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thejustmaiden · 3 years

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So out of nowhere I was tagged and quoted by a SR shipper for a blog of mine posted in August of last year. Talk about throwback but, hey, gotta appreciate that level of snooping. 😉

Back in the day I actually used to encourage discourse amongst Inuyasha fans- both shippers and antis alike- but I've since realized that it's a lost cause. But for you, @feministmetalgreymon , I'll grant this exception. Just 'cause it's been a while so why the hell not. haha

I want to assure you, however, that nothing you say will ever convince me that Sesshomaru and Rin are meant to be together romantically or that the story intended it so. Nor will you find any validation here. You can ship them for all I care, but please for all that is good and holy while I have your attention try- I mean really try- to understand why it is so many of us Inuyasha fans are so against this pairing in the first place (newsflash: it's not about ship wars), and why we believe a romance between the two of them is completely and utterly out of character.

For those of you interested in reading this, the blog of mine in question that the above shipper mentions in their counter-argument is here for reference. It's titled "Jaken = Rin's Dad?" I'm going to try and keep this short, but I'm also making no such promises. After all, I'm not exactly known for my brevity. haha Now let's get crackin'!

Like you, feministmetalgreymon, did for your recent blog here where you took screenshots of mine to address certain parts, I will be doing the same and dissecting yours accordingly.

[Snippet 1]

I worked with kids for many years as a teacher, and many people in my family have too or still do. Two of them happen to be just over 5 feet which is quite short for the average adult woman living here. I've also worked alongside many a women of short stature, and never did I hear any of them complaining of issues with their students having difficulty differentiating them from their own peers just because they were short as well. I'm sorry but that's just ridiculous. Kids are quite smart and pick up on a lot more than you seem to give them credit for. Height is not the only characteristic they look at to determine who's an adult and who's not, and it's foolish to suggest otherwise. So unless you're a babysitter who's still in their teens and/or who has very childlike features or behavior then I'm afraid what you're getting at is total hogwash. This is just another example of how you shippers offer nothing of real substance to your reasoning, it's only ever cherry-picking or strawmanning from you guys. Stop deflecting from the real issues please, because this certainly isn't one and only winds up being a complete waste of time for all parties involved.

[Snippet 2]

Okay, calm down now. I wasn't insinuating that relationships between parents and children can't change over time in terms of how they get along. Of course that's possible, as all families experience their fair share of estrangement and abuse. What I was speaking about was in reference to the overall dynamic between the two. Because a bad mother or father can still be viewed as a parental figure to their child even if say they're not in said child's life anymore. Since Sesshomaru and Rin share a healthy bond- and just a friendly reminder that in my blog I even said that he doesn't have to necessarily be labeled her father but that a romantic relationship later would still be inappropriate- I didn't deem it necessary to address what you brought up. Plus, it kinda, umm, misses the point?? Please, let's stay on topic. And it's not captured in the screenshot, but stop acting like there isn't a small part of them that idolizes their parents at some point during childhood. Just like you mention later on how it's normal for kids to have innocent crushes on adults that they eventually grow out of? Well, guess what, the same concept applies here. Kids eventually learn that their parents are far from perfect and make mistakes too. Rin is so damn young in the OG series though that we never even get to see her reach that maturity level.

[Snippet 3]

LOL! Alright, okay, so the "unbreakable bond" bit you're mentioning was actually me quoting you sessrinners. Did you not catch that? I literally spelled it out. *sigh* The whole point I was making is that shippers like yourself make hypocritical and contradictory statements all.the.goddamn.time. One moment you guys claim that Sesshomaru and Rin were essentially strangers and meant very little to each other, only to say in the same breath a few seconds later that they were destined to be together and their bond is like no other. I agree, their bond is special, but why must that mean they're going to fall in love?

That is the root of the matter here. Too many animes/mangas have romanticized this older adult man & young girl growing up falling in love trope that it's become way too normalized and widely accepted across the world- and yes, in some cultures more than others. Sadly, you lack the awareness to recognize how this all works. You know how we know that? When we see that you shippers are so desensitized to sexualized images of girls in the media that you share posts like this one below which *subtly* imply a future romance although one half of that pairing is still just a child in the pic and then try and pass it off as cute. That's like super fucking problematic and it scares me that you can't see that (or deny you do). 🤢

After all that's said and done, Sesshomaru leaving Rin in the village with Kaede is to me the strongest indicator more than pretty much anything else he's done for Rin that proves he is her adoptive father. It's so funny to me how you somehow see the exact opposite though. 🤔 What I think is happening is that you got yourself on some squeaky clean ass shipper goggles fresh out of your little echo chamber. Because I hate to tell you, but what you're fantasizing is what you want to see and not what's actually there on screen or was written into the story. I'm strictly talking about Inuyasha and the manga of course. [For the TL; DR version skip to the last paragraph.]

Parents looking after their kids is what parents are supposed to do. A good parent will do anything to keep their child safe and ensure they are cared for, so what he did for her by leaving her there was in her best interests clearly. Besides, as a babysitter, you more than most people should understand that parents aren't always able to be there for their kids so sometimes others gotta step in to help. Haven't you heard of the saying, "it takes a village to raise a child?" Which in Rin's case is literally true! 😂 Sometimes kids are even sent off to stay with grandparents and that's who raises them instead. Or maybe they have to temporarily live with an aunt or uncle because their single parent's job requires they work out of town 4-5 days of the week so they're hardly home. But that doesn't mean that the parents care or love their kids any less, and it's foolish to assume that Sesshomaru must have thought very little of Rin simply due to the fact that he made the decision to leave her in the village. Come on, y'all are acting like he abandoned her there!!

It's just given the circumstances Sesshomaru finally came to learn that Rin traveling with him was no longer safe. I also like to think it's because he wished for her to live a more normal life and to learn how to fully trust humans again. Plus, continuing to travel with him as young as she was would have proven dangerous and unwise. Now for you to know all this and still manage to turn his past actions towards her while she was just a child into a romantic gesture is what boggles my mind. Regardless of how you look at it, from my perspective or your own, Sesshomaru is in the wrong. Either he's a father figure who impregnates his daughter at the young age of approximately 14. OR he's this man she used to travel with who maybe isn't a father to her but who nonetheless basically rapes her since kids her age can't consent to sex with an adult. Idk about you but it sounds to me like nobody here wins with either scenario we're given. In other words, you should be just as mad as we are. If only one side didn't choose to forsake their morals they know we both have in common for the sake of a ship. Welp. 🤷‍♀️

I agree, incest is disgusting but that's not the only problem we have with this pairing. A romantic bond forming between Sesshomaru and Rin would also constitute as grooming.

You realize that over the years he visited her in the village that he brought her gifts too and essentially watched her grow up right before his very eyes, right? I mean, I know you do, but I really shouldn't have to explain further why pursuing a romantic/sexual relationship with each other is plain and simple wrong. And before you say it's not because he didn't have any malintent, please understand that considering their history and power dynamic up to then that yes this is still considered grooming even if Rin supposedly "wanted it" or "made the first move." Whether you consider him her father or not, as the adult who took on a role resembling that of a caretaker in her early life- a critical developmental time for a child- Sesshomaru is obligated to turn down any advances by Rin and most definitely should not initiate any himself. As the first close adult figure she's had in her life since her parents died, it's unfathomable to imagine how Sesshomaru could go through with taking advantage of this young girl who was under his care and supervision since they met. To think he could be capable of betraying that trust sickens me to the core.

This. Now THIS is how a parent/guardian or a similar adult caretaker (babysitter, teacher, etc.) talks to a child. And, in turn, this is how some young children talk to adults. You'd be insane and delusional to deny it! We see it in our everyday lives, do we not? From where else do you think our stories draw most of their inspiration? Yes, obviously these fictional universes have aspects of fantasy that don't exist in the real world, but so how then do you suppose we're able to relate to them? The reason for that being is because these stories are written by people for people, so naturally there are going to be real life aspects embedded throughout. Sure, a little escapism doesn't hurt as we don't need to take everything so seriously, but ultimately we all need to recognize that the messages in the stories we tell matter. Most stories possess a combination of both light and dark themes, but when it specifically comes to the latter we gotta be careful with how we tackle this in children's media since kids are far more impressionable.

So if at the center of a story we have two of the main protagonists whose mom is basically their same age and to top it off she knew their dad when she was just a girl and who just so happened to help raise her, wouldn't you say that's beyond fucked up or at the very least so fucking weird? Like why would we think it's even remotely okay for our children to watch this garbage?? Really think about it. Try and be objective for once and think about how it would sound explaining this storyline to an outsider who's never watched IY or HNY. Well, antis have tried this before many times and we always get the same reaction: Ewww!

Like I said earlier, if you wanna ship it then fine, but 1) please stop seeking our approval or trying to change our minds - your ship wish came true didn't it, so why do you need us to validate it? 2) even though it's not canon, respect that we don't support this sequel portraying pedophilia in a positive light. It's harmful af to not only allow but glorify the continuation of sexualized images of young girls everywhere. And I shouldn't have to say this, but just because this trope is popular as you say does not make it right. Lolicon themes in the media have been an issue forever and it needs to stop. Yes, even some people in Japan or "the East" would agree. Shocker!

We're pissed off and rightfully so because Yashahime's TV rating is 14, not to mention it airs at the prime time kids in Japan watch TV after getting home from school. That's Towa and Setsuna's age, true, but if Rin being the mom when she's like only a year older than them (please don't argue w/ me about the math- antis have so far been right every time with it) is straight-up disgusting and not something we should be supporting or endorsing. Rin's a whole ass child!! Please don't start with the "but times were different then so her having kids at 15 is acceptable" argument either, because we've already debunked that and every other single excuse you guys throw at us. Besides, how or why would you expect young viewers to know these historical "facts" anyway, especially if as you suggest fiction doesn't affect reality so what does it matter? Yet here we are, arguing over a fictional show in real life almost a year and a half into the "Sesshomaru fucks?" sequel being announced. My ass, your ass, hell all our asses fiction doesn't affect reality!

Look, I do apologize if the tone of this blog came off as snippy or condescending at times. I do not wish you any ill will, it's just I'm not really sure what you expected to get out of all this besides maybe getting on my nerves perhaps. haha A lot of you shippers have been desperately scrambling to interact with us, lurking in our tags, jumping onto our posts screaming canon and getting so defensive even though you sought us out first. We've been sticking to our tags, so how about you stay in your lane too. By the way since we're on the topic, have you seen Twitter or Reddit?! SR shippers there are the actual worst and many Inuyasha fans (not just antis) have complained of not feeling welcomed to engage in fandom spaces anymore. Shippers swarm them and scare them off simply because fans don't like your ship and refuse to accept it. It's pathetic, really. No one should ever be bullied or harassed just because they don't like something you might. We're all fans of Inuyasha, aren't we? So let's act like it. Yashahime on the other hand, you guys are welcome to that pungent heap of trash. Fans have a right to criticize it too, but if you like it then good for you, so keep on liking it and don't mind us.

I'm almost done, but real quick back to Jaken! Let's not forget about how the official Yashahime website- which came out after my blog, mind you- described Jaken. This translation isn't the best one available but it's the only version a fellow anti friend could track down. They do recall a better one done by a native Japanese speaker who was also an anti, and that member confirmed that Jaken is indeed called Rin's babysitter. So you see, I was right in my interpretation. In the original post I did compare Jaken to a brother, but after talking to others (some comments can be found under said post) I did acknowledge that he's more of a reluctant babysitter who's not related. And if he's not at least a brother to Rin, then he's definitely not her father.

At the end of the day, the creator Rumiko Takahashi has the final word. Which is guess what? Hogosha. 💖 Probably should've just started out with that and saved us all the trouble, huh? Good day/night to you.

Papamaru bids you adieu now. 🤞

#anti yashahime #anti sessrin #sesshomaru is rin's dad #papamaru #hogosha 💖#the sequel may not be canon but sunrise can still burn in hell

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genderqueerpositivity · 3 years

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I guess I'll go ahead and do a 5 month HRT update today, because a few folks have asked how that is going. On Friday I'll officially be 5 months on T, which is just unbelievable???

CW: changes from HRT, talking about periods, eating habits, changes to body parts and gentials, sex drive, etc

My dose increased in June, so I've been applying daily .75 ml of a 100 mg/ml cream since then. I can't say that I've noticed an increase in how fast things are happening since increasing my dose. Some changes are still happening slowly and steadily, while it feels like others have backed off a bit.

My voice hasn't changed significantly since I last posted screenshots from the voice analyzer app. I'm fine with that? I really like my voice how it is now. It would be great if it drops more in the future, but I think I would also be fine if it doesn't?

My voice has gotten me he/him'd and sir'd a few times. My voice is now my most visibly trans feature and it's a powerful one. I recently showed someone my driver's license (which has not been changed) and filled out paperwork with my legal name (also not changed) and I was still consistently called he and sir the entire time, and I wasn't making any special attempt at passing, not even wearing a binder.

One thing I do wish is that I could get back to being able to speak as loudly as I did pre-T. In loud areas it feels like I'm constantly being told now that I need to speak up. Especially at work, it's difficult to lead meetings and even have one on one conversations. Being loud enough to be heard over background noise takes a lot more effort than it did back when I had a naturally high voice. Trying to force a louder voice for long periods of time leaves me with a sore throat. I think this is because I haven't gotten the hang of the whole "speaking from my chest" thing.

Body hair is still happening steadily. I have so much back hair now. Toe hair. Hair on the tops of my hands. Sideburns. Hair on my upper arms and upper legs. Butt hair, chest hair, and belly hair. Really this is getting ridiculous but I actually really like it. I had a diagnosis of hirsutism pre-T but now I see that my pre-T body and facial hair was nothing compared to this lol.

I've still been shaving my facial hair pretty regularly, because I wear a mask for 8 hours a day and it itches my face a lot. But I'm starting to really want to grow it out for a few weeks to see what it looks like on me. I'm a little nervous about what other people might think, and also about it possibly looking patchy and weird. But I also really want a break from shaving irritation and ingrown hairs, and I want to see if I'll like having my face unshaven or not.

Either I've gotten used to it, or my skin isn't as oily as it was at first. My skin is definitely still breaking out in places though. I didn't have this much acne during my first puberty. I definitely sweat more than I used to, but also it's August here so that could just be the humidity lol. I've noticed some changes to my shoulders, upperarms, and forearms for sure; they look more masculine and I've gained some muscle there and I like it. I've surprised myself with my own strength a few times, which is pretty cool.

*skip the next three short paragraphs if you don't want to read about periods or vague comments about bottom growth and sex*

Sadly my period hasn't stopped yet. I'm tracking it with an app, so I do know that they're happening less frequently now, are shorter (which means only 7 days and not 9+) and are lighter than ever before. I have fewer PMS symptoms now, and less pre-period sensory issues. Even my cramps are and feel different now; they seem less sharp and more manageable.

I'm actually really disappointed that my bottom growth appears to have stopped. I was hoping for more of that. I hope that what I've gotten so far isn't all there is, because I know that it varies a lot by person. I don't really know what would be considered an average amount of growth at this point, and I don't know what to expect personally overall.

In related news, I understand now why so many transmasc people complain about their sex drive increasing on T....because that is definitely a thing. And let's just say that things work kind of differently down there now, and I like the changes. I've also had a few experiences lately that have caused me to question my gray-asexuality a bit, so that sure is...something. Sexual attraction is odd--and this keeps happening to allosexual people, like forever? Sounds fake.

Other minor stuff:

I haven't noticed a change in appetite since starting T, but I do think I have less of a sweet tooth. Even when do I crave sweets now, I want less than I did before. And it seems like I'm more likely to have a stomachache after eating them. I don't really know why this is or if this is entirely HRT related.

I haven't lost any hair and I don't think my hairline has changed any yet. I have so much gray hair now though wtf.

I can still cry. I've cried today in fact (they were happy tears, no worries). I think I am quicker to get an attitude now though? I've had a few moments lately where afterwards I was like...."damn I really said all that out loud, huh".

As much as all of this is, I feel like I look the same as I did pre-T. The changes to my appearance haven't been drastic at all. I expected that by 5-6 months, I wouldn't be able to hide the fact that I'm on T anymore, but it looks like that isn't the case. I'm not out at work at all, and if anyone has noticed the changes, no one has said a word to me about it. Apart from the week or so around the time where I lost my voice (it was assumed that I was sick), and a single comment making fun of my facial hair (which I already had some of pre-T), not even my parents have caught on to what I'm doing. And regardless of how that all turns out in the end, I'm not going to regret doing this. Choosing to move forward with HRT has been one of my best life choices so far.

I've realized that I definitely feel more positive about my body now than I did pre-T. Showers and baths are more enjoyable. I went swimming last month for the first time in years and it was a blast. This has all been so worth it.

My next HRT appointment is in less than a month. And I've just realized that I'm might have to reschedule it, so that's fun. Anyway, if the lab tests come back good and I'm given the chance to increase my dose again at that appointment, I'm going to take it.

#hrt journal #hrt diary #genderqueer #transmasculine #ftm #op #personal #menstruation tw #gentials tw #food tw

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reverielix · 3 years

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Excuse me Sir, Sorry to bother you. But frankly I'm new to this astrology topic but it's very fascinating to say the least.

Friend asked me to do a natal chart? No clue. Have no clue. Saw the previous post, was wondering if you help a stranger out here ? Lol.

Hi haha!

I’m a Miss but OFC I CAN TELL YOU MORE ABOUT IT! (Can you tell I’m excited? Lol) I’ll be seizing this opportunity to make an...

Astrology basics masterpost

Okay first off, the natal chart is a “snap shot” of the sky when you were born with the earth in the middle. There are 4 compounds that birth charts are made of:

1. The signs

You’ve definitely already heard of zodiac signs. In astrology, the sky is divided into 12 equal parts, each reserved for a sign starting at Aries and ending at Pisces. It goes like this: Aries ♈️, Taurus ♉️, Gemini ♊️, Cancer ♋️, Leo ♌️, Virgo ♍️, Libra ♎️, Scorpio ♏️, Sagittarius ♐️, Capricorn ♑️, Aquarius ♒️, Pisces ♓️

Basically, each sign is associated with certain character traits (which range many more than I or any singular source could encompass in short, I left a few links for gathering information in the end of this post). But it always depends on how evolved the person is. Aquarians CAN be detached if not evolved, but also have many more qualities such as their modality and element (which imply traits such as their innovative nature, intellect, hunger for knowledge, empathy, sociability,...)

So basically there are 4 elements (fire, earth, air and water) in astrology and 3 modalities (cardinal, fixed, mutable) which all carry certain meanings to them. Those elements and modalities are evenly distributed within the zodiac and move along the signs in the order I wrote them up above. So we start with cardinal fire (Aries), then we follow up with fixed earth (Taurus), after that we’ve got mutable air (Gemini), then again a cardinal sign but this time belonging to the water signs (Cancer), and so on. Additionally, all earth and water signs are of negative polarity while fire and air are of positive polarity.

The signs are the outermost circle you see when looking at your birth/natal chart. (On the left, where the arrow points, for instance, was Virgo ♍️ when & where you were born) They represent the way that you express a certain core part (3rd point) of yourself.

2. The houses

The numbers you see around the innermost circle with the lines in it are the houses. Each house is ruled by a sign in modern astrology: Aries is the first sign, so it rules the first house,...). This means that each house is afflicted with one sign and its qualities and traits.

Each house represents an area of life: The 4th house—ruled by Cancer—represents the home, comfort zone, where we crave for stability and emotional support as well as a lot more.

The angular houses ruled by cardinal signs, so: the 1st house (ascendant/rising), the 4th house (ic/ Imum Coeli), the 7th house (descendant), the 10th house (mc/midheaven) show in the picture you sent me with arrows and have a special significance in the chart + also have aspects (4th point) to them shown.

The first 6 houses are afflicted most with yourself and the last 6 houses have to do with your social/public self (e.g.: 2nd house has to do with resources and the 8th with shares resources). This can also be applied to each sign ruling the house.

3. The celestial bodies

When somebody asks what your zodiac sign is, you would answer with Capricorn, when in actuality, it’s just your sun sign (so one of many zodiac signs in your chart).

Each celestial body represents a core part of the human psyche/personality and also rules a/two sign(s) and with that a/two house(s). Another terminology for rulership can be domicile (e.g.: Saturn is in domicile in Capricorn).

Every planet is afflicted with the signs (and houses) in the form of essential dignity (whether in terms of exaltation/fall or detriment/domicile)

The sun rules Leo and the 5th house. These connections are made as to better understand each house/sign/planet and clarify/stress the connections between these three “compounds”. So, ruling Leo and the 5th house, the sun represents how we express ourselves and how we perform along with our egos, overall sense of identity and self-awareness among other things.

Before you say that you (know people who) don’t relate to their zodiac sign or don’t seem to present yourself/themselves like that at all: a placement (celestial body in a sign in a house) always depends on the aspects and also the house that nobody talks about. You’re not only a Capricorn, but a Capricorn sun in the 4th house conjunct Mercury,... (+ other aspects). Your sun in the 12th/7th/8th houses (houses, among others, afflicted with the subconscious) can mean that your way to express yourself is more in the background or not quite figured out yet. (With Leo in the 12th house that may also apply to you:) In the case of the 12th house, you may want to express yourself, but don’t exactly know how to...

Also, all of your chart matters! The sun sign is only a part of it, though one of the 3 most important placements (sun, moon, rising).

For the following paragraph keep in mind: personal/inner celestial bodies/planets (houses and signs matter equally), generational/outer planets/placements (houses matter most because they move slowly along the zodiac. the slower they move, the less the sign matters.)

The celestial bodies used in astrology aren’t limited to a certain amount as asteroids can also be interpreted/also have meanings but the most commonly used and talked about are: the sun, the moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars (Nodes, Vertex — aren’t celestial bodies but fall into the “sign & house are important” category and are a tool that function/are illustrated like celestial bodies), Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto (Chiron, black moon Lilith)

You can see each celestial body’s name listed with its symbol in the bottom right corner of the screenshot you sent me and can then look at the circle between the signs and house numbers for where they are placed.

Lastly, planets are afflicted with each other as well since generational planets can be higher octaves of personal planets, and “get along” or don’t “get along” just like the signs, whose compatibility is determined by...

4. The aspects

The expression of every planet depends on these! Aspects show the relationship between two placements and how they connect into one whole personality (Additional information about humans in general: our personality integrates at around the ages of 7 to 9. Before that, we have different needs and wants but not one integrated personality that is made of interwoven traits, qualities,...). They point out how many degrees two or more placements are away from each other (e.g. 180deg = opposition). So when you look at your own chart, you can see that Virgo ♍️ and Pisces ♓️ are in opposition to each other. This also means that people born during Pisces season and people born during Virgo season celebrate their birthdays approximately 6 months apart from each other (because the sun needs a year to transit through the signs).

There are major and minor aspects. Major aspects are usually displayed in the innermost space of the circle using different colored lines and are an umbrella term for: the opposition, the square, the conjunction, the trine and the sextile. Minor aspects are usually listed in extended chart selection options (semi-sextiles, quincunxes, quintiles,...)

Those are then divided into hard/challenging (square, opposition,...), neutral (conjunction,...) and soft/harmonious (trine, sextile,...) aspects. Example: your Sagittarius Mercury (communication, (early) education, rationality, speech, day-to-day expression, perfectionism/detail-orientation,...) in the 4th in a trine (same element, a “flow of energy”) with your Aries moon (emotions, empathy, feelings of security, nurture, comfort,...) in the 8th can indicate potential for the verbal expression of your emotions. You may let your emotions out by talking to people who you live with or your immediate family. Moreover, you could have a desire to write about your emotions in a philosophical/educational way to make others think, but decide to keep your writing to yourself or your closest circle nonetheless. One could chat about an aspect for sooo long just because there are so many things associated with the houses, signs, aspects and celestial bodies. There are so many different angles to take and you’re never done learning about astrology.

Whenever you ask somebody what sign is most compatible with yours, you’d look at the aspects between your sign and other signs to determine if your placements are in a harmonious relationship with each other, though synastry (astrology of compatibility between two birth chart) is much more complex then that.

Lastly, aspects don’t go specifically with one sign/house/celestial body, and some placements can also be unaspected. There are also things such as retrogrades, chart shapes, aspect patterns, dominant signs, persona charts, interceptions and much more but that would definitely go beyond the scope. Let me know if you’d like for me to make a post going in depth regarding those things.

How astrology on social media and day-to-day life has been altered to be regarded as something it is not:

The key is to view modern astrology less as a predictive tool or proof for assumption—because frankly it isn’t—but more as a tool to recognize psychological patterns and behavioral tendencies, which ultimately are what astrology illustrates through elements in the sky. So, no, actions cannot be justified because somebody has a certain placement. (As I mentioned above, it is crucial to regard that placements can be evolved or not evolved and therefore can “manifest” (not the candles in a circle for clear skin and money kind lol) differently). Lastly, astrology doesn’t tell you what to do and you alone have the power over your behavior. You can break free from the patterns illustrated and tendencies pointed out. It’s all about who you choose to be.

Please mark that the links for planets, signs and houses don’t encompass everything that the planets/houses/signs illustrate. For more information I recommend Hannah’s Elsewhere, astro-charts, astro.com, cafe.astrology or astrology.com (lmk if you know about more sources).

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bevercges · 3 years

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🐭 • So we literally know nothing about Bradley’s shenanigans between the end of Coon vs. Coon & Friends, when he left Earth to discover what happened to his home planet, and Bring the Crunch, where he states that he is living there now and doing who knows what.

Well I always wanted to write a post giving my thoughts on the subject (and I have a bit of a teaser here) so, for the sake of future RPs, I may as well do it. I will probably divide this into two posts because the Lore and my shenanigans are different things.

Just saying it now: this is mostly my own making and ideas as there’s very little canonical backing on the topic. If I have anything that I can quote to use as proof of my statements I will do it, but this is mostly my own interpretation.

youtube

Bradley Biggle has been around as a background character since Season 3, joining the main four as one of their classmates after moving to the fourth grade in Season 4. Still, until Season 14, he has been a (recognizable) background character with voice roles that could be easily counted with your hands –akin to characters like DogPoo or Kevin Stoley–.

The introductory paragraph above is a way of saying: we didn’t really know that much about Bradley until the Coon & Friends Trilogy. Hell, we still don’t, it is only on the final part of the trilogy, Coon Vs. Coon & Friends, when we learn a few things about him, and that episode starts with the video above.

“But Bradley Biggle is no ordinary fourth-grader!”

I am not going to waste time explaining why is Mintberry Crunch and what he does (for that’s what his About Page is all about) but, obviously, the entire clip is a form of foreshadowing to the ending. Spoilers to a 10-year-old episode: Bradley receives a message from outer space in which he’s told that he’s an alien from a far away planet whose destiny is to save Earth from C’thulu. Also Kenny thought that this revelation was going to be for him so he got scammed of his backstory, I guess.

So yeah, Bradley is a superhero with a backstory akin to Superman: he is an enhanced alien that was sent off to safety as a baby during times of crisis, and was found, adopted and raised by a human family, the Biggles. Yeah, I don’t think anyone really thought that Bradley and Henrietta were biological siblings, but whatever.

While we don’t know if everyone in the planet K'oh Kajan (or Kokujon, as I will be typing it like that) has the same powers as MBC, since we know that the berries of that planet “have the power to fuel nearly anything”, I’m going to take a guess that the “nearly” is there because they cannot grant superpowers to people, so Bradley is the outlier and a case of the chosen one. He is the only one with this powers, basically.

So he defeats C’thulu with his mint and berry superpowers and stuff (yes, defeats, he can only summon mint and berry to his aid, which would mostly work to reduce an opponent rather than killing them), and this episode ends with what would mark MBC’s exit from the show (outside of the very rare background appearance) for a very long time:

Canonically-speaking, this is what we know.

Bradley left to search for his biological parents (and his home planet, I suppose) and we would not hear about him for sure until Season 21. To be more precise, we would not hear about MBC’s shenanigans until his appearance in Fractured But Whole’s second DLC, Bring the Crunch.

youtube

Timestamp goes from 1:06 to 2:22 (unless you want spoilers).

Funny enough, while this would mark MBC’s return, it still does not give us much information about what he has been up to before the events pertaining this DLC. However, we still get a few clues from his in-game dialogue which I’m going to interpret for you guys.

"I picked up your distress call from the berry mines of my home planet. I've come to offer my assistance."

Something we know for sure is that he made it back to Kokujon!! This means that the main reason he has been away for so long (or so it’s my guess) is because he found his home planet, reunited with his biological parents and decided to settle there instead of returning to Earth with the Biggles. We still know that he visits, however, as he appears in Stick of Truth and in some more episodes (before disappearing again in Season 22):

We still don’t really know anything about his home planet, though, outside of very selective information he gives in and out of battle. Here’s a few examples:

"It's so weird being back on Earth. I can't believe you guys only have one sun!"

“You wanna know the best thing about Kokujon? No school."

"I didn't travel halfway across the galaxy to be treated like this."

He doesn’t live anywhere in the Solar System, that’s for sure, because not only he has traveled “across the galaxy” to respond to Fastpass’ distress call (which is another can of worms in itself, because how could have he received a call like that from literal light years away?), but also our system only has one sun.

This is just me trying to tie things together with South Park canon (so it’s a bit of a tangent), but in Season 13, in the episode Pinewood Derby, we are made aware of the existence of the Federation of Planets, a government body that is on a galactic level. The only reason I mention this is because MBC has proven to be capable of traveling at warp speed –traveling from his home planet to Earth in a matter of (what I am going to suppose were) minutes after receiving that distress call–, and all the planets that have discovered warp speed are part of the Federation, so that must be the case for Kokujon.

The exception to this rule, if anyone has watched the episode, would be Earth, but that’s because they didn’t meet the requirements to join the Federation and were blocked off the rest of the galaxy instead.

Not sure if this is canon anymore, but if it is that means that Bradley is constantly breaking the law by visiting a planet that has been labeled as off-limits, but he is not the only alien that has set foot in South Park anyways.

Actually, speaking of breaking the law and stuff, that reminds me... here is a screenshot of MBC’s character sheet:

While most characters in FBW have the Lawful (and only Lawful) alignment, MBC stands out because he has a more specific alignment. Not only he is Chaotic (which explains the possibility of him being breaking the law whenever he travels back to Earth), but also Neutral, which makes him... a morally grey character. He is neither good, neither bad, he is just... well, himself.

Why am I bringing this up anyways? Because there is one detail about the Kokujonian society that those that have played the DLC are aware about: the caste system.

"On my home planet, you'd get 10 years in the berry mines for that!"

The mention of these berry mines have been a thing ever since Season 14, but this line that can pop up when MBC is attacked in game has quite the connotations. Simple: you commit a crime, you are sent to the berry mines. You commit a crime, you work at the berry mines. You commit a crime, you become a slave. But you could say “oh, Mouse, but it could be like community service like many prisons on Earth- “ and I would have to tell you that you’re wrong because even MBC says so himself.

Despite being a trope in many sci-fi stories based around alien societies it is a very fucked up elephant in the room and everyone and their mother knows this. The last mission in the Bring the Crunch DLC involves fighting (and killing) a mind-controlling alien whose motivation was revenge against the society that put his family (and possibly his entire race to) into this position. Not only that, but if MBC is being truthful, the Kokujonian society has no issue to do the same with anyone that breaks the law, even their own people.

So, does the fact that he is part of this society make Bradley evil? No. Once again, he is Chaotic Neutral, he is just Bradley. And looking at the definition of Chaotic Neutral:

“Chaotic neutral characters like to indulge in everything. [...] This type of character will at least consider doing anything if they can find enjoyment or amusement. Life has meaning, but theirs has the greatest meaning. According to chaotic neutrals, laws and rules infringe on personal freedom and were meant to be broken. This character is always looking for the best deal, and will work with good, neutral, or evil to get it; as long as he comes out of the situation on top. The chaotic neutral is constantly teetering between good and evil, rebelling, and bending the law to fit his needs.”

His alignment makes him more complicated than the black-and-white idea that is being good or being evil on one fact alone. He is defined, however, by the fact that he does what he pleases regardless of what society, morality and laws say. And this is easily backed up by how he addresses the Crooked Cop enemy class in FBW:

"Earth police have no jurisdiction over... Mintberry Crunch!"

"Authority figures are no match for... the crunch!"

So, basically, his alignment makes him a free spirit and, at best, because his family owns slaves, he would be a proxy. He’s mostly a 10-year-old with superpowers that has been granted total freedom to do what he wants and takes full advantage of it (an also a superhero and an illegal alien on Earth, literally and figuratively), so he is not precisely defined by the society of his home planet. I do believe, though, that he has been influenced by the Kokujonian society as a result of living with his biological parents, so his morality and ideas flip-flop a lot.

“Chaotic neutral characters are extremely difficult to deal with. Such characters have been known to cheerfully and for no apparent purpose gamble away everything they have on the roll of a single die. They are almost totally unreliable. In fact, the only reliable thing about them is that they cannot be relied upon!”

MBC choosing to fight that alien (an alien he carelessly allowed to follow him to Earth) could also be interpreted as personal defense and him defending planet Earth from an outer space threat as the Zarganor voices his intentions pretty clearly in-battle, but everyone is welcome to draw their own conclusions since both of them were motivated by very different things.

Anyways, once again, Kokujon is a pretty fucked up planet, but it is also Bradley’s home planet. We can assume that finding this planet and his biological parents helped him discover his real identity as Gok'zarah and, once he accomplished this goal, decided that he had nothing else worth pursuing and settled. He is rather unpredictable, as his alignment dictates, so he may not even stay on Kokujon a lot and instead travels through the galaxy- but those are headcanons of mine.

In conclusion, as a TL;DR: Bradley disappeared from Season 14 to Season 21, and then from Season 22 and onwards, because he’s an alien and has chosen to live in his home planet. Said planet’s society has its fucked up side but Bradley is so unpredictable due to his free spirit nature it is hard to pin-point his morals.

Anyways, for a character that started as a joke character that was used as a deus ex machina, I think he’s pretty cool! :·D And probably one of the strongest characters in this show’s universe.

#📁 • OOC.#🍚 • Bradley!About.#🍚 • Bradley!Headcanon.#cw long post #(Though in this blog I love all of my boys this one has a weird history.)#(I still remember when I liked MBC in an ironical sense; yeah; sure.)#(Now he's just one of my favorite characters ever LOL.)#(What do you mean I shouldn't care this much about a joke character?.)

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it-me-ari · 4 years

Text

“Beautiful Pain” (reposte)

This is a fic I wrote a while ago and I never proof read (there were soo many mistakes). Also I didn’t make any paragrahs and could only post it in screenshots bc my phone couldn’t handle it. But here it is again, corrected, with paragraphs and as a normal text post!

The Winchesters and I just came back from a hunt and I was about to cook something for all of us (Dean didn't care for healthy food as usual) when Arthur Ketch, our favourite brit (not) suddenly stepped into our meeting room. Sam and Dean pulled out their guns in an instant and I was ready to throw my knife at him but instead of attacking he just lifted his hands above his head. "Don't shoot. I come in peace." He said in a calm voice and carefully pulled a badly beaten up person, clothed in dirty rags, beside him. "And I come bearing gifts." He continued and gestured at the poor guy who looked at us with tensed shoulders and fear in his eyes. I didn't recognize him at first, as he was covered in blood and dirt, but then it hit me and I took a sharp breath. "Gabriel?!" I whispered, trying to push down the emotions that whirled up inside me.

I thought he was dead. I thought I'd never see him again. Hell, I didn't eat for weeks because of his death. Before he 'died' we were good friends, that had the potential to be something more, considering our flirting and teasing it wouldn't have been long before we got together. And, most importantly, Gabriel kissed me before he took on Lucifer and got 'killed'. I couldn't believe what I saw, what had happened to him? I didn't understand why he was alive and why he looked like someone tortured him. Ketch explained that Asmodeus, fourth prince of no hell, had captured him, tortured him and drained him of his grace to inject it himself. The Winchesters and I changed meaningful glances, archangel grace was the last ingredient we needed to open a door to Mary and Jack.

“We're gonna need his grace." Sam finally said you could see that he felt guilty saying that, as Gabriel was in such a bad shape. As soon as he said that the archangel whimpered and stumbled backwards in panic. "Wow calm down. I've also brought this-" said Ketch, calming Gabriel while pulling out two ampoules, filled with shimmering grace, carefully he put them on the table. Gabriel's reaction hurt me, this was not the cocky, powerful archangel I remembered, this was a broken soul, scared and hurt. I hated seeing him like this, hurt, broken, fearful. It pained me that he was suffering so much and the strong urge to take care of him and protect him rose inside me. The boys finally put their guns away and started strategizing with Ketch, unsure what to do with him, they argued for quite a while. I was still in shock about the sudden twist our mission had taken and didn't participate.

Finally, they decided that Dean and Ketch will go to apocalypse world to save Mary and Jack, while Sam and I would stay at the bunker to take care of Gabriel and to guard the door. After they left Castiel arrived and the three of us tried to get a reaction from Gabriel, but he either didn't realize our presence or didn't remember us. Anyway it was very painful to watch him in that state and I almost couldn't bear it, but I kept reminding myself that I had to be strong for Gabriel. When we tried to give him the ampoule of his grace we had left he struggled and refused to take it. "I don't think he will accept it in his current state," Cas stated worried and we decided to let him rest for a while.

After a few hours Cas went to check on Gabriel and what he found in the room caused him to call for us in an urgent tone. "Sam, Angel!" Sam and I were there in an instant, equally surprised how the room had changed. The walls were covered in enochian symbols from top to bottom. "What is this? Did he do that?" I stuttered and looked at Cas in confusion: "Is it enochian?"

Cas scanned the walls with a frown before he answered: "It's his story. It starts with his death." I winced as I remembered how Gabriel died in front of my eyes, murdered by his own brother. Cas continued, oblivious to my reaction to his words: "Or what appeared to be his death. 'As usual, my brother had double my brawn and half my brains. He assumed the counterfeit me is what vanished that night and he thought that he'd stabbed the real thing.' " He ran his fingers over the symbols before he kept on reading: " 'The truth is, the thing Luci skewered was a fake. Plenty of fakes to go around. Everyone believed Gabriel was gone. And suddenly, I was free. No obligations to god or heaven or mankind. And so I did what everyone would do. I moved to Monte Carlo and shacked up with porn stars.' "

As he read those words my head snapped up and I looked at Gabriel in shock, unable to conceal my feelings. It was probably the wrong time to be jealous and hurt but I couldn't ignore the sharp pain in my chest, it felt like someone stabbed me in the heart. I realized that I never had a chance at a relationship with Gabriel. To him, I was just a toy, a mildly amusing distraction at the end of the world. And the kiss was probably just to underline the drama of his 'death'. Cas, who didn't see my reaction, read quietly for a while before he started talking again: "Well he goes on and on for quite a while about porn stars and, uh-" "Cas, please." Interrupted Sam, guessing how I was feeling about the things he just said.

Cas looked at me briefly and continued: "Okay, so Gabriel was captured and delivered to Asmodeus. 'For years, I knew nothing but endless torture. Asmodeus, once the weakest of Hell's princes, grew strong by feeding on my grace.' " I looked at Gabriel again and felt how anger cut through the pain, I hated Asmodeus for doing that to Gabriel, even though he left me for some porn stars I still loved him and didn't want anyone to hurt him. Well, obviously his intellect is intact." Stated Castiel after a few minutes of grave silence. "So, why isn't he talking to us?" I whispered, not trusting my voice to conceal my mixed feelings. "I don't know, maybe he can't." Answered Castiel, his voice filled with helplessness. "Or maybe he's choosing not to. Maybe he thinks it's safer that way." Said Sam quietly, sounding like he knew the feeling. I tensed slightly and dropped my head, wishing desperately I could help him.

In an attempt to make things better we helped Gabriel to sit down on the bed and Castiel and I tried to heal him. Neither of us had any luck, his injuries were too severe. Castiel looked at us, his hands still on Gabriel's head: "It's not possible for an angel to heal an archangel. I'm just trying to jolt his mind into thinking straight." He sighed and removed his hands from Gabriel. "Even then, it's possible that he's lost." I breathed in shakily, holding back my tears, I just couldn't bear the thought that Gabriel might be lost forever. Sam silently put his hand on my shoulder, trying to comfort me.

After that Castiel left, while I and Sam stayed with Gabriel, keeping him company. It was silent for a long while, neither I nor Sam knew what to say. Finally, Sam stood up and faced Gabriel with an intense gaze. "Gabriel, you have to dig yourself out of this hole. Look, I know you think it's safer inside. No more torture. No more pain. No more expectations." He sighed and looked at Gabriel, searching for something that would indicate that he understood what Sam was saying. But he just stared into nothing, his eyes empty. So Sam continued: "I've been there. You were nothing like your family. You sure as hell weren't like your dad. Me either. And just like you, I got out. Or I thought I got out. But then.." He took a step closer to Gabriel, still looking at him intensely. "Then, my family needed me. And this is my life. No matter how many times I've tried to fight it, this is what I was put here to do. This is where I make the world a better place." He sighed again and shrugged his shoulders in a resigned way. "And sure, yeah, hookers in Monte Carlo, sounds great, but your family needs you. Jack, your nephew, needs you. The world needs you. We need you." He paused and looked briefly at me, before turning his head back to Gabriel: "Angel needs you." He said quietly and let Gabriel time to process his words. "So please, help us." He said finally.

It was silent for a few minutes and just when I thought Sam's speech didn't get through to Gabriel at all, he said something: "Porn stars. They were porn stars, Sam." His eyes glowed in a bright blue and the ghost of his old, cocky grin flickered across his face. As much as I was relieved that we got Gabriel back, I was also hurt that the first words he said after years of torture were about porn stars. Porn stars. Barely able to hold back my tears I stormed out of the room, through the long corridors of the bunker, in my room, where I threw myself in my bed and started crying. I knew I should be happy that Gabriel was alive and still kind of sane, but I couldn't ban the image of him with some porn stars of my mind. I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that he faked his death and took off without a word to me. I thought we had something going on, but the fact that he abandoned me for his freedom told a different story.

Back in Gabriel's room, he barely noticed that I left because he was still not completely himself, Sam and Castiel fed him the other ampoule of his grace to help him recover. Only seconds after that, Sam's phone rang. He picked up and put the person calling on speaker: "Samuel." An all to familiar voice said in a confident tone. Gabriel looked up in horror and jerked back, it was the voice of his torturer. It was Asmodeus. "I hope you're having a pleasant day." Gabriel’s breath quickened and he looked like a cornered animal. "It's come to my attention you boys have something that belongs to me and I'd like it back." Sam and Castiel exchanged worried glances but he answered calmly: "I don't know what you're talking about." "Oh, I believe you do. And I'm gonna give you one chance to return him to me. No harm, no foul." If I were present during that phone call I'd ripped the phone out of Sam's hand to give him a piece of my mind. But Sam just stayed cool as he answered simply: "I'm hanging up." Asmodeus didn't like that: "Do not hang up on me." He roared furiously. "Gabriel is of no use to you in his current condition. Should you choose to resist me, I have no choice but to take him by force." Gabriel looked horrified at his words and panted fearfully. "I will reduce you and that sad little bunker of yours to ashes. You've got ten minutes." With that said he just hung up, leaving Gabriel on the edge of a panic attack and two very worried boys.

Meanwhile, I was in my room, trying to get myself together again. By the time the bunker went into the emergency mode, I'd stopped crying and was almost back to normal again, or at least almost ready to act normal again. As soon as the lights went red and the alarm started blaring, I burst out of my room and rushed to the entrance, almost running into Sam and Cas, who were headed to the same direction. "What's going on?!" I asked tensed, a knife in my hand. "Asmodeus. He's coming for Gabriel." Sam answered courtly and fastened his pace. When we reached the conference room we were immediately attacked by a bunch of demons, but we could handle them without a problem. The problems started when Asmodeus himself appeared, grinning arrogantly at us.

"Your warding wasn't designed for the likes of me, Samuel." He pinned the three of us against a wall, using his powers and looked at us, mildly amused. "I've come to claim what's mine." We had to watch helplessly how two demons dragged Gabriel across the room towards Asmodeus, he looked confused and scared. Asmodeus walked towards him and patted his cheek with an arrogant smile. "Oh, I missed you, boy." Gabriel whimpered and turned his head away from him. Asmodeus chuckled and took a step back, Gabriel squirmed under his gaze and looked up to him like a frightened child. "I'm gonna have to punish you rather severely, I'm afraid." He said, trying to achieve a fatherly tone, but it just sounded slimy. Gabriel breathed heavily and looked around, his eyes pleading for help. Watching a pathetic little demon like Asmodeus treating a powerful, several millennia's old archangel like a naughty child made me furious and gave me new strength. Somehow I managed to break free from Asmodeus' grip and jumped at him with my knife directed at his heart. But he saw me coming and with just a single movement of his hand, I was thrown against a wall again. This time I wasn't so lucky, my head slammed against the wall and I immediately lost my consciousness, causing me to miss all the following action.

Asmodeus watched Gabriel with a while, a satisfied smile on his lips. Finally, he nodded towards the stairs and the demons holding him dragged him up the stairs and towards the bunker door. Asmodeus straightened his suit in a business-like manner and turned towards the boys. "As for you two.." he raised his fists and slowly started closing them, causing Sam and Castiel to squirm in pain. Apparently, he had forgotten about unconscious me, lying beneath the table. Meanwhile, Gabriel and the two demons dragging him reached the top of the stairs, where Gabriel struggled and overwhelmed them. He threw them both over the railing and leaned on it, panting. Asmodeus frowned and shifted his attention to the battered archangel: "Gabriel. What are you doing, son?" His voice was amused, bursting with confidence. If I had been awake this statement would've made me furious. Asmodeus smiled sadistically: "You know too well what I can do to you." The angel didn't react, his head hanging low, his hands tightly gripped the railing. Asmodeus frowned, now getting angry, and shouted: "I broke you!"

Gabriel slowly lifted his head, eyes glowing bright blue. "You're too weak!" Asmodeus shouted again, now really furious. With a sudden movement, Gabriel straightened his back while at the same time his appearance changed back to normal. His wounds disappeared, so did the blood and the dirt and his hair were clean and fluffy again. With still glowing eyes he looked down at Asmodeus, unfolding his wings as a demonstration of power. The look on Asmodeus' face changed as he slowly began to realise that Gabriel was finding back to his old self, hectically he produced a lightning bolt and threw it at Gabriel. But the archangel casually slapped it to the side, cracked his head a little and looked at Asmodeus with cold eyes: "Not anymore." He tilted his head a little and said in his usual, mocking tone: "Oh, by the way, I always hated that dumbass suit." And with that, leaving Asmodeus no time to react, his hand jerked forward, his eyes started glowing and Asmodeus slowly started smoking. Gabriel twisted his hand a little and the smoke turned into fire. Asmodeus looked at his hands in horror and started screaming, Gabriel smiled and watched satisfied how his torturer burned to death. And I was still unconscious, which really annoys me now, I would've enjoyed seeing him burn.

Afterwards (after they brought me to my room) Cas and Sam told Gabriel everything that'd happened, including how we want to save Mary Winchester and his nephew Jack from an alternate universe. It was a lot to take in and Gabriel, freshly recovered, was a little overwhelmed. "Whoa- too much information." He stuttered. "Slow down, I'm not processing." He groaned and massaged his temples. Castiel sighed: "And there's more... Michael wants to come to this earth and destroy it. We may need your help to fight him." Gabriel slowly raised his eyebrows, obviously hoping that he'd heard wrong: "What?" Sam chuckled softly at his reaction: "Yeah." It was not a happy chuckle tho, more like a 'yeah, I know, we're fucked' chuckle. Gabriel looked at Sam with a 'please tell me you're joking' face. Sam sighed and said with fake joy: "Welcome to the team."

The archangels face showed his disapproval: "Uh- yeah. Not so much." He said slowly and leaned back. "I mean, thank you for the rescue and for the redemption arc, but uh-" he slowly stood up while speaking "I'm not really a 'team' guy." Sam looked at him like a lost puppy while Cas, already knew what came next, looked annoyed. Gabriel, not caring about any of them, continued speaking: "Sooo, I'm gonna bounce, okay? Uhm, but, you know, it's been- uhm- What's the opposite of fun?" He tilted his head a little, pretending to think about it, then answered the question himself: "That." He walked past the two boys, seemingly not caring at all. "No. Gabriel, don't- you- you can't just walk way!" Stuttered Sam, still looking like a lost puppy. "If Michael comes here, he will end this world." He continued after Gabriel just walked past him. The angel sighed and turned around: "And the last time the world was ending, I put my money on you." He said and pointed at Sam with a finger gun. "I think you can pull it off again." He turned around and started walking again when Castiel spoke: "No. You cannot turn your back on your father's creation." His face was serious as he when he appealed to his sense of honour. Gabriel turned around again and looked at the other angel almost pitiful: "Castiel, my father turned his back to his creation." After no-one replied he shrugged and said: "Guess it just runs in the family" sounding a little bitter and before anyone could answer he was gone.

That was the moment when I walked into the room, I could just hear the flutter of his wings and frowned in confusion, I was still dizzy from my head injury. "What the hell is going on?" I asked Sam and Cas and they told me everything. "He- he left?" I whispered, close to crying. Again. Nobody said anything. Cas looked at me with pity. Sam pulled me into a hug. When Dean got back from apocalypse world, without Ketch, we found out that he wasn't able to find Mary and Jack and Ketch decided to stay in apocalypse world to prepare everything for another rescue attempt. He was not happy when he found out that Gabriel took off and we haven't had any archangel grace left.

Two weeks later, after we found Rowena, we finally knew were Gabriel was and of course we immediately took off to the town where Rowena's tracking spell told us he was. I was not sure how I should feel, now that we had a real clue where Gabriel was. I was still hurt about how he acted but I also missed him, I've been missing him for over 7 years and his sudden appearance brought all the feelings back. I wanted at least talk to him, maybe shout at him. Arguing from the other end of the motel room brought me back to reality and I decided to see what Sam and Dean were fighting about this time. Turned out, that Sam wanted to stay longer in this town, to check every possibility, while Dean wanted to move on. "We don't have time Sammy!" He shouted angrily, but also desperate, he was like this all the time since he came back from apocalypse world without Mary and Jack. "Mom and Jack, they could be hurt or worse. And we're stuck here in this stupid motel room looking for some runaway, dumbass archangel who doesn't wanna be found!"

Sam frowned and opened his mouth to answer, but before he could say anything I decided to involve myself and maybe try to calm things down. "Dean, calm down, we still have a chance of finding Gabriel. I mean, yeah, Rowena isn't the most trustworthy person but she is a powerful witch after all." I said in a calm voice, hoping I could reason with him. But he just rolled his eyes: "This town has more than five houses, Angel, what do you think is gonna happen? That Gabriel just comes here like 'hey fellas, I'm here to help you'?" I opened my mouth to protest but was interrupted by someone knocking on our door. I exchanged glances with the brothers and together we walked to the door, weapons ready. Dean carefully opened it and what was behind that door took us all by surprise.

It was Gabriel, with messy hair and a bloody shirt. He smiled weakly at our dumbstruck faces: "Hey fellas, looking for me?" Slowly we put our guns down and let him in. I wanted to heal his wound but Dean wouldn't let me, he didn't want Gabe getting strong enough to disappear again, so I let Sam handle it. It was bad being so close to him and knowing that I never meant anything to him, but it was worse that he acted like he didn't know me. He barely looked at me and only shot me a curious look when I offered to heal him. I mean I never told him about my powers, but it still hurt to see him act that way. I tried to ban these thoughts from my mind and watched Sam patching up Gabriel instead. "Alright, this is gonna hurt a little." He said while he bandaged him. "A little?" Gabriel groaned and shut his eyes in pain. I couldn't fight a smile, guess he wasn't used to being actually hurt.

"How'd you know we were here?" Sam asked after he finished and looked at the wounded archangel. Dean and I stood beside him, watching him with emotionless faces, probably the first time I was with Dean when it comes to deal with the Trickster. "Come on." Said Trickster chuckled and sat up. "I felt your witch's tracking spell the second she laid it on me. Tasted like haggis." "So now you're in trouble?" Sam asked casually while putting away his medical stuff. "What gave you that idea?" Gabriel asked, trying to sound as cool as always. Dean lifted his eyebrows and answered: "Well, you show up at our doorstep, bleeding like a stuck pig." "This?" Gabriel laughed, gesturing at his wound. "Eh you know, I roll into town, have some fun, stumble into the wrong poker game, take a guy's money... his wife.." He shrugged. "Things get messy." None of us believed him for a second, I was the one to voice my disbelief: "You're trying to tell us you came here to have some fun?" I asked with raised eyebrows. "Yeah, this isn't exactly the Riviera." Dean scoffed. "I know right?" Gabe laughed and then looked at me curiously. I hated it, like he never met me.

Then he cleared his throat and got ready to stand up: "Yeah, so anyway, uhm- I don't suppose you guys have any more of my grace laying around, right? 'Cause, uh, the tank's a little low." He looked up hopefully and I reluctantly admitted to myself that he looked adorable like that. "Did you drain it killing Asmodeus?" Sam asked, sounding a little worried. "And ditching you," Gabriel added and I winced, another thing that hurt. "I'll recharge eventually but uh- until then..." He didn't finish the sentence and looked a little desperate. "Whatever we didn't use on you, we used to open up a rift." Dean finally said. The archangels face showed literally 'oh fuck' and he was silent for a while. "...cool" he finally said. "Super duper. Okay. Well, uh, in that case, gentlemen and lady, I must bid you my goodb-" he groaned loudly as he tried to stand up and his wound hurt. "Yeah, no-" he said, leaning back again. "Maybe after a little siesta." With that said he laid down on the couch and closed his eyes. The fact that he actually fell asleep worried me a little, even though I tried to ignore that. We used the time he slept to discuss what we should do with him.

"I don't get why he's here," Sam said thoughtfully and looked at the sleeping angel. "Yeah, well, right now I don't care. He's here and we're gonna keep him here." Dean said and before I could say something Gabriel woke up in a jolt. "Where am I?" He mumbled confused until he saw us sitting at the table. "Oh, right. You." He sighed and touched his wound carefully. "Ouch." He winced and looked down at his stomach. Sam stood up. "Gabriel, look, we don't really know what's going on here." "We need your help," I said bluntly, staring at him with a neutral expression. "Uh-" he started, confused about my behaviour "Yeah, not a big joiner." He chuckled. Dean looked at him and raised his eyebrows triggered. "So you have better things to do than save the world?" "Exactly." He answered defensively. Dean and I exchanged glances while Gabriel tried to stand up again. "Look, this has been great, a real thrill, but uh- I just came here for the silver stuff. And since you don't have it anymore-" he lifted his suitcase and jacket and stood up with a barley concealed grunt "-it's time for me to say sayonara."

In exactly that moment the door flew open and two men stood in the doorway. "We're here for the angel." Said the big, muscular one with a Scandinavian accent, while the other one, a smaller, slimmer man (more a boy than a man), just flexed with his nicely done hair. For a second under the big one's features glowed a dangerous-looking face with horns, while the slim one had a horses head underneath his human face. "What the hell are you guys?" Asked Dean horrified, then whispered to Gabriel, loud enough for everyone to hear: "The hell are these guys?" "Oh, just a couple of Norse demigods." Answered the angel in his typical, casual way. "Demigods?" I snapped and raised my knife, ready to fight. It followed a brief fight that ended with Gabriel stabbing the big guy with a wooden sword that looked like a katana. When his body dropped to the ground the other dude froze and stared at Gabriel with wide eyes. "Hey, handsome" the angel teased "are you ready to die?" The boy broke free from his paralysis and ran away. As soon as he was out of sight, Gabriel lowered the sword and held his wound, groaning.

Dean relaxed a little and looked at Gabriel. "You okay?" He asked, even tho the answer was obvious. "Yeah, yeah.. I'll go after him in a sec... I just.. need a minute." Answered Gabriel panting, still holding his wound. "Wrong." Replied Dean simply and pulled out a pair of angel-proof handcuffs. "You're not going anywhere." Gabriel looked at the handcuffs and sighed frustrated, but didn't seem surprised. So we tied Gabriel to the bedframe and went to get rid of the body, laying in our room. "You know, you guys are lucky I'm low on power, considering what I did to the last guy who locked me up." Dean took off his jacket unimpressed. "You know what?" He asked. "We said we'd let you go, just as soon as you tell us what the hell is going on here." Gabriel looked away "yeah.." he clicked his tongue "it's not a fun story." "Well, we just broke into a junkyard and stuffed the body of a demigod into a car crusher. So I think you owe us some answers." Sam and Dean threw their jackets at their beds and sat down in front of Gabe, while I leaned against the wall.

“Okay, they’re not really demigods." Gabriel started, which just got him unimpressed stares from each of us, so he continued, sounding almost defensive. "Look, the whole Norse pantheon is its own weird thing." He looked at us, checking if we were listening. "Think of them more like, uh, God begotten monsters-" "Yeah, whatever. What did they want with you?" Interrupted Dean impatiently. Our 'prisoner' sighed, knowing his stalling time was over: "I killed their brother." He said directly. Sam looked at him like 'you did WHAT?' but then just asked why. The archangel was silent for a moment and then started he started to talk: "Remember when I told you what happened after I faked my death at that motel?" He asked and I closed my eyes, knowing what was about to come. "Yeah, of course, you went to uhh- Monte Carlo with a bunch of porn stars." Dean's reaction was soft chuckle like 'niiice dude', but then he was serious again.

"Yeah, well, I left a few parts out." Gabriel took on narrating again: "After Lucifer 'killed me', I needed to lay low. Luckily, I used to hang with a pretty resourceful crew. Found me a real top-shelf hideaway." He then told us about this fancy penthouse, the porn stars, how he played poker and so on. "I had it made." He sighed. "All the booze I could drink, all the uh- entertainment, I could handle.." Sam saw how my gaze hardened and quickly interrupted before he could continue: "Okay. Why don't we just skip to the end?" Dean looked a little disappointed but seemed to understand, while Gabriel was kind of offended, but then he sighed and skipped, as requested, to the end of his story: "So this is how it ended. The two dudes from earlier, along with their brother, captured me in my sleep and somehow managed to sedate me. By the time I came to, they had me sold to Asmodeus."

"Why would they do that?" Asked Sam, looking confused. Gabriel looked at Sam like he was stupid: "Helloo? Lucifer? In case you don't remember, there was an apocalypse brewing at the time." "We remember." Sam courtly answered. "Well, Vegas odds had my bro pulling off a big win." "Yeah? And whose fault is that?" Dean asked coldly. Gabe pressed his lips together and didn't answer at first. "Hmmm." He said finally. "Fenrir, Sleipnir and Narfi were just trying to cover their asses. They needed to get rid of me before Lucifer figured out where they had me hidden. But selling me to that Kentucky fried asshole? For them? That was all profit." His speech grew a bit heated towards the end, but who would blame him? Dean nodded slowly and then asked: "So you want revenge?" Gabriel rolled his eyes: "Well, obviously. Roasting Asmodeus was satisfying- for a hot minute. But you know one thing better than killing him? Slaughtering them all."

Sam nodded slowly. "But since you're low on grace, you had to do it the old fashioned way. With wood." The archangel smirked: "Don't let anybody ever tell you, you're just a pretty face. Sam stood up from his chair and looked down at Gabe: "All right. Anyway, if there are only three, uh- gods, monsters, whatever-" he walked over to Gabriel suitcase with the swords and opened it "how come there are four swords?" "Oh, that top one? That is for the man with the plan, the architect of my torture and my own, personal public enemy number one. Their papa. Loki." His eyes were dark as he spoke out his name and a shudder ran down my spine, he was scary when he had that look on his face. "Hold on-" Dean was confused, "I thought Loki was you?" Gabriel then explained how he once saved Loki and therefore the god of mischief let him use his identity. We were silent for a while, then I asked: "And you saw Loki in Monte Carlo?" He looked at me, again with that thoughtful, curious look in his eyes: "Well, I needed someplace to hide." He then answered, shrugging his shoulders. “And he’d already helped me once.”

Dean nodded slowly then looked away and scoffed: "You know, none of this would've happened if you'd just stuck around and helped us fight Lucifer." Gabriel looked at him offended: "Hey, I did help you!" Yeah, but you didn't stick around. I thought and looked away for a second. But Gabriel was now in defence mode. "Casa Erotica?" Oh yeah, I remembered this. I cried. Good times. "You call that help?" Asked Sam, in disbelief. "I call that art." Gabriel shot back. "But, yes, without me, you two chuckleheads and that girl-" Really Gabe? Just "that girl"? Thanks. "-never would've known how to throw Lucifer back in the cage!" Dean was not impressed: "Yeah, but instead of giving us a hand, you ran and you just did it again when you ditched us in the bunker!" His voice grew louder every second and this time, I didn't try to calm him down, I agreed silently. "Alright, Dean-" Sam tried to stop him but Gabriel got in the way: "I have more important things to do than to join your little band of merry men." He spat back. "What you're doing. This. This is not important-" Dean started to argue back but Gabriel cut him off. "Every day, Asmodeus tortured me! Every day! He fed off my grace for years! He used me. He debased me. Until I was-" he broke off and calmed down a bit. Nobody dared to say something until he continued. "What I went through, you don't forgive. Everyone who had a hand in it will die. Get me?!" He asked aggressively.

Sam wanted to answer but now I had enough. "Of course we get you." I snapped and came closer. "Everyone of us gets you," I growled. "Dean went to hell for fucking 40 years. He was tortured every single day for 40 years! Every day! He got the mark of Cain and became a demon! Sam's soul was in the cage with Lucifer and Michael for 120 years, being tortured by the devil himself! He got possessed by an angel and had to watch him kill one of his friends! And I too, know torture, physical and mental. (I deliberately didn't go into detail here, it was too personal) We all lost so much over the years. Friends. Family. But we didn't give up. We didn't run. We kept going and saved the fucking world more than once. So would you stop thinking about yourself for one goddamn minute and get yourself together? We need you. The world needs you." I started screaming but ended with barely a whisper. Everyone stared at me with wide eyes. I scoffed and left the room, I needed alone time to get my feelings under control.

After I left, Sam and Dean stared at Gabriel, waiting for him to say something. After a few minutes of complete silence, he looked up. "I guess-" he cleared his throat "I guess she's right.. I'm sorry guys." He just seemed tired now. Neither Sam nor Dean answered, but their gazes softened a little bit. "Okayyy awkward-" Gabriel tried to find back to his usual, unbothered self. "Can you at least tell me who that girl was who just shouted at me? I feel like I know her but I can't put my finger on it.." That was the wrong thing to say. "You don't remember her?" Dean growled and glared at him murderously. "Should I?" Gabe raised an eyebrow, more confused than scared. "Angel? The girl who lives with us in the bunker? The half nymph?" Sam tried to jolt his memory. Gabriel's eyes widened in shock: "That was her? That was my Angel?!" "She's not your Angel! And she never will be, not after what you put her through." Snapped Dean and stabbed him with his gaze. "What I put her through? I-I didn't do anything to her!" Gabriel exclaimed, truly shocked by the accusation.

Sam sighed: "You died. She never recovered from that. She didn't eat properly for weeks. She didn't go out. She cried every night. Gabriel, that girl loves you with every cell of her body and after she learned that you went to Monte Carlo to "shack up with porn stars".. well it hurt her almost worse than the fact that you let her in the dark about you being alive." Gabriel's head dropped to the ground. "I was just trying to protect her.." He looked up to the boys: "You have to believe me! I never meant to hurt her! I love her!" His eyes were desperate and the brothers knew he was telling the truth. "Alright." Sam finally sighed. "But you need to tell her that." He said with a serious face and unlocked the handcuffs that kept the archangel in check. "Woah- you're just gonna let him go?" Dean objected, not happy with his younger brother. Sam sighed. "Dean.." Dean just rolled his eyes and raised his hands: "Yeah, yeah, whatever. Go talk to her." Though it was clear that he wasn't exactly happy about that. Gabriel sighed in relief and stood up. "Thank you, I'll be back." He walked to the door and froze. "Uhm... Guys?" Sam and Dean looked at each other alerted and rushed to see what Gabriel had discovered. In front of the door lay a strand of my hair, a lollipop and a piece of paper saying 'catch me if you can'. "What the hell..?" Dean asked, looking at Gabriel for an explanation. Gabe sighed and picked up the lollipop. "Loki." He said with a dark look in his eyes. Sam looked at him horrified while Dean slammed him against the wall, furiously. "So you're saying that because of your stupid little revenge plans, a Norse god captured Angel?" "Dean, we don't have time for this! We have to get her back!" He said urgently and Dean reluctantly let the archangel go. "Okay, Gabriel, do you have any idea where Loki might be?" Asked Sam, trying to stay calm and focus.

You're probably wondering how I got into this situation, well, lemme tell ya. As you might remember I left the room after I was done shouting at Gabriel. I planned to go for a walk to cool off a little and to get a grip on my emotions, but then someone knocked me out with a baseball bat. (That was quite painful.) When I woke up again I was in a luxurious suite, apparently a penthouse, I looked around in confusion and noticed a guy standing by the window, his back turned to me. Apparently, he sensed that I was awake and turned to me, smiling, a lollipop in his hand. I gasped as I saw his face: "Gabriel?!" Then the rational part of my brain kicked in: "No you're not Gabriel, you are- are you Loki?" The dude looking like Gabriel smiled and nodded appreciatively: "Smart girl." I probably should be terrified, held captive by the god of mischief, but I was actually delighted, I always had a thing for Norse mythology.

"Amazing!" I exclaimed, causing Loki to raise his eyebrows, visible confused, apparently not the reaction he had expected. "Excuse me?" "Actually, I'm a fan." I grinned at him and spend the following minutes discussing Norse mythology with Loki, a dream come true. But suddenly we heard noises from outside the door and Loki sighed. "I'm afraid I might have to kill you soon, although I really do like you." I nodded solemnly: "You need to pressure Sam and Dean, eh?" I guessed. "That's okay, I understand." My reaction to someone telling me that they would kill me might seem a little odd but frankly, I didn't care if I would live or die, plus I was pretty sure that even Loki couldn't defeat Sam and Dean. "You sure are something, I understand why he likes you so much." The god murmured, watching me thoughtfully. "He?" I asked in confusion, but Loki didn't get to answer, as the door burst open and the Winchesters, lead by Gabriel, stormed into the room.

I was mildly surprised to see him, but then again, he wanted his revenge so it made sense. "Ahh Gabriel, glad you decided to show up," Loki exclaimed, greeting the archangel like an old friend. "And you brought your friends, how nice of you." He chuckled and eyed the Winchesters in amusement. "What do you want, Loki?" He growled, a wooden sword in his hand. The god's face turned hard and he pulled a knife, holding it to my throat. "I'm gonna see you suffer and then I will kill you." Now I was confused, why was he threatening Gabriel with my death? "Don't bother, Gabriel won't care about my death. You would piss of Sam and Dean tho, and believe me- you don't want that." I said calm and collected, not caring about the cold knife at my throat. I did not expect Gabriel's reaction to Loki's words tho: "Don't you fucking dare killing her!" He growled and took a step closer to us. "Ah-ah, be careful!" Loki said in a cheerful voice and increased the pressure on my throat, causing it to cut into my skin and I felt a small rinsal of blood running down my throat, Gabriel immediately froze, watching me with wide, anxious eyes.

Surprised I realized that he actually cared about me, at least enough to not want me dead. "You must know, that Gabriel here cares about you quite a lot," Loki said, his face close to my ear. He smirked at Gabriel and the Winchesters provocative. "He wouldn't shut up about you." I looked at Gabriel, eyes wide with disbelief. "He does?" Gabriel smiled at me weakly but didn't respond. "Oh yes, of course." Loki laughed delighted and stepped away from me again. He was about to say something but before he could he was attacked by Dean, who had sneaked up from behind. Then Gabriel appeared in front of him, stabbing the wooden sword into his heart before he could even react. Meanwhile, Sam freed me from the ropes that strapped me to the chair, then he hugged me tightly. After he released me, Dean pulled me into a hug, relieved I was still alive and well. "Alright let's go." He finally said and let me go. I nodded but looked down on Loki's body one last time. "I actually liked him." I sighed and left the room, following Sam and Dean. Gabriel followed after me and it took all my strength to not look back at him. I was really confused about what Loki had told me and how Gabriel behaved. What did all that mean?

Sam and Dean were waiting at the car and I was about to join them when Gabriel held me back. "Can I talk to you for a second?" He asked, with unusual seriousness. "Uh- sure." I nodded, not knowing how I should act in front of him. He pulled me out of Sam and Dean's sight and took a deep breath. "Look, I'm sorry I left you. That I didn't tell you I'm alive. But I was- I was just trying to protect you! If Lucifer found out about my feelings for you, he would've hurt you to control me and I couldn't let that happen." He sighed and looked at me regretfully. "I thought of you all the time. Even with the porn stars when I did- uh.. things.. with them." I cringed, too much information. Then I sighed and looked up to him, about to say something but he was faster: "I love you Angel and I never meant to hurt you. You have to believe me!" He pleaded while I was caught off guard by his sincerity. "I- I believe you." I finally said and I could see him relax. "And I love you too," I added and realized it was true as soon as I said it. I could see Gabriel's eyes light up with joy and he leaned forward to kiss me when we heard someone clearing his throat in a very angry way. Simultaneously we turned around and saw Dean looking at us with his arms folded across his chest: "Are we ready to go?" He asked and then looked at Gabriel: "Are you coming?" Gabriel straightened himself and nodded: "Yes, I'm gonna help you safe the world. And your mum and Jack." "Great. Let's go." Was his only reaction. Then he took my arm and pulled me gently away from Gabriel and towards the car. The archangel just rolled his eyes at Dean and then followed us.

Nearly immediately after Gabriel sat down next to me I fell asleep against his shoulder, it was an exhausting day. When Dean noticed how close we were, he deliberately made a swerve, that caused me to glide away from Gabriel and now leaned against the window, still sleeping tho. "Dean-" Sam sighed and shook his head. Gabriel glared at Dean in annoyance but decided to let it go. Dean just grinned and drove steadily towards the bunker.

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indigopurple · 4 years

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Basically a review of OP episode 503 ig

Currently rewatching post-war arc (in the dub so I don't have any screenshots for u guys sry) and theres a few things id like to point out.

During a conversation Dadan once had with Garp, they were talking about Roger. Garp said that even if they were facing powerful enemies, he would never run away because he wouldnt dare leaving his comrads behind; it wasnt an option for him. Obviously we see this in Ace. But ALSO, isnt this what he did with Katakuri? It was a little different cuz of the setting mostly, but he separated himself from his crew to fight off katakuri, and lied to them about being okay so they didn't worry (he was already getting his ass kicked by then, so he just made that stupid smile and told them not to worry (or smth like that, I can remember the exact line) (that smile was so gross and fake cuz he fucking sucks at lying). Also he said roger destroyed a buncha soldiers cuz they mouthed off his men. That's what Ace tried to do but instead he died. :(

"The pain he went through just made him hold on tighter to the ones he loved" -Garp, about Roger. "Despite his flaws and his bad reputation, his crew still trusted him completely." -also Garp, about Roger. These both sound a lot like Luffy AND Ace.

When Dogra got home and told everyone about Sabo's ship being shit down and him dying (which we all know didnt happen, thank fuck), (by the way the absolutely lost looks on Ace's and Luffy's faces with the sudden silence hurt like a bitch), Luffy started crying and said "WE SHOULDNT'A LET HIM GO, IT'S ALL OUR FAULT". Which fucking says something about him (thinking of episodes 913-915 when he goes fucking berserk, but before that he learns that Kaido probably killed Tama and he says "I should've escorted them..!" (*ugly cries*)). Ace also reacted pretty similarly-- "Sabo...why didn't we go back into town and bring him back here?! We're so stupid!" And he gets mad and asks where he could find the bastard that killed him (obviously not getting a good answer since it was a fucking celestial dragon ugh). That is what Luffy does, in present time. He results to anger first, not sadness. Not sure when he learned to do that but I'm 99 percent sure it was from Ace. Also the blaming himself thing? High chance thats ALSO from Ace. Who else would teach him that self hating behaviour?!

Dadan pins Ace down to stop him from going after the Celestial Dragon to calm him down, telling him he cant do anything, he's not big or strong enough to do anything and he'll be killed as soon as he tries anything, especially since it was the whole country -the whole WORLD- that killed Sabo. He can't do anything. And then they tied him to a tree outside to let him cool off. Oh yeah then he also told luffy to stop crying like a little girl or else he'll- (and he didn't finish the sentence). ...Ok maybe thats why luffy started being more angry than sad.

This is where things get a little more :( . Ace reads the letter Sabo sent them before he died. As he reads, he walks to the end of the forest, to a cliff overlooking the ocean. And starts fucking bawling (btw the voice actor who had Ace's childhood part did not do a very good job, no where near as in character and real as Coleen Clickenberg did with all of Luffy's crying scenes. She was spot on.) ...do you see where im going with that? He isolated himself before letting himself feel sad. It was all rage and then calm beforehand. Y-you see where im going with that. Dont make me say it.

"How's Luffy doing, is he any better?" "Well...he hasnt been eating much, but he still eats twice as much as we do". Oh look, That's what happened after Ace died too. There's a behavioral pattern that hasnt gone away. Not sure why it wouldve tho.

Luffy is mopeing, lying on the ground in a similar setting ace was at when he cried. Hes thinking about some of the things Sabo said, like how theyre gonna sail the seas together, and he clenches his hands into tight, shaking fists. After Ace shows up and hits him, and talking abt some other stuff I don't feel like relaying, Luffy tightens his grip on the straw hat and tells ace, whimpering, he wants to get stronger (and stronger, and stronger, and stronger and stronger and....) And he wants to be the strongest in the world. "And then, I'll protect everyone. I won't lose anyone I care about". He gets stronger mainly to protect the people he loves. And then he asks ace to promise he won't die. To which he hits Luffy again and tells him he should be more worried about himself dying first. And then the famous line that hurts like a bitch- "I'm NEVER going to DIE!" And then this hopeful music comes on (fucking damnit funimation, u gotta do this? Really??) Also he says he wont die as long as he has a wussy little brother to protect. ...FUCK. Ok, the fist clenching is a thing he does all the fucking time, usually when he gets mad. This was different because he wasnt mad, he was sad. He clenched his fist because thinking about it hurt. Which, huh, sounds a lot like his whole episode after waking up from his 2 week coma on the polar tang. To try and stop the mental pain of those horrendous memories, he resulted to physically pain. He hurt himself. So, He clenches his fists in times like these to fight off the mental pain and the urge to cause himself physical pain. Guys, our boy is bad at emotions, help him. ....ok this paragraph is longer than I anticipated so ill dumb down the rest of it ig. Next part, him asking ace to promise he wont die. The music, the body language, the over change in mood- this comforts him. He stopped hiding his face and silently sobbing after ace said this. OH YEAH! didn't he tell jinbe not to die when they parted ways in Totto Land? And then, hes missing still in Wano and we see Luffy is worried....but convinced Jinbe will show up. Again, this comforts him. Hes nervous cuz someone KOFF KOFF ACE broke that promise once. But jinbe is his crew mate so he trusts him, thank god.

"-But whoever did it, they must be opposed to freedom." The whole freedom thing? That runs through Luffy's blood and spirit.His brothers fought for it, his dad is the man who strives to give everyone freedom basically, and Luffy himself has seen enough of the OPPOSITE of freedom to be so, so much more than just against it. Hence why he of course was so eager to free the slaves in Sabaody, the kids in punk hazard, the toys in dressrosa, the country of Wano from Kaido's tyrany. The apple doesnt fall far from the tree huh.

I dont think Luffy would remember his promise with Shanks if it werent for his brothers putting feul to his dream. It was a stupid bet at first; he just wanted to beat Shanks, right then. But after meeting Sabo and Ace, he found the opposite of freedom and human rights. And then he wanted, REALLY wanted, to become the free-est man in the world; the pirate king.

Last one i promise ok? This one is less connected to whats going on in the episode at this point, but something I noticed (its so obvious everyone has seen this ok) was when luffy cries, his posture is always open. He doesn't curl in on himself like many people would do (I know I would, lol). He doesnt hug himself, protect himself. He's just, opened up to whoever is watching, literally. This has a little more to do with something I haven't talked about much in this post yet; his self-destruction issues. I said he tried to hurt himself when he felt mental pain, which is definitely similar. But he cries and doesnt try to protect or comfort himself, like he doesn't have that programmed into his mind. Reminder that he only wants to live because of his dream, and if he doesnt have his dream, he wants to die. (Whoa.). Ok, so no self preservation mechanism at all rlly. Hes basically ride or die. So, when things hurt so much that he cries, he has no hope left. He just kinda...dies inside. So this was mildly different after sabo died. Yes we saw him just standing there, sobbing. But the next day he's still crying, and instead he's laying on the ground. I saw that and the voice in the back of my head told me he wanted to be a part of that lifeless dirt beneath him. Then, Ace walked over. And his words made him feel the hope that I told you about earlier, and he sat up into a sitting position. And HUGGED HIS LEGS TO HIS CHEST. There's some self preservation! Some hope! Some will to exist, to live! Something we saw none of as he sat in front of his brothers corpse, shutting down. He sat there, open to his enemies, incapable of protecting himself. Practically anyone couldve killed him right then and there. I think he mightve liked that, at that moment. Like thank god he has that stupidly good luck cuz if he didn't I swear someone couldve thrown and axe or FUCKING ANYTHING AT THAT MOMENT and hed be dead becuase he never physically or mentally prepared himself. On purpose.

Our poor boy needs some fucking attention and therapists. (Insert my rant post about how jinbe is on the crew primarily for anger management and therapy, not just being a helmsman.) Ugh, smh ugly cries

Aaaaand thats about the end of the episode. Theres so many little tics and peesonality traits that you notive thru this episode, and I only noticed them cuz im rewatching this part of the show for like the third time. I don't react as much as the first time of course but some things are definitely sadder after knowing what's going on and what will happen later on.

Moral of the story (post)? I think luffy is almost equally as alike -if not, more similar to roger as ace is. Also, high key genuinely think Luffy met like NO ONE but Garp before he met Shanks and his crew. What the fuck was his first like 5 years of being alive like? (He wantd to be a pirate cuz Garp didnt want that. Rebellious baby asshole. And then shanks made things worse, in a good way for luffy. And then ace and sabo made that worse thing worse for a good reason. Luffy lives...for those influences. And that is fucking it. Why.

Oh thanks tumblr for moving my picture to the bottom of the post u fucking idiot

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youtubioreview-blog · 4 years

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With Advanced Channel Manager, Video Manager, Playlist Manager, Template Manager, Keyword Finder, Rank Tracking, Auto-Reply, Thumbnail Creator, Analytics Feature, And Video Splitter – This App Alone Performs The Functionality Of 10-12 Apps In Just A Few Minutes.

Are you aware, 70% marketers state youtube videos convert more than any other content? So, YouTubio is an all in one solution that includes all the latest and proven youtube marketing strategies to create engaging and high converting youtube marketing campaigns hands down.

It comes with Ebook, audio & video training. The course is developed by their own team. It’s not just a copy paste work so don’t get confused with complicated word.

With its help, you will be able to tap into billions of youtube users & get high returns from youtube marketing like never before. So Don’t hesitate to check the next parts of this YouTubio Review as I’ll show you how powerful it is!

YouTubio Review Overview

Vendor Firelaunchers et al

Product YouTubio

Launch Date 2020-Aug-31

Launch Time 11:00 EDT

Front-End Price $37

Bonuses YES, HUGE BONUS

Refund YES, 30 Days Money-Back Guarantee

Product Type Youtube marketing

Support Effective Response

Official site 👉VISIT OFFICIAL SITE

Recommended Highly Recommended

Skill Level Needed All Levels

About Creator

Firelaunchers is known as one of the most successful PLR creator / provider on Internet. Their products have a good quality, and sold over 50000 sales on Jvzoo.

You can get to know more about their previous product by searching for their names such as MediaCloudPro, LogoMart, Viral Traffic Quotes Pack, etc.

Now, let’s look at the next part of this YouTubio Review and find out its features.

Key features of YouTubio

Here’s a list of mind-blowing features:

Channel Manager

Import and manage multiple channels from right inside one dashboard. Manage likes, views, subscribers, and more without having to switch between different tabs, windows, or desktops.

Video Manager

Upload, Download, Optimize, and Manage multiple videos from right inside our app – no extra software required. Also, you can create and manage multiple playlists to shortcut the process and get straight to results.

Keyword Finder

Struggling to optimize your videos? Not anymore, with our advanced keyword finder, you will get a downloadable list of targeted keywords to optimize your videos with awesome Title, Tags, and Descriptions within minutes only.

Auto-Reply

With our powerful platform, you just need to set-up your template once and your comments will be replied automatically. You can also make generic replies/comments, multiple comments/replies, and delete offensive comments completely hands-free.

Rank Tracking

Track Rankings based on keywords and see how your and other people’s video do over time. This will help you in keeping an eye on trends and know exactly when to take action.

Dashboard

Get detailed and accurate statistics on the dashboard to find the real winner. Re-evaluate your videos and efforts, check for weaknesses, and improve them for HIGHER ranking and more traffic.

And many more other features:

Easily import and manage multiple channels in one click

Automate reply, likes and comments via Auto-reply and Auto-comment template

Manage your videos and playlist with advanced playlist manager

Instantly Search, Upload, Download and Edit Videos in few clicks

Enhance your video rankings by optimizing them with targeted Title, Description, Tags, and Category

Uncover the Exact Keywords You Should Rank For with Keyword Finder & Get The Most Traffic from Your Videos

Instantly Check & Track Your Video Rankings with our special Rank Tracking tool

Phenomenal Link Wheel for multiple videos to increase your YouTube Income

Create compelling thumbnails for your videos and get better engagements

Split videos into smaller parts via splitter to post on FB, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, or anywhere else.

Get detailed analytics reports of ranking, traffic, watch time, clicks, views, likes, comments, share, subscribers, etc. right under one dashboard

Everything you need and more under ONE roof.

YouTubio is a DFY product that can be used in following ways:

Smart Ways To Get More Subscribers on YouTube

How to Get YouTube Videos Ranked

Using the YouTube Trending Feed for Market Research

Affiliate Marketing with YouTube

As it includes Complete & Step by Step Course on:

What YouTube is all about Nowadays

What Business Goals can you accomplish with YouTube

Shocking YouTube Marketing Facts to Consider

That’s not all. The first 50 people will be receiving these additional modules:

1: High Quality Training Guide (Valued at $720)

2: Cheat Sheet (Valued at $20)

3: Mind Map (Valued at $40)

4: Top Resources Report (Valued at $20)

5: High Converting Sales Copy (Valued at $320)

6: 6 Professional Minisites (Valued at $160)

7: Doodle Style Sales Video (Valued at $320)

8: Swipe Emails for Affiliates (Valued at $20)

9: Complete Set of Animated Banners (Valued at $160)

10: Complete Set of Professional Graphics (Valued at $240)

They will also give you their High Quality Training Guide:

An unique and completely updated 102 pages/16900+ words Training Guide full of examples and highly effective and very easy to apply YouTube Marketing techniques.

You will not get a boring PDF full of text with 20-line paragraphs. The training guide also includes graphics, nicely formatted subtitles, and high-quality information with screenshots showing how to apply every step of the process as well.

Check the segments and tips that you will discover after downloading this Training Guide:

Section 1: YouTube Marketing 2020 Basics

Chapter 1: What Is YouTube Marketing All About?

Chapter 2: Creating and Optimizing A Branded YouTube Channel

Chapter 3: Enabling Monetization On Your Channel

Chapter 4: Picking A Profitable Niche And Doing Keyword Research

Section 2: YouTube Marketing In 2020 – Step by Step

Chapter 5: Ranking A Video The Right Way

Chapter 6: Making Money With Direct Affiliate Links

Chapter 7: Using End-Of-Video Calls To Action To Send People To Your Store

Chapter 8: Making Money By Jacking Product Launches

Chapter 9: Making Money By Renting Annotation Space

Chapter 10: Using YouTube To Raise Money With PayPal.Me

Section 3: Advanced YouTube Marketing 2019 Strategies

Chapter 11: Promoting Your Videos For Cheap With AdWords

Chapter 12: How To Find Direct Sponsorship Deals (PowerPoint)

Chapter 13: How To Increase Watch Times, Engagement, and Other Metrics

Chapter 14: Search Engine Optimization Strategies That Make Money In 2020

Chapter 15: Must-Know YouTube Best Practices For Businesses

Chapter 16: Alternative Monetization Strategies To Consider

Section 4: Additional Tips to consider

Chapter 17: Do’s And Don’ts

Chapter 18: Premium Tools And Services To Consider

Chapter 19: Shocking Case Studies

Chapter 20: Frequently Asked Questions

👉VISIT OFFICIAL SITE

YouTubio Review: Is it worth your money?

Are you ready to absolutely dominate youtube for higher rankings, traffic, leads and sales in just minutes from now?

Right on this YouTubio Review page we’re going to provide you a groundbreaking youtube automation tool that will help your videos to climb on the top of youtube, get quality traffic, command better attention, convert visitors into subscribers and sales and ultimately make you big profits.

Amazing right? The thing is when it comes to online marketing, your conversions and sales directly depend on the traffic you receive. More traffic equals more sales, equals more leads, equals more profits.

And nothing is more powerful for traffic than video marketing. With super-fast broadband and the likes of 4G / 5G readily available – along with the popularity of Smartphones – Video is BOOMING!

And now due to pandemic outbreak and country-wise lockdown, the video train is moving even faster, and it’s moving with or without you. And when it comes to successful video marketing, youtube is hot property.

As you can see, YouTube represents the biggest and best opportunity for you to get in front of your potential customers. But it is not that easy as big as youtube is. It seems it presents even bigger challenges for marketers to extract profits from it.

Video SEO Is The Biggest Problem

YouTube Channel Management Is A Pain

Replying And Managing Comments Is Challenging

Tracking Metrics Can Be Daunting

The list goes on and on. All of these are overwhelming even for professional marketers. So we can only imagine how newbies are going to feel and the tools available in the market to help.

Let’s just say that their cost will almost put you in an early grave. So if you don’t have money to burn on expensive complicated software and don’t have time to do every mundane tedious task manually then YouTubio is your solution.

YouTubio is the most powerful advanced all-in-one youtube automation platform to help in getting higher rankings, traffic, leads and sales to any offer in any niche whenever you like.

Don’t worry if you are not very technical, you’ll find that youtubio is easy enough for newbies but still powerful for the most advanced marketers.

With this YouTubio, you can turn youtube into a profit pulling machine and so much more in just three simple steps. Simply log into the dashboard, set up your campaigns and that’s it.

Using this you’ll be able to…

Explode your traffic by ranking tons of videos on youtube.

Save tons of time by extracting keywords to optimize your title, description and tags.

Redirect extremely targeted traffic to any website page or offer you want.

Start seeing traffic flow to your preferred destinations in the same day compete with all the big boys in extremely competitive niches.

Create traffic from scratch with just a few clicks of your mouse.

Spend less than an hour a day to boost your income from youtube

and a lot lot more…

With YouTubio, you could dominate YouTube for sending you free traffic and funnel that traffic right to your sales funnel. This would allow you to build a list, generate leads, and close sales all on the handsfree mode in the present and the future!

With auto-reply, playlist manager, and keyword research, you can point people to your favorite videos that you use to profit. You can get more juice and boost your YouTube rankings while getting more subscribers to your channel.And the more subscribers you have, the more revenue you’ll make!

Just think about it. Having 1st Page Ranker is like having an army of salespeople who go out and bring you more buyers for your products – no matter the niche.

One of the great things you’ll love about YouTubio is that you never have to be on camera. Not one single time.

There are several ways to get amazing results with videos WITHOUT the need to be on camera such as:

Use slides and record yourself talking through the presentation. Then save the video, upload to YouTubio, hit a few buttons to optimize it and you’re ready to start getting traffic.

Or tap into the power of YouTube Creative Commons videos which you download as many as you like from YouTubio. You simply use them, add a call to action, optimize it withYouTubio and you’re off to the races!

So whether you want to appear on camera or just lay in the background, you can start getting traffic and rankings within minutes hands down.

The beauty of YouTubio is that everything is 100% cloud-based.No longer will you have to wait for 100’s of megabytes or even gigabytes to download to your computer. And even once you do, who knows if there will be any compatibility issues?

They’ve taken care of that by creating the best YouTube automation software tool in the cloud.This way, instead of focusing on trying to get the software up and running, you can focus on what really matters.And that’s increasing your profits.

As you can see there is just so much that YouTubio can offer to your business. You can either keep trying to simulate profits from youtube the hard way or you can do it the easy way with YouTubio.

With that being said, no other software app out there can do what YouTubio does especially at a low one-time price which is only available for a limited time.

All other apps out there are charging monthly fees are limited on features and have lots of restrictions, but with YouTubio at just one time ridiculously low payment, you’ll get an advanced youtube weapon that will skyrocket your engagement, leads and sales almost instantly.

Pricing

For a limited time, you can grab YouTubio with early bird discount price in these options below. Let’s pick the best suited options for you before this special offer gone!

Front-end: YouTubio ($37)

Now that we have established that YouTubio is an INCREDIBLE, no-risk, and cost-effective tool to increase your traffic, sales, leads, and profits from videos…for just about any niche you can think of…the next move is up to YOU.

OTO 1: Pro Upgrade ($97)

Advanced Video Splitter App to split big videos in smaller chunks

Share short videos on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat or anywhere you want to grab viral traffic

Super-simple thumbnail creator to create impossible-to-ignore thumbnails for your YouTube videos

Easy-to-use sitemap generator to generate a sitemap of all videos in just minutes

Import and manage Unlimited Channels with just a few clicks

Upload/Manage Unlimited Videos and snag tons of server-melting traffic

Create Unlimited Auto-Reply & Auto-Comment templates for better engagement

Find keywords and track rankings for Unlimited Videos and boost your profits

Details Analytics and Reporting panel to find the real winner

OTO 2: Agency Rights ($167)

You don’t need to pay THOUSANDS of dollars to Designers and Developers, to custom develop a YouTube automation software and then taking months to get it off the ground.

YouTubio Agency Upgrade is a fraction of the cost of doing all of this hard work and effort. This is one of those investments that will quickly pay for itself.

If you want to charge your clients good money and make as much money as possible with the software you just purchased, grab this Agency License Now!

It is a very useful product that has tons of features that makes it something to look out for.

OTO 3: Reseller License ($197)

Sell YouTubio to Anyone you want and Keep all the Profits

DFY Set-up Saving you Hundreds of Dollars

24*7 Software membership and Customer support

Earn Hands-Free Recurring Income

Get 100% Commission on FE and 50% on all OTOs

And so much more…

YouTubio Review Conclusion

Thank you so much for reading YouTubio Review! I really hope it did help you with your buying decision. This system is coming out with many bonuses for the early bird. Take your action ASAP for the best deal.

REMEMBER! If you purchase through my link, you will be supported 24/7; That means you can contact me ANYTIME when you get trouble in using or can not contact with the authors/ product supporters. I will help you RIGHT AWAY!

Besides, if you buy this product through my link, you can also get these huge bonuses below (Please remember that these bonuses are not for the TRIAL or FREE versions):

👉VISIT OFFICIAL SITE

You can have an opportunity to receive extra bonuses if you finish 3 steps below:

Step 1: Order the product by Clicking here.

Step 2: Choose 1 of my huge Bonus Packages below! Remember that you can pick one more bonuses pack for each Upgrade you purchased!

Step 3: After your purchase goes through, email your receipt & your chosen bonuses pack to me at [email protected] so I can confirm your purchase and email you information about how to access to your bonus material.

I Will Always Update New Bonus

Now, Check your bonus below!

»»Plugin Bonus Package««

»»Theme Bonus Package««

»»General Bonus Package««

#YouTubio #YouTubio review #YouTubio oto #YouTubio demo

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blackgirlblues · 4 years

Text

Being A Black Girl: And Chasing Your Dreams.. Yikes.

Hi,

It’s me, your resident black girl back with some new shit to rant about. I’ve been posting a few screenshots of short poems and paragraphs I’ve been writing on my phone as a way to heal and get over Capricorn boy from my last post on here and I see you guys like and reblog. Thank you for showing love, although it makes me sad that so many of you seem to be going through the same range of emotions I am. I’m sorry.

I know it’s a lonely place to be in.

But, on the bright side, I’ve got a lot of new followers joining the diary/manual/rant page that is blackgirlology and it’s nice cause I think it’s becoming a little bit of a community. So, in a way, were never really going through any of these emotions alone. If you’ve found this page-you’re part of a community. Bask in it.

Anyways, that aside, a lot has happened since I last spoke to you. I don’t know if any of you may remember, and for some new people this will be a surprise. But I’m actually a singer songwriter from Ireland. Moved to London a year and a half ago to pursue my music dream and that’s how I met Capricorn boy whos been the source of all my poems.

Throughout this time in between, I’ve been trying to chase my dreams, and chase them relentlessly. and this summer i did just that, let me tell you, what im about to tell you guys, is to put it simply, wild. I’ll just cut to the chase.

It all started in July. I’d been in London for quite a long time now, over a year and now have a manager who’s my best friend first and foremost. We’ll call her Maya. I met her in my first week of moving to London in the student halls I was staying at and we became best friends pretty quick. She studies music business, so it made sense and she just naturally ended up taking up the role as my music manager. Shes seen everything. The songs I wrote about Capricorn boy, the tears, everything. And she saw everything this summer.

I saw an ad for a record label opportunity in London. It was advertised on my university facebook page; a new indie label, looking for demo submissions for a competition they were setting up to find their new signee. I sent a screenshot to Maya who agreed I should send my stuff in. I did, they liked it, I got a meeting, we were sent terms and conditions for the competition. We signed it, the rest was supposed to be history.

Big yikes.

There’s so many layers to this story that I will be shortening it, just because it can get very draining for me to talk about or even write about. I’ve healed from it i think, but I still want to put it here and write it about to finally close that chapter and be done with my feelings about what happened to me and my music.

Basically, the whole competition, the record label, the dickhead CEO, it was all a scam. I had accidentally signed away the master rights to my new song to a record label started by a fake CEO who was committing fraud and known for tricking young artists into handing over their master rights so he could profit off of them, for power.

It was a mess. Another contestant told me and Maya when we were outside of their office. Just minutes before we were under the impression that I was doing an interview for Billboard Magazine. Honestly, I never truly believed it. Shit was too good to be true.

But she told us everything. How he was actually a run away from Spain, where he was caught and exposed for doing the exact same thing to artists there, how he didn’t have any money to fund the competition he had somehow roped all of us into, how he was illegally avoiding paying his team, how none of the creatives we had collaborated with for photoshoots etc were paid, how everything was a lie, how he didnt have any connections, and how he was trying to convince me specifically to sign a 360 deal with his label.

Which, guys, I’m not stupid. After the first week of being with the label for the competition and letting my song live through their disastrous marketing campaign, Maya and I long decided that regardless of what they said, I would not under any circumstances be signing anything with any entity of their company.

After being told the truth, I had to sit down. You see, when I came across this opportunity, I thought this was finally the life I’d been manifesting coming true. I had begun to grow in my spirituality and start journaling, writing down my manifestations, and getting to work with a record label who would later offer me a fair contract before I turn 20 was one of the manifestations I had written down every night before I went to bed. However, what I’d gotten was the exact opposite.

I remember, me, Maya, and 2 of the girls from the competition all stood around in a circle outside of their new office that the CEO also hadnt paid for wondering what our next move would be with this new information. There was still 2 other contestants inside who had no idea what was really going on was an elaborate scam. One of them wanted to go in and expose them on the spot. I said no, we had to go in and pretend like everything was normal until we figured out what to do afterwards.

So in I went, plastering the fakest smile on my face and pretended like I still thought I was about to be speaking with Billboard Magazine. Once I got out, I broke down in Maya’s arms.

I went home to my flatmates, Ellie and Bea and cried for hours before I had to go work a 7 hour shift at a pizza place.

I stayed in bed, and cried, and cried. and cried again. I didn’t get out of bed unless I needed too. The only people I talked too were my flatmates E and B and Maya.

Everything was sorted out eventually, a lot more happened, but as I’ve been writing this article for you guys, I realised that all of that stuff is no longer relevant to my journey and isnt something I want to bring back into my energetic circle because I’ve made peace with the fact that a lot of people who betrayed me when I was at my lowest, peace with the fact that these contestants who wanted to “work together” to get out of this mess, actually wanted to save their own asses and leave me in the cold.

But I still got out of it and I’m still here.

I nearly got sued by a man with less than 20 pound to his company account online, but hey, I’m here.

I guess why I’m telling you guys this really short account of my summer is to both record it for myself but also to say its okay to flop, its okay to fail. I did both this summer. and thank god i did. it was the best thing that ever happened to me.

following your dreams is scary, doing it as a black girl is terrifying because society has already kind of set you up to fail. there’s already misconceptions about what you do, who you are, where you come from and how good you’re going to be at what you do. its almost like we cant fail and we need to work 10 times harder to obtain half of what the average white person will get. and sometimes it can feel like we dont have any space to fail or make mistakes because of this but let me tell you thats not true.

if anything, the universe will put you in places that will force you to grow through the mistakes you make. and thats exactly what happened to me this summer.

i chased my dream so relentlessly i ended up in an environment i thought i manifested, i thought was good for me, only for the universe to show me that that specific environment i’d been wishing to be in is the furthest from what i need right now in my life.

this so called failure showed me that not everybody who smiles can be trusted, and that people can be way more deceiving than i ever thought, especially when push comes to shove and they need to save themselves. you start to see the real them when it starts to get tense. the people who seem to be around you when you’re doing good will most likely dissapear when things start to go south, including some of your oldest friends. you will get radio silence on their end. be upset. cry. but after that be glad that this situation revealed their true colours.

and then never put any more energy into them again.

this failure showed me how fucking strong i am. how resilient and kind i am even in the face of disrespect and actual evil. it showed me how much i can care for someone who i believe is at a risk of losing it all, and showed me that this will not always be reciprocated. and for a while i thought that meant that i had to harden myself up and grow a shell. but i dont think so. i will not allow the things ive been through to make me into a hard person when i was born soft. i mean now, im a little rough around the edges, jagged enough to cut anyone who comes too close with some of that bad energy, but soft enough to hold myself tight and glue myself back together when i need to. soft enough to hold the people who held me this summer. soft enough to help people who i know deserve it.

im a good person in a shitty world, i don’t need to match the world and become a shitty person to survive.

after all of this happened, i stopped writing music.

i haven’t written anything properly or produced anything in months and sometimes i get worried that ive completely lost my talent. but thats another thing that this failure taught me, i can never truly lose whats meant to be mine. i know that i was put on this earth to create change, to inspire, to be an activist and a voice for people who dont have one. i know i was put here to do it through a creative medium and right now i still think that is music.

i think i just need to stop being so scared to start again, to learn my craft again.

i used to be so scared of failure but now i am so thankful for it and the lessons its taught me. i had so much hurt and pain and hatred in my heart for the universe for, in my head, doing this to me. but then i realised that the universe never does anything to you, it does it for you. all of this happened in my best interest and while i definitely didnt understand at the time, i get it now.

thank you universe for the worst summer of my life.

and my black ass will be continuing to chase my dreams relentlessly, failing, tripping and falling on my ass until i get to the very top.

besides, if everything had just gone right, that wouldnt have been very interesting, would it?

#blackgirlology #black girl #black power #black love #black blogger #Black Blogs #music #blog #blogger #journal #journaling #diary entry #diary of a black girl #diary #dear diary #tumblr diary #dreams

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pcnnydime · 5 years

Text

I’m Leaving Tumblr.

Dramatic? Probably, but it’s come to my attention (again, and again, and again) that a great number of people feel uncomfortable in my presence, so I’d rather the title sum up the post. You can read this and try to see things from my point of view, or you can move on with your lives. Either way, I hope this doesn’t cause much drama for anyone not involved, and I hope everyone regardless of involvement has a good day/night.

First, I apologize if this post seems robotic, but after countless anxiety attacks , multiple lost friends, and a few instances of self harm due to everything that’s been happening around me, I find myself lacking the emotional energy to put more ‘pep’ or ‘enthusiasm’ into this post. I’ve been on Tumblr since Red Thread was at its peak, however many years that may have been, and roleplaying, meeting people here, and developing characters that mean the world to me has helped me grow as a person. It brought me out of a near 2 year long depression that included an extremely abusive relationship, being left behind by all my close local friends, and a failed suicide attempt. Writing on tumblr introduced me to my best friend, many dear friends, and my current romantic partner. It’s seen me through a really tough job, two cross-country moves, and some of my worst and lowest points. But with the word ‘racist’ following me at every turn, I no longer feel welcome or supported by what was once my favorite hobby and best coping mechanism.

The reason being labelled a racist has effected me so deeply is because I come from a multi-racial home. I am half Puerto Rican, one quarter African American, and one quarter white. I have tan skin, very hispanic features, and very curly, thick hair with dark brown eyes. I don’t look white. I grew up in a rural area where I was one of very few people of color in BOTH of the schools I attended, and I’ve never lived in very diverse areas in all my 21 years. I don’t believe I was treated any differently because of it, I never had any race-specific issues in my childhood, and I’m very lucky because of that. Sure, I’ve had a few ‘playful nicknames’ but nothing that ever hurt me as much as being bullied about my height, weight, or chest size.

My Grandmother is white and my Grandfather is black - they got together in the 60′s and dealt with a great deal of prejudice and hardship due to being an interracial couple. They and my mother raised me to look past what people look like on the outside - weight, height, gender, age, race, religion - they believe, and I believe that it shouldn’t matter. People should be judged and valued or ignored based upon their personalities. In a near-perfect society, that’s how everyone would feel, but ours is far from perfect. People of color are faced with violence, hate, and even murder on a daily basis all over the world - not just in America - and by no means has it ever been my intent to diminish that, I simply am deterred by conflict because it hurts me to see.

Now that I’ve described myself, the way I’ve been affected, and my views on race and in/equality, I will explain my experience as a “racist”. For months, I’ve been blocked, shunned, and ignored due to this. I spent MONTHS not knowing why people were blocking me, why all of a sudden people I had been writing with and even admired for their graphic and literary skill were suddenly ignoring me and treating me like I was less than a stranger.

Because no one told me.

Not until sometime around perhaps September or October, when someone was finally kind and considerate enough to step out of their comfort zone and inform me that I’d made a comment about Black Panther without thinking about my wording. On Twitter, I said something to the effect of ‘Black Panther has too much black power for me’, something along those lines. What I should have said was: Black Panther was a good movie, and I liked Killmonger as an antagonist until he began building a highly advanced army of thousands of near-superpowered warriors and devastating militaristic technology to declare war on what was clearly intended to be Caucasians as a race. At that point, I became uncomfortable because racial war of any kind isn’t something I would have paid money to see in a theatre, had I known it was going to be included. But I didn’t say that because twitter has a character limit, and I didn’t think anyone wanted to read an entire thread of my review of what was, all in all, an excellent movie.

Another individual recently followed suit and gave me a few more examples of why people believe I’m racist and discriminatory.

1. I’ve used the “n” word on multiple occasions. This is not true. I am incredibly uncomfortable around the use of that word, in any form, even it’s reclaimed version. I don’t like it. I don’t know where or when I would have used it before, but even as someone who is African-American and has multiple African-American family members who say it ‘affectionately’ to refer to each other, I have not EVER said that word. Not as a joke, and certainly not as an insult.

2. I hold people who speak English as a secondary, third, or otherwise language to a higher standard than those who do not.

No. If anything, it’s the opposite. I strongly admire and respect anyone who speaks more than one language, as someone who only speaks English and very broken Spanish. I formerly had an RP partner whose first language is Spanish, and is very proud of their heritage. My father, who I’m no longer in contact with due to estrangement and abandonment, primarily speaks Spanish and I had no quarrel with him because of that. Some contradictory things you may have read can be found here and here. These are screenshots from the rules page on an old blog of mine that I would rather not explicitly name, for the sake of privacy for people who used to interact with me. In these screenshots, I say “[Does] Understand that English is not everyone’s first language. It’s okay if you have some errors with grammar or spelling, as long as you’re making the best effort that you can.” perhaps that can come off as me saying ‘you have to try really hard if you want to write with me’, but in fact, it just meant that I wanted some manner of effort to be present. I.E., if I write 2 paragraphs, at least write one in response, rather than a single sentence. Could I have worded that better? Absolutely. But since realizing that can be perceived incorrectly, I removed it from my rules page entirely to avoid offending anyone.

In the other screenshot, I mention not tolerating anyone who is ‘cis or heterophobic’. This ties back into my ideal of not seeing people for who they are on the outside, but rather, who they are on the inside. I’ve had great friendships with people who were either cisgendered, heterosexual, or both, and it upsets me to see all the jokes about ‘down with cishets’ and the hate that the LGBT+ community sends their way. I understand that being a ‘cishet’ doesn’t put them in any ‘legitimate’ danger like being LGBT+ does, but it doesn’t feel good to be judged for being LGBT+, so it doesn’t seem right to judge ANYONE based on sexuality or gender without personal experience. If someone has been repeatedly hurt, offended, or otherwise wronged by individuals of those designation, I understand, but mob mentalities frighten me.

I’ve apologized for these accusations, and explained my reasoning and my ‘side’ behind them, and there’s one last thing I’d like to address. My being perceived as acting like a victim. This, I can’t contest. Perhaps I have been overly dramatic over this hole thing. Roleplay is a hobby, at the end of the day, and while it may not be a great one, I do have a life outside of Tumblr and Twitter. What I don’t have, however, is friends. My only friends are miles and miles away, and they’re few and far between. The ones I did have began telling me I was a racist, to me, seemingly out of nowhere. I had no clue when these things began to spread because again, I wasn’t confronted. I’ve lost two people I consider to be good friends, and I’ve been doing my best to keep to myself ever since. I stopped reaching out, out of fear that people would find me obnoxious or abrasive, not knowing how far my reputation had spread. The absolute last thing I wanted was to hurt anyone, so when I vented to my friends I asked them not to make a big deal out of it. I didn’t want them with the label as well. I didn’t want to see them ostracized, or to be the reason they lost a hobby they enjoyed. When one of them went against my wishes and said something on their blog, it was deemed ‘public drama that didn’t belong on the dash’ and I was TERRIFIED that they would end up losing the chance to interact with others. Thankfully they didn’t, but that’s the example I have. No, something like that didn’t necessarily belong on the dash, but they were simply trying to look out for me while watching me have an anxiety attack and contemplate dropping all of my muses and completely deleting all social media. I’ve moved twitters multiple times due to trust issues this whole ordeal has caused for my own mental health. I’ve hidden behind locked accounts because the thought of people who are triggered by public drama having to see something of this scale was at the forefront of my mind. In short, if it seemed as though I was playing the part of a victim, it’s because I have, for months, been confused and hurt without understanding what was going on. When I tried to move past it and remedy my mistakes, I was pushed away and hurt even more by people I called friends.

To sum the entirety of this long post up, I’m upset. Far more upset than perhaps I’ve conveyed here, because I’m doing my best to remain logical and fair. I understand why anyone who has heard these things about me would block me and would want to avoid contact - I wouldn’t want to interact with a racist either. But I’m not a racist. I’m not judgemental. I’m open-minded to a fault, it seems, and my ideal of perfect equality is unrealistic in the world we live in full of murder and segregation. If anyone would like to talk to me in more detail about anything they’ve read here, they may do so at my open twitter which is solely for responding to inquiries about my reputation, my tumblr blog here, which will no longer be active, or my personal discord, which is mad dog!#6346 .

There are likely many issues I forgot to address, or simply don’t know about, but I’d like to thank anyone who read this far. Your attention means more to me than I can express.

#racism tw #segregation tw #murder tw #prejudice tw #self harm tw #suicide mention tw #attempted suicide mention #suicide tw #homophobia mention #war tw #anxiety tw #anxiety attack tw #n word mention #n word tw #anxiety mention #supremacy tw

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starco-conut · 6 years

Text

Our Thoughts on Season 3

Hey everyone!! as you may have seen...Alan and I have been just a bit let down by some of the stuff going on. Luckily, we’re both huge ass nerds so we wrote it all out in a multi-paragraph post. With visual aids! if you’ve been feeling a little offput by the new episodes but can’t place why, we probably have your reason put into words somewhere in here.

Reviews, replies, general additions to this post are not only permitted, but strongly encouraged!! :D

bold is nicole. italics is alan

Scent of a hoodie

I mean. one word summary;... Uncomfortable. it was rough to watch my girl obsess like that and honestly??? there was no clear message at the end... with the whole ‘the scent is in ur heart....’ do they mean to imply she’s getting over marco or that he’s always gonna be around in her mind??????????. yeh. not much to say here.

this episode was kind of strange and felt really awkward with star’s obsession with marco but had a sweet ending with star learning that its really unhealthy for her to latch onto marco like this and its time to move on. it felt like one of those iffy episodes throughout most of it but the end was decent enough

Rest in Pudding

Her little monologue to glossaryk was super cute and well done!! that whole bit was just. Good! felt like Old Times! but then there’s

This was... a gag? I dont know. when i saw it first my gut reaction was that they were setting up some angst about how star’s calling people on earth that aren’t her best friend Marco and THAT got me!! i was Ready To Be Hurt by that! but then like...nothing. Unless it comes up in a nearing episode this was just a bad joke. overall episode wasn’t bad at all though!!

i really enjoyed this episode! the pacing, mystery, and comedy all held up to the Star standard and only had a small amount of plot progression which felt appropriate for a halloween episode. my only gripe is that after the whole Battle For Mewni deal, i expected Moon to believe Star a bit more when she says Glossaryck is alive

oh yeah that too for sure

Club Snubbed

pretty much made me want to die and barf simultaneously. when it got to the scene above, where she talked about just needing a friend i thought, hey, thats cool. and accurate. maybe that dance scene clip, since its unfortunately not a flashback, is going to be presented as platonic!

nope. anyone in for a suicide pact?

To be fair, i should elaborate. Tomstar, in theory, is super cool. I definitely vibed with the fire and butterfly magic mix happening, back when I thought it was a flashback. But...Its been, what, 5, maybe 6 episodes since marco left and she’s already just...whoop? who’s marco? haha what? There’s not enough time.

And from what I can tell, none of their old issues have been addressed. Tom still has anger issues, but because ‘its hard’ and he’s ‘trying’ suddenly star’s all over him? sleazy ppl come to their exes like ‘i’ve changed!!’ for a reason. the ex should actually. want. to see. change. Star seems content to say ‘fuckall, tom’s here, why not’

WHICH..could actually be good? If it’s presented that way? My hope is that she’s latching on to Tom because they have history, and a bond already. Marco’s gone suddenly, she’s urging for somewhere to direct her affection- lord knows the sweet girl has lots to give. and then they’ll part as friends after she realizes whatever they are now is unhealthy and ingenuine romantically. I have no backing for this and honestly it doesn’t look like that’s the way they’re going but... I’m gonna hope.

this episode definitely throws a spin on our view of tom as an “uncaring, lying, manipulative ex boyfriend” and for the first time i felt like i really saw Tom Lucitor, a boy with anger issues and an unfortunate history with his actions. i was really glad to see this character growth for him but i feel like the writers completely skipped over the real impacts that a relationship like tom and star’s had on each other.

yes!! i didn’t say but, i kinda love tom as an independent character. his anger issues are presented as a part of his personality, he is a guy who has anger issues, not Anger Issues in a physical form. lots of cool depth on that.

realistically, star would not immediately fall back in love with tom because...why would she? we as the viewers know that Tom has changed but to Star? he has a significant history of lying to manipulate her and marco to get closer to them and star doesn’t have a real reason to believe what he’s saying is true and she shouldn’t have 100% faith in him so quickly especially when she had 0 trust in him just a few minutes prior. overall i was impressed with the development for tom but the future implications were disappointing to me

i will be talking more about my issues with Star and her trust issues later.

Stranger Danger

My only issue with this episode is that it doesn't exist outside of its own ten minutes. I literally forgot about it til i looked up an episode list of s3 to write this post. Eclipsa is sitting there, queen of darkness, in the same castle grounds as star, and shes nor the trial is brought up in the subsequent episodes. Alan goes wild on this one so I’ll let him take it away- he’s 100% on point here.

THIS IS A LONG ONE BOYS, STRAP IN,

i agree with nicole here, there is no buildup to the immense revelation that eclipsa is free and roaming the castle gardens. battle for mewni had planted the seed that eclipsa was breaking out but there was no mention of this in any other episode. and then there’s this:

what was this all about?? did no one notice that Eclipsa, the Queen of Darkness, one of the most powerful queens and magic users in Mewni’s history, and a wanted criminal, was FREE FROM THE CRYSTAL THEY FROZE HER IN?? And in BFM, Moon even visits Eclipsa’s crystal prison to check if she’s still there but now? she didnt seem worried about it AT ALL. only when Star is peacefully talking to her does Moon and the magic high comission show up because...plot reasons.

aside from that, however, i feel like the pacing in this episode was not planned very well. from the opening scene of Star taking care of Glossaryck for well over 4 minutes, it felt like this was going to be a fun silly episode with general shenanigans (there’s nothing wrong with silly episodes, it just didn’t end up being one). but halfway through the episode, eclipsa shows up and suddenly the plot is moving at a rapid pace. and while this felt like it should have been the climax of the 11-minutes, the climax just continues? there is no falling action in this episode. it continues with star being decontaminated and at one point she is strapped to an examining table and flashes through some disturbing faces

why is she smiling? who drew this? this feels really creepy, like someone is putting their kinks into the show and its really uncomfortable to watch and think about. there is a heart touching moment with Moon and Star talking about their actions and both side have somewhat understandable reasons, though star clearly has the show’s bias so the plot progresses (which is not necessarily a bad thing). afterwards, Star meets Eclipsa in her cell and still, the climax of the episode has not fallen at all with all the arguing. and then finally when star confronts eclipsa in her tower, she says,

“Just because i didn’t want you crystalized again, doesn’t mean i trust you.”

????

She literally has no past with eclipsa other than having a pleasant conversation with her. She knows next to nothing about her actual actions or personality but immediately doesn’t trust her? but in Club Snubbed she immediately trusts tom? the guy who directly had severe negative impacts on her life?? Why?! Why are the writers so inconsistent? nothing makes sense! It’s cheap, forced romance that’s why!

and after this ridiculously long climax the episode just ENDS. there is no resolution, and it doesn’t touch on it again anywhere in the next four episodes. It’s bad show writing.

Demoncism

I picked this screenshot because it was the most disgusting!!! this is just...more of an opinion here but I really like the trope where one is out of their mind, dangerous, causing magic destruction and the other defies the risk and holds them, curing the issue with The Power Of Love. it’s corny but I love it. and yet.

here. they decided to just. chuck it in. I’ve seen shows do this trope Very Very well (oddly, one example i can think of also involves a wild demon kid and a forest in blue fire.....) but to just...throw this in there. with. like 8 seconds of buildup. n-o. no. ESPECIALLY because tom and star, where they are currently in the show, aren’t ready to be romantic, and this trope always has romantic implications.

i got extremely mixed feelings from this episode. on one hand it had a great message that you shouldn’t force change but rather to grow naturally and learn from your mistakes. on the other hand, a lot of it is still tainted by this cliche, boring, romance. Star immediately barges in and claims that he’s only doing this for her and generally is untrusting of his actions.

......

are you noticing a common theme here? writers purposefully twisting characters’ interactions for the sole purpose of causing drama? give me one good reason for star’s sense of trust to be flip-flopping like this over and over again. im being serious, if you even read this far, leave a reply and call me out because i CAN NOT THINK OF ONE GOOD REASON.

“Okayy, but no tickling.” Again, more creepy bdsm, moving on.

Then later when hes doing that whole floaty, blue veined, writhing scene i will actually commend the writers for making a very good analogy of how painful and unhealthy this process is for tom to quickly force himself to change. then star comes back and hugs him and says shes here for him which would have actually been a very sweet moment if they had just been friends but of course, they’re not. its just a reminder that “uwu they’re in love now”. and then there’s this:

confirmation that yes, the show is going to do that. rush star and tom’s relationship bc #teendrama. and the worst part of it is: star and tom could actually have been an acceptable, if not role model relationship if it wasn’t written so poorly, which is what the next paragraph or so is dedicated to.

I don’t hate Tom and Star’s relationship. I don’t. i see it as a missed opportunity. Tom and Star were two people who used to be a couple in the past and broke up for reasons unknown. we can speculate that it was because of Tom’s anger issues and problems with lying, and also Star’s inability to deal with complex situations and face her problems. THIS IS AN INCREDIBLY COMMON REAL LIFE SITUATION. This was a ripe opportunity to go in-depth with Star and Tom’s issues, not just their own but also the issues between them. and it is wasted. I know that its hard to fit this into one measly episode but there’s a whole half season to develop them at a proper, realistic pace! i wouldn’t care if the entire season is dedicated to Star and Tom working to solve these issues if it meant we had this enormously important topic resolved in a healthy and wholesome manner.

But the problem is, none of this happens. And it’s not going to. The writers completely skip over all of Tom and Star’s anger towards each other and go straight to “UWU THEYRE IN LOVE NOW”. Star is just rebounding off Marco and onto Tom and there’s going to be more unnecessary drama, and someone’s going to get hurt.

And I am disgusted.

Sophomore Slump

jarco saved this ep ? the only parts of it i could really relax and enjoy was the little jarco montage it was cute. and then. and THEN. the random dumping. I get what the writers were trying to say, y’know? ohohohoh, nudge nudge, we all know who marcos REAL best friend is...hohoho...except. they shouldnt have. said it. at least not via jackie. She was used in this disgustingly common way where she’s just there to deliver a message and help marco realize something. do y’all realize the most drastic adjective i can apply to her realizing she+marco wont work is like....”bummed”. It’s realistic to cry, to be fucking mad, to show...FEELING...i don’t care how cool and chill she is. It’s an absolute travesty to her to not let her be upset about it.

AND THE CAPE. it was obnoxious, I hated his attitude about it, not because it was annoying but because he expected others to stop ‘acting weird’. I had hope when jackie knocked sense into him but then he...was then REWARDED for his obsession with it? He ended up getting what he wanted, a ticket back to Mewni, by being a stubborn arse about it. no.

god where do i begin. alright.

Marco was so out of character this episode. im not talking like “he isnt the safe kid anymore he takes some uncharacteristic risks”. no. I don’t know who this kid is but it is not Marco Diaz. He’s some plot device created by the writers to create drama. Why is he so obsessed with his cape? Why is he forcing his experience on mewni into every conversation? Why. Is he. The Croissant Girl. The dude spent over sixteen YEARS in other dimensions going on quests of epic scale and comes back home without a single issue readjusting. Not one word. but then he spends one week in the butterfly castle and serves essentially no purpose the entire time other than freeing Star from her chains one time. He was completely and utterly unimportant in the grand scheme of the BFM movie. and then he comes back to earth and feels this great pride as if he was some great part of the event. Why? what does he have to be proud of? there was no mention of this development in any of the earlier episodes. and i havent even mentioned the ridiculous forced breakup yet.

at some point it seems like Jackie’s words really do come through to Marco. He snaps out of his daze and seems to genuinely want to make it up to her. the scene with Marco and Jackie having a fun date at the pier was incredibly sweet and was generally a good experience. We got to see more of Jackie’s fun side that we were desperately searching for in season 1 and the first half of season 2. it was very satisfying to know that jackie was a character everyone would eventually come to love. but then

that. Why? Why has Marco not moved on at all and learned his mistakes? why does he not understand that he’s being destructive. why do the writers like creating unnecessary drama. you know what show had a very similar plot issue and resolved this properly??

That’s right! Everybody’s favorite racist, ableist, offensive, generally unfunny show: The Big Bang Theory. I don’t even remember this dude’s name but when he came back from space and was being annoying, his girlfriend talked to him and he realized that “WOW IM ANNOYING LET ME THINK ABOUT OTHER’S FEELINGS FOR ONCE.”

100%. if they had stopped with the callout via jackie, and he had actually taken off the cape, I would have been fine. lesson learned. but, obviously, they didnt do that.

If this show (which has an incredible track record for doing crappy show writing) can get it right then why can’t Star vs the Forces of Evil? A show that is usually praised for it’s amazing talent for intelligent, easy to understand, and great moral messaging?

Because of the writers. They don’t want to teach important messages for these kids (the target audience may i remind you) to latch on to and learn from. They want to write their angsty fanfiction and throw it into canon.

Nicole-TL;DR my lasting hope is star’s affections for tom are, and are revealed as such, a way to cope with going cold-turkey on marco and things resolve without a stupid fucking love triangle also jackie and janna start dating. aaand im just. disappointed with the show rn. something’s different and after shoving this amazing ass show in everyones face for so long just to see it kind of...well, it’s starting to peel. idk why. but im just hoping this is like...banagic incident but...several episodes long.

Alan-TL;DR

#svtfoe #star vs the forces of evil #star butterfly #marco diaz #alan #nicole

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marcomguys-blog · 4 years

Text

Why Manual Link Building?

Manual link building is a procedure of actively increasing links pointing to your website. It has been put to the test many times and has emerged stronger and more relevant.

Every website that is at the top page for years now, has achieved it by working smart, by building natural manual links. This article will help you know why manual links deliver quality and long term results and the different strategies that will work in 2019 and beyond.

Why Manual Link Building is Important?

Before we move onto the different strategies that should be a part of your digital marketing campaign, lets first know why manual link building is essential.

By now, you might be questioning yourself what is manual link building and may have already looked upon a few videos. Creating manual links is harder in 2019 but not impossible. It is one of the essential parts of the digital marketing campaign that increases your website traffic and rankings.

Google keeps flipping the coin and the techniques that work today might be spam tomorrow, but same is not the case with manual links. They are still the driving force of search traffic and high rankings.

The end result of manual link building is not only increased traffic and high Google rankings but also increased sales. It focuses on relevancy, unlike some black hat SEO techniques which can help you get traffic but not conversions.

You might be surprised seeing the screenshot below about the results that appear for ‘build links’ and ‘buy links’.

For a successful digital marketing campaign, natural manual links is a must. Do not get carried away with any black hat SEO techniques for temporary results, rather focus on natural link building for long term results.

Importance of Content Marketing

Content marketing for most companies is an integral part of the digital marketing campaign and no longer be set aside as an entertainment factor. The aim is to add value to the reader through blog posts, storytelling, infographic, or articles.

Content marketing focuses on:

Convincing your target audience of the value of service/product you are offering

Finding new clients

Retaining old clients

The best part about content marketing is that it can generate thrice as many leads as regular marketing campaign. Content marketing is preferred because 70% of people would instead learn something new from an article than a regular advertisement.

Where is content marketing required?

Branding and PR

Search engine optimization and link building

Inbound Marketing

Key figures used in content marketing are:

Visitors

Length of stay

Reach

Conversions

Leads and orders

Always remember, useful content is the centerpiece of any marketing campaign.

Manual Link Building Strategies

Any type of natural link building was blooming until Google started penalizing websites for unnatural link profiles. This was not the fall of manual links but low-quality links and the rise of high-quality links.

Below mentioned are the natural link building tactics that help you get quality links for your website.

1. Suitable Blog Comments

Blog comments are still powerful and a valuable way of getting links to your website as

long as they are from relevant and high authority websites. The comment you put on a blog should be relevant to the content.

You can not comment on any website that does not curate its comments and has lots pointing to another random website. It will not do any good to your website. Google does not like low-quality irrelevant links from sites with low domain authority, so ensure to stay away.

Your aim should be to provide value to the readers of the blog. Google likes blog comments that are done manually, relevant, with correct spellings and grammar.

According to Google’s Link Schemes, manual and quality links are a must. It includes forum comments with optimized links in the signature.

2. Valuable Press Release

A press release is an either make or break manual link building strategy. Ensure you create this write up only when there is something authentic and newsworthy to announce. Abusing this technique can make you fall into the pit.

When used smartly, this is one of the essential link building tactics. Just like the link building techniques, when used incorrectly, this strategy can cause you troubles. Do not consider a press release as a link building tactic but a medium to help readers discover something new.

When a press release adds value to the reader, traffic, clicks, visibility, and social shares will follow naturally.

3. Guest Blogging

This has been a hot topic for a while now, and some people also considered these links as spam. Guest blogging, when done correctly, is an essential strategy of manual link building. Matt Cutts, former head at Google webspam said that guest blogging abuse will be punished.

Here, we are talking about authoritative guest blogging, quality content creation as an essential part of content marketing and not just short sentences and paragraphs influencing the rankings.

While considering this strategy, you need to focus on quality content, keep the reader in mind, count comments, and social shares as content success and not just links. Keep guest blogging as a technique to increase your website awareness rather than just links. When done smartly, it can prove to be successful.

Your digital marketing strategies are on the right track when you focus on quality and relevant content.

Building Quality Links Require Manual Efforts

Link building and SEO are directly related to a successful digital marketing campaign. In 2019, securing meaningful links requires you to put manual efforts. No manual promotion means you are letting links slip through your fingers.

Links still hold an important place in Google’s search algorithm and also essential to rank. Links do not only offer marketing value but also:

Creating new online connections

Referral traffic

More access to your site

Branding value

Natural link building cannot be automated because it requires:

Relevance

Relationship building

Critical thinking

Human creativity

Strategic promotion

Human interaction

Audience Research

Humans build real links and these are the types of links Google wants you to value.

Manual Links will always be alive in SEO

Links are a part of a larger marketing cycle. As long as you require your brand to be marketed, you will require manual links. Other marketing tactics will also be required, but without natural links, these will be wasted.

Even if Google and other search engines alter their algorithms, real links will still be significant to the web. Contrary to your belief, Google doesn’t make links valuable but the value links make them worthwhile. Links are the heart of the Internet without which it would be impossible to navigate the web, and this is not going to change in 2019 or beyond.

Manual link building will continue to be valuable and should always be considered in your digital marketing campaign.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Is link building still alive in 2019?

Link building is relevant in 2019 and ranking your site without links is certainly challenging. Links are the search engine’s number one ranking factor.

Good backlinks from a high authority website will not only give you ranking in the SERP but also massive traffic to your website.

2. What does link building mean?

Link building involves strategies to get a link to your website or page from another website by promotion. The main purpose of link building is to get traffic to your website, increase rankings and conversions.

3. When should you use a no follow link?

The nofollow tag allows a website to add the link that restrains from being a vote by the editor. Using the nofollow tag is safe when you buy link because you do not want it to be counted as a vote by the search engine otherwise you may be penalized.

4. How do backlinks help?

Backlinks are an important part of SEO. These help the bots to crawl on your website and rank it correctly as per the content quality. Every backlink is a part of the ranking puzzle and this is why the owner wishes to get as many as possible for improving its rank.

Many people get fooled by black hat SEO techniques that provide them temporary results. Switch to manual link building and enjoy long term results. We hope to have helped you understand this concept well. If you have any doubts, leave it in the comments section below.

#manual link building service #manual link building

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suzanneshannon · 4 years

Text

WordPress Block Transforms

This has been the year of Gutenberg for us here at CSS-Tricks. In fact, that’s a goal we set at the end of last year. We’re much further along that I thought we’d be, authoring all new content in the block editor¹, enabling the block editor for all content now. That means when we open most old posts, we see all the content in the “Classic” block. It looks like this:

A post written on CSS-Tricks before we were using the block editor.

The entire contents of the post is in a single block, so not exactly making any use of the block editor. It’s still “visual,” like the block editor, but it’s more like the old visual editor using TinyMCE. I never used that as it kinda forcefully mangled HTML in a way I didn’t like.

This is the #1 thing I was worried about

Transforming a Classic block into new blocks is as trivial as selecting the Classic block and selecting the “Convert to Blocks” option.

Select the option and the one block becomes many blocks.

How does the block editor handle block-izing old content, when we tell it to do that from the “Convert to Blocks” option? What if it totally screws up content during the conversion? Will we ever be able to switch?

The answer: it does a pretty darn good job. But… there are still issues. Not “bugs” but situations where we have custom HTML in our old content and it doesn’t know what to do with it — let alone how to convert it into exactly the blocks we wish it would. There is a way!

Basic Block Transforms

That’s where this idea of “Block Transforms” comes in. All (well, most?) native blocks have “to” and “from” transformations. You’re probably already familiar with how it manifests in the UI. Like a paragraph can transform “to” a quote and vice versa. Here’s a super meta screenshot of this very paragraph:

Those transforms aren’t magic; they are very explicitly coded. When you register a block, you specify the transforms. Say you were registering your own custom code block. You’d want to make sure that you could transform it…

From and to the default built-in code block, and probably a handful of others that might be useful.

Back to the built-in code block.

Which might look like:

registerBlockType("my/code-block", { title: __("My Code Block"), ... transforms: { from: [ { type: "block", priority: 7, blocks: ["core/code", "core/paragraph", "core/preformatted"], transform: function (attributes) { return createBlock("my/code-block", { content: attributes.content, }); }, }, ], to: [ { type: "block", blocks: ["core/code"], transform: ({ content }) => createBlock("core/code", { content }), }, ], ...

Those are transforms to and from other blocks. Fortunately, this is a pretty simple block where we’re just shuffling the content around. More complex blocks might need to pass around more data, but I haven’t had to deal with that yet.

The more magical stuff: Block Transforms from raw code

Here’s the moment of truth for old content:

The “Convert to Blocks” option.

In this situation, blocks are being created not from other blocks, but from raw code. Quite literally, the HTML is being looked at and choices are being made about what blocks to make from chunks of that HTML. This is where it’s amazing the block editor does such a good job with the choices, and also where things can go wrong and it can fail, make wrong block choices, or mangle content.

In our old content, a block of code (a super very important thing) in a post would look like this:

Sometimes the block conversion would do OK on those, turning it into a native code block. But there were a number of problems:

I don’t want a native code block. I want that to be transformed into our own new code block (blogged about that here).

I need some of the information in those attributes to inform settings on the new block, like what kind of code it is.

The HTML in our old code blocks was not escaped and I need it to not choke on that.

I don’t have all the answers here, as this is an evolving process, but I do have some block transforms in place now that are working pretty well. Here’s what a “raw” transform (as opposed to a “block” transform) looks like:

registerBlockType("my/code-block", { title: __("My Code Block"), // ... transforms: { from: [ { type: "block", priority: 7, // ... }, { type: "raw", priority: 8, isMatch: (node) => node.nodeName === "PRE" && node.children.length === 1 && node.firstChild.nodeName === "CODE", transform: function (node) { let pre = node; let code = node.querySelector("code"); let codeType = "html"; if (pre.classList.contains("language-css")) { codeType = "css"; } if (pre.getAttribute("rel") === "CSS") { codeType = "css"; } if (pre.classList.contains("language-javascript")) { codeType = "javascript"; } if (code.classList.contains("language-javascript")) { codeType = "javascript"; } // ... other data wrangling... return createBlock("csstricks/code-block", { content: code.innerHTML, codeType: codeType, }); }, }, ], to: [ // ... ], // ... }

That isMatch function runs on every node in the HTML it finds, so this is the big opportunity to return true from that in the special situations you need to. Note in the code above that I’m specifically looking for HTML that looks like <pre ...><code ...>. When that matches, the transform runs, and I can return a createBlock call that passes in data and content I extract from the node with JavaScript.

Another example: Pasting a URL

“Raw” transforms don’t only happen when you “Convert to Blocks.” They happen when you paste content into the block editor too. You’ve probably experienced this before. Say you have copied some table markup from somewhere and paste it into the block editor -— it will probably paste as a table. A YouTube URL might paste into an embed. This kind of thing is why copy/pasting from Word documents and the like tend to work so well with the block editor.

Say you want some special behavior when a certain type of URL is pasted into the editor. This was the situation I was in with our custom CodePen Embed block. I wanted it so if you pasted a codepen.io URL, it would use this custom block, instead of the default embed.

This is a “from” transform that looks like this:

{ type: "raw", priority: 8, // higher number to beat out default isMatch: (node) => node.nodeName === "P" && node.innerText.startsWith("https://codepen.io/"), transform: function (node) { return createBlock("cp/codepen-gutenberg-embed-block", { penURL: node.innerText, penID: getPenID(node.innerText), // helper function }); }, }

So…

Is it messy? A little. But it’s as powerful as you need it to be. If you have an old site with lots of bespoke HTML and shortcodes and stuff, then getting into block transforms is the only ticket out.

I’m glad I went to WPBlockTalk and caught K. Adam White’s talk on shortcodes because there was just one slide that clued me into that this was even possible. There is a little bit of documentation on it.

One thing I’d like to figure out is if it’s possible to run these transforms on all old content in the database. Seems a little scary, but also like it might be a good idea in some situations. Once I get my transformations really solid, I could see doing that so any old content ready-to-go in the block editor when opening it up. I just have no idea how to go about it.

I’m glad to be somewhat on top of this though, as I friggin love the block editor right now. It’s a pleasure to write in and build content with it. I like what Justin Tadlock said:

The block system is not going anywhere. WordPress has moved beyond the point where we should consider the block editor as a separate entity. It is an integral part of WordPress and will eventually touch more and more areas outside of the editing screen.

It’s here to stay. Embracing the block editor and bending it to our will is key.

What are we calling it anyway? “Gutenberg” doesn’t seem right anymore. Feels like that will fade away, even though the development of it still happens in the Gutenberg plugin. I think I’ll just call it “the block editor” unless specifically referring to that plugin.

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holytheoristtastemaker · 4 years

Link

A post written on CSS-Tricks before we were using the block editor.

This is the #1 thing I was worried about

Transforming a Classic block into new blocks is as trivial as selecting the Classic block and selecting the “Convert to Blocks” option.

Select the option and the one block becomes many blocks.

Basic Block Transforms

From and to the default built-in code block, and probably a handful of others that might be useful.

Back to the built-in code block.

Which might look like:

The more magical stuff: Block Transforms from raw code

Here’s the moment of truth for old content:

The “Convert to Blocks” option.

In our old content, a block of code (a super very important thing) in a post would look like this:

Sometimes the block conversion would do OK on those, turning it into a native code block. But there were a number of problems:

I don’t want a native code block. I want that to be transformed into our own new code block (blogged about that here).

I need some of the information in those attributes to inform settings on the new block, like what kind of code it is.

The HTML in our old code blocks was not escaped and I need it to not choke on that.

Another example: Pasting a URL

This is a “from” transform that looks like this:

So…

I’m glad to be somewhat on top of this though, as I friggin love the block editor right now. It’s a pleasure to write in and build content with it. I like what Justin Tadlock said:

It’s here to stay. Embracing the block editor and bending it to our will is key.

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recruitmentdubai · 4 years

Text

WordPress Block Transforms

A post written on CSS-Tricks before we were using the block editor.

This is the #1 thing I was worried about

Transforming a Classic block into new blocks is as trivial as selecting the Classic block and selecting the “Convert to Blocks” option.

Select the option and the one block becomes many blocks.

Basic Block Transforms

From and to the default built-in code block, and probably a handful of others that might be useful.

Back to the built-in code block.

Which might look like:

The more magical stuff: Block Transforms from raw code

Here’s the moment of truth for old content:

The “Convert to Blocks” option.

In our old content, a block of code (a super very important thing) in a post would look like this:

Sometimes the block conversion would do OK on those, turning it into a native code block. But there were a number of problems:

I don’t want a native code block. I want that to be transformed into our own new code block (blogged about that here).

I need some of the information in those attributes to inform settings on the new block, like what kind of code it is.

The HTML in our old code blocks was not escaped and I need it to not choke on that.

Another example: Pasting a URL

This is a “from” transform that looks like this:

So…

I’m glad to be somewhat on top of this though, as I friggin love the block editor right now. It’s a pleasure to write in and build content with it. I like what Justin Tadlock said:

It’s here to stay. Embracing the block editor and bending it to our will is key.

The post WordPress Block Transforms appeared first on CSS-Tricks.

source https://css-tricks.com/wordpress-block-transforms/

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