#it's not something i seek out fanworks for but if i happen upon it i can enjoy it

[cozylittleartblog]

What do you think of Tasque and Queen being together? :0

i do not mind that ship, I think it's cute :>

[luulapants]

Goncharov (1973) is a perfect example of how fandom creates a shell around a piece of media and then slowly erodes the core it was originally built upon.

I have been in two fandoms that echo chambered their way to a theory invalidating all of canon, thereby making the source material itself irrelevant. One is the “Scott is an unreliable narrator” theory from the Teen Wolf fandom, which uses an odd POV choice from the series finale (the protagonist telling the story of their final battle to a character in a flash-forward) as evidence that the entire SHOW is actually him telling a heavily edited version of the story to make himself look like the hero. The other is the “Ghostfacers Effect” from the Supernatural fandom which also uses a weird POV episode (told through camera footage from a ghost hunting crew) to argue that, because the characters swear (bleeped out) in that episode but nowhere else in the series, this is evidence that the whole series is censored and edited by the author/God Chuck.

Both fandoms had animosity between fans and show creators, especially from queer shipping bases. Both have a huge amount of fanworks for those ships, and both experienced the “fandom echochamber” effect. Reinforced by positive responses from those seeking fluffy, kinky, self-insert, or otherwise wish-fulfilling stories, popular fanon characterizations slowly drifted until many fanworks featured characters virtually unrecognizable as their canon counterpart.

These drifts are addressed differently throughout fandom: Most people look at it and say, “No, that’s not canon, but it’s fun to read sometimes anyway,” or “This is just my headcanon.” Fanfic readers who never watched the source material are oblivious and perpetuate fanon characterizations as canon. Canon lovers decry the OOC-ness and complain that they can’t find fics about the actual characters they want to read about.

And some start arguing that fanon is actually more correct than canon.

Thus, the erosion of canon begins. “These episodes don’t count because the head writer was garbage.” “They made the character act like that to advance the plot - they wouldn’t have actually done that.” “Everything after this season is basically a different show.” “This happened off-screen but the network was too cowardly to show us.” And, finally, “Canon isn’t real.”

There is no canon. It’s a fanon shell wrapped around a desiccated center.

It’s Goncharov (1973).

Why do we need a source material? Canon isn’t real!

No shit canon isn’t real. It’s a fictional show.

You can’t argue the objective reality of a fictional story.

“But what’s the truth?”

None of it. None of it is the truth. It’s about werewolves. It’s about a gay angel. It’s not real.

You can argue objective reality in real-life historical accounts, analyzing sources and biases and excluded viewpoints. In a fictional story with an unreliable narrator, you can argue about what the text of the narration reveals about them. But there is no argument to be had about the objective reality of a fictional character. They are the text. Everything else is interpretation.

Why can’t your interpretation be what it is: an interpretation? Why can’t your headcanon be a headcanon? Why do you feel the need to saw the ladder off from underneath you? Why does fanon need to be more “true” than canon? Why would you rather have a fandom built on nothing than a fandom built on a text that disagrees with it?

Goncharov (1973) is the perfect canon because it will never disagree with fanon. It has no voice to do so. It is the perfect void that people have been trying to carve into their respective canons for years.

As Andrey said before his final betrayal, “You once told me you built your empire from nothing. You can’t get something from nothing, Goncharov. And so I fear we are nothing.”

[alpaca-clouds]

Respectability Politics suck

Okay, let me talk about respectibility politics and why they suck. The face eating tiger party is gonna eat your face, believe it or not.

And hey, this is a topic that even concerns fanwork and shipping and all of that.

I understand that to many Respectability Politics is a word that gets thrown around a lot, but from what I see a lot of people are not quite sure of the exact meaning.

So, basically Respectability Politics is when a marginalized group tries to police parts of their own culture to be more accepted by the majority culture of whatever country they life in. While not the origin of this, the most classical example of this is queer folks trying to push other queer folks into going into more normative, nuclear families. To further the narrative of "we are not so different from you, love is love!" As such quite a few aspects of queer culture (like cruising, for example, but also ballroom culture and such) were socially frowned upon from those queer folks who were trying to seek acceptance by the majority culture.

Which is exactly also what is happening with those queer folks, who try to exclude trans people. and Those trans people trying to exclude non-binary folks. And trans medicalists, and so on and so forth.

It is also seen within general feminism - where this always has been a big thing. "Sure, I want voting rights, but do you really have to wear trousers?!"

Of course this extends to every other marginalized group. My white ass does not have the right to talk about Black civil rights for the most part, but just think of those people who would go "that is not how you ask for it" when it comes to Black Lives Matter and the like.

Or, for example, in the Disability Rights groups, where some people are trying to exclude some other folks. Or are pushing for a "everybody should want to be healed" narrative.

It really is all around.

We see it within fandom culture, too. The entire "proshipping"/"antishipping" thing expesically nothing but Respectability Politics. Be it respectability politics for fandom culture - or for queer culture, because both things are so closely related.

But the thing is this: No matter how much those people pushing for Respectability Politics do that... they will never be accapted by majority culture. They will be used as pawns for those more right leaning folks on the side of the majority culture to go: "See, even the XY agree with us. It is just XY extremists who see it differently and extremism is bad actually!" But make no mistakes: If those right leaning folks manage to push for laws against any minority group, those laws will be acted out against EVERYONE within that minority group, not just the "deviants".

Because here is the thing: the people who think of queerness as something bad and unnatural, will not leave you alone just because you and your gay husband/wife mime a nuclear family perfectly. They will still hate you, vandalize your house and what not. They might just go for the more "deviant" queers, first.

So, yeah. Fuck Respectability Politics. They do not get you anywhere. And when you need to give up part of yourself and your culture to be accepted, you are not accepted at all.

[henshengs]

About Rule 63 fanworks

I was asked yesterday to elaborate on my genderbend opinions, as a trans person, which I’m happy to do, and I’ve thought about it a bit today to make sure I’m not saying something off the cuff and not thought through. Still, this is a sensitive, complicated topic, and I’m open to discussion on it.

This also got long, so I’m putting it under a cut.

So, obviously I can’t speak for all trans people. No minority group is a monolith in our opinions and this is particularly the case for the transgender community because our experiences are so very diverse and individual.

I am very rarely hurt or offended by genderbends/genderswaps/rule 63 fanworks. I know people for whom this is not the case, and I believe the pain involved is very real. The thing is... living in this world is inherently kinda painful when you’re trans. This world’s not built for us. All kinds of random things can cause me pain throughout my day. Store mannequins. My own reflection. Lesbian poetry. Pictures of other trans people. When something triggers my dysphoria or feelings of alienation, I have to stop, acknowledge the feeling, and then consider whether the thing is, outside of hurting me, contributing to the ignorance of and hatred of people like me by its very existence.

I don’t think the basic act of asking, “What if this character who is a cis man, was a cis woman instead?” does that. I think if anything, it opens the door to then ask “what if he was a trans man? Or a trans woman? Or nonbinary?”

Asking “what if this story was about a cis woman” lets cis women talk about their experiences and see themselves in stories, something I think is valuable! and also can lead to stories exploring sexism and misogyny, things which affect all trans people too!

In the rest of this post I’m going to use the terms “rule 63″ and “genderswap” to refer to the act of creating a fanwork changing a cis/presumed cis man to a cis or not-specified-to-be-trans woman, because this is the vast majority of the work under that label, because most fictional heroes and iconic characters are cis men, and because people who create cis man->trans woman or cis woman->trans man content, in my experience, usually use terms like “trans headcanon” instead.

(A lot of rule 63 fanworks don’t explicitly specify that the now-female character is cis. We can presume that most artists aren’t even thinking about the possibility of the character being trans, but we can presume that for 99.99% of all art, anywhere. It’s not a unique evil of rule 63.)

The claims that rule 63 is inherently transphobic, rather than just something where it’s good to be extra careful to avoid transphobia, as far as I’ve seen, use two arguments: A) that making the character a cis woman is wasting an opportunity to make them a trans person, and this is transphobic, and B) that rule 63 fan art is gender essentialist and cissexist, because it ties gender to physical characteristics.

Argument A doesn’t hold up for me, 

because couldn’t one then say that reimagining an abled white cis character as an abled white trans woman is racist and ableist? that reimagining them as an abled trans woman of color is ableist? No transformative reimagining can cover every identity. We say “write what you know” and talk about Own Voices, and that includes cis women who want to write about the experience they know. 

It’s also not fair to tell trans people that we must always think about trans experiences, even in our fiction. A lot of the time we don’t want to have to write or think about dysphoria and discrimination and we want to live in the heads of cis characters or even just characters whose AGAB is not mentioned! 

And it is also, imo, not a great idea to pressure people who may not be educated about trans experiences to write about trans characters just because they want to explore sexism or write about lesbians. 

many, many trans people first begin exploring their gender identity through creating cis rule 63 content, because it’s ‘safer’ than directly engaging with trans content.

With argument B, I agree that a lot of rule 63 art looks like this

and this sucks. To me, though, it’s important that it’s not the genderswap aspect that makes it suck. Artists who do this are also designing original characters with sexist, gender essentialist designs. Artists who don’t draw sexist art in general, also don’t draw sexist rule 63.

(yes, I know She-Hulk is not a rule 63 of regular Hulk. But you guys know the kind of art I’m talking about.)

I’ve also noticed a genre of fanfic that’s like, “if these characters were girls, they’d be sensible and conflict avoidant and none of the plot would happen!” or “what if these violent, tragic male characters were Soft Lesbians who braided each others’ hair” and again, I assume these authors write canonical women the same way. The genderswap part isn’t the bad part, the sexism is. 

Non-sexist rule 63 actually, in my opinion, fights gender essentialism and cissexism. When a character is exactly the same except for the ways a gender essentialist world has shaped and pressured them based on their AGAB, that’s a strong statement on the constructed nature of gender! 

But the argument that making /any/ change is gender essentialist, is... I understand where it’s coming from. I am a trans person who presents androgynously and I am a hypervisible freak because of it. I would love to live in a society where visible gender markers weren’t a thing! Unfortunately, we don’t live in that society. We live in one where we are constantly under pressure to conform to one of two profiles. There are almost no gender non conforming male characters in popular media. And changing a gender conforming cis man into a gender conforming cis woman seems to me to be a neutral action at worst. Not to mention characters from historical canons, who would be under a ton of pressure to conform. 

For physical body type characteristics... 65% of all speaking roles in Hollywood are cis and male. It’s harder to get statistics on other forms of media, but it’s undeniable that overall, most stories are told about cis men who do not have breasts or wide hips. Changing the story to be about a cis woman who has those features is introducing more diversity! 

I typed “rule 63″ and “genderswap” into the tumblr search bar today, and I saw a lot of art of women with a variety of aesthetics and body shapes and characteristics, who looked like people I’d see out at the mall.

Again, I sure do wish we lived in a post gender society. But we don’t, and in our society, everyone, myself included, looks at a picture of a person and gender categorizes them based on appearance. It is not wrong for someone to draw “Geralt the Witcher as a hot butch woman” and give her some physical markers generally agreed upon to denote ‘butch woman’ rather than ‘gender conforming man’ to tell the viewer that that is what they have drawn. Just as it is not wrong to draw “my OC who is a hot butch woman who fights monsters” and give her those markers. 

Finally, both arguments against genderswaps are, in my opinion, flawed because they implicitly posit the act of creating fanworks of the original, cis male gender conforming character design, as neutral. I think this is incorrect. I think that if you’re going to argue that drawing a cis male character as a cis woman is transphobic, you have to also argue that drawing the character as a cis man is transphobic. But I’ve only seen people do this when a trans headcanon becomes extremely popular in a fandom.

Again, I’m just one person. I’m also biased, because firstly, as I mentioned, rule 63 doesn’t usually trigger my dysphoria; secondly, I almost always come down on the side of “don’t limit what people can explore in fiction; ask them to explore it more sensitively or with more content warnings instead.” 

I definitely encourage creators to seek out and listen to a variety of trans opinions. But this is mine: I love rule 63, I make a lot of it myself, and I think if no one created it we’d lose something awesome. 

At the end of the day, what I really want is more trans content*, but I’d rather have cis rule 63 than just stories about cis men. 

Also: I personally have nothing against the terms genderswap or genderbend. I don’t think it reinforces the gender binary to acknowledge its existence by saying you’re ‘swapping’ the character from being cis with one AGAB to being cis with the other. But I can definitely see the argument against it, so I don’t blame anyone for going with rule 63 instead.

If you made it this far, thanks for reading; I hope you have a nice day, and have fun creating and consuming the fanworks your heart desires. I’ll end by linking this comic, which is just eternally relevant.

(*by which I mean: trans content created by other trans people, that matches my hyperspecific headcanons, likes and dislikes, and doesn’t set off any of my often changing dysphoria triggers. See what I said at the start, about transgender existence being constantly mildly painful. There are many awesome aspects to being trans! This is one of the less awesome.)

[unsoundedcomic]

^^ Anon: Hi! This latest chapter looks *awesome*, and I'm excited to read more. One of the fanworks contest entries and some recent asks got me wondering: How discrete/continuous are memories when they're broken down on entry into the khert? My memories bleed into each other - blowing out birthday candles runs into cutting a cake runs into eating cake. Would this be one memory, three, infinity, or something in-between? Are they purely emotional impressions, or is there a max/min 'length' limit?

The memories as catalogued by your brain and the memories as stored in a Kasslynian’s perfect soul are not the same. One is subjective and the other is objective. Brains are primarily interested in keeping us going from day to day, seeking patterns beneficial for survival, repressing undesired memories, rewriting others to better suit our tastes.

Kasslynian souls use the physical senses to record memories as they happen, the way they are. You’re a little walking recording studio making the movie of your life.

Without getting too into the mechanics of this because thar be spoilers here, the two systems are separate, but imperfectly enmeshed. Dreaming brains can stumble into the soul, and the soul can be stained by strong emotional impulses from the brain. This latter is what taints so many of them into negative and positive memories, forming the fault lines that shatter lives upon death and scatter them. The conscious brain is walled off from accessing the mnemonic information in the soul; it’s like a metaphysical third side of the normally two-sided brain, but one with its own very specific concern.

There’s some really curious questions raised by all this, but I can’t answer them yet :) But the khert - or at least the designer of this system - wanted actual data more than he wanted how you feel about the data. He wanted to know the colour of your birthday candles more than how happy you were to blow them out. Still, that puff of air may have wound up with a mind of its own and become a tiny squish one day. The khert is a jungle, the things happening inside of it may not have been foreseen.

[cruelfeline]

While most clones are probably going to try and stick to primes ways, I could see a few trying, a bit to enthusiastically, to mimic etherian customs as an attempt to prove they're not a threat. They'd get things almost right. Or they'd do things correctly but not understand why, like keeping something not because it's something they particularly like, but because they saw an Etherian do the same thing. Or they'd insist on eating Etherian food before their bodies can handle it.

I can definitely see this happening, anon!

Personally, I like to headcanon/categorize clones into three general classes when thinking of their initial post-Prime behavior. Well, four, I guess, if you count "remarkably well-adjusted." But for those who have behavioral pathology, three:

Class I describes a clone who employs what I like to refer to as the "Hordak Technique" for dealing with Prime's absence: cling to his teachings as much as possible and maintain a safe distance from others via aggressive behavior. These clones tend to be aloof, standoffish, and may become violent depending on individual circumstances. They are resistant to change. Some may be holding out hope that Prime will return and thus maintain certain behaviors to appeal to him. Others are just lost and frightened, and they employ anger and aggression to combat that fear. The challenge in handling these clones is clear: they are simply difficult to bond to and may even be dangerous in some instances. Hordak, upon landing on Etheria, is a good example. So is how I predict Yudi will be.

Class II describes clones that are neither aggressive nor overly eager, but rather those that maintain a very blank affect and essentially withdraw into themselves as a defense against the trauma they've experienced. Some of this is a sort of continuation of Prime's teachings, while some of it is a kind of extended emotional shock. These clones can be challenging to handle because they are the ones least likely to voice their own needs; rather, they end up masking hunger and exhaustion and illness until it becomes an emergency. Most clones, I think, will fall into this category: distressed, but quiet. For caretakers, they are less difficult to deal with than class I clones given the lack of rudeness and aggression, but they pose the challenge of really being able to assess how they're doing. They may be fairly pliant and cooperative, but also hard to read.

Class III describes the sort of clone you're thinking of, anon: enthusiastic, willing, nigh-on friendly individuals who take to their new lives with gusto. They're cheerful, helpful chaps who partake in Etherian customs and behaviors whenever they have a chance... even if they don't really want to. They maintain a happy expression and seek only to assist their caretakers and new friends, but beneath this jolly attitude is the same loss and confusion that their other brothers are experiencing. These clones mask in this fashion largely out of a sense of duty to their hosts (throwing themselves into the idea of "if I'm useful, I'm good," displacing from Prime to Etherian) and out of a need to belong. Cut off from the hivemind and from Prime's false facsimile of love, they react by grasping onto any bond they can, even if they feel the need to throttle their pain to do so. These clones can be, counterintuitively, very difficult to manage because they, like class II's, will mask their pain but seem fine while doing so. While a class II clone is withdrawn and silent and clearly needs care, a class III will look to be adjusting very well to their new life while suffering within. Whereas, for example, a class II clone might not tell anyone they are hungry and thus need closer assessment, a class III clone will eat, but as you say: they'll eat something because they think they should, even if it makes them sick or is unsatisfying, solely to please their hosts. They thus escape closer assessment while actually needing it.

Wrong Hordak actually strikes me as potentially this type of clone, and I've seen this portrayal of him in various fanworks: happy to help, seems to be adjusting splendidly, but actually hurting very badly inside.

...anyway! I don't know why I wrote all of that. It's probably weird that I have clone classifications. Oh, well!

[absynthe--minded]

You’ve maybe posted about this already, but what are your thoughts about denethor? (Since my feelings about Denethor and his kids have evolved as I have aged, and I’m interested to hear your take)

Oh.

Oh boy.

Okay.

I think all perspectives on Denethor (and on all controversial characters) have a space in fanwork, even when I’m frustrated by them or find them inaccurate to what I observe in the text. This might get heated but it’s not an attack, you know? also I’m going to be discussing my read on canon as opposed to what I think the Objective Facts of the text are - there’s different ways to interpret this stuff and this is only mine.

That being said.

Denethor, by my reading, is incredibly abusive, and his dignity and his intelligence and his admittedly impressive ability to resist Sauron don’t change that.

When we see Denethor in The Return of the King, he’s in the depths of an incredibly bad depressive episode that’s bringing out the worst in him. I think it’s important to note that he wasn’t not depressed before - Finduilas’s death broke him, in a very real and measurable way, and we’re told that he responded to this by alternately lashing out at and loving his sons. I think it’s interesting that Boromir and Faramir fit the golden child/scapegoat model we see in a lot of parental abuse situations, right down to the fact that Faramir seems to know that his failures as a military commander wouldn’t have been criticized to hell and back if Boromir had been the one failing. It’s not the existence of bad results that Denethor is unsatisfied with, it’s the one getting the bad results.

I think Denethor is threatened by a change in the status quo, too - he and the other Stewards are essentially absolute monarchs in all but title and they have less check on their power than the former Kings did, and if Aragorn comes to the throne he loses that power. I’d go so far as to say his political ambitions would have been a major check to Aragorn’s aims even without Sauron and grief fucking him over - back in his youth, he was jealous of “Thorongil”/Aragorn-in-disguise for how highly esteemed the man was, so I get the sense he was a bit of a schemer who knew what he wanted and that Finduilas was a supporter of his aims. He perceives Gandalf as a threat, and Gandalf is kind to Faramir, which only increases his frustration with the designated scapegoat child.

I don’t personally have enough attachment to Denethor to be too annoyed with what was done to him in the Jackson RotK - in that film he’s a metaphor for the old society that must be changed or removed for any lasting healing to come, and he serves that purpose well. And - here’s the controversial part - I don’t actually think his abuse of Faramir was invented for the film? It was more explicit, but it’s still there.

like - let’s take a look at the text:

‘As the dark drew on I knew that haste was needed, so I rode thence with three others that could also be horsed. The rest of my company I sent south to strengthen the garrison at the fords of Osgiliath. I hope that I have not done ill?’ He looked at his father.

‘Ill?’ cried Denethor, and his eyes flashed suddenly. ‘Why do you ask? The men were under your command. Or do you ask for my judgement on all your deeds? Your bearing is lowly in my presence, yet it is long now since you turned from your own way at my counsel. See, you have spoken skilfully, as ever; but I, have I not seen your eye fixed on Mithrandir, seeking whether you said well or too much? He has long had your heart in his keeping.

‘My son, your father is old but not yet dotard. I can see and hear, as was my wont; and little of what you have half said or left unsaid is now hidden from me. I know the answer to many riddles. Alas, alas for Boromir!’

‘If what I have done displeases you, my father,’ said Faramir quietly, ‘I wish I had known your counsel before the burden of so weighty a judgement was thrust on me.’

‘Would that have availed to change your judgement?’ said Denethor. ‘You would still have done just so, I deem. I know you well. Ever your desire is to appear lordly and generous as a king of old, gracious, gentle. That may well befit one of high race, if he sits in power and peace. But in desperate hours gentleness may be repaid with death.’

‘So be it,’ said Faramir.

‘So be it!’ cried Denethor. ‘But not with your death only, Lord Faramir: with the death also of your father, and of all your people, whom it is your part to protect now that Boromir is gone.’

‘Do you wish then,’ said Faramir, ‘that our places had been exchanged?’

‘Yes, I wish that indeed,’ said Denethor. ‘For Boromir was loyal to me and no wizard’s pupil. He would have remembered his father’s need, and would not have squandered what fortune gave. He would have brought me a mighty gift.’

For a moment Faramir’s restraint gave way. ‘I would ask you, my father, to remember why it was that I, not he, was in Ithilien. On one occasion at least your counsel has prevailed, not long ago. It was the Lord of the City that gave the errand to him.’

‘Stir not the bitterness in the cup that I mixed for myself,’ said Denethor. ‘Have I not tasted it now many nights upon my tongue foreboding that worse yet lay in the dregs?’

This is an abusive interaction. This is abuse, as I read it. Dismissal, mocking of the child’s interests, public reprimand with no care for who’s watching, confirmation that yes actually I would rather you have died, and even some DARVO (Deny Attack Reverse Victim and Offender) going on at the end where Denethor turns on Faramir for bringing up the fact that he’s responsible for Boromir’s death. At no point does he apologize, at no point does he admit that he was wrong to do this, and at no point does he ever recognize that he’s been treating his younger son like garbage because it’s easier than dealing with his complicated emotions regarding his wife’s death. Denethor is laying the destruction of all Gondor on his son’s shoulders for no reason other than “you did something I don’t like and I know I’m right about what’s going to happen.”

It’s not his fault he’s grieving, it’s not his fault he’s being attacked psychically by Sauron. It is his fault that he’s not wise enough or kind enough to recognize his actions are still his responsibility. Look at Frodo, look at Boromir, hell, look at Sméagol - they’re all impacted by Sauron, and all of them ultimately still claim responsibility for their actions in some capacity and make at least token efforts to fight back. Denethor doesn’t do that.

Ultimately I can’t like somebody who’s that way, you know? I respect that he went through a lot, I recognize his grief and his growing stress and despair at his attempts to protect his people, but you can’t just let all that misery rot you, you have to fight back.

[writeangstime]

Writing tips: Group therapy

The interesting notion I noticed about fiction and fanwork that while the first one is almost swamped with the ideas of group therapy (and relations that are developed on them), the fanmade works somehow completely skip the subject. There is no surprise that the focus might be on a different part of matter, but at the same time, when I started to participate in one, I just realised how distant it is from the fiction I saw and how little information are there - I didn't know about rules, how it works and to be honest, everything felt weird when I came in.

Now the issue is also that the is no one definite kind of "group therapy" - the vast difference there might be even inside the one place, not to say about different kind of therapies (there is a huge difference between alcohol addiction therapy and psychological issues therapy), different places (the attitudes in prisons or the behaviour in hospital wards) or even the kinds of therapy itself (one can be more like a workshop and one can be conducted with very strict rules). There are also cases where society groups play important parts, like religious or race ones. I can tell only about my experience and don't treat it like a basic on every continent. But remember that these are genuine rules and tips I have encountered, so don't treat this as an only and true option.

HOW DOES IT LOOK LIKE?

FIRST MEETING - ESTABLISHING THE RULES AND THE GROUP SQUAD

It might sound a bit weird, but the group therapy starts with a set of rules that everyone attending on the therapy should understand and accept for everyone to work together. Also there can be also the matter of the group itself - people should be more or less the same when they meet on the whole meeting. It is hard to tell it for sake of different types of meeting, but if you work through the very important matters, the best would be to stay around the same people all the time - because when you learn to open, you also learn to open to matters of others and trust them with the things you are going to say. So in those moments, especially when you pay for it, you can expect that the circle of attendands would be the same.

1. You don't know others and they don’t know you

This is probably pretty obvious, but when you are there, you shouldn't even know the surname of the other people. Even more, you shouldn't be with the person you know in there - if you meet or know each other outside this place, one of you should go to the other therapy if this is possible. The reason is simple: in there you know about the problems that could be really changing when it comes to other's personal life, and that can turn your relation completely. What was also said to us, we shouldn't meet with others outside the therapy.

It comes for two reasons why this was laid out in the matter like that - first, we weren’t supposed to discuss what happened on therapy and there was an option that we would do this because the situation would just be too tempting. Second, there are many people who have a complicated situation when it comes to attending to psychological help - they can't always say that their mental problems are serious enough to seek help because they wouldn't be accepted by the close ones. So they, by no means, should be even showing that they know you if this would be a problem for them. This is also something that psychologist would do - they won't initiate contact with their patients upon stumbling on them, as well as they won't meet with the patients in private for a year after finishing the therapy, once again for safety reasons.

So the essence of this point is that the less you know your group partners on the personal note, the better it would be both for your mental health safety and personal one.

2. Everything you say in there is a secret

Of course, there is not a way this would be a lawfully sanctioned, but if you return home, you shouldn't speak about what happened in the therapy. Even more, you shouldn't be speaking at all about other people problems. Of course, once again it is connected with the safety because there is no way of telling who can know the people that are attending with you on with the group, so talking about the problems might actually point about someone's life to the people who know him, and at the same time spilling the same secrets.

Also, the matter would be about the simple human decency because this is the moment, where people trust you about their secrets they can't share with their friends and family, but at the same time, you just go around saying it about them. I guess that you also wouldn't be too happy if you learned that someone spilt about the secrets you have told someone in confidence.

3. You don't get late and don't drink and eat

This can be said about everything important in the human relations, but here is another matter that can be pointed out - when you come late, you can be surprised that people are already in the middle of an important exercise or deep into the conversation that is hard for them. So usually that kind of meetings requires being on time or informing about being late so they can wait for you.

The other matter can be said about eating up the stress and negative emotion - we use to do that when we don't feel well or we are stressed, so this is a way to avoid so that you focus only on what is happening (and that there is some kind of culture in that as well). Of course, you can eat and drink during the break, but while you listen or speak, you just stay focused and skip that for later.

4. Talk about your feelings

Of course, you are encouraged to talk, not only about your own problems but also give support to the others, but in that matter, there is always encouragement to speak from your own experience, using also phrases like "I feel that...", "I think that this matter...". You know that they could share and gain from your opinion and feelings, but saying about your feelings aloud can help you in setting them right also for yourself.

These are, of course, basic rules and there is no way that every group therapy in the world looks like this. But these regulations were also made for your help and I hope that if you are going to write something on this subject, you will have more information now. Just remember - there would be a lot of stress at the beginning, no matter how accustomed people are.

[what2finish]

Creator Post: Rudearrow

Rudearrow’s WTF Creator Post (Auction #1001, #1002)

Creator’s previous works: Here!

Link to GDrive Folder of WIP Summaries/HCs/Plot Bunnies Creator is Offering: Here! 

you can contact the creator before bidding at:

email: rudearrow@gmail.com

Likes:  fantasy au, sci-fi au, plotfic/casefic, found family, Redemption Arc With Hard Work, Demonstrating Contrition, and Learning to Love Yourself(tm), wingfic, lesser known pairings and characters, crossovers, whacky ideas taken seriously, whacky ideas taken whackily, bdsm

Do Not Wants: no non-con, torture, incest, or underage. no harder kinks, ie: scat, waterworks, gore, etc.

Preferred Charities of the creator: Any

Full Charities List

___

Auction #1

Type of fanwork: fanfiction

Fandom: Marvel, DC, Stranger Things, Game of Thrones, Supernatural, Mo Dao Zu Shi/The Untamed, (honestly, just email me if you like my writing... if I know your canon, I'm probably down)

Pairing(s): I'm a multi-shipper who loves underdog/rarepairs, existing WIPs are for Winterhawk, Winteriron, Winterironhawk, Robb/Theon, Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington/Dean Winchester. Platonic/grey-ace pairings welcome!

Character(s): there isn't a character from any of the canons listed that I won't write

Rating: General, Teen, Mature

Marvel WIPs:

Crimson & Clover: Urban Fantasy AU; 616 Clint & Bucky, endgame Winterhawk. Clint Barton has finally done the Right Thing(tm) and left his life of petty crime with Cirque du Nuit behind him. He’s got a GED, a bow, and coffee- and not much else. In the process of rebuilding his life, he runs into a not-so-tall, dark, and handsome stranger. Literally. He thinks a spilled latte and a bump on the head will be the end of his encounter, but with each successive run-in, he realizes that maybe luck just isn’t on his side and outrunning his past might not be in the cards after all. Current WC: 15k.

Half-splitting the Problem: Winteriron canon reversal! Feared dead after an attack on his convoy in Afghanistan nearly three months ago, the CEO of Barnes Industries has once again defied expectations. Having survived the attack and his subsequent captivity by the terrorist organization, The Ten Rings, James ‘Bucky’ Barnes has returned to American soil and turned his company upside down. Tony Stark, a young man from humble means with few options, has been working his internship with SI R&D for nearly a year now. He’s noticed activities that can only be described as ‘iffy’ at best, but with a boatload of student debt and a work history peppered with reprimands and missed deadlines he’s decided to keep his head down for the almighty dollar and hope for the best... Until he stumbles across Obadiah Stane’s personal project. Current WC: 1.5k

Seraphic (Hallowed Incorporeal Entities) Liaison Division, AKA: S.H.I.E.L.D.: Winterironhawk wingfic! Bucky Barnes has been assigned a new Seraph partner and he’s not happy about it. Tony Stark is that  Seraph and while he’s not thrilled either, it really is a lot of fun to push Barnes’s buttons. Clinton Francis Barton, unbeknownst to him, is their first assigned charge. And honestly? He could use all the help S.H.I.E.L.D. can spare. Current WC: 3k

Misadventures in Solitude: Clint Barton-centric, fwb Winterhawk, open to endgame romantic Winterhawk, alternative Clint pairing (except Nat. Sorry, for me they are always platonic soul mates), and/or poly. Just a day in the life of Clint Barton, coffee-riddled, exhausted corporate cog. He did all the “right” things- went to school, got a decent white-collar job, moved to the big city- so why is he so unhappy? And lost. Except, shit... he’s actually lost. Where the futz is he? Current WC: 1.5k

Part I:  The Space Between Us: 616 Winterhawk; Space! Kidnapped Clint! BDSM. This is technically part one to the fic I finished a few months ago on my linked Ao3, Show Me the Miles. Bucky has been chosen for the “away team”, as Stark likes to call it. While Bucky is bored almost to tears watching Stark and Rogers schmooze with extraterrestrial royalty, Clint is snatched while on a milk run mission back on Earth. Bucky, suffice it to say, doesn’t exactly take the news well. Current WC: 5.5k

Marvel HC:

Fairytale Winteriron AU: Bucky/Tony Bucky is a sprite with moth wings. Tony is a sprite with butterfly wings. Their peoples have centuries of animosity and sharp words for each other. Then ‘the fire(fly) nation attacked’ and [choose which one here] is injured, only to be saved by the other! Begrudging friendship and appreciation turn into more. Endgame is sprites in love. \o/ 

Completion WC Estimates:

Crimson & Clover, Estimated 40k+ upon completion. 

Half-splitting the Problem, Estimated 15-20k upon completion. 

Seraphic (Hallowed Incorporeal Entities) Liaison Division, AKA: S.H.I.E.L.D., Estimated 20k+ upon completion. 

Misadventures in Solitude, Estimated 10k+ upon completion.

Part I: The Space Between Us, Estimated 15-20k upon completion.

Fairytale Winteriron AU HC, Estimated 15-20k upon completion.

GOT WIP:

Manual for Spaceship Westeros: Robb/Theon; Space Colony Au! There is tension between the loose planetary alliance that calls itself Westeros. Robb Stark, as the only full-blood Stark son of age, is sent to negotiate a stronger alliance with Iron Born, a terrifying clan who has made a small water planet habitable through the genetic modification of its ancestors, sweat, and blood. Robb arrives to seek an audience with The Greyjoy and make his offer- the hand of his sister Sansa. But The Greyjoy deems this insufficient and Robb quickly finds himself on the offering plate. Current WC 2k.

Completion WC Estimate: 20-25k

Stranger Things & Supernatural: 

Billy Dean Was My Lover (working tongue in cheek title): main pairing Steve/Billy (possibly Steve/Billy/Dean?); Billy/Dean; crossover plot-ish fic! When his dad called and ordered Dean to pack up Sam then head for the Midwest, he didn’t ask questions. Apparently, strange things were happening in small town Indiana; which was usually a Winchester’s bread and butter. Yet even Dean and Sam aren’t quite prepared for the kind of strange Hawkins has, especially with John failing to meet them at the town’s motel. But there was something even more surprising than the super-powered teenage girl and a whole new world of monsters... 

Hearing the name of Dean’s tape-swap penpal out of some preppy, polo-wearing guy’s mouth. Current WC 1k.

WILDCARD, AKA: ANY HC/PROMPT FOR THE ABOVE PAIRINGS AND FANDOMS LISTED.

If you like my writing but aren’t into the WIPs here, I will write a fic that is a minimum of 10k for any character, ship, platonic pair, for any of the fandoms listed above. I’m also happy to write for material/canon I know but that isn’t listed above. If I know it well enough, I’ll write it for you! (Exception being RPS.) Just message me if you’re curious and I’ll confirm that I’m familiar with the source material. :)

Starting Bid: $10

Creator Notes:

Like my fellow mod, Mei, I am willing to work my winner's likes into my stories and am open to brainstorming sessions!

Feel free to email me to learn more about any of the WIPs stories and if you like, I will give you my Discord handle. I am willing to work with my winner's pairings as long as they don't fall into my DNWs. For Marvel the only two pairings (of the ones I am most familiar) that I just cannot see romantically/sexually are Clint/Natasha and Bucky/Steve.

Current Bid Spreadsheet: Here.

Please check what the current bid is at before bidding.

Bids might take a few minutes to load.

Bidding ends on November 28th 11:59:00pm CST. The highest bid before that deadline will win the auction.

Bidding Form: Here.

Please check the Bid Spreadsheet and bid higher than the previous bid.

You will not be notified if you have been outbid. Only the winner will be notified after bidding ends.

___

Auction #2

Type of fanwork: fanfiction

Fandom: Marvel, DC, Stranger Things, Game of Thrones, Supernatural, Mo Dao Zu Shi/The Untamed, (honestly, just email me if you like my writing... if I know your canon, I'm probably down)

Pairing(s): I'm a multi-shipper who loves underdog/rarepairs, existing WIPs are for Winterhawk, Winteriron, Winterironhawk, Robb/Theon, Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington/Dean Winchester. Platonic/grey-ace pairings welcome!

Character(s): there isn't a character from any of the canons listed that I won't write

Rating: General, Teen, Mature

WIPs/Prompt:

Literally the same as Auction #1!

Staring Bid: $10

Creator Notes:

Like my fellow mod, Mei, I am willing to work my winner's likes into my stories and am open to brainstorming sessions!

Feel free to email me to learn more about any of the WIPs stories and if you like, I will give you my Discord handle. I am willing to work with my winner's pairings as long as they don't fall into my DNWs. For Marvel the only two pairings (of the ones I am most familiar) that I just cannot see romantically/sexually are Clint/Natasha and Bucky/Steve.

**In the unlikely event that both winning bidders want the same fic and you don’t want any of the other WIPs listed, I will offer up a fic of equal or greater length for whatever HC you desire. Within, of course, the same DNW parameters listed above. This includes the Wild Card option!**

Current Bid Spreadsheet: Here.

Please check what the current bid is at before bidding.

Bids might take a few minutes to load.

Bidding ends on November 28th 11:59:00pm CST. The highest bid before that deadline will win the auction.

Bidding Form: Here.

Please check the Bid Spreadsheet and bid higher than the previous bid.

You will not be notified if you have been outbid. Only the winner will be notified after bidding ends.

[jyou-no-sonoko19]

~*~Fic Titles Meme~*~

Thank you to @singofsolace​ and @edenevanson​ for tagging me! \(^u^)

I’d like to start by saying that I have but seven works on Ao3, which sounds bonkers since I’ve posted about 100k words in the past few months. That of course being because Answers for Mary is a 80K word behemoth. And I wonder... if I should consider the titles of those chapters... when I answer this? (the chapter titles aren’t actually on Ao3, they’re ***tumblr exclusives*** fsr)

1. How many titles are you happy with?

I am pretty happy with the titles I make. They do perhaps suffer from flowery pretentiousness at times (or at least I fear that such is the case), but I do still like them. I try more than anything to evoke a mood with a title, and I always want it to come from someplace authentic inside of me.

2. How many are…not great?

To be honest... when I started Answers for Mary, the entire purpose of the piece was wrapped up in that simple desire for justice, set ablaze by the agony of Part 3. Yet as time has worn on, I have come to feel the title inadequate, especially for where the story sits now. Unfortunately, it’s way too late to do anything about that now, even if I do have a few ideas. It’s already out there, the name will stick, simple as it is. Ah well.

3. How many did you scramble for at the last minute?

I guess Is This A MemeLord or a MemeLady? may have been a bit of a scramble. I wanted something to sort of refer to the ‘Is this a pigeon?’ image macro, and that was the best I could do. I just wanted to get it posted, because it was a half hour piece of nonsense for @alexusonfire​!

4. How many did you know before you started writing/creating, or near the beginning?

Answers for Mary, really. The title was pretty much the mission statement. 

5. How many are quotes from songs or poems?

None. It’s kind of a rule I’ve set myself, to only draw from inside of myself for titles... pretentious as that might sound! I don’t want to reach to anyone else’s work to convey mine. If I’ve managed to write a fic, I should also be able to title it, in a matching tone.

(And I dearly hope that doesn’t sound dismissive of folks who use a lot of song titles, because it’s absolutely not meant! Though honestly I hardly ever know they’re song titles unless it’s stated. ^^; )

6. How many are other quotes?

Sometimes I like to draw a piece of dialogue or just general prose from the piece itself, if I feel like it effectively characterises the piece. That’s true for quite a few AfM chapters, and also the Zelda-in-Japan short, It Can’t Be Helped, Really (the ‘really’ isn’t actually said, but in another line of dialogue, the Japanese equivalent, “Shouganai, desu ne?” is used).

7. Which best reflects the plot of the story/content of the fanwork?

Uhh... my titles do suffer from a tendency towards abstraction, but aside from the obvious Answers for Mary, I think Chasing Out The Chill is a fairly straightforward plot summary, where you’re talking about visiting a hotspring in the winter.

8. Which best reflects the theme of the story?

You know, I really do like the vibe of the first two fics’ titles, An Imposition Upon Her Tragedy and Lost In The Ruins, the pair of shorts which explore what would have happened should Zelda have been in town during the events of The Missionaries, were she to seek out ‘Ms Wardwell’ for additional aid.

9. Which best reflects the character voice of the story/pov of the fanwork?

It Can’t Be Helped, Really. It’s both a quote and also the emotional thrust of the piece, and Zelda’s viewpoint throughout, as regards the situation with Edward’s marriage and Diana’s pregnancy.

10. Which is your favorite title?

I do really like And Reality Tore Like Tinfoil, because it’s so visceral, the feeling and sound of doing that to tinfoil, and the terrifying concept of that applying to reality itself. Though I think An Imposition Upon Her Tragedy would come second, I’m just really fond it the wording.

Thank you, this was so much fun! I by far prefer memes about my creative pursuits over those requiring me to expose my personal self! Sadly I think everyone I’d tag has been tagged already.

[bigskydreaming]

I am so endlessly tired of being told ‘comics aren’t real’ and ‘these characters aren’t real’ and ‘don’t be so angry about things that aren’t real.’

Because I’m aware of that, thanks, but the part so many people seem willfully determined to ignore is that our attitudes towards and about these stories and our reception of them and the works we create based on them...ARE REAL.

And they very much DO matter.

So when I make a ranty post like the one this morning that’s gotten me blocked by a couple of accounts because I apparently lessen the gravity of abuse by applying it to ‘characters who aren’t real’ and don’t understand what abuse really is....

Let me spell it out as clearly as possible, since apparently this isn’t as obvious as I thought:

Posts like that, my anger about that, at the end of the day its not even ABOUT Dick Grayson or any other fictional character, who I’m aware isn’t real, yes. The thing I’m TRULY angry about is the normalization of abusive behaviors and dynamics in regards to any one character. Because whenever it becomes deemed acceptable and no big deal for one specific character to frequently be written as accepting his own siblings’ reasons for hitting him and deeming them justified and making no attempt to defend himself or ask for apologies.....AND for this to become so normalized in a fandom’s eyes that the vast majority of commenters on scenes like this don’t even blink an eye at it, its not even worth a mention in their overall reaction to the chapter.....

THAT IS THE NORMALIZATION OF AN ABUSIVE DYNAMIC.

And I do happen to take any and all discussions of abuse very VERY seriously, thanks ever so much, which is WHY I make posts like the one in question, and WHY I’m so heated in them. I’m not actually defending the CHARACTER, when I make them. Even if he’s the proxy for the discussion, the catalyst for it. If I don’t say anything about being bothered by that trend in various writings around his character, both canon AND fanworks....I’m perfectly aware that he, the fictional entity, will not be any worse off should the trend continue, for however long it does so.

Ultimately, my reason for saying these things isn’t about the character, its about the fandom and the people in it. Anyone who’s grown accustomed to not thinking there’s anything noteworthy about the kind of dynamic I’ve described, that there’s no reason it should be regarded as toxic and criticized as such. Even though the alternative is tacit agreement that its acceptable.

THE IDEA THAT THIS KIND OF DYNAMIC IS AT ALL VIEWED AS ACCEPTABLE AND NOTHING ABOUT IT NEEDS OR BEARS ADDRESSING....

THAT IS WHAT HAS ME HEATED WHEN I MAKE THESE POSTS AND BUST OUT THE ALL CAPS.

Stories are just stories. I’m a writer. I get that, thanks. Totally with you, 100%. They’re not real.

But the ways they affect us very much ARE real. The ways we react to them ARE real. The ways they inform our own behaviors, the ways our behaviors inform them, and thus from there are often passed on to other readers where they potentially inform their own behaviors in certain ways....real, real, real and real.

So no, at the root of it all, I’m not upset when I read a story where a close friend or family member hits Dick and he just takes it as his just desserts....because I wish I could hold him and give him an ice pack and tell him otherwise. When I read through the comments and see nobody else taking issue with that, I don’t want to yell in frustration because nobody seems to care how Dick’s feelings have been hurt by the lack of empathy and support.

No, the thing that actually makes me want to tear my hair out is just the simple, generalized fact that for whatever reasons, this has become sufficiently normalized in fandom that people routinely absorb stories where this sort of dynamic is perpetuated, and appear to be perfectly content with it being perpetuated. Which, for the record, isn’t just at the expense of Dick’s character, but every character doing it to him as well, because whether its acknowledged or not....it makes them look like shit when they do this.

And I make these sort of posts because “if you don’t like it then don’t read it, simple as that” COMPLETELY MISSES THE POINT.

I don’t hate it just because it makes for shitty stories about the character I’m seeking out stories about to read. I hate it because it EXISTS. I hate the normalization of abusive dynamics IN AND OF ITSELF. WHEREVER IT OCCURS.

THAT is always my problem, in this specific matter. And simply not reading these stories when I come across them does FUCK ALL to address that specific problem, because its the normalization among readers and writers that’s my issue, not my personal lack of enjoyment upon reading the fic. That’s literally WHY I don’t enjoy the fic.

Hence, these posts. And me calling out specific trends in WRITING, both canon AND fanworks, because ITS ALL RELEVANT TO THE SPECIFIC ISSUE I’M TALKING ABOUT AND RAISING IN THESE POSTS.

Because sorry not sorry, my preference is trying to actually acknowledge, address and DO something about problems I have, rather than click x and pretend that problem doesn’t exist.

If that bothers you or offends you for whatever reason, kindly take your own advice and simply don’t read my posts. I’ve explained why that doesn’t work for ME but I see no reason it shouldn’t work for those of you who like to give that advice to me, given that you’re the ones advocating for it in the first place.

I am perfectly, 100% fine with my priorities exactly as they are. I’ve done my due diligence and examined them and how I personally rank them and why I feel so strongly about them, and thus I’m absolutely content standing by my convictions. Its other peoples’ priorities I currently have issue with, in regards to certain tendencies in the REAL reactions and viewpoints that both lead to and stem from the writing in fanworks about yes, this specific character....

HENCE WHY I POST EXACTLY THAT.

No, I mean, I literally included the words “I have a problem with fandom’s priorities in regards to this character.” Not that people were being mean to him at all. Not because he got a fictional ow-ie. The prioritization fandom applies to this kind of dynamic existing at Dick’s expense vs even the HINT of this kind of dynamic being written at a different character’s expense. 

In other words: I don’t even care if people don’t like Dick Grayson, that’s allowed, nobody said otherwise. 

But even so, acting like its normal and acceptable for him to be used as the dumping ground for the toxic behavior of everyone around him while calling out even the slightest trace of harmful tendencies in a character’s actions towards another character like Jason or Tim...THAT’S THE PROBLEM. 

Yes, I’m undoubtedly more cognizant of it and more passionate about it because its at the expense of a personal fave of mine specifically, but literally all of my posts about the problems I have with fandom’s writing and reception of his character revolve specifically around the existence of clear double standards in what fans feel he should be accountable for and when he should be viewed sympathetically.....compared to every other character.

What’s harmful and toxic for everyone else has NO valid reason for not being viewed as equally harmful and toxic for his character. That’s it. That’s my big old dissertation, THE END.

Is it REALLY that outlandish for me to get pissed off at everpresent evidence that fandom’s normalized the application of a completely separate standard of both harm and responsibility to one specific character? Because...hold tight and make this leap with me, folks....if you can normalize and accept that kind of double standard with a character without blinking an eye.....you can normalize and accept that kind of double standard WITH REAL PEOPLE TOO. 

Because it doesn’t matter that the characters aren’t real....when the thought processes behind writing a character in that dynamic and reading that dynamic without seeing reason to object to it....those are real.

So. Is that okay with everyone? Does it meet the committee’s approval for things I’m allowed to get worked up about?

Fucking hell.

So yeah, FYI, don’t come at me for being too passionate and angry about a fictional character. It’ll never get you more than an eye roll from me.

I know EXACTLY what I’m truly passionate about and why I’m really angry.

Do you?

[thefloatingstone]

Would you please make me a list of your rcommended comics(books or web-series any genre original content or fanworks)

Oh that’s a god one! Thank you so very much 💙 Let me see what I have on my shelf and on my hard drive. (I don’t know if I’ve ever made a list of my favourite comics before or not here on tumblr?)

in no particular order;

1: Usagi Yojimbo by Stan Sakai

I dunno if it ever really shows or not, but Japanese historical settings are something I’m really into! I think it’s one of those dormant interests that flares up every now and then. Anyway. Usagi Yojimbo has basically been tied for my favourite comic for over 10 years now. It’s a series of stories, both short and with longer arcs, following the character of Miyamoto Usagi (roughly based on Miyamoto Musashi) travelling around the country of Japan in the early 1600s as a Ronin after the lord he served was defeated and killed in battle. Usagi, being one of his samurai, is not killed in the same battle which, considering his lord was killed, is a massive disgrace in historical Japanese culture. Basically along the thought of “If your lord died and you didn’t you must not have fought hard enough to protect him.”

Anyway, the comic is both a history lesson on Edo period Japan, a travel diary, a slice of life comic, a Chanbara, an action comic, some times even a horror or ghost story, a tragedy involving unfulfilled love and lost families, a lesson on traditional Japanese Yokai and other mythology, and now and then high fantasy.

10/10. HIGHLY recommend. The author Stan Sakai is also a wonderful person I’ve had the pleasure to meet a few times at Comic Con. And considering he like... remembers who I AM despite being an extremely famous comic artist... I dunno. I have endless respect for the man and he’s shown me great kindness in the past.

Also you know... black and white comics. They’re my jam, yo!

2: Bone by Jeff Smith

I have no idea if I even have to say anything because Bone might just, without hyperbole, be the greatest comic ever drawn.

At 1300+ pages drawn over the course of 10 years, the story starts out as a cartoon, full of hijinks and fun adventures and jokes and very slowly, reality starts setting in, things get more dangerous, the stakes get higher, the bad guys much darker. And by the time you reach book 3 of the 9 book story, you’re suddenly in a story of the “epic” variety. Not in the internet slang term but in the actual definition of the word.

You have massive wars between men and monsters, you have clashing cultures and ideologies, conflicting motivations and goals, and of course saving the world.

And it manages to do so without you EVER feeling “Excuse me but this was a cartoon book about funny jokes. This shift in tone is really weird and doesn’t work with the cartoony characters.”

It just blends and grows beautifully. And has remained as my favourite comic for... *counts* lord... 14 years now.

The book was recently released in a new colour version in case you prefer hat, but I honestly recommend “The Brick” single volume black and white version. It’s cheaper, first of all, but also I cannot express how masterful the blacks and whites of Bone are. They’re essentially Watterson level.

(also Jeff Smith is ANOTHER comic artist who is just like... the nicest person. Like REALLY nice. He’s been kind to me on occasions in that “you really didn’t have to be that nice” kind of way)

3: The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck by Don Rosa

It’s published by Disney officially... but the Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck is essentially a fancomic. The only reason its not is because Don Rosa became SO GOOD at making duck comics Disney hired him to make them officially and he was SO GOOD at it became one of the most important Duck artists just after Carl Barks (the creator of Scrooge) himself.

The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck is a comprehensive biography of Scrooge McDuck’s life, not just made up by Don Rosa, but pieced together from Carl Barks’ own comics where he would have Scrooge make passing mention to events in his past or people he met. Don Rosa essentially took all these passing remarks and mentions and drew out a timeline, starting with Scrooge age 13 leading all the way up to his reunion with his family when Donald as an adult met up with him again.

It starts with Scrooge, from a poor family in Glasgow in 1877, boarding a ship for America to seek his fortune. We follow him through the years as with each chapter, he comes close to being rich and successful, only for it to fail or fall apart at the last minute, until, eventually, we see him catch his break and become the obscenely rich and successful person he’s fought and worked and bled so hard to be.

...and then the comic continues. And we see him lose himself. Greed, the constant need for MORE money and MORE success keeps going. The need to show HOW rich and successful he is takes over, until we see him and his family fall apart. And the comic echoes Citizen Kane as Scrooge realises the best time of his life was when he was seeking riches, not after he finally succeeded.

And then Donald and his nephews appear, and Scrooge’s life gets a second wind. His lust for adventure flares up again, his need to seek fortunes and treasures burns as strong as ever. And he keeps going.

The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck is a story about looking for your place in the world and fighting to create it with your own two hands, but it’s also about how you should think hard where you place your value in life, and it’s never too late to re-direct course and try again.

There is also “The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck Companion” which is a collection of stories that didn’t fit in with the original comic and would have disrupted flow. Basically like how a fanfic will have oneshots related to a larger story

Also, the producer of the band “Nightwish” created a soundtrack to accompany the original comic as a sort of “What If” in what he imagined the story would sound like if it was made into a movie

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4: Cucumber Quest by Gigi D.G. ( @ggdgart )

A newer comic I stumbled upon which has skyrocketed into being a fave and I can already tell, that’s not a position it’s gonna relinquish. Cucumber Quest is a more cartoony and comedic story than the previous comics on this list. But that by no means makes it of any less value or dulls the moments that this comic decides to punch you in the gut with emotions HARD.

The art and colours are glorious and something I hope to study so I can better my own art hopefully, and the writing and humour is of a calibre that I just know I could not replicate it if I even tried. Full of puns, absurdism, awkward jokes and a whole lot of FEELINGS, It manages to make me both laugh myself into a coughing fit as often as it makes me yell “OH NOOOO!!!” when something dramatic happens.

The story follows our main character Cucumber, a put-upon out-of-his-depth wizard-to-be who is tasked with saving the world from the evil Nightmare Knight who has been summoned from his thousand year slumber by an evil sorcerer who wants to take over the world (as you do). With him is his little sister, the sword wielding Almond, who is WAY more into this “being a hero” thing than he is (and probably better at it too) as the duo make friends and travel to the various kingdoms to defeat the Nightmare Knight’s lackeys, working their way up to fighting the Nightmare Knight himself and sealing him away once more!

That all sounds.... really straightforward, doesn’t it? Well... that’s what everybody else in the comic thinks too. ...Shame that real life is never easy and straightforward.

From evil henchmen that start crushing on cool “Good Guys” with cool swords, good guys who don’t REALLY want to hurt the bad guys because they don’t seem so bad? To cool good guys with cool swords suddenly learning that being in danger is not as much fun as it sounded when they started this. To big evil final boss bad guys who are just tired of all of this...

What’s also awesome is the entire comic... all OVER 800 PAGES OF IT... is completely free to read online! But you can also buy physical copies of the first 4 volumes in book form to support the author! 

http://cucumber.gigidigi.com/cq/page-1/

I HIGHLY recommend this one too! It has canon LGBT characters! It has found family plots! It has scary bad guys that just need a hug! It has magical girl transformations! Literally anything you could want is in this comic. Including emotional wrecking angst! Did I mention FEELINGS???

(I couldn’t pick a single page so here are 3 random ones without context. Seriously almost EVERY page is so good I struggled very hard to choose)

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5: The Property of Hate by @modmad

Hey. Do you like fantasy worlds made of imagination? How about protagonists with grey morality who act like super primand proper gentlemen when they’re actually huge nerds? How about reluctant “Well I guess I’ve ADOPTED you now you annoying gremlin” adult-kid relationships? How about puns? How about abstract and colourfull character designs? Or saving the world?

The Property of Hate is Modmad’s original comic that they’ve been working on a few years now. it follows our lead character, RGB or “Problematic Mary Poppins” as I like to think of him, as he asks a young child if she’d like to be a hero and help him save his world? When she agrees, he takes her to a fantasy land... completely NOT preparing her for what she’s signed up for. The story then follows the duo through the abstract and shifting world as RGB slowly divulges information on what exactly our Hero has to do to save the world. It turns out it’s a lot more complicated and messy than merely “beat the bad guy” or anything like that.

Not to mention it seems this fantasy world has its own rules of reality and dangers. Emotions and abstract thoughts have real physical form here, and something like an “idea” can quite literally run around and create havoc, while something like dreams can fuel or destroy, and emotions like grief can cause irreparable damage.

Our Hero also learns RGB himself is a lot more complex and messy than he first appears. Seeming to be a good person trying to do good things (despite being a little stand offish and rude at times) but seems to also be carrying a past and the weight of having done some very very bad things “for the greater good”. And our Hero, as well as we, the readers, start wondering how much we should trust him, even though, just like our Hero, deep deep down we just know we WANT to trust him. And maybe he needs saving just as much as the world itself does. Even when he’s at his scariest and... not quite himself.

The Property of Hate is also available online completely for free. Modmad does have books for sale but I believe it’s on-demand or something along those lines. Please feel free to message them here on tumblr and they are happy to chat to their readers and interact.

http://thepropertyofhate.com/TPoH/The%20Hook/1

I think I’ll leave it there despite meaning to do 10 at first because this is already EXTREMELY long.

Hopefully you found something that seems interesting! Let me know if you decide to check any of these out and whether you ended up liking them or not! I’d love to hear your opinions.

And thank you for indulging me <3

(I’m trying to remember to add my ko-fi link to all longer posts like this I make. Especially since I keep forgetting ☕️Buy me a Ko-fi ☕️ )

[iamtrashforash]

“Problematic” Fanworks, i.e. Re: Last Reblog

A particularly prolific and highly talented artist-writer duo in the Banana Fish fandom has been getting aggressive messages that toe and occasionally cross the line to harassment, on top of actual hate messages.  The common grievances are that their fanworks often feature “controversial” pairings, e.g. Max/Ash and Foxx/Ash, and are sexually explicit in nature.

@silverquillsideas wrote a lengthy response to an anon ask regarding the matter, which I would highly recommend people to read.  I am mostly interested in the responses to @silverquillsideas post, which I find to echo similar sentiments (or “arguments”) found on Twitter and Tumblr.

[Fiction affects reality.  These fanworks contribute to the normalisation and/or romanticisation of rape, abuse, and pedophilia.  Hence, they are not allowed to exist.]

To “normalise” these things, I argue that the works have to present them in a normalised manner.  However, this is simply not the case.  The fanworks are conscientiously put behind age and NSFW filters (in this case, Privateer) and well-tagged with trigger warnings.  At one point, the artist even made a separate, viewable upon approval account for the more NSFW pieces, so that people who are interested only in the SFW or “sanctioned to be non-problematic” artworks need not be notified of the existence of the “non-sanctioned” artworks.  The experience is highly opt-in, and is by no means normalising.  The multiple filters and warnings highlight the paraphilic, outside-the-norm nature of the artworks.

Personally, I think this normalisation argument is patronising: it underestimates the ability of adults (especially -- let’s be honest here -- female adults) to distinguish between reality and fiction, and between safe, consensual sex and fantasy materials.

[Think about the children!]

This argument is often attached to the normalisation argument.  It is heavily undermined by the presence of the age filters.  Age filters are put up precisely because, in general, younger consumers lack the critical thinking to properly compartmentalise fiction/fantasy from reality.  When you click through an age filter, you are, in effect, declaring that you have the critical thinking and maturity to properly digest whatever awaits beyond.

[Fandom is a safe space!]

And still it remains, as long as we keep up the standards of proper age filters, NSFW filters, and trigger warnings.

[Why would you have these unhealthy fantasies when healthier fantasies exist? What is wrong with you?]

Sometimes, people ship things because they think it looks good.  It appeals to an aesthetic side of them.  Sexual arousal by visual cues is, unsurprisingly, greatly rooted in the aesthetics.  It does not need to go deeper than that.  An anecdote: I am, technically speaking, a Shingeki no Kyojin Eren/Levi shipper. Since I neither read nor watch SnK, for a long, long time, I did not realise Eren’s age and the age gap between the two.  Even after finding out, I could not stop aesthetically liking the ship.  When I ship them, I am not consciously and actively shipping a teenager with a middle-aged man.  I ship them because they appeal to me aesthetically: I like their visuals and the fandom’s depictions of their interactions in doujinshi.  I fancy that, for a lot of people, this compartmentalisation of aesthetics and age of the characters involved happens often.  Some people, however, seem incapable of internalising the idea that other people are capable of this mental separation -- a failure of the imagination.

(A tangent: I mean no harsh judgment on those who fail to separate character age from fantasies, but I think one does have to accept the personal limitations of one’s own tastes.  Personally, I find it hard to separate biology from shipping; hence, A/B/O fanworks are simply Not My Thing.  The common trope of feminising male omega characters tends to make my eye twitch.  But I am not leaving comments of how disturbed I am on A/B/O fanworks for their dissemination of wildly inaccurate biological facts and/or their tendency to reinforce a masculinity-femininity binary in MLM relationships.)

Regarding depictions of rape, assault, abusive relationships, etc., ravishment fantasies are very common; this is a fact.  Sexual arousal, fear, pain, and pleasure are incontrovertibly linked: they all belong to the response pathways of the “primitive brain”, having existed long before our ancestors began developing the cortex of higher thinking.  The arbitrary categorisation of “healthy” and “unhealthy” fantasies means nothing to something as basal as sexual responses.

[Still, these fantasies are disturbing.]

Some of them do disturb me.  However, again, the content creators have done their utmost to make sure the experience is opt-in by nature, with big warning signs attached.  If you think the content will disturb you, please do not engage with it.  Think of it as not buying pickle-flavoured ice cream when you know it won’t be to your taste and/or you are allergic to pickles.  The presence of pickle-flavoured ice cream might weird you out, but you have no obligation to consume it.  In the same way, it is unreasonable for you to demand the ice cream company to withdraw their product because the thought of pickle ice cream disturbs you, or to complain to the convenience store for allowing the pickle ice cream to be stocked on their shelves.  They released the flavour because they believe there is an audience for it out there, and that the release would bring some people delight and/or money.

[I have the right to announce how disturbed I am by these fanworks.]

I agree.  You do not, however, have the right to harass people over them, especially when -- I reiterate -- the creators have made the entire experience highly opt-in.

Also, I implore you to think of the practical consequences of your actions before you decide to send strongly worded messages to content creators:

No real person is harmed in the creation of fanworks.

On the other hand, your strong words may dampen the mood of a real live person who has decided to share their talents with the world.

In consequentialist terms, when you send messages like, “You disgust me,” to a content creator, the net result of your actions is....negative.  In other words, I am asking you, “Aren’t there better things to do with your time?”

[To depict Ash, a sexual abuse survivor, in sexual situations is highly damaging/insensitive/triggerring to CSA survivors.]

I have a very personal, by-no-means objective reaction to this particular extremist view.  Please just skip this entire section if rationality is what you seek.  I will even give you a TL;DR; it reads, “Fuck off.”

I had an entire essay planned on this for my own benefit -- think of it as bloodletting -- but I might as well say it now.  Banana Fish and Ash made me realise that I was the victim of a systematic pedophile, almost twenty years after the fact.  Ash and I had our fateful encounters at roughly the same age, in startlingly similar scenarios.

The realisation came more as a shock than I could ever have expected.  I struggle (note the present tense) with the endowment of the mantle of a victim.  I don’t know why Ash became the final piece to the jigsaw puzzle -- I mean, I had read Lolita cover to cover multiple times -- but I hypothesise that it is because his trauma does not consume most of his identity.  So many stories of abuse survivors are heavily focussed on how their experiences, well, fucked them up, but I -- I was so young that I got out without any visible mental and physical scars; all that is left are grimy fingerprints on a pane of glass, visible only when you breathe on it.  Specific parts of my body are weirdly off-limits in sexual situations, but I managed to ascribe those to “just how my body is” instead of “the parts he touched”.  Stories about trauma are certainly needed, but what my memory needed was representation in the manner of Ash’s.

Reading about Ash exploring his sexuality, especially in a healing manner that I will never experience due to my odd lack of apparent trauma, helped me a lot with coming to terms with the realisation.  I was devastated when an author abandoned an R18 fic of Ash reclaiming his sexuality with the help of Eiji, due to people messaging her with the argument above and claiming to speak for all CSA survivors.  Thankfully, the author returned to finish the fic, but the experience overall had been marred, and the author was clearly uncomfortable with having posted the fic at all.  It feels terrible to know that something that has helped me tremendously is regarded as disturbing by its own creator.

In other words, if you have used the above argument to harass content creators, please stop.

CLOSING REMARKS

I have none.  It is currently 02.30 a.m. in Japan.  Please feel free to comment with your own opinions and experiences; I will try to reply after I get some sleep.  I may edit this piece tomorrow, should my morning self violently disagree with my 02.30 a.m. self. 

[bettsfic]

a third stance on the moral dichotomy of fandom

i have one more thing to say, or i guess reiterate, on the topic of moral purity policing in fanfiction as perpetuated by minors, in a more rebloggable format than my previous asks. what i have to say is an incredibly unpopular opinion because it takes neither side of this dichotomized issue, and addresses, not the minors perpetuating the purity rhetoric, but the adults fighting against it. 

first i’ll offer a run-down of the overall issue at hand:

side 1, or what i call “think of the CHILDREN”: there is a large sect of people in fandom right now, mostly teens and young adults as far as i can tell, who believe that taboo works (noncon and underage) should not be allowed to exist. if they are written, they should be flagged and subsequently taken down. these people seem to hold these beliefs for several reasons, the prevailing ones being “fiction affects reality” and “children might read it!!” this stance is the active one, the (literal) minority, the side trying to enact change upon an established and (legally) supported status quo. these people do not separate the art from the artist. 

in practice, these beliefs are aggressive and toxic. we see them in rude or cruel anonymous asks urging writers to kill themselves. we see them in “only follow if” and “do not interact if” pages with lengthy bullet point lists of traits and behaviors that are Not Okay. we see them in yfip. we see them in anti tags. we see them in long, poorly researched and contextualized responses to well-meaning pro-”ship and let ship” posts. we see them in accusations of pedophilia for fics and ships that are not in fact pedophilic. we see them in phrases like “abuse apologists” and “problematic” and “romanticize” and “fetishize.” 

despite the seeming growth of what i’ve been calling the Gen Z Puritanical Movement, what we see on tumblr is only a narrow view of a much wider issue spanning outside fandom and into the world of art itself. it stems from problems of decades past, McCarthyism, the Hays Code, the nuclear family, for example, and the subsequent counterculture movements against them. right now Gen X has all the power and prestige in the enormous world art, and being the children of Baby Boomers, they simultaneously believe you must always separate the art from the artist, while also widely disbelieving (or having had to learn) that inequality and disenfranchisement have any bearing in the success of art. 

“the discourse” as we call it has its roots in every creative field and we are in midst of a revolution in the way we understand and interact with art. i believe, with any revolution, the answer is not in stalling it but negotiating with it, learning from it, interrogating it, and adapting. 

side 2, which i’ll unpack below, is comprised mostly of what i would venture are Millennials, and fall somewhere between Gen Z purity and Gen X freedom. and as much as i want to discuss this gaping chasm of beliefs further, i’m specifically talking about the way transformative art is presently policed by side 1.

which brings us to the other side.

side 2, or what i call “i do what i WANT”: these people believe that a fan writer/artist should be able to write, post, and share with the public any creative work the mind can devise as long as it is warned/tagged properly, and all people who do not want to view their art should walk away and not interact. key phrases include “ship and let ship” and “don’t like, don’t read.” the prevailing root of this belief is that all art is valid and important, all art belongs, even when that art is devised entirely by the id. additionally, they believe they do not have to justify, defend, or explain their art in order for it to exist, and most importantly, it is every reader/viewer’s responsibility to understand the difference between fiction and reality. these people separate art from the artist. 

in practice, these beliefs are poised to defend of the attacks from side 1. this is a reaction to a movement, an assertion of maintaining the status quo. we see posts speaking to an audience of side 1, pleading or at times demanding for them to learn not only the fraught history of fanworks but also the greater context of art and censorship. these posts are then reblogged by people with similar beliefs, attacked by side 1, and no one seems to really learn anything at all. the dichotomy is maintained. battles end as posts fall into obscurity, but the war rages on.

side 2 holds the status quo, the most common sense. it is the most educated perspective, upheld by the wiser and older parties of fandom, the transformative artists who have lived through strikethrough and boldthrough and have experienced the damaging consequences of the censorship and ideology of side 1. moreover, it is upheld by the actual people who built and run the archive on which our art rests. in this dichotomy, side 2 has all the power. side 2 is the majority. 

here’s where i get to my incredibly unpopular opinion:

people in positions of power have no reason to meet aggression with more aggression except to re-establish and assert that power over the minority opinion. aggression does not sway the minority opinion; it only fuels it. 

in other, more practical words, we are ADULTS sharing a public community space with CHILDREN, and some of those children have made it clear that they are angry. 

why do we meet that anger with anger when we are older and wiser and have all the authority? if a child is having a violent tantrum, do you punch them in the face? no, you hold their wrists. you calm them down. you ask them what’s wrong. you try to parse out what happened and work together to make sure it doesn’t happen again. you can’t expect them to articulate that anger; you have to ask questions. you have to listen to them.

side 1 says that taboo works are wrong and bad and shameful. i personally disagree with that belief, but my curiosity lies in the extreme emotional reaction and value judgments behind it. and when enough people are angry about something, if a movement becomes wide enough, it means there is something else going on, some seed of truth happening somewhere -- a needle in a haystack, an invisible shard of glass on the kitchen floor -- that needs to be found. i’m not saying side 1 is right, but i am saying that there is something in that anger which might ring true, even if the toxic rhetoric they are spouting is not. i don’t know what that truth is, and the point of this post is not to find it, but to encourage us to seek bigger answers about this very big problem.

side 2, you might be saying, they’re not children, they’re teenagers and young adults. you might be saying, when i was their age, i knew to obey the etiquette of fandom. you might be saying, we are not equals, they should be learning from us. you might be saying, it’s their responsibility to know fiction from reality. you might be saying, none of this is my responsibility. you might be saying, this movement is getting bigger and scarier and it may become an actual threat to our art. 

and you might be feeling: i have no interest in logically or morally defending the taboo nature my aesthetic interests. i know that they appeal to me, and i know i should not be tasked with or required to publicly explain myself. i should not have to assert that art is separate from the artist. i should not have to endure aggressive mobs of anons in my inbox. i should not be chased away by pitchforks held by my own community. i should not be accused of being a predator, rapist, abuse apologist, or pedophile. 

and maybe you know that you are not any of those things, and to be accused of them is ridiculous and appalling, but maybe it still hurts to be called all of that which makes life so dangerous and cruel. maybe it always hurts to have your art misunderstood.

this brings me back to anger. all anger is devised of pain and fear. we get angry when we’re hurt and scared. when i see two angry sides of a wide divide, all i see is that fear and pain, and all i want is to lessen it. 

on side 1, we have a group of young people whose only context is the present and whose only fear is the future. i put myself in the shoes of what it must be like to be a teenager in america in 2018, how different it is from when i was a teenager. teen stars on red carpet events in 2005 dressed in ugly cargo pants and sweatshirts. millie bobby brown at 13 was dressed like a supermodel at last year’s emmy’s. young people today have more and easier access to information pertaining to violence and sex, consume media steeped in those things, than they ever have. and it’s becoming increasingly difficult for parents to keep them from that interaction. side 2′s rhetoric around this is to wipe their hands free of it -- “your parents should monitor what you’re doing on the internet.” and they should, they absolutely should, but while technology has changed, teenage curiosity hasn’t. i clicked past every 18+ warning i’ve ever seen in my life, and that was my choice, and i handled the consequences. 

but just for a second imagine being 14 again, and curiosity getting the best of you, and clicking on something in which your physical equivalent is being hurt and abused and eroticized. can you imagine not having any understanding of the greater context of what you’ve just read, in art or in life? wouldn’t you be scared too, to know those things exist? wouldn’t you be reluctant to listen to the explanation of them when you are young and afraid and suddenly aware that you can be hurt? 

i am not encouraging writers to stop creating taboo fanworks. i think they have an important artistic purpose and function and place, and i value any mind that can conceive and face such darkness. but as someone who aims to understand as much as i possibly can about what it is to be human, to be alive today, i am inclined to consider the various interpretations of taboo art and its potential repercussions. 

teenagers today are more aware and attuned to -- and have constant access to -- current events than any other generation before, but that does not mean they have learned or educated themselves on the historical context of these events in order to understand them fully. they don’t have a wide perspective, but they do have their moral compasses guided by the abhorrence of the constant human rights violations that occur on macro and micro scales every single day, and it’s those compasses that place value judgments on the content they consume in fandom, the place where they feel, i speculate, the most valued. the place they have the most power and sway. the only place, maybe, that their voice and fear and anger is ever heard, witnessed, responded to, taken seriously. 

being a teenager today is a completely new and terrifying machine made of old parts. we, the adults in fandom, understand the parts but not the machine. how can all the same parts make something so different from us? who built this monster, and how to we destroy it? why is it attacking us when there are bigger and more important battles to fight? why doesn’t it go read a fucking book for once?

that brings us to side 2. if side 1 has the future, side 2 has the past. we see the toxic rhetoric of side 1 and we know what consequences can come of it because we’ve lived the worst of it. we have both the pain of the past and the fear of the future to handle, and neither are easy to cope with. 

so what do we do? we either get angry and fight back, or disengage. sometimes i think the latter is the most toxic of all, because i believe it’s every artist’s responsibility to understand the work they’re doing and the greater context of that work, how it fits in their given lexicon of art. they should not be required to defend it or speak for it, but they should know it. inside and out, they should know their art and why they make it. 

i also believe, if you know your art and why you make it, if you can separate yourself the artist from the art, why disengage from those who are repulsed but reaching out? it’s definitely my gut instinct to meet cruelty with anger and upsetness, but cruelty also piques my curiosity -- i want to know where the repulsion comes from. i want to ask questions. why are you offended by this art? how have you interpreted it? why are you afraid of it? how has its existence hurt you? if nothing else, it always gives me a broader understanding of my work and how it can be seen, which is invaluable feedback for any artist. 

if there is any bridge at all to be built between this divide, i think it is in our ability to ask questions, listen to the answers, and use those answers, not to argue with or defend ourselves or to become upset by, but to ask more questions. 

here are two ways this mentality has helped me -- 

in my old job (commercial finance real estate), i worked with upperclass middle-aged white men who got paid six figures a year to golf and cheat on their wives while i did all their paperwork. eventually i made a hobby of sitting in their offices and asking them questions, knowing they had authority over me, knowing our opinions differed. knowing i had no place to argue with them or leverage in telling them all the ways i felt they were wrong about politics and society at large. i pretended they were teaching me things, showing me the way of the world. i let them believe that, and i continued asking questions, forcing them to articulate aloud why they believed what they believed, hours and hours, slowly boxing them into corners from which they would eventually change their own minds.

in my current job (i’m a college instructor) i do something similar. i sit down with every single student one on one and i ask them questions about their political and social beliefs. often my students are 19, white, straight, affluent, conservative young adults who hold many of the same puritanical ideas as that of side 1 with less of the toxic rhetoric. at first, i was terrified to do this. it was different than my old job because suddenly i was the one with authority. i thought, what if i encounter racism? prejudice? sexism? what if they are fundamentally wrong on every level, and won’t listen to me, someone who knows the greater context of their opinions? what if i end up arguing with them? what if they don’t respect me? what if i can’t change their minds? and most importantly -- is it my responsibility to change their minds at all?

after the first semester, i realized how young they were, how much they still had left to grow, and learn, and live, and that my class would not be able to teach them everything they needed to know in order to strip away the prejudices and narrow-mindedness of their upbringings. i learned that all i could do was be a person in a position of authority listening to their beliefs and asking them tough questions no one has ever asked them. forcing them on the spot to articulate the beliefs they have not before had the opportunity to interrogate. i find i rarely agree with what they say, but i validate their right and ability to say it. to have a voice and space and responsibility in and to society. to think, itself. and most importantly to think through their ideals, which they cannot do if they are never given a chance to be heard, if they are never asked the questions whose answers will lead them to deeper and more meaningful insights.

i have never changed the mind of a single person by arguing, but i have changed several minds by asking. 

we have an entire generation of terrified young people who are lashing out, and i do not want to hate them. i do not want to meet their rage and toxicity with fear, defensiveness, and dismissal. i want to sympathize and listen. i want to know more about why they feel how they feel, what the real root of it is, the seeds of truth behind the rhetoric. i want to understand. and mostly, i want to help fix all the broken and awful things in the greater sociopolitical sphere that have built this terrifying machine and dug our moral divide.

[toomanylokifeels]

I don't agree with blaming fans who create mature fanworks for people exposing themselves to it, but if you intend to share something explicit with someone it's always a good practice to ask them first instead of just showing it to them without warning.

Most fans do that by appropriately labeling content, which is another reason why people shouldn't seek it out just to yell at someone for creating it. However, this is another reason why you shouldn't just show celebrities explicit content of them/their characters.

They don't have the option of filtering content for themselves in these kinds of situations. It would be different if they seek it out on their own, accidentally happen upon it, or they give permission to see explicit content. That doesn't often happen, though.

[ganymedesclock]

kaorusan241 replied to your post: I’ve expressed my frustration before with fanon...

Tbh if you’re gonna make a post like this you ought to mention that they share plenty of negative traits too…. otherwise you’re just a hypocrite for stanning Shiro/ignoring his canon faults whilst accusing Lance stans of doing the same

Hi, friend! That post was pretty tongue-in-cheek, admittedly, it was mostly me expressing frustration.

The intent of the post was not that either Shiro or Lance are perfect or flawless people, but, rather, that Lance is mistakenly given Shiro’s traits, and I wanted to rally against that not only because Shiro deserves recognition for who and what he is, but also because that’s not fair to Lance at all! He’s not Shiro, and he shouldn’t have to be like Shiro to be seen as a worthwhile person.

Because Lance is a very empathetic and open person. If anything, he and Shiro are polar opposites in how they address their feelings. Lance is very inclined to networking and opening up to people, and as seen in s3e6 with Keith, will actively seek people out to talk about his concerns and stresses.

This is a fantastic quality of Lance’s, one of, in my opinion, his greatest character strengths and it’s something Shiro is awful at. Lance actually does the good thing and addresses his feelings. This makes sense because multiple official sources tell us the Blue Lion is the nurturing emotional head of Voltron- the “heart” of the team. And that’s an area where Lance excels.

Conversely this is an area Shiro struggles with profoundly. This poor guy has an obvious undiagnosed anxiety disorder (PTSD) and seems to have been a slightly high-strung overachiever most of his life. Shiro stocks strengths Lance doesn’t- he has an incredible resolve, pain tolerance, and determination. That’s not to say Lance is weak-willed or cowardly, but, consider incidents like in s1e5 where Lance fights awake for a brief period of time to attack Sendak and then rapidly loses consciousness again.

Shiro has the most determination and greatest force of personality out of the team, in general. He has a powerful sense of personal ethics and will live or die, stare into the abyss for his ideals.

Lance, while also a hero, and able to do some amazing things (he was able to get under Shiro’s skin in s2e8 challenging him, he’s no wimp in the willpower department ‘cause none of these kids are) doesn’t have all of Shiro’s strengths and that’s fine. He doesn’t need to. He has all of Lance’s strengths, instead.

Furthermore, you have to consider where Lance was in s1e1 and what that says about Lance. Lance is not a genius or a prodigy. However, he was able to, through basically just diligence and hard work- another major virtue of his- reach Keith’s position. He was able to occupy the slot in the fighter class saved for Keith, their most promising cadet. Iverson phrases it incredibly harshly, but he clearly thinks Lance has potential, and the only problem is he doesn’t think Lance is taking this seriously.

But Lance isn’t happy in s1e1. Because that slot wasn’t meant for him. It was someone else’s role. And there’s something to this once s3e2 comes around and Lance steps up as Red Paladin.

Unlike Allura or Keith, Lance struggles the least, observably, with the Red Lion. His single argument is the controls are tricky, and by s3e3 he’s overwhelmingly worked that out.

Of the paladins, Lance is the most adaptable to an unpredictable or changing situation. This is also reflected in s4e4, when all the paladins are called upon to act contrary to who they really are- notice that Lance is the one who thrives in that environment. Because Lance is a chameleon of a person. He’s able to be what the situation needs of him with a great deal of flexibility.

(Consider that his counterpart on Team Sincline is an almost literal chameleon.)

But ultimately those roles are disappointing and unfulfilling. They don’t work as a permanent arrangement because he knows they’re not for him, and he knows what feels right.

Full disclosure here, I adore Lance. The reason why I get so frustrated at popular fanon Lance is he’s one of my favorite characters and I feel like people really do not give him credit where credit’s due! Especially because my point that he’s given Shiro’s characteristics is that time and time again, I’ve seen fanwork of Lance being utterly destroyed in his own area of expertise.

Again, Lance is the feelings guy out of the team! Shiro, Keith, and Allura are frankly all prone to bottling issues, failing to address them, holding things past the breaking point and snapping at the worst possible time and place. Lance? Lance doesn’t do that. Lance can be basically precision suckerpunched right where it hurts with his own issues- look at s3e1 and the revelation that not only did Shiro actively nominate Keith as leader in his absence but the Black Lion also thinks so right when Lance was still nursing the hurt of being rejected by Black.

Look at how perfectly Lance takes it upon himself to put everything he’s feeling, that he knows, that he acknowledges, that he’s already been venting and communicating- aside, and talk about it in a mature and empathetic manner because he can tell that Keith is suffering in this situation.

This is Lance who says “This isn’t a participation game, this is war,” or who spent s4e6 doing everything he could to make Allura believe she could do what the entire team was counting on. Lance, who with certainty knows that the Blue Lion is the heart of the team and uses that to prop up Allura, but never took that knowledge to aggrandize himself.

Lance is an amazing person. He’s a wonderful, empathetic guy full of love, and he’s got fantastic instincts about people’s emotions. When he gets in trouble, he’s a very proactive force getting out of them and often his saving grace in situations is how good he is at listening to people even if he doesn’t necessarily like them or wants to prove himself against them. He’s so much stronger than his own insecurities.

But Lance isn’t a Black Paladin. He could do it, just like he can work with Red, but it wouldn’t be ideal for him. He’d sure do a lot better than Shiro would do with Blue, because... uh. Consider what happened with Allura, and consider what happened in Beta Traz when Shiro was in a stressful situation and felt like it was out of his control.

I also have great affection for Shiro. But. Dear god, he’s that friend that you knew that was taking all advanced classes and holding down straight A’s and also on a competitive sport team and you see them occasionally at mealtimes and they have never, ever had enough sleep.

Like I said it before, Shiro has the strongest personal ethics and greatest determination out of the paladins and that’s a high damn bar but he pays for that by being stressed the hell out. And he’s spectacularly bad at self-care, because he’s got so much fortitude that he assumes he can make it, and most of the time he’s right, but it has a very heavy cost to him.

Conversely, Lance, as I started this out by saying- Lance is fantastic at self-care. This is actively shown in his grooming habits. In s1e2 when everybody runs to the bridge, Shiro is the guy who was awake way too early and dressed and exercising probably because his sleep routine is fucked up and wasn’t relaxing at all. Lance wanders in late, but rested, pampered, and clearly having taken time and resources to make sure he’s at his best.

Yes, one of them is the one you want on your side during a catastrophe, but, that’s really not anywhere approaching a long-term healthy lifestyle. Even as herculean as Shiro is, he’s gonna burn himself out a long time before Lance does, because Lance understands that while the last-gasp ‘wake up from a coma to shoot the guy hassling your friends and damn your internal injuries’ stunts have a place and a value, if that happens more than once you should look at how many times something blows up on you.

And that’s really important to me, because emotions and nurturing are seen as stereotypically feminine traits- and because of that, a lot of boys and men are denied that. What are you, some kind of wuss who needs emotional care? (Spoiler: you are. Everyone is.) This amazing, important, heroic quality is seen as worthless- and that happens big time with characterizing Lance! I’ve heard people say he did absolutely nothing when it was his intervention and his virtues in s4e6 that let Allura awaken her powers that went on and saved everybody. Lancey Lance did that!

TL;DR Lance and Shiro are both amazing people, and very different people, and as someone who loves both of them, I want the qualities they have to be respected, rather than misattributed to other people or ignored.