interesting things to study, from so many different angles. I just don’t have one of my own.

xii. would you want a personal robot (think 'bicentennial man' or 'a.i.')? what would you name it? what purpose would it serve? >> Heh. Well, I don’t know. I mean, I feel like it would be cool to have an android companion, but it wouldn’t be happening in a vacuum. If, say, America figured out AI and started making AI companions for people, you can pretty much imagine how that would go. Capitalist hellscape plus a terrible culture of human superiority (well, white man superiority, to be specific, but) and a productivity-based mentality? Can we just not create and subject a new kind of lifeform to that, please.

xiii. are you eager to see how far science + technology will advance, or do you prefer an older way of doing things? do you think we are better off with these advancements, or not? >> I used to be really into technological advancement and The Singularity and all of that, which is why this question exists. And I still personally think all that shit is cool as hell. But like I said, none of it happens in a vacuum, and as long as we continue not to improve as organic, social, sapient lifeforms... it really doesn’t matter if cars can drive themselves or whatever. It’s all just part of the hellscape. I love my computers, I love the internet, I love the weird new gadgets I see on Gizmodo and I love space programs. God knows I do. I just... can’t unsee the other stuff.

xiv. what is your favourite comic book or graphic novel? does your favourite novel come in comic-book form? (if not, would you like it to?) >> My favourite comic book (well, comic book series) is probably... Promethea. Or Sandman. Preacher is definitely up there too. I don’t have a favourite novel, but I think Lovecraftian comics are great (Alan Moore did a few that I loved), and the Dark Tower comics were works of art. I wish someone would make Ayn Rand books into comics, I think that’d be funky.

xv. have you ever thought of a question that you'd like to see on a survey, but you couldn't think of enough other questions to put it in a survey yourself? do you remember what the question was? (if you can, feel free to answer it here.) >> I have a post in my drafts that’s just for throwing in questions that I think up, in the hopes that one day I’ll have thrown enough random questions in there to make a whole survey out of. We’ll see, lmao.

[iampikachuhearmeroar]

jobs rant:

so i follow my area’s local job board on facebook, right. there’s this girl around my age (23) I think, who constantly posts about urgently needing “any type of job” in retail or a job in beauty therapy/hairdressing etc bc she’s got the qualifications in those fields. but it’s not her posts that annoy me (bc feels girl) but the people that comment on them, because a load of baby boomers hop on the post and say the following things:

(1.) boomer 1:“look here, you stupid girl, stop whinging! go hand out your resume in shops and meet them!” 

problem 1). hmm yeah go fuck yourself Martha. loads of people my age attest to doing what Martha suggested and get told to “just go apply online, we don’t take hard copy resumes!” or they spend whole days handing out resumes with only one shop taking them  bc they had a sign in the window. but does Martha listen to that? nope.

(2.) boomer 2: “how about you go in and ask for some work experience for 3 days a week, and offer to do it for free or like $5 an hour?” 

problem 2.) your suggestion is literally fucking illegal in Australia, Tessa, unless it’s part of a tafe or uni course (and you either don’t get paid or you get decently paid (hopefully) paid work experience). 

(3.) boomer 3 sometimes also in response to boomer/problem 2:  “oh but the above shows your initiative! because you’re not seeing a problem, but a solution! there’s only solutions! just stop bitching and start at the bottom just like all the others before you. you entitled brat.”

problem 3.) ??? no, Marcus, you fuck, I actually need fair pay and a real fucking job. getting either severely underpaid or not paid at all is NOT A SOLUTION, YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE. EVEN IF IT IS JUST FOR EXPERIENCE. IT’S NOT SHOWING INITIATIVE IF I’M BEING USED AS FREE FUCKING LABOUR!!!!! HOW THE HELL ARE PEOPLE WHO LIVE OUT OF HOME SUPPOSED TO PAY THEIR BILLS OR RENT WITH VERY LITTLE PAY OR NO PAY AT ALL????!!!!! GO EAT SHIT FROM YOUR OWN BOTTOM MATE, IF WE’RE STARTING FROM THERE.”

(4.) boomer 4: how about you just pawn your stuff off then, you spoilt brat?” / just apply for maccas/or another fast food place!”

problem 4.) you see, Leanne, i’m in the midst of applying for several fucking grad positions (which f.y.i are proper jobs outside of uni) and several other fucking jobs, including unpaid internships. i’ve applied to some fast food places before, and they’ve told me directly that they DO NOT WANT ME AT ALL bc it’s far easier and cheaper for them to employ a 15/16 year old, than employing a 23yo who actually knows what they should be paid, and not a kid who doesn’t know anything about fair work and wages. also as someone with a degree and a diploma etc, they straight up tell me i’m too overqualified and that i’ll expect too much pay so they don’t want me bc of that. also what fuck is this pawning my stuff off bullshit??? what the actual FUCK does that have to do with this??? 

(5.) boomer 5: “the job market isn’t insecure you imbecile, only you are because you obviously can’t get a job like that! learn to be more confident and maybe you’ll get one. stop being soooooo needy, and one will find you! look for more opps!” 

problem 5.) the job market isn’t insecure, Brenton? sure you can fucking say that when you’re a boomer who refuses to leave their fucking job. that’s fucking rich. but be more confident and a job will find you??? really?? thanks for the absolute bullshit mate. i’m done here. actually i’m not done! what the fuck is this “stop being sooooo needy” bs??? i’m sorry that i need some meagre ass fucking money to literally fucking survive in this horrendous capitalist hellscape you helped create, Brenton. look for more opportunities??? mate i’ve applied to like 300 bs “opportunities” nearly all of which exploit young workers to the fullest extent. hell, a good bulk of them i dont even have the quals or requirements for! ALSO, MOST OF THEM ARE INTERNSHIPS AND THEY’RE MOSTLY UNPAID OR ONLY PAID FOR ONE DAY A WEEK!! (so only $300). just.... now im done. go fuck yourself.

boomer 6: “go get a useful qualification (to attack uni/college etc quals) or *insert some other work related thing like an responsible service of alcohol (RSA) & RCG (responsible conduct of gambling or w/e it is) card here or a barista course here* or if you can’t afford it, save for it maybe??? if you’ve been to uni maybe you’d have the sense to know that much????”

problem 6.) honestly every millennial is sick of hearing this Mildred. no qualification is guaranteed to get you a job anymore, you hack. but also.... but have you ever considered how expensive an RSA or an RCG is or a combined one is??? (for reference a combined rsa&rcg in my state, new south wales, is $240)  or even a barista course???? (again for reference a barista course is anywhere between $120-$200)... like im sure for people who are living out of home, that their rent and bills are far, far more important to pay than some bullshit courses that cost like half of their fucking rent money. 

boomer 7: GO VOLUNTEER! YOU LEARN AMAZING NEW SKILLS (blah blah blah)!!!”

problem 7.) ok Mick, yes i know volunteering is a good thing.... i practically had its “importance” forcefully shoved down my throat at uni.... but consider this: only those who have some spare money around can typically afford this option, because it’s largely not paid. and if it is paid, you don’t get paid much.... but of course that all depends on the provider. you can go on about all the new skills you get from volunteering all day fucking long. but like. for most “millennials”, as you condescendingly call us, it is not fucking feasible if they have literally ZERO funds, like myself. i couldn’t afford to do the volunteer blogger position i tried to do at uni. so i ultimately gave it up.

honestly, the only boomers or maybe gen xers (who knows really) that i like who comment on these posts, are the ones who commiserate with us jobless 20-somethings about their teenage or sometimes fellow 20-something son/s or daughter/s trying to get a job.... but always getting rejected bc of their complete lack of experience (i.e. they have none) or whatever else.  

anyway that’s my dramatic rant of the month of january over lmao.

[comradecowplant]

WELL it was an easy read and I finished the book already. I gotta do a classic Dani Vents About a Story post that will include significant spoilers, so be careful if you are reading/want to read The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargraves. I’m about to bitch about it a lot, but overall it was an interesting book that I’d still (mostly) recommend if you have an interest in historical fiction surrounding the Norwegian witch trials.

Most of it was really good, although a few theme threads and character arcs completely fell apart in the final act. I knew it was going to be dark-- again, 17th century witch trial shit-- but the actual “murder my favorite characters” bit thankfully didn’t begin until pretty late in the story, which lets the focus remain more on the lives of the women vs their horrific deaths. The author does a (mostly) great job at creating interesting characters you fall in love with, and succeeded immensely at bringing the landscape and village of Vardo to life.

BUT 

IN THE LAST LITERAL FOUR PAGES, THE NARRATIVE TOOK ALL THE MEANING THAT THE PROTAGANISTS HAD CREATED OUT OF THEIR HARDSHIPS AND THREW IT OVER A CLIFF (LITERALLY! & EACH USE OF THIS WORD HERE HAS BEEN THE PROPER USE. although i guess a fictional event cannot be truly ‘literal’ BUT WHATEVER I AM NOT GETTING LOST IN THE WEEDS WITH PEDANTICS). I am so fucking mad, and it serves as a reminder to why I typically don’t read/watch many period pieces these days, unless it is a period setting in a fantasy/sci fi world. So many people think that in order to bE rEaLiStIc when writing about periods in history, you simply MUST be as grimdark as possible, especially with conclusions, but I find that perspective boring and uncreative as hell. Bitch it’s already fiction! it’s already lies! you are god in the universe you write, have some courage and don’t concede to established tropes that center on garish suffering to define the experiences of historically (& contemporaneously) marginalized people! At least in a medieval-set fantasy story, you get the vibes of the historical setting, but also your friends can swoop by on a dragon and rescue the innocent pants-wearing fisherwoman who is about to be burned alive by the racist woman-hating church.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love a story with a messy & unhappy ending. I even love an occasional grimdark story! But as I get older, I see & feel more the evils which inspired these historical events and how they still burden our world today, and I do not enjoy spending my free time reading/watching movies that are centered on suffering for suffering’s sake-- if I want a story about senseless violence & the underdogs who never win, I will just turn on the fucking news. SO, for me, the dark stories I do enjoy cannot just be traumaporn in a difference shell, the darkness has. to. make. sense. You can’t spend 300 pages on a woman overcoming her grief of losing her brother/father/fiancé/half her village & learning how to be a #StrongIndependantWoman, then have her just kill herself on the last page. It just isn’t narratively good, it just isn’t! And to be clear, the author could have gone WAYYYYYYYY darker in many places throughout the book & did not even come close to going full grimdark. I think overall she greatly succeeded at balancing hope & hopelessness. It was done so well in fact that I was lulled into a false sense of security that maybe just maybe there might be a way out for our ladies, a conclusion that didn’t end with the kind of complete misery that historic fiction tends to skew towards. But there is this overwhelming sense in the final few pages that, probably due to the aforementioned loyalty to perceived “historical accuracy”, she hadn’t included enough suffering (even though there is PLENTY of tragedy to go around by that point) & she didn’t know how to finish the story. So when in doubt, kill 👏 those 👏 gays 👏 (although we don’t know the fate of the other woman, who has entire chapters given from her perspective, but Meren just says bye & we never hear about Ursa again 😤)

Which brings us to, yeah, it did have gay shit like I thought, and up until the garbage of the last four pages, it was a very touching romance. But it too concluded in a way that is only satisfying if you squint, and adds to the inconsistencies that I mentioned above. I’ve never in my life said this before, and it makes me ill to even type this, but, *sob* it probably would have been a better story if the two women had remained platonic friends and no touch-a the booba. I know a lot of people think I’m One of Those cringe queers who will read/watch absolute garbage just if there is a queer person (which tbf I definitely also do sometimes, & it’s actually very valid of me, thank u very much), but if that were true I would have finished that awful Warming Trend book that I blogged about like 2 years go, or read any of the hundreds of stupid “subtext” trash that folks like to recommend, or ship Supercorp (no offense to anyone who ships them, I get it, Katie McGrath is hot, but come on, there is a perfectly good lesbian already on the show), or watched Glee. No, I do actually have some standards--  Are they super high, as a love-starved reader/viewer who uses romantic fiction as a primary means of escapism/coping with my shitty life? No, lmao. But as a writer, and as a queermo, nothing grinds my gears more than a badly executed lgbtq+ storyline.

Anyway, I just finished the book an hour ago so my crankiness & disappointment is raw and thus I am all over the place with this rant. I hope I’m not coming off as being too hard on the author, because despite it’s flaws, I am very glad to have serendipitously found The Mercies, and I look forward to checking out KMH’s other works. It’s been a long time since I’ve dug into a book and read it in just a few sittings like I did this, repeating “just one more chapter” for hours until it’s suddenly 3 am, and despite the fuckery to my sleep schedule it contributes to, the feeling is good-- it brings me back to simpler times when I actually was able to experience an ease from the constant uneasiness I always carry in my chest. Idk, moral of the story is that reading is fun, & when I get stuck in my Bad Turns & don’t read for months, it becomes easy to forget how much solace can come from a mid-quality but seductive (not in a horny way. but sometimes also in a horny way, lol) novel. Like, most of my reading these days is miserable 20th century theory or other academic/non-fiction writing related to our depressing capitalist hellscape & impending climate disaster, and The Mercies helped me remember that my roots lie in fiction. It also has me inspired to revisit a couple of historical fictions projects I have laying around, aND MAKE A WOMAN-EMPOWERMENT, ANTI-RACIST, QUEER AS HELL PERIOD FICTION PEICE THAT DOES NOT END IN COMPLETE GARBAGE! And in the meantime, I shall be revisiting the works of Sarah Waters, the only bad bitch I know of who writes queer historical fiction without relinquishing her characters solely to the suffering they experience ✌ 

If anyone has read this far and has any books/authors to recommend (wlw focused preferably, historical fiction or any genre as long as the story itself doesn’t rely on the tropes I touched on, recently published also preferably bc I have a long list of older books/authors but i don’t keep up with new releases like I should, & a lot of the ones I know are white & cis so PLEASE send reccs for more diverse stories/authors if you have them)