#i'm basically venting

[lazylittledragon]

so uhhhhhhhh. not to be cryptic and bitchy on main but congratulations to everyone in my messages for like 5 months on being right i guess

[basket-of-radiants]

Why were you so disappointed by Rhythm of War?

This has been sitting in my askbox for years. I've taken several cracks at answering, only to get frustrated with the subject matter and burn myself out every time. I didn't like Rhythm of War. More than that, I didn't like it in a way that tainted my enjoyment of the entire series. And despite what it may seem, I don't actually enjoy discussing things which I don't like. I always want to talk from a place of good faith. Which is why now that my feelings towards the series are a little more positive, I think I can finally answer this.

I'm going to try to stay away from specific plotpoints and story beats for this post, because my goal isn't to nitpick (if for no other reason than it would take a week to write this post), I'm just looking to talk about my overall impressions. I think that might mean the only spoilers here will be structural? idk, if you haven't read Rhythm of War yourself then you should probably do that before looking for other people's opinions anyway. 

I liked Way of Kings when I first read it. I didn't love it at the time, but I liked it. Certainly enough to keep reading once I'd finished. One thing that made me a bit uncomfy, however, was the war against the Parshendi. They were this unknowable enemy which the book was not interested in knowing. An inhuman army. Their main purpose was to kill Kaladin's friends, or else be killed by Dalinar's armies. And yet the Parshendi, and the parshmen in the form of Shen, did show hints of personhood. And so it bothered me how Dalinar spoke so casually about how the Alethi had decimated their numbers, how the others used the war as a means to amass wealth and power. (It didn't bother me in a "this is a bad book" way but in a "these characters are bad people" way.)

One of my foibles as a reader is that when a book is very clearly treating one side of a conflict with more humanity, I tend to be a bit predisposed towards the other to account for that. And with the Alethi clearly being the invading party and superior military force, there was also some underdog favoritism. I didn't really like how the book treated the Parshendi. This is to say that going forward, the singers would be more important to me than any other through line.

So imagine my delight at reading Words of Radiance and meeting Eshonai, one of the Parshendi, who even gets her own point of view sections! They were no longer being treated as a faceless mass, we were getting to see things from their perspective as well. And it became plain to see the damage the Alethi had done to them. I couldn't really bring myself to root for Dalinar or really any of the humans against the listeners. I couldn't even bring myself to like most of these characters. I still enjoyed the book but once it became clear there wouldn't be a peaceful conclusion, let's just say that I wouldn't have wept for Dalinar and Adolin if Szeth had managed to off them. Like everyone in the book, I assumed that going forward all the parshmen would be turned into evil voidbringers in the everstorm and that the listeners were mostly dead. Except for Rlain, and Eshonai because I'd read or been told that book 4 would be Eshonai's book and thus had assumed she was fine. (Oathbringer spoilers, she was not fine.) So ultimately it was still a bit of a downer way to end the book. 

So imagine my delight at reading Oathbringer, where for the first time singers were being treated as people, full and real people, and where the human characters could no longer ignore or dismiss them. We met Khen and the others, common singers who were sympathetic and just wanted freedom from bondage. We see Venli grapple with the loss of her home. We see Leshwi and Moash connecting with and understanding one another. We learn of a history where singers were the original inhabitants of the planet. Parallel to this, Dalinar is having a truly excellent character arc about confronting one's past actions and acknowledging them to move forward and do better. I loved Oathbringer, for some years it was my favorite book, and I was excited as hell to see what came next. At the time, it seemed to me that there is a clear direction the story is going. Two books about needless war, and then a third where the main cast is forced to acknowledge the personhood of their enemies. This was so cool, all of my feelings from the previous installments were being validated, the characters were going to have to face what they've done in the past and outgrow their militaristic mindsets, I was so sure of that.

Imagine my disappointment when that does not even remotely resemble the direction the story went in Rhythm of War. RoW presented a clear, straightforward “us vs. them" narrative, where every character was totally fine with killing singers. Characters aligned with the singers were either flattened into wholly evil versions of themselves (Moash) or were expected to turn on their side in favor of the humans (Venli.) Because clearly there was no reason good people would be on the side that's all former slaves trying to stay free. Maybe there's some sort of accord or understanding between Navani and Raboniel that I might have found meaningful if the seeds of mutual understanding weren't already there in Oathbringer and then apparently ignored for a year by all the characters.

I have a lot of issues with how the listeners are handled in these books. (Here's some elaboration.) Following OB, I had thought that all my concerns were going to be addressed. Following RoW, I knew they never would be. 

Which is my main complaint, because that's the thread that matters most to me in this series.

I have a lot of other Things as well. Gonna just talk about a few big ones. 

One outsized source of disappointment that may seem a little petty, and which probably is, is that I felt mislead by the premise of the book. It had been announced that this book would center Venli and Eshonai, and I was unbelievably hyped for that. That did not really turn out to be the case. The purpose for their backstory chapters felt less about exploring them as people and contextualizing their arcs, and more about filling in gaps of world history. In the main plot, Venli was a POV character and she certainly played a role, but honestly not a very important one overall. To me she felt like a side character in her own book. I don't think it's controversial to say that the main character of RoW was Navani. A lot of people really like Navani and are happy about that. Unfortunately I'm not one of those people, and I found it all the more difficult to enjoy her when it felt like it was coming at the expense of some of my favorite characters. 

This particular gripe somewhat comes down to preference, obviously everyone prefers to read about characters they like more than those they don't, and it can go both ways. (For instance, on a craft/technical level RoW is probably the superior book to W&T, but I liked the latter a lot more because of my stupidly outsized attachment to Szeth and Nale.) But I do think there's something of a real criticism in how the book would rather focus on the feelings of a queen rather than those of a genocide survivor, and how the former's are given significantly more weight and import. It ties in with my main criticism, I think. 

And then there's how human/human racism had also been wholly cast aside as a plot point. Jasnah fixed slavery so that's resolved, and the only person who still cares about structural racism is the evil bad bad evil villain Moash/Vyre, who is now wholly irredeemable and who you're allowed to totally write off because he's sold his soul to Odium. I've already talked a lot about this. Other people have already talked about this, probably better than me. The writing was actually on the wall for me in OB, but again, RoW was when I fully accepted that this was never going to be addressed. 

There's something else that probably deserves its own discussion rather than being quickly tacked on at the end here, but here we are. This book changed how the series approaches war. 

In WoK, war was very clearly portrayed as a bad and inglorious thing. It was brutal, it was painful, those at the bottom died cruelly and unceremoniously and pointlessly while those at the top turned a profit. Every day was a new horror. The enemy were never evil, they were always just more people forced to go through the same thing. Through the next couple books, it felt to me that even if the characters had accepted war as necessary, there was still a tragedy to it. Conversely, in RoW (and W&T) war is basically a series of boss battles, in between which our protagonists can kill dozens of footsoldiers with barely a thought in the same way WoK had criticized.

Final note on all this, it sucks how we have no perspectives from the former-slaves-singers demographic. Those guys are really thrown under the bus, and seemingly get no self-determination now or ever. It was a glaring problem to me in RoW. Conscripted and enslaved humans and singers probably have just as much ground to form mutual understanding as a fused and a queen. (In fact they already had. In Oathbringer.)

In essence, RoW disappointed me because it left me with the distinct impression that none of the series's most important through lines (well, most important to me) were going to be resolved well. I liked W&T, but I haven't revised my opinion very much about the overall handling of these topics across the series. Maybe one of the reasons I was able to enjoy W&T so much more was because I no longer had such high expectations.

[remnri]

xiaos

[shootingstarpilot]

saw your post last week about your job i hope it went okay!

First off, thank you so much for checking in, that is genuinely so sweet of you and I appreciate it tremendously. Now, am I answering this three weeks late because I wanted to have an actual resolution for you?

Yes. Yes I am.

Am I also about to vent for several paragraphs, screaming incoherently into the void as the insane stress of the past few months searches desperately for an open valve?

Yeah, that too.

So. February 14, 2025. With no formal warning and only 24 hours of informal warning from other rank-and-file staff, myself and several thousand other probationary employees (meaning those with less than a year in their current position) were unceremoniously and illegally terminated. Termination notifications stated that our "subject matter knowledge, skills, and abilities do not meet the Department's current needs." This comes into play later, because this is patently false. Myself and many others had promotions to permanent status in the works before the federal hiring freeze condemned them to the void. These terminations did not involve any of our direct supervisors or anyone who had actual knowledge of the quality of our work.

These notifications were rolled out by region. Sitting at my computer, watching the texts roll in from friends at parks across the country, knowing mine was coming and not being able to do a damn thing about it...

Yeah. That was fucking miserable.

I get very lucky. My boss goes to bat hard for me and gets me a position with our partner organization; I am unemployed only for the weekend. A lot of national parks have these (most libraries and the like have them too). These partner organizations are often vital to the functioning of the park. As an example of what they can do- because they're non-governmental non-profits, they can assist in fundraising efforts and solicit donations that federal regulations bar parks (as federal entities) from participating in.

I am, again, tremendously lucky. Other probies have families to support. Other probies are left without paychecks entirely. We are supposed to have access to our benefits for a month after being terminated; many find their health insurance is now inactive. Other probies, after uprooting their whole lives to move to remote locations for their dream jobs, are suddenly left isolated and unmoored. Many have to move back home, closer to friends and family who can help support them.

And then March 13 rolls around, and two separate judges (US District Judge William Alsup of San Francisco and US District Judge James Bredar of Baltimore) order the Trump administration to reinstate all fired probationary employees by March 18. Fully reinstated, meaning they can't just put employees on paid admin leave and call them "reinstated."

I don't know how the other agencies handled this, but just for the DOI:

Going completely against the court orders, the DOI splits all probationary employees into two groups. Group A are mostly front-line probies, those involved in visitor services, maintenance, etc., and are to be reinstated immediately. Group B are mostly back-of-house- admin, resource management, and the like- to be placed on paid admin leave. I'm in cultural resource management, so I was placed in Group B. Also worth noting- all of those notifications about group designations and reinstatements? We got absolutely nothing in writing. All of this is conveyed by phone calls from our direct supervisors, who are as baffled and furious as the rest of us.

(If you had any faith left that "oh, they're doing this to save money!", let that put those to rest. Paid admin leave means you're paying people to do nothing. We all were chomping at the bit to GET BACK TO DOING OUR JOBS.)

So, of course, this sets off a ruckus. We are contacting the courts, we are contacting our union reps, we are contacting our congressional reps, those of us who live or work in one of the 19 states that filed the lawsuits are contacting our attorney generals. We care about the work we do. We are not content with paid admin leave.

And the ruckus works. The next day, we receive notice that the group designations are no longer valid. Everyone is being reinstated, effective immediately.

Great.

Until the Supreme Court strikes this down on a legal technicality, saying that the states and the union do not have "standing" to sue. Importantly, they're not ruling on the legality of the firings themselves; that question is still making its way through the courts.

The Department of Commerce, which includes agencies like the U.S. Census Bureau and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, immediately re-fires all their probationary employees. This is because DOC leadership is full of a bunch of stupid cunts.

DOI leadership does one thing right and decides not to re-fire their probies until the legality of doing so is decided. This is good, because it gives more time for current probationary employees to make it to a year of service, thereby taking them off probationary status. This is also what happens to me- three days after the SC ruling comes down, I make it off probationary status and breathe a (very tentative) sigh of relief.

Now I am faced with a different problem.

There are a few different categories of employment. You can be permanent, which is exactly what it sounds like. You can be seasonal, which is also exactly what it sounds like. Or you can be term. Term employees function on an annual renewal; positions can be renewed for up to four years. Normally, while the renewals themselves are only processed the week before your term is up (for some godforsaken reason), you'll usually know whether or not you're getting renewed a few months beforehand because your supervisor will tell you whether or not they've filed the paperwork to extend your term. This is generally fine, because having the advance notice lets you prepare and search for new jobs. HR basically rubber-stamps your supervisor's decision.

However, in this new hellscape, whether or not you get renewed is no longer up to your supervisor. It's up to the Office of Personnel Management, led by the guy who said he wanted to "traumatize" federal employees. Also, I cannot stress enough-

THE GOAL OF THIS ADMINISTRATION IS TO GUT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.

So. You know. We're all having a great time.

There is no uniformity and no guidance. Some terms are getting renewed. Some are not. These are scattered across regions and divisions and offices; there is no pattern to be found. This is becoming the depressing norm.

Again, my boss goes to bat for me. He tells me he filed the paperwork for my renewal the moment he found out I was getting reinstated. He is arguing that in order to meet the new order to "prioritize keeping parks open" (I'm not even fucking touching that right now), he needs to be allowed to keep his staff so he can reassign them if necessary. He is giving me multiple long-term projects to work on. He says he is optimistic, even though he doesn't look it.

I am not.

I am back-of-house, meaning that I do not directly impact the visitor experience the same way a staff shortage of front-line rangers would. I work in cultural resource management, which this administration is aiming to demolish. I spend the next few weeks tidying things up as much as I can for my successor, trying to process the grief of losing a fantastic job, doing very bleak math with my meager savings to figure out how far I can stretch them (the answer: not very), and applying for other positions. I try to take some sick time and fail because I actually really love my job.

This would all be so much easier if I hated my job.

Fast-forward to today. It's the last day of my term. I resigned myself last week to not being renewed. I still have not heard anything, not even about a termination notice- non-renewal of the term still requires paperwork actions. I am plodding along and trying to prioritize the most enjoyable parts of my job.

Then, with less than six hours of my term left, I find out that my term has been extended.

I have so much work to do.

I can't wait.

[knifeforkspooncup]

my bad i forgot this was the morality ocd purgatory website where thought crimes are more damnable than real crimes and you can catch Being Evil like it's TB in the 1800s just by looking at problematic media

[ciel-phantomhives-world]

Maybe I don't follow other fandoms as much as I follow Kuroshitsuji fandom and maybe it's just me but why is this fandom so toxic? Why is this fandom so fixated on their theories and assumptions so much to the point where they try to shove their opinions as facts down to other people's throats even though it's definitely not canon? Reading the manga and interpreting everything in your own way and coming up with theories and sharing them is wonderful. Nobody's stopping anybody from doing that and many theories are quite helpful and gives every readers a broader perspective. I definitely appreciate the people who works so hard to put 2 and 2 together and realized that there are twins even before it was officially revealed. We need that type of intelligent and observant people in every fandom since it provides so much insight and knowledge.

But then there are those who try to spread misinformation and assumptions as real facts and others are just eating it all without being bothered to do their own research. And I could give so many examples. Starting from how Yana said that Kuro is supposed to be yaoi but that won't sell much, then how SebaCiel or Lizzy x Ciel or Sullivan x Ciel ship is canon, then how Sebastian took Vincent's looks so that Ciel trusts him more (despite Yana clearly addressing the "same face syndrome"), then how OCiel hates Lizzie and is just keeping up with her just because he's forced to even though it's him who decided to play the fiance part (I'm pretty sure that if he refused to carry it out after coming back from that hellhole, even whilst pretending to be Ciel, then maybe nobody would be actually forcing him to do that), then how everybody hated OCiel for being sick and only loved Real Ciel, then how Real Ciel was evil even before dying or how he's so bad with servants even though none of those servants were his (except Tanaka) and the only thing he told them was to shut up or lower their voice in front of the master of the house. That's just it. Also where did he treat Sebastian badly, not like I would have cared anyway but the question still remains? He just asked him that how dare he play with his dead body and disrespect him. Who wouldn't even ask that if they came back from the dead? Who would be even as calm and collected as Ciel? Most would be quite angry and lose their shit if they are standing in front of a being that disrespected their dead body.

The yaoi part isn't even a theory but a rather lame rumor and I would say that all these other ones are also quite bad takes and barely theories. You need to provide some solid evidence and connections in order to make a valid, well thought-out theory and none of these rumors/theories have that to suggest anything (Theories about the ships and relations can make sense and can be entertaining then Real Ciel being evil or at least being related to the manor attack is the only well thought-out theory here but again, I have no intention of talking shit about good/average/bad/ridiculous theories here and theories can be good or bad, but I'm just talking about those who claim certain things as facts and not just theories but don't even have evidence to back that up). Many just read certain theories, take their favorite parts from a certain theory, run with it and pretend as if they themselves came up with that shit and treat that as facts. How delusional. Also, what a shame that it's been years yet people still believe these liars and these liars are still spreading such misinformation and still clinging on to their delusions despite others proving them wrong over and over.

[sn0wbat]

thought about my boy siini again. and his human vampire AU self. he's my son no matter what

(alt versions under the cut!)

ibis paint has fun mirroring features :]

[mirasventhole2536]

"Erm you shouldn't put that in your DNI It might hurt people"

I'm sorry for being uncomfortable and not wanting people I don't want on my blogs 🥀

[magentasnail]

Hey, how are you doing?

well I just started art uni and it's going so much worse than I expected,,, genuinely considering dropping out but that just makes me feel worse about myself !

so yknow, great !

[greennoobartist]

*walks in from the void*

*looks at the clock: 9pm*

...

Sup chat ✌

[bs0da]

A little bit of venting about some unnecessary stuff here, but I just wanna see if someone else also has this problem, and perhaps if there is something to do to make it a bit more bearable?..

I don't know why, but when it comes to certain games I love and want to play, I'm just completely unable to play them, purely out of fear of screwing up the gameplay

Like... my most recent example is the Baldi's Basics Plus (surprisingly). There's no issue witht he game, I absolutely ADORE it. I love the total absurdity of it, the gimmicks, the characters... and Micah has my full respect for creating something as fun and creative as this.

But... That also makes me scared of playing the game, simply out of that respect. I feel bad for failing while learning how to navigate it, and each mistake makes me feel not worthy of even being in the fandom.

And that drives me up the wall, cuz it's so much fun and I really want to master the gameplay ;;

It's not only BB+, as I have the same issue with a lot of other great titles I wanted to try out, like RDR2, DBH, Cult of the Lamb and even fucking Minecraft.

I was able to break the curse with Mafia II somehow (Probably the best game I've ever played), and I'm trying to follow the same path with those other games, but it's hard. Unbelievably hard.

Is this a common thing, or am I going crazy?

(Might delete later)

[brudiza-spudnik]

this is the worst week of math homework since 7th grade

[girzapata6]

I have this white teddy bear.. that I got when I first arrived in the USA... It didn't have a name or anything until recently.

I decided I would name her Clementine:)🤍

[embers--and--ashes]

... I hate coming to the realization over and over again that my love is never going to be enough because I'm aromantic. I don't want that realization to hurt every time. Because it always reappears just after it stopped stinging. I know that but it still does hurt a little every time. I don't need it to hurt every time. I... don't know. I don't mind being aromantic, I am comfortable and do love my identity, I mind that romance gets valued over platonic relationships

[screamingwiththewolves]

god damn it

....it'S ALREADY A LOT!

[spacekatdet]

Already seen victim blaming on xitter 👍 Lets not do that and lets leave the hermits alone. Make up your own minds on if you should support Iskall. But I feel like if one of his VH team members leaving for differing morals, the hermits going back 6 plus years to remove him from thumbnails and titles, and removing him from the site and merch should be enough Doc even said they can't talk about it which could mean anything, including something legal. Mumbo said there were no minors invovled but doesn't mean others weren't since there ARE victims Just leave the hermits be, and let the victims decide if they want to come out. And stop victim blaming lmao