#just to clear things up about how some harmful tropes can be used unintentionally

[saltminerising]

re: post/734821757300686848/

i'd like to state that there's also a difference in content having racist themes / tropes / negative stereotypes / etc. in it, vs. the people themselves being racist. i feel like that is an important distinction to make. you can absolutely accidentally write in racist content without being racist yourself. mistakes happen. staff is doing what they can to fix their errors; in fact, they're being very good about being transparent, and trying to amend the problematic content in their story/lore. but calling them "racist" seems a bit too far, and people insisting that they're still just awful people no matter what they do is an unhelpful and dismissive mindset.

yes, they should own up to their mistakes. yes, they should fix or rewrite the lore. this isn't about being "coddled," it's about realizing that perhaps not everyone's intention is to be directly hurtful, dehumanizing, or othering to any type of group. their content can be unintentionally harmful without them being a terrible person who condones racism and the horrible things that ideology stands for. there are people genuinely acting as though staff cannot redeem themselves from this offense, and that's such a negative, vitriolic mindset that does not allow growth, that does not account for the fact that they are people too, who can make mistakes. let people learn without tearing them down in the process. that doesn't help. if anything, it discourages it. positive reinforcement truly goes a long way.

there is not a single person who hasn't accidentally hurt someone else in some way or form. there's nobody who is perfect. does that make you a bad person, who can never recover from what you've done, not ever, despite how hard you try to, despite any effort you may give in rectifying that? i'm not here to say "staff didn't do anything wrong, uwu why are you all bullying them." no. they did do things wrong. but what matters is that they're making efforts to fix those things to the best of their abilities, with the feedback they have gotten from poc voices or those representing them. in light of that, shouldn't we give them the benefit of the doubt, rather than acting like they are the "villain" in this story, some faceless, greedy corporation who cares nothing about the feelings of their userbase? that all they want is money, that they do not take into account criticism? that they meant all that harm and hurt? it is very clear it was not their intention or their goal.

yes, people have every right to be upset and hurt over the story. that is so fair. it is so extremely valid. but... can we advocate for just a little more empathy on both sides here? i just think that calling them "racist" is an oversimplification of a very complex topic. it's not so black-and-white. it's grey, and it's okay to navigate those waters with a critical eye. but it is unnecessary to throw out terms that are so accusatory, and influence people to get riled up. you cannot claim "racist" and "racism" aren't loaded terms that don't immediately cause upset from both sides of the equation when these words are used.

again, i'm not advocating for censorship. or sugar-coating, or coddling, or what have you. i'm personally advocating for empathy above all else. only by fostering open communication can we really understand and grow as a community, rather than doing what we can to dismiss others, throw blame, tear each other down. respect and compassion is the best way to move forwards, from both sides.

for instance, i very recently came across someone on the forums who was using an ableist joke. and so i took the time to privately message them, informing and educating them. no blame. no anger. merely pointing things out in a civil manner in the case they did not know. they took it very well, they edited their post, because they really were just ignorant that it was something hurtful after all. sometimes, a situation can be solved with escalating it further. how would that person have reacted, if i had immediately jumped to calling them ableist instead? it is one thing to say their content is ableist. it is another to point fingers and blame, and say that they are, too. it would've done nothing but hurt them, shut down their want to be better, discouraged them from even trying. perhaps they still would have, even so. but you cannot deny there would have been an amount of hurt that was unnecessary to create in such a situation. does that make sense? (/genuine)

that is all, really. thank you for reading if you did. and if not, that is perfectly fine as well. apologies if i've upset anyone with my words, genuinely. because again, people are right to be hurt and upset. and really, this is my own two cents on the matter, and you are perfectly free to disregard what i've to say. after all, although i am poc myself, i'm but a single person in a sea of many, so i don't expect my words to hold that much weight. it just makes me sad to see everyone so angry and divided on this topic, rather than us all coming to a mutual understanding, as a community, but most of all, as people.

regardless if you disagree or not, i thank you anyways. please, take care of yourselves. and stay safe.

[mimzy-writing-online]

You probably know this by now, I don't know if you keep up with Whumptober, but one of the prompts this year includes "blindness". I'm not blind but based on your posts about writing blind characters, and based on how I would feel if one of my disabilities were used as a whump prompt, I'm not super comfortable with it. I was wondering what your thoughts are on blindness being a Whumptober prompt.

(unironically and with feeling) thanks, I hate it.

Yes, I’m familiar with Whumptober, but I’ve never participated myself and I haven’t seen this year’s prompts.

Edit: I later did see the prompts and check out the blog. I think it's a good set of prompts and I look forward to all the promising content, especially since some of my favorite tropes are there. To be clear before you read this, I have no problem with Whumptober2021 or whump in general. This is not the first time blindness has been included for a list of whump prompts, and it won't be the last.

This post directed at the concept of "blindness" as a whump prompt and why I think it's a bad idea. The intended audience is individual writers thinking about future projects.

The timing of this is almost too perfect because I read a fanfic earlier this week that would meet that prompt exactly. Tags included whump, blindness, and angst with a happy ending. Now whump, hurt/comfort, and angst with a happy ending are tags I enjoy reading, but blindness as whump has a specific message to it.

To explain that message, I want to discuss what whump is. Many readers are already familiar with the genre, but I think taking the specific definitions and picking apart what it means and what expectations we carry when reading whump fanfiction

Urban Dictionary defines it as: taking a character and putting them through physical and/or mental torment and is typically followed by the same character being treated for their traumas. To indicate the characters place in the situation they’d typically be called a whumpee (the character being hurt/comforted), the whumper (the character that causes harm and trauma), and the caretaker (the character designated the helping/healing/comforting the whumpee).

Fanlore has a page for whump that explains it in depth, including where it started in fanfiction, examples of whump, and even a list of “popular targets” in different fandoms. (Warning: you might find yourself called out on the popular targets list)

“The term whump (or whumping) generally refers to a form of Hurt/Comfort that is heavy on the hurt and is often found in gen stories. The exact definition varies and has evolved over time. Essentially, whump involves taking a canon character, and placing them in physically painful or psychologically-damaging scenarios. Often this character is a fan favorite…”

To add to that, I think an important detail is the distinction Fanlore makes between hurt/comfort and whump:

“While some communities and fandoms may use whump as a synonym for hurt/comfort, there is still a recognition that whump refers to darker and more extreme scenarios. And there are still whump fics been written that have very little, or no comfort at the end of the story.”

The big appeal of hurt/comfort is getting to both explore the darker sides of pain and then experience the catharsis of being taken care of, of being supported by your loved ones as you recover from the trauma. The character is the proxy for experiencing those highs and lows while you yourself are safe at home.

I personally don’t read much/any whump without some h/c involved, but I’m happy there are stories out there for people who do enjoy it. I’m not here to judge what you like reading or what you do to your characters.

What I want is to express how blindness, my disability, used as a whump prompt personally makes me feel and what message it sends to me, to others, and how that message affects my daily life.

Whump undeniably involves watching a character suffer through something painful and traumatic.

My use of the word “suffer” is what I want you to focus on.

Vision loss can be painful and traumatic. I personally developed an anxiety disorder in response to vision loss. Others experience depression. For some it might result in relapsing into old, maladaptive coping mechanisms like drug use, self harm, or eating disorders.

A big part of my anxiety was how people reacted to my vision loss. It was a cause of their stress. They were worried because they genuinely believed I would never live a happy life without normal vision, and that my life would only be struggle and pain.

I recently saw an old friend who hadn’t heard about my vision loss. The conversation was awkward, but the worst part was how they reacted as though I had experienced an insurmountable tragedy. And even when I assured them I’m happy with my life, they clearly didn’t believe me. They acted like I was just lying or in denial.

I love that people want to empathize with my situation and ask themselves what they would do in my situation, but I hate when the conclusion they come to is something along the lines of “I could never do that, I’d be too miserable thinking about everything I lost, I’d never be able to do anything I enjoyed ever again.” But I did go blind. And I’m not miserable, I’m actually happy with the direction my life is going, and I still enjoy my hobbies, even if I engage with them differently.

I’m not suffering. My life didn’t end with vision loss. It’s not ruined, broken, or worthless.

I read a fanfic that was tagged with whump, blindness, and angst with a happy ending. A general synopsis of the plot: the whumpee had gone blind due to a curse. It was true love’s kiss that broke the curse. Even from the summary I knew it was going to end with whumpee being cured somehow and that I’d leave that fanfic vaguely dissatisfied no matter how good the rest of the fanfic was.

I can say this for the fanfic: the whumpee had already accepted that they would likely be blind for the rest of their life, but everyone around them was treating it as a tragedy that needed to be fixed, working tirelessly for a cure despite the whumpee’s protests that they didn’t have to.

It actually hit home to my personal experience.

I still left it dissatisfied with the ending. I might love curse fics in that fandom, and I love the “true love’s kiss” trope, but it wasn’t enough to distract me from the fact that: an actual person out in the world thought the best happy ending, maybe the only happy ending, would be if the character got their sight back.

(note: I clicked kudos and exited out of the story's page because no fanfic writer deserves unsolicited critique or hate, especially for content I consumed for free and at my own volition.)

Why read a story I knew would disappoint me?

Because blindness representation is so damn rare that I feel like I’m wandering in a desert, dying from thirst and desperate for that oasis. But sometimes that oasis is a mirage and the author is unintentionally telling you that your life is actually awful and you’ll never be fully happy like this. And that is a shit mentality to walk through life with.

I don’t appreciate blindness being a whump plot. I hate it. Hundreds (thousands?) of fanfictions featuring blind characters are about to enter the internet and the overall message is going to be “You poor thing! You must be in so much pain, you must be miserable! Who’s going to save you? Who’s going to comfort you? Wouldn’t it be terrible if there was no one in your life to take care of you? You poor helpless thing!”

And I feel objectified. I feel trivialized. The mirage in the desert is going to become a starch, empty room filled with dozens of water bottles, almost all of them poisoned. My representation is going to hurt me personally, and it’s going to reinforce that idea strangers have about how awful my life must be.

(I returned to school this past month, and every day I’m hesitant to tell someone I’m visually impaired because I don’t want to be treated differently. If I’ve managed to pass as sighted this whole time and then suddenly reveal “oh yeah, I’m visually impaired” I feel this instant silence, this pause of awkwardness as people suddenly question how they’re supposed to treat me. They treated me like a person, and now I’m something strange and unfamiliar.)

I’ve worked so hard to improve representation for blind people, to give internet strangers the exposure to a blind person they need to normalize blindness because I hope that if they’re ever so lucky as to meet a blind person, they’ll treat that person with respect. That hope that another person in the blind community will find a friend they feel comfortable and accepted with. I hope that I’ll meet people who accept my blindness as just another aspect of me (like being bisexual or gender fluid or a writer or a cat lover).

Please don’t turn me and my community into a caricature. Don’t erase everything I’ve worked for with this blog.

To be clear, this is not just me saying "I hate the cure trope" again. This is me saying "the purpose of whump is to painfully hurt your favorite character, and I hate that your idea of pain and suffering is my daily (wonderful) life."

[writingwithcolor]

Argentine trans man with controlling parents; can I code them as Jewish?

@rcsordinaryworld asked:

The main character of a comic is an Argentine trans guy named Levi who ended up being somewhat Jewish coded. I’ve been debating whether to make it explicit, and I’m a little worried about his parents in particular. Part of his story is that he comes from an affluent family, and that his parents are somewhat toxic if not abusive. They’re funding college + transition for him, but on the condition he does what they want him to do. While he himself is a fairly good person, I’m worried about his mother perpetuating antisemitic tropes because she’s pretty manipulative and overbearing and finances are tied into it. Most of my characters are queer with bad parents, but I was wondering how I could handle his backstory respectfully if I did commit to making him Jewish?

If you are Jewish, disregard this part, because you are allowed to write your own experiences: If you’re writing us from the outside what is your motivation for making him Jewish in the first place? Because, yeah, I understand where you’re coming from that this might be messy. The experiences of a Jewish trans man with an unpleasant mother might be something highly specific that even a gentile trans man author with an unpleasant mother wouldn’t be able to capture accurately, or without accidentally stepping into stereotypes.

I understand that writing about queer characters with bad parents puts you in a bind vis a vis marginalized ethnic groups, because it’s tricky to write that setup from the outside of the group without accidentally sounding like a critique of the marginalized group as a whole. (Of course one way to do that is have lots of members of the group counteract the bad parents by treating the queer characters better.)

So yes, I would hesitate before making a character with a manipulative, overbearing, financially abusive mom Jewish if writing from the outside. There’s no reason that plot can’t be written about a gentile, and that way transmasculine Jewish readers won’t feel torn between the affirming validation of your character’s journey and feeling unwelcome and unsure about the portrayal of the mom. (Disclosure: I am not trans, so if you are trans and Jewish please weigh in on the notes.)

If he needs to be Jewish -- can they be bad parents in another way? Like completely preoccupied, or play favorites with a different kid, or something?

  - Shira

While I see Shira’s point, I would like to say that this:

>>Most of my characters are queer with bad parents

makes a big difference to me. If I had to pick the Number One Thing to communicate when writing bad Jewish characters, I would probably say make sure it’s clear that they’re not bad because they’re darn Jews. The fact that most of your non-Jewish characters are in the same boat with their own parents, achieves that.

The specifics of this character’s bad traits, using money to control and manipulate, are a little problematic. In my opinion, the money-grabbing and string-pulling tropes are just about avoided, purely because the only victim of the financial abuse is also Jewish. Usually, the stereotype is that we’re conspiring to benefit Jews at the expense of everyone else.

For this reason, you might be able to work with this story if you emphasise the son’s Jewish identity and highlight his positive experiences and personality traits associated with his Jewishness. If that involves finding a community with other Jewish people where he can be safe from the abuse, even better.

It would also help to make some of the other bad parents equally wealthy. I’m starting to see more examples in fiction of Jewishness being used as a synonym or shorthand for privilege, and I’m a little worried this is becoming a modern version of the money-grabbing trope. Diluting this association by having non-Jewish wealthy families would be helpful.

Even with these things in place, not all Jewish readers will agree that the stereotypes have been averted. In particular, I think Shira made an excellent point (which I don’t really feel qualified to expand on) about transmasculine Jewish readers. People in this group may not often get to see people like them in stories, so I don’t know how it would feel for that to be in any way tarnished with even a slight stereotype. Coming back to the fact that most of your characters are queer with bad parents, how interchangeable are their circumstances? Can you simply swap this character arc with someone else’s to avoid the uncomfortableness?

-  Shoshi

Though Shira and Shoshi covered things nicely, I'll weigh in briefly as the resident trans/nonbinary Jewish person. 

Here are the issues I see at a glance: 

A Jewish mother who is manipulative, toxic, abusive, and uses money to get her way

A Jewish man who is cowed by his mother, and vulnerable to financial coercion

An affluent Jewish family who uses their money to control

Now, as you suspected, having an overbearing, manipulative Jewish mother is feeding into a trope that causes constant pain for Jewish women. The idea that Jewish women are shrill, demanding, and unconcerned with the lives, and happiness of others around them is tossed around, even by some in the Jewish community. It's damaging, and also leaves Jewish women vulnerable. I think you could offset the damage by also including Jewish women, and especially maternal figures who are very clearly shown to not be overbearing, and to be generous (or at least not dictatorial ) with their money. 

Your character himself is also a concern for me, and one of the reasons I decided to give input, despite Shira and Shoshi covering things very well already. The trope of the domineering Jewish woman is incredibly prevalent, and beside it you will often find the trope of the weak, nebbish of a Jewish man. The idea is that our men are ineffectual, easily cowed, wimpy. In short, the nebbishy Jewish man, written into so much media, is a reflection of the idea that our men are not really men, and how much harder does that stereotype hit, when it's being applied to a Jewish trans man? There is a danger here, when you show your character (who has his own reasons to play along, transitioning socially, or medically can have astronomical attendant costs) bowing to pressures from his family, especially his mother, you are unintentionally reinforcing that negative image of Jewish men, and of trans men. 

Finally, the stereotypes of Jewish men, and women, are both combined with the overarching theme I'm seeing here: they have money, and they use it to get what they want, no matter the harm. Now, some people do this, of those people some are parents, inevitably some of those parents are Jewish, but this falls right in line with a third, very dangerous conception of Jewish people: that we all have money, and we use it for harm. 

So, like Shira I do wonder what made you want to make this character Jewish. Did you decide arbitrarily, and build the overbearing mother, the money, and the capitulating character himself after that, or did you have those things first, and decide he must be Jewish later? I feel this is a character, and a backstory that can be written, but not without putting in a fair bit of work, and examining your own logic is a part of that. In your writing you will need to show other Jewish people who are not rich, some who are and are not using that money to control. Showing mothers (and maternal figures) who listen, and are gentle, loving, sweet even. Showing Jewish men who are thoughtful, but know their own minds, and are willing to stand up for themselves, and others. It's possible, but certainly will expand your word count, and increase the time spent double-checking your work for these biases, and tropes. If you want to go ahead be ready, and be determined, it's a lot of work.

- Dierdra

[burning-omen]

Mutations and pleasure headcanons

Characters: Kurt Wagner, Scott Summers, Warren Worthington III, Peter Maximoff

Warning ⚠️: N*fw

Kurt Wagner:

It’s not part of his mutation but it’s worth mentioning, he’s flexible. To the point that it might be unreasonable.

He can fold himself into so many goddamn position and he’s strong enough to hold them for however long he needs to

Anyways, he has 100% just disappeared durning sex.

One moment your railing him into the mattress the next the entire room is covered in blue smoke and Kurt is nowhere to be seen.

About 10 seconds later he’s back with an extremely flustered look in his face.

Before you could question him about where he went he told you he was going to bed. He climbed in next to you and faced the wall for the rest of the night

The next morning he practically begged you to forget that it happened but to also say away from Logan for a few days.

And that’s how you figured out where he landed.

Your avoidance didn’t last long because at some point the next day you ran into Logan, who just let out a long sigh before patting you on the shoulder and walking away.

A few days later Kurt’s over it, just a freak accident, right?

Nope, happened again the next time you had sex with him.

After this kept happening he, begrudgingly, went and asked for help from no other than Logan!

The conversation was basically “hey Logan you fuck a lot right? Can you help me with my sex-teleporting problem?”

And he did, pretty much told him he just needed to be more in the moment mentally so his body wouldn’t take him out of it physically. (whatever that fuck that mean)

After he re-figured out how to stop teleporting spontaneously he decided to use this to his advantage.

I would like to introduce you all to a concept that I like to call “teleportation as a form a teasing”

Intentional teasing wasn’t one of Kurt’s strong suits so he figured that it might help

The first time it happened you were not prepared at all.

You were watching tv, as one does, your mind wandering off as some show played.

Then BOOM

There’s Kurt, looking determined but you could see he was nervous.

Carefully he climbed into your lap, staring down at you for a moment then leaning down, pressing a quick kiss on your lips, he kept going, kissing you over and over again.

He grinds himself against your thigh, groaning softly as sped up. The fabric of his underwear somehow hits every nerve just right.

You watched him as you gently kissing his neck and the bit of exposed chest just above the collar of his shirt.

“You’re bold today, sweetheart.”

“I-i know.”

And just like that, he was gone. A cloud of blue smoke left behind.

You knew this was different from the other times he’d disappeared, then he’d been so absorbed in pleasure that he just POOFED away. This was different, you barely even started, you hardly even touched him and he was gone. And even if it was an accident, he told you he had that under control now.

You just hoped that he hadn’t lied to you.

A few minutes later you wandered into Kurt's room, watching him from the doorway as he frantically arranged and rearranged the things on his desk. A nervous habit of his.

He tries his hardest not to look over at you, focusing incredibly hard on all the stuff on his desk.

He refused to look up even when he heard you close and lock the door, or when you walked up behind him, pressing your body against his as you wrapped your arms around him.

“Kurt..”

“...”

“I know you can hear me sweetheart, you wanna tell me what happened earlier?”

“Nothing..”

“Really? Nothing? Didn’t feel like nothing..”

Feel a little bad for him, he doesn’t know how to tease correctly.

You’re going to have to make him admit to attempting to tease you through the ultimate means of fucking him into the mattress until he’s seeing stars.

Scott Summers:

And now, a list of things you couldn’t do with Scott before he got some semi-permanent glasses:

Roughly fuck his face, because if you did and you knocked his glasses off you’d, at the very, very least, have your entire dick cut off.

Fucking him too hard. Period. It sounds fun but who’s going to pay for the holes in the ceiling or continuously replace your mattress when giant holes are inevitably burned into him?

So if he doesn’t have some semi-permanent glasses by the time you two start having sex everything’s going to be extremely soft and gentle

But the moment he shows you the new glasses it’s over for him.

He’s getting railed on/in/against everything you could think of, because you can do that now without bodily harm or thousands of dollars worth of property damage.

Have y’all been caught having sex in a place y’all shouldn’t be? Yes.

Do you give a flying fuck? No!

No Scott can’t do anything on his own the next day because moving hurts but hey, he had fun.

Warren Worthington III:

Hey Siri, define wing kink

For y’all’s that don’t know “Wing Kink is a related trope which often appears in wingfic (or in fanworks where a canonical character has wings), in which the character's wings are an erogenous zone and caressing them produces pleasurable feelings.” - the fanlore wiki

His wings, when you first started having sex with him, were completely off limits.

He made that undeniably clear to you.

Not because he didn’t like having them touched, but more because he didn’t think you’d like touching them.

All of that went straight out the window a few months later.

He was drunk, which had recently stopped being a normal occurrence for him. He tries to break out of his alcoholism, but it’s a slow and painful process. Instead of just outright stopping all at once he decided it would be better for him to just slow down. It works, he’s not drunk every minute of every day anymore so that’s better. He’ll drink on the weekends, and maybe take a shot before bed but other than that he won’t drink too much. But tonight he was drinking with Logan and in his attempts to keep up with him he’d ended up drunk out of his mind.

He cut himself off, he knew that if he drank more he’d blackout and he didn’t know what he’d do if he did.

So he stumbled all the way back to your room and tripped on literal air.

The sound of him hitting the floor woke you up.

Sitting up you saw Warren laying face down on the floor, giggling like a fool as he made multiple attempts to get up only to end up right back on the floor.

“Warren, it’s 3 in the morning, come lay down.”

You wanted to go over and pick him up. But you knew how he was about his wings and being touched in general.

After a few minutes of coaxing and encouraging him to get into bed he finally did.

Basically plopping down on top of you with a tired grin spread across his face

Burying his face in your chest, he closed his eyes.

After a few minutes you thought he was asleep, but you were proven wrong when he let out a long sigh and looked up at you.

“Fucking hold me..”

No, he doesn’t know how to ask for things nicely he’s a little bastard

You try and avoid his wings at first, gently draping your arms around his shoulders.

But that very quickly frustrated Warren, causing him to grab your arms and forces them around him and his wings.

Before you could try and say anything about it you could hear him snoring.

You sighed, deciding to deal with the breakage of limits could be talked about in the morning.

When you woke up Warren was already awake, still laying on your chest, just staring at you. His cheeks turned a light pinkish color when you looked down at him.

He wouldn’t say anything. He just stared at you for a solid 10 minutes before rolling over onto the other side of the bed.

He’s afraid that in his drunken state he’d made you uncomfortable, which led him to the never ending spiral of anxiety that made him say his wings were off limits in the first place.

Asking him what was wrong just led to him apologizing without actually saying what for.

Throughout the rest of the day he avoided the subject which made him ultimately avoid you.

You see? This is why you should talk to your partners, guys.

It took him awhile but he eventually said what he needed to say.

NOW ONTO THE SEXY BITS

Lightly running your finger through his lower feathers can be a way to get him in The Mood or to calm him down after a particularly rough sex (it helps with his sub drop)

This ones a bit more romantic but kiss his wings, especially the little part where they connect to his back.

He’ll melt, just straight up die on the spot because it’s just so nice and soft and feels so good.

Try not to be to rough with them, it hurts a fuck ton.

His wings are still off limits in certain aspects.

No using them to overstimulate him, he doesn’t like it. No pulling on his feathers, it hurts in the Not Good way.

But do kiss, massage, pet, and run your fingers through them.

He was very nervous when he first let you touch them, unintentionally flinching away when you reached for them.

Run your hands through his feathers while he rides you, he won’t last very long if you do.

praise him and call them beautiful, it took him a long time for him to learn to love himself and his mutation and he needs to be reassured sometimes

STILL BE CAREFUL

HIS WINGS ARE PRECIOUS AND MORE PRONE TO BAD PAIN THAN ANY OTHER PART OF HIS BODY

Just be careful with him stg I love him so much

Peter Maximoff:

Zoom zoom bitch

He fast

He has the nicest ass because of how much he runs

He can and will grab you and take you back to his room if he’s feeling especially needy.

And then he’ll act extremely bratty despite the fact that he brought you there.

He vibrates.

Most of the time unintentionally.

It’s his version of shaking, so he definitely does it when he cums

“Peter, what the fuck are you doing?”

“Just...give me a moment..”

He’s gotten too eager before and fallen off the bed while trying to change position.

When I say this man gives the best blowjobs in the history of blowjobs I mean it

His tongue vibrates too. That added with the fact that he has no gag reflex AND no shame? Rip

Quickies, anywhere anytime.

Cameras can be covered in less than a second and he can have both of you looking relatively decent before anyone comes in.

You have to guide him while he rides/fucks himself onto you because he might hurt you or himself by going too fast.

He’s not aloud to use his speed when given sexual orders

Usually after being punished he’s much more shy and nervous.

Making him do things slowly only adds to that.

Make him get on his knees in front of you? Gone, he’s so blushy and embarrassed at just being in that position.

Make him strip and prep himself while you watch? Ceases to exist

Will beg and cry for you to let him speed up, but he’s just putting on a show.

Grinding against pillows or folded blankets with some kind of plug up his ass is his preferred method of masturbation because he can go as fast as he wants without worry.

He’s ripped holes in a few blankets and pillows and has very unsuccessfully hidden.

“So are we not going to talk about the hole in my brand new blank?”

“No we are not.”

[gameofdrarry]

Wizards Hearts Recs: Angst

Wizards Hearts was a four-month-long Drarry reading fest. Players were given a playing deck of 52 tropes, and were asked to find 52 different fics to read and comment on to fill their decks. To prevent the same few fics from being read, fics were restricted to only being used for the game three times before being considered ineligible for further points. The tropes and submissions list can be found here.

Check out the masterlist of fics for this trope below the cut!

📜 remember me by hupsoonheng Rated:  Teen and Up Words:  31082 Tags: Amnesia, Temporary Amnesia, Obliviation, Established Relationship, Established Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Legilimency, Age Regression/De-Aging, Angst, Depression, Suicidal Thoughts, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Reformed Draco Malfoy, POV Draco Malfoy, Good Draco Malfoy, Gardens & Gardening, Angst with a Happy Ending, Happy Ending, POV Harry Potter Summary:  On a chilly day in October, Draco kisses Harry goodbye before he goes on yet another dangerous, undercover mission with the Aurors. And then Harry doesn't come back. Only Draco believes that Harry isn't dead, and pours himself into finding his husband despite his friends' pleas to move on and grieve properly. What he finds at the end of that work, though, is not at all what he wanted. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 you've got the antidote for me by Kandakicksass Rated:  Mature Words:  20730 Tags: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Soul Bond, Red String of Fate, Heavy Angst, Terminal Illnesses, Major Illness, Angst with a Happy Ending Summary:  When Harry Potter unintentionally severs their soulbond before it can fully form, Draco Malfoy resigns himself to a slow death and decides not to burden Harry with a soulmate he's made it very clear he doesn't want. He's never been selfless before, but for Harry, he can try. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Every Breath You Take by hephaestiions Rated:  Mature Words:  19252 Tags: Major Character Death, Death (Harry Potter), Suicide, Child Death, Miscommunication, Angst, Angst and Tragedy Summary:  It starts and ends with Death. Scorpius was just caught in between. Like always. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Between Myth and Man by slytherco Rated:  Explicit Words:  16242 Tags: Veritaserum, Truth Serum, Mundane, London, Falling In Love, Lies, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, This whole story is just Draco angsting really, Sexual Content, keeping secrets, Smoking, Bad Weather, References to Drugs, Making Out, One (1) Scared Little Sparrow, And also lots of texting Summary:  Draco, lost and a little broken, navigates post-war reality convinced that people like him should not be allowed to make their own choices. To solve the problem of his self-sabotaging tendencies, he starts taking a few drops of Veritaserum every morning. A story about the complexity of choices, repressed desires that come to the surface when we least expect them, and the utter hopelessness of truths built on a foundation of lies. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Three Boxes and a Scrapbook by dracogotgame Rated:  Mature Words:  30493 Tags: mention of divorce, flangst, Bill is a bro Summary:  One year after being accidentally bonded to each other, Harry and Draco are free to move on with their lives. But perhaps, what they needed was here all along. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Intertwined by bluefay Rated:  Explicit Words:  25086 Tags: Memory Loss, Memory Alteration, Accidental Bonding, Magic Gone Wrong, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, Malfoy Manor, Self-Harm, Dark Mark (Harry Potter), Serious Injuries, But they're not very graphic so don't fret!, Self-Hatred, Angst, Enemies to Lovers, Established Relationship, Sort Of, Anal Sex, Anal Fingering, Blow Jobs, Hate Sex, Childhood Trauma ,Flashbacks, St Mungo's Hospital, Sharing a Bed, Angst with a Happy Ending, First Time, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020 Summary:  On May 3rd, 1998, Draco Malfoy wakes up with no memory of Voldemort, the war, or Harry Potter, his supposed boyfriend. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 I Am Not Who I Became by mab_di Rated:  Explicit Words:  93189 Tags: H/D Fan Fair 2019, Secondary Theme: Travel Fair, Secondary Theme: Book Fair, Commercial Fisherman Draco Malfoy, Failed Writer Harry Potter, Depressed Harry Potter, Magically Powerful Harry Potter, Muscular Draco Malfoy, Recluse Harry Potter, Angst, Smut, Drama & Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Post-Second War with Voldemort, Wandless Magic, Boats and Ships, Finland (Country), Fishing, Redemption, School Reunion, Minor Draco Malfoy/Original Male Character(s), Anal Sex, Rough Sex, Sex Magic, Suicidal Thoughts, Near Death Experiences, Magical Theory, POV Alternating Summary:  Draco left England after the trials and has travelled the world meeting wizards and Muggles from different cultures and with vastly different relationships to magic, each other, and the natural world. Now he's a fisherman in Finland on commercial vessels. Harry has been struggling since the war and has become a recluse while trying to write his autobiography. An invitation to the Hogwarts class of 1998's 15th reunion isn't welcomed by either of them, but neither could predict how the night, and their reunion, will upend their lives. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 When I Put My Eyes On You by Zzzara Rated:  Explicit Words:  31160 Tags: Blindness, Blind Character, Blind Harry Potter, Disability, Physical Disability, Disabled Character, Slow Burn, Falling In Love, Love, Idiots in Love, Love Confessions, Dorks in Love, Friendship/Love, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Requited Unrequited Love, Hogwarts, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Amortentia, Potions, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt, Emotions, Emotional, Emotional Roller Coaster, Pining, Pining Harry Potter, Friendship, Friends to Lovers, Developing Friendships, Romantic Friendship, Best Friends, Draco Malfoy & Harry Potter Friendship, POV Harry Potter, Patronus, Spells & Enchantments, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst and Feels, Angst and Romance, Jealousy, Jealous Harry Potter, Male Friendship, Male-Female Friendship, Spin the Bottle, Halloween, Party, Party Games, Mistletoe, Kissing, Surprise Kissing, Boys Kissing, Rough Kissing, Drunken Kissing, Gentle Kissing, Boys In Love, Drinking, Drunken Shenanigans, Drunkenness, First Time, Explicit Sexual Content, Sex, Gay Sex, Hand Jobs, Emotional Sex, Awkward First Times, Sleeping Together, Literal Sleeping Together, Dancing, Showers, Masturbation in Shower, Sexual Fantasy, Sexual Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Resolved Sexual Tension, Dreams, Fantasizing, Desire, Self-Esteem Issues, Substance Abuse, Angst with a Happy Ending, Happy Ending, Lights Camera Drarry 2020, Lights Camera Drarry, LCDrarry, LCD - Freeform, The Way he looks, film inspired, Self-Prompt, Healing Summary:  When a hero defeats a villain, there's supposed to be a happily-ever-after... but when did anything ever happen to Harry Potter the way it was supposed to? Having sacrificed himself to the greater good, Harry is left alone in the darkness, blindly groping for the shreds of the life he knew. When the enemies meet, how is the story supposed to go, once they learn there's more to it than the eye can see? A story of pain, hope and things we discover, once we stop looking for them with our eyes. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 You open always (petal by petal) by birdsofshore Rated:  Explicit Words:  65214 Tags: Post War, Rent Boy!Draco, Down-And-Out!Draco, Grimmauld Place, House magic, Portraits, First Times, Antagonism, Hurt/Comfort, Coming Out, Pining, Angst, UST, Kissing, Frotting, Blow Jobs, Rimming, Intergluteal Sex, Anal Sex, Homophobic Slurs And Attitudes, Internalised Homophobia, Derogatory Attitudes To Sex Workers, Some Mentions Of Sadistic Violence, Brief Thoughts Of Sexual Activity With A Sleeping Partner, Rough Sex, Brief Mention Of Harry With A Woman (Past Relationship), Mentions Of Dubious Consent In Connection With Sex Work, Community: hd_erised, Inexperienced Harry, Top Harry Potter, House Elves, Masturbation Summary:  Harry’s not the kind of person who pays for sex. He really isn’t. Until he is. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Solder by Oakstone730 Rated:  Explicit Words:  34547 Tags: potion/alcohol addiction, Recovery, Nipple Play, Rimming, Dirty Talk, Angst, PiningUST, Reconciliation, LoveForgiveness, Cursebreaker!Draco, Artist!Harry Summary:  Seven years ago, Harry disappeared out of Draco and Scorpius's life without a trace after Harry's addictions destroyed his and Draco's marriage. Now, Harry’s back, and Draco wants to believe he’s changed. But Harry isn’t the only one haunted by the past. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Three Months, Eleven Days and Nine Hours by sassy_cissa Rated:  Teen and Up Words:  sassy_cissa Tags: H/D Food Fair 2018, Angst, Romance, Paroled Draco Malfoy, Rebuilding Hogwarts, Draco Malfoy/, Harry Potter Friendship, Down and Out Draco Malfoy, Food Forager Draco Malfoy, Soup Kitchens, Happy Ending, Post-Hogwarts, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Hungry Draco Malfoy Summary:  Broke and living in a one room hovel in Knockturn Alley, Draco hunts in rubbish bins for food. Nothing could be more humiliating, right? Unless you're Draco Malfoy... ❤️ Read on AO3

Texting You by ununquadius Rated:  Teen and Up Words:  6005 Tags: Major Character Death, text fic, draco is dead, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, or maybe hurt/no comfort, Everyday Life, Pets, Asexual Harry Potter, Indian Harry Potter, one penis drawing, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Loneliness, Drinking, Terminal Illnesses, blink and you missed them suicidal thoughts Summary:  After Draco's death, Harry can't let go so he keeps texting their private chat, updating him on his life and rambling about everything and anything until it almost feels like there's a possibility that, one day, a reply will come. Read on AO3

📜 Wake Up In The Night by p1013 Rated:  Explicit Words:  10483 Tags: Angst with a Happy Ending, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, Explicit Sexual Content, Face-Fucking, Public Sex, Blow Jobs, Versatile Draco Malfoy, Versatile Harry Potter, Anal Sex, Rimming, Anal Fingering, Dirty Talk, Facials, 69 (Sex Position), Coming Untouched, Love Confessions, Curses, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Drinking, Additional Warnings In Author's Note, POV Draco Malfoy, Voyeurism, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020, Emotional Manipulation Summary:  In the days after the War ended, there were a great many things that were changed or changing, a great many things that somehow slipped beneath the notice of Ministry officials and healers from St. Mungo's and Aurors that were tasked with capturing fleeing Death Eaters. It was, after all, the end of the War, and much like war itself, the clean up was heartbreaking. Lives had been lost. The world as they knew it had been changed irrevocably. In the grand scheme of things, there were more important things to worry about than Draco Malfoy's sudden, inexplicable inability to feel love. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Coated in Rust and Blood by crazyparakiss Rated:  Mature Words:  2429 Tags: Mpreg, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Therapy, Break Up, Post-Break Up, Angst, Violent Sex, Self-Hatred, Grief/Mourning, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020 Summary:  No one escapes the nightmares. That’s what his headshrinker tells Harry every time he tries to unpack the baggage he was handed from infancy. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Here Without You by  gracerene Rated:  Explicit Words:  26869 Tags: Post-Hogwarts, War, Canon-Typical Violence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Character Death, Minor Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Background Het, Non-Linear Narrative, Flashbacks, Epistolary, Love Letters, Dirty Letters, An Ode to Draco's Bum, Bottom Draco Malfoy, Top Harry Potter, Implied Switching, Auror Harry Potter, Healer Draco Malfoy, Explosions, Harry Potter & Parvati Patil Friendship, Loneliness, Denial, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020 Summary:  It's been seven years since the end of the Second Wizarding War with Voldemort, and a new Dark Lady has taken over in nearby Ireland. Harry feels compelled to volunteer to fight on the front lines, but war is never safe, and Harry has a lot—including his blissfully happy relationship with Draco—to lose. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Orion in the Sky by space_wingding Rated:  Explicit Words:  30709 Tags: Bookshop Owner Draco Malfoy, Coffee, Village life, Slow Burn, Pining, Denial, Frottage, Hand Jobs, Blow Jobs, Jigsaw Puzzles, Falling In Love, Getting Together, Post-Hogwarts, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, POV Draco Malfoy, POV Harry Potter, Fatal Curse, Serious Injuries, Suicidal Thoughts, Hospitalization, Death, Character Death, Unhappy Ending, St Mungo's Hospital, Grief, mentions of anal sex, Chronic or Terminal Illness, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020 Summary:  Draco Malfoy owns a bookshop in the Lake District. He’s also cursed. Enter: Harry Potter. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Forgot to remember you by Andithiel Rated:  Mature Words:  1753 Tags: Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Auror Partners, Magical Accidents, Memory Loss, Partial Memory Loss, Getting Together, DreamsPining, Light Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Drarropoly 2.0 - A Drarry Game/Fest, Rated M for language, There's not any real stuff going on Summary:  Harry was hit with a spell that made him forget the week before he was hurt. Most of his memories have come back, but he has a niggling suspicion that he did something wrong. Why else would his Auror partner (and the object of his desires) go from friendly to hostile? ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 On the Last Day by trishjames Rated:  Explicit Words:  53481 Tags: Mystery, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, Unreliable Narrator, Drama, Dramatic Irony, Flashbacks, Non-Linear Flashbacks, Memory Loss, Horror Elements, Suicidal Ideation, Depression, Occlumency (Harry Potter), Occlumency as a Coping Mechanism, Panic Attacks, Discussion and Depiction of Mini Seizures, mention of overdoses, Revenge, Repression, Science, Neurology & Neuroscience, Neurological damage, Medicine, Potions, Original Characters - Freeform, Slow Burn, Enemies to Lovers, Somewhat Bond!Fic, Strong Friendships, Strong Women, Maternal love, Department of Mysteries, Unspeakables (Harry Potter), The Love Chamber, The Death Chamber, Death Potion, Amortentia, The Veil, Near Death Experiences, Souls, Major character death - Freeform, Death, forced drugging, Mind Control (Imperio), Murder, Vomit, Medical Procedures, Consent, Amoral Behaviour, Unethical Behaviour, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Possession, Ghost Sex, True Love Conquers All, ghost!harry, Magically Powerful Harry Potter, Auror Harry Potter, Unspeakable/Scientist Hermione Granger, Unspeakable/Scientist Draco Malfoy, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020, Psst...angst with a happy ending.. Summary:  Draco is still mourning the recent loss of his mother when the Wizarding World is struck with the tragic news of Harry Potter’s untimely death. It’s just his luck that Potter not only comes back as a ghost, but seems intent on haunting Draco as he’s the only one that can see him. It’s a race against time to retrace the last few days of Potter’s life in order to find his body before he’s lost to the living or spiritual realm forever. On their journey, they’ll uncover secrets, betrayals, and a horrific truth that will disrupt both the living and the dead. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Poland | A Faint Glow of Hope by EvAEleanor Rated:  Mature Words:  6123 Tags: Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Summer Solstice, Solstice, Curses, Unspeakable Draco Malfoy, Auror Harry Potter, Auror Ron Weasley, Healer Hermione Granger, Herbology Professor Neville Longbottom, Angst, Flowers, Slavic mythology, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Mentions of Myth & Folklore, Mythology References. Folklore, poland - Freeform, POV Draco Malfoy, Headmistress Minerva McGonagall, Community: Seven Shades of Drarry Summary:  On Draco’s 25th birthday, somebody attempts to curse him, but Harry Potter jumps between them and is hit instead, with unexpected consequences. Potter is running out of time, and they both embark on a race against time to find the only cure that could save Harry. Little do they know they will need to face a myriad of magical creatures and their own feelings on the way. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 Grounds for Divorce by Tepre Rated:  Explicit Words:  122217 Tags: Slow Burn, Pining, UST, Anal Sex, brief but all the same enthusiastic rimming, One (1) lemon tree, Accidental Bonding, And I mean like U! S! T!, Jealousy, Deals with Trauma, They both top at some point, ron is a good friend, Draco is a Good Cook, Dubious Consent due to the Accidental Bonding, The actual SLOWEST burn, Hurt/Comfort, Have I mentioned UST? Cannot overstate this it's like A LOT, First there's frottage, And then there's more sex, Anal Fingering, Blow Jobs, Hand Jobs, and just a lot of sex, sex on a bed, sex in the shower, sex on the floor, Sex on a settee, In other news they go to Egypt, Teddy is a Small Bean, There is one (1) cat, and one (1) happy ending Summary:  Malfoy finds a coin. Harry finds a letter. A story about histories, a story about families. A story about a lemon tree somewhere in Upper Egypt. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 At Evening's End by manixzen Rated:  Explicit Words:  31055 Tags: Pre-Relationship, Angst, Azkaban, Hurt/Comfort, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Slow Burn, Post-Hogwarts, Friendship, Past Child Abuse, Enemies to Friends, Auror Harry Potter, Inmate Draco Malfoy, Prison, Auror Ron Weasley Summary:  When the dementors are removed from Azkaban, a compromise has to be made for the prison to remain secure and wizard-kind to feel safe. Harry and Ron find themselves assigned to a rotation as guards during their first year as Junior Aurors as a part of the new system. Harry finds his values challenged in the harsh environment, but an unexpected friendship may carry him through this difficult year. ❤️ Read on AO3

📜 all you ever did was wreck me by SailorChibi Rated:  Mature Words:  10807 Tags: Post-Hogwarts, Not Epilogue Compliant, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, draco has PTSD, Harry has PTSDN, ightmares, Animagus, Harry is an animagus, prison break - Freeform, Touch-Starved, affection starved, Fear of Death, fear of touch, touch repulsed, Trauma, Aftermath of Torture, harry doesn't want anyone else to die, harry is very angry at the world, Protective Harry, harry had to grow up too soon, Possessive Harry, harry wants to protect draco, house arrest, Ministry of Magic, ministry of magic has gone power hungry, Fear of Magic, draco is scared of magic, it's been used for too much evil, Draco Malfoy Feels, Sad Draco Malfoy, Protective Draco Malfoy, Sharing a Bed, platonically sharing a bed, First Kiss, Hugging, Cuddling, Platonic Cuddling, Harry Potter is a Good Friend, death is scary, Happy Ending, Angst with a Happy Endingh, appyish ending, might be a little bittersweet, but it will be ok I swear Summary:  After the war, the Ministry decides to make a clean go of it and sentences all Death Eaters to death. After a year spent imprisoned beneath the Ministry, with his mother safely in France, his father dead and only the Aurors who hate him for "company", Draco is waiting for his time to die. Harry gets to him first. ❤️ Read on AO3

[mst3kproject]

The Flame Barrier

I’ve got an awful lot of movies from 1958 on my resume, don’t I?  Why is that? Honestly, I couldn’t tell you. Apparently it was just a bumper year for cheap, crappy black-and-white films.  This one stars Kathleen Crowley from The Rebel Set and Rodd Redwing from The Mole People, in a movie written by George Worthing Yates, who also penned Earth vs the Spider.  Also featuring a blob from outer space, with motives even less clear than the one in The Space Children.

Over yet another stock-footage rocket launch, one of those deep-voiced 50’s narrators informs us that there’s a layer of Earth’s atmosphere called the Flame Barrier which destroys everything it touches. This particular rocket was no exception, and its crash-landing in the Mexican jungle may be related to the disappearance of explorer Howard Dalman, whose wife Carol has now come looking for him. She seeks out a pair of prospectors, Dave and Matt Hollister, to guide her to his last known location.  As they go deeper into the bush, they find they’re wandering into something unknown… something that can make men burst into flames!

This movie isn’t terrible.  It’s not great, but it’s not irredeemably awful.  It reminds me a lot of The Giant Gila Monster, in that there’s a story going on and it’s not a bad story per se, but it’s one that’s got nothing whatsoever to do with the title and premise that drew us to the film in the first place.  When the supposed main plot pops up again at the end, it makes for a sudden and jarring shift.

The Flame Barrier starts off all right.  We have the inevitable narrator to give us the backstory, and then it gets right on with meeting the characters.  They’re introduced one by one, telling us their personalities and goals: Carol is naïve and spoiled but she’s trying her best, Matt is a drunk fool but he’s got a good heart, and Dave is a gruff, cynical realist who loves his brother but is tired of his bullshit.  None of them are exactly nice people but you can see where they’re coming from, and they each get an arc.  Carol struggles with whether she really loved Howard, whom she barely knew, and the movie allows her to toughen up and learn how to survive in the wilderness. Dave spends much of the movie being a jerk to Carol but eventually realizes he judged her too harshly and apologizes.  Matt gets a chance to be a hero and takes it, believing that he owes it to Dave for never giving up on him.  The writing is frequently unsubtle but the actors are competent, and these little stories work just fine.

The movie that surrounds them, however, is often very sloppy.  The narrator tells us that the space probe from the opening crashed because ‘it unexpectedly lost its gravitational force’.  What?  What is that supposed to even mean?  The narrator also tells us it’s been six months since Howard disappeared, then mere minutes later Carol says it’s been four. There’s a bit where Carol is menaced by an iguana… the creature is never actually in the shot with her, so they couldn’t find anything scarier?  The stock wildlife footage on their trek through the soundstage sets of Central America includes hyenas.  I can hear Crow saying, “boy, are we in Afri… wait a minute…”  And, pet peeve, they describe a snake as poisonous instead of venomous.

This being a jungle movie, obviously there are ‘natives’.  I think most of these are actual Mexicans, although Wikipedia says Rodd Redwing may have been from India (if so, I like to think his entire career in Westerns was based on just walking into casting directors’ offices and announcing he was ‘an Indian’, and letting them draw their own conclusions).  Being as this is a movie from the fifties, the natives are there largely to provide a body count – white people aren’t allowed to die until the climax.  To its credit, The Flame Barrier mostly (though not entirely) avoids the trope where the natives have interpreted the mysterious happenings as supernatural, leading the white characters to scoff at the whole thing.  There is some of this, but Dave clearly knows these people well and respects their culture and their warnings.

Then there’s the love story.  Obviously this is a movie, so Carol’s gotta fall for one or other of these idiots, but neither of the Hollister brothers is a good choice. Matt is sweet to her but he’s also a useless drunk who only has a job because his brother puts up with him.  Dave spends eighty percent of the movie being an asshole and I have no idea what Carol sees in him.  At least the two men never fight over her.  I guess the love affair is important to the plot, because it spurs the party on to finish their search for the missing Howard Dalman despite the odds being stacked against them… but that basically boils down to Carol and Dave needing to be sure she’s a widow before they can bone.

After all this messing around in the jungle, with the run time half over we get to the plot, and the movie changes gears with an almost audible ka-chunk.  Now we’ve got this space blob sitting in a cave (how did it get in there when it’s still attached to the rocket?) doubling in size every two hours, which must be destroyed before it can consume the entire earth!  Suddenly we have a laboratory, because all the scientific equipment Howard brought with him is still in perfect condition despite having been sitting in the jungle for either four or six months.  Suddenly Dave the rugged survivalist is a scientist and mathematician.  It’s like they took the same actors and sets and started trying to make a totally different movie.

Honestly, I think this is more or less what happened. I think the multiplying space blob was the movie somebody originally wanted to make – it starts out as a tiny thing in a test tube, growing bigger and bigger until it consumes the whole building and will destroy the entire city if it isn’t stopped!  That sounds like a pretty fun 50’s sci-fi movie in itself. It also, however, sounds like an expensive 50’s sci-fi movie, needing miniatures destroyed and screaming extras and other stuff The Flame Barrier just didn’t have the money for. Hence the need to spend so much time wandering around in the jungle swapping tragic backstories before the characters are allowed to get to that point.

The unfortunate thing about this is that the movie doesn’t really have time to get into the nature of its alien.  In Spacemaster X-7, the Blood Rust was offscreen much of the time but we still had a good idea of what it was and of its capabilities, and the explanations we were given made a reasonable amount of sense.  In The Flame Barrier, we’ve got this blob that apparently lives in the rarified and super-hot outer atmosphere (the writers seem to have confused Earth’s atmosphere with the Sun’s corona), but can also survive on the ground… and its effects are all over the place. Sometimes when things get too close to it, they’re just electrocuted and disintegrated, as happens to the rocket’s original passenger, a very young chimpanzee.  Sometimes people get horribly burned and then burst into flames and are reduced to skeletons hours or days later, as keeps happening to the natives. And then there’s Howard, who somehow managed to get close enough to be swallowed up by the thing and his corpse is still completely intact inside it.

None of this makes any sense.  If the blob has that protective electrocution barrier that the humans must be so careful to avoid, how did Howard get close enough to be trapped in it?  How did the chimp get out to end up wandering around in the jungle?  What the heck is happening to the natives who get burned and then skeletonized and why doesn’t that ever happen to the chimp or any of the main characters?  And how do they manage to kill by electrocution a creature that uses lethal amounts of electricity without any harm to itself?  ‘It’s an alien – we don’t understand it’ can cover a multitude of sins in movie writing, but the blob’s random effects don’t even feel like they could potentially make sense.

The Flame Barrier reminds me of other MST3K movies, too. Prominent among them are It Conquered the World and The Crawling Hand, both of which ended on the same unintentionally depressing note: they suggest that the dangers of going into space are so great that humans will never be able to overcome them.  It Conquered the World tells us that there are eight more Venusians just waiting for their own turn to invade.  The Crawling Hand says that exposure to outer space causes mutations that will turn astronauts into mindless murderers.  The Flame Barrier posits that not only is space itself deadly, but is also full of deadly creatures, and the only way to avoid them is to stay on the ground.

This has always interested me because movies like this stand alongside things like the tales of Rocky Jones, Space Ranger!, in which humans have an exciting future among the stars. Stories set in space can be about either the exhilaration of discovery or the terror of the unknown, and this dichotomy seems to be as old as science fiction – Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is considered the first work of proper sci-fi, and it encompasses both.  Frankenstein tells us that if we let our fear over-rule our curiosity, we’ll miss out on something potentially wonderful.  Movies like The Flame Barrier, and even modern space monster flicks like Alien, seem to say the opposite, that we shouldn’t meddle with the unknown at all.

This movie was kind of a compromise on my part.  I’ve had a lot on my plate lately and I picked The Flame Barrier as a movie that was kinda stupid but wouldn’t be either a test of my endurance or particularly challenging to write about.  I’m hoping to have something a little juicier for you next time.

[mysidekickisaukulele]

The Charlie Test, or, “Am I Unintentionally Making My Writing Sexist?”

1. Does your writing (story, novel, script, etc.) center around, or involve as a large plot point, a character’s gender identity? (For example, a play about a woman facing discriminating because of gender, or a character coming to terms with their gender identity, etc.) If so, ignore step 2.

2. Can you swap the genders of your characters and have everything still makes sense? (Allowing for some small tweaks, like a line about going through menopause being switched to a cis male character). If the answer is no, or you try this and it feels wrong, there is a chance your writing could be unintentionally sexist, or relying on sexist tropes!

This is something I use a lot when I’m writing, because there are so many harmful, sexist tropes that different forms of media rely on again and again, and it’s hard not to let that permeate your own writing unless you are being active about it. Using this tool has made me a much better, and more confident, writer!

I call it the Charlie test because of what happened the first time I unofficially used it. I had given a script to a friend to look over, and I could see as they were reading that they were very confused and disconcerted. As we talked through the scripts issues, it became clear that she had thought my one character, Charlie, was male, when I had in fact written Charlie as female. Her face instantly cleared up when I explained this to her, but then it hit me that this information shouldn’t have impacted my friend’s ability to follow the story. As I combed through the script, I found dozens of small microaggressions, throwaway sexist remarks, and unchecked applications of sexist tropes to Charlie. All small things, that when removed changed nothing about her character, but did change everything about how this character was seen. Small things like other characters constantly asking “are you sure?”, her own self doubt. Things that seemed so natural to include when writing Charlie the woman, but seemed unnecessary and forced when reading it with Charlie the man. Reading that script the way my friend had, I realized how common it was for me to include all of these sexist microaggressions in my own writing. And how they were not only unnecessary, but actually made my writing worse. So I started doing this in purpose. Gender-swapping my characters while writing a scene to make sure it would still make sense, that it wouldn’t compromise the scene I had set up (And this is not exclusive to cis characters either— does this scene change if my cis male lead is now gender neutral? If he is a trans man? And honestly, if the answer is no, I do sometimes question why the character has to be a cis man in the first place). But I find this tool especially helpful when writing two person scenes, especially those between a man and a woman, ESPECIALLY if the scene is meant to be romantic in any way. If the woman is suddenly the one questioning every move the male makes, does it still make narrative sense, or was that me parroting what I’ve seen after watching too many Cary Grant films? If the man suddenly the butt of every joke, does that say something about his character, or how I view women (or myself!)? Sometimes it leads to me changing what I’ve written or how I’ve written it. Other times it challenges me to change how I think about a situation. Sometimes it inspires me to utilize what I learned in that swap in another piece of writing. But no matter what, it provides a crucial shift in view and forces me to engage with my writing and my internalized sexism critically and head on.

As with anything, there are always exceptions to the rule (See the movie Gravity not passing the Bechdel test, yet still considered feminist by most people, considering it is mostly Sandra Bullock just being an absolute badass), and the Charlie Test does not necessarily mean that you are sexist. In fact, if you are using the Charlie Test, there’s a good chance you aren’t! It’s more a measure of how sexist overtones can still pervade our own writing despite us not thinking that way at all, and a tool to help us see our own writing in a different way. And it can be used in so many other ways too! So take this tool! Use it for good! Change it to fit your own needs! Tell me about it! Engage critically with your own work and internalizations!

[fyeahwaywardvictorians]

Some ramblings about the Asylum for Wayward Victorian Girls and Victorian attitudes towards women and suicide

Despite it being my main hyperfixation at the moment, one of the things that bugs me about the asylum book is the framing of Emily’s suicide attempt as an act of rebellion against society.

Throughout my years of obsessing over Victorian culture, one thing that comes up again and again is the disturbing implication that suicide was considered the inevitable, or even honorable, course of action for certain women--namely those who lost their virginity before marriage, or “fallen women” as they were often referred to.

The romanticized depictions of women drowning themselves that are discussed--and unintentionally(?) perpetuated--in the book, existed not in spite of attitudes towards female suicide, but because of them. Because a woman’s role in Victorian society was that of a wife and mother, one who was made unsuitable for such a role by premarital sex--even in the case of rape--would be viewed as a burden on society at best, and an actively destructive influence at worst.

Don’t get me wrong here; there was absolutely a stigma against suicide regardless of circumstances, and it is historically accurate that Emily would be shamed and sent to the asylum for it. It was a classic “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” kind of double bind.

Probably the most blatant instance of a fallen woman’s suicide being romanticized in Victorian literature comes from Thomas Hood’s poem, The Bridge of Sighs, which is essentially an ode to the corpse of a prostitute. An excerpt:

Make no deep scrutiny Into her mutiny Rash and undutiful: Past all dishonour Death has left on her Only the beautiful.

The clear implication here is that the woman in question has been at least partially redeemed by her suicide. (Note that this poem was controversial for being too sympathetic to prostitutes.)

Likewise, Charles Dickens tended to treat the suicides of fallen women as tragic, but more or less inevitable. In Oliver Twist, the prostitute Nancy remarks:

How  many  times  do  you  read  of  such  as  me  who  spring  into the  tide,  and  leave  no  living  thing  to  care  for  or  bewail them.  It may  be  years  hence,  or  it  may  be  only  months,  but I shall  come  to  that  at last.

It’s worth noting that, on the whole, Nancy is portrayed sympathetically, and that she ultimately dies by murder rather than suicide. (She is brutally beaten to death by her pimp.)

Regardless of how much sympathy they receive from their authors, the majority of fallen woman in Victorian literature die by the end of the stories they feature in, either by suicide or circumstance. The title character of Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary swallows arsenic after a string of extravagant spending and extramarital affairs. In Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Grey, Dorian’s first major crime is unceremoniously dumping his fiance for petty reasons, resulting in her suicide. The breaking of the engagement is framed as being equivalent to murder, implying that suicide is the inevitable fate of a woman scorned. 

Those who do not die by suicide are killed off by illness or circumstance, usually after a great deal of suffering. Examples include the eponymous character of Elizabeth Gaskell’s Mary Barton, and Lady Isobel in Ellen Wood’s East Lynne.

Even rape victims are not exempt. More the most part, Thomas Hardy’s novel Tess of D’Ubervilles is a deconstruction of the fallen woman trope; the title character is described by the author as “a pure woman,” and the mistreatment that she experiences as a result of being raped is overtly framed as an injustice on the part of society. Nonetheless, she is hanged after killing her rapist. 

Even the few fallen women who are not killed by their authors suffer for their actions, and typically deliver a monologue or two about their suicidal feelings. Charles Dickens includes two characters of this archetype, Martha Endell and Emily Peggotty, in David Copperfield. Although both are ultimately redeemed, they express deep shame and suicidal feelings.

Standing at the edge of the Thames, Martha exclaims:

I know that I belong to it. I know that it’s the natural company of such as I am! It comes from country places, where there was once no harm in it—and it creeps through the dismal streets, defiled and miserable—and it goes away, like my life, to a great sea, that is always troubled—and I feel that I must go with it!

In the same scene:

How can I go on as I am, a solitary curse to myself, a living disgrace to everyone I come near!

In the same novel, Emily Peggotty runs away from home in disgrace after a one night stand. She mentions on a few occasions that that she considers her disgrace to be a fate worse than death. Later on, her rival Rosa Dartle outright suicide-baits her:

‘Hide yourself... if not at home, somewhere. Let it be somewhere beyond reach; in some obscure life—or, better still, in some obscure death. I wonder, if your loving heart will not break, you have found no way of helping it to be still! I have heard of such means sometimes. I believe they may be easily found.’    

Although both Martha Endell and Emily Peggotty are implied to live out full, normal lives, they must flee to Australia in order to escape their own reputations.

Circling back to Emily with a Y and the Asylum, I agree with the book’s assertion that Emily and Anne’s suicide attempt was by no means an act of madness or even mental illness in the modern sense, but I don’t think it was an assertion of defiance or the most rational way of dealing with the situation, either.

Simply put, they were manipulated into it. Not only by the Count DeRothsburg--given that several of his previous victims wound up in the Asylum, and the fact that having any witnesses to his crimes going insane and/or killing themselves would be very convenient for him, it would not be unreasonable to suspect that he intentionally drove them to suicide--but by a society that saw little use for the victims of sexual exploitation.

This interpretation works from the standpoint of character arc, as well. The first time she is victimized, Emily naively assumes that suicide is her only option. By the climax of the novel, she has learned to question social norms and recognize the systemic injustice that pushed her to that conclusion, and, with this knowledge, she instead makes the decision to destroy these institutions rather than herself, and ultimately comes out victorious.

(Until the contrived mass suicide at the ending, which pretty much obliterates all that, so I’m just gonna pretend it’s non-canon.)

Note: Here’s some sources/more reading on the fallen woman archetype and Victorian attitudes towards suicide, in case you’re as nerdy as I am and wanted to read more:

https://opus.uleth.ca/bitstream/handle/10133/241/MR17382.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y

http://www.victorianweb.org/books/suicide/07.html

[flyingcatstiel]

1/5 Hi, ignore this if you’re not interested in commentary (sorry if it’s rude to send it, new to not just lurking and am trying to figure out when it’s appropriate to say things or whether it’s polite to be on anon or not be on anon, etc. and am actually bad at that kind of thing IRL, too, so yeah, sorry if this is just unacceptable or something), but thanks for the post about Gordon. I’ve seen that in fic and been uncomfortable and then not sure if I’m being oversensitive, because

2/5 he is one of the more interesting/ memorable characters in SPN so I can see why he might be the first villain some people think of, and there’s a sort of caricature-method of writing villains I see in fic which means they become kind of two-dimensional plot devices for convenience. By the same token, though I don’t post fic, I do write it and I have also used him to populate bully groups on a couple of occasions, and given that I have been uncomfortable/ragey, both with this and with 

3/5 SPN’s bullshit vis-a-vis POC/women/queer people/etc in general, maybe I should not have done that. Something for me to think about. So. Yeah. Sorry if I offend at all, or if you just wanted to let out spleen in peace, but thank you for making the post. I saw your tag “(and I’m such a chicken shit)” and I appreciate that you posted anyway. Your tag commentary is also always very gratifying to read and I was relieved in the spring when you made that post clearly identifying the fandom policing

4/5 happening to diminuel as exactly what it was, since I didn’t understand how it could be happening in the first place (A+ on your tags then as well). Which isn’t to say you should post things if you’re uncomfortable, because this place is terrifying, but. I appreciated it now as well as then, so thanks for doing it! Sorry for rambling, I don’t expect you to respond, and again, sorry if I should not have commented. And have a very nice day!

5/5 (P.S. thanks for mentioning Bartholomew! I don’t understand why I don’t see him the most. I know it’s just how they wrote/styled him but whenever I see him in gifs or episodes I suddenly feel like I should watch my drink, even though I’m at home in my pajamas)

First of all, thanks for your message! My inbox is open, so it means I welcome asks and any kind of venting, anons included. When it will get too much I will close the box, that’s all. 

under cut this goes since it is so long

So, my post about Gordon Walker. This is actually a very old pet peeve of mine - the way how evil and one dimensional Gordon is in destiel fics. I love Gordon as a character and it hurts me to see him reduced to a homophobic sexual aggressor. Which he was not on the show! (Alistair is the one who did unspeakable things to Dean) I could kinda understand when older (canon) fics posted around s4/5 used Gordon as theor go to villain, since he was still fresh in the memory. But now, 12 years after his death on the show to have Gordon as the cartoonish villain in an AU destiel fic is really a questionable choice. SPN is such a white show, there’s plenty of one episode white evil dudes to chose from. There’s plenty of reoccurring white villains like Lucifer, Michael, Metatron, Bartholomew, heck, Crowley is a villain. And I’ve seen them used as villains in fics, so, the choices are abundant.

I really appreciate you saying that even when you like Gordon as a character, you also have depicted him as a bully in your fics. I truly believe that most fic writers who write evil Gordon never intended it to be a racist statement (despite using all angry black male tropes on him). I remember reading a fic with a leery Gordon that was written by a POC author. That’s how pervasive this is. That’s why it is important to name the problem - fandom racism - and then let people to think about it. Feel free to share my post, my goal was to get people thinking.

And let me be clear, evil Gordon trope is racist not because the author used Gordon as a character or even as a villain. It is racist because usually Gordon is the only POC character in the fic and his only role is to be a one dimensional sexual aggressor. I’m stoked when destiel fics have well developed canon POC characters (as few as they are) or even make up their own. There are fics with surly neutral Gordon as well, so, it is possible to have representation without indulging in racist stereotypes. We can’t change the show and their unfortunate tendency to cast non white actors as one episode villains to be killed by white leads. But we can try to make destiel fic more friendly for non white destiel shippers.

The reason why it took me so long to make this post is that I can’t really talk about evil Gordon in destiel fic without drawing attention to said fics. I don’t want to put fic writers in a tough spot because I believe that they didn’t mean harm. But, that’s how everyday racism happens - unintentionally. Last year I read two new fics with evil Gordon and one with evil Victor Heinriksen. I’m sure there’s been more since then. And I don’t know how to draw attention to this problem without starting fandom wank. I made a decision to not to rec such fics on @destielfanfic, but since our reccing has declined in general, this is not a big deal. It’s too little too late. I’ve recced fics with evil Gordon before, they are still on the blog, I’m truly sorry about that. So, I made a post to yell in a void! Thank you for your message, it means I’m not alone ;)

[littlewalken]

May 9

Isn’t Pr0n H*b the same place that has that guy who posted nice anti trope videos and got a lot of likes? And are the memes about them giving sex ed and sponsoring snow plows real? (I’m not going to search because it isn’t my thing) So they might be a good buyer for this emotional support hell site. They might do something about the bots, hate, and child harming.

When the adult purge came didn’t someone throw out the idea of an adult side to Tumblr to try and keep the young fandom kids away from the stuff they aren’t old enough for? 

I’d be all for an adult Tumblr that you’d have to option in to. In my general Tumblring I don’t want to deal with adult activities. I want to see memes and silly pets and what ever hyperfixation my brain is on at the moment. 

And it seems like the naughty site people know how to run big complicated media filled websites.

Okay, got to regain some sanity yesterday by removing myself from the dwelling and having tacos. Found a couple of those crochet kit and book things that pop up in the gift section at the book store. Always wanted to try one but the price and not quite having characters I wanted kept me from it. 

I picked up the Peanuts one first, they’re a safe place but I’m not that much in to them, then saw the Princesses and thought for the price it wouldn’t hurt. I might not even use their yarn and go with colors i have, can’t tell if some Princess ones are missing any way. If the hooks are steel I’ll use my Clover ones with their flat handles. 

Yeah so it’s really the instructions I want because although I can crochet I’ve never made these kind of critters and it’ll be good lessons in shaping and stuff. And once I figure out that part I don’t see it being too hard to hack them in to other critters. 

Was also a good day for picking up tatting supplies as it looks like the Hobby Lobby is cutting down. What ever, got berry colored bobbins for the berry shuttle and silver ones for the silver shuttle along with the needle tatting DVD. It gives clear instructions and the working off the ball method for rings and chains can be applied to two shuttles. Also the ladies that host it are unintentionally hilarious in the older crafting lady way. 

At first I was worried I’d need a new container for my shuttles but as it worked out there is just enough room for them. And the DVD came with a nice plastic envelope to put the needles in since the tube they came in broke. 

What I still want is something else to keep my threads and supplies in. The container I have is okay but it’s also one of those that stacking ones that spontaneously falls apart. 

Gonna have to whatever when I get the energy and I don’t know. I need a second room and a couple of weeks to be able to take stuff out of my room, do a good vacuuming and cleaning, and then put stuff back in a more organized way. 

Still dealing with the general _____ that is ruling over my current situation that I have to take al the Repressitall and Ignoritall for because there’s no time to process one trauma before the next one occurs.

More reading and note taking today while I ponder what string thing or arting I want to do next.

[fantroll-purgatory]

@plumb1tes

This is my Athena Troll! Hope you like her ^u^

YES with the 80′s businesswoman vibe! Love her!

FIRST: Alternia or Beforus or some type of AU?

Ok, this is a WIP AU where twelve trolls (based off of Greek Gods) play sgrub, and their planet is pretty similar to Alternia in terms of enforcing the hemospectrum and the like. This troll is based off of Athena, the goddess of wisdom and war (the tactical side of it)

Name (preferably include how you came up with it and why): Athine Pallas (Athine from the goddes’s name, Athena. Pallas is from the extra title that some address Athena, as some call her Athena Pallas.)

Hmmmm I worry that this name tips its hand a little too readily? Athena’s got a lot of epithets besides “Pallas,” many of which serve an actual function of her role as a goddess. Based on your description, I think the best ones to use for her are Atrytone, “The Unweariying,” and Promachos, “She Who Fights in Front.”

So maybe…Atryon Pachos? Also keeps her initials the same.

Age: 7 sweeps (almost 8)

Strife Specibus: shieldKind (Can be throwable, and its quite high-tech, like Captain America’s. It has retractable razors on the rim of the shield, and circles back after thrown like a boomerang.)

God I love this! As CD pointed out, Athena from borderlands has a rad shield that might be fun to use as a visual anchor!

Fetch Modus: Not really great with these, but puzzlemodus seems to fit her, as she likes solving problems.

I kinda like giving her Jade’s Pictionary Modus since Athena is a also a goddess of handicrafts.

Blood color: Teal

Symbol and meaning: It’s an astrology sign of Minerva, Athena’s roman counterpart.

Love it! It already fits tealblood sign language pretty well! I may add a line and open up the upper loop a little but I think it’s good to go!

Trolltag: adroitExarch

You’ll see below that I’ve offered suggestions to modify her ancestor’s title, but I still like this trolltag since it sets up a desire to rise above her station.

Quirk: She doesn’t use any other punctuation other than a period. It’s to show her monotone voice. (If you have any suggestions I’m glad to hear some!)

Nah, I think this works! Troll quirks don’t have to be super complicated. If you wanna add a fun one, maybe she extends her “oo” sounds into “ooo” when she’s over-excited, sort of like an owl hoot!

ex: “Whooo the fuck do yooou think yooou are?”

Special Abilities (if any):

Lusus: An owl, which is sacred to Athena. She was a mentor to Athine, and raised her without much fighting, as Athine was a pretty composed grub. However as Athine gets older, she spends less time with Owlmom, and doesn’t really listen to her advice as much due to believing she’s smart enough to not need it, becoming absorbed into studying due to wanting to be a general, like her ancestor. Owlmom loved Athine, and felt pretty sad about being ignored. She grew a bit mischievious, and would frequently cause trouble to get Athine to pay attention to her.

Personality: The first thing to describe Athine: logical to a fault. She is a pretty unemotional person, and responds to questions with the most logical answer she can think of. Athine is an ambitious person, and a go-getter. She doesn’t want to settle with being a legislacerator, even though she assumes she’d be a pretty good one. She has her sight on being the general of the emperor’s army. With her perception and intelligence, she gained a decently sized ego, though it’s much more subtle than others in her session (*cough cough* the Aphrodite troll *cough*).

I wanna MEET the Aphrodite troll!

Athine is also a pretty irritable person, but most of her frustration is directed at her lusus’s mischief, and tries not to lose her cool in front of her group if she can help it. She is a pretty professional person, and almost always reacts to situations with an apathetic demeanor. This doesn’t mean she’s emotionless, but she prefers to not have her feelings cloud her judgement on others.

God yeah she’s a Dersite.

Athine is confident in herself as a leader, and is good at ordering others to work in order to achieve a goal. She’s definitely not a personable troll, nor is she very friendly, but is able to quickly make decisions in the heat of the moment. She is very no nonsense, and has no sense of humor most of the time. While she thinks herself as a good leader, if a friend were to be harmed by her own judgement or decisions unintentionally, she would be quite remorseful and critical of herself for a long time.

Interests: She loves to play chess, and has played it since she was a grub. Athine is also pretty studious, and likes to gain knowledge that will benefit her or her group, though she doesn’t really like trivial knowledge, or information that isn’t useful to her.

Athine likes to play FLARP with the Ares troll of their session, being a pretty formidable duo (him being the one that does most of the actual fighting, and her giving him orders. This is symbolic of the fact that Ares and Athena are two sides of war; Ares is the brutal fighting, and Athena is the tactical planning.)

Honestly if I could add something? Include weaving. She’s the goddess of warfare and of handicrafts, and her weaving competition with Arachne is one of the more famous myths with which she’s associated. Also much like tactical warfare, weaving requires immense pre-planning and rapid adjustment if you mess up.

Ansestor: The Exarch. A supreme general that squashed rebellions, leaded fleets of soldiers to victory, and the Emperor’s right hand woman. Her story was a pretty well-known one, and it is from her ancestor that Athine aspired to become as brilliant as her, and wanted to become a general instead of a legislacerator. Athine greatly respects and admired her ancestor, and wishes to be just like her.

Man I like the concept but troll rules as far as we know still state that ancestor titles be eight letters long. If we go a rank above Exarch, we get Patriarch, which actually matches the correct number? Whether you wanna change it to Matriarch or not is up to you, but I like Patriarch since it lines up with Athena wanting to be on the level of her male contemporaries. As CD points out, a common feminist criticism is that Athena favors men in her stories but also like…men wrote those myths, so…

But the point stands. I especially feel like this fits her because you’d expect army generals to be purplebloods or violetbloods, both of which are apparently male-dominated castes.

Title: Thief of Mind (I think this suits her pretty well, but if you believe you found another one that suits her, I’m all ears.)

I…honestly think she might be a Space player? Tactical warfare and handicraft have a lot to do with manipulating space, and while I admit that I’m the one who included weaving, Space definitely has an association with fashion (Just look at Kanaya and Jade, the most fashionable characters in Homestuck).

Given her desire to be this flawless leader, I think Heir of Space is a fitting title? Especially since the inverse, Mage of Time, also lines up with the character you gave her.

Land: Any suggestions?

Yes! Land of Spiders and Frogs. Given the Arachne myth, I can’t imagine she’s a fan of ‘em. Also lets you design a very witchy-looking planet, which is fun since Athena is also worshiped as an aspect of the Goddess in Wicca. Go wild! Put some crystals on it! And Hoo BOY is frog breeding the perfect task for her! It’s literally all about pre-visualization and intense strategy.

Dream Planet: Derse

Yep yep. With her new classpect, that would make her Liga, sign of the Dogged. I think it suits her real well, and incorporating it into her original sign is as easy as adding just a couple lines. Let’s go to the redesign!

My redesign was pretty heavy handed, partly because of how well-designed she is in the first place. Sometimes it’s like, I could just textually give you one suggestion or go absolutely crazy with it.

So CD and I have a running theory that tealbloods are all designed after college kids of some kind. But the lady on the left doesn’t look like she goes to my college! She looks like she’s mock-interviewing me and keeps scribbling way too many notes after each of my answers and never changes expression.

She’s 7 sweeps old. She should look like a teenager. So I wanted to design the girl that might eventually grow up to be the woman on the left. And who becomes an 80′s powersuited war general? A 70s college feminist, potentially. I based the design on the right on Gloria Steinem, who was really weirdly upfront about working for the CIA because it was “liberal, nonviolent, and honorable” lol. Let’s go top to bottom!

Hair - Original is heavily edited from Sollux’s hair, of all people (I admit to being very weak when it comes to spriting hair with limited volume), while the new version is from a naphal sprite sheet. Gloria Steinem had iconically highlighted hair and I wanted to nod to that.

Eyes - whenever we talk about a “wise owl” we usually see a cartoon owl with a graduation cap, a set of comically large glasses, and a pointer. I wanted to give her glasses to make her look more owlish while keeping the downcast condescending look from the original.

Lips(/Heels) - I wanted to add a little bit of college-y rebellion to her aesthetic and felt the best way to do that was to play on the trope of “lipstick as red as the blood of her enemies.” Instead, she’s sporting a seadweller-purple lip and a matching kitten heel, to make it clear she’s gonna chew ‘em up and stomp on ‘em.

Shirt - I was listening to Death By Glamour on loop when I sprited the left side to get in the mood for those shoulders. On the right I simplified a lot. Gloria Steinem usually wore plain shirts with high-waisted pants, which was easy enough to edit from your original.

Symbol - made it a little bigger and added two internal horizontal lines to reference Liga

So that’s my very indulgent review of your troll! I hope you like some of the suggestions I made!

-TR

[faemoria]

IS MY MUSE A SUB , DOM , OR SWITCH ?

        switch  ,  sub  ,  dom  ,  power bottom  ,  you name it  .  she finds power struggles exciting  ,  so if it befits the general mood to play as any  ,  you can probably expect that she won’t stay in one role the entire time  ,  even if it’s only for brief moments of flustering her partner(s)  .        but  ,  it’s also not a dynamic she needs to enjoy herself  .  if her partner(s) isn’t interested in such a dichotomy  ,  or too much makes them uncomfortable  , then she’s perfectly happy being more  .  .  .  idk  .  “ vanilla ”  ?  since she’s so empathetic  ,  she’s pretty good at reading what others want  .

WHAT WAS MY MUSE’S FIRST TIME LIKE ?

* drags my hands down my face *

         so tooth’s first time happened when she was around thirty . ( which i know sounds pretty old but keep in mind that she was just an angry child isolating herself in thailand with no interaction  &&  therefor no real growth in social maturity for much of her early life .   )   it was when she traveled to europe to do the whole sword reforging thing  && she stayed with the faeries helping her for about a year  .  the name of her partner was å synge med stjernelys who was  ,  in fact  ,  three faeries who identified as the same being  && it was a very gentle but it was also very  ,  very  ,  very weird experience  .  not as in  ,  it was weird because it was tooth’s first time  ,  but as in everything that faeries do is very Extra™  && surreal  && decidedly not-human  ,  with the fact that different kinds of faeries have different cultural practices of approaching sex to top it off  &&  this was theirs  .         honestly comparing it to an extreme drug trip wouldn’t be too far off the mark  .  but i suppose what matters in the end is that it was a positive experience  && the fact that it was so unconventional probably plaid a part in how comfortable she is with sex in general now  .

DOES MY MUSE PREFER TO BE ASKED ON A DATE ?

       i’m not exactly certain how best to explain this  ,  but toothiana doesn’t really go on ‘ dates ’ for the most part  ?  she simply doesn’t schedule the  specifics of spending time with other people  ,  merely categorizes it generally into ‘ things to do between my work ’ , which means she’ll just sort of  .  .  .  show up  &&  spend time with them  &&  do whatever they both decide they want to do  ,  or try to set the time aside if they do the same to her  .        so if someone is interested in organizing a ‘ date ’ with tooth , unless their relationship is already very well-established  ,  the best they’re probably going to get is  ‘  i will see you again soon  .  ’  which could mean anywhere between a few days later to months  .

WOULD TOOTH HAVE SEX ON THE FIRST DATE ?

             considering the previous answer in regards to tooth having ‘dates’ I’m going to just substitute this for ‘the first time she meets someone’ in which case the answer is yes  .  very rarely  .  like only if it’s pretty clear that sexual interest is  all the attraction is   && there’s no point to beating around the bush  && what she’s doing at the moment is super unappealing/uninteresting  && running off with someone for a few hours would be an improvement .

HAS SHE EVER BEEN IN LOVE ?

           so many times  .  tooth falls in love in every manner of speaking very easily  ,   just by nature of how passionate a person she is  .  but she’s self aware of this  && it doesn’t really trouble her not to act on it or if it isn’t reciprocated  .  most of the time  .

WOULD TOOTH EVER BE UP FOR A THREESOME ?

          she lost her virginity in a foursome  .   this seems self explanatory  .

WHAT IS HER ROMANTIC/SEXUAL ORIENTATION ?

           tooth doesn’t identify as anything  .  she is older than the western gender binary  && scales of sexual orientation  ,  modern descriptions of such are things she can only point to as ‘close enough’ for the sake of keeping things simple to anyone who cares to know  .  && unfortunately I do not know enough about anthropology  && etymology to know what identities she would have used based on her childhood in ancient Thailand  ,  if any  .         but as far as writer’s prerogative goes  ,  she is pansexual  && panromantic  && a nonbinary woman  .  (  if a character is not interested in women I assume they will not be interested in tooth  )

WHAT ARE HER FETISHES/KINKS ?

          b l u H  .  this would be a long list  .  presumably this list would be longer than my entire knowledge of what kinks even exist because tooth has had approximately 100x the amount of time  &&  experience to figure this stuff out down to the most acute specifics  .  but here’s some of the general trash that comes to mind first : - power play  ,  obviously  .  does being an annoying little shit fall under this  ?  she honestly loves frustrating people so much  . - worship in either direction  .  pretty much spells itself out when it comes to a certain piece of garbage because they’re  .  .  . literally a king  &&  queen  .  but also stuff like admiring her wings if she trusts someone enough to touch them will make her really happy  . - Bondage  &&  Sensory Denial Lite™ i guess  ?  I feel like i just legitimately do not know the extent people will go to with these things  && that what she does would be considered child’s play to someone out there  .  but it’s your standard stuff  ,  tying wrists  ,  blindfolding  ,  pinning  ,  choking etc  .  again  ,  something she enjoys both ways . - oh  ,  biting  ,  obviously  .  && scratching  .  really just leaving marks in any way that last beyond the encounter  .  she’s usually not trying to really harm her partners or looking to be harmed by them  ,  but exceptions need not be named  .  ( also i swear this is the closest she has a to a ‘tooth fetish’   .  she doesn’t care how straight your teeth are so long as they can chomp  .  no she’s not going to get off on pretending to be your dentist  .  pay her if you want her to clean your mouth so she can take the money  && say ‘ no ’ because she’ll find that more sexually gratifying  .  ) - GARBAGE BOY TRASH MAN DOES WEIRD THINGS WITH SHADOWS . - doing stuff in secret/trying not to get caught  .  not in places belonging to someone she actually respects though  .  && definitely not any place mostly occupied by children  .  more like rubbing someone’s leg under a table during a fancy dinner  ,  or intentionally being really flirty  && suggestive in a situation where it can’t be acted on  ,  or sneaking off to a closet at a party or something like that  .  or you know , making out with the eldritch entity the man in the moon specifically told her to keep away from entirely . weird that so many of these are relevant to cavity . really really weird … . - she likes praising  &&  being praised so long as it doesn’t come off as just being condescending   ,  which admittedly is a thin line if she doesn’t know someone super well .

WOULD TOOTH EVER GET MARRIED ?

         as some sort of political/power union yeah maybe  ( see : her  verse with this stud  )  && even then it would almost certainly be polygamous  .  otherwise it doesn’t make sense to do something so official  .  monogamy is          while certainly not unheard of        considered the unusual when it comes to entities that live hundreds to billions of years  .  one of the few exceptions i can think of is that tooth would probably commit herself entirely to a relationship with seraphina  ,  which I don’t think would culminate in a literal marriage  ,  but definitely some sort of symbolic oath to one another  . but can i please just make a note here  &&  say : give me all of your fake marriage tropes so i can roll around in them && absorb them directly into my skin .

WHAT ARE SOME WAYS TOOTH SAYS ‘ I LOVE YOU ’ WITHOUT ACTUALLY SAYING IT ?

       simplest way in general  :  she’ll intentionally dedicate  &&  premeditate time to them  .        otherwise  ,  romantically  ,  tooth will study them  ,  memorize everything she can  ,  keep track of their tastes  &&  especially things they unintentionally show they enjoy even if they don’t admit it  .  she’ll open up to them more  ,  leave herself more vulnerable both physically  &&  emotionally  ,  trust them to handle places like her face  &&  wings  .  she’ll tease  &&  play with them  ( non maliciously that is )  &&  physically touch them in a lot in mundane ways  ( place a hand on their shoulder  ,  bump foreheads  ,  sprawl over them when laying down  ,  stroke their hair , etc. )  .          platonically  &&  overarchingly  ,  tooth will be more protective in certain ways  &&  be upset with them if they act self-destructively  .  she’ll invite  &&  encourage their company in her home  ,  even if they aren’t necessarily doing anything together   . gifts will become pretty common if the other person enjoys such things  .  specifically she’ll become especially privy to dressing them up  ( && incidentally  ,  back towards the more romantic side of things  ,  dressing up in their clothes as well )  .  you can also tell if toothiana likes you because her little faeries will generally betray her more withheld excitement of your presence  .