silusvesuius · 1 year ago
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old LN art i dug back up; most of it from 2021 🌼 it sure wus a time
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just-some-random-blogger · 2 years ago
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hello gorgeous! if you don't mind modern au, i have an idea. if you don't feel like writing anything it'd be great to hear your thoughts abt it. daemon x wife!reader (who's somehow connected with magic but not targaryen) who are devoted to each other like madly in love. before daemon has to go to war they're saying goodbyes kissing, crying and not being able to let the other go. feeling like something's off he says smth like "i'll find you in another life. i'll find you in any time we'll be existing. i will love you any time i am alive" (in high valyrian or calling her some name in it) kissing her knuckles and going away. unfortunately, he was right. reader died some way while he was away and he remains faithful to her for the rest of his life (oc but whatever) and in the modern world he does find her. maybe targaryens are some sort of royal family, maybe they keep a family business or an ordinary family with lots of relatives. but he fins the reader and they somehow just feel. sorry if it's too much. i'd really like to read something about it but it absolutely ok if you don't feel like it. thank u in advance! take care!
Waiting For A Lifetime
Part 1 2 3 ?
Daemon Targaryen x Reader + Aegon Targaryen x Reader cos it just sorta happened
Summary: Overcome by grief, Daemon turned to black magic to revive you. Moved by pity, the witch who casted the spell promised you would live until you met your love again in his next life.
Word Count: 3k+
Warnings: Modern AU, fem!reader, mentions/depictions of death/still birth/war, my pretty boy aegon whom i would die for, angst, fluff, typos, etc.
A/N: i saw this last night when i woke up in the middle of my sleep and couldn't stop thinking about it. I changed a lot about your req nonnie. I do hope you still like it though. I absolutely could not help myself with this one and I got so carried away T_T also a lot of facts about the Targaryens have distorted so just just just roll with it ok ok ok thank you And yes i know this is a gif from the crown but i love it so much the hat falling off the kiss ITS EVERYTHING I WANT TO BE HERRRRRRRRRRRRR also i do acknowledge the fact that this anon came to me with this idea after i reblogged this amazing moodboard sooooo yeah i think this post sparked this fic idea lol ALSO ALSO ALSO 2022 MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!! LOVE YA ALL imagine seeing this post in like 2032 or smth shit thats like 35 years from now Tagging: @pinksirensong @deniixlovezelda @targaryenmoony pssst i made p2 "Never Before"
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Daemon's face was streaked with tears and sorrow. His eyes were bloodshot and his voice was as sure as it was grave as he repeated the word he uttered to the shaman, "anything."
She looked at him, able to taste the desperation in the air, "even if it costs your life, prince?"
Daemon looks at his love before him, his love that was carrying his child. He places his bloody palm on the gaping wound on her stomach.
"Your child will not live even if she does."
Daemon screws his eyes shut tightly. He begins to quiver in anger, in grief, in pure sorrow. He mutters, "anything," he slowly opens his eyes to gaze upon her lifeless face, "better it me than her. There is no world worth living without her."
The woman narrows her eyes at the prince. She knew he was the Targaryen, once heir, known to be rugged and harsh. The Rouge Prince. Yet, there was no trace of malice within his being, only what she would describe as true devotion, true love.
"So, may it be done by the gods old and new," she says, drawing the prince's attention to her, "I will plead for her soul that she may live."
Daemon watches the witch, as she stands to her feet from the ground they were both sprawled on, in front of the body of the dead woman.
"I will plead that she may live long enough to meet you again in another life, so that you may have the love you have now once more."
"Another life?"
"Yes," she says, "the gods recreate humans they are pleased with to grace the earth again. I am certain they will let you be reborn to be with her again. I will make it certain."
Daemon grabs the cold hand that was beginning to stiffen.
"Although, I am unsure if they will allow you to remember her."
"I will remember her," Daemon retorts, kissing the hand of his love, "I will remember her no matter form I take... I will, I must."
"So it remains to be seen," she says before speaking out her incantation.
And it would not be seen until nearly 2000 years later.
The times have changed drastically. Women wore pants and voted. Men where made to take more responsibility for their actions, though still got away with things.
And yet...
... my love for him never faded.
Every prince that was born and named Daemon, I hoped would finally be him. It went about like this century after century, war after war, plague after plague, rise after fall. I had feared the Targaryens would die out, but they proved to be as strong as the very foundations of the earth.
And it took the televised of the marriage of Viserys XXIX to Duchess Aemma of Eyrie for me to see the face of my love: Daemon, the Wild Child, the Knight of Knickers, as penned by the press. Ultimately, the prince of my heart.
I burst into tears when I saw his cheeky face as he nudged his brother at the isle. I pressed my hands on the screen, thinking to myself, the wait was finally over, he was finally here.
All that was left was for me to meet the Prince of Valyria.
Yes. That would be no problem at all.
Except it was, because Daemon was just as mad as he was in this life as he was in the last.
After all, he did not get those nicknames from the press for nothing.
I used up so many of my resources to even just get a glimpse of him. It was hard to catch him in one place. I mostly caught him with a scandalous headline in the cover of magazines and newspapers.
Tonight, it was a newspaper.
"You know," the bartender taps his finger on my newspaper that was sprawled out on his bar, "he's a frequent here."
I turn to the blonde, in his white dress shirt, black waist apron, and black slacks. I raise a brow as he purses his lips as though the information was ground breaking. He wipes on a glass with his blue towel.
"Gee, Aegon," I lean on the surface before me, "I would have never guessed that from the picture on the wall."
I nod at the said picture. It's one of Daemon and the current owner of the bar, Tywin Lannister, who also happened to own Lannister Land Corp, shaking hands. Oh, Lannisters.
"Hey," Aegon shrugs, pulling his lips down in a nuff-said manner, "it had to be said, since you're literally the only patron here that has not interrogated me with questions about the Knight of Knickers."
I snort, "then allow me to change that," I rest my head on my hand, "is he truly so dashing that his looks practically steal the knickers of the ladies around him?"
Aegon finishes buffing his glass and puts it down, looking up in thought, "mmm, I think it's mostly cause he's a prince that he's got the effect he's got. I've got no idea what possessed the first girl to throw her panties at him."
I giggle, "are you saying the prince is ugly?"
"Bit harsh, innit," Aegon pulls back, getting another glass, rubbing it down with his towel, "your words, not mine."
I roll my eyes, shaking my head, as I laugh at the light haired boy's muses, "you know, if we had been living at the height of the Targaryen rule, Daemon would have had your head for that, pretty boy."
"Gods, to be beheaded," he sighed, "a dream, rather than working here, taking about some monarch who lives off the money of the people."
I snort once more. Aegon's face softens as he breaks into a laugh himself.
"No, but honestly," he says putting down the glass and the towel, "you, my dear, are my saving grace. The highlight of my begrudgingly stretched out day," he stretches out a hand to me.
I chuckle at him as I take his hand. He presses a kiss on the back of it, making me grin at him in amusement.
"You're the only sane person here," he releases my hand, "everyone else is so desperate to brush shoulders with the prince, or simply even catch a of whiff of his flatulence."
I break out into a fit of chuckles, slamming firmly at the wood between us.
"No, I'm serious! I heard the fittest gal, a total bombshell, boasting with pride about how she managed a sniff of the bloke's fart."
I'm wheezing with laughter, unable to believe what I'm hearing.
Aegon releases a deep and dramatic sigh, "what has the world come to?"
I wipe a tear as Aegon watches me empty myself of laughter. His face crinkles in a pleased expression, Adam's apple bobbing as he chuckles airily.
I sigh, catching my breath, "well, if I ever become that desperate, I ask that you pray for my soul."
Aegon presses his palms together, "praying for that girl as we speak."
I chuckle, folding the newspaper before me, "I must say, I am actually desperate to meet the wild child myself."
Aegon drops his hands along with his humored expression.
I cannot help but laugh at him as I continue to fold the paper, "though, I would say I am the desperate kind that is so desperate..." I eye him as I press the grey material together, "that I, somehow, dread to meet him at all."
Aegon snorts, screwing his eyes shut as he wipes his face, "the Stranger. Don't say things like that! I nearly had a heart attack believing you."
"No, but it's true, Aegon!" I say with a faux wounded pout, "prince Daemon is my great love, we have been destined to meet for millennia!"
Aegon leans on the table, humming as he nodds his head, "yes, and I suppose I am Aegon the Conqueror."
I lean towards him and grab his jaw, "no, you look more like Aegon II. The spitting image, I dare say."
He scoffs, swatting me off, "I'm hotter than him."
I pull away, "yes. That I can agree with, pretty boy. Personal hygiene does wonders."
Aegon snorts and plays off the blush on his cheeks by wiping his nose with his thumb, "you speak as though you met him."
I straighten up, "that's because I have. He was once my nephew."
He narrows his eyes and crosses his arms. His face contorts at the thought.
I raise my brows at him, "have I not told you I am not only a Targaryen historian, an expert at that, but I am also a patron of the Museum of Ice and Fire? I'm married into their family."
"Okay," he raises a finger, "ew."
I snort.
Aegon lifts his jaw and hums, "well, now that you mentioned it, I always knew you were one of those insanely rich blokes who frequent here. I was thinking you were a mafia boss or something though."
I scoff in amusement, raising my brows at him.
He pushes his white sleeves up then raises his hand in defense, "you have a very intense aura about you."
"That's because you trigger my fight mode," I retort.
He huffs, "do I? I'm scared to know what you'll do to me when I've seen what you do to men who hit on you."
"Aww, don't worry," I coo, "I wouldn't hurt my pretty, baby boy."
Aegon doesn't get to reply when a customer calls his attention. With this, he pulls away and leaves me to my own devices.
We don't get to continue our conversation at all, for it was clear that the rush hour had begun.
I eventually pulled back and decided to entertain myself while my favorite bartender was busy. I swiveled on my stool, looking out to the room, spotting the jukebox collecting dust in the corner. I smile at the sight of it, thinking about how it was still here after all these years, in spite of being older than Aegon.
I stand from my seat and walk over to it.
Aegon, finding one patron missing, frantically looks around then calms, raising a brow.
I place my hands on the jukebox, bending over to check if it was plugged in.
Aegon snorts as he hands a man a beer, eyes not at all fixed on him, "that doesn't work, love."
"Mmm, ye of little faith."
Aegon is annoyed by the man that sits on the vacated stool, blocking his vision. In retaliation, he blocks out the sound of his voice. Aegon calls out, "if you can make that hunkajunk work, I'll clear your tab for you."
I chuckle as I pull the machine forward, checking its wiring, "I wouldn't want to make a kid working on minimum wage to pay for me at all."
"I only said I would clear your tab, doll face," is all he replies before he goes back to tending to drinks again.
I break into chuckles as I fiddle with the wires on the back. I admit, it took me quite a while to go through everything, which was why Aegon warned that he would not call an ambulance for me if I got electrocuted.
The sight of the jukebox coming to life was enough to shut him up.
I get to my feet with a huff, brushing my hands off with each other. I turn to Aegon, who was already looking at me in astonishment, along with a few other people in the room.
I smirk, "my tab then?"
"Good as gone," Aegon shakes his head in disbelief, cutting his hand across his neck.
I release a satisfied sigh as I punch at the hardened buttons and play whatever it was that was available to be played.
When the music starts, I close my eyes and allow myself to drift off with the music. The sound brings back some memories I had in the 1940's. If I recall correctly, it was around this time Daemon's father, King Baelon, was crowned.
I slowly moved to the rhythm of the song, swaying my hips, waving my extended arms out as I made my way to the center of the room.
Aegon stilled in his spot upon seeing this. His breath caught in his throat and he was only brought back to reality when someone demanded a gin. He looked around the room as he poured that idjit his drink and clenched his jaw tightly when he saw the onlooking crowd.
He snorts loudly, grabbing his towel, throwing it over his shoulder roughly, clearing his throat with more noise than necessary.
I smile to myself when I hear Aegon's familiar coughing. He had a tendency to do this whenever men around me started to be a bother. And I loved him dearly for it. He was a sweet boy.
With my eyes still closed, I continue dancing to the soothing song. My smile grows bigger when a section comes that tickles my musical senses. I chuckle as I twirl in my spot.
When I felt a hand come to my waist, I didn't have to open my eyes to know it was Aegon. He wouldn't have let anyone come near me at all without barking up a storm.
I hummed at the scent of him, familiar yet foreign to me at once. He must have changed his cologne. I prefer this one better. He pulls me close when I reach out to him, grabbing one of his hands and placing a palm on his shoulder. His dress shirt is softer than what I imagined it to be.
I am surprised when he leads us into a ballroom dance. In fact, I am so shocked, I open my eyes and see a blur of his white shirt and blonde hair as he spins me around.
I break into a fit of chuckles, screwing my eyes shut in pure bliss when he dips me, "I had no idea you were a dancer, pretty boy."
"Yes, well, journalists don't find it interesting enough to write about."
My eyes burst open at the sound of the deep voice.
My heart is pounding at the sight of the smirking man with silver hair. I nearly faint at the violet irises so close to mine.
"I do say," his hot breath fans on my face, "if we were spotted by one now, they'd have a field day."
I jolt upright and shove the man away. He doesn't seem to be offended by my harsh actions, and, in fact, chuckles as he reels back from my action, "not what I had expected and not the reaction I usually get, but there's a first for everything."
My breath hitches when he smiles at me. I turn from him, to Aegon, who was staring coldly from his place behind the bar. It seems the rest of the people here were doing the same as well, gobsmacked by the presence of the man in the middle of the room
I roll my shoulders back, turning to my dance partner, "Prince Daemon," I mutter, bowing my head slowly, "pardon my rudeness."
He chuckles, waving me off as he stuffs a hand in his pocket, "oh, no need to be so formal, my dear. I can understand the shock," he tilts his head at me, lips still curved, "you surely weren't expecting to be dancing with the prince and thought me to be someone else, no?"
I look at him and stare in silence. For the first time in my life, I was at a loss for words.
Everything was suddenly so real, and it was making my mind and my heart race.
Aegon watches this and clears his throat loudly.
It does not help anyone.
Daemon raises his brows at me in expectation, placing his other hand in his pocket as he leans on one leg.
I open my mouth. A second passes before I mutter, "I thought you were my pretty boy."
His lips spread into a toothy grin. Airy chuckles leave him, "I can be your pretty boy."
When he extends his hand out to me, it was like the heavens opened and I could hear the angels sing.
This was the moment I have been waiting for since that day that I came back to life and kissed him goodbye with a promise of finding him in his next one.
My breath was heavily taxed when I lifted my hand.
My soul nearly leaves me when I jolt in shock over the sound of a record scratching and jumping, repeating over and over again.
In that moment, I am hit by an epiphany. I am so overwhelmed with emotions that I could barely breathe. The sight of Daemon before me brought tears to my eyes. This was all I ever wanted, and yet-- and yet-- I was drowning. I could not breathe properly.
"I..." I shudder, making Daemon's face fall, "I have to go," I mutter through a strained breath.
Daemon knits his brows, shifting in his spot with his hand still out, "what?"
Aegon watched with tightly knit brows as I ran out of the room.
The prince drops his hand and spins on his heels, eyes locked on the runaway. His nostrils flare as his face contorts in confusion, "wait! Stop! Where are you going?!"
I heave heavily as I push past people on my way out. I am absolutely winded when I exit the establishment, hands shivering from both the cold and the nerves that were getting to me in this moment.
I walk aimlessly farther out, down to the lawn that was now dark, since it was gods-know-what hour.
"Wait!"
My heart drops.
I spin around when someone grabs my wrist. My heart is still quick in my chest when I see Daemon, heaving. His short, light hair was slightly tousled in its place. He knits his brows at me, tilting his head, "you dare leave your prince, Cinderella?"
My jaw hangs low.
He releases a sigh, shaking his head, "I forbid it."
Seeing him here and now made everything feel more Real with a capital R.
Daemon adjusts his grip on my wrist, pulling his hand back, so that he was now holding my hand.
I look at him, blinking the glassiness of my eyes away, still in shock of his presence. A million questions were running through my head, and I was glad to be able to even have the mind to ask one in this moment, "do you know me, Daemon?"
He tilts his head upon hearing this, brows knitting, lips curving. He releases a chuckle at the lack of formality and how haphazard the question was, but finds himself further drawn because of it, "no," he shakes his head, "but I would love to know you."
Hearing the words come out of his mouth shatters something in me.
He did not know me.
I turn away from him as I try to even my breath. I retreat my hand and step back as a shiver runs down my spine.
And yet here he was, chasing after me.
Daemon steps forward to make up for the space between us, "don't leave. Come back inside with me. I'll give you my coat, then you can boast that the prince of Valyria gave it to you."
I continue stepping back as I shake my head, "you don't understand," I mutter under my breath in High Valyrian.
"Then make me understand," he retorts in the same tongue with a chuckle as he shakes his head and takes a wide stride over to me, grabbing my hand again.
I gasp at the warmth of his touch. When I turn back to him, tears have finally fallen from my eyes.
Daemon's face hardens at the sight of it. His hand reaches out to my face, wiping the wetness away. The sight of his torn expression tears at me, bringing me more tears.
"Why are you crying?" he asks in High Valyrian.
I do not get to reply, as suddenly there is a loud burst from behind us, commanding both our attentions.
It's Aegon. He busted through the door with my things in his hand. Upon catching the sight of the two of us, he freezes, breathing heavily as the looks out.
Daemon's expression hardens; his grip on me tightens. He turns to me, jealousy coating his mouth when he catches I where I am looking, "is that your pretty boy?"
I do not reply to him as Aegon walks over.
Daemon pulls me close to him. I look up at him with teary eyes. Aegon looks between us, jaw tense as he hands me my bag, coat, and newspaper.
"Thank you, bartender," Daemon dismisses, patting Aegon on the shoulder, before turning from him to face me again.
When I catch Aegon's face, I finally have the wits to move.
I pull away from Daemon to put my coat on. I swallow a heavy lump in my throat at feel of the stares of the two men.
Once I have my coat on, I pull a card from my bag, handing it to Daemon. He wastes no time in taking it from me, immediately scrutinizing it.
"I'd..." I start, taking a deep breath, "like to see you again."
Daemon's eyes dart to me, breaking into a smile.
Butterflies explode in my stomach at the sight of him.
Aegon's face tenses.
I release a breath before asking, "when are you fr-"
"Whenever," Daemon blurts. He places the card in the breast pocket of his white shirt, "I'm free whenever."
I nod slowly at his words, "I have work tomorrow, but I do have a long lunch at 12-
"I'll call you a 11:55."
I purse my lips at his words, trying to hold back my chuckle, but failing, "11:55?"
Daemon grins, nodding once, "on the dot."
I chuckle, turning to my feet as I nod at his words, "11:55 then."
"On the dot," he nods, extending a hand out to rub his thumb on my cheek.
I turn to him just as Daemon pulls away and stuffs his hands back in his pockets, "I'll walk you."
I shake my head, turning to Aegon, who was still standing there, watching the whole interaction between us, "you don't have to. I have a car parked nearby."
"Then I'll walk you to your car."
I turn back to Daemon, who then offers his arm out to me. I smile, unable to deny him, or myself, of the offer. I take his arm, and the next moment, he leads us off.
I turn over my shoulder, raising a hand at Aegon while I offer him a smile, "see you, Aegon."
Aegon watches as I turn back.
There is a twisted feeling inside him that grows. He mutters softly. It is too soft for anyone but himself to hear, "see you."
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sailormoonrarepairweek · 1 year ago
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Welcome to the third annual Sailor Moon Rare Pair Week! The event will take place from March 24th - March 30th, 2024, but I'm announcing the themes early to give everyone plenty of time to create their fanworks.
What counts as a rare pair for this event, you ask? Any pairing that isn't Usagi/Mamoru (or any of their incarnations), pretty much! (Don’t get too hung up on the word “rare”. Just roll with it, okay?) They usually have their own week, so this event is a chance for fans to show their love for pairings other than the Miracle Romance, canon or not. You can even include poly, platonic, and cross-over ships, if you'd like! Almost anything goes, as long as you follow some simple guidelines.
Fanworks should somehow incorporate the one of the day's themes. (You can pick just one; you don't have to use both.) How you choose the interpret the theme is up to you!
A non-UsaMamo pair must be the MAIN focus of the work (although Usagi/Mamoru can appear as a side pairing or as part of a polycule).
All ratings allowed.
No smut involving underage characters, which I'm defining as under 18 years old. Otherwise, as long as the characters are portrayed as adults in the fanwork, go wild! Just please make sure to properly tag.
Pairings of all sexual/romantic orientations welcome.
Fanfics should be a minimum of 500 words. Poetry may be shorter, though. (If you would prefer to write drabbles instead, you can write five separate 100-word drabbles about the day's themes, but a day's entry should still be at least 500 words long. You have over four months until the week begins and plenty of time afterward if you don't finish in time. That's plenty of time to write 500 words. I don't think that's too much to ask.) If you're writing fanfic, I REALLY would prefer you post your fics on AO3 or Fanfiction.net and provide a link to your story, but if you must post on Tumblr itself, please make use of the "Read More" option.
Fanart should be a completed drawing. (Any fanart portraying nudity or anything of an R/NC-17 nature should be cropped if immediately visible on your Tumblr post and/or posted with the appropriate community label. You can post the full image under a "Read More" or provide a link to the image on another site.)
Graphics, image boards, playlists, cosplay photos, crafts, meta/essays, etc. are also welcome!
Comments, kudos, and reblogs are encouraged, but don't be a jerk! If you're not a fan of a pairing, please just ignore and move on.
On Tumblr, if you tag #smrarepairweek2024, I will reblog your post. I'll tag explict art and fics reblogs as #nsfw, so feel free to block that tag if you'd rather not see those posts.
Please do not post your works anywhere until the day dedicated to your chosen theme. An AO3 collection has now been set up for this year's event. (Adding your work to the collection will not be required.) If you'd like to look back at the last event's works, the 2023 collection can be found here.
And here is the 2022 collection.
Themes
Day 1: Magic/Mundane Day 2: Hugs/Kisses Day 3: Fire/Ice Day 4: Music/Silence Day 5: Birth/Death Day 6: Break-Up/Make-Up Day 7: Free
(Event Organizer: @kaleidodreams)
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mariacallous · 26 days ago
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From the order in which members of The Beatles should be listed to the origins of the Pavlova dessert, “edit wars” have dominated Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, since its inception. Though many of these online discussions pertain to cultural icons and phenomena, some have taken a more sinister turn—especially when it comes to controversial or politically sensitive topics such elections, protests, or wars. This has become particularly apparent in the case of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, shaped by multiple competing and ever-evolving narratives.
Started in May 2001, the Russian-language Wikipedia is among the world’s top six Wikipedia sites and, until recently, has remained a popular source of information in and about the country. However, over the last two decades, it has become embroiled in controversy, largely due to the Kremlin’s state-sponsored disinformation plaguing the platform.
Reliant on government sources and edited by Russian editors, Russian-language Wikipedia pages have often featured pro-Kremlin narratives, especially in relation to Russia’s war against Ukraine. For example, while articles in English have clearly indicated the illegal and disputed nature of Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and its occupation of Donetsk, the Russian-language pages have previously downplayed the role of the Russian military and portrayed Donetsk as a people’s separatist republic (though it has since been changed and is now consistent with the English version).
Another example is the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17. While the English-language version acknowledges that the flight was shot down by the Russian military, which is the international consensus, Russian Wikipedia has called it a “catastrophe” without any attribution of guilt. There are also many inconsistencies having to do with famous historical figures appropriated by Russia, such as those of King Volodymyr the Great or Nestor the Chronicler, both of whom lived in Kyiv.
Over the last two years, Russian courts have fined the Wikimedia Foundation, which owns Wikipedia, several times over content related to Russia’s war in Ukraine. Meanwhile, according to a 2022 report, multiple groups of “sock-puppet” editor accounts, which have coordinated their activity to rewrite pages relating to Russian-Ukrainian relations while using false identifiers. These groups have actively undermined Western and Ukrainian information sources and instead endorsed Russian narratives and state-sponsored media.
Though Russia briefly banned Wikipedia in August 2015, it has now taken its digital offensive campaign to the next level.
Earlier this year, Vladimir Medeyko, the former director of Wikimedia Russia, launched an alternative platform called Ruwiki. The new platform started out as a copy-pasted version of the original Russian-language Wikipedia, exploiting a technicality of Wikipedia’s open-source agreement. Today, the new platform contains up to 2 million articles in Russian, as well as 12 other regional languages spoken in Russia, and is not affiliated with the Wikimedia Foundation.
Unlike the well-established Wikipedia model, in which any user with internet access can create, edit, or update articles, which then undergo rigorous community moderation, Ruwiki works in a different way. While any user can contribute content, it is subject to review by a narrow circle of undisclosed, likely government-sanctioned “experts” to avoid “mistakes” and adjudicate “complex issues.” But it is no secret which issues are considered “complex” by the Kremlin, whose disinformation machine has been working relentlessly to justify its invasion of Ukraine and vehemently deny the war crimes committed there.
Ruwiki is an isolated digital ecosystem that has created an alternate reality. In this version, Holodomor, the man-made famine under Stalin’s rule that killed up to 8 million Ukrainians by some estimates, never happened. Ukraine’s regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, and, of course, Crimea are missing from the country’s internationally recognised administrative map. The 2022 Bucha massacre, in which more than 400 Ukrainians were tortured and killed by the Russian military, is explained as an unverifiable “provocation.” And of course, the platform promotes Russia’s official (wrong) narrative that NATO “provoked” the Russian invasion and that NATO soldiers have participated in the war on behalf of Ukraine.
Ruwiki is the perfect example of the “splinternet”—the fragmentation of the global internet into smaller, divergent, and disconnected spaces. Sometimes, splinters form organically on platforms due to cultural and linguistic preferences of their users. But more often, it is a result of targeted government policies that restrict access to certain websites and services in an attempt to curtail free speech. These measures are often undertaken by authoritarian regimes under the guise of digital sovereignty, ensuring the state’s autonomy and control over its communication and digital infrastructures.
In 2011, Iran’s National Information Network (NIN) project, which envisioned the creation of an absolutely independent online ecosystem back in 2011, is a famous case of digital authoritarianism. Another example is Turkey’s new amendments to the Press Law, which came into effect in 2022. The law increased government control over social media and news platforms and has been dubbed as a “draconian” censorship law by media rights activists and opposition leaders.
Similarly, Russia’s Sovereign Internet Law, adopted in 2019, grants the Kremlin the power to isolate the Russian internet from other countries. The law requires Russian internet service providers to hand over many of their powers to the state, including the ability to directly censor unwanted content and prevent users from accessing alternative ways of seeing banned websites.
While these measures to nationalize the internet might seem benign from the perspective of maintaining technological autonomy, such concentration of power in the hands of the state also comes with an unprecedented ability to surveil its domestic population. Since 2019, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) has direct access, complete with encryption codes, to access any messages transmitted via Russian social media platforms or stored on servers located within the country.
These splinternets undermine the idea of a unified and global internet. They create isolated pockets of content that is easy to censor and can only be accessed by users from within the state, thus cutting them off from internationally produced content. As numerous studies show, such fragmentation is a pathway to a rapid deterioration of democratic discourse on platforms that institute it.
Take, for example, Truth Social, former U.S. President Donald Trump’s social media platform, which routinely echoes radical right-wing narratives on immigration, gun ownership, and the 2020 election. Another example is Ukraine’s 2017 decision to ban Russian social media platforms, VK and Odnoklassniki, in the interest of national security, after the platforms had become a toxic cesspool of hate speech, racism, and xenophobia, with well documented calls to rape and murder Ukrainians.
Similarly, in 2022, Russian TikTok blocked all non-Russian content in Russia. Once splintered from the rest of the platform and left unchecked, it became a hotbed of Russian war propaganda.
However, Russian propaganda on TikTok is not limited to its borders alone. Recent research indicates that accounts affiliated with Russian state media, especially Russia Today and Sputnik, have enjoyed a wide international reach, with their content being shared in multiple languages. Once those accounts were flagged by the platform as Russian state-affiliated in 2022, they became inactive and switched to newly created, unlabelled accounts to avoid detection. Another action, which flew under the radar, was Russia’s use of political influencers to sway public opinion in the United States, ahead of its upcoming presidential election.
In light of these disturbing developments, we can reasonably expect to see Ruwiki move along the same historical pathway. Though other countries like China, Turkey, India, and Pakistan have either banned or threatened to ban Wikipedia, Ruwiki’s full control over facts will allow the Kremlin to retell history on its own terms—including denying its war crimes in Ukraine.
This—combined with the targeted destruction of Ukrainian books, the rewriting of Russian school curriculum, and the murder of Ukrainian public intellectuals in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories—will help Russia justify its expansionist goals and cement its colonial dominance over the region.
This digitally mediated historical revisionism is particularly dangerous in light of the increasing use of the internet as the ultimate source of information, especially among Russia’s youth. Splintered from the rest of the world, they will be coming of age in an alternative Kremlin-manufactured version of reality where “nothing is true, but everything is possible.”
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dreaminginthedeepsouth · 2 months ago
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LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN
September 2, 2024
Heather Cox Richardson
Sep 03, 2024
In an interview with right-wing host Mark Levin on the Fox News Channel last night, Trump complained about the new grand jury indictment of him for trying to steal the 2020 presidential election. “Whoever heard you get indicted for interfering with a presidential election where you have every right to do it,” he asked. 
In fact, no one has a right to interfere with a presidential election. Several federal laws prohibit such interference. Legal analyst Joyce White Vance added: “This is the banality of evil right here—Trump asserting he can override the will of the voters to claim victory in an election he lost. And, he will do it again. We must vote against him in overwhelming numbers.”
Former president Trump is approaching the election of 2024 the way southern white supremacists approached elections from 1876 to 1964. He has made it very clear he is not trying to win the votes of a majority of Americans. He and his loyalists are trying to intimidate his opponents to keep them from voting while egging on his supporters to commit violence. They are bringing the tactics of the reactionary southern Democrats after the Civil War forward to the present day in an attempt to impose the same sort of minority rule on the nation as a whole. 
Trump has made it clear he is not trying to win the popular vote. When his primary challenger Nikki Haley dropped out of the race in March, Trump’s team made no effort to win over her voters; it was President Joe Biden’s reelection team that reached out to them.
A few days later, when Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump and his loyalist Michael Whatley took over the Republican National Committee, they killed the plans of former RNC chair Ronna McDaniel to open 40 satellite campaign offices across ten battleground states. As The Dispatch noted, that meant very little ground game: doors knocked on, phone calls made, or volunteers organized. The new leadership of the RNC also fired 40 out of 60 employees whose job was field organizing.
Trump was clear what he was doing: rather than worrying about attracting voters, he intended to play out the game of the Big Lie that he had won the 2020 presidential election. 
Since the 2020 election, at least 28 states have passed laws making it harder to vote in 2024. Whatley was a chief proponent of the Big Lie that justified those laws, and Trump put him in place, saying he wanted the RNC to prioritize “election integrity” efforts. The campaign has focused on lawsuits to make it harder to vote and to put their own loyalists into positions where they might be able to affect the certification of the 2024 vote. As Peter Nicholas reported at NBC News yesterday, Republicans have filed dozens of lawsuits that seemed designed not only to game the system, but also to convince supporters that the election is rigged against Trump. 
That lie was the argument Florida governor Ron DeSantis made to justify creating an election police unit in 2022 to stop what he claimed was illegal voting, although voter fraud is vanishingly rare. The unit conducted raids—mostly in the early morning—primarily against Black Americans shortly before the 2022 election. Most of the cases were later dropped, or those charged agreed to a plea deal without jail time. 
The raids did, though, depress voting. In its 2023 annual report, the Office of Election Crime and Security wrote: “Enforcing Florida election law has the primary effect of punishing violators, but enforcement also and equally as important acts as a deterrent for those who may consider voting illegally or committing other election related crimes.” 
Now MAGA Republicans have joined Trump in arguing that Democrats are trying to get noncitizen immigrants to vote for their candidates, although a federal law in place since 1996 makes it clear that it is illegal for noncitizens to vote in elections for president or members of Congress. It does not appear to matter to Republicans that there is no evidence that noncitizens try to vote. As House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said in May: “We all know, intuitively, that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections, but it’s not been something that is easily provable.” 
Texas attorney general Ken Paxton also created an “Election Integrity Unit” in the wake of the 2020 election, and on August 21, 2024, after Fox News Channel personality Maria Bartiromo repeated a baseless rumor about noncitizens registering to vote, Paxton launched what he called an undercover investigation that, just days later, launched raids against Latino activists. “It is evident through his pattern of lawsuits, raids, searches, and seizures that he is trying to keep Latinos from voting,” Latino leaders say. 
This pattern echoes the Reconstruction Era intimidation of Black voters and their white Republican allies, and it does so with the same justification: the idea that business regulation, social welfare, infrastructure, and civil rights policies are “socialism.” Those policies had nothing to do with the actual principles of socialism, which call for the government to control the means of production. This “socialism” echoed the argument of southern white supremacists who used it to attack Black voting in 1871 after the Fifteenth Amendment, ratified the year before, made it unconstitutional to stop someone from voting on the basis of race. 
As newly enfranchised formerly enslaved men who owned little property—because enslavers took what they produced—and white Republicans voted for lawmakers who would rebuild the South, white supremacist Democrats maintained that the roads, schools, and hospitals a healthy society needed could be paid for only with tax dollars. Since white men owned most of the property, such improvements were, they said, a redistribution of wealth. 
In the nineteenth century, that argument led first to voter suppression and then to the argument that anyone who did not vote to keep the white supremacists in power was a danger to society. Good Americans must keep such dangerous people out of any proximity to power. In that light, outright violence to maintain the rule of the minority was a demonstration of civic virtue. 
True to form, Trump and his supporters have made it clear they consider their ascendancy imperative to recover America from the carnage into which they allege President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have led it. And, if their opponents are truly as dangerous as they insist, those opponents must be capable of any of the actions MAGA Republicans falsely attribute to them. 
Trump and his campaign advisor Corey Lewandowski have recently asserted the lie that Democrats kill newborn babies, for example, and Trump told the right-wing Moms for Liberty organization on Friday that schools are operating on children to transition them to a different sex. In a direct link to the ideas of the late nineteenth century that white supremacists used to justify taking power, Trump routinely calls Vice President Harris a communist. 
Trump’s lies have become cartoonish as his attachment to reality has slipped, but behind them is a demonizing of his opponents that echoes the past argument that certain people must be kept from power and, possibly, purged from society.  
Many of those arrested for attacking the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, told the court they believed they were defending American democracy from those who were destroying the country and had stolen the election. Trump has championed those arrested for trying to install him into the presidency, saying they are “patriots” who have been “treated unfairly” and “have shown incredible courage and sacrifice,” and has promised that if reelected, he will pardon the nearly 1,000 people found guilty of crimes related to that event.  
A gala to celebrate and raise money for those attackers—the J6 Awards Gala—was scheduled to be held at Trump’s Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club this Thursday but has just been called off until after the election. 
The celebration of violence is now deeply embedded in the MAGA movement with leaders like North Carolina lieutenant governor Mark Robinson, the Republican nominee for governor, who recently attacked an assortment of enemies and assured his audience: “Some folks need killing!” As Josh Kovensky of Talking Points Memo wrote on August 27, this violent tendency has become for MAGA Republicans a fantasy about deploying the military against American citizens. 
Yesterday, on the same day that Trump declared he had the right to interfere in a presidential election to put himself in power, the pro-Trump owner of X, Elon Musk, reposted to his nearly 200 million followers a statement suggesting that women and men who can’t physically defend themselves are inferior to “alpha men” and are not good participants in government because they lack the ability to think critically. “This is why a Republic of high status males is best for decision making,” the original post said. “Democratic, but a democracy only for those who are free to think.” 
Over the statement, Musk posted: “Interesting observation.”
LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN
HEATHER COX RICHARDSON
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writtenbymkl · 2 years ago
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pairing: best friend!haechan x fem! reader
word count: 2.3k
genres: ANGST !! , unrequited love, college au, heartbreak
warnings: none
a/n: the last part to good person !! i wanted to be a short au just because i wanted to test the waters with my first completed written story so i hope you guys enjoy it !!
PART 2 OF GOOD PERSON
Two weeks later and you’re at the get-together that your friends threw for your birthday that was coming up soon. One problem, though, Haechan wasn’t here yet.
You: where r u? everyones here and ur the only one missing _._
Sent 5:37 pm
You: seriously this isnt funny, what r u even doing?
Sent 6:40 pm
You: the get together is ending soon, we have like an hour left here, dont even bother showing up anymore dude
Seen 8:00 pm
You roll your eyes, seeing that he finally read your message.
“Hey! That was mine. If you wanted one, I could’ve just gotten you one, dude,” Mark looks at you with sullen eyes, “But I’m assuming by that reaction, he’s not coming?”
“You know Mark,” You sigh. “He’s been acting really weird since you said that stuff about being a couple. This is all your fault,” You state. You know it wasn’t his fault, it was Haechan’s for being so weird about it, but you had to blame someone. 
Mark’s eyes widen. “How was I supposed to know it would cause a disturbance in your friendship?”  
“Ugh, whatever, let me just blame you peacefully,” 
“Come on, man, don’t be so down today. We came to celebrate before your birthday, so we should make the most of it, even if it means Haechan won’t come. I mean, it’s not the end of the world, right? You guys can celebrate on your birthday?” He suggests. I mean, you guess he’s right, it isn’t actually your birthday yet, but it still didn’t take away from the fact that you wanted to spend it with all of your friends, including Haechan.
“Okay… Sorry, I didn’t mean to be a downer. It’s just, Haechan is-”
“Haechan’s your best friend, yeah, dude, I know, but you also have us as your friends, too, you know?” Mark gives you a gentle smile while looking at your other friends laughing and talking at the tables.
“You’re right. Thanks, Mark. Has anyone told you you’re a really good listener?” You ask.
“No problem, and yeah, I guess,” He shrugs. “Now, let’s get in a good moment for the last hour remaining.” Mark gets up and holds out his hand to pull you up. Right as you're getting up, the door jingling gets your attention. Immediately looking towards the door, you see Haechan walking in and greeting everyone. 
“Haechan, you finally made–” You stop your sentence seeing a girl come from behind him, holding onto his arm. Haechan finally notices you and makes his way over, pulling the girl behind him. You can see Mark from the corner of your eyes giving you a pitiful look. 
“Y/n! Hey! Sorry, I’m late. I had to go pick up Mihye from her house and drive all the way back here,” Haechan explains while the apparent Mihye just giggles. You just give Haechan a blank stare. I mean, this is unbelievable, and you don’t know what to say.
Haechan quickly realizes he forgot to introduce the girl by his side. “Oh, by the way, Mihye, meet Y/n, Y/n, meet Mihye. She’s my new girlfriend,” Haechan smiles. Mihye holds out her hand for you to shake, and Haechans waits for you to grab it, but the moment never comes.
Mark quickly grabs your own hand and places it in Mihye’s.
“Silly Y/n, haha, I think, she’s just, um, in shock and happy that Haechan finally made it,” 
You don’t know what to say. You feel tears already starting to form, but you don’t want to make a scene. 
“I think I’m going to take a breather outside. I’ll be back,” You tell Mark before rushing past Haechan and Mihye to go outside. Except Haechan stops you for a second.
“What’s wrong? You need me to go outside with you?” He says, concerned. 
Yanking your hand back, you bitterly say, “No. I need time alone. You’ve already done enough.”
Mark’s eyes widen. “Y/n, I think now should be a time to leave and talk to him. I’ll keep Mihye company.” Sighing, you give in and walk outside with Haechan following.
Not before he tells Mihye he’ll be back. Standing in the dark, with the wind blowing slightly, you sigh. A moment of silence is filled between you two until Haechan breaks the silence, like always.
“Are you mad because I have a new girlfriend?” He asks. And you snap because this is always the problem you have with him, and it is just a continuous cycle you’re tired of dealing with. 
“What?! Haechan, you cannot seriously be so oblivious?” You look at him, shocked. 
Rolling his eyes, “I knew you’d react like this.”
“How else did you want me to react when you’re telling me you already found a new person and you brought them to my birthday get-together without informing me?!”
Haechan scoffs, “Oh come on, it’s not really that big of a deal, Y/n. It’s not like they’re taking the spotlight away from you.”
“That’s not the problem, Haechan, don’t you get it?! It’s the fact that it hasn’t even been a full month, nonetheless three weeks, since your last girlfriend? Do you enjoy being heartbroken? Do you enjoy the fact that I keep looking after you every time? Are you satisfied with the fact that I’m always there to pick up the pieces? Or is it the fact that you know I’ll always be by your side and drop everything for you?” The feeling of finally being able to speak out feels liberating. Except, it doesn’t mean you’ll get the outcome that you’re expecting. 
“I never made you drop anything for me,” He angrily retorts while pointing. “And so what if it’s been less than a month, or three weeks, whatever, can’t you just be happy for me?! Isn’t that what you’re here for? To be by my side and be my BEST FRIEND?”
You stay silent. “Fine,” you weakly smile. 
“I won’t say anything more, and I'm sorry for overreacting. And you’re right. As your best friend, I should stick by you no matter what choices you make. I’m happy for you, Hyuck, I really am.” You pat him on the shoulder as you walk past him back into the restaurant.
Haechan just sighs and follows after you, grabbing your wrist before you can fully step inside. 
“Talk to me. What is this really about? Why are you so upset? You know I always do this, so why is it a problem now?” You think for a few minutes.
Should you tell him? Should you tell him about the fact that you’ve been in love with him for the past, God knows how many years? Or the fact that you’re jealous about all the girls he’s spent time with when it should’ve been you? How everyone, including his friends, knows that you’re in love with him? Is that a risk you want to take? 
Looking at him with sad eyes, you make your decision and give up. “It’s not that … It’s….” Tearing up, you know you have to get this off your chest. “I just need to get this off my chest,” you say shakily.
Haechan looks at you, concerned. “What is it?”
“I’m... I’ve just been … in-“ you get cut off by someone yelling out, “Haechan? Y/n? Where are you guys?” Your heart drops. Of course, it’s his new girlfriend.
Haechan whips his head around and yells back, “Mihye? What are you doing out here? I said I’d be back. Go back inside.” 
“I was worried. It’s been a while since you guys left,” Mihye says from the door.
“We… We should probably go back inside. They’re probably bored without us, and Mihye’s starting to get worried.”
“No, tell me what you were gonna say,” Haechan firmly states while grabbing you again.
“It’s not important anymore,” You shake off his hands, moving towards the door, as Mihye is no longer there.
“Tell me, or I won’t let you leave.” 
“Fine. I was just going to say how I’ve been concerned for you for many years now. You’ve had me worried whether you’d be able to be happy and find a good person for you, there. Happy?” You sarcastically smile.
“So that’s it? That’s what you made a big deal for?” He lightly laughs.
“It's not funny. I’m just worried about you, you’re my best friend, and I don’t want to see you lose the light in your eyes. That’s what makes you Haechan.”
Wrapping his arms around your waist and leaning his head into your shoulder, he says, “I know you’re concerned for me, Y/n, and you’re my best friend in the whole world, too. It’s a good thing I’ll have you with me every time to get me through it, though, isn’t it?” 
“Yeah, you’re lucky it’s me and not someone else.” He pulls away.
“You know, for a second, I thought you were going to say you were in love with me or something. That would’ve been an easier explanation as to why you were acting like you were, but it’s a good thing that wasn’t it,” he laughs. 
As if your heart wasn’t already torn to pieces. You should’ve known he’d never see you in that light. I mean, look at yourself; compared to Mihye, you were a completely shabby version of her. If only he knew that that was the exact reason why you were acting like you were. But you’d never tell him that, not when it meant risking your friendship and never talking to him again. 
“Yeah .. that’s a ridiculous thought there. I don’t know how you came up with that conclusion,” it just came out your mouth, it’s not like you wanted it to, but it’s the only way for you to cope with a rejection that wasn’t even formal; how oblivious he was. 
Heading back into the restaurant with Haechan following behind you, you notice Mark and Jaemin looking at you both.
 
“Why don’t you head back to Mihye now? I’m sure she’s been waiting for a while,” You say, nodding your head over to where she was standing. Haechan just nods, and you watch as he walks up behind her, embracing her in a back hug and kissing the top of her head.
Looking away, you walk to where Mark and Jaemin are and slide into the seat across from them.
“So? Did you tell him?” Jaemin asks curiously. Mark just nudges him. “What? I’m just asking,” He shrugs.
“I’m gonna assume you didn’t tell him,” Mark scratches the back of his neck. You can’t seem to say anything. Maybe you should’ve told him. No. Everything would’ve gone down the drain if you did. Maybe it’s a good thing you didn’t. 
“I didn’t.” You finally say.
“Well, why not?” Mark asks. 
“Mark,” You look up at him raising your eyebrows. “Are you seriously asking that? He has a girlfriend, and it doesn’t seem as easy as you make it out to be. How am I going to just tell him, oh, I'm in love with you, have been since forever!” 
“Hey, you said it, not me,” He points at you. You roll your eyes. 
You point over to where Haechan is, “Whatever. I mean, it’s my get-together, and he seems to be wanting to spend more time with Mihye than me.”
“Like I mentioned before, you guys can hang out on your actual birthday. Right now, spend some time with us. There’s only a few more minutes left, so let’s make the most of it,” Mark smiles. “Right, Jaemin?”
“Yes, exactly. Forget him for today!” Jaemin says, grabbing your hand to pull you up.
“That’s if he doesn’t forget my birthday too,”
“He won’t! We’ll make sure of it,” Mark pats your back.
“Thanks, guys. I don’t know what I would do without you.” You embrace both Mark and Jaemin, and they hug you back. 
—---------------------------------
It’s been a month since your birthday. You spent the day with Haechan, Mark, and Jaemin. One of the best days and you couldn’t forget it. Except today seems to feel really familiar. Almost as if you’ve done this for the 20th time already. Why? Because Haechan sits in your bed again, eating ice cream and sniffling. 
“I’m guessing Mihye broke up with you?” You ask, sighing, not even surprised he’s here again after a month. You saw it coming, but how could you tell him that? You would seem like a bad friend, and that’s the last thing you want Haechan to think. 
Haechan blows his nose with a tissue, “Yeah….”
All you can do is rub his back once again, and it’s all you can ever seem to do. Watch him find a new girlfriend, fall in love, get heartbroken, and be there by his side when it happens. 
“I’m sorry you have to deal with me all the time,” Haechan sighs, bringing his shoulders down.
“Hey, it’s okay. That’s what I’m here for, right? What kind of a best friend would I be if I wasn’t there for your ups and downs?” He just smiles.
“Can you give me a hug?” You embrace him while patting his back as he sniffles.
“I know I’ve said this almost every time this happens, but you really are a good person, you know?” Haechan says while leaning his head on your shoulder.
“Thanks,” Is all you can say. 
And the cycle repeats, as it always will because you’re the good person he’s always needed in life, even if he doesn’t know it. And you’re okay with him not knowing. The ones who will make him cry, you can only comfort him and be by his side.
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marrowhyena · 3 months ago
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Anonymous Coward asked: Do you speak any other languages than english, and if not, considered learning any
I took three years of German in high school, then had a scheduling conflict with the only German IV class, so I became his teaching assistant in a lower German class instead because I liked my teacher a lot. I think my dumb logic as a 13 year old entering high school was that I had to choose a language and I couldn't roll my R's, or whatever. 
 It was a reoccurring novelty on my channel that I would randomly speak or understand some German. Some claimed that it was accent-less, sometimes, or whatever. A bit of a gimmick was that we all chose a German name from a list on day one and would address each other as those names throughout all four years of the class. Twitter, Youtube, and the Xbox 360 all came into existence around 2006, when I was 16 and in the middle of these classes, so a lot of my usernames became Sebastian because that was my not-my-name moniker that I already had ready. 
Yes, I was already basically a furry, but I didn't have a named fursona until 2022 and doubt I would have openly embraced it as my name all the way back then. 
 [As an aside, folks fixate on me mentioning that I was a furry when I was a minor, and then juxtapose that with me making the point that minors probably shouldn't be online. This isn't really a contradiction. First, yeah, I was an unsupervised minor online and that probably wasn't great. But second, I grew up on a very, very different internet than the one that exists today. It's not just about how Twitter makes no effort to separate minors from adult content etc, but also the upsetting way that the internet forms this secondary layer over middle and high school that further enables bullying and paranoia. We know the internet is fucking kids up nowadays. When I talk about having "usernames" in 2006, we're talking about Halo 2 and cat videos. Even when I mention websites that still exist today, they were purely chronological feeds with manually-curated front pages. There was no algorithm as we understand it today. FurAffinity is like the only website that still functions like things did in 2006, and people hate using it for that exact reason lmao]
Anyway that was a surprising amount of my identity in the early years of doing let's plays [2011-2015], insofar as having any distinguishable features whatsoever was your "identity" among a sea of nearly identical gaming channels. I was the guy who played puzzle games, took his time, rambled a lot, spoke some German, and would randomly spout off rock facts because I was also freshly graduating college with a bachelor of science degree in geology. I was surprised by how excited people would get about rock rants. I got excited when I saw basalt columns in Dragon Age Inquisition, but quickly started to notice that they were absolutely everywhere in games, so I started maintaining a gallery that listed them all: https://imgur.com/gallery/columnar-jointing-watch-Alpmz 
I didn't have a particular attraction to German or geology, though. I took German because I was asked to pick a mandatory language class as a young teen, and I took geology because I dropped out of computer science and needed to still get a degree because I was raise to go to college. So in the years since my memory of both has faded significantly. My last German class was in 2007, and my last bit of geology in 2013.
Realistically, the most useful language to learn would probably be Japanese. That might seem unintuitive since everyone in California says Spanish for obvious reasons, but understanding Japanese would actually come in handy for my job pretty regularly. It sure would have helped when I was litigating specific elements of Beastars, that's for sure. Lately I just send screenshots of stuff to Toaster with the caption "heeeeeeelllp" 
 [Smile or comment on the answer here](https://retrospring.net/@Boring_Keith/a/112854073679531772)
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redistrictgirl · 2 months ago
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What's the deal with North Carolina and Georgia?
So we have our first weird quirk of this presidential election - North Carolina seemingly polling much less favorably for former President Trump than Georgia, even though he won NC and lost GA in 2020. Indeed, my polling average has Mr. Trump leading by over two points in the Peach State but only half a point in the Tar Heel State, so today I wanted to analyze the phenomenon more closely and come up with a few different factors that might be contributing to this.
First, let's go over the one that Republicans will want to talk about and Democrats fear, polling error. In 2020, President Biden led polls in North Carolina by a point more than he did in Georgia, yet lost the former by about 1.5% while winning the latter narrowly. Clearly, this is the same situation and a harbinger of a red wave, right?
Calm down there. First, yes, state-level polls produce outcomes like this from time to time, but it defies logic to assume that pollsters didn't attempt to correct for their genuinely disastrous misses in 2020. Second, there are more undecided voters in North Carolina, which could certainly cause the gap to close as we trudge towards November. Finally, even if we ignore those first two factors, the current polling gap between the two Southeast states is bigger than 2020's - so any polling error must not be the only factor.
This brings us to a possibility that liberals would prefer - the post-Dobbs coalition applying to its first presidential election. For those who haven't seen me use this term before, this describes the depolarization of party coalitions along racial lines in favor of increased polarization along religiosity lines - a phenomenon we started to see in 2020 but really took hold and accelerated in 2022. If it accelerates this year, it would be a boon for Democrats along the Rust Belt and in more secular Sun Belt states like Arizona and Nevada. Certainly, there's some compelling evidence that these demographic shits might be a factor or even the primary driver of the disparity - for one thing, at the state government level, North Carolina actually voted to the left of Georgia on average last cycle! Part of this is the across-the-aisle appeal that Governor Kemp and Secretary Raffensperger have proven to have, but it was still somewhat of a surprise to see that outcome in practice during the midterms. Georgia also had 6% more black voters compared to North Carolina (relative to overall turnout), so the racial depolarization aspect of this equation makes sense here, and we're seeing the strong polling along the Blue Wall for Vice President Harris that would match our hypothesis.
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That said, I have a couple of problems with this theory. First, North Carolina actually has more evangelicals in its voter pool than Georgia, so religious polarization should be a problem for Tar Heel Democrats. Second, we're not seeing big polling surprises in Florida, which is more secular but is still a Southeast state, is extremely racially diverse, and just came off an R+20 election in 2022.
Finally, let's look at the boring option, a different pool of pollsters in Georgia vs. North Carolina. It's August, so we aren't going to see a glut of data yet (which is reflected in my model). So let's just do an apples-to-apples comparison of polls from both states around the same time and by the same pollsters, based on which had more favorable margins for Ms. Harris:
GA +2 (Morning Consult, late July)
GA +1 (Redfield & Wilton, late July)
NC +1 (BSG/GS Strategy Group, late July)
NC +6 (NYT/Siena Group, mid-August)
GA +2 (Redfield & Wilton, mid-August)
That's a much slimmer difference in North Carolina's favor on average, and really driven by one massive outlier poll (by the New York Times, but still!) It looks very likely that we're dealing with selection bias at the moment.
So in conclusion, the North Carolina rating being to the left of Georgia is probably a nothingburger driven by small sample sizes, but watch to see more signs of the post-Dobbs coalition going forward - it could make the 2024 map look weird.
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lotusunset · 2 years ago
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Far too many pics of the Palais Garnier (Part Three!)
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In October of 2022, I had the extraordinary experience of getting to complete an 15+ year old dream of mine to visit the Palais Garnier. I took a metric fuckton of pictures and now I want to share them with you all, the PotO community!
Before I start dumping, a few things:
Please reblog this post. I usually don’t post a lot, therefore I don’t have a big following. I’d really appreciate people sharing these as much as they can. When I was a dumb kid in ye olden days of the internet, finding a post like this was the sort of thing I would have been hyped up on for weeks. Help spread that kind of joy!
Feel free to use these photos for any sorts of graphics, artistic reference or any other fandom related projects, as long as it’s not for profit. Please just credit me in some way. In fact, I'd love to be tagged to see whatever creations come from sharing all this!
This is part three, which is a continuation of pictures from the interior. I will continue to share information from the tour I took in this post as well. In fact, these are some of my personal favorites, as I never knew about some of these rooms as just some silly American girl on the internet. I hope you guys enjoy these even more than the last!
Part 1 (Exterior) | Part 2 (staircase) | Part 3 (HERE) | Part 4 (stage)
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This is the grand foyer, an area that is pretty heavily photographed already. Standing in this room is almost as impressive as the massive staircase. The paintings on the walls and ceilings depict a lot of mythological scenes. In one of them, there is a hidden portrait of Garnier, along with the other artists that were involved in creating the paintings. The doors leading to the 2nd level balcony are located in the grand foyer.
Historically, only the gentlemen were allowed in the grand foyer, as it was seen as a place for them to converse and do business until one night, the Queen of Spain decided that she didn't care about such arbitrary rules. Ignoring it completely, she entered the room. The men all decided to leave, offended that even a queen would dare to encroach on their space. As word traveled around the Opera that night, all the other women soon joined the Queen in the foyer, wanting to see for themselves that she was there. Afterwards, men and women were begrudgingly allowed to mingle.
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I found this to be a very interesting room. At the end of the grand foyer, this room was full of sunlight and comparatively simple decorations. The wealthy patrons themselves served as the real decorations of this room, as they would gather here for refreshments! The common folk, while not permitted to enter, would come to simply watch the rich people indulge in lots of expensive treats.
In fact, the menu still hangs on the wall in the form of all the portraits! All the women are holding items that symbolize various food items, tea, coffee, wine, game meat, fish, ice cream, citrus fruits and pastries.
I couldn't help but imagine Raoul taking various treats and sneaking them out to share with Christine.
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We weren't allowed to go down this hallway but it just continued to make this place feel like a giant maze.
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These two rooms were nearly identical, though on opposite ends of a hallway. A few mistakes were made during their construction. The top room is known as the Sun room, for its warmer ambiance. The bottom is the Moon room.
Firstly, the rooms were meant to be swapped locations. The Sun Room was supposed to lead into the gentlemen's smoking room, but the Moon room leads to it instead. On the ceiling of the Sun room, salamanders are painted. The little amphibians were believed to ward off the danger of fire and protect the building. By the time the mistake was caught, it was too late to change it.
The other mistake can be seen in the mirror illusion in the Sun room. Because of a fault in the construction of the mirrors, the glass is too curved and the error is magnified with the illusion. The light appears to bend around a corner, instead of repeating on into infinity.
I imagine Erik was quite cross with the workers when he realized these errors occurred. I certainly wouldn't have wanted to be on the receiving end of his temper that day!
Looking at the star motifs painted on both ceilings, I wonder if they could have inspired Christine's Star Princess costume in the musical.
PART 1 (exteriors) | PART 2 (staircase) | PART 3 (here!) | Part 4 (stage)
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ikoarts · 10 months ago
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what up, we finally updating things around here x
im starting from May 2022 onwards, bc if i think if i tried uploading everything since whenever i last uploaded any traditional/non polished digital art, id probs go insane
anyhow here's May 2022 art, ill stick the dates and some info under the cut x
1, 2 - 06/06/2022 : Some FemKaards when I was just getting my design down for her <3
3, 4 - 07/05/2022 : FeMTT and more FemKaard, they r gay ur honour. i still love them a lot, very girlboss of me to make them into OCs
5 - 23/05/2022 : A draft for an updated Honey design. though I ended up reversing the colour of the boots, I wanted to only use the highlighter yellow and b/w, cuz its fun
6, 7 - 26/05/2022 : Fanarts of Surge the Tenrec and Doctor Starline from the Sonic IDW comics, some of my fave characters in the franchise as a whole tbqh
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leqclerc · 7 months ago
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honestly carlos also isn’t that impressive when you look at the calibre of drivers ferrari have hired in let’s say the past 2 decades… seb, alonso, kimi, micheal, barrichello are all either world champions or (for barrichello) finished at least 2nd in the wdc (and here we can include charles also!) so if we’re just looking at wdc positions carlos is the weakest ferrari driver in 20 years. it’s ferrari… the standards are different
anyw this is a bit divisive so i understand if udw to reply!
Hello 👋🏻😊
No worries! I see what you're saying. I think the thing with Ferrari is though... I mean, obviously they will always be a legendary marque with plenty of historical successes, and as much as one can pretend that doesn't move them, you can't deny the appeal of wanting to be part of that, wanting to experience a slice of that and be immortalized in the history books yourself. I also think there's a bit of a "I can fix her" aspect at play here, this tantalizing idea that you can be the one to restore Ferrari to end the title drought and bring the trophy back to Maranello, to do the one thing so many others failed to do.
Which kind of brings me to my next point which is that... legendary status aside, I think their stock has kind of fallen in the last few years. Particularly in that 2020-21 period where they came crashing down and then had to rebuild and they already knew they wouldn't be anywhere close to being championship contenders.
I mean every year we see the stats and the "it's been X years since Ferrari's last championship" stuff going around. The 2010s and early 2020s just haven't been a great time for the team. They've had some highs but generally they're probably remembered for the lows (unfortunately.) They've had two (three, if you count 2022) failed title bids that fizzled out before the end of the season. There's been a lot of staff turnover (including TPs), lots of chaos behind the scenes with people trying to do things their way in hopes of breaking the cycle (Binotto.) It's like it's always close but no cigar, if that makes sense.
So at the time they were looking for a replacement for Seb, let's say early 2020 (unbeknownst to us at the time, because the narrative was that they intended to stick with him and then Covid complicated things...) I think they 1. just were not an attractive option for drivers of a similar caliber/world champions. Max wasn't going to move after getting stuck in at Red Bull and Mercedes were having their heyday so Lewis wasn't about to walk either. The only other WDC on the grid at the time was Kimi iirc, whom they had just recently let go to bring in Charles. And 2. I think they were trying to sort of shake things up and almost forge a new identity. They took a chance on Charles, doing something they traditionally wouldn't have resorted to, bringing in a wet behind the ears driver in just his second year of F1. Of course he was their academy driver, he did sim work for them, test-drove their cars and was generally familiar with the people and the environment and factory and everything so it's not like they plucked him out of nowhere, but still, it was unlike them, and many pointed out that they were flipping the script with this move.
Again hearkening back to a point I made previously, on paper Carlos seems like a pretty solid driver and more or less along the lines of what they needed at that time. He generally had a good time at McLaren, he was beating Lando (a rookie but still) and was being praised for his professionalism and team player attitude (little did we know.)
I think the only other name that was mentioned as having credible talks with them at the time was Daniel, who maybe would've been more in line with what we came to expect from their signings (so a driver with more experience and actual race wins under his belt. Not WDC though.)
There was also very much this perception that they were going to go all in and build the team around Charles as their no. 1, so they didn't really need a senior driver he could learn from anymore (they already had that in Seb) but rather someone to back him up. (Obviously things uh. Didn't quite pan out that way but.)
I remember there was a stat going around about how Charles and Carlos were Ferrari's youngest driver pairing since like 1968, which is kind of insane. So I think they also kind of used that to launch their new era where they kind of tried to re-brand themselves as this team that's betting on young, fresh talent.
Now they seem to be on the up again with the development direction, new TP and a surprise juggernaut lineup for 25-26 so there's this sense (and hope) that they're heading towards building something akin to the dominant, iconic team of the early 2000s.
All in all it was a decently long partnership, especially considering the state of modern F1 and the near-constant silly season and people getting short-term contracts, lots of academy drivers waiting in the wings and stuff. Carlos himself was a serial team-hopper so to speak before getting the Ferrari seat, the longest he's been with one team so far in his career I believe? Will this lineup be considered a standout Ferrari lineup some 10, 15 years down the line? Probably not, especially sandwiched in between two WDC drivers and falling in this no man's land period with no titles and few wins (as of right now, who knows what happens this season). But all in all I think Carlos's four season stint with Ferrari is pretty much an accurate reflection of where they were at that moment in time.
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pocima · 11 months ago
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My top 10 favorite music projects of 2023 ૢ✧∘* ✧・゚
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Welcome to this list that 2 people were mildly anticipating tops, a list where I ramble about note sequences that give me a sense of enjoyment, which is essentially what this blog of mine is dedicated to. I’ve been on this site for more than a year now, I had the pleasure of interacting and chatting with my lovely mutuals who share my silly little interests, both here and on @akaneverse. At the end of last year, I simply uploaded a topster of my favorite albums and EPs, and this December, I’m taking my time to review said projects, and show them appreciation with words and expressions slightly bigger than “the production is so insane” and “BANGER”. This year has been good to me as a music enjoyer, with new releases from my longer-time faves and incredible new discoveries, some possibly becoming all-time faves, which will be mentioned in the post. Pitchfork, your bankruptcy is nearing. And yes, the GIF is a spoiler.
⑩ Ichijikikoku (EP) - Atarashii Gakko!
I can say I somewhat got into Japanese music this year and this anti-idol group with a school leader concept looking camp right in the eye were some of the first artists that caught my attention. Having accidentally come across them through snooping around a beloved mutual’s Spotify profile, the quality of their songs such as Pineapple Kryptonite, Nainainai and Freaks caught me off guard in a great way. Their discography offers various genres such as robotic chant-filled hyperpop, groovy city pop, alternative rock, hip-hop and their latest EP truly showcases their diversity and range. From Otona Blue, the funky pop song that was the push start for the girls to get their rightful recognition, to a revisit to their older rock sound, to their first club banger and more city pop hits, this EP presents what their music has to offer in a nutshell. 2023 treated the school leaders well as they both got their deserved success and delivered a well-rounded project along with other listen-worthy singles.
Favorite tracks: Otome no Bigaku and Giri Giri.
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⑨ 3 of Us (EP) - FLO
After taking the Internet’s ‘00s R&B revivalists and girl group appreciators by storm with their first EP Cardboard Box in 2022, this iconic trio went on an ongoing streak to constantly deliver the best and improve their music and skills. 3 of Us serves as lunchables before the upcoming full-course meal which is their debut album, and not so surprisingly considering the consistent high quality of the group’s releases, the snack surely is fulfilling. Two of the tunes were anticipated then-unreleased songs but the title track and the later added-on Suite Life were loved by us FLOlifers as well. The four songs showcase both the group’s incredible vocals and their empowering no-nonsense attitude. The title track is an anthem that shows the world the girls have each other’s backs, through a smooth execution of a humorous scenario of a guy simultaneously trying to toy with the 3 of them. FLO are real it girls, and this mini alone is definitely convincing of that enough.
Favorite tracks: what if I said all of them?
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⑧ MY World (EP) - aespa
aespa have long-ago established their cybergirl fighter Kwangya concept and a solid spot in the K-pop industry as a group with one of the strongest group identities, top-notch discographies and powerful vocals. I slowly fell in love with them in 2021 and they have been one of the very few anchors to my interest in K-pop lately. Through mismanagement and complete bs coming from their crappy record label, standing ten toes down with these girls and experiencing the comeback of the summer was 100% worth it. Though the label needs to pull themselves together a little for the creative direction of all of their groups, MY World offered aespa’s two different takes on the summer which somehow felt fresh and unique, still suiting the group and proving aespacore’s wide range. The music, however, gave the signature aespa sound we had missed because of the music drought. Reol and Slayyyter’s souls truly split into two each, possessing the four members and giving us the gritty, in-your-face EDM banger that is the lead single Spicy. Welcome to MY World, the mini’s pre-release single, on the other hand, is an orchestral, alluring alternative pop track, which is a genre I never knew I needed aespa to dip their toes into. Salty and Sweet is a package delivery for the MYs who are especially seated for aespa’s metallic hyperpop releases, while Thirsty is contemporary R&B with a bubbly aespacore twist to it and I’m Unhappy is a splendid hyperballad. No offense but had they left the basic and frankly flow-disrupting ballad ‘Til We Meet Again in the vault, the ranking of the EP would be higher on here, and this is my only criticism of the project music-wise. As I always say on aespa comeback release days: the girls did it again.
Favorite tracks: answer changes every 5 business days but right now I’m gonna go with Welcome to MY World and Spicy.
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⑦ Crying in the Carwash (EP) - Lolo Zouaï
I’ve been keeping up with Lolo Zouaï on the low (pun intended, see Encore) since the release day of her sophomore album PLAYGIRL but I might have to pay closer attention to her because of her elevated excellence showcased on this mini. Besides giving her more freedom over her work and artistic direction, returning to her independent artist days allowed her to wiggle more with her own feelings and experiences directly, as opposed to the personas she conveyed the story of PLAYGIRL through. Before the unveiling of the EP, the roll-out fully hooked me in with both the singles and mesmerizing visuals. Encore was the perfect earworm-y invitation to the era, and Crying in the Carwash showed us the rainy panorama none other than Lolo’s mind with soft, melancholic jungle drums as the track’s stand-out point. The rest of the three songs, sitting prettily in the middle, give us soulful R&B blessed with the artist’s gentle vocal runs and UK garage reminiscent of e-motions by Mura Masa and Erika de Casier. All in all, I can’t be the only one who can’t wait to see what Zouaï will have to offer with her future work.
Favorite track: Crying in the Carwash.
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⑥ ESFERA DE AMOR - Simona
Esfera de Amor? In “my top 10 favorite projects of the year”? More like “top 10 most slept on albums of the year”. I’m not saying this just because of my personal opinion or just by looking at the streaming numbers either. This project is worth checking out for everyone looking for ethereal, light, bubbly pop à la 4th gen K-pop girl group music. Simona took recent pop micro-trends such as the incorporation of house, UK garage, hyperpop, neo-reggaeton and baile funk, and shaped them up into her very own world of love. The record, while being a relatively easy listen and having the ability to appeal to a wider audience, keeps you attentive and never bored, with an intro that leaves the sense of time and reality behind to make room for dancing and a classy vintage-style interlude. At one stop you unwind, at the second you dance at midnight in your bedroom, and at another you’re an otherworldly romantic. Feel free to do whatever you please, because after all, you’re in a sphere of love where everything’s fine.
Favorite tracks: Adentro de Mí, Polidrama, Plush, Meloni and Llaga Verdadera.
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⑤ BB/ANG3L - Tinashe
Tinashe has been an impactful figure in modern R&B for nearly a decade now, with her resumé ranging from choreography material groovy bops to heartfelt, calmer, vocal-heavy songs. BB/ANG3L, in the musician’s own words, combines her past and her present, her darker debut day sound with her faster-paced, catchier, dreamy tunes. The songwriting keeps it real and personal: we go from a dramatic reflection on a toxic relationship, to wanting to be pampered and treated with respect and class, to more reflections and slowly letting go. In the music video for Talk To Me Nice, Tinashe peels away her former self and gets purified with the dripping water, getting down to her essence. (I will further elaborate on my newly found love for water concepts/metaphors in some next entries.) Thanks to producer Machinedrum, garage and dnb rhythms (can you tell those are my weaknesses yet?) are beautifully incorporated in two of the tracks, and the production is atmospheric and tastefully bleak throughout the entire tracklist. Keeping up with Tinashe’s releases for a good while, a couple of years in my case, remains a pleasure with this project of hers.
Favorite track: answer changes often once again and this time I’m picking Tightrope.
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④ Raven - Kelela
If there were courses on how to take breaks of long years after releasing a top-tier album and make an even more world-shaking, majestic comeback, Raven would be the diligently studied textbook. Though I personally can’t relate to the 6-year wait as I discovered Kelela at the beginning of this year, my commentary is unnecessary for one to know she is a legend whose impact on alternative R&B, dance music and neo-soul is not up for any questioning. While Raven has even more of a slower and sultrier side than before, the intimacy and maturity stays consistent whether we’re talking jungle, aurora-like synths or soothing orchestration. It’s a true, well-constructed and developed body of fruitful work, with seamless thought-out sequencing, an art that’s being kept alive by artists that rightfully value it. Motifs reappearing in her previous albums such as “all the way down”, “on the run”, “far away” make their returns, but in no way does anything feel repetitive or any less unique. The album cover art and the music videos for Washed Away and Enough for Love present us more water imagery that couldn’t have been any more suitable for the sultriness and haziness of the record. Raven is the deep melancholic ocean that you trust to wrap your body around, where you witness musical scenery that’s so breath-taking that you can barely tell if it’s real.
Favorite track: On the Run.
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Let’s get some honorable mentions out of the way before the top 3: Heaven knows by PinkPantheress (literally 11th place, Feelings was on repeat for like a week straight), My 21st Century Blues by Raye (robbed by the Scammys), Unlock My World by fromis_9 (if I make a best ‘23 K-pop b-side list Prom Night has a high spot secured), seOul collection by OnlyOneOf (I ignore the old tracks included in the album and candy bOmb is the K-pop b-side of the year) and Bébe Yana’s singles this year bc even though they’re not a body of work they’re too good not to get a shout-out. 
③ Code Ge4ss - 4s4ki
As I was getting into Japanese music in March, I suddenly wondered whether there was a full-fledged hyperpop or experimental electronic music scene in Japan. After a quick Google search, an interesting artist popped up, with the metallic cybercore aesthetic I’ve been craving more of on the cover art of her latest album called Killer in Neverland. Interesting album name, intriguing song titles too, and as soon as I heard Log Out she took it in my eyes, there and then. Listening to Killer in Neverland as a whole took my shock to another level. Who was this and why did her music satisfy my cravings to this extent? As I went through her discography in a day or two, I fell deeper and deeper in love with her enchanting production (she’s her very own producer, mind you), crunchy autotuned vocals that somehow sound magical, her risk-taking unique concepts, something in between camp and outright beautiful visuals, precisely crafted songwriting and artistry. She manages to be the perfect amount of fun, the perfect amount of edgy, the perfect amount of bright, the perfect amount of sharp, the perfect amount of real, the perfect amount of satirical, the perfect amount of joyful, the perfect amount of sad on each and every project of hers. What didn’t hit me like a truck at first, however, is her tremendous improvement as a musician in pretty much every aspect: production, songwriting, album cohesion, creative direction, visuals. Not until her latest album Code Ge4ss finally got released in late June.
I was confused at first at the Code Geass anime collab thing, I wasn’t exactly sure of the release date and whether 4s4ki was actually releasing yet another scrumptious FULL album not too long after I got into her. The album dropped, I was tuned in right at midnight and my already high expectations were surpassed. Banging (kicking if you will) Jersey club beats, birds chirping accompanying glitchy trap instrumentals, screams followed by almost Machine Girl-level noisy circuit board sorcery, samples of characters’ speeches over electro guitar riffs, a piano interlude paired with opera runs taken from the show, pacifying ballads which are a mix of acoustic guitar and hard-hitting pots-pans and 8-bit synths, all closed by surreal orchestration with the classic electronica touches of 4s4ki and collaborator producer Kotonohouse. I’m sure I’d appreciate the Code Geass-themed lyricism on an even deeper level if I hadn’t paused watching the anime after 5 episodes like the terrible TV consumer I am. What I can be certain about is that everything about this project feels genuine and from within because it IS genuine and from within. 4s4ki couldn’t have been a more suitable choice for this collaboration, she’s been a fan of the franchise since elementary school and very few emit the weird cyber-glitchcore internet baby aesthetics the way she does. The cover art is stunning and references the series once again, and the Shirley MV leaves us with calming visuals that may remind you of Welcome to MY World by aespa, which spoke to the aespa x 4s4ki truther in me.
As I was saying, this album is what really rubbed her major progress as an artist and musician in my face. We’ve gone such a long way from the calmer EDM-pop antics of Your Dreamland, for example, not even to mention the synth-pop balladry in her debut Gender. Every era of hers sonically gets increasingly complex and intense and ethereal, and in every body of work she leaves in a bigger, more intimate piece of her. There’s just so much personality in everything she puts out and presents. She built her sonic and artistic identity from the bottom to the top and even as a fan for less than a year, continuing to witness this makes me feel pure admiration. Words aren’t enough to properly express how I feel about her art but that won’t stop me from typing up paragraphs to try to get someone to understand me on this. People have various opinions on 4s4ki’s experimentation and self-expression, however what absolutely nobody can ever deny is that she’s a true artist, visionary and one of the most skilled producers of this generation. 2023 brought her both achievements and unfortunately some hardships, and I sincerely hope 2024 is kinder and even more generous to her. (She’s not done with taking over the year yet! Stream her new single Continue and stay tuned for winter again coming Dec 15.)
Favorite track: Eleven.
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② Fountain Baby - Amaarae
I touched upon my adoration for water imagery on my entries for BB/ANG3L and Raven but as you can see from the title, Fountain Baby took the theme to an entirely different level. The analogy potential of water is infinite as the fluidity, cadence, calmness, riptides, uncertainty, contradictions of water can very well be converted into the multi-faceted human emotion. The same water that you’re dependent on in order to live can poison you at an overload, the same water that rinses your body and soul can drown and choke you up when contacted with the wrong places. Fountain Baby expresses various moods and states of mind not only through concept visuals, but more importantly by sprinkling water euphemisms throughout the entire record: “fountain baby, wash her, make it wet”, “water on my neck, come make it warm”, “water from wine”, “water, it mix with the substance” being prominent examples. Amaarae chats love, sensuality, materialism and lastly, meeting your maker in a way other than passing away. She defines a “fountain baby” as “a person with endless charisma, someone that is abundant in their blessings and ultimately a blessed child of God.” The universe Fountain Baby resides in is essentially rich, delicate, cloudy and raw.
While water is a consistent element of the album, it was far from being Amaarae’s only source of inspiration. She draws on ‘00s pop staples Timbaland and Britney Spears, The Neptunes, Clipse (sampled in Counterfeit), Janet Jackson, Missy Elliott and diverse genres such as Afro-beats, classic and contemporary hip-hop, Americana punk rock and dance. The melting pot of live orchestra, harps, baile funk, tire whirring, R&B-infused shiny Afro-futurism, Japanese folk song samples, Chinese bow violins, Arabic scales, gunshot and cash register clicking sounds, mid-song switches that make you feel like the main character of a coming of age movie, glitter and sax and guitars creates a record that refuses to be boxed into one genre or label. A “clever alchemist” and “a chemist who fuses world music” are titles that are deservingly given to the artist for these reasons. The record has plenty of variety yet the sequence all comes together akin to a satisfying crossword. It’s lucrative and shimmery but has its child-like, playful side that’s a natural result of Amaarae getting in touch with her inner 8 year-old during the cultivation process. The music videos are all different but inseparable approaches to the Fountain Baby-verse. The MV for the first pre-release Reckless and Sweet is based on editorials and has a silky luxurious look, with direct hints at the album’s concept. Co-Star, the second pre-release, casts zodiac signs as racer-models and fast cars come running around in a competition, keeping the high fashion coded color grading and filming style. The music video for the lead single Wasted Eyes is heavily inspired by the film Rush Hour and pays homage to Japanese culture about as much as the song does (it’s worth to mention the song is co-written by the iconic Crystal Kay whose speech you can hear in it). The intricacy and planning of every aspect of this era is pop music at its peak. With Fountain Baby, Amaarae finds the epitome of pop perfection without special dedication to seeking it.
Favorite track: Wasted Eyes.
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① Ambrosia (EP) - Namasenda
Some projects make your jaw drop from the get-go, some others grow on you with some time. Ambrosia crept up on me the longer I kept it on repeat, all the way to being my favorite project of this year. I already enjoyed Namasenda’s previous songs such as Black Ops 2, Demonic and the pre-release single maserati. As I later found more about the background of the project, how its concept came together and read the translation of the lyrics to rosa, my love for the it multiplied. Right now if I were to describe the EP in two simple words, they would be “ethereal”, “gorgeous” and “atmospheric”. These words are used with way more power than you may realize this time.
Sonically, the already unique artist stays true to herself but the execution of her vision is somehow… better than her previous work. north star and deathrow bby are unorthodox but celestial perspectives on baile funk, the former being a siren-like intro-lude that lures you in and the latter having a slightly haunting catchy Europop inspired jingle feel, serving as closer out of the 4 songs. maserati is a fresh take on polished but cutting pop, while rosa is a divine ballad that takes you to a dream realm. “Unconditionally here / I mean what I promise / When the sky is completely pink”, she sings in her home language Swedish, over the Casey MQ co-produced blissful synths. Maybe it’s executive producer Simon on the Moon’s musical genius (he’s also to be thanked for his involvement in Natural Brown Prom Queen by Sudan Archives), maybe it’s Namasenda unveiling a more authentic side of herself and therefore causing the music to be the most authentic version of itself. This authenticity drips through the production, the visuals and the lyrics. The stark contrast between Ambrosia and the jeweled, metallic, extreme meta-pop in her previous work, specifically Unlimited Ammo, opens up a conversation on the future of hyperpop.
Besides the heavy, detail-embroidered production, the focus of hyperpop was pretty much always exaggerating the artificial aspects of pop music, such as vocal manipulation, heavy bass, deafening drums, unforgettable melodies and shallow lyrics. How long could one use these funnily unrealistic musical personas before wanting to face themselves and do a deeper, more pure dive on pop? This I-D article on PC Music (the record label pioneering the hyperpop scene) shutting down concludes with “Perhaps it’s time to get off the computer and rediscover the personal.” Indeed, we can’t exactly reach a verdict on whether “hyperpop” will become just another fad or not, but moving on from simply exaggerating pop to expanding, beautifying and authenticating its sound isn’t an inaccurate prediction. 4s4ki and Namasenda (who, by the way, parted ways with PCMus before Ambrosia) are two of the artists that embody the beautiful, complex hyperpop-transcendent sound and experimental electronic pop music is in good hands thanks to artists like them.
To finish off this entry, Ambrosia manages to pinpoint exactly what I like to hear, both characteristics that I mentioned and things you can’t really put into sentences, only listen to and let them sink in. The production is some of the most stunning I’ve ever heard in my life, the EP is cohesive despite the short 9-minute run time, the visuals are simple but creative and the craft is passionate and genuine. Next time somebody asks me about the music I like, I’m sending them this EP with no further elaboration as it summarizes my tastes like no other body of work ever has.
Favorite track: rosa, it also grew on me the most drastically.
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Now to end this post, every year gives me brand new outlooks on how I consume music and the details I notice, the things I pay attention to. 2023 was filled to the brim with musicians offering their own outlooks on how they create. I’m keeping my eye on the masterpieces that will come out of 2024 and I wonder how my interests will transform with me next year.
Hey @nayeonline (special thankies for indirectly fueling my writing process) and @timetravellingkitty, I wiggled my keyboard a bit 😗
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profiterole-reads · 2 years ago
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2022 Favourites
In no particular order. This is content I've read and watched in 2022, not necessarily content released in 2022.
Books
1. A Taste of Gold and Iron by Alexandra Rowland: m/m heroic fantasy + non-binary characters. This was one of my most expected novels of the year and I was fully satisfied with the result. One of the protagonists suffers from severe anxiety.
2. [French] L’Héritage des Rois-Passeurs by Manon Fargetton: portal fantasy with a lesbian protagonist. The French language in the secondary world is different, but I don't know if the author invented the variations or based them on something real.
3. Sword Dance by AJ Demas: m/nb historical fantasy. This trilogy takes place in a fictional world based on Ancient Greece. It's a delightful mix of intrigue and domesticity shenanigans.
4. The Hollow Star Saga by Ashley Shuttleworth: f/f and m/m urban fantasy (YA). This series about the fae also includes a touch of Greek mythology. I care a lot about all the characters.
5. Youngblood by Sasha Laurens: f/f urban fantasy (YA). This is my favourite queer vampire novel. It's an excellent mix of vampire lore, romance and mystery.
6. The Magic Between by Stephanie Hoyt: m/m magical realism. The characters have superpowers, but it's not superhero fiction. It's a fun bi4bi romance.
7. One Verse Multi by Sander Santiago: m/m/m science fiction with a trans male protagonist. This is my favourite read of the year. I loved the science in this story and how the author played with the Mandela effect (false memories shared by many people).
8. Safe and Sound by EM Lindsey: m/m romance. This is a very moving hurt & comfort novel. This author always does a great job with the intersectionality of queerness and disability, deafness and vertigo in this case.
9. If You Still Recognise Me by Cynthia So: f/f romance. This novel is about identity (queer, but also British and Cantonese) and fandom.
10. [Spanish] Anne sin Filtros by Iria Parente and Selene Pascual: f/f/m romance with a trans male protagonist (YA). This novel is also about queerness and fandom. I've read several books by these authors and this is my fave.
 TV shows
1. Ancient Detective: murder mystery/wuxia with BL vibes + a non-binary character in the last few episodes. While this c-drama is mostly m/f, I appreciated the queer touches, as well as the complex plot.
2. Legend of Yunze: GL wuxia. This c-drama is a quick watch, with episodes that are only a few minutes long. What's nice is that the f/f is not very censored for a Chinese show.
3. The Lost Tomb/DMBJ franchise: adventure/fantasy with BL vibes. This c-drama franchise kept me busy for a good part of the year and I estimate that I've seen about half of it. It covers a genre that is relatively rare in Western shows.
4. Bulgasal: urban fantasy with a queer-coded villain. Sure, queer-coded villains aren't the best form of representation, but the one in this k-drama is very well-written. The reincarnation plot is fascinating as well.
5. Vampire Academy: urban fantasy with some f/f and some m/m (YA). I loved the movie way back and I'm glad that they've added queer representation to the show, even though it would have been even better if they had made the Lissa/Rose subtext canon.
6. Wednesday: murder mystery/urban fantasy with a probably a-spec protagonist (YA). This is a delightful adaptation of the Addams Family, true to the old movies.
7. Love in the Air: BL romance. This addictive Thai drama is my favourite show of the year. Payu/Rain are my fave couple, they're so playful and loving. For Prapai/Sky, there's a lot of hurt & comfort, which gave me so many feels.
8. Semantic Error: BL romance. This k-drama's protagonist is on the autism spectrum. It's enemies-to-lovers, or rather annoyances-to-lovers.
9. She Makes My Heart Flutter: GL romance. This k-drama is a quick watch. I love that it mostly focuses on sapphic friendships.
10. Heartstopper: m/m romance with some f/f and a trans girl (YA). I love the webcomic and the adaptation is really well done. It's such a sweet story.
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rabbitechoes · 3 months ago
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definitely a less eventful week than the last, but still some interesting songs dropped. one of these songs is one of my favorites of the year!!!
to see last week's post, click here!!! also feel free to follow me on rate your music and twitter <3
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"SIN MIEDO" - JPEGMAFIA
◇ released: July 15, 2024 ◇ genres: experimental hip hop, hardcore hip hop, rap rock
For the last JPEGMAFIA single, I wrote a long-winded diatribe about how irritated I was with his ongoing antics - I don't feel like doing that for "SIN MIEDO" too. I'm not absolutely in love with this track, but there are some good ideas here. For one, the beat is unreal. He sits comfortably in the upper echelon of experimental hip hop producers. I'm not crazy about Peggy's lyricism on these new singles though, it just feels way too generic for him. Like he's playing into his hallmarks rather than pushing himself further. Anyway, I do like this song! It seems like there's a new album of his on the way so maybe these songs will hit harder in the grand scheme of things, but for now they're just decent.
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"HOODLUMZ" - Denzel Curry feat. PlayThatBoiZay & A$AP Rocky
◇ released: July 16, 2024 ◇ featured on King of the Mischievous South Vol. 2 ◇ genres: trap, southern hip hop
Denzel Curry's new album drops this week and this single "HOODLUMZ" dropped a few days prior. This is another solid cut. Curry seems to be getting back in touch with his roots on this project and he sounds reinvigorated. Not that he ever "fell off" per say, but he just sounds so energized here. PlayThatBoiZay and A$AP Rocky also offer good verses here. Looking forward to listening to and reviewing the full album!
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"I Am Dog Now" - Chat Pile
◇ released: July 16, 2024 ◇ featured on Cool World (not yet released) ◇ genres: noise rock, sludge metal
After bursting onto the scene with their 2022 album God's Country, The Flenser's Chat Pile are gearing up for the follow-up. "I Am Dog Now" is the lead single for their new album Cool World releasing this October. The pieces from the last album are all hear, but everything sounds more claustrophobic. There were moments on God's Country you could seek shelter from, but "I Am Dog Now" offers no such respite. It cranks up the intensity a lot, it's really cool. I'm curious to hear if that's the case for the rest of the album. This is a good single and I'm really looking forward to this new record.
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"Satellite Business 2.0" - Sampha feat. Little Simz
🥇 BEST SONG OF THE MONTH
◇ released: July 16, 2024 ◇ genres: alternative r&b, UK hip hop, neo-soul
Oh, boy. Sampha's masterful sophomore album Lahai was one of my favorite albums from last year and it's only grown on me ever since. Hearing he was going to be releasing this new version of the 1-and-a-half minute "Satellite Business" with Little Simz got me incredibly excited. This is as great as I thought it would be, perhaps even greater. Two of the brightest artists of today firing on all cylinders together. For starters, the production here is immaculate, it sounds otherworldly. Sampha's verses have this funky-ness to them, they just have a strong groove. This isn't one of the Sampha songs you sink into and relax to, this is a banger. The verse from Simz is incredible too, further proof that she's one of the most unique rappers currently active. This is amazing. Please go out of your way to listen to "Satellite Business 2.0." One of the best songs you will hear all year, trust me.
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"In the Night" - Childish Gambino feat. Jorja Smith & Amaaerae
◇ released: July 16, 2024 ◇ featured on Bando Stone & the New World ◇ genres: alternative r&b, alté
The second single for the final Childish Gambino album that drops this week is drastically different than the previous. "In the Night" goes in a more R&B and alté direction which is pleasant, but it never reaches a second gear. Jorja Smith and Amaaerae give the song some extra depth though. I'm curious to hear how many different directions the album goes in and if it'll come together in a coherent way - I'm also curious about the accompanying film itself for that matter. These two tastes we've gotten from Bando Stone & the New World are cool, but nothing extraordinary. By the time this post comes out, I will have probably already formed an opinion on the actual album itself so ... I guess we will see!!!
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"Brush Pile" - Diary
◇ released: July 16, 2024 ◇ featured on Speedboat (not yet released) ◇ genre: indie rock
I came upon this single randomly, I had never heard of Diary before, but "Brush Pile" rocks. Just a confident, sort of throwback indie rock cut that harkens back to the lackadaisical vibe of early 90s Sonic Youth - just significantly less noise rock. Their influences are evident and, while this song is very good, I'm hoping the band can carve out their own sound beyond that. Regardless, Diary seem to have all the right tools and I'll definitely be sure to give their upcoming EP Speedboat a listen.
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"Detective Alice" - Alice Longyu Gao
◇ released: July 17, 2024 ◇ genres: trip hop, pop rap
I was first introduced to Alice Longyu Gao through her abrasive Let's Hope Heteros Fail, Learn, and Retire EP from last year. It was certainly a unique project, but I never found myself revisiting it too much. "Detective Alice" has her popping up on my radar once again and this is fun! Gao sings about using Instagram as a dating app and spying on people's exes. It's tongue in cheek, I do wish it had a bit more substance though.
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"that's what time does" - Oso Oso
◇ released: July 18, 2024 ◇ featured on Life Till Bones (not yet released) ◇ genre: indie rock
New York indie rockers Oso Oso are back with a new album dropping in a few weeks which I was totally unaware of. In high school, I really liked Basking in the Glow for like the span of two weeks or so. It was just what I needed for that time! I just lost track of them since then, but this new single "that's what time does" is a solid track. Their music sounds brighter than I remember, there's a shimmer to it. I'll definitely be sure to check out Life Till Bones, I'll try not to lose track of you next time!
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"Lets Get On Dey Ass" - Lil Yachty
◇ released: July 19, 2024 ◇ genre: trap
Lukewarm off of a middling collab album with James Blake last month, Lil Yachty has returned to old stomping grounds with a trap song - a genre he has talked condescendingly towards ever since his psychedelic rock record Let's Start Here. from early last year. The single's cover art harkens back to some vague 90s rap aesthetics, but the song is nothing like that. This is just Yachty doing trap again, it just kinda rolls along leaving no lasting impression. Made even worse by his aforementioned dismissal of the genre he made a name for himself in. Total snoozer, but I guess it isn't offensively bad.
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"15 MINUTES" - Madison Beer
◇ released: July 19, 2024 ◇ genres: dance pop, slap house
My interactions with Madison Beer's music have been brief outside of checking out her album Life Support back in 2021. I was pretty unimpressed by that album, but "15 MINUTES" kind of impressed me. Mainly due to its transfixing production. It puts in a trance almost. Beer's presence is understated, but not bad. Definitely wish she could've brought a bit more, but this is a solid track. Not enough to get me stoked for a future Madison Beer project, but she's on the right track.
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"into place" - Midrift
◇ released: July 19, 2024 ◇ genre: shoegaze
Midrift is a band of teenagers from California making some pretty decent shoegaze tunes. They've been at this for a couple years, and while I haven't ventured through their other work, it definitely sounds like they've grown confident in this sound. If you're in the mood for some no-frills shoegaze, give "into place" a quick listen. The future seems bright for them - which seems ironic because shoegaze is a bit of a dour genre, but still.
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"Work It Out" - Joe Jonas
◇ released: July 19, 2024 ◇ featured on Music For People Who Believe In Love (not yet released) ◇ genre: pop rock, new wave
Joe Jonas is embarking on his second big solo run with this unremarkable, sanitized brand of pop rock. It's not bad, it just isn't particularly exciting either. I mean ... it's Joe Jonas - I wasn't expecting this to be great. After hearing "Cake By The Ocean" and that one big Jonas Brothers hit from a few years ago literally everywhere, I was expecting something way worse so maybe it's good that this is just bland rather than irritating!
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"Alexander" | "Guitar Song" - Rex Orange County
◇ released: July 19, 2024 ◇ featured on The Alexander Technique (not yet released) ◇ genre: bedroom pop, indie pop
Besides being taken to courts on six counts of sexual assault - in which he was seemingly found innocent - Rex Orange County has had a relatively uneventful last couple of years. I remember around the big Flower Boy boom of the late 2010s it seemed like he was the next big thing. Hell, I used to love his music to death - but then I grew up. Every project I've heard of his since has lead me to one conclusion; I've grown up, but he hasn't. That remains true on these two new singles, the leads to his upcoming album The Alexander Technique. Mopey bedroom pop that's overly earnest and exhausting to my ears now. I don't know, I think I'm just past this. I do think there are some cool parts in the arrangement for "Guitar Song," like the instrumental break for example, but it's not enough to make it super compelling. Can't say I'm too excited about this new record.
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psssst. i made a discord server called COSMIACORD ... if u wanna join and have fun, talk about music, play fortnite, or whatever here's the invite :3 https://discord.gg/rsHMenTU
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tartrat · 4 months ago
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Lights out drop 2 review I guess
Im not good at giving reviews but here are my thoughts on paparazzi and the legacy songs because I don't own JD3 or 4 as well as other general thoughts i might have. Spoilers for paparazzi i guess.
Paparazzi: I always forget how slow this song is and i was listening to it this morning before the drop went live. Anyway I actually really like it, the outfits remind me a lot of Gaga especially the hero/villain costume from the movie part. Moves were a bit confusing at first (I only got superstar on my first try there.) but theres this sort of elegance and class to them during the red carpet section and then the sort of monstrous movements during the movie section were fun, although a bit hard to get down at first.
Hot For Me: The dance is great, i was hoping for the song to be a bit better. I don't really have much else to say.
Dance All Nite: Out of the three legacy songs in this drop, this is the best and fits the theme of the season better with all the neon in the background. I did mess up the second last gold move on my first attempt though. All around a solid map.
We R Who we R: I never knew that this was the "Hot and Dangerous" song, like i knew that it was Kesha who said it but didn't know the song lol. Its sort of lost on me like i don't know what the map is trying to say or what the general theming is. The coach is obviously a punk but then the people in the back at the rave section are normal, I think. Then there is the random fire that happens in the background. Its fun but i wouldn't go out of my way to do it often
My ranking for the new songs is:
1 Todo de ti
2 Paparazzi
3 Don't Rush
and for the legacy songs
1 Circus (Extreme)
2 Dance All Nite
3 Part of Me
4 Hot For Me
5 We R Who We R
I wouldn't necessarily say that wrwwr is the worst legacy song just more that its the weakest. I think that JD 4 has some of the worst or weakest maps in the series, i really only care about So what and Gold Dust from that game. In general JD4 is overated.
I also want to know who is stalking Eva Chase and the other Lady Gaga Coaches who are seen on the cork board. Initially i thought that Louise Dials would be the coach you could see her in the top right corner of the background in the season rewards. It could be Night Swan after the events of the escape in telephone or someone else whos hunting them down in relation to the event and noticed how Eva, and possibly Felicia evaded capture.
I think after Poker Face releases in JD2025 thats the majority of Gaga's hits covered in the series. I think what remains is Edge of glory, Perfect Illusion, and i guess Shallow (though that might be awkward), before they go for her other popular songs that aren't as big. I really hope they do Americano or Replay at some point even if its just during a season.
I'm now excited for the next event. then after that it'll probably be another celebration event akin to last year's 2024 event. I can see Night Swan being the legendary avatar for that. Its so funny because i believe that a majority of the fandom who came in from JD 2023 wouldn't have survived prior as the seasons from 2019 - 2022 were just the three new songs and legacies and then radio silence for a month an a half, with the only rewards being from the world dance floor which were always kind of weird I don't know how we managed with those basic avatars for so long, much prefer the new avatars). and then 2022 only had 2 seasons but at least they got 8 songs each. I can't really remember but i think back during the 2018 era the exclusives and legacies were just dropped at random times, like i even remember when Sax and Mi Gente leaked and was left wondering when those would release and it wasn't until like January and April respectively or something like that.
Side note its so funny how you can see some leakers complain about fans complaining about leaks. Like obviously people are going to be upset that you've been parading around leaks, people want to be surprised and make their own theories and not just be told what exactly is going down. Like all the games from JD2021-2024 have been leaked so far and i think as a direct result of that the previews have been shortened down to 30 seconds, or songs getting cut or replaced (Darkest hour still fits better than Eurythmics because it feels more like Leda's thoughts, I'll defend darkest hour and the Night Swan Prologue until i die). I think at this point the leakers are just getting off of the reactions of those who are annoyed, and we can't ignore them as it feels like they are purposely making themselves known. Best thing i can akin the leakers to is Trisha Paytas, like we all try our best to ignore her then she does something insanely weird to draw our attention back to her. I know that the leakers have had their own fair share of respective drama as it comes up on my YouTube home feed from time to time and i try to ignore it. its been going on for years i don't think it'll stop any time soon as they just find new ways to get info.
Anyway the seasons have been great this year (minus Don't rush) and im excited to see what comes next, lets just try to be positive.
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nitazenes · 2 months ago
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What are your murder dreams about?
Hey
Good question
I don't know why I have this reoccurring dream but as a disclaimer I consider these dreams to be nightmares/night terrors. I don't enjoy them. In fact, they cause me a great deal of stress.
I've never had these dreams about another person except for once but these are mostly tied to my ex, she's on my DNI. Her name is Buffy. She did nonconsensual things to me when I was inebriated and couldn't give consent and overall she made my life a living hell from ages 15-21 which are like key fundamental years in life development and becoming a person and all that and I feel quit stunted.
When we broke up I lost *all* of my friends. Leaving me almost entirely alone with Graham (another name on my DNI) who had been abusing me for years at that point.
But the best thing Graham ever did for me was help me realize that I was staying with my partner out of fear of being alone.
When B and I broke up. Something snapped or switched in her because whe went from being somewhat reserved to bragging about going on a date and getting fucked 3 days after our break up
I never used to call her a rapist before because I didn't recognize the signs but she would use one of my touch triggers against me. It's a programming thing. But touch in that area, she discovered, would activate programming that made me submissive and encouraging of sexual behavior so. I didn't recognize this as the R word until later on. I was never giving consent even if I acted like I wanted to do it.
Anyway. Because of being manipulated this way. Being isolated, and my ex accusing me of things I didn't do and seeing my friends on social media saying they wish I'd die, I just shut down.
And then the dreams started. They always start with some sort of attempt to be diplomatic but it turns into her egging me on, something she did in pur relationship, intentionally making me so mad that she would act innocent and like I was crazy for being so angry.
I wasn't innocent BTW, this relationship was abusive on both ends. Mostly me being unmedicated and my BPD would make me rage at her. If she were to call me verbally/emotionally abusive. I would have to agree. I was. But I'm not that person anymore.
Anyway I had dreams about killing her every night. It would always start diplomatically but would turn into her ignoring me or egging me on to the point I would accidentally lash out and go too far and end up killing her
Those dreams haunted me for 2 years after the relationship ended but they went away for about a year. And then in 2022 she decided to DARVO and started calling me *her* rapist. Her story of what happened isn't coherent like there's so many plot holes. She's just saying it to garner more sympathy from her friends.
After these allegations, the nightmares started again. This time a lot more brutal and my intentions were set to kill her in those dreams.
The night terrors went away again until I experienced abuse from Ripley and Leah. Even though my issues were with other people, it was still always about her.
Last night was disturbing bc i had been making lunges at her with ol reliable (big knife I own) and she kept showing me her wrists which were scarred as if encouraging me to slash at her arms instead
That disturbed me enough to wake up.
My therapist tells me I have these dreams from repressed anger/trauma I experienced with her and also feeling the situation is out of my control like entirely.
Bc of this I have these night terrors but I must express again, they're just intrusive thoughts while I'm sleeping and I have no desire to actually hurt her or ever see her again
Just seeing the same type of car she had puts me on edge. I'd be more bound to get away from her bc she scares me. Rather than trying to harm. It's just a dream
An annoying one but a dream
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