#is loved by lots of very nice humans

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

License to Kitty.

[rebelwriter99]

As a Star Wars fan that is relatively new to all of this, given that there have been fans around for 40 odd years and I haven’t been alive that long, I have made some *observations*.

We’re not nearly as terrible a fandom as advertised. And especially as experienced online.

Hear me out.

I have never attended any kind of con before. Ever. Too scared. I have a metric ton of traumatic experiences linked to my CPTSD where my special interests (as an autistic person) were mocked to the point I felt physically unwell whenever I looked at them or tried to engage with them. It reached the point I was meticulously secretive about the things I loved. Star Wars being one of them. A few years ago though, I got sick, I now have 7 medical conditions that disable me in differing ways and in differing degrees and Star Wars has kept me alive while I dealt with all of that. Learning to Hope and learning to action Hope are key skills when living as someone like me I feel. I also have an Assistance Dog now, and have to deal with everything the world and the general public throw at me about that.

Two weeks ago I went to Star Wars Celebration. I got on the tube in the Star Wars dress I loved so much I hopped around my flat with joy when the parcel arrived but never had the courage to wear anywhere. My Assistance Dog had his Star Wars patch on. I got there, near shaking because I was no nervous, and I was inside for about 30-45mins before Skye (my dog) put me on the floor to lie down because my HR got too high.

And I have never felt safer doing that anywhere. Ever.

In a venue with that many people, I have never had such a tiny number of people distracting/trying to pet my dog. And the few that did, 90% of the time there was a language barrier so reading his gear wasn’t going to be super helpful to them. And every single time I said “sorry he’s working-he’s my medical equipment!” people instantly just backed off. No shouting at me, no complaining or saying how rude/grumpy/horrible/mean to my dog I am. Hey just two days go I got told on a train mid medical episode whilst Skye was alerting that I didn’t deserve to have a dog because I stopped a man from petting him, twice! But not at Celebration.

If I was sat on the floor or otherwise sorting a medical episode, and people asked ‘are you OK?’ people actually listened to and respected the answer I gave, rather than calling security or staring for ages or refusing to leave me alone. Skye had to do crowd control one day to keep me safe when we got the tube at the end of the day. Everyone just seemed to ‘get it’ and gave him the space. Previously I’ve had people walk straight into him like he’s not there. He’s 35kg of very large Labrador.

And more than anything-people spoke to me and not my dog. Despite seemingly everyone there eventually knowing his name, if people said hello to us or asked for a picture or anything at all-they spoke to me instead of Skye. I was a real human being and not just the thing that happened to be holding the cool dog’s lead.

I wish people knew how rare it was for me to have such an overwhelmingly safe and positive experience in such a large crowd of people. It is genuinely a testament to the kindness and understanding of thousands of people that I was able to spend 4 days there and the worst moment be when I realised I had to leave at the end.

There will always be people, I think, who say they love Star Wars and mean something quite different. But honestly having found my corner of the Star Wars fandom here, and having been to celebration-I don’t think I’ve come across a not nice human as of yet (I do not count comments of YouTube videos I glance over I do not interact with this species). Sure some of us like different things-but I feel that’s rather the point. Some people were at Celebration for the pin collecting, some for Lego or something similar, I was there to listen to people talk about storytelling for hours on end. But we can all agree that Star Wars is wonderful at the end of the day.

I’m not entirely sure how to go about saying it-but please be happy you’re a Star Wars fan. And don’t feel like saying so out loud might make people think you’re “one of the mean ones.” Based on my experience, I think the vast vast majority of this fandom are rather lovely. And since I am unable to say thank you to thousands of people at once for enabling me to exist in a building and be very happy whilst I’m there, or thank everyone individually on here for geeking out about these things with me and making me feel like part of a little community of writers and artists I shall forever be in awe of-I wrote this post.

So. Thank you humans who love Star Wars. I think you’re all rather wonderful. And I shall send you all of the Star Wars joy. Always 🌟

TLDR: in this essay I will explain why Star Wars fans are very lovely actually. No I will not be taking corrective comments at this time. I am having feelings about experiencing happiness in an accommodating space and can’t possibly be interrupted.

[turtleblogatlast]

Something I think is cute is that - y’know how Raph’s eyes are more on the yellow side?

Well, you know who also has slightly yellowed eyes? Donnie.

While Raph’s are more yellow, I think it’s cute that this is something that they share and I don’t see it pointed out too often?

It’s also something they both share with Draxum and Splinter’s current form (though again, these two have much more yellow sclera than the boys do.)

But yeah, I like that there’s this little detail that ties Raph and Donnie together, even if it’s small.

[covertblizzard]

jaykyle au where they're theatre kids in the same school but they're not the actors jason's the scriptwriter/director and kyle is the prop manager (i don't know the official terms sorry) and they'd probably do an amazing job on the backstage setting if they could stop arguing for 5 whole seconds about their artistic visions and ideas and how "this would obviously work better this way"

[autumn-may]

being a kh mobile fan is so funny because all the kh content i see is going off about motifs and parallels and the development within both the light/dark and interpersonal connection themes and dissecting how it affects the other events within the story… and then i go to the kh main tag and its ‘Top ten reasons sora and riku should make out on kairis grave (and this will make kairi a better character)’

[moeblob]

What Deacon thinks: what did that mean? did he want me to wear a collar too? why else would he mention my neck? i mean, if he /asked/ me i would wear one but he didn't so would wearing one be weird?

What Ymber meant: It's nice to be near someone who isn't tethered to this world to serve it with a physical reminder for all to see.

[lornasaurusrex]

I miss you Lorna… this is such a mess

This is an old message and I had several other similar messages, but I miss you guys and hope you’re all doing well!! I’m sorry to see nothing has improved.

I saw I was kindly mentioned by @awesomefringey and some other commenters the other day, so just wanted to log in and say hello and log back out for a few more months. 💕

Sending so so much love to all of you. Take care of yourselves and each other, please.

The video is still on YT.

[icewindandboringhorror]

reminders of the passage of time moodeboard

[good-beanswrites]

Hello! So like I've been having that Lights, Camera, Sing Your Sins AU rent free in my head for a while, and thought this up.

Since the prisoners weren't allowed to meet at first, they could hear the others practicing their singing nearby/next door. Some are awed by how passionate they put into their songs (eg: Haruka & Shidou), how into it (eg: Fuuta & Kotoko), how emotional (eg: Kazui), etc. This allowed the prisoners to imagine what the others are like.

...Then there's Mikoto with Red going all out with their MeMe song and it stunned everyone into silent fear until the prisoners meet him and go "YOU SANG THAT!?!"

I've been going so so crazy over this omg!!

No matter how big the facilities are, I'd imagine it would be difficult to keep ten people undergoing a full filming process completely separate from each other. Though they don't actually see each other, they overhear recording booth sessions while while walking down the hall. They spot unique outfits and props in the costume closet. They hear crew members giving Jackalope weird updates ("sir, where do you want the massive tarot cards when they're finished?" "the order of thousands of fake flowers has arrived" "we ran out of medieval outfits" etc.) They see teams lugging around massive set pieces from one stage to another. They hear a few hushed rehearsals from behind dressing room doors.

Mahiru totally tears up listening to Kazui. Meanwhile Kazui is blown away by Mahiru's enthusiasm and speed. Yuno thinks After Pain sounds really fun. Amane is awed at the other songs, (she's never even heard rock music before). Kotoko finds herself singing bits of Weakness. Muu is moved by Shidou. Fuuta is torn between being jealous of Mikoto's song and excited there's someone else with some yelling.

And so of course, the prisoners go crazy trying to piece together predictions about their upcoming cellmates. One the experiment begins, they subconsciously start matching up the voices they remembered hearing with their expectations. I think Shidou, Amane, and Kotoko would surprise people the most -- it seems hard hard to get a day-to-day read on them from their songs alone. Fuuta is simultaneously exactly what people were expecting and nothing like what they thought. Everyone's ideas of Mahiru were spot on. Haruka sang so confidently that the group is surprised to hear him stutter so often. Anyone who heard a bit of Meme is shocked when they meet Mikoto and make the connection. When asked about it, he just shrugs and laughs innocently, which only makes it harder to believe. Fuuta, excited to find someone else who did a rock song, is sorely disappointed at first.

[sysig]

DAX is just so expressive ♥ (Patreon)

[dirty-bear-rick-sanchez]

I can’t believe that Rick canonically had a slap fight with an old man because he was jealous that Summer wanted to spend time with him

Like it 100% sounds like the sort of thing we would make up for a funny post on here but nope… canon

Edit: for some reason the order of the pictures is a bit fucked up but I can’t be bothered to fix it lol, sorry

[vaugarde]

anyways. im really loving utena so far, i honestly wasnt expecting it to be as funny as it is?? like its strange but it's humor has this bite to it that's amplified by the cutesy art style and the absurdity of the situations these characters get into and it's a blast to watch

[aroaessidhe]

2024 reads / storygraph

Song of the Six Realms

a magical YA fantasy romance

follows a girl who’s an indentured musician at an entertainment house, with a talent for playing the qin

when her uncle (her only family) is killed, a Duke buys her contract with a promise to end her contract after one year - and reveals she might be the key to unlock the magical secrets tied to her uncle’s death

not to mention that he’s actually the Duke of Dreams, and she is whisked away to the Celestial Realm which is on the brink of disaster, plagued by demonic monsters

[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

[not-poignant]

Looking forward to the new chapter of UtB! Also I learn a lot hearing your thoughts on fandom culture, and I was wondering why you think puritanism is getting stronger? Lately I’ve experienced it a lot both online and irl.

Hi anon,

I could write like a 10,000 word essay on why I think moral puritanism is getting stronger in the world, and how that intersects with increased moral panic, and 'anti' or fancop behaviour among fandom.

But I think there's more than one reason, and that at the centre of it, is the radicalisation of political extremes alongside the disdain for human life and education in the USA specifically. In non English-speaking cultures, antis are often considered a uniquely American phenomenon, for example. (They're not, but I do think some of the problems start there).

And from there it's necessary to look at:

The high presence of evangelist religion and their millions in USA politics in particular, and the influence this has on the news and government systems from the top down, affecting legislation, what we see on the media, what gets censored, who gets impacted (SESTA/FOSTA etc.) and so on. When companies like Paypal or similar say they won't support certain sites because they don't support sex workers or explicit artwork, we see extremist perspectives being normalised into the mainstream. Puritanism becomes baked into the system, and accepted as normal. And it has a domino effect, taking one thing away usually means to another thing being taken away, and by 'one thing' I usually mean like... equality, access to basic human rights, and more.

The presence of certain billionaire TERFs in UK politics actively working to destroy legislation over there gives a platform to hateful, bigoted extremists of all kinds, including Nazis (as seen in Australia recently, during a TERF event where Nazis turned up in open support). Also, I'd like to add that a lot of anti/fancop thinking is generally SWERF, anti-kink and eventually TERF in nature, and often homophobic and transphobic even when it's perpetuated by queer folk.

A long-term attack (we're talking over several decades now) on education (especially the humanities and any area that teaches critical thinking) including gutting the funding to libraries, colleges, high schools, primary schools and not increasing the pay of teachers, decreasing the general intelligence of US citizens in IQ tests across multiple metrics (except spatial reasoning). This, combined with the lack of emphasis on teaching nuance and critical thinking, means you get people primed to make didactic, black-or-white decisions and often are prone to radicalisation and black-or-white thinking. There's an increasing lack of ability to understand complex or even reasonably moderately complex thinking tasks. A great example of this was re: anti-vaxxers who said 'if masking works so well, why do you need vaccines' because there was a complete inability to understand that just because something works well, doesn't mean it works 100% of the time. There was a consistent inability too, to grok things like the swiss cheese model. That's not the only reason people are anti-vaxxers and there are some extremely smart people who are anti-vaxxers, but among broader populations, a lack of basic appreciation of nuance and risk mitigation in health was a huge issue. (And it's fairly easy to see this happening in many fandom discussions when we discuss how racism in fiction is generally not great, but that rape in fiction does not cause rape in reality.)

I know the above paragraph is long and unwieldy but it doesn't actually come close to capturing a lot of my thoughts on this so slafkjdsa it'll have to do though. The tl;dr is 'the government said philosophy and critical thinking isn't worth money, so a lot of people don't know how to do it, and anyone who can do it is often attacked or viewed with suspicion' (see also: The increasing suspicion and hostility towards experts in their field x.x). (Oh see also: A lot of people thinking YouTube videos count as 'valid research' for their viewpoints, and a lot of folks just...not ever learning how to research in general).

Something something social media privileging inflammatory and provocative takes as well as clickbait etc. encouraging people to often say things in the worst or least nuanced way possible.

The systemic attacks on democratic processes in the USA (and the UK and Australia and many other places).

The loudest and most obnoxious voices are often the people saying the stupidest shit. As in: It will feel like puritans are everywhere (and there's definitely more of them), but they're also just louder and getting more attention than they used to. It's misleading. Anti-vaxxers are actually a tiny minority for example, and antis are a minority in fandom, they're just...the loudest and the most willing to try and murder real people to defend the rights of fictional characters.

Er so. That's some of it anyway. There's more, absolutely, because I could talk about the presence of puritanism in a lot of levels of our experience/s, whether you're religious or not.

It's frustrating writing about this because I fall into the same trap of knowing that I can't talk about this in as nuanced a way as I want to, even if I get to do it in 1000 words instead of like, a miserable amount of characters on Twitter. Anyone thinking 'but it's not always like that!' or 'but not in every situation!' like trust me, I know. But if I sat here caveating everything that deserves a good caveat this post would blow out even more.

Basically if you try to stop educating your people as much, don't teach them how to research, debate or learn (yes, you have to learn how to learn), and don't give them access to basic needs, and gut your democracy/s, and the people at the top believe a fictional being cares if they're virgins or not or have abortions or not, and you don't care if people commit genocide against the children of your nation because that's not as important as the right to kill them in a moment of anger..., and you create a world where the children of your nation are primed to develop PTSD due to the fear of being gunned down while learning, you create a really great environment for radicalisation, extremism, the safety and comfort of puritanism (i.e. following very strict rules in the hope of fixing what's wrong with the world) while people look for a solution to why they feel so empty and hopeless in their lives.

[nexus-nebulae]

i always really like how i can slowly pick up words as i listen to a language more and more. I'm learning japanese by accident