#it's so damaging to fandoms

[martinsorbit]

[Finders Keepers au] From the crappy sketches folder; Unstoppable force meets an immovable object (y/n and moon are both at all times)

lore dumping in tags cuz i will get insufferable

[spirk-trek]

this is me btw :)

[navarice]

horror and psychological thriller in tgcf was done so incredibly well that if the beautiful and touching love story wasn’t incorporated into the book, I would be fully convinced mxtx decided to switch to another genre.

no one really talks about her fascination with the descent to madness and the morals surrounding humanity. at least one main character of each book goes through it. for lbh, it stemmed from the fear of abandonment and the emptiness that follows when the people you care most about decide you aren’t worth being chosen. for wwx, it was the outside in. society deemed him a monster so he had no other option available to him. no way to prove them wrong, and no way to convince himself he’s not either. anything he would do, despite his most well meaning, sincere, and self sacrificing motives, will always be twisted by the world who likes to paint others the devil. for xl…it was such a defeating combination of the two that it was near impossible for him find a way out. no family nor friend to turn to, no place to hide or run away, continuously forced to confront dilemmas beyond anyone’s capacity that sawed away at his already frayed sanity. worse was him having to confront godhood doesn’t mean omnipotent, nor does ascension mean free of suffering.

the way i choose to see it as this is her commentary on human nature, in both freedom and fallibility. ascend to heaven as a human, yet those in heaven are still human. wants, desires, fears, traumas, love, hate, selfishness, self-lessness, kindness, compassion, sacrifice, loss, hubris, duty, family, friends, hierarchy, power, and, above all, free will are all things that make humans what they are. are we wwx and xl? sacrificing ourselves time and time again only to have it all thrown back at our face? never once chosen or understood unless when it’s something short of a miracle? or are we the masses? afraid of the sinister, the disease, the wars? afraid for our young and old, for the talented and lame? for our lives and legacy? what are we, if not forever doomed to be helplessly flawed and hopelessly human?

the way she sees it, we have always been, and always be, both sides. because to her, they aren’t mutually exclusive, but rather each reflections of the other. both never wrong, but never quite right either. convoluted and confusing, mundane yet a tale as old as time.

mxtx writes her beautiful loves stories seamlessly. but she displays her talent best of all by weaving tales of hope and humanity into the threads.

[mikakuna]

my problem is that i always end up emotionally invested in the angry abuse victim character-- the character who is always the "wrong" kind of victim. the one who lashes out and is violent, a complete juxtaposition to their sunshine/lawful good counterparts in the media.

i end up resonating too hard with these characters that i always end up on the shitty side of the fandom where people will see you as a bad person for enjoying representation of an angry victim.

[athina-blaine]

genuinely don't understand people who gripe about someone getting into dunmesh for m/m pairings as opposed to f/f when none of them are even close to being the main point of the series

[royaltea000]

This too, is healing my inner child U_U (11 year old who wore a rubber prussia bracelet everyday until the picture rubbed off)

[boundinparchment]

breaking in for a second to say that a lot of the recent stuff going on for writers in particular boils down inherently to a lack of respect.

for one another.

for ourselves.

for our hobby.

from readers who passively just assume that a like is enough. that you don’t need to or want to engage meaningfully.

social media trained you all to be passive consumers and let a computer make decisions for you.

change that shit. reblog. comment. tell people you like their stuff. saying “I liked this” is better than a single fucking like on a post that is lost in the void.

and for those who write based on trends and find themselves constantly burning out: respect yourself and the characters you enjoy more. cherish them. stop chasing so much. this hobby isn’t about notes and being popular, it’s about the love (and sometimes the hate) for canon. not everyone is gonna be the next Cassy Claire or Ali Hazlewood or BNF, just be yourself and stop saying something flopped. maybe just make something you love and embrace happiness.

for those who get into the weird nonsense about ship politics and dark content and other shit: see above about changing behavior and stop engaging with shit you don’t want to see. change your filters. block tags. like you’re capable of using tools given to you instead of harassing people off the face of the internet and being a faceless bully.

[krash-and-co]

friendly reminder this fandom isnt a job and you don't have to actively work to 'save the show' all the time, you can just have fun

[satorugojoswiife]

i kinda miss back when jjk wasn't big

[swordsmans]

There's been a lot going around in the last week or so about fanbinding and concerns from fic authors about binders profiting from their work. I just wanted to clear the air a little around here with some info about my own work just so we're all on the same page.

I will never profit from any fanbound works, including my own. Every book I bind includes a legalese section in the beginning of the typeset stating that it is not for for-profit resale. I do not charge anything for books I choose to bind and gift myself.

I will never sell another author's work even indirectly through commissions. My fanbinding requests are open exclusively to fic authors who want their own fics bound or exceptional cases of a third party who can guarantee a gift copy will make it to the fic author (and, preferably, any interested fic fanartists) with author permission.

I will never sell finished typesets. Ever. No negotiations. If you want a typeset I've already made so that you can bind a copy of the fic for yourself, just ask. My own typesets are available for free to anyone who wants them, and I'm happy to share other typesets to trusted parties as long as I have author permission and a guarantee that they will not be monetized once the typesets leave my hands.

The books and typesets that do end up on my store will always be 1) copies of my own fics; 2) priced free/as low as possible with a "pay what you want" option. I will never put binds of someone else's fics on my store. I will never list a bind of my own for sale that is not also (again) accompanied by a free typeset. This is to ensure that no aspect of the fanwork is behind a paywall (including other artists' fanart) and any money exchanged is exclusively for the physical art of binding.

I have a deep, lifelong love for books. As a librarian, my entire life (both personally and professionally) revolves around free and no-profit access to knowledge and stories. I can't speak for others (especially the assholes on Etsy), but I did not begin binding fanworks with the intent to profit and that still holds true. I have the utmost respect for fic authors as both a fan and a fellow fanwriter, and I'm wildly disappointed that a few bad actors have put such a negative spotlight on a corner of fanart that has always been fundamentally about uplifting and supporting fanfiction and fanwriting at its heart.

Anyway, thanks for reading!

[goldensunset]

ayyyyy it's the art year in review post with my best work from each month

[sga-owns-my-soul]

this is something i have been thinking about basically since i got back into fandom and it feels especially relevant right now with some of the posts i've seen floating around

something that's very common to hear in fandom is "there's no ______ explanation for this" (fill in the blank with straight, normal, platonic, non-sexual, etc) and i get it, we're all guilty of it, i do it all the time, i think it's part of the fun of fandom is having a space to go insane about something and that's fine!

but i think it's also really really important to remember that there is literally endless ways to interpret something because no two human beings are the same, and the same thing can mean different things to different people

let's use me as an example. in my last relationship with my ex, we would regularly tell each other that we loved each other and wanted to spend our lives together and in that context, it was a very romantic sentiment. however, in my current relationship, we tell each other constantly that we love each other and we want to spend our lives together and there's not a single ounce of romanticism in either of us, because neither of us want or express romance to each other. most of my friends are convinced we're boyfriend/girlfriend, because to them our relationship WOULD be dating, but that doesn't mean we are

the same can be said about fandom. you can take a scene that is VERY romance heavy and one person might genuinely see that as a sexual expression, and someone else might genuinely see it as a platonic expression, and someone else might genuinely see it as a hateful expression, and i think it's really really important to remember that all of these takes are valid.

there's no one right or wrong way to interact with fandom (unless you're deliberately being harmful and hateful towards the characters and the community at large but that's a different topic of conversation) and i think people get really hung up on their takes and headcanons and forget that there's always going to be endless ways of interpreting fiction and that other interpretations are just as valid.

and this isn't to say you can't go insane about your blorbos or ships and you can't say they're obviously in love or whatever, because that's half the fun of fandom!! i just really wish people would realize that, no, there are actually multiple ways to view that scene or relationship and that's entirely valid

[cosmic-v0id]

Wait. Hold the fuck up. Yellow isnt just LIKE John. Yellow IS John. And no, I don't mean 'oh they're both pieces of the King in Yellow so they're the same.' No. No, no, no, no.

Yellow is the entity that would become John taken from another universe.

God, I can't believe it took me a relisten to realize this. The pieces are so clearly laid out!

Look, Kayne straight up told us that he was going to give Arthur John without his memories. What better way to do exactly that than to grab a John who hasn't met Arthur yet? Oh, it absolutely reeks of the kind of shit Kayne would pull. I can practically hear his gleeful little cackle.

But look, that's conjecture, I get it. So let's look at the facts. There's really only the one that matters though. Quite simply: it's that Yellow remembers the Dark World. The two theories I see about Yellow's origins are that he was a) ripped out of the King or b) that he is the King with his memories wiped (i'll admit i was in this camp because of kayne's little comment about the dreamlands).

Both of those theories don't hold up to his remembering of the Dark World though. Because that's somewhere only John has been. And we also know that Yellow came directly from the Dark World and had no memories of who he was. Just like John did.

And you know what else? This explains why Yellow and John were having issues existing on the same plane. Cause that didn't happen with the King. That only happened to Yellow and John. And I think it's because they are the exact same piece of the King in Yellow. They can't both be on the same plane -- it's a paradox. They sort of got around this by staying locked inside their people, but whenever Yellow manifested (and then later john) only one of them could keep their existence and power fully intact.

Kayne must have been laughing himself sick watching Arthur reject Yellow. What delicious, delicious irony. Poor Yellow

[obstinatecondolement]

Do unironically and genuinely love that in fandom we will say "there is no platonic explanation for this" completely straightfaced and then go back to writing pornography tailored to our friends' turn ons, which we have extensive knowledge of, to gift them as an entirely platonic gesture.

[dennisboobs]

plain and simple i am not going to be able to remain in this fandom long-term if i have to keep putting disclaimers on every single one of my posts that say i don't condone dennis' bad, bad actions and that i am in fact aware he's got a history of sexual assault and dubious/nonconsent. the entire gang has done heinous shit. why is dennis the only one who needs to be treated like this? if some rando wants to post about how dennis is pookie pie that doesn't automatically mean they're blind to his crimes. every single member of the gang is a piece of shit. that's kind of the point.

draw dennis with cat ears who give a shit

[scrumptiousobjectcollector]

Really hope you saw that one post that was like "I wish people stopped sucking g3's dick because it has body variety" like ok. Let's stop praising this new generation for being more inclusive and making people feel more seen. It's different from the one I grew up with so it sucks! This fandom is so obnoxious and entitled like I'm genuinely sorry that being happy that children are growing up with an inclusive piece of media annoys y'all so much

THAT WAS THE POST! Like why are we mad that people are celebrating having inclusive content?? To call it "d*ck sucking" just shows how immature these people are.

G3 fanbase doesn't have to bring down g1, and honestly I haven't seen much people praising g3 at the expense of g1 so it doesn't even make sense the things that person said.

It has to be trolling at this point the way these people seem to be upset and annoyed at the representation of g3? The way g1 stans can't even be critical about g1(maybe they are the ones who should drop d*ck sucking) they talk about g1 like it's faultless then try and turn it around and get mad a people who just want to enjoy g3 and have fun and see more representation on screen.

Also people need to take into account the ART STYLE of the show. There is definitely body variety, being upset that they didn't make all these characters look risqué or whatever is so weird to me. They obviously are presenting these characters more like high schoolers.

G1 was around with the likes of Bratz and those fashion lines, and ofc the style back then isn't going to reflect the style and catering there is now. People need to realize how ignorant they sound. Like you're basing your analysis on the past and how things were back then???

And to say that the dolls are ugly🥴 please grow up because these dolls are actually very fashionable. Just because they don't all look gaunt and risqué in every outfit??