#literal worst platform for discourse

[rhinedottirau]

I can be like "hey everyone, politicians being paid off by other companies and tiktok competitors isn't the real root of the issue here. Our government is being run by men that grew up on radio and televisions that were boxes with antenna - they legitimately don't understand data mining and that every app is doing it. They've targeted tiktok because of xenophobia and "China bad" mentality

Some person on le Zuckerbergs platform that may as well be the nine circles of hell: this is an unacceptable and incorrect take. Do you even know what the Cia has done in the past?

[iatrophilosophos]

One of the underdiscussed tragedies of covid is the fact that a ton of newly disabled people have been shoved into the discursive spotlight as the dominant voice on disability issues to spew frankly rancid takes

Basically everything said i have immense compassion and solidarity and time for coming from struggling individuals but whej spoken as a major discursive line, many of these takes are having pretty disastrous effects on the discourse and efficacy of the socio-medical field of chronic illness management and justice

Long covid is real, and debilitating. It's also novel-- the longest anyone can possibly have had long covid is about 5 years. I don't know that I know any chronically ill person who's condition arose as an adult who've made meaningful progress in managing their illness well in under 5 years; NOR anyone who hasn't made significant progress coping in under 10 years.

Becoming disabled is terrifying and there's a lot of grief and frustration and rage to work through-- and a lot of ableism. Most people who became #disabilityjusticeadvocates after being disabled by long covid have absolutely 0 knowledge of the history or tactics of disabled movements. Frankly offensive and ludicrous comparisons to AIDS, for example, run rampant-- despite the fact this is nothing like AIDS and ppl making these comparisons appear to be only passingly familiar with the AIDS epidemic and wholly unaware of the current abuse and criminalization forced on ppl who are HIV+. We can make critiques of how capitalism and frankly civilized society disables people, specific political critiques of covid even, without rudely and unhelpfully asserting that this is the Worst Thing That's Happened And Nobodys Ever Had It As Bad As You. It is not, and will never be, *literally illegal* to have long covid. Fuck, governments actually DID SOMETHING and responded!! It sucked, because it will always suck, it pushed poor people hardest, and so on, but cmon. You cannot seriously compare problematic but prompt vaccine rollouts and ongoing intense research into management and cures to 20 years of unaddressed death; nor a "resistance" movement that essentially amounts to insults & ineffectual propaganda to one that worked extremely hard at building communal support structures and making legit gains. Yall ain't even pumping infected air into the cdc offices. Smh.

My heart fucking hurts for the huge numbers of ppl who have become disabled without access to support and then asked to become discursive authorities on disability while still trying to figure out what living as a newly disabled person can look like, but I'm also fully pissed at the behavior of some of yall and how bystanders willing platform really ineffectual and frankly ableist shit because of "listening to affected voices".

People ARE making moves-- there are support groups and communities sharing new strategies both from DIY versions of new literature and observations from personal experiments. Nicotine patches are what I'm aware of most recently and i bieve Four Theives published a guide to a drug that *cures* a meaningful, but not fda-requirememt-satisfying # of cases. It is possible to take strides, movement is still possible, it is important to not lose rage or critique! AND everyone is still figuring this thing out (let me reiterate that long covid is getting a comparatively huge amount of research and attention than many other chronic illnesses, like fr) & the least some of yall can fucking do is not drag the entire concept of chronic illness management down in your despair.

[flower-boi16]

https://www.tumblr.com/flower-boi16/774678304341016576/i-thought-you-already-learnt-in-literacy-class

yeah, the issue isn't wanting the show to have a moral spelled out at the end or even that stol1tz is problematic.

the issue is that the show outright romanticizes its problematic ship - it isn't trying to be some character study of two messed up people without wanting the audience to come to any conclusions. It's blatantly obvious that the show is designed to make the audience think two things:

one: Stolas is only a tiny bit not really flawed and is basically the innocent wronged party in the relationship breakdown and 99% of the problems were caused by Blitzo and his insecurities and selfishness

and two: they actually want us to root for Stol1tz to work out.

and anyone who points out that they have no chemistry or that how Stolas started and continued the whole affair is textbook sexual extortion (something which the show has completely swept under the rug and refused to address) somehow gets accused of being a puritan or having low media literacy? even though critics are ones actually paying attention to the details that suggest stol1tz is a car crash waiting to happen and Stolas has been nothing but babied through the entirety of s2?? make it make sense

absolutely nothing about their duet in mastermind reads ironic, it's all terribly trite and sincere in expecting the audience to think their romance is tragic and moving. there's no reason to think the show is all that interested in exploring the dynamics of a messy relationship because the show outright refuses to meaningfully discuss the worst and messiest part of it except in passing i.e. the transactional deal. ffs, they spent all of apology tour calling Blitzo and Stolas "exes" when they never even dated. the show is outright rewriting its own history solely to avoid talking about the messy stuff because it would make Stolas look bad

also it's incredibly rich that people keep pulling out the "you just want a morality tale where you're told what to think, and that's bad writing!" card when this is literally what apology tour was. the show was outright screaming at the viewer to think that Stolas is the victim, that Blitzo is way worse than s1 had built him up to be and that Blitzo needed to apologize. the whole thing is structured around the moral of Blitzo needing to apologize and Verosika outright saying the point of the episode: "if you wanna change, say good for him (when he runs off to make out with someone else first chance he gets after claiming he loved you)"

I mean Blitzo basically says to the camera "the only reason I rejected Stolas was because the class difference made me insecure and I push away everyone who could care about me". it's incredibly blunt, garbage obvious storytelling

the writing isn't subtle at any other time (cough cough, Stella, cough) but suddenly when it comes fans asking why the writers aren't calling Stolas out for basically any of his shit suddenly the show is treated like some nuanced high art character drama where no one is allowed to openly discuss the sexual extortion shaped elephant in the room.

and it's blatantly not that. the closest helluva ever got to well done storytelling was in s1 and Viv flushed all that down the toilet the minute s2e1 happened

I still find it amazing how my post critisizing the fandom for not knowing what the actual critiques of the show are still holds up today. These are the kinds of fans that pretend that the highest amount of hard-hitting critique for Helluva and Hazbin comes from randos on tumblr when the critisicm these shows get extends far more than just tumblr. If anything, tumblr is less than a FRACTION of the people voicing their issues with the show.

And, if you actually payed attention to discourse surrounding the series on other platforms, mainly youtube....you would find people have far more nuanced critiques than "PROBLAMATIC = BAD!!!".

HELL, Sarcastic Chorus, one of the most popular Youtuers discussing the series, initially liked Stolitz BECAUSE of the problamatic elements, but he stopped carring for it because the show WASN'T ACTUALLY ADDRESSING THEM!!!!

But these fans focus more on trying to strawman critics rather than actually trying to meaningfully engauge with disscussion on the issues with the shows.

Because they can't handle people critisizing their favourite demon show.

[jynjackets]

I really appreciate you sharing your thoughts on these matters. I'm frustrated that this show is receiving so much praise and being held on such a pedestal. It's worth of criticism just like anything else. Also I saw people on twitter saying you are a racist if you ship rebelcaptain and prefer Cassian with Jyn over Bix and Cassian but like, its not even a shipping thing for me, I feel uncomfortable when women are sidelined in romantic arcs and I feel like that's valid??? Like there's a lot of issues happening at once.

Hi thank you anon <3 People are hella stupid. It’s a lot right now, but it will die down just as s1 did. I hope it helps if i can put some truths into perspective tho.

1. Andor is a flop.

Streaming services are not legally obligated to share their numbers but your most reliable source will be to check Nielsen ratings. Season 1 was a flop.

These are fan made Nielsen-based charts pulled during the middle of when the acolyte was airing. You can do your own updated research and the numbers will not be different. Data for all series before the acolyte show that Andor was the second least watched star wars show on Disney+ all time.

This is partly where a lot of the “you guys aren’t nearly as intelligent as we are” argument comes from because this show is just super unpopular. Deadass nobody cares and it makes them upset.

It was so severely unpopular that ABC and Hulu scheduled to air 6 of the 12 episodes for free. Until the first 2 episodes flopped so hard they pulled the rest from the schedule before it could air. Later, Disney posted the entire series to YouTube to garner more audience for season 2. Season 2’s lets-get-this-over-with 3-week block release schedule is most logically due to s1’s overall failure.

Nielsen needs some weeks to release the complete numbers but what we know already is that Andor S2 failed to make the Top 10 for at least 2 out of the three arcs with most notably its premiere having missed out. That’s quite embarrassing when all your Emmy competitors, even the ‘boring’ ones, have zero problem with this. They also have won a total of zero Emmy’s. So much for critically acclaimed.

2. Social media sucks right now more than ever

I don’t think people seem to remember that twitter is literally owned by Elon Musk. If people are drawing dicks on teslas why are people still using twitter? But they’re also not. Since the takeover, twitter has lost around 7 million users while making no revenue. New AI features and purchase-able exposure has made it unusable while the demographic has also largely shifted to noticeably less poc users. This is also similar for reddit.

So not only do we have a shit platform, we are looking at one of the worst star wars (emphasis on star wars!) fanbases on a shit platform. That post about being a racist rebelcaptain shipper if you don’t like bin, is stupid as fuck. I’m 90% sure it’s coming from someone white. Even if it’s not they’re still fucking stupid and get off making shitty discourse. These people want to talk race relations when their favorite show consistently hates black and brown people. And the most important topic for them is how race is a factor in picking a fictional girlfriend. be so fr.

Back to the show, season 1 was criticized for being boring which many agreed and voiced. The special case with season 2 is that everyone that loved it will be returning, while other parties are completely checked out, making for a very polarizing fanbase. So in looking up conversation about season 2, you’re only going to find the exact type of people that have no problem with gratuitous sexual assault and latinophobia, having not bat an eye at the sexualization and racism of s1. We are looking inside a bag labeled dead bird and expecting to find something else.

Sorry to blurb!

These are just my own affirmations that help me stay sane in this mess. You said you believe women shouldn’t be sidelined for shitty romantic arcs. You are right and you know it. Remain confident in the fact that you know what’s right even when everyone else makes you feel insane. They want you to cave, they want a reaction. You dont need to fight it but you need to keep yourself safe which includes protecting your values.

Also last thing if you’re still here. Deadass, everyone just watch rogue one. and have a good cry about it.

For me, watching it again and i was reminded how there really isn’t a movie that has made me want to kill myself (compliment) like rogue one. I don’t love the movie because it was made by disney star wars, i love it for what it was on its own and what it meant to me. If something is going to even COMPARE to that feeling it gives me, it sure as fuck not going to be a hyperflop anti-women fanfic youtube series. It all becomes so small when i’m reminded that a character like jyn was even a possibility.

[transfemme-shelterdog]

i know it’s frustrating and heartbreaking to see bigotry within our own community, but i feel like it’s really important to remember that despite the discourse and infighting, we are not each other’s worst enemies. trans women are not more likely to be transandrophobic than anyone else. trans women are not the biggest source of transandrophobia by a *long* shot. anyone who advocates for trans men by saying that trans women are our enemies is not an ally of mine.

Our? I'm a trans woman. Just because I defend transmacs and call out trans radfems doesn't make me a man.

Also, given what I've seen on here, and the fact that I was literally cancelled by several sizable friend groups of transfems for defending trans men, that's not a good sign.

Does every transfem hate transmascs? Of course not.

Has the vast majority of people who defend transandrophobic rhetoric been transfem given what I've seen on here, and other platforms as well as in real life? Yep.

I know of very few people who aren't transmasc who aren't transandrophobic, and I am in a shit load of trans spaces (well, I was, until I had the audacity to say that maybe we shouldn't shit transmascs)

Never said transfems are "our enemies" (I mean, they do say that you're your own worst enemy), just that the vast majority of bigotry is coming from my own side, and I gave my speculation as to why.

[spinningbuster98]

Sonic Adventure (Dreamcast) Sonic Part 3: Careful redesigning

Twinkle Park is a bit like Ice Cap, but also a bit better

The go kart ride is better than the snowboard in my opinion because it’s a bit more involved controls-wise and you cam actually get damaged here, so you’re at least a bit incentivized to actually dodge here

The actual level is nothing to write home about, mostly platform heavy like the first half of Ice Cap, but a bit meatier

And now from this point on Sonic’s story is smooth sailing

Got nothing to really say about Speed Highway, it’s great, I just wish it were a bit longer, the level seems to end early due to the last part being Knuckles’ section which...isn’t really a Sonic level

This is why I prefer Red Mountain, it’s a bit better paced in terms of content and has quite a few great hidden secrets...plus some weird kinda ghostly prisoners which I guess must’ve pissed Knuckles off something fierce given that we’re on Angel Island

Now I wanted to talk about another contentious issue regarding SA1, one that has always been at the center of SA1 discourse

The redesigns

They’re great

Ok look: I think that older fans have a point: SA1 marked in many ways too much of a departure from the classics in terms of gameplay structure, storytelling and even music, so to top it all off with different designs doesn’t exactly help people to ease in

Plus these designs have a distinctly different feel: the Classic designs were...well classic in the purest sense, they were largely inspired by the aesthetics of Felix the Cat and the like and so lent themselves perfectly to the bright and abstract worlds of most Classic games. The modern designs are sleeker, a bit more detailed, especially in Uekawa’s original artstyle they gave more of a late 90s graffity style vibe rather than those of a classic cartoon, which lent them more to the more grounded though still colorful vibes of the post SA1 games

So they both have their unique strengths, which meant that if you’re into Sonic because you really valued that specific aesthetic of Sonic 1,2,CD etc then you’re justified not to vibe with modern Sonic, which goes for a bit of a different feel

That said I’ve always thought that folks were super exaggerated when it came to criticizing the redesigns. People calling them a disgrace or even “unrecognizable”. That last one I actually saw with my own eyes once. Unrecognizable. Really?

Because if you ask me these redesigns should be used as an example on how to do character redesigns, because despite their different looks and vibes they are still absolutely, unmistakenly the same characters as the classics, and this is something that not all videogame redesigns have pulled off

Look at Castlevania after Symphony of the Night, many of the designs made by artist Ayami Kojima, while good on their own grounds....are not redesigns. They are completely different characters physically. Alucard looks nothing like his original Castlevania 3 self and the Belmonts completely change their styles of clothing from conan the barbarian-esque muscle bound warriors, to elegant bishonen hunters. You would never be able to recognize Kojima’s Simon or Trevor as their original counterparts if the games didn’t outright tell you

But with Sonic? Sonic himself is literally the same as before, only taller, with longer proportions, green eyes (the horror) and slightly more detailed sneakers. Every other key design element is kept, from the color scheme, to the number and position of the quills, the gloves etc. It is 100%, unmistakenly Sonic the Hedgehog and the same goes for the rest of the cast

The only 2 exceptions, in part, are Amy and Eggman

Amy looks really different from her classic self.....which I prefer. Sorry guys, but I was never crazy about female, pink Sonic with a little dress. Amy here has much more of her unique visual identity. At worst she’s got less color variation, being predominantly pink and red, but that’s a small price to pay in my eyes

Eggman I’m more mixed about. It’s a good design and still very much Eggman, but unlike the other characters this design is noticeably less simple and much busier, what with the extra detail and buttons on the vest, the extra goggles that he almost never uses etc. It’s a much starker contrast to the simplicity of Classic Eggman, who was also much simpler and rounder in overall design, while modern Eggman looks way more vertically developed. It’s still good, I just think it’s walking a bit of a line here

What I love about these designs is that, while they may have been made to fit a cooler, more serious tone in response to Sonic gaining more and more of a reputation as a cutesy mascot (which by itself is a questionable logic to me, the Classic designs worked rather well in the likes of the Bad Futures and even the OVA, so they still could’ve worked in this context probably), these designs can still work really well in more classic oriented aesthetics, like Heroes, the Advance games or Colors

Honestly the only thing I don’t much like about the redesigns...isn’t actually anything to do with the designs themselves or een Uekawa’s work, but more the way that they were presented in the early years

I love and have lots of nostalgia for Uekawa’s art, but I’ve never liked how in the Adventure games (plus Heroes if we wanna count that) the characters looked like they were...forcing themselves to look cool, Sonic especially

I know that this is gonna be blasphemous, but I really don’t like how some of the artwork puts Sonic (and sometimes other characters too) in extreme, “coolish” poses. One of the fundamental aspects of Sonic’s presentation, in my eyes, is that Sonic is supposed to be effortlessly cool

When you look at pretty much any classic artwork, not to mention the Sonic CD cutscenes, Sonic typically has a relaxed, smiling expression that he does while striking a pose or doing something cool. This characterizes him as a laid back character, who can spring into action to do cool stunts without even breaking a sweat, though also with a goofy side to him. That’s exactly how he’s represented in Sonic CD’s cutscenes. Hell, it’s how he’s written in this very game! But by presenting him in artwork as always giving mischievous grins and striking more dynamic and dramatic poses you run the risk of giving the idea that he’s just your typical adrenaline junkie who’s trying really really hard to impress the folks at hime with his stunts....which funnily enough aligns with the version of Sonic presented by Sega of America, oops!

Again: it’s a matter of this early presentation, not the designs themselves, as by the time the Advance games rolled around, Sonic and the gang started getting represented in a way that’s much closer to the classics, while still maintaining that specifically modern edge and vibrancy.

Nowadays I actually really do enjoy Uekawa’s more recent artstyle...I just wished it was used in the actual games instead of using 3D models for cover art and promotional stuff, which is an issue that is widespread in games nowadays, as I believe that 3D art, while effective, can be a lot more hit or miss than traditional 2D art. Just saying that covers like those of Colors, Generations and Frontiers are decent, but they could’ve worked so much better as 2D drawings if you ask me, but that’s just my 2 cents

[the-real-rain-world-confessions]

I used to be a person who would refuse the idea that Rainworld as a fandom was toxic but I took a break from it and now I just don’t want to go back to trying to interact.

There’s corruption from moderators/higher ups in every main community, server etc. (maincord, twitter community, reddit community…) Even fellow people I meet on Meadow put me off sometimes; I don’t want to be associated with the type of person I see playing Rainworld/meadow (< rarely tho)

In the time I’ve spent here I’ve grown to avoid big-platform fandom members, because they can actually be quite toxic, and their influence runs so deep.

Discourse around nothing, literal adults flipping their lids over nothing, buzzwords and call-outs over someone who’s “icky and gives me a bad vibe” simply because someone has a suggestive pfp, or they made a sex joke, or they drew a slugcat anthro suggestively.

No, this may be the worst place I’ve been. Perhaps it’s not so bad if you agree with the above ^ but if you believe in Leaving People Alone and not trying to be a martyr then this fandom sucks balls and I’m sick of it.

.

[fansplaining]

IWTV is the best show on TV. In today’s media environment, it is singular to be able to enjoy a show without the toxicity of the large fandoms. I have found that a majority of the show’s fans are hardcore Anne Rice fans making conversations about the show far more interesting. I am concerned of how this will change once S1 premiers on Netflix. The show deserves a larger audience and it will get it after it premiers on Netflix, but I hope the show runners remain true to the source material and continue on the path they have laid. Looking forward to future IWTV episodes.

Hello! Apologies for the delay in answering this, which I believe was in response to this article I wrote about the show and its audiences. With the official announcement this week that the AMC slate of shows are coming to Netflix on August 19th—

(also: lol Netflix, thank u)

—I was reminded to come back to it!

I totally agree with you re: the show itself, of course—but I also think you've curated your feeds very well haha. I've been observing many corners of the fandom throughout s2, partly because I was reporting on the fan/creator stuff, partly because I'm in the fandom, too. Fandoms are multifarious, and I'm not trying to paint with an overly broad brush—I've seen a ton of creativity and plenty of smart analysis etc. But I have also seen *so* much toxicity and *so* many willfully bad readings over the past few weeks, it's been shocking. Twitter in particular seems to have a literal Discourse of the Day and I don't understand how this is going to be sustainable over the year+ until s3 (lord help us all when s3 arrives lol).

There's a running joke—made so many times I'm not even thinking of a specific post—that people fear ~the Netflix masses~ will bring Bad Takes, but it seems highly likely a casual viewer will go, "Wow! Entertaining!" and move on with their lives, whereas existing fans of this show are already rocket-launching The Worst Takes at each other like clockwork (and even at random viewers who love the show but aren't a part of fandom conversations—because they don't like a person's phrasing, or the picture they chose for a post, etc etc etc).

As far as the idea that Rolin Jones or AMC will waver from their plans, I absolutely don't see that happening. AMC has long licensed their shows to large-audience platforms (Netflix in particular), but they're not making TV *for* those platforms. Jones and (IWTV EP) Mark Johnson have been pretty explicit about how they only could have made this show at AMC. I also found these post-finale comments from Jones very interesting:

I’m confident that we made the best vampire show we could make. I’m proud of the adaptation. There’s the element of second windows, how these things are going to be disseminated going forward. There does seem to be a lot of legwork done by fans. I look at 98 percent on Rotten Tomatoes, and part of me is like, Ugh, that’s way too high. If the intention here is to make something that will haunt you and that will work 15, 20 years from now, did we piss off enough people?

There was another interview I cannot find now about how a larger viewing audience in those "second windows" means more chances for the people who really connect to the show to find it. I've loved seeing that this season, even—people who hadn't checked it out for whatever reason and have now been changed by it. When I wrote that article, fans were kind of cycling in an information vacuum, with minimal signals from AMC/the creators that the metrics for success weren't a pure numbers game. But in the final press run, they hit that message hard—they are in it for the long run, they want to make the best show they can, and they understand this is a sustained partnership with fans. I think they're going to continue taking the biggest creative swings they can, and I can't wait to see what's next.

(BTW, IWTV folks: I pulled @flourish away from their baby for 90 minutes and despite their combined total of perhaps 10 hours of sleep over the past 4 weeks lol we managed to finally record a season 2 special episode. It should be out for patrons early next week!)

[menofprogress]

Sometimes i catch glimpses of what the fandom is like on other platforms and good god, am i glad im here.

Twitter is full of the worst discourse youve ever seen, like ppl over there accuse each other of the vilest hatecrimes simply bc they dont like the ship they like. Tiktok has beautiful fanedits, but its also where media literacy goes to die. Reddit afaik just hates jayvik and most of the changes the show did to league lore. And i do use bsky to look at fanart, but it annoys me that ppl drag the discourse they see on twitter over to this platform and also a lot of bsky arcane fans seem to not like the show at all? Which would be fine, but why are you in the arcane fandom then?

But tbh, there literally might be a full on shipping war/fandom discourse happening here on tumblr and i would be none the wiser bc i literally block ppl the second they get a little too worked up and mean over fictional ships lmao. My blocklist is long and my fandom experience drama free

[hiimawarish]

I've been bombarded by posts about characters being shitty DPS or "the worst DPS" in basically every social media platform and I am SO tired of them. Why are meta players SO repetitive? Yeah, sure, maybe JY needs a bit more time and resources to do more damage but I don't care? Like some of us play and pull for characters we like, not because they are meta or because our sole purpose is to do tons of damage. Sure, damage is nice, but as long as I can defeat the enemies, I don't give a damn about my characters doing 1M.

And I've seen a lot of the same discourse with Navia and Itto now??? With people arguing about who's the better DPS and whatnot about geo and monogeo teams. I pulled for Navia because she's gorgeous and I am emotionally attached to her, not because she does big numbers. I literally didn't know she'd make big numbers when I decided to pull for her. Kinda like when I pulled for Neuvi.

I'm just so tired of meta players coming on to every single post saying these things. We get it. You love builds and investing in the best characters and teams. Good for you.

Just let me fucking enjoy my game with my characters in peace.

[jahtrashh]

Antis are so fucking insane like, this isn’t a ‘who had it worse’ competition, or ‘why i hate this character because of toxic *character/ship* stans’. ‘who’s the most strongest bender/avatar’ ‘why these two look better together’ or ‘which child did the worst stuff’ None of these arguments fucking matter at the end of the day, and the fact that this is all you got from the show says you need to sniff yourself and contemplate on whether your ignorance is causing you to smell like the bottom of a septic tank. This is a show about war and how it affects all people and the world so negatively.

This is a show spreading awareness about genocide. This is a show about personal growth as a person and learning to redeem yourself. This is a show about how terrible countries use children as a means to fight/colonize places on their behalf. It shows how even the abused can become abusers, how childhood can truly affect the kind of person you are. How people really can bring the best out in others. How negativity can drown out the inner fire of your human spirit and progression. About how you too can contribute to the greater good no matter who you are or where you are from. It talks about how no one is perfect EVER, ‘perfect’ or ‘perfection’ is a broke mindset created to distract us and keep us from accepting our beautiful and very humane differences as a society. That mistakes are part of the human experience, and the list goes on.

This show is about how good will always prevail over evil, though it may sound simplistic, it can be as complex as the universe itself.

Avatar is literally a timeless masterpiece, it’s so much for a kid’s television show, it’s not perfect AND THAT’S OKAY. It’s so much more than all the drama and discourse within it, all of it which is ultimately the most useless waste of words people can possible muster up on the platform. There are more tags of people shitting on the main seven who came together to actually save the world, than of the people who were clearly and outright on the opposing side of the conflict. Nothing that is mainly bickered about in this fanDUMB is ever worth arguing about, EVER.

[dianight]

Not directed at anyone in particular

...but rather because I keep seeing related stuff constantly.

Once you change your mentality, once you internalize that being a trans woman is not a bad thing but rather something good and to be desired, it'll be as if you automatically learn a new language, or more accurately learn how to decypher a code in front of you.

Said code being a metaphor, obviously, for the clear disdain and way more often than I'd like or I'd ever imagined outright hatred that people seem to have for trans women.

You read something that's palpably transmisogynistic and it's undoubtedly clear what the person who wrote wants to say, but needs a few logic jumps and beating around the bush since stating it plainly will be too blunt. You think, "am I reading this in bad faith or is this person hating on trans women?" You spend a few minutes trying to come up with some explanation of how this person typed what can only be interpreted as "being a trans woman is HORRIBLE" without spelling it out and eventually you accept that it's just transmisogyny, no matter how you spin it.

You keep seeing similar shit. You get literal poll data that screams what you already know: the average (ignoring sampling bias for a moment) tumblr user thinks being a trans woman is bad. You keep seeing harrassment campaings by hate groups targeting trans women. You keep seeing them get driven out of platforms that some (many?) of them need to get funds to live. You keep seeing absurd escalation only and only ever against transfems. You keep seeing the same blogs (already blocked) that start witch hunts or pile on them reblogging funny memes as usual. You keep seeing random trans women getting terminated for no reason, for minor reasons that literally any other demographic can get away with, for being the target (not instigator) of those same witch hunts.

Sure, telling people off can get out of hand after you get hatemail for days, weeks, months and maybe even years. Trans women are expected to always be ready to debate our right to exist at any given moment and endure all the random poking and insults all the while remaining civil. [<- See that? A bit of trickery, not quite a lie but not true either. Trans women are NOT expected to do all that. That's simply an excuse for when the time comes when a woman tells some random anon off, she gets reported and terminated. We are just illustrating the point about seeing the "code" here.]

And after many years of seeing the vitriol that gets thrown our way, after seeing all the excuses (the same ones, over and over), after seeing who gets driven out of communities and why, and who drives us out; after you see groups of women clearly explain "this happens because transmisogyny"and then being ignored, silenced and attacked; you eventually realize that you and the people who hate you just have a different perspective when it comes to trans women.

You (I) think that being a trans woman is good, and at worst a neutral aspect of who you are. Those who you (I) have seen over the years harassing, attacking and mocking trans women just think that being a trans woman is bad at best, and at worst it's something to be erradicated. They make it very clear if you pay a minimum of attention to their actions.

So whenever I see reblogs complaining about callouts and shit; well, you can't really stop them from happening (as an individual) but it does make me happy that I never see them since I block anyone who reblogs them. Whenever I see discourse (<- not my word) about eggs (<- recent), about calling yourself transfem when you are afab (<- less recent), about whatever fetish some popular (<- I assume) trans woman just happens to be into and magically it becomes the most terrible thing you can possibly get the hots for; I see it for what it truly is:

Excuses to hate on trans women. And in order to love every trans woman before it's too late people need to stop hating them first.

[fish-tankk]

hstwt is insufferable

i think twitter has to be the worst platform to interact with the rest of the homestuck fandom at this point, because people genuinely do not know how to behave. it's becoming more of a cesspool and at this point, i don't even open the comments anymore because of how unfriendly things are.

i've seen so many posts today alone of people sharing their sexuality/gender/ect. headcanons with the trolls and kids, and the comments are just flaming the shit out of them because apparently how they interpret is "wrong" because it's not the general, popular headcanon that everyone else seems to have. and it happens especially on those anonymous confessions accounts. i saw someone submit their personal skin tone headcanons, and they just *happened* to headcanon gamzee as paler. it's not like there wasn't any diversity in skintones (so not like whitestuck ragebaiting), but everyone else for the most part focused on that and acted like it was some crime.

me personally, i don't headcanon gamzee as paler, but there is no reason why people should be made fun of, harassed, or made fun of because their headcanon doesn't fit everyone else's. that's literally the fun of headcanons! people should be able to have their fun and have their own vision for characters they like.

i'm just really sick of all the discourse that's continuously rinsed and repeated in the fandom (vriska as a whole, cronus/meulin/meenah/rufio with the things they've said/done during the ministrife hs and openbound, if rose and kanaya are really lesbians, if moirailegence really is platonic or romantic, race headcanons) because all we're doing is fighting and forgetting about it until someone decides to run the same topic even further into the ground.

[xomoosexo]

i swear twitter is getting worse and worse, i’ve been on it for literally 10 years and never thought it was as bad as it is now

it's cause it's falling apart. it's experiencing a sort of anarchy dude idek. I think the increased word limit from a whileee back just turned it in this direction. back in the day, the site was terrible for discourse because you could basically only tweet phrases and jokes, (people obviously still were annoying but it wasn't as bad) but now that you can basically make *almost* a full point in a tweet, but not enough room for nuance, its become the best platform for the worst people you know.

[tin-wufborf]

Teen Wolf Rewatch: Season 1, Episode 1—“Wolf Moon”

All right, party people, please prepare yourself for my morally grey and overly cynical rewatch of a show I both love and hate more than anything. Also, I’m a rambler and a ranter, so this is gonna be long, no doubt.

Also, fair warning, I am not a fan of Scott McCall, so if you’re a proud card-holding member of the Scott McCall Defense Squad (dumb name btw), I recommend that you keep on scrolling because you do not want to engage in discourse with me. I am a petty little bitch and absolutely will argue with you for the sake of arguing. Ya’ll get hilariously upset about people’s dislike of him, and it gives me great joy to see the absolutely pathetic length’s you’ll go to in order to protect this piece of shit ass character.

I know he can’t help it, but I could not stop staring at DOB’s stress herpes that appears intermittently throughout this episode. Like, you can almost track what order scenes were filmed in based on the size of the middle of his top lip. Poor baby was absolutely pressed on his first real acting gig, and his body was absolutely responding to it.

As someone who is from Northern California and has spent time in our wooded areas and forests, it is laughable to me how much these Georgia woods could not be mistaken for California forests in a police lineup. Like, I know they had to make do with what they had, but holy fuck, the foliage in these two states aren’t even fucking close, my dude.

I always love that Scott has a guitar in his room throughout the entirety of the show, but we never once find out whether or not this fool can actually play. Like, it’s literal set dressing, and it’s even more hilarious when you consider that Tyler Posey actually can and does play the guitar. They could have given Scott a cool little skill if they wanted, but they were like “eh, he does lacrosse, that’s enough character traits for Scott”.

Maybe Scott had a fucking asthma attack while looking for the body because he wouldn’t just shut the fuck up and stop complaining about the thing he wasn’t forced to do. Jesus christ, Scott, shut the fuck up. We get it. You don’t wanna be here. But then, like, why did you go?

I also love that they wanted us to believe that Scott was that severely asthmatic at the beginning, but they start the show by showing him putting on a pretty impressive pull-up show and having a pretty nice body before being bitten, like ???

I love the Sheriff shining a flashlight through the sparse trees in the woods like you can’t see everything out there. You could run blindfolded through these trees and not hit a single fucking thing because everything is so damn far apart.

On a related note to the point above, where the fuck did these deer just appear from?? They literally just come from some sort of liminal space that exists behind the trees. Is there a platform nine and three-quarters situation happening in the trees of Beacon Hills?

All of the dead bodies and crime scenes in this show are so clean, my god.

I would have beat the fucking freckles off of Jackson Whittemore for how he treats people, stg. Little fucking punk-ass rich could. Ugh.

I kind of vaguely recall that the reason BHHS is all about lacrosse is that Jeff Davis was trying way too hard to be different, but like…what fucking Northern California public high school is this meant to represent? I’m not saying that it doesn’t or can’t possibly exist, but I would say that the overwhelmingly popular sports in our area are still your basic ass football, baseball, and basketball. In these parts, that’s a rich kid sport. Some public schools have lacrosse teams, but they tend to be even less popular than soccer teams out this way.

So, I love Lydia (or, more so, I love what fans have postulated about her and built her up to be in fandom because she actually kinda sucks as a character with real dimension in the show), but like…she is the worst version of a popular hot chick ever. Lydia Martin is a straight-up bitch in the first season of this show. Like…what a shallow little cunty bitch.

Will continue in a reblog because apparently this has gone on too long and Tumblr likes to tell me what to do.

[spinningbuster98]

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (1992) Ending: Super Sonic Sweeping

I like Hill Top Zone!

Yeah sure it’s blue Emerald Hill with a mountain aesthetic and some lava and, level design wise, it’s definitely the weakest of the game, but I really vibe with both the aesthetic and especially the music, they give the stage a really unique feel to it that’s very cozy

Mystic Cave is a favorite of mine. It’s a bit cramped and the pit of doom is a bonafide dick move but how many levels in this series are set within dark, spooky caves?

Oil Ocean is where the game seemingly starts to drop off for some people, but personally this level is fine, the only issue being the sea horses being dicks

Metropolis on the other hand is a bit of a bitch

Now I will say that this level is nowhere close to being as hard as people always say. Sonic games in general tend to be pretty low in terms of platformers ranked by difficulty. Metropolis is easier than your typical Megaman level, Hell it’s way easier than just about anything in Castlevania 3. The issue isn’t Metropolis’ difficulty, it’s its tendency to feature some very annoying enemy placement.

Let’s be clear here: the player running into obstacles that come from off screen too quickly to react is a universal issue across ALL 2D Sonic games. ALL of them, with pretty much no exception. It’s an inherent flaw of the formula that you can’t help but run into when you decide to have a game be this fast while also being a side scroller. It’s just something that you’ll need to accept on some level if you plan on enjoying these games, Sonic 3 as well, as good as that game is, is not exempt from this. But even by those standards Metropolis can just get straight up annoying with it. The worst are those sections where you slowly ride those cog wheels upwards, but if an asteron hits you with its spikes you plummet all the way down, you gotta off screen the thing in order for it to come back down and it’s just a slog. Plus it’s 3 acts rather than one, mainly due to one of them being from a scrapped level. I also think that, aesthetically, it’s nowhere close to Scrap Brain. It’s...fine with its gear theme, but it doesn’t feel like Eggman’s base, and it doesn’t carry any environmentalist messages with it. I actually won’t knock off Sonic 2 for not being as “environmental” as the first game though. I mean when you really think about it the only Sonic games that truly commited to that angle were Sonic 1 and CD (Colors too, if you count Planet Wisp), the latter pretty much being a jacked up Sonic 1 anyway. Sonic 2 only has Eggman kidnap animals, but otherwise it’s just about stopping him from using his Star Wars knockoff. It’s a standard save the world story. So is Sonic 3. And SA1. And SA2 etc

Again I don’t “hate” Metropolis Zone, I think you can do much worse in terms of bullshit hard stages (this isn’t even a blip on a sub atomic radar when compared to Gate’s Stages from Mega Man X6), but it’s definitely that one part of the game that makes me go “alright it’s that time now”

You know what makes it more palatable though? Super Sonic

I don’t wanna get into any discourse over Super Sonic’s use as a plot device in later games, I’m referring to him as a purely gameplay element in these games when I say that I absolutely love him here

Of course it’s partly due to the inherent satisfaction of getting such an insanely OP powerup as a reward for completing 7 hard special stages, but it’s also because Super Sonic is not a literal win button and still requires some skill to use properly: you need to collect at least 50 rings before you can use him, you gotta keep collecting more in order to keep the transformation going, speed may be greater yeah but this also makes him harder to control over tiny platforms so you have to be careful. There’s always something going on when you play as Super Sonic, which means you can’t just sleep on the controller when you activate him, you have to put in the effort to actually MAINTAIN him.

My favorite aspect is how he, in a way, can encourage you to explore the levels more throughly. Since you need rings to maintain the transformation you will likely have to scour the place for extra rings and ring monitors, which keeps giving you an incentive to explore and be rewarded for it even after getting all 7 Emeralds, which Sonic 3 will be especially good at doing

I have mixed feelings on the Death Egg Robot. On the one hand I like how climactic it feels, especially for such a simple early 90s platformer and while on the one hand I appreciate the challenge...it can also be way too steep, mostly due to this game having limited continues

Now this was an issue in the first game as well, but it’s worse here because, simply put, the game is longer and you stand to lose more, especially the Chaos Emeralds. Plus getting extra continues here is harder: in Sonic 1 you just had to collect at least 50 rings while inside a Special Stage which wasn’t too hard, here you need at least 10K points at the end of an Act, which requires you to both beat it in a short time and collect a big number of rings without losing them. If you’re using Super Sonic this may paradoxically make reaching this goal harder since he drains rings. While I haven’t gotten a gameover in this game since I was 7, I definitely remember it feeling like quite a kick to the nuts

And I know that some people may say that this stuff was common place back then but...not really? Games like Castlevania and Megaman had infinite continues plus password systems to help you get back to where you left off. The most Sonic 1 and 2 have is a cheat code that brings up the level select...and that just feels wrong