#maybe a result of culture?

[lameotello]

I find it very interesting that antis are usually preoccupied with the shipping part of fandom. You'll see fics and artwork that details torture and gore with "proship dni" on it. I'm not saying that those works don't deserve to exist, obviously they do, but I just find it interesting that antis tend to only have a problem when it comes to taboo relationships in fandom. If you're able to separate reality from fiction when it comes to violence, why not when it comes to romantic or sexual relations?

[crocsandbitches]

Not to get overly sentimental but rap beef is honestly such a creative form of expression. Like we’re going to hold off on kicking the shit out of each other and calling up shooters to make clever rhymes about each other and get the common man saying words like ‘double entendre.’

Here’s a couple of suggestions of other diss tracks to listen to if you’ve found you’ve liked bitchy poetry:

Ether - Nas (2001) - diss track vs Jay Z & widely considered to be one of the best diss tracks ever released. It’s a response to Jay Z’s diss ‘Takeover’ which at the time of its release left people thinking Nas’ career was over and then Nas uno reversed that shit with Ether and it’s still considered to be a miracle that Jay Z managed to maintain his fame.

Hit ‘em up - 2Pac (1996) -diss track vs Biggie & Bad Boy records. Part of the East Coast / West Coast beef. 2Pac was shot 5 times and survived and Biggie released a song called ‘Who Shot Ya.’ Hit em up is Pac’s response and it’s iconic. Plus the tune is groovy as shit.

Real Muthaphuckkin’ G’s - Eazy E (1993) - Dr Dre left his group NWA over a dispute about contracts/pay. He later released a song called ‘Fuck with Dre Day’ where he had a go at Eazy E (the lead rapper of NWA). Eazy released this in response and it’s another groovy, west coast banger.

Story of Adidon- Pusha T (2018) - Pusha T walked so Kendrick Lamar could run. Need I say more.

No Vaseline - Ice Cube (1991) - vs remaining members of NWA. Cube was the first to leave NWA over contracts/pay disputes. The remaining members released an album, with subtle disses against him. Ice Cube, as Ice Cube does, got pissed.

Life’s on the Line - 50 Cent (2003) - adding this because 50 Cent hates as easily as he breathes and it’s something to marvel at. His beef with Ja Rule started in ‘99 when Ja Rule was robbed by 50’s people and then one thing lead to another and 50 was stabbed and then he was shot 9 times. ‘Time is the best medicine-‘ no. no it’s not. If anything 50 gets angrier through the years. 19 years later 50 bought 200 tickets to Ja Rule’s concert so the front rows were completely empty.

[ink-the-artist]

truly not trying to detract from the very russian art of the generational trauma wolves, and i know the colors are from the ussr + russia flags, but it also spoke to me as a hispanic person. especially w respect to misogyny and how machismo tears families apart, and how trauma that comes from outside the family units gets repeated/expressed within the family unit. idk.

absolutely it applies to more than just russians, im glad it speaks to other ppl :)

[seaofreverie]

Sparkstember Day 19: Lil' Beethoven (Ride 'Em Cowboy)

First of all, let this very important fact be known: the love I have for all three albums in the Lil' Beethoven trilogy cannot be overstated. I think I can safely call them my favourite pieces of art ever made. You know, when you look forward to something and it not only lives up to all your expectations but it's also just SO SO much more? Something about this neoclassical / dada / deconstruction of pop music / whatever-you-should-even-call-it approach is absolutely PERFECTLY suited for my tastes, and I didn't even know I was looking for something EXACTLY like this until I found it.

I think the circumstances of my first hearing of this album are pretty funny and something I got pretty lucky with actually (I often think about this with Sparks in general, as much as I wish I've known about them sooner I also do feel like they appeared in my life when I needed that the most. But anyway.) I was very eagerly looking forward to hearing it and finally seeing for myself what the genius of this album is all about. But I insisted that I can only do it through a physical format because yesss, let's make it even more *special*! The moment I've been waiting for! So yeah let's gooo, I need to wait until my CD arrives in the mail (that was one of the longest weeks of my life). And then I started to wonder, well, maybe I actually won't like it that much. To hype myself up to this extent and then be severly dissapointed - would have sucked!

Well, I was NOT dissapointed. Instead I was perplexed, confused, but also very intrigued and quite, ok not just quite, *completely* amazed already. That was the initial reaction and I think it's a rare but very beautiful moment when this happens - no need to *fully* grasp it right away, but enough to be all like "oh that was SOMETHING. I need more." As I said after that first listen (and I actually have my whole LIVE reaction to hearing LB written down lmao, that's how much of a big deal this was for me), I felt like it actually has to grow on me a bit still, gradually but surely with each next listen, rather than the 1st listen being THE prime listening experience. And that was very true! But it wasn't even gradual, it was very fast, seriously. And something very important that stood out to me right away too were the melodies - something about them, and that continues into HYL and ECOTD too. It's this classic feeling of: this always existed, or at least it feels like I've known it for years already. And as I listen more and become more familiar with them the magic still grows.

It's of course no coincidence to me that an album that relies so much on extreme levels of repetition is so addicting, even hypnotising. And once upon a time I thought that I couldn't like something that's too repetitive and therefore could be considered monotonous or "predictable". But nothing is predictable about LB actually. (Besides... ok, I'll get to that one bit later). But yeah, it's good for the brain. And it's been said before by others but this music definitely has this certain neurodivergent appeal thanks to all this, and, well, I love that aspect of it so much and I definitely relate to it on some level that goes even deeper than just song topics and instrumentation choices. It's in the structure and the fundaments of it all too.

I legally can't finish this without a dedicated paragraph to the 2004 Live In Stockholm performance because HOLY SHIT. Feeling so lucky again that all three of these albums got this treatment and we have recordings of these half-concert-half-performance-art pieces that we can now marvel at. I will say that like, a pretty big part of the sum of the appeal that LB has as an album is stored in this show and its visual and narrative elaboration on its themes. And also it's just so fun to watch! Sometimes I thought about how this might be an even better introduction to LB / this era of Sparks / Sparks in general than the actual album but well, never had a chance to test that and you know. Maybe shouldn't recommend Sparks with one of the most leftfield things there is to be found from them. Either way, very good, very important, felt like experiencing the power of LB for the first time all over again.

So now, please hear my exact reasonings for why I so deeply love (almost) every single one of these songs......

The Rhythm Thief

NO song made such a big impression on me the first time I heard it as this. I might have gotten more used to it after all this time but man, The Rhythm Thief, you will always be the realest one to me. This is what made me look forward to the whole album so much and convinced me that it would be like nothing else I've heard before. And that turned out to be so very beautifully true!

How Do I Get To Carnegie Hall?

I could listen to this one a hundred times in a row over and over and not get sick of it one bit. That's it, idk what else to add, beautiful and ethereal in every way

What Are All These Bands So Angry About?

Mostly I just want to direct everyone's attention to the bridge section, at the 2:26-2:52 time mark, which as far as I can say is the most heavenly piece of music ever made. Feeling like that Winnie The Pooh soul leaving his body gif each time I hear this

I Married Myself

Aromantic anthem, to me. Not that much to say actually but it's just, a very sweet and pretty song even when it might be taken as just this sort of ironic piece, I think it's this situation where a song can be taken more or less literally and it doesn't lose anything, rather the sincerity takes on a new sort of meaning? Because yes, maybe this hyperbolic situation (marrying yourself) COULD be the solution to the heartbreak of failed relationships. Ever thought about that??? Ok, stopping right here and leaving my I Married Myself analysis for another day

Ride 'Em Cowboy

My mind is blank on this one suddenly. But it's so good believe me. I love it a lot. It just has this LB spirit that makes it very addicting to listen to

My Baby's Taking Me Home

This was sort of the first Sparks song I've ever heard, or maybe that I quote-unquote purposefully listened to, and I think that's pretty important considering that it was the moment that ultimately lead to... all this. This song has always been incredibly beautiful and powerful to me, but lately it just makes me emotional to an extent that makes it hard to listen to most of the time. I WOULD sell all my material possessions for even one chance to experience this song live by the way

Your Call Is Very Important To Us. Please Hold

Earns soooo much as a live version, but even without that I think it's genius in the same way as The Rhythm Thief, and maybe the most disquieting piece here overall... If we ignore the next one maybe

Ugly Guys With Beautiful Girls

Sitting there hearing the intro of this song all like "huh, this is so chill and calm... too calm..." and then being hit with, well, everything that's going on in this song afterwards was truly THE MOMENT back in the day (and re: the predictability thing. idk though, it's not like, really an issue). Later on I decided that this sort of narrative nature of the song makes it have less replayability value than the rest (???) but I abandoned that opinion soon enough, thank god. I love it how long it took me to realize that this song and the ending of MBTMH are the only times when drums appear on this entire album (I mean no, I'm not very proud of that fact actually, as the self-proclaimed biggest LB fan in my area. And The Rhythm Thief literally saying "say goodbye to the beat"... come on man). So yes, sometimes less is more! I adore this song now it's such a treat I would gladly terrorize my neighbours with it

Suburban Homeboy

Ok, I'm sorry Suburban Homeboy fans but this is the only song here that I'm not a HUGE fan of. I still think it's brilliant and an incredibly fitting ending for the whole thing - the mood whiplash is amazing as this is the only "vaguely happy sounding" song on here, per my words from months back. And what's better than yelling WE ARE THE SUBURBAN HOMEBOYS! (I'm actually awaiting today's Sparks karaoke rating reveal very impatiently lol the reveal happened before I posted this and I'm very happy about it)

One more actually, a quick word on Wunderbar because it gave us two things that we might have not been able to do without: 1) this whole album actually (the fact that LB exists because of Wunderbar giving the Maels the idea to continue meddling with this style. Up there as one of my fav pieces of Sparks trivia) 2) anddddd the 21×21 performance of it of course

[starlooove]

“Fandom isn’t fun anymore fandom isn’t fun anymore” tbh it just feels like white racist “normies” jumped in as opposed to white racist nerds and for me personally u can feeeel it kinda but it doesn’t change much

[stillness138]

shrug

[friedricebunny]

why is the decision of whether or not to reveal your main to someone you mainly interact w/ on a sideblog by following them so stressful

[you-can-be-what-you-want-to-be]

I think the reason trans girl mob goes off so hard is because… the show is inherently about a kid who’s an outcast learning to be his best most happy self. Like people always say be yourself yeah but that usually doesn’t actually mean anything.

Mob psychos thesis statement is you are NOT special, and that is beautiful because it means you can be anything. Just because you’re a good artist and a shit singer doesn’t mean you should do art instead of singing, you should do what makes you happy and strive to be as good at it as you can, because mediocre is an achievement when you aren’t special, it’s about self improvement, not being the best.

And then you get a kid, who’s constantly terrified of his own emotions and how they effect others and is seen as naive, who doesn’t fit the stereotypical masculine world well (weak as hell, cares a lot about emotions, pacifist) and doesn’t fit the stereotypical feminine world well either (reserved usually, in the body improvement club, horrible fashion, not able to read a room) and you say part of being the best, happiest possible version of yourself is realizing your gender, and it’s not a sad thing, and it’s not about anyone else, it’s about being the best you possible.

I don’t think mob in show is trans or would be any better or worse at being a girl than he is at being a boy, because it isn’t about that. It’s about the idea that when people do the things that are important to them without regard for what other people might think and only focus on being who they want to be (not who they think they should be, not on who they are, who they WANT to be, who would be both a good person and make them happy) that that is the best, happiest, most successful version of them. And I think that’s beautiful.

[alexjcrowley]

Hey I just want to know something: am I the stupidest person on the planet or the f1 fandom is built differently?

Everytime I go on a social media to look up f1 content I see cute/horny (let's be honest) edits and everybody calling the drivers pookie or making memes. And that's alright, I guess.

I most definitely know that a bunch of (mostly white) men in a very competitive male-dominated sport rooted more than many others in capitalism are probably going to have scandals around them. I am not that dumb. I also know that because probably none of them is scandal-free and people who get crushes/hyperfixation on them just learn to live with them, but I didn't think they just...ignored them? Swept them under the rug? Let me explain.

When I so much as stumble on a TikTok with a song by The 1975 or McCafferty- or hell even Lovejoy recently- I see comments flooding with "bUt DoN't YoU kNoW tHeY'rE pRoBlEmAtIC?". Same happened with content about cinema or books. And on Tumblr happens less but still happens. As soon as you mention something that has ties with sexism, racism, homophobia, etc. people will soon point it out to you. Maybe because they're some of those people with the obsession of only consuming "morally pure" content, maybe they genuinely want to inform you, maybe they fucking hate that song/book/movie and want to give YOU a reason to dislike it.

But can someone tell me if I'm fucking dumb and I managed to stumble in the wrong part of instagram/tumblr/TikTok or NOBODY fucking talks about the shit some drivers have done? Because I am stumbling on a LOT of shit done by drivers I really liked lately even though I have been interested in F1 for a while now. Not too long, but enough that I think I would have heard some stuff.

Like, if I spent like 6 months on the hashtag of Guy Who Drives, why am I now finding out that they said something really discriminatory? I am just confused, I simply thought it would have popped out sooner, but apparently it was buried under 500+ posts about their abs? Like what?

I get that anyway it's not like you can cancel a driver, no matter what shit they say they'll probably still going to be racing the next weekend, but why people don't talk about it? Was my socials' fault for showing me horny posts everytime I simply looked up the name of a guy or do people don't talk about this stuff in the f1 community because "what are you gonna do anyway"?

I am leaning towards the second option because there are a few things that happened while I was already watching f1 (not in order: Lando's comments about, Trump, Hornergate, most drivers saying Hornergate was just noise) and at first people were talking about it but then they just...stopped? Like, I don't know, personally the words of disenterest many drivers expressed about Hornergate made me change my opinion about them at least a little and people seemed so outraged at first but now...it's like it never happened. Everybody back thirsting on main for Ricciardo, Norris, etc.

Genuine question, is the general response of the f1 community to these behaviours "forgive and forget in time of the next gp"? Am I missing something? I don't think they should be crucified but why I have not seen more people talking about this stuff? The "serious sport bunch" seems to be uninterested in "gossip" or whatever happens outsid the tracks, the good old fashioned fandom is writing fanfiction/making edits/funny posts, who keeps tracks of this stuff?

I have never been interested in a sport before. In the artistic world (cinema, literature, etc.) some scandals can get you out of a job and a long lasting hatred from the community. In motorsports, because the success of a driver does not depend from his fans' engagement but can be "objectively proved" by results and victories, do people just...make peace with the fact that some athletes are pieces of shit?

I want to specify it one more time, I am NOT saying LET'S CANCEL ALL THE DRIVERS AND BOO THEM BECAUSE THEY HAVE DONE SOMETHING QRONG AT SOME POINT, I am asking:

how do you deal when an athlete you cheer for does something really fucked up, and you know other athletes in the same field are no saints?

[blackbackedjackal]

The culture of that kind of extreme bully breeding comes from a long history of black exploitation and racism so I'm sure the person making casual p*do jokes will handle that topic with the utmost racial sensitivity.

Spoiler: they didn't

[justarandomlambblog]

Hehehe

[cluster-c-pds-culture-is]

avpd culture is “hi safe person i’m so glad i feel secure around you i love you :) in fact i love you so much that i’m going to stop interacting with you because i’m empty and worthless and you’re better off without me. wait a second”

.

[professorluxray]

I'm fascinated by the differences in views on mega evolution in between regions, especially in Alola, where it's viewed as incredibly harmful to the pokemon themselves.

It's my personal belief, one I've come to through my own observations and research, that these harmful effects are exclusive to pokemon who don't share a strong enough bond with their trainers. But that begs several other questions, what about this bond negates these harmful effects? At what point do you know your bond with your pokemon is strong enough to keep them from harm?

[anghraine]

I was thinking about Tolkien trying to clobber Gondorian Sindarin into making sense by having it be a marker of class, even though most aristocrats in the novel use Westron (possibly as a courtesy to the hobbits) and the Sindarin-speakers tend to be just random soldiers.

On top of that, Quenya is supposed to be even more of an elite marker of knowledge, as indicated by the warden of the Houses of Healing and the Appendices (though enough could speak it that more Gondorians knew Quenya during the War of the Ring than Elves did). Faramir mentions learning some linguistic stuff that most people don't know and pretty clearly prefers at least some Quenya terms (he's one of the only people who still calls Lothlórien Laurelindórenan), and Denethor is learned in lore and can read things that others can't.

...and the Gondorian soldiers praise Frodo and Sam in Westron, Sindarin, and Quenya because it's cool.

I do think there's a tension between Tolkien essentially "giving" Sindarin and in some cases Quenya to Gondorians because he thought it was cool, and him trying to make sense of them speaking an easily recognizable form of it after such an incredibly long time (when it changed much more rapidly even among immortal Elves), and this is the solution he came up with—I've talked about that before.

But also, the textual link between Sindarin/sometimes Quenya and soldiers specifically is really intriguing to me.

Sure, it might be coincidental, since there's not much cause for the hobbits to encounter Gondorian civilians. But the soldiers who do it don't seem super important in the book, especially the "many" soldiers in Minas Tirith who talk behind Pippin's back in Sindarin.

And then there's someone like Ioreth, a civilian known by what's likely a Sindarin nickname (Ioreth means "old woman"). She doesn't seem to be fluent in Sindarin and is unfamiliar with Sindarin terms for familiar plants. But she sometimes uses Sindarin terms where Westron ones are also in usage (like perian instead of "halfling"). So it's probably not the case that all Gondorians can be divided into 100% fluent in Sindarin (or Quenya) and 0% fluent.

But we do hear that a) Gondorian warriors are expected to have skills beyond military ones + b) military skills are now particularly prized in Gondorian society, above all others. It does make a certain Tolkienian sense that the other skills Gondorian soldiers are expected to have would include singing in Sindarin and Quenya, honestly, and that this would also be a marker of the relatively high status conferred on them in contemporary Gondorian culture.

Regardless, I still think it's interesting.

[timeisacephalopod]

You know as a horror fan "cultural Christianity" is such a useful term because as an atheist as well as a horror fan and a fan of haunted house stuff if it's done well I very, very quickly noticed how many horror movies are Christian propaganda. So few horror movies involving religion (which is a shocking amount of them btw) pick any religion that's not Christianity to center itself around and when they do that religion is bad and evil, not the cause of evil and the savior from it (because the demons may be Christian, but God and the bible are also the solutions in a way other religions aren't granted. Bonus points if it's an indigenous religion being portrayed as Evil and Bad).

Pretty much any exceptions I can think of to that rule use Judaism and the Holocaust as a backdrop and never in like a normal, the Holocaust is horrible way it's always playing on myths of Nazi Germany's experimentation on the Jewish population. Which I find highly troubling and disturbing, but regardless nothing like being a horror fan to convince you of cultural Christianity because no other genre leans on religion as a plot device so much unless it's straight up a Christian movie for a Christian audience using Christianity as it's main theme and through line.

[dylawas-reblogs]

So I only occasionally look at my tumblr activity, yknow, see if anyone thought anything I reblogged was cool enough to comment on, and I get to one post I reblogged where OP took a screenshot of all my "proship/antiship" tags and said "The equivalent of watching the neighborhood kid chuck rocks at a beehive."

First of all, it just felt... kind of rude? I could be reading WAY too deep into it though. That is absolutely not impossible on my part. I dunno, unless someone is being especially stupid, cruel, or ignorant (or it's a funny addition deserving of praise), I've never understood the culture of screenshots and callouts on tumblr posts. This was like, the emotional opposite of "how dare you hide this in the tags."

Second, if someone were to search for those tags I use in Tumblr's search, my reblog of that post wouldn't even come up; those were tags on a reblog, not an original post. AFAIK, tumblr tag searches only bring up original posts. My usage (or overuse) of tags on a reblog would have minimal bearing on people finding me, unless they're the kind of person to look into a post's notes commonly (which, I don't, unless I'm using a post for a blocklist-- usually for TERFs. Is that a normal thing? Do people commonly look in the notes of any post?).

Third, I use all those tags specifically so I cover all my bases for things people want to blacklist, and maybe I'll tag something someone already has blacklisted so they don't have to add another one in the first place. It's like how some people will tag every variation of "blood" or "trigger warning: blood" that they can think of, hoping to be able to spare any new blog viewers from something they've already decided they don't want to see.

Fourth, and finally, all those tags are the equivalent of the bright colors on a poisonous creature. "Don't eat me, it won't be pleasant for either of us." People who use their brains will at worst be mildly annoyed by it; people who think that murdering a character equates to irl murderous predispositions will likely run screaming-- if the post content itself wasn't enough.