#like don't go at people who like complex and shitty characters and just say 'well you have problems'

[musical-chick-13]

I'm the LAST person to suggest that you have to preface every single comment you make about a character/fictional relationship/etc. you like with a reminder that you Know™ it's pRoBLeMaTiC, but I DO question what the point of acting genuinely for real like there were no problems is.

[factsilike]

Really tired of constantly seeing posts declaring that everyone in MXTX novels is complicated and 'morally grey' and that's what makes her works wonderfully written, and that everyone else who doesn't see that is stupid, or is 'demonising' characters and bashing them for rightfully criticising their shitty, very much unjustified actions.

And ironically it seems so simplistic to just declare that, because yes her stories are wonderfully written and complex, but not for that reason. You're clearly not reading her works and only spouting what you think her stories say. There are many morally grey characters in morally complex stories out there, but MDZS IS NOT ONE OF THEM.

NONE OF THE MAIN CHARACTERS (i.e protagonists and their male leads except for LBH maybe) ARE MORALLY GREY OR MORALLY COMPLEX.

THEY ARE ALL MORALLY RIGHTEOUS.

Just take a closer look at their actions compared to the actions of literally everyone else around them, it's not that hard to see.

Not to mention that MXTX herself literally says that WWX and LWJ are both morally ideal and that ahe hopes her readers can be like them, but people seem to have no respect for the word of authors in the name of their self projection onto the characters being contradicted nowadays 😒

(also saw someone dismissively say that HC may think that the world revolves around XL or whatever, but others don't and they're right??

First of all, did you even read the novel? HC made his judgement based on how others treated him versus how XL did when he was a CHILD. And how XL continues to treat others to this day. He is well within his rights to think the world of XL, especially since XL suffered more than every other person and still doesn't succumb to evil, despite having every right to do so, miles more than others. He all but regards XL as his moral compass, because he's proof that truly good people do exist in this world, and not ONE other person in the novel is shown to be as good as him.)

One of the reasons why I really don't like the Xianle Trio is this; neither FX nor MQ seem to regard XL as his own person with his own agency, who is capable of making his own decisions initially as HC does, and only near the end of the novel do they let up a bit when their asses had to be saved by XL multiple times. (especially considering what fools they made of themselves in that spiderweb cave lmao)

Both of them try to enforce XL ALL THE TIME ("Your Highness don't do this or don't do that or don't say this or don't go there or don't talk to him"), as if XL has not survived perfectly well on his own without them FOR 800 YEARS.

The difference between them and HC is clearly spelled out when FC asks HC about why he is not stopping XL, and HC replies that while he may not agree with some of XL's decisions, he would never force him to do what he thinks is correct, something both MQ and FX are CONSTANTLY shown to try to do.

Like please. Xianle Trio who? More like suffering XL and his pair of nuisances who think themselves to be his babysitters. And most of the time he's the one babysitting them.

Another thing that irks me is that their frequent arguments are often played off for laughs, but XL is truly a saint, because if my friends were constantly bickering over petty things all throughout our dangerous journey and giving me nothing but headaches, especially in survival situations, I'd given them the boot a long time ago.

[zonedelicious]

In the X-Men fandom this scene is constantly brought up to call the character Noriko racist, call the entire book racist, and even call the fans and writers racist. And as a Muslim fan of Academy X I am very confused at this harsh reaction because to me it is obvious the story is siding with Sooraya.

For starters X-Men can be very VERY racist and islamophobic. I've recently been reading Claremont's New Mutants and it's painful how racist that book is to Arabs. I wanted to stop reading because of the racism.

But I do not get this reaction from Academy X, which is my favourite X-Men book.

I think a lot of people don't know what kind of book Academy X is. Academy X is a book about delinquents. The main characters are a bunch of asshole kids. The appeal to me is seeing these shitty kids grow and become better people. Yes they make mistakes that's the point. They're stupid kids.

Noriko is one of these kids. She was homeless at a young age because of the poor relationship with her family and because of this she's afraid of ever showing any vulnerability. Choosing to rather lash out at others. It's a realistic coping mechanism.

The scene with Sooraya shows this as Noriko is projecting her own trauma onto a poor girl who only wanted to be nice to her. Yes it's shitty but that's the point. We're seeing how their personalities and viewpoints clash, and how Sooraya is challenging Noriko's beliefs.

I do not see how anyone can read this as the book being racist when the scene even shows Sooraya sad. Something like this never happens when an X-Men book is actually islamophobic. Yet people never react as harshly to actually racist X-Men books as they do to this.

It's actually very similar to a scene at the start of Ms Marvel, where Zoe is racist to Nakia. We can clearly see both scenes are suppose to make you feel uncomfortable and make you side with the Muslim girl. And both Zoe and Noriko are humanized despite being bullies.

We even get a conclusion. Some say this isn't enough, but remember that Noriko refuses to show emotions, so the fact she's willing to go against her instincts here is interesting. It's more interesting to me than simply having a generic anti racism speech.

Again Sooraya is entirely humanized here. The comic is understanding of her struggle. I do disagree with the way she's drawn at times, but the writing makes her a character I could relate to. And reading this conclusion only makes me more interested in both characters.

Sadly neither character ever got a proper character arc after the comic ended. But to me that just makes me wish there were more comics of this group where we do see Sooraya and Noriko become close friends like Nakia and Zoe. It makes me think of writing my own story with them.

I love this book and what it means for Sooraya. I love seeing Sooraya's relationship with the Hellions, Jay and Laura. This is still her definitive comic, so why are we dismissing it entirely because of one scene that exists to make us relate to her?

It's very strange that this one scene, that to me is well made and relatable, is being used as a way to hate the characters, the comic, and everyone who likes it. Most hate isn't even coming from Muslims so is it just performative outrage and misunderstanding?

Or maybe this scene hits at home for some people? With the conversation being very realistic and grounded, people may see themselves in Noriko. Maybe they had a similar reaction towards a Muslim girl and are remembering it.

Noriko's stance isn't even that different from ex Muslim feminists who say similar things. The issue is how she is projecting onto Sooraya. And maybe that's what makes people uncomfortable. The complexity this conversation has in the real world.

Whatever it may be, Noriko still clearly grows after this arc. We do see her become a great leader who stands up for her friends. And even if she has issues to deal with, she was slowly becoming a better person.

In conclusion I love this book because it's relatable in how it portrays its characters. I like Sooraya being a Muslim character who's also a protagonist and a big part of the story. I hope more people give this book a chance and see the charm of it that I see.

Anyway time to go listen to anime music and imagine my OCs hanging out with the Academy X kids (need to draw that one day).

[yggdraseed]

An Incomplete Analysis of the Sukunadome

I stress the point that this is an inherently incomplete analysis. It's getting late, I'm tired and unhappy, and… well, the fight isn't over yet, so there's no way this analysis could be complete even if I felt like it. However, it's on my mind, and I feel the need to start exerting myself more on these things. Sometimes sweat is the better medicine. I know this is a long one and doesn’t have any pictures, but if we all support each other, we’ll get through it together.

Full disclosure, I wish more people had gotten filtered by this fight and just stopped talking about Jujutsu Kaisen by now. Like yeah, I think it's great different people see things in different ways, but let's all be honest with ourselves here, most of the people criticizing this fight are not doing so with any sort of literary or artistic perspective or good faith. Most of it is Gojo fans who are still crying, seething, vomiting, pissing, and shitting over the fact that the character they attached their ego to didn't win Jujutsu Kaisen like they wanted. If this describes you, well, this post will probably do you some good, but I'm confident nobody who takes the stance that Gojo should have won would have the space in their mind for what I'm about to say about Sukunadome.

Because that's what I'm calling it. "The Sukuna Cycle" was maybe a little funny for a week or two, but like most memes about this series, it wasn't really based on the story so much as it was on an agenda. Kusakabe was part of the fight since Yuji and Higuruma entered, and up until Miguel, we knew all the combatants who would be tagging in were there. We knew Yuta was off dealing with Kenjaku and would return, we knew Maki was in play, and there really weren't a lot of switches. Just Choso leaving and coming back, Ui Ui retrieving Higuruma's and Gojo's corpses, and… you know, actually, I think that's it. Sure isn't as much as the "Sukuna Cycle" memes made it out to be, huh?

Okay, if you haven't noticed yet, I'm a big JJK fan and a big JJK fandom hater. I think JJK has the worst Western internet fanbase I've seen in a long time, with only a few oases scattered across the internet where you can find intelligent life. Like it's insane what kind of bullshit a person can convince themselves of.

However, I'm not analyzing JJK's fanbase, I'm analyzing JJK. Someday we'll litigate whether or not Lobotomy Kaisen was really funny enough to justify how badly it ruined this fanbase's ability to objectively, productively engage with with one of the most competently written and culturally impactful manga to come out this century. Today is not that day.

So Sukuna's got four arms and knows how to use them. He's got four eyes and so much sass one mouth wasn't enough for the amount of trash he's got to talk to the youths of today. Just on a basic level, having four arms would be such an insignificant power in any other Shonen as to almost be a joke. Yet with how jujutsu sorcery functions as a power system and how adept Sukuna is at using every possible advantage at his disposal - even going so far as to take what probably should be disadvantages and twist them to work for him - having the ability to make hand seals while fighting hand-to-hand, and being able to chant without interrupting his breathing, are inseparable from Sukuna's godlike fighting ability. I love how something seemingly so mundane is such a huge x factor for Sukuna.

We continually see how Sukuna is a complex, but fundamentally vile antagonist. He has a very rich, detailed view of the world, but one that fundamentally reduces every other human being to be his playthings and food. It's just that Sukuna says, "Don't like it? Then get stronger." It's a very Social Darwinist, late stage capitalist view to be coming from the Heian Era, and I think that maybe it's intentional. Shitty people are shitty in mostly the same ways, it's just they find new things to be shitty about or to use to be shitty with.

Like if that were all it is, it'd make Sukuna so effective as a villain to hate and would slot so nicely into Jujutsu Kaisen's overarching social and political commentary. Cruelty within suffering, selfishness as a strength and a weakness, the unfairness of how the strength to pursue one's agency is unevenly distributed and how the haves don’t realize how easily they could have instead been have-nots, it's all there.

But there’s this inherent charisma to Sukuna that I think is intentional. He has this noblesse oblige where he’s so inherently aware of his greatness that he doesn’t have a problem with giving credit where credit is due. Like he talks all the trash when he’s fighting Jogo, but where Gojo’s insults come across as puerile and blunt, Sukuna’s always displaying this wit to him. And when the battle’s over, he acknowledges that even though Jogo wasn’t as strong as him, he was stronger than most and could have gone even further if he hadn’t held himself back. He starts off belittling Gojo in their fight, but by the end, he expresses a profound respect and gratitude towards Gojo. Like it’s a very warped form of those sentiments, but I think it’s sincere. Even with Ishigori, when Sukuna fails to cut him the first time, he just acknowledges it was disrespectful to hold back and that he’ll give it full force the next strike.

Something to keep in mind is that everything Megumi warned Yuji about when it comes to ancient sorcerers applies to Sukuna as well. They’re not treated as uniformly, unambiguously evil anymore than anyone else in JJK is, and are acknowledged as having fundamentally different world views about violence and the value of human life. Kashimo, for instance, seems to value his life only because he’s able to risk his life and lay it on the line. They’re people from an era where children died so young that parents often gave them numbered names so as to not get too attached until they’d see if their kids actually were going to make it or not. If you didn’t give your whole life over to a goal, you probably wouldn’t achieve it. Whereas modern sorcerers, modern people, have all these complex and sometimes contradictory views and needs, ancient sorcerers show a tendency to shave everything away except their one singular conviction because that was what you had to do in an era of much shorter life expectancies and peril on all sides. You’d be very lucky to accomplish one life goal, let alone as many as people of today set out to achieve: graduating high school, graduating college, getting a job, starting a family, and hopefully having one or two passions on the side. Fundamentally different worldviews from fundamentally different periods of history.

And Sukuna is no different. His goal is simple: partake in the many colors and flavors of humanity through mortal combat in the arena of sorcery. Sukuna’s love for sorcery runs deep. He’s always curious about different cursed techniques, even ones that are pedestrian to a sorcerer of his level, like Nanako’s smartphone-based technique. He reminds me of a quote from Baki: “Someone who works hard can never beat someone who enjoys himself.” Sukuna has clearly put forth great effort to master sorcery, but clearly doesn’t see it as work. He sees it as just doing what he enjoys and is good at.

Unfortunately for everyone else, he enjoys killing and is extremely good at it. Sukuna is the ultimate ethical heat death of the “live for yourself, cherish your own agency, don’t let yourself be controlled” mindset that is the ideological starting point of JJK. It’s a very dark, extreme interpretation of Buddhist non-attachment, where even compassion is an attachment to ultimately shed. Sukuna lives perfectly freely, including being free from guilt or compassion.

Naturally, there’s an exception. All things seem to have exceptions. In Sukuna’s case, that would be Uraume. I’ve been fascinated by their dynamic since we first learned of Uraume’s allegiance to Sukuna during Shibuya and I still can’t wait to know more. Suffice to say, Sukuna dotes on Uraume, forgiving their mistakes and seeming to enjoy their company not just because of their service to him, but because their existence makes him happy. I’m reminded of Power in Chainsaw Man, how she was seemingly incapable of empathy or mercy until she met Meowy.

Honestly, Sukuna reminds me a lot of a lot of characters in Chainsaw Man. People who are trying to climb from this state of misery, of struggling just to meet basic desires, and learning to be human. Yet Sukuna is so strong he never needed to learn to be human. He never needed to cooperate with others to survive — or at least, doesn’t seem to believe he did — and so he never saw the value in it. And so he’s basically brute forced his way around having to undergo an arc like Denji’s, and has instead ended up a hedonistic black hole devising all these complicated philosophical arguments to justify what is, really, a very simplistic, predatory desire to only satisfy his basic material wants and creative interests and nothing else for anyone else.

But like, it’s not that simple. If you give to others, you get something immaterial in return. I can’t quantity it or define it, but I’m sure most of you know what I mean. The happiness that comes from taking care of others’ needs, and the deeper levels beyond that happiness. Like I do believe that’s the subtext behind Binding Vows as metaphor: that you almost never give without getting in return. You might not get the same thing back, in the same form, but being changed by the act of putting the needs and wants of others before your own even temporarily still is part of the exchange. It’s part of becoming complete as a human being.

Sukuna has defied that exchange and broken the cycle, and I don’t think it’s inherently for his own benefit. There are some thing about being human that you don’t just get to opt out of, no matter how much you claim you’re more than or less than human. Even if Sukuna doesn’t think he’s lost something of value, he has. And that something of value is inherent to the whole point of this final battle.

Jujutsu Kaisen is basically working on two big problems. There are lots of ideas at play in the series, but there are two fundamental problems for which every fiight, every character arc, every turn of the gears consitutes part of the calculus to solve one or both of those problems.

The first problem, a thematic and philosophical one: “How do you love and fight for something when you know you’re going to die?”

The second problem, a metatextual one: “Is there any artistic and social value left in the Shonen formula as it stands in the modern day?”

And this fight is, ultimately, where GeGe is showing their work. It’s where Yuji has to defeat Sukuna, if not in terms of out-boxing him, then in terms of prevailing over his beliefs about humanity and the world as a whole.

GeGe has stripped Yuji of everything that is supposed to determine the worth of a Shonen protagonist’s victory. He’s not fighting alone, he didn’t go off and train all by himself, he trained with a lot of powerful, smart people who helped him. And Yuji is arguably not even the most important participant in the fight. So why should we care if Yuji wins?

The answer is so simple it’s easy to lose track of it. Yuji is risking his life to rescue someone, his friend, from being exploited, and to save the people of Japan from being exploited. Even after everything that’s happened, Yuji plants his fucking feet and takes a stance that no, shithead, there is such a thing as the right thing. Maybe it isn’t obvious all the time, and it sure as hell isn’t always easy to know what it is, but he knows now with certainty what it isn’t: to exploit others or to destroy yourself. We can find our answers somewhere in-between.

Sometimes we can’t resolve our problems with a tidy solution that makes everyone happy and sometimes we have to carve a piece of ourselves out and give to something we won’t be sure to see the fruition of, but that’s just life. It doesn’t mean we have to throw away all hope for things to get better. Even if the world won’t become utopian, it can still become better, no matter how many nihilists hide their own inequities behind assertions that there is no point.

Nihilism is not a solution to the problems of life, it is the choice to run away and hide. To give into nihilism is to give up the fight even while other people are still fighting all around you.

So that’s the fucking point of the Sukunadome. Nobara already said it better than anyone else has before she made Mahito look like the bitch he was and always will be: “Sometimes you need to fight even when you know you can’t win.” Because you won’t always win and you won’t escape death, nor will you know what lies beyond death. However, you can still live according to your principles and fight for the things you see as meaningful even if other people don’t.

That is why so many characters have come and gone from the fight. All gave some, some gave all. Nobody is truly useless — even if Miwa self-deprecatingly jokes about being useless, she still was the one thing standing between Maki and Malevolent Shrine’s eviscerating hellscape. Even Amai’s sweets-conjuring joke technique saved Hana from a would-be fatal fall and helped to supply sugar to the brains of people using reverse cursed technique in Shoko’s triage. Larue couldn’t do much, but they caught Sukuna’s eye at the perfect time for Yuji to land a Black Flash, and that means something. It all means something.

Given how deeply GeGe clearly respects Hunter X Hunter, I want to end off by citing one of the quotes in Hunter X Hunter that has been the most impactful for me and I suspect has been about as impactful on GeGe: “It seems small things… infinitesimally small things… are needed to build the entire universe. The size of a thing has nothing to do with its power.” We always seem to direct our senses to the superlatives. The largest, the oldest, the loudest, the things that hit the hardest. But while it would be wrong to throw those out, we often lose sight of how many little, important things there are in the midst of those huge, important things.

Seeing someone’s smile when you remembered something they said that showed you were listening to them. The feeling of a warm breeze on a summer morning. The smell of honeysuckle on your walk home. Waking up to rain on a Sunday. The taste of watermelon. Getting married. Having your heart broken. Songs that make you smile, songs that make you cry — songs that do both, and songs that make you feel things you can’t describe. When you’re always looking to those immense, monolithic things, always comparing your seemingly small, seemingley meaningless life to them, you lose sight of just how meaningful all of it is.

Just because it doesn’t have cosmic, absolute meaning doesn’t make it meaningless. Every little thing that means something to you is worthy of being cherished. The people around you, the things that bring you happiness, even if that happiness is going to ebb and flow. It’s all worth fighting for and living for. It just takes bravery and conviction to keep fighting and keep living with authenticity and love. And if there’s an artistic value, a greater meaning to Shonen, now and always, it’s the unerring, unabashed belief that there’s a reason to aim high and not give up.

Because sometimes, life hurts. But if it’s just pain, Yuji Itadori will never stop. We’ll see what I have to amend, reconsider, or elaborate on when the fight is finished. I hope this gave some of you a new way to look at it.

[not-goldy]

Tkk have zero respect for Jk. Today, tkk still lying saying Jikook seperated after 5 weeks or Jk wanted to join Tae, but can't cause of tattoos, even tho he never said any of that & Jimin was a last resort, even tho Jk could've enlisted alone. Mad they didn't get the buddy system for their favs. My question tho, why is it Jk always doing all the sacrificing in their minds? Its Jk wanted to be with his baby, but couldn't. You don't hear them say Tae could've enlisted with Jk instead, if tattoos were an issue tho. Do you? Does this mean Tae doesn't love JK as much as Jk loves Tae, since Tae didn't sacrifice what he wanted to do, to be with Jk? You don't hear them saying poor Jk, when all tae's pictures of him and jennie hit the web or Tae was vacationing with her or walking with her holding her hand in Paris and how Tae spent more time in Paris with Jennie, then he did with Jk on that friend ski trip. Do you? Its always Jk either being the shitty BF emotionally abusing Tae & even physically cause they try to say Jk yanks Tae away from people, etc or its Jk is the reason Taekook is not Taekooking or Its his tattoos, he couldn't go, but he wanted too LIE. Its them saying Tae tried to tell us for months Jk is his lover, but Jk is off doing fanservice with others and hurting Tae instead. The flip flopping narratives & victim complex throw on Tae is disturbing. Its okay for Tae to fuck Jennie for 2 years, hold her hand in Paris, take intimate pics in her bed, take couple selfies with her in his house wearing matching clothes, follow her on IG, lounge in bed with Wooga and kiss on them and go off with them and hang on randoms in paris & say he likes Jimin the most over Jk and move another man into his home who is not Jk. See all of that is okay in their minds and yet they still manage to make Jk the abuser treating tae like shit, cause how dare he enlist with another man, hang out with his 97 line, its all fanservice, he doesn't treat tae right.

They don't know what narrative they want to run with, but they know whatever it is, Tae has to be the main character. They are all tae solos and want him to be the main character no matter what. Even if it means painting him as a helpless abused victim by the most popular idol on one hand & on the other, the one Jk has to make sacrifices for, but never the other way around. Tae can treat JK like garbage, cause its deserved for all his years doing fanservice with Jimin. They really hate Jk and they hate him more now since Chapter 2, cause he didn't play along with what Tae was doing. Plain and simple, but he's the most popular idol and that pairs well with more attention on Tae when it comes to trending, so they keep him around for that. Its not Taekook they like. Its the ship being big that they like and the attention they get from it and the bigger the ship, the more attention for Tae and that is what matters. That's what it always been about it. Funny thing is though, Tae hates these fools and keeps shitting on their fantasies on purpose and they keep letting him. He gives a little, then snatches their fucking scalps for them. Deserved too.

That's an understatement I don't know a single Tuktukkers who likes Jungkook for real

In fact he has no agency no autonomy where they are concerned everything he does is coerced, against his will there's no free choice in their vocabulary

To think some of them are grown adults with this mindset is crazy

Jungkook has been caught sneaking Jimin into his hotel room by hybe hidden cameras and nooooo Jimin is the one to blame for it. Not the guy who sneaks into his room at 1am to lie on his bed doing absolutely nothing

They just can't admit the fact Jungkook IS NOT who and what they think he is nor what they want him to be in their ship realm.

And they HATE him for it too

They hate that man they ship with their favs

[genderflu1dwh0r]

Are you stupid?

You can be racist and have POC friends, Jason is way worse than Billy any day. Jason isn't the one being abused by his father everyday, he isn't poor, he didn't get taken from his home and live with a step sibling that he didn't know that well.

Jason is a horrible person and got his friend to tackle Erica, then he held a gun at Lucas. You can't tell me that that isn't racist, you can't tell me that's worse than what Billy ever did. Jason said "I thought you were one of the good ones". That. Is. Racist.

Billy got his bad traits from his father. Billy got beat by his father. Billy was crying into the phone for his mom to come home. Billy had no support system. Steve was the only person that Billy bullied and tormented, and in my opinion, Steve is a worse character than Billy.

Steve threw slurs, while Billy got slurs thrown at him by his own father. Just because you don't care about abuse victims, doesn't mean you have to spread your hate.

I think that Billy just wanted Lucas to stop hanging around because if Neil found out, Billy would be the one getting beat. Neil would probably hurt Lucas way more than Billy could have ever done. Billy was protecting Max and himself, he was scared that Neil would find out. He did care and love Max, he just showed it in some confusing ways.

Also, the Duffer brothers are racist, they wanted Dacre to say the N word. Dacre protested and it ended up not happening. Billy saying the N word isn't canon, cause it didn't happen in the show. Stop always going to that excuse for him being a bad person. He never said any slur.

People say "if the actor wasn't hot, then people wouldn't have liked him" and I disagree. His character is very interesting. He has a backstory, he has trauma, he has an actual interesting plot unlike any other character. Dacre is also a very amazing actor, he was able to make Billy even more interesting.

Dacre has said that his art imitates his life. He put his own life into the character, he didn't have a great relationship with his dad, he has said this.

Max is a horrible person too, she drugged Billy with something that she didn't know was in, almost hit him with Steve's bat, screamed at him before leaving and stealing his car. Billy could have died on the floor, he was drugged and had no car. Tell me that that isn't abuse. Just because Billy grabbed her wrist ONE time, doesn't mean it's abuse.

Siblings fight all the time, it's just what happens. Especially how their family dynamics was. I and many others have fights with our siblings. You get over it in like a day. That doesn't make Billy a bad person. He did some really shitty things, yes. But that doesn't excuse all the hate he gets. He's a complex character, no other character is like him.

That's why he's my baby boy. I relate to him, I'm an abuse victim, I love knowing that I have a character to relate to. Stop blaming abuse victims on how they grew up, they can change. He could have changed if he didn't die. He could have, but nobody let him.

Nobody tried to help him. He didn't have a support system. The people who compare Jonathan to Billy are wild, cause Jonathan did have a support system, his mother did so much. Billy had nobody. His father beat him, hi stepmother did NOTHING to stop Neil, she just watched. She was clearly abused too, but she's the adult, she has to be there for Billy. She has to get Max away from all of this, which in season 4, she did. But she turned into an even worse mom.

Right here. He was trying to get help, he was trying to get the MF to get out. He wanted someone to help him. He kept fighting, and that's how he saved everyone on the day he died. He knew he was going to die, he was sobbing.

Try to think before talking bad against Billy.

Why do people say Vecna/Henry/Jason/Troy/James/Angela are better than Billy?

Vecna/Henry literally tried to kill children and the whole world. Billy wanted to have some fun and games, he would never go to prison for killing a child. He was never going to hit Mike, Lucas, Dustin, or Will.

Troy/James made Mike jump off of a fucking cliff while wanting to take Dustins teeth out. Tell me that isn't fucked. MIKE WOULD HAVE DIED IF EL WASN'T THERE!!

Jason held a fucking gun to Lucas's head and got Erica hurt. He sent a witch-hunt over Eddie and that ended up killing that poor boy. Literally, he was poor and Jason is a rich christian white boy. Tell me that isn't classist. Jason also did this to get information out of a kid.

Angela deserved the roller skate to the face for what she did to El. I would have done the same thing, El never deserved any of what she went through there.

Anyone going to object? Cause you can't, my points are spot on. Why aren't we gonna get mad at Jamie Campbell Bower over saying he relates to Vecna/Henry? If Dacre is bad for doing so, why can't we shame Jamie for the same thing?

I would count the MF taking over Billy like that as a reference of sexual assault. His body gets taken away from him, he is crying for help, he is scared and tried to tell someone. I've talked to SA survivors and they agree.

Anyway, I am pissed at Billy antis and I am just so done with them.

[southeofficeworker]

What does your tf2 kin say about you? Part 2

id do one post but theres characters limit.

-----

ENGINEER

On your good side/green flags:

×Youre a clever guy and you know it.

×Youre a sweetheart, at least when it's useful or you trust the person.

×Youre always there for people, no matter who they are, you're willing to listen.

×Youre cautious enough, but you're willing to do whatever is needed for the job. Except you're actually good in it, like, really.

×Youre a chill guy, and love a good relaxing day, if you have one.

Your bad side/red flags:

×Youre two faces, yes, you're a sweet guy, but you'd take no time doing a bloody revenge with a little cute grin on your face

×You have god complex, but you hide it good enough.

×You can be very crude at times, though in a way that people don't realise you just mocked them.

×Youre workaholic and won't stop till the job is done, even if it takes no eating and sleeping at all.

Your love language: quality time, acts of service or physical touch

MEDIC

On your good side/green flags:

×Youre responsible, you'll whine about it, but you'll still get whatever needs to be done, because you don't trust it with others

×You get the job done no matter what, even if it involves stabbing someone, of course you'll do the last part only if you have plan B if something will go wrong.

×Youre an interesting person to talk to, but you don't have much friends because you're the strange one.

×You have a very morbid humour and curiousity, not bad but not good. Just don't carve people's organs out.

On your bad side/red flags:

×You have both, god complex and a shitty self worth. You think you deserve everything and nothing.

×You can rely on people too much and be too demanding.

×You had a trauma, and it changed you in a bad way.

×You have a very morbid humour and curiousity, not bad, but not good either.

×In conclusion, youre a hypocrite with little sadistic tendicies who can't normally read people and react accordingly the situation.

Your love language might be: quality time, acts of service or words of affirmation

SNIPER

On your good side/green flags:

×Youre a cool guy, you like adventures and stars.

×You don't have a lot of friends, but you're very loyal. It can take years for you to trust someone fully though.

×You aren't the person to get in conflicts, and if you do, you try your best to ignore it.

×Youre a strange one, and you don't care.

×You like physical touch, but you'll stiff when someone touches you.

×You probably have some hyperfixations which you keep to yourself.

On your bad side/red flags:

×You convinced yourself you're better off alone. You're used to it, and you have no idea how to react to kindness or new people without being paranoid.

×You hide your emotions till they bottle up and you break down.

×Youre a professional in whatever sphere you have chosen, until the situations falls from control.

×Youre getting very quiet when focused, to the point you might creep people out by silence.

×People always tell you to socialise more and you brush them off, 'im content with being by myself'

Your love language: basically anything, more likely quality time or acts or service

SPY

On your good side/green flags:

×Youre actually a nice guy when you warm up to people(if you can do that)

×Youre protective over the one's you love, but in a cat way. But once people make a comment on that you might stop.

×People might dislike you, but most of them go for you for an advice, especially if dating advice. And if you never had a relationship, you're good in pretending.

×Youre more on a quiet side, but if you're comfortable, and you actually trust the person, then you get extremely talkative, well, till you won't get bored.

×You can be stealthy when you want to. You can be helpful. But you'll do it only if you'll get something from it.

×You can easily adapt to new situations.

On your bad side/red flags:

×You run away from responsibility, but youre still number one to take it if no once will act on it.

×You are scared of commitment, and you don't like people. You'd do anything to push them away, even of it involves lying about your whole identity and actions. Involves acting like an absolute asshole.

×You can't let yourself get close to anyone, once you did and regretted it. You don't want it to happen again. Even if you knew the person for 10 years, you'll never trust them fully. What if they'll betray you? What if they'll suddenly realize you're actually not a good person? Hell, you don't even trust yourself.

×You think your past is forgotten, but it always comes back to you, be it a person from the past, or just something else. That involves no one knowing the real details about your past.

×You can easily get bored by people, even if you loved someone dearly, the unexpected disgust will come out and you'll be slightly anxious about it.

×You pretend you're alright with people disliking you, and you even make it into crudy jokes, but deep down you actually care for reassurance and affection, not like you'll ever admit it though. You still might slap a person if they'll touch you.

One of your love languages might be: quality time, words of affirmation or gift gifting.

Additional, in short:

Ms.Pauling

If you kin this woman, I'd say you're a hardworking person who always gets overworked no matter what. But if the jobs needs to be done? It'll be done.

You avoid any attachments and try to keep a quiet life, which doesn't always work.You tend to ignore people, give them a cold shoulder, but if people get to know you, you're an exciting person, just you dont show that often.

You'd enjoy quality time with people, and acts of service because you don't get a lot of time for yourself.

Get sleep. Medic & Engi kins, you too.

[beevean]

But Lanolin is just trying to do her best with what information she has!

If your teammates are afraid to come to you and saying just about anything to you in fear of being the target of your wrath resulting from it, than you're a shitty leader. I'd even go as far to say that Lanolin is a bully at this point. Which, again, it wouldn't bother me as much if characters who wouldn't otherwise put up with ir weren't lobotomized in order to tuck their tail in between their legs. Tangle's girlfriend was pretty much assaulted by Lanolin, yet she and Silver don't really say or do shit about in any way that actually matters. So much for Tangle being a "kick butt girl".

Yeah. Tangle should not be afraid that Lanolin might do "something" if she learned that Sonic disrupted the race. Anyone in her place would simply be confused and ask questions, because this is not Sonic's modus operandi at all and so it would mean that something's going on (pretty much the Babylon Rogues' reasoning).

But Lanolin doesn't ask questions. Lanolin has been shown to only assume and judge. She never questioned Silver when he accused Duo of leaving him to die, he just berated him like an angry mother (and Silver forgot he could yeet her away with a flick of his mind). She never questioned Whisper's unusual aggressiveness towards Duo (and never thought "huh, two people have come forward against him"), she shut down any sort of conversation and then resorted to physical violence when Whisper did not fall back in line. She also recently spared no thought and no pity for Sonic, Tails and Amy hurting themselves on the track, only barked at them to move out. And I didn't even mention how aggressive she has been towards Tangle specifically, like when she yanked the paddleball from her hands.

I don't blame Tangle for being scared of her, she is finally having a human reaction, although I question why this brave adventurous girl would be all shaking at the sight of a furious Lanolin - she, too, is much stronger and more experienced than her. But I could be generous and say that it's a good representation of how much abuse can beat you down to the point where you see yourself as much weaker and stupider than you actually are, much like Whisper who was made to not trust herself anymore. By all means, in a well written story, this should be the tipping point where Lanolin is left alone by her colleagues, because she is anything but a team player, and she has caused nothing but harm to the whole squad.

But hey, she's just a flawed, complex #girlboss, so it's all okay :^) and if you hate her you're a sexist misogynist anyway :^)

[juminies]

Don't know if you've ever talked on this subject or not, but what's your interpretation on Jumin's relationship with Jaehee after her good ending? Really love how mindfully you explain Jumin's feelings and actions, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on the matter! Especially bc her route kinda leaves many people feeling like he's an antagonist of sorts 😬 But I kinda always felt like he'd respect her a lot, especially once he sees how much passion she puts into her dream? And Jaehee shows her genuine care for Jumin, too, moreso after his infamous crash. I'm kinda babbling here, but yeah! Really curious to read up on your interpretation <3

I haven't talked about this before actually—I think there's a lotttt of nuance to it and I didn't want to be haphazard with it in case it comes across as me being over lenient with corporate heirs or whatever hahah. I promise I'm not! I just love Jumin. Also sorry this took me a while to answer, I had actually just started a game the day you sent it with the intention of doing Jaehee's route so I decided I would play before responding to ensure it was fresh in my mind. I hadn't played her route in so long, and I wanted to get the Jumin outgoing calls too!

To get into how I think he would treat her after some time passes I first want to discuss their dynamic in her route a bit, because I honestly think people are unnecessarily harsh on him because of it sometimes. I personally don't feel as if they pushed him too far into an antagonistic role, but perhaps since Cheritz weren't bringing in an outsider (à la Echo Girl or Sarah Choi) to act as the driving force it seemed that way to some people? It was inevitable given the nature of Jaehee's struggles that Jumin would be viewed as the bad guy in a sense, but I feel like it's often sort of blown out of proportion due to a misunderstanding of both Jumin's intentions and his character as a whole. He is admittedly at his worst in Jaehee's route, but people tend to brush his actions during it off as completely out of line and absurd and then go on to use it to totally mischaracterise him as someone who doesn't value his employees whatsoever or is an abusive boss. In reality though, the way he acts as a superior in general as well as given the specific circumstances is very... Jumin? in that it's logical and efficient and goal-driven. Jaehee's route is such a push and pull in the sense that the two of them clash repeatedly in a scenario where neither person is willing to compromise—for what, to each of them personally, is good reason! Jaehee is a victim of a wider system, of capitalism itself, less so than of Jumin as an individual.

On one hand, Jaehee having to give up a project she was finally actually enjoying working on would be incredibly frustrating, even without having something she actively dislikes stacked on top of it. I get why she went against Jumin's wishes of doing a bad job (why would she choose now of all times to put in half of her effort when it's something she's actually having fun with?) and I get why she used Seven's cat hotel proposal. Life can be messy like that. Sometimes you have to make a decision that has a shitty outcome for someone else for your own sake or vice versa. She should be doing something that makes her happy, and had she not gotten the encouragement to find something she loves she would have continued to feel unfulfilled for god knows how long. Plus, in regard to the coffee report she is still technically doing her job and doing it well, even if going against her boss' personal wishes in doing so. She also does use her own time to revise it in the end so Jumin can have his way (and maybe a little bit so she can use her ideas for her own place) so, to me, that says she understands where he's coming from and doesn't particularly resent him. It's a complex situation for sure, and objectively Jumin does have the upper hand even if he doesn't quite realise the extent of it. I absolutely support Jaehee in her endeavours; I love her so much and she absolutely deserves better than eternal C&R bullshit.

At the same time, Jumin's perspective does make sense if you try to understand his worldview a bit more. Jaehee is the only person at C&R he feels he can genuinely rely on, and when he's already been thrown through a loop with his father prior to her disobedience it's entirely logical that he would feel as if everyone who should be working with him is suddenly against him. Jumin has been shown before to not quite have a grasp on the social standing he holds over Jaehee, for example in this chat from deep story day 2 where he doesn't understand why she can't tell him, as he told her, that she doesn't like seeing him in chatrooms.

And I think it's genuine obliviousness as opposed to purposeful ignorance; he overlooks bigger structures at play because he legitimately values hearing the honest opinions of the people around him and expects them to have a mutual respect for him. As far as Jumin is concerned his employees should be able to come to him with honest feedback, but of course that typically isn't the case and so Jaehee can't express how she really feels to him lest she face consequences. Jumin's thought process when it comes to employment is shown to be, to put it simply, people work for money -> more work is more money -> more work is good, and it hasn't been explained to him why this isn't the case for a lot of people. Jaehee's actions register to Jumin as is simply a betrayal of his trust and respect, because he doesn't quite see the level at which he and Jaehee are on unequal footing in the first place. On top of that he is rigid in that he needs everything to be done as he expects it; he does not like sudden change and (as demonstrated in his own route) can be incredibly rattled by it if he is already otherwise stressed or overworked. Just because he stands strong for his friends does not mean he is entirely invulnerable to being overwhelmed and acting out, and while I completely agree he was on some level being selfish in regards to the cat project, at the point where Jaehee quits she has already left him with what (to Jumin) is a mess to handle essentially on his own. He is overworked too, something Jaehee admits herself, and he wanted to transfer the coffee project to another department both to make less work for the two of them and in order to not succumb to his father's lack of consideration for anyone or anything but his current partner.

Again I do not blame Jaehee for anything she did whatsoever—I think it was a good idea for her to quit and she absolutely deserves the happiness she finds in MC and their café!—but Jaehee is incredibly competent and Jumin knows that. Consequently he knows she has big boots to fill and it can't be done on a whim. I'm sure you can see why he would be incredibly frustrated. As a whole it's just a very messy situation where the two of them can't really fathom the other's perspective. Their lives and outlooks on the world are so intrinsically different at this turning point in Jaehee's life, and that's fine. Neither of them have bad intentions towards the other whatsoever.

Now to actually answer your question! Firstly I want to put out there that he says this on days nine and ten respectively:

Then I want to add that I do not think Jumin is the type to hold a grudge. He is shown frequently to take on a sort of each to their own/whatever will be will be attitude, and though this situation is something that impacts him directly I can't imagine him taking it any more personally in the long term than he would anything else. Sure he's a little hostile in her AE, but to be completely honest with you I do not think he would have gone to visit the café at all if he was completely furious and had lost all respect for Jaehee (and/or MC) after her endeavours. Again he knows that Jaehee is highly capable, hardworking, and generally a very good person, and I can't imagine that one rocky dilemma between the two of them is something that would make him bad tempered around her forever. He still clearly held her highly and has a lot of respect for her despite their differences, and she doesn't seem to have any ill will towards him either. Ultimately, as you say, he would grow to respect her passion and would hear her out on why she took the course of action she did in the end. While Jumin may not be great at putting himself in others shoes he can identify patterns well, and it lets him draw parallels between his own experiences and other people's. Once he finds the common ground (he knows how fulfilling passion projects can be, he knows how frustrating it can be to work yourself to the bone for others' sake without any real incentive, and he values real friendship an awful amount) I think he would accept it.

I actually feel like hypothetically in the long term not working together would be good for their relationship in terms of RFA too—Jaehee was only made part of the group originally because of Jumin and it meant that all of their interactions even amongst their mutual friends were that of a work relationship. We know they both dislike being in chatrooms together and dislike hearing each other talk outside of work, which was bound to have put a strain (even if very minor) on their association with RFA as an organisation. Jaehee even says herself it's like an extension of C&R for her! Dropping the working boundary between them means less tiptoeing around each other and more openness among friends, especially for Jaehee.

As for Yoosung becoming Jumin's intern/assistant, I don't think it would carry the same tone into RFA as it did with Jaehee since they are already well associated without the business relationship prior to Yoosung being hired. Sure things might be a little weird at times, but no discomfort or frustration to the same extent. It's already shown to be kind of unserious and silly, and I honestly don't think Yoosung would last long as Jumin's assistant anyway, lol.

[lapelduide]

Listen y'all. I love Simon&Daphne, Kate&Anthony, Charlotte&George and Penelope&Colin. I love all of them and I can WITHOUT HUMILIATING ANY OF THEM FOR FLATTERING ANOTHER. They all are good in their own ways. You can love s1, s2 and QC -i do too- and I respect that but I have no respect for those who are bringing down upcoming s3 for praising QC. Saying it can never be as good as QC. Fr why can't it be? It surely can. Colin and Penelope are complex characters playing by wonderful actors.

You may not like Penelope and Colin but as it has been said before s1 Anthony was unlikeable too and it literally takes 2 episodes for people to fall in love with him. So why can't you love Polin too?

I sometimes wonder are we actually watching the same series with those who are saying Pen is evil and Colin is selfish.

Well the reason I felt the need to write my thoughts down was a comment I saw. A fans comment basically saying she/he and most of the fans -you are a single person talk for YOURSELF wtf- will not watch s3 if there will not be Kate and Anthony as much as s2. That Penelope has so much screen time and that's why "most of the fans" don't like her.

First of all I think toxic Kathony fans need to understand that their season was season 2. They can't have the whole series and can't be the main focus all of the upcoming seasons. GET OVER IT. IF YOU WANT TO WATCH THEM AS MAIN COUPLE GO AND REWATCH SEASON 2. If you are going to watch s3 just for them then simply don't watch.

And Penelope having so much screen time? I don't think so but even if she does, it is understandable. Because guess what?- She is Lady Whistledown! SHE IS IMPORTANT. If you are disliking a character because of this shitty reason then don't blame the character. I personally don't think there is something wrong about her screen time, in fact we are understanding Pen's pov. -I mean I hope WE are. At least I do.-

I can't understand why some people can't assimilate s3's main couple? One way or another the explanations I read was nothing more than excuses.

-Pen should have character development through season 3 and Polin season should come after that? She will have this in s3.

-There is so much to solve? Well that is one of the reasons why it will be exciting.

I am not even going to talk about the ones who are saying Penelope should BEG Colin, Eloise and Marina; the ones who are saying Colin doesn't deserve Pen, the ones who are saying Pen doesn't deserve Colin; defending Colin loves Marina, that Polin shouldn't be the endgame etc. Huh, I have seen enough.

Anyways. Nobody can change my opinion about how good s3 will be but I was furious after reading that comment. So thank y'all for reading my little verdantly TED Talk.

Since I am so nervous... here are some gifs for some relaxation. (I wish i could create gifs too...)

[tortured-demigods-department]

an unhinged (and unofficial) dissertation on the pjo fandom

so i don't usually post anything that isn't my-works-related, but i had a...mildly heated discussion with a fellow film student tonight about the pjo show and it's got me thinking. bear with me, we'll be here awhile.

as we all know, the first season of pjo has ended. i've stayed relatively OFF tumblr and other social media during this time, but i know there are a lot of OG fans who are (in their words) "massively disappointed" in the show. most of the complaints i've heard have been during in person conversations though, so this post is mostly going to be referencing real complaints i've heard.

i've been a part of this fandom since i was thirteen. that's nearly eight fucking years of my life that i've devoted to the pjo universe. i have written and consumed YEARS' worth of fanfiction, i have read and reread every book so many times i can quote them forwards and backwards, and i went to the bookstore every single year on the new books' release dates to pick up my copies in-person. this fandom, these characters and this world have brought so much joy to my life, and i don't think i could ever fully articulate that in words. when i think of this series, i genuinely feel nothing but happiness.

but a few years ago—around the time i started college—i started distancing myself from the fandom for one glaring reason. this fandom can be such an...angry place? like, genuinely, i don't know how far it goes back—maybe all the way to the release of HoA, honestly—but i wasn't here pre-HoA, so all i know is that i very much remember how much people hated ToA when it came out.

here i was, having the TIME of my life with apollo and his silly little haikus, and people are going to war over how the series' writing quality has gone to shit and how everything was better before, blah, blah, blah. IN SPITE of everything that series gave us—discussion of the repercussions of child abuse and ptsd, representation of lgbtqa+ characters, and deep psychological messages that really teach young readers, i think, how to better understand themselves and their emotions and deal with them in healthy ways. and it just wasn't fun to be in a fandom where, as soon as you go "hey, did you read the new book?" they scoff and roll their eyes and only want to talk about how terrible it is. (i also missed all the discourse on the sun and the star when it came out—PHENOMENAL read, btw—but i've read some things that lead me to believe that it wasn't well received either, in spite of how lovely it was.)

so...it's dramatic to say i "left" the fandom, but i certainly withdrew from it. deleted my pjo ao3 and tumblr, started over with a different fandom. but the love has always been there, and the show starting really helped spark it fully back to life.

but now, the same thing is happening again, i'm noticing. remember back in the day, when we only had the shitty fucking movies, and we were like "man, ANYTHING would be better than this garbage. literally just give us actors who are the right age and we'll be happy." well, now we have PHENOMENAL kid actors who genuinely are having a good time playing our beloved characters, and instead of supporting them, we're STILL complaining about them not being "portrayed correctly"?

i've talked to so many people who complain that percy is "too smart," which is kind of a bullshit insult to percy's canon character. in the books (at least the first five) we're seeing things ONLY from percy's pov. he's a kid who's struggled with learning disabilities and been told he's an idiot all his life by everyone except his mom—but as others have pointed out way more eloquently than i could, percy is a very intelligent and powerful individual while maintaining his goofy fun personality, which is WHY so many people love him so much. he's complex, and i think they managed to capture that really well in the show even amidst all the changes.

don't get me started on the fucking racism towards leah sava jeffries—i'm honest to gods ashamed that there are racists who call themselves pjo fans. she is so talented, and everything we ever could have hoped for in an on-screen annabeth. ALL of the kids are—there's literally no argument to be had there.

and then, if people aren't complaining about the casting, it's the series' writing. or there's too much exposition. rick is changing too many things. the directors don't know what they're doing. it's not a TRUE book adaptation. (someone said that to me, and i genuinely laughed because i thought they were joking. when the MOVIES exist, they wanted to make that comment about the show.)

are there some things i would change about the show, given the opportunity? god, yes. the set design for the underworld was horrendous. (in my opinion, of course.) but here's the thing. i have spent eight years of my life waiting for this show to happen, and in that time, i've learned a lot about how much goes into successfully producing such a complex series. how much money and time is spent, and how many people have to be on board to make it happen. it's genuinely kind of miraculous that we're even getting this show at all, considering all the ways it could have failed before it even made it out of pre-production.

and i think we, as fans, sometimes forget that we aren't owed this. we don't own the percy jackson franchise. it makes me so sick and tired when authors or artists in any capacity feel like they have to cater their works to the masses, because they know they'll get thrown into the fucking fire if they don't. rick and becky riordan didn't have to got to the trouble of producing this show for us. they chose to—everyone involved chose to—because they wanted to make something fun and enjoyable not only for the fans, but everyone who chose to be a part of it.

do you know how insane it is that, when you read pretty much any interview of pjo bts, everyone talks about how fun the production was? i've been on film sets. they can be ABSOLUTELY miserable when they're not done right. but eight months into production, the kids were still laughing and having a good time, everyone's still giving 100%, they're excited, it's fun. walker was willing to go into a diving tank for a full fucking day in order to get one scene—i know i would never have that kind of dedication, and i bet 99% of you wouldn't either.

i know this has gotten really long-winded, but i've said all of that to say that...i'm kind of tired of fans trying to bring down the show, and more than that, trying to bring down each other for having a good time. as i've said before (many times, i'm sure), i waited eight years for this, and i have had SUCH a fun time watching it. assuming we get a season 2 renewal, there are going to be even more new fans coming in than we've already gotten from season 1, and i want this fandom to be a fun and positive place for them. for all of us. we don't have to miserable and angry all time. we can critique the show, sure—it's not perfect, and it was never going to be—but we have to remember that television is an art form, and that art is subjective even when it involves our favorite characters. and we can accept that and still have a good time, because it's just more fun to have fun, you know?

this fandom has always had so much potential to be the BIGGEST, most supportive and kind and loving fandom. with how much representation this series has, with how much content we've been given, with the SHEER massive number of us...i've always thought we could be a really, really great community. maybe it's impossible to hope that we could be the best fandom on earth, but if nothing else...could we all try to just be a little bit kinder? genuinely, as cheesy as it may sound...it's just nicer when we're nice to each other. and when there's so many real things in the world to be mad about...i would much rather this be a place where we can come to at the end of a long day and just...feel at home. personally, i just think that would be really, really nice.

[irrigos]

interpreters in fallen london, ranked by how badly they violate the Code of Professional Conduct

I'm using the Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf's CPC, because thats what I learned. none of these characters would actually fall under the jurisdiction of RID, because its an American organization. and also. was founded in 1964. I also acknowledge that none of the clients these interpreters are interpreting for are, in fact, deaf, but I don't know anything about spoken language interpreting, and I feel like the needs of these specific clients are more akin to the interpreting needs of deaf clients I've had than anything else. (Also, the CPC calls them "consumers", I prefer "clients" because that's what I learned, but people will use either and it doesn't matter that much)

This post is very long, and there's not even that many people on it! I could have made it shorter, but I already didn't do that. You're the one who chose to read it! That's not my problem!

The CPC:

RID's Code of Professional Conduct was written in collaboration with the National Association of the Deaf in 2005 (replacing their prior Code of Ethics). It has 7 tenets, which each have several points of illustrative behaviors. I decided to cite the specific illustrative behaviors that these interpreters fail to perform, because I thought that would be more interesting and thorough. And no one will ever accuse me of not being thorough.

Here is the CPC presented in American Sign Language, and here it is in written English. It's not a very long or complex document, if you're interested in reading it yourself. I can't really imagine anyone WOULD be that interested in the code of conduct for a profession you're not in, unless you're like... me... but hey, there it is.

Barqujin:

Batachikhan's interpreter in Mask of the Rose. He wants to leave the amber warrens beneath London and go start a shop, but she thinks it's a bad idea. Purposefully interprets Batachikhan incorrectly to try to convince the player to help with her plan instead (facilitating a slower, more planned introduction of Rubbery Men into London society.) Is clearly threatened by the player character also being able to understand Batachikhan, since she spent years with the Rubberies learning their ways and you're just some dipshit. Also can have a threesome with the player and Batachikhan.

Tenets violated:

2.3 ("Render the message faithfully by conveying the content and spirit of what is being communicated, using language most readily understood by consumers, and correcting errors discreetly and expeditiously.") She is very much not faithfully rendering the message

4.1 ("Consider consumer requests or needs regarding language preferences, and render the message accordingly") This might seem like the same as 2.3, but this one focuses more on language preferences than content, eg using Signed Exact English instead of pure ASL if that is what the client prefers. So this would be like when Batachikhan is writing and breaks the chalk, and Barqujin gets annoyed and refuses to get more. Not respecting the method by which her client would like to communicate.

Conclusion:

I put her first on the list (so, least bad) because she at least DOES seem to care about Batachikhan and his well-being, even if she's pretty shitty about it. Also, I'm counting the time she spent in the amber warrens as "professional development", so she IS fulfilling tenet 7.0 ("Interpreters engage in professional development.") although I don't know how many CEUs that would be worth. Really, I think Barqujin is a good example for why the Americans with Disabilities Act says that a "companion" (family member, guardian, friend, religious leader, etc) cannot be counted as a qualified interpreter in most circumstances. Barqujin lacks the impartiality required to be an effective interpreter!!

The Sagacious Ape

In the ambition Hearts Desire, your monkey friend Gregory Beechwood hires an interpreter from the Empire of Hands to facilitate him actually having a conversation with you. Probably should come before Barqujin, technically, as her misconduct is probably worse (it's pretty bad to purposefully interpret something incorrectly because YOU think they should have said something different! that is generally Frowned Upon!) but he bothers me more. Also you could argue that Barqujin is not operating in the game as a Certified Interpreter who is bound by the code of conduct, but as a bilingual friend doing a favor, so… idk. Barqujin gets to be less bad because the Sagacious Ape bothers me so much more.

Tenets violated:

2.2 (“Assess consumer needs and the interpreting situation before and during the assignment and make adjustments as needed.”) Maybe a nitpick to start us off, but I was trained to always show up at least 15 minutes early, so you can meet with your client for a bit and figure out their linguistic needs. And the Sagacious Ape did not do that, although I SUPPOSE I can allow for the possibility that they met sometime off-screen.

I GUESS. 2.3 (Render the message faithfully, etc.) Tries to downplay Beechwood's tone/language use. He keeps making little asides objecting to Beechwood's swearing, or doing what seems to be downplaying the intended tone. Sorry, Mr Ape Interpreter. Gregory Beechwood wants to say fuck and you and I both know it. You gotta say the fuck word.

2.5 (“Refrain from providing counsel, advice, or personal opinions.”) Guessed what Beechwood wanted from the Marvelous before Beechwood said anything. You are not a participant in this conversation, man! You don't get to give your input here!

Conclusion:

Unfortunately, I am in love with Barqujin so she gets a little more leeway than the Sagacious Ape. And he's also the only one on this list who is licensed, so he has no excuse. But frankly, worse than the CPC violations, his greatest crime was doing my two biggest interpreter pet peeves. 1. He doesn't interpret into first person language (“He says he's sorry“ should instead be ”I'm sorry.“ This is a thing you learn in literally day 1 of an Interpreter Training Program.) 2. He calls himself a translator and not an interpreter, even though he is interpreting and not translating (I actually emailed FBG about this when it came up with the last election, but I don't know if they went back and fixed it in HD, too. I'd already beaten it by then. But a translator takes a static text in one language and converts it into another language, and an interpreter takes a live text in one language and converts it into another. An interpreter is working in the moment, so you'd have one at doctors appointments or presentations or plays, and a translator is working over time, so you'd hire a translator to work on a book or an article or a poem. I have done lots of interpreting and very little translating.) So, sorry Sagacious Ape. We ARE voting you off the island.

A small addendum to the entry on the Sagacious Ape- I couldn't find a good way to fit this in, but he reminds me almost more of a Deaf Interpreter than an Interpreter for the Deaf. A Hearing interpreter (or an interpreter for the deaf) would be a Hearing person who is fluent in both sign language and English (or, well, probably any spoken language, really) and interprets between the two. A Deaf interpreter is one who is themselves Deaf. Their role is to take the interpretation from the Hearing Interpreter and make it into more natural, fluent sign language, and to take the sign language of the client and make it easier for the Hearing interpreter to interpret correctly. They primarily work with people who are multiply disabled, or have some other language disability. The situations I've seen where a Deaf interpreter has also been hired have been for things like the client being DeafBlind, the client having cerebral palsy, or the client experienced language deprivation and isn't fluent in sign language. I think the Sagacious Ape is a little more like a Deaf interpreter because, while monkeys in Fallen London CAN speak (clearly, as the Sagacious Ape can!) Beechwood is not able to communicate in any language, so the Sagacious Ape is interpreting off of things like gestures and grunts. And that's closer to what I've seen Deaf interpreters do with clients who went through language deprivation than it is to any interpreting work I've ever done. Just a fun thought I wanted to share, even though it's not really relevant to the list.

The Nocturnal Landscape Artist

The Nocturnal Landscape Artist (who is also sometimes in game referred to as the Nocturnal Landscape Painter) was the Tentacled Entrepreneur's interpreter during the election of 1898, and was fired later, in Helicon House. I hate him terribly, and he's my favorite representation of an interpreter in the game.

Tenets violated:

1.1 (”Share assignment-related information only on a confidential and “as needed” basis.”) This might be a bit of a stretch, but during the election, you could get drunk with him and he'd talk a little shit about how actually TE doesn't know anything and HE'S the real brains here. Obviously this is incredibly inappropriate, but I'm also gonna say it's breaking confidentiality. Yknow. Among other problems.

2.5 (“Refrain from providing counsel, advice, or personal opinions.”) He was involved in TE's mayoral campaign to provide counsel and advice, while also providing interpreting services

3.5 ("Conduct and present themselves in an unobtrusive manner and exercise care in choice of attire.") I guess it's a little different for him, because he's not ACTUALLY a sign language interpreter, but generally speaking, I always had a VERY strict dress code, which boiled down to basically wearing only solid, dark colors, like black or navy. I guess they don't really describe the Painter in the game that much, but I mean… look at this guy. Do you think this guy is capable of being unobtrusive? I do not.

3.8 ("Avoid actual or perceived conflicts of interest that might cause harm or interfere with the effectiveness of interpreting services." The CPC defines a conflict of interest as "A conflict between the private interests (personal, financial, or professional) and the official or professional responsibilities of an interpreter in a position of trust, whether actual or perceived, deriving from a specific interpreting situation.") The Artist is literally involved with TE to better himself. During the election, he one time says ”We'll be the mayor“ which is. Yikes, man.

3.10 (”Refrain from using confidential interpreted information for the benefit of personal or professional affiliations or entities.“ See above.)

6.6 ("Refrain from harassment or coercion before, during, or after the provision of interpreting services.") Shows up at TE's art show without being invited, in an attempt to berate him. Cringe.

Conclusion:

"He needs me. As a teacher. A mentor. Fortunately, he does act on my advice. An' we both have the same goals. …You have to keep this to yourself. He's the money, but I'm the brains. We'll be mayor, just you see." BAD!!! I hate this man!! But the reason he's my favorite representation of an interpreter I've seen in this game, and quite possibly ANY game, is that… I've totally met this guy. Every Deaf person I know who has needed an interpreter has met this guy. There is a certain kind of person who becomes an interpreter (or really goes into any field that involves working closely with a marginalized group) primarily because they think that these poor people need their HELP. THEY know what's best for their clients! And they're going to see that done! Client's input be damned! It makes my skin crawl. The role of an interpreter is complex, and there are a lot of different opinions about how much an interpreter should interpret cultures as well as language, and this is made even MORE complex when you're interpreting for someone who is marginalized BECAUSE of this culture and language. But the Nocturnal Landscape Painter is clearly convinced that TE is going about everything wrong, and he's using his position as TE's interpreter to try to force him into what the Painter thinks is correct. And then has a big baby tantrum when TE does what he wanted to do anyway! It's no wonder they aren't friends anymore, if they ever were to begin with. I was glad that I got to throw this dude out of Helicon House. Wish I could do the same to everyone in my interpreting training cohort who thought it was their role to help all these poor sad Deaf people who couldn't get by without us. Gross.

In conclusion:

[nokingsonlyfooles]

The Dark Secret of Kung Fu Panda, Part 2...

...if you're coming from a place of Western tropes and values, you need to read Shifu as a shitty teacher, or the story doesn't scan.

Oh, and also a shitty parent, a shitty student of kung fu, and a shitty student of Buddhism.

(Sorry, little dude.)

I've already unpacked the teacher part, but all these things are a result of trying to write a story set in China, that both Chinese and Western audiences will understand. They did very well! But there's always a few folks who aren't able to keep up with a complex read like this - and they don't go, "Oh well, this story wasn't for me," they get mad at the characters and the writers.

So! Let's talk more about kung fu, Buddhism, child development, tropes and subversions - and whether that shiny piece of paper Tai Lung was after actually meant something or was just an elaborate troll.

I like to go to TVTropes and read the Headscratchers. For a storyteller like me, it's like playing Narrative Minesweeper. Let's see, did anyone have trouble with this plot point? (click) Ah, not too bad. What about this one? (click)

(Check that link! This is the page for Kung Fu Panda 2! People are really upset about this!)

KABOOM! Oh, man. Okay. Let's plant a flag in that and try to figure out why it blew up so bad.

Something I've seen across stories is that audiences have a really hard time noticing that they are being lied to when characters or narrators say one thing and do another. I think it's a mirage coughed up by the suspension of disbelief required to consume a story in the first place. We see a lot of villains who are supposed to be criminal masterminds, yet to make the plot go they have to behave like utter idiots. We're willing to put up with that, as long as it seems like they're supposed to be brilliant in-universe.

Then Rian Johnson throws a character like Miles Bron at us. The whole point of Miles is we're supposed to roll with the "in-universe mastermind" tropes, but only up to a point. The message of the film rests on the audience's ability to snap out of it, pick up their critical thinking skills and go, "Yeah, this guy never did one smart thing. Just a lot of audacious things, because he's too sheltered and dumb to understand the consequences."

But if you check the Headscrachers for Glass Onion (and if you care to look at any right-wing critiques of the film), you'll find a lot of people groping for reasons Miles is smart, actually. Maybe Blanc just called him dumb to get a rise out of him! Maybe he's smart socially but dumb with business! Or vice-versa! Maybe the film is badly-written!

No, he is very dumb. Truly. And I don't think the film is badly-written. But some people just blow right trough a sign reading "STOP RIGHT HERE, THIS TROPE IS BEING SUBVERTED, THE DETOUR IS THIS WAY" stagger off the path, and wind up dead in a ditch. Metaphorically speaking.

The above Troper - who is upset by Tai Lung's lack of a redemption arc, while expecting a nuanced story where the bad guys aren't all bad - has failed to detect a nuanced story where the good guys aren't all good.

In China, audiences need a stop sign that reads "Actually, the brilliant teacher is still learning and can do even better." This isn't too jarring, especially given the relationship between Oogway and Shifu. Shifu admits Oogway is a better teacher than him, and smarter than him. Even when he doesn't understand the lesson and loses hope of ever understanding it, he doesn't blame the turtle, he blames himself for just not getting it, and prepares to clean up his mess the best way he knows how. For his part, Oogway was clearly trying to get some hard lessons into Shifu's head - up to and including, "You don't actually need me to guide you down the path, you need to start looking around and trying to understand it for yourself..."

"Bye-eeee!"

Oogway is teaching in accordance with Theravada Buddhism, which is basically the philosophical equivalent of trying to get the dog to notice you've dropped the bacon on the ground and he's not gonna get anything by sniffing your fingers.

Tai Lung's return is an emergency situation, and if Shifu's not careful he'll be trying to reach enlightenment from the Spirit Realm (which does seem doable, given that Oogway continues to train and meditate himself). So Oogway leaves Shifu a $50, says, "You will have to find bacon without me," and buggers off. Permanently. And you know what? After three films, it works!

"Ah, you have finally mastered your Pride. Never stop learning, my most stubborn student!"

On the other hand, a Western audience has much less patience for jerk-ass teachers - and while they do have experience with Trickster mentors, it's much harder for them to see where Oogway is coming from, and why he nopes out instead of just being honest when it's important! They need a much bigger stop sign that says, "SHIFU IS ACTUALLY A SLOW STUDENT AND A BAD TEACHER AND OOGWAY HAS BEEN DESPERATELY TRYING, AND FAILING, TO CORRECT THIS PROBLEM FOR DECADES." But that's unnecessary and nonsensical in China. What we ended up with is much more subtle and open to interpretation. Some people decided to interpret it as, "Oogway's a troll, Shifu's an idiot, Tai Lung got a raw deal, nobody ever admits any of this, and this movie is stupid."

It's true, nobody ever gets called a troll or an idiot - that would be incredibly disrespectful in China, so that's a nonstarter - so you have to draw your own conclusions based on what they do. We see Shifu having a lot of difficulty in picking up what Oogway is laying down. He trusts Oogway implicity and knows there is always some kind of wisdom being imparted, but he gets impatient and tries to speed up the lesson, or he grabs for the most obvious interpretation and runs, or he just gives up and falls back to something he understands a little better.

Like when he gets sick of waiting for Oogway to blow out the candles and get to the point and he douses all of them with a cool move. Oogway is modeling the behaviour he'd like to see - Shifu really needs to slow down and learn patience. But Shifu responds as if the lesson is, "My Master needs help blowing out candles!" which is just silly, but he's going too fast and not paying attention.

Now watch Po listen to Oogway... and watch Oogway listen to Po! Oogay doesn't run in and go, "We don't have time for this! Tai Lung's coming! Get your shit together!" He lets Po set the pace, reflects back his feelings, and offers a little nudge. Which Po absorbs and thinks about at his own pace, instead of pushing to understand everything as fast as possible right now. Ideally, that's how it should go, but with Shifu this approach has about as much impact as boinking croutons off a brick wall.

So it's not too difficult to imagine that Shifu let his pride get the better of him in educating Tai Lung, while ignoring multiple nudges from his own teacher, because he was just too focused on his ultimate goal and going too fast.

In this case, his ultimate goal was a shiny piece of paper his Master rolled up and stuck in a cool-looking temple, all to give some future student a nudge to help them understand, "Self-worth isn't earned or bestowed in this way, it is intrinsic." And Shifu focused on proving his worth as a teacher by trying to turn out a student who was worthy of the scroll!

"Son, I am beginning to suspect you just ain't right in the head."

How can a friend and teacher manage this without stepping off the path of Theravada Buddhism, which a Chinese audience will recognize and expect to remain consistent? The only thing to do is back off, give your student some room to screw up, and nudge him again when he's open to listening.

Unfortunately, that took a very long time. Decades. In the meantime, Tai Lung grew up expecting to make his father proud by earning the scroll.

"What do you MEAN I spent my whole life training and I'm STILL NOT GOOD ENOUGH?"

There is something that I was taught explicitly, because I learned how to teach preschoolers: it is super easy to get kids to believe your love is conditional and dependent on their ability to get good grades and perform. Like, you can swear up and down that you love your child no matter what, but if you lose your shit and take them to Disneyland when they make Student of the Month, the kid is going to draw their own conclusions. You know how Tai Lung complains about how hard Shifu drove him to train? You can do that with praise just as easily as with discipline. More easily, sometimes.

In China, that's a perfectly acceptable way to teach a child, no further explanation necessary. In the West, not so much, but the writers can't hit us over the head with how wrong it is because in China, it's fine. So we have to watch and pay attention to how they act.

In the flashbacks, we never see Shifu being anything but loving and supportive, even when Tai Lung rips off a piece of his moustache and causes him obvious pain.

We never see the leopard boy eat all of his dad's bamboo furniture and cause a freakout (presumably followed by apologies on both sides). Young Shifu seems to have two modes of parenting and teaching: "I'm proud of you" and "Wow! Great job! I'm extra proud of you!" the second of which is reserved for punching and kicking real good. If that's all his dad seems to want from him, and the solution to every problem is to train harder and punch and kick better, it's possible Tai Lung's first experience with real failure is not getting the Dragon Scroll. You know, the thing his dad named him after.

His lack of experience with failure is evident in his reaction; he has no emotional maturity, he's like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum. Shifu taught him how to punch and kick real good, and did not teach him how to deal with failure, frustration, and a lack of outside validation. That's because Shifu himself is super bad at all those things!

Kung fu is not just punching and kicking and going as hard as you can, it is listening and adapting and approaching situations with open-minded humility. When Shifu rolls up and presents his first student like an art project to be graded, Oogway knows he done messed up. All he can do is nudge them away from a lesson neither one of them is ready to learn yet, and back off.

"Ultimately, my stubborn student, this is my failure, but I'm not sure how to resolve this situation. And your kid is a ticking time bomb, do you not even see that?"

Unfortunately, Shifu's flawed teaching method has resulted in a student who knows nothing but punching and kicking, so all he can do is punch and kick. Real good. "Laying waste" to the village was a late add, to help the audience understand how badly Tai Lung melted down, but it makes perfect sense in this context. If he's not getting the validation he needs for his skill, he'll beat up the whole Valley trying to prove he's the best. And when he gets back to the Jade Palace, no, somehow he has still not punched and kicked hard enough to get what he's after, so he tries to beat up the people standing in his way. Maybe that's how you prove yourself worthy of the scroll!

Alas, it was not. And with a student too misguided and dangerous to teach - yet who still might be able to learn, and help Shifu learn - pausing his rampage for a few decades to allow Shifu some more time to get a clue was the best option Oogway had.

Thank heaven for plot devices!

It turns out, Shifu is capable of improving, through immense pain and suffering. After his failure with Tai Lung, Shifu's despair leads him to fall face first into teaching Tigress with Oogway's method...

...That is, at least he backs off and lets her learn she's going to get no validation from the outside, so she stops looking for it. That's enough to keep her from having a total meltdown when she doesn't get what she wants - it's not a betrayal, it's just par for the course. She goes off by herself, because she's learned to solve her own damn problems (as have the rest of the Five, who follow her), and she almost gets them all killed, 'cos Shifu still doesn't know how to teach humility.

It takes him a few movies - he expects to learn everything through hard work and suffering and so, inevitably, he does.

Just to hammer home how badly Shifu messed up, and how fundamentally flawed Tai Lung's understanding of kung fu is, when Po just hands him the scroll, Tai Lung doesn't get it.

Po is a Mahayana Buddhist. He always tries to enlighten his enemies. When they make it clear they're not ready for it, he'll do what he can to keep them from screwing up everyone else's chance to learn.

So Tai Lung gets yeeted direct to the Spirit Realm. But, it is possible to keep learning in the Spirit Realm, as Oogway and Kai show us in the third film. We just don't see Tai Lung again until the animated series, 'cos no matter how cute he is, he's not the protagonist.

Also, I think the writers can't help but noticed how badly Tai Lung's arc landed with some audience members. There is no good way to address that in under two hours of film. Look how long it took me to unpack it in text!

In the end, the Dragon Scroll isn't meant to be useless, or an elaborate troll from a Trickster archetype. It's a nudge in the right direction. For Po and Shifu, once they slowed down and thought about it, it landed. Tai Lung just wasn't there yet, and showing him that the scroll was nothing but a shiny piece of paper wouldn't have gotten him there, no matter when it happened. But respect to the Dragon Warrior for trying, that's just how he rolls. He's not wrong to try, but Oogway's also not wrong about enlightenment not being a thing to teach.

That's why ya boi gets Oogway's staff, and Shifu ends the film series still needing a little more time to learn.

[hxhhasmysoul]

Opinion on Maki?

I like Maki as a character, I’m not sure I’d be close friends with her as a person but I think she could be an okay person to know. 

I like how Maki’s story isn’t really that closely related to the main story of JJK i.e. Kenjaku’s plan. She gets to have her own stuff, her life doesn’t exclusively revolve around Kenjaku, Sukuna, etc. At the same time her story is very strongly tied to the themes of JJK. It’s a story about an oppressive, abusive system and about how it can’t be reformed, just destroyed, and how it won’t be satisfying for those who would do that because of what it will cost them. It’s a story about a woman in a patriarchal system. About dehumanisation, being valued through the lens of strength, gender and assimilation into the status quo. About family. About loss and loneliness. About how much it costs to be true to yourself. How much strength is a false idol and power ups don’t mean shit, they are not worth it. About how sometimes it’s impossible to reconcile opposing desires/goals. 

But this is probably not what you’re asking for in terms of detailed answer XD

But for the longest time this was all I could come up with because I didn’t know how to frame a more complex answer. XD

I don't know if you wanted salt either but well, this is what I came up with. Sorry it took me months...

I think Maki is one of the characters that the fandom mistreats a lot. And various parts of the fandom mistreat her in various ways. 

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“OMG Maki’s the worst for what she did to Mai” aka the victim blaming crowd

So to this group Maki not staying with the Zen’in for Mai’s sake is the worst crime. Often worse than what the Zen’in actually did to Mai, because hadn’t Maki left… 

I will be honest, I’m biassed against these people because Mai really reminds me of my abuser and the way these people excuse Mai’s behaviour rubs me the wrong way. Especially with how many of them openly say that they identify with Mai, or hint at that. To me it often feels that by excusing Mai’s rancid behaviour they try to excuse their own, and like whatever trauma you go through, it’s not okay to harm strangers and then excuse it with the said trauma. It may explain the behaviour but never justifies it, it’s still shitty behaviour and I actually like that JJK’s stance on that is consistently critical. 

The situation into which Maki and Mai were born was abusive and traumatising to both of them. Women in the Zen’in clan are less than men, their worth is measured by their looks and willingness to be meek and subservient. Also non sorcerers are treated as less than. 

Which actually made Maki’s start in that family harder and Mai’s. She had her Heavenly Restriction and a blunt personality, didn’t want to become a servant. Mai’s cursed technique and personality, on the other hand, made her seem slightly more palatable to the Zen’in. 

And this difference between them informed how they tried to cope with the abuse. 

Mai chose to try and make herself smaller and participate in the system, make herself as invisible as possible so that the oppressive system would not pay attention to her. The joke was on her because that strategy doesn’t offer much protection. Even if Maki had stayed, sooner or later the family would’ve remembered about them. If Naoya had forced himself on Mai there’s not guarantee that Maki could’ve protected her, if he groomed her, which I actually find more likely, then he would’ve forced a wedge between them first, isolated Mai maybe by showing her favour. Like Maki’s presence there would not have made Mai safer and would not have guaranteed that the Zen’in wouldn’t have turned them against each other.

Maki chose to try to defeat the system by playing by its rules. She wanted to become the head of the family, to become someone so strong and respected in the jujutsu society that she could take over the family. The joke was on her because the clan rules or the jujutsu society rules were never meant to work for her, they were meant to uphold the status quo. 

In their circumstances there was no right choice for either of them to make. It was the Zen’in’s choice to target Mai after Maki left. It was the Zen’in’s fault Maki wanted to leave in the first place. 

The Zen’in acted like textbook abusers who try to put the blame for their behaviour on the victims, want to make the victims feel responsible for what happens to other victims. And the fact how much the fandom is okay with that framing is sickening. Older children that get old enough to leave an abusive household often are blamed like this and often feel guilt that they wanted to protect themselves, as if they owe others their suffering. 

Maki wanted to come back, to make the Zeni’n clan more livable for herself and Mai. Her thinking was very naive, but so was Mai’s. They were both abused kids who had nowhere to turn for help. They both tried to survive in the way that felt the most reasonable to them. They both failed at what they tried.

_________________________

The even more far gone “Maki exploited Mai” aka the victim blamers meet performative feminism crowd

Some fans go further, claiming that Mai was exploited for Maki’s power up. 

After their father brutalises the twins and leaves them to be mauled by the curses, Maki is ready to die with Mai. It’s very clear Maki missed Mai, that she loved her dearly despite their differences. Maki feels defeated and done. She and Mai are finally close again, finally talking again. And Maki is ready to die there with her. She finds closure in their reunion, however brief and tragic it is. She does not want Mai’s gift, she doesn’t not want Mai to leave her, she doesn’t want to live without Mai.

I could even call that moment Mai’s little revenge. But like endearingly, without any malice. I don’t judge Mai for what she does then, like I don’t judge Maki for what she did. The roles here are reversed. 

When Maki left the clan, she made that decision despite knowing Mai would not like it and that she was leaving Mai behind. As I said, she was justified to do that because she didn’t owe suffering to Mai. 

In their death scene, in the curse pit, Mai makes the decision to leave Maki behind even though Maki asks her not to. Maki doesn’t want to stay in the world without Mai, she calls Mai her heart. Maki’s subsequent revenge on the Zen’in is performed without any sense of achievement. It’s clear she feels nothing at that point. 

Saying that Mai got exploited for Maki’s power up does not only willfully ignore how Maki behaved in that situation and how she reacted. It also disrespects Mai.

Abuse strips people of true agency and reclaiming even a sliver of that agency always comes at a cost. Maki’s was separation from her beloved sister. Mai also showed some agency then, it may feel awful to call it that, but she did make a choice to stay because it aligned more with her personality and desires. The alternatives both of them were presented with were awful, and neither made a true free choice, but they both showed some agency. Because abuse usually offers people such shitty choices, so their acts of agency are marred with regret and doubt and maybe even resentment.

In their death scene Mai shows her agency again, this time it is her who makes a choice for both of them because she’s the one with the power in that situation. Maki wouldn’t have been able to heal Mai and leave her with a weapon or with her strength. She also wouldn’t want to because she knows that Mai doesn’t not want to fight. Maki never pressures Mai to leave the Zen’in with her because she knows Mai doesn’t want the sorcerer's life. 

Mai still chose between two shitty options: die alone and leave Maki or die together. But she chose the one which aligned the most with her own desires and the one that she surely thought was the most aligned with Maki’s. 

When Maki left the Zen’in clan, Mai felt abandoned by her. I wish she understood that it was the Zen’in who took Maki away from her because they made it impossible for Maki to stay there, maybe then Mai’s fans wouldn’t be so confused. Maki actually realises who took Mai away from her. 

The nastiest part of the exploitation take is when its proponents pull gender into it. Try to align Mai with femininity and Maki with masculinity. I’ve written about how messed up it is to call Maki masculine. And this is done very deliberately to make hating on Maki “excusable”. 

When this sort of terfy “feminism” is used, it comes with the belief that masculinity is by default bad and anyone aligned with it becomes by default the exploiter, the abuser, the powerful one in the situation. And hating men has become normalised in terf infested online “lefty” discourse. 

So if they first align Maki with masculinity and Mai with femininity, then they can sound justified in talking about Mai being exploited, Mai being the sole victim of that situation. And Maki is the evil one.

They can willfully misinterpret the Zen’in massacre as some male power fantasy that Maki has enacted and ignore Maki’s words or state of mind. Maki is not “feminine” enough in her grief, she’s not hysterical and crying. Maybe if she was like Megumi or Yuuji, those unmanly crying weaklings, then it would’ve shown that she really cared.  

_________________________

The “Maki is just Touji 2.0” aka the what the heck is story analysis and reading comprehension crowd

I don’t even want to devote too much time to these people. Because their point boils down to: Maki has the same powers as Touji so she’s exactly the same character as him, or like a replacement for him. And my main reaction to this is honestly just sighing and rolling my eyes.

Because seriously, both characters have more to them than just their powers.

 They have different personalities. 

The Zen’in clan had a different attitude to them, despite the clan rejecting them both. 

The way they relate to other characters is completely different.

Their character arcs are different.

Their role in the story is completely different. 

The way they play into the themes of the story is different. 

Their Heavenly Restriction and blood relation are the only two similarities. And the fact that the Zen’in shitstains only see Maki through the lens of her gender or her strength. Maki had failed as a woman, completely when she became disfigured, Naoya was very clear about that. So she was measured by them only by her strength. And the only way they could find a point of reference for that strength was by equating her to the one they had all rejected and feared: Touji.

Oh, okay, I forgot Maki now has the same hairstyle as Touji, my bad, they are the same character.

I think that there are two major drivers for people to hold the opinion that Maki is just Touji 2.0. 

There are the “archetypes, tropes and parallels” people. People who when they interact with new stories try to find similarities to other stories and when they catch a glimpse, a faint scent, of a trope or archetype they will latch onto it and then zero in on everything that will  confirm that yes, this is it, it is done exactly the same way as in other stories. And they will willfully ignore any creative deviations in how the story uses the trope or archetype. 

Or if the cognitive dissonance becomes too much they will get upset at the story and the author, which is extremely common among the JJK casual watchers/readers turned haters when the story turns out not to be what they assumed it would be. 

And the same for inside the story parallels. For them a parallel between X and Y often means that X and Y are the exact same thing. Like they will aggressively try to prove that Yuuji, Nobara and Megumi are a repeat of Gojou, Getou and Shoko due to I guess, the gender ratio matching, even if doing that means ignoring everything about these characters. And they will also do it when it comes to Maki and Touji. 

The other group are the fandom rancid homophobes who are often, but not exclusively, Gojou or Getou or SatoSugu fans. Their main point is that they decided that Gege is a man (which may be true, but Gege doesn’t officially gender themself) and that Gege wants to fuck some of the characters they’d created. 

There are 2 characters that are most often mentioned as the objects of Gege’s supposed carnal desires: Touji and Sukuna… 

Okay, I will be blunter because it’s not only homophobia but also like with an extra layer of bottom prejudice. Gege is accused of “dick riding” the characters, and that’s not an accident. As isn’t the fact that disrespecting Kenjaku, when it takes a sexualised form, is always about them taking it from behind from Jin. Because these people - and I can’t stress this enough, a lot of these people ship M/M ships - these people will still love to treat homosexuality as degrading, especially being a bottom. 

These people will just say that Gege can’t live without Touji so Maki is in the story solely so Touji can be mentioned. They will also often frame it in performative feminism, because how dare Gege mention Touji sometimes when Maki is concerned, that means that Gege doesn’t care about Maki at all and is just thinking about Touji. When it’s most likely the fans just see Maki as Touji because they don’t really care about either character and they don’t know what they are about.

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The “Gege killed Maki on International Women’s Day” aka the no object permanence meets performative feminism crowd

So these are the “champions of feminism” in the fandom. Those who will scream that “Gege hates women”. And the moment Maki gets hurt and isn’t instantly shown to be alive, those people will instantly assume Maki was killed. And scream that “Gege hates women”.

It doesn’t matter that it makes no sense considering what Maki’s been through in the story thus far. It doesn’t matter that it reeks of terfism and misogyny to assume that even small damage a female character takes means that she is incapacitated/dead, when it’s not assumed of male characters in the same story who are taking much more serious damage. 

What matters is performing feminism on social media and feeling justified in posting vitriol targeted at Gege.

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tl;dr

In the way the fandom treats her, Maki suffers from not being a sexyman but sharing her powers with one. She also suffers from not doing the victim of abuse and dehumanisation right.

[sibylsleaves]

Can you expand on your thoughts on redemptions in the show? I enjoyed Hen’s mother’s and Eddie’s fathers because we saw they are genuine in their willingness to change and have an understanding how they have affected their children. They aren’t perfect but it’s taking accountability and it’s a start. The others? No. With Taylor they give her a backstory to distract from her bad actions that seemed never ending. Now with Tommy. Do you think the writers/Tim think the general audience doesn’t pick up or remember how these people’s actions deeply affected the other characters(Buckleys, Chim’s dad, Taylor and the other T) before they bring them back and force people to have sympathy for them? I try to invoke nuance and empathy because losing a child is horrific but two living children did and still suffer from the Buckley’s actions. I am glad that Buck and Maddie appear to be moving forward despite their parents unwillingness to address and accept their role in how their children are to this day but that’s got to hurt deeply. As well as Chimney’s dad. And when Taylor left after causing the chaos and hurting so many people over the years they bring in someone else that has a grimey past that is already overlooked

you sent this to me a while ago and I'm so sorry it's taken me so long to answer it. I saw it and I was like hmmm interesting topic I will ruminate on this and then of course I forgot about it.

Anyway. This IS an interesting topic to me because I feel like the concept of redemption is in many ways the raison d'etre of the show. Or at least they want it to be, given how they set up Bobby's character arc in the first season. It's definitely a theme they keep returning to with, imo, mixed results in their execution.

Part of the problem I think is just that 911 is fundamentally a basic network procedural television show, which is always going to tend more toward the schlocky and heartfelt. Which, don't get me wrong, is also one of the selling points of the show imo--we are not watching this show the way you watch prestige television that's maybe more willing to take its characters down a darker path and grapple with these questions with more complexity.

So at the end of the day it's kind of in the show's nature to want to tell feel-good stories, and to that end I think they are maybe more likely to brush off past wrongdoing in order to make the point that redemption is always possible and reconciliation is, almost always, the end-goal. There are a few storylines where they have characters who are simply painted as irredeemable monsters (Doug and Jeffrey are the main ones that come to mind) and what's interesting to me about that is they really have to heavily emphasize the monstrousness of those characters.

But fundamentally the show is just ill-suited to telling the story of like. Here's a kind of shitty guy (or woman) who isn't a complete and total monster by any means but nevertheless will not actually learn from his mistakes and seek redemption because sometimes people are just incapable or not interested in doing that. Or even: here is a kind of shitty guy or woman who did something fairly reprehensible and is trying to do better but nevertheless the people affected by their actions have every right to NOT forgive them or want them in their lives.

As a show it is overall more optimistic than realistic about the human condition--and again. I do think that's a selling point of the show and often what makes it work. Just thinking about personally some of my favorite moments of the show which are heavy on the "heartfelt/feel good": everyone coming together to lift the firetruck off Buck, the scene with the christmas lights during the black-out, the part in Defend in Place when they are all praying together in the parking lot.

But. all this to say. That does mean that sometimes their depictions of something as complex and messy as "redemption" can fall a bit flat. I do think the show has a pattern of "redeeming" characters without actually showing us that they understand what they did was wrong. They use short-hand instead--the Buckley parents sticking around after Buck was struck by lightning to show us they've changed, Tommy shaking Chim's hand after he saved his life, etc. And skip over the actual messy parts of the process of redemption. Which is also in part because these are, at the end of the day, side characters, and their internal lives are not really important except with respect to how they influence their relationships with our main characters. Which is also why I think the most nuanced take they've managed to do is with Bobby's story--at least with SOME of the Amir storyline it's clear that to Bobby this process is far from complete and the fact that Amir did not actually offer Bobby his forgiveness at the end is, in my opinion, the closest they've come so far to telling this story in an actually nuanced way. But even then they tied it up with about as neat as a bow as they could.

[thousand-winters]

I really don't understand this fandom. You want grace to go through more pain? We know from chain of iron that Tatiana beat her repeatedly, that she was pimped out to young and old men, and she was used as a mere doll by Belial, besides all the grooming and psychological abuse she suffered from Tatiana. She goes through a horrible interrogation, gets her power taken out in the most painful and horrific way, her brother completely forgets about her and her only friend dies. And you people want her to get her marks stripped? She explicitly says she didn't want to do what she did to James, that it was wrong, that she didn't enjoyed any of it. And as soon as she's free from Tatiana's grasp she takes the bracelet off him, bc Tatiana wouldn't be able to hurt her anymore (are we forgetting Tatiana hit her when her power didn't work on James?).

What she did was wrong, period. But it seems to me all the pain and abuse she's a suffered, plus all the things she did to help should free her from any extra punishment. Like, people act as if her life with Tatiana was fun when she actually says: the only thing that gave my life some meaning was Jesse.

People are so quick to forgive male characters, who do some shitty horrible things (obviously different from this particular situation) but then you have a girl, with one of the saddest back stories from tsc, who was used and actually regrets her actions and is changing for the better, and you treat her like a monster? Why is it so difficult to offer her the same sympathy you do to the white men from these books?

She's all alone, her mind is completely fucked up, and it's gonna take years for her to be in a good place mentally. Isn't that enough? After all of this, shouldn't they offer her some kindness? The books make it very clear that if she wouldn't have been under Tatiana's roof she would have never done something like this, she would have lived a normal life, been a normal person.

This fandom always complains about the Clave's treatment towards children and their lack of accountability and understanding, but then go and act the same way towards Grace. Why can't you understand that this is a complex situation? Not something you can reduce to black and white (like the book does). I've seen people have more sympathy towards Sebastian (you know the biggest villain of these books) than to Grace.

If you hate her so much just stop talking about her. Please.

Oh, the callout about the white men 🤭

It is truly heinous how people act towards Grace, isn't it? I don't have much to add to this because you have summed it up really nicely and I agree with everything you have pointed out here.

Frankly? Half of the people I saw hating on her pre-COT did so because of her "interfering with Jordelia" which was very ridiculous already, because if you're gonna dislike her, better be it for something that actually makes sense instead of shippy reasons, but oh, well. Fandoms are like that sometimes.

Would love if they didn't talk about her in worse ways than how actual evil characters are talked about, but it is what it is.

There are people with some sense at least, like you, dear anon 🙏