#miscellaneous musings

[demystifiedstardust]

Researching Constelic

Cw subjective opinions.

⚠️ This is intended to be an analysis of what I've been able to dig up concerning the topic of constelic identity, and how it exclusively applies to myself. I have no intention of invalidating anyone's constelic experience. This piece contains both positive and negative opinions on stelling exclusively as a framework, and is not meant as commentary on people who use constelic terminology for themselves. Still, I understand that a person very attached to stelling may take this analysis personally when no offense is meant. Use your best judgment on if this piece is appropriate for you. ⚠️

While searching for fresh ideas, I stumbled upon the constelic community. It seemed promising at a glance, except for an important detail...

...is there a community?

I can find lots of flag and coining blogs, but actual constels are nowhere to be seen. I can't find anyone talking about the experience of stelling at the time of this writing, save for an anonymous submission blog (and during my research, I hit the bottom of #actually constelic, wow).

Well, that and... from what scant information I can find about the subculture to begin with, it seems less about experience to begin with, and more about label hoarding.

I'd like to say right now that there's nothing inherently Wrong or Bad about hoarding labels. Some people find meaning in doing so. That being said, I am not one of those people. Label hoarding isn't what I'm looking for in a potential identity-centric community.

Hoarding constels feels like... the aesthetic of an identity, without actually exploring an identity? I don't see the appeal of not engaging with your own identity. I wouldn't have made this blog at all if I didn't feel strongly about that. I don't have a desire to curate and grow a list for the sake of keeping a list. While there's nothing inherently wrong with aesthetics either, for me, the list is secondary to the experience itself.

This aestheticization of identity permeates the various terminologies under the constelic umbrella. Orbiting, veiling, constel(ation)s, phases. Why is the core terminology celestial-body-based? Is there a reason, other than aesthetic? Everything not immediately celestial-based is a rebrand of existing kin words, right down to stellie as an alternative to kinnie. Why is all this hyperspecific vocabulary necessary for a concept that has yet to be adopted by a core base of users, if not for aesthetic?

The end result is something that feels derivative of kin, without the organic community and subcultural development of kin. I think it was meant to be a more inclusive alternative to kin, but in its current state it feels forced. That there are posts in the tags at all indicates an amount of success, but it still feels like a sterile environment, like the internet version of a staged home that's never meant to be actually lived in. The lack of discoverable experiences compounds this feeling. It's unfortunate, because there are aspects within the framework of stelling that deserve to be explored.

The lack of separation between "identify as" and "identity with" is the most attractive feature of stelling in my humble opinion, as these two concepts can become fuzzy and fluid between each other. This is something I experience with my relationship to vampires and deep water. I oscillate between both modalities, and while the oscillation itself causes me no discomfort, there isn't much in the way of community that can accommodate a fluid state of being such as my own.

This lack of distinction serves as both an affirmation of freedom of identity fluidity within the label, as well as an anti-gatekeeping measure. I also like the affirmation that a constel can be obtained and dropped at any point in a person's life, contrary to the heavy insinuation in kin spaces that identity is permanent and inherent. It theoretically creates an environment with comparatively less expectations and more wiggle room to parse out an identity without fear of mistakes.

The constelic symbol is also really logographic! I can't say the same about some other logos in the same vein, like the fic//tionkin keys symbol. Perhaps as expected from a framework heavily concerned with aesthetic, but it still should be noticed and appreciated. I'm a sucker for good graphic design. One more thing I like is the color scheme on the basic constellic flag. I hope the creator is proud of themselves, because they did a great job.

So as a concept, there are many things I really like about the constelic framework of identity. Unfortunately, the hoarding aspect of constels is incompatible with what I desire for myself. I want to understand the different aspects myself--how they influence me on a granular level, how they influence each other, how they paint the picture of "me". I want to play with my identity, and I want to be serious with my identity. Above all, I want to engage with my identity. This creates a conceptual disconnect between me and stelling.

In practice, the constelic community is barren and unpopulated. There's nothing of substance--no connections between other people, no posts to read except endless coinings that may or may not have a practical use. It's disappointing but not surprising, given the constelic framework's leaning toward identity hoarding and not engaging.

Ultimately, I don't have a use for stelling in my life, aside from comparing and contrasting it to my ideals. My march continues onward, but this was an interesting pitstop.

[lirilan]

'I have absolutely no interest in engaging with this thing you're creating, but I'm glad you're having fun' is a mindset we can and should embrace. (But don't actually say it out loud, obviously, that's part of the deal that I wish I didn't have to specify.)

Even if you like someone, even if you generally enjoy their stuff, some of it will not be your jam. So scroll past it, silently. Unfollow them if you really have to, if there's too much of the thing you dislike, silently. Or filter out whatever tag they use for it, silently.

You control what you see, you don't control what others make. And you can be glad others are enjoying themselves even if you want nothing to do with it.

Some people are made deeply, profoundly happy by, say, furniture restoration. But I would be driven to near-terminal boredom discussing... varnish varieties and how they affect a project, or suchlike. So I just don't engage. I don't go on their blogs and say 'that was boring, you should be making cat videos' because that would be rude and I can get cat videos elsewhere.

Sometimes they come closer to my level and post, say, a before-and-after shot of something where I can say 'wow, that looks so pretty now,' but the majority of their content isn't going to be for me and that's okay.

Being happy from a distance for the happiness of others is a much more relaxing vibe than kicking off arguments and trying to insist the whole of everything ever be customised for me and me alone.

[tamras-shieldmaiden]

Kuvira and the re-education camps

First, since I’ll be using these terms, let me first provide the definitions.

A Watsonian perspective tries to interpret the text from the standpoint of the text. This is sometimes called an in-universe perspective.

A Doylist perspective stands outside the text, and is sometimes called a real-world perspective. Things that happen in canon happen because of decisions made by the author or the Powers that Be (TPTB); inconsistencies are probably authorial error. These explanations will sometimes be written right into the canon.

Okay, so my theory goes as follows:

In Ruins of the Empire, Vol 3, Kuvira said the following to the court:

“And though I wasn’t fully aware of everything going on in the re-education camps, I should have been.”

I personally believe the creators realized that they had gone too far in giving Kuvira all the Build Your Own Dictator 101 attributes as if they compiled a list and ticked on all the boxes including the always favorite concentration camps/gulags, etc. So when the moment came to redeem a character that had apparently knowingly greenlit on such atrocities (because I also believe they intended Kuvira to be redeemed eventually by certain choices they made on B4 to always keep her sympathetic), they realized the uphill battle they faced if that thorny issue was overlooked. So they went and fixed the conundrum by writing themselves out of the corner they had trapped themselves into in the comics. So this is my Doylist interpretation. However, there are enough elements in canon to grant a Watsonian interpretation which is the one that follows.

My in-universe interpretation is based on a couple of things. In S3, we saw how the Dai Li rounded up the airbenders on forced conscription in order to build airbending corps. Who’s not to say they hadn’t done the same with waterbenders and firebenders? The Dai Li is well known to work under secrecy so these things weren’t probably known by the majority of the people so, leading me to think that what came to be known as the reeducation camps had their origin in these secret camps. Besides, the Queen was very vocal about what she believed was an illegal land grab of Earth Kingdom territory concocted by King Kuei, Aang, and Firelord Zuko to create the United Republic so it’s likely that both the Dai Li as well as several people in key positions of the government and the military held a similar line of thought. I’ve already posited that although the Ba Sing Se branch of the Dai Li was obliterated by the Red Lotus, some members remained at large and when Kuvira was given the authority to lead the country and manage its resources, she had to deal with the power of the Dai Li and had no other choice but to reach a compromise in order to avoid having them as enemies of her efforts. I’m sure she had heard nasty stories about the camps as well as everyone else (including flaming hypocrite Varrick because a guy who can orchestrate a civil war knows quite well how to obtain intel) but decided to willfully ignore it, believing her influence to be far-reaching enough to allow for reforms in said camps, but as we later found out, our girl was wrong, very wrong. So, what we see in ROTE is the truth. A mixture of naivete and arrogance, along with a corrupt institution that preceded her tenure, ending up with one of the most tragic chapters of the Earth Empire.

[ainulindaelynn]

The eternal struggle between moving forward in a game and just wallowing over the same bit of content forever. The writer part of me wants to linger, to preserve the immersion. To get lost in the feelings. To be absorbed in one headspace as long as humanly possible.

Aaaand the gamer part in me is spinning circles, because no matter how much of a completionist I am, there are only so many glowy map markers I can hunt down before I lose my mind completley.

The agony.

[tirami-tzu]

Miscellaneous musing that won't become a textpost: the legacy of status ailments in JRPGs is probably going to be ultimately carried by a few edge cases where something that's designed around being difficult to rely on becomes reliable. This came to mind after seeing somebody describe the Pokemon status effects as being extremely strong by RPG standards, which I initially felt was a strange assessment - the majority of the status effects of Pokemon are actually quite weak, only sleep and freeze seem particularly notable, and both of these are largely held back by inaccessibility - freezing is mostly relegated to 10% chance status riders in a game where battles are rarely 10 turns long and sleep is mostly dependent on random chance. Spore is generally the only reliable method, which seems to be a typical case of a method balanced around being inaccessible becoming reliable. I'm reminded of how SMTV is sometimes described as being a SMT game that makes status ailments into a usable strategy, but I wonder if it's really a game where status ailments are a viable strategy or if it's just Accursed Poison giving you a completely reliable method of inflicting seal, which is seemingly balanced around being fickle at best.

[jonathanbrostar]

It’s actually pretty fun that on this website I can read what is essentially a two-page college essay about some absurdly esoteric topic written for reactionary reasons by someone who is really mad, and halfway through find a premise I think is faulty that allows me to fully dismiss the post. The effort people on here put into being wrong is nothing short of inspiring

[gyrrakavian]

Re: “progressive”

It’s curious how what’s considered ‘progressive’ and what isn’t changes over the course of time.

While researching the origins of the Rednex song Cotton-Eyed Joe, I learned that it’s about a pre-Civil War early African American folk character of that very name. And, that the earliest published work referring to Cotton-Eyed Joe was praised and considered ‘progressive’ at the time of its publication (1882) due to the book using “black dialects”, and the contents praising positive bonds between white and black people.

Of course, the story those accolades have long been stripped away as said “black dialects” was actually just a racist stereotype of how black people spoke back then spelt phoenetically, and the descriptions of black people within the book were largely just racist caricatures.

And while Louise Clarke Pyrnelle’s book may have been racist, opinions have swung back and fourth on the song for some time now. Some people have even claimed that it’s racist simply because the folk character originated from enslaved black folks. I know I’m not qualified to speak on the matter, but that seems a bit much.

Another example from 100 years later would be having gay-coded or other queer-coded characters that weren’t villains was once considered progressive. Even if the characters were more caricatures. The fact that LGBTQ were represented at all no matter how clumsily was considered ‘enough’ back then. But (thankfully) things have changed on that front as well.

And that’s not even touching on what once was and now is considered progressive regarding women (again, not qualified to speak on the matter).

However, the whole of it has got me wondering if there were self-righteous loudmouths talking over the people they claimed to be speaking for nearly a century-and-a-half ago as well.

[kanadraws]

I love Jeeves and Wooster, but to maintain a balanced life, I sometimes need to focus my mind on other matters besides Bertie, Jeeves, and their relationship dynamics. It’s a bit of a shame. On the other hand, there are times that I wish that Jeeves and Wooster would give me my brain back for other uses.

[stardewremixed]

SDV Smut? Yay or Nay?

This is a SFW post, btw. Just a question... a musing really.

I've been stretching myself as a writer and I've come up with some hot-hot-fire-hot NSFW ideas for sexy scenes with the Stardew bachelors. I shared with my IRL BFF my initial outlines and was encouraged to share it. I'm trying to grow as a writer and learn how to write sex scenes.

So here's me, awkwardly asking, if anyone cares to read this kind-of stuff or if this is even the right platform for it.

So far, I've outlined:

Female x Sebastian

Female x Sam

Female x Harvey

(I may do others too...)

Context is a female protagonist and already established friendship with the male love interest. Pre confession of feelings. Long burning desire. Hidden attraction. Fantasizing becomes reality. First time together.

Story itself: On a rainy night, they share a steamy encounter while both a little intoxicated. The next day, they're talking over if a one-night stand could turn into something more.

If I get a nibble, then I might just post here once I have the courage to... haha. I might rework a scene or two into a SDV+TS4 crossover at some point, but that's for later. Here it'd just be smut, I guess... if anyone cares or is interested.

[srhe203]

KUMIE SPEAKING.

OVER.

[demystifiedstardust]

Gender

I never have a reason to talk about it, but I have a xenogender. Exactly one, but it fits me like a glove. Maybe it's more accurate to say I am xenogender, full stop? Because I don't think of myself as multigender. I just happen to have a gender that encompasses more than one traditional modality of gender... it feels like a singular unified gender to me, though.

Nonbinary, genderqueer, transmasculine, xenogender... when it comes to my relationship to these words in particular, it all feels like different ways of trying to express the same idea. They're not multiple genders I have, but vocabulary I use to try and explain my relationship with gendered society.

Which is a lot of words to not even mention the xenogender in question, but it's not really about whatever word I chose. It does make me happy to have a concise little gender label that I can call intrinsically mine, but my focus right now is moreso about getting the information from me to others. Is it possible to fundamentally express what I need to say in a space as compressed as a label? I'm not so sure. This is a concern that's been repeating itself in my life lately.

My gender identity is remarkably stable. It's just hard to pin down how to explain it. I've mostly given up on a singular label to both encompass my gender and explain it adequately. It's easiest to live in the uncertainty, but it's personally frustrating at times.

[lirilan]

"I don't know enough about that yet to venture an opinion."

It's a terrifying statement, at first. It feels like admitting you're not smart. That you're not clued in.

Especially if you were the Smart Kid. The Precocious Kid. The Kid With Adult Opinions. The Articulate Kid.

At some point you can get used to the idea that you're supposed to be able to venture an intelligent-sounding response on cue. Even if it's ill-advised. Because you have to perform, don't you? It's your cue, time to be smart! If you're not clever, is there anything unique about you?

But taking the time to think and research is clever. Weighing your words and knowing the limitations of your experience, that's clever.

And saying 'I don't know enough to talk about it'? Holy shit, it can be the most liberating thing you could ever do. You don't have to perform on cue! You don't have to assess everything in a split second, decide on your position, then shore up that position desperately even when it starts to crumble. You don't need to defend a conclusion you never jumped to in the first place.

You can take your time, and you don't have to think up all the answers right then and there.

Knowing what you don't know can be the wisest thing of all.

[gemkun]

@abyssah commented : flirt ig,,, 🧍‍♂️

      ⸻       an   encounter   with   as   renowned   as   a   figure   as   luocha   ,   a   notorious   intergalactic   merchant   ,   was   an   indubitable   prospect.   accredited   to   his   cosmic   expeditions   ,   surging   him   to   and   fro   across   numerous   planets   and   galaxies   alike.   even   conducted   dealings   had   involved   this   commercial   personnel   ,   with   how   extensive   the   ipc   branched   off   to   ,   in   terms   of   securing   available   galactical   assets   and   resources.

  he   will   conclude   the   choice   of   diction   is   a   mere   tool   ,   espoused   to   gather   a   successful   business   exchange.   thereby   ,   brushing   off   expendable   phrases   utilised   to   coax   potential   clients   and   stakeholders   alike.   ❝   mr   luocha   ,   as   charming   as   your   words   might   be   ,   i   would   like   to   redirect   our   attention   to   the   matter   at   hand.   need   i   remind   you   ,   this   is   a   transaction   ,   and   i   will   not   perform   business   with   you   without   the   appropriate   evidence   pointing   to   the   generation   of   results   i   am   seeking.   ❞

[mercyburned]

I feel like a lot of my dynamics have fizzled out over the past couple months (or the fandom disappeared for it) so I’d really like to have new things to focus on!

Please like this post if you’re interested in developing some dynamics! Ships / friendships / family dynamics / etc are all on the table for mutuals. I’ll be reblogging this a few times.

[blossomhcir]

Various Edits 9/??

[riwrite]

every year or so im like. im gonna try making a carrd again. and every time i get fed up within an hour