#my tags aren't working and testing a theory

[atimefordragons]

@giftober 2024 | Day 4: Slow Motion ↳ Raj and Simran's private little moment in Mehndi Laga ke Rakhna

[applestorms]

following the very funny take that L just speedran his feelings for light from denial to acceptance over the course of the tennis game alone, i do think that even if L was somehow aware of the fact that his feelings verged on less-platonic he wouldn't necessarily see them as being requited. or alternatively, that if they are, light is too much of a repressed freak to ever get over his own bullshit enough to make it actually happen.

like i said in my own tags, this perhaps is another anime/manga difference to me. to elaborate...

in both cases, i think it starts off mostly the same: L's interest is Piqued when he realizes KIRA might actually be a human person, with the high of that feeling hitting its peak during lind l tailor as his theories are confirmed -> L's feelings about KIRA develop/are further complicated as he starts investigating light specifically. personally, i think he starts getting Interested™ while stalking him through the cameras in their house & seeing how he acts under the mask, realizes his feelings are Developing in a way he didn't expect the more he watches, and is fully in the Annoyance/Denial stage when he's autism staring at him throughout the testing sequence (could still vary) -> he works through/accepts it by the end of the tennis game, like a kind of background process monologue, maybe capping off specifically when light beats him.

following this, it seems natural to me that there would be a period where L furthers his investigation on light as KIRA while simultaneously also kinda trying to figure out how DTF he is. he's already pretty certain about the former point so a lot of this is just checking his work, watching very carefully to see if he can push light into losing his cool again and giving himself away, which has the additional side effect of pushing his newly developed crush to the front of his brain on a regular basis through sheer necessity.

this all comes to a head w/ misa's arrest. again, at some point throughout this time frame i think L starts putting enough pieces of the Light Yagami puzzle together to start figuring out that he's either 1. not interested entirely, or 2. never gonna fucking admit anything truthful about who he actually is, ever, even to himself. perhaps the next planned step of L's approach would be to push light into telling the truth or revealing something genuine about himself period, even outside of the KIRA investigation itself, but this gets fucked up by light's little memory loss/alternation plan.

yotsuba is interesting because it obviously gets to L quite a bit, showing aspects of his character that we don't really see outright before that point. it is well known that L is a filthy little liar, and that he specifically uses his lies as a way of testing light, but i think yotsuba is when he kinda. gives up on that. in a way, light is being fully truthful during yotsuba, it's just that what he believes to be truth has been manipulated beyond what's usually humanly possible. so L gets what he wants but it's a twisted version of it, and still misses the key component that drew him towards light in the first place (KIRA).

he's grumpy, basically. his toys aren't working the way he wanted them to, so he's throwing them at the wall and demanding that they fix themselves again. as i said before, L is simultaneously incredibly alienated from (the rest of/his own) humanity and directs his entire focus on it- he's the world's greatest detective, not out of empathy or sympathy for human suffering, but because people are the most interesting/complex puzzle he's ever come across and the scale of mass murder makes his dick harder than anything else.

in a way, you could see him locking light away in this shitty little constantly watched cell/literally holding him on a handcuff leash at all times as L's attempt to recreate the feelings that started popping up while he was watching light in his house the first time, seeing the seeds of a serial murderer in his little perfect teenager pet. the most notable shift throughout all of this though is the fact that L starts telling the truth- to bring this classic panel back,

he's not bothering with the "ooo sounds like something KIRA would say," shtick now. honestly the only other time someone really gets this blunt about telling light he's KIRA to his face is near:

(think this might be my favorite near panel ever lmfao. finally found it in ch.80 =3=)

point is, L is both pissed and genuinely kind of depressed throughout most of yotsuba, or at the very least has been annoyed into spitefully shucking off all his duties cuz he doesn't wanna play the game anymore. childish, and a sore loser- just like he said.

ANYWAYS. the differences between the anime and the manga, right.

the main way this diverges is that i think L is definitely aware of his feelings in the anime. all of the evidence for this comes down to episode 25- the rain scene, the foot washing, "Have you ever told the truth once in your life?" and so on and so forth. part of this may actually follow the divergences of light's characterization between the anime and manga, but L is almost certainly talking about something that light isn't willing to admit during these scenes and it's motivating a lot of his hardest lines.

again, it's the two cases: either he's morose about the fact that his feelings are unrequited and kicking back as a final fuck you for getting pulled around for so long, or (and personally, i kinda think this is more likely) he is aware of the fact that light does like him back in that way and Supremely salty about the fact that he won't ever act on it. "It will be lonely, won't it," etc. etc. "You're gonna fucking miss me, bitch. You don't have to do this but you're going to tear us apart anyway, and I don't forgive you, never will." light is putting the game above them, and L is fucking mad about it lol.

sidenote: it's interesting that the tennis game itself kind of parallels/foreshadows L losing in this way. as i've said before, in the tags on some fucking post i don't even remember now, light knows throughout the tennis game that winning might add to his KIRA percentage (though it is admittedly still quite vague), but he chooses to go for it anyway. just can't stop himself from winning, even if it goes against him and everything he actually wants... some classic light yagami shit right there.

in the manga this is a lot less clear, specifically because we are lacking these scenes in particular. L's death just happens so goddamn quick in the manga, it rushes up and catches him by surprise basically the second he lets his guard down and stops watching light, so we don't get this same drawn out saltiness as he metaphorically bleeds out. this is not to say it isn't present entirely- much of the above analysis still applies to the manga just as much as the anime, but it is perhaps a lot more subtle to follow by the end.

honestly, that all being said, i think manga L is also a lot more likely to simply never figure his shit out when it comes to light. it's a particularly interesting part of canon to me that both of these interpretations actually seem to work equally well when it comes to L, that he is either fully aware for most of the series about his feelings or entirely unaware and never bothers to reflect or consider it. says something about his character i guess, that he still manages to hide or cloud so many of his internal thoughts that shit like this can be pretty ambiguous and still feel kind of core to his character.

anyways, thanks again to @ai-the-broccoli and that original post for kicking this particular essay off, as well as everyone else who responded for getting my brain rolling this time around :)

[bakuhatsufallinlove]

No. Because I do not like ᴅᴋʙᴋ.

If I sound frustrated in this response, please know that it is because for two and a half years, I ran my meta blog and never received a single question about shipping dynamics. As soon as I specifically named myself as a member of a fixed ktdk/bkdk group, which exclusively releases works with that dynamic, I started getting questions and comments about the opposite dynamic.

My meta analyzes their canon dynamic, which does not go into sexual situations on-screen. I hold myself to high standards of being persuasive and compelling in my writing, and I had no interest in examining the language used in canon to illustrate the complexities of their relationship and then suddenly go "ANYWAY SO THAT'S WHY IZUKU TAKES IT UP THE ASS."

Would that be funny? yeah absolutely. But I wrote my posts to be informative, engaging, and interesting. I wrote them to help people understand more cultural and linguistic nuance in the storytelling and in their characterizations as shown in canon.

As a result, I am not surprised when people do not know my preferences regarding sexual dynamics or assume I might be a switch fan. I intentionally did not get into dynamic discourse for the entire run of my blog because people get really intense about it and take it very personally. It starts fights I have no interest in participating in.

That said, I am a fixed bkdk fan. I always have been. There was a brief period where I tested the ᴅᴋʙᴋ waters out of curiosity, but I discovered I disagreed with the interpretations of their characters, motivations, and desire for each other.

I have no judgment against other people's tastes. I'm happy if people enjoy my work and find it informative regardless of their own preferences. However, I have seen ᴅᴋʙᴋ fans post about my meta and then immediately twist my words and come to conclusions I did not advocate for, and I always found that baffling, but I decided it's not my problem and I can't control how some people simply hear what they want to hear.

If you look at my blog, you will actually see a number of my posts directly contradict interpretations and theories spread by some ᴅᴋʙᴋ fans. ᴅᴋʙᴋ fans were the biggest promoters of the "repressed Izuku/control your heart is about how he needs to accept his feelings for Katsuki" theory, which I criticized and deconstructed from a number of angles.

Another factor is this: ᴅᴋʙᴋ is not really popular in Japan. The exact number varies depending on platform, but at any given time, ᴅᴋʙᴋ content only has roughly 25% of the amount of content bkdk has.

Fanworks on jpn site Pixiv, graphed across the years.

Doujinshi listed for sale on Toranoana. Pairings in order: ʙᴀᴋᴜɢᴏᴜ ᴋᴀᴛsᴜᴋɪ x ᴍɪᴅᴏʀɪʏᴀ ɪᴢᴜᴋᴜ (3,051 doujinshi) ᴛᴏᴅᴏʀᴏᴋɪ sʜᴏᴜᴛᴏ x ʙᴀᴋᴜɢᴏᴜ ᴋᴀᴛsᴜᴋɪ (1,473 doujinshi) ᴛᴏᴅᴏʀᴏᴋɪ sʜᴏᴜᴛᴏ x ᴍɪᴅᴏʀɪʏᴀ ɪᴢᴜᴋᴜ (1,429 doujinshi) ᴍɪᴅᴏʀɪʏᴀ ɪᴢᴜᴋᴜ x ʙᴀᴋᴜɢᴏᴜ ᴋᴀᴛsᴜᴋɪ (1,274 doujinshi)

ᴅᴋʙᴋ doujinshi has a higher ratio than other kinds of fanworks, with 41% of the doujinshi bkdk has. This arguably indicates that ᴅᴋʙᴋ is not popular on a widespread level and instead has a small but loyal fanbase, since doujinshi involve more effort than other kinds of fanworks.

One could argue that ᴅᴋʙᴋ appears more popular, proportionally, in English-speaking fandom than jpn fandom, but no one really knows. Unlike jpn fandom, which is fairly well organized, the numbers for English-speaking fanworks are impossible to glean with any accuracy. Even AO3 tags don't tell the whole story, because not every fanfic on there specifies top and bottom, which jpn fandom never fails to do.

I bring this up because there simply aren't that many ᴅᴋʙᴋ doujinshi, and the number of new releases has dwindled since the series ended. Even if I wanted to translate ᴅᴋʙᴋ doujinshi, I wouldn't have a lot of material to work with. The opposite is true of bkdk doujinshi. We're having a goddamn renaissance over here!

And as I mentioned in my original post about translating bkdk doujinshi, in Japanese fandom, the separate spaces for fans of different dynamics is strongly enforced. A fan of one dynamic may have "landmines," which refers to things they never want to see or engage with in fandom. When you force someone to see or interact with content of the opposite dynamic they have expressed alignment with, you are being disrespectful of that person and the fandom space itself.

Every single one of my posts is tagged with bkdk, not ᴅᴋʙᴋ and not both tags. My bio says "bkdk triumphs." My sexy fanfic wips are top-Katsuki. My fanart is top-Katsuki.

I do understand if, up until my post about translating bkdk doujinshi, you did not notice the signs that indicated my preferences. English-speaking fandom is a mess and has no real respect for structure. People misunderstand tags and terms and misapply them all the time.

But both of these comments have come as a direct result of me specifying my preference, and it is impossible to read that as anything other than disrespect.

I apologize sincerely to anybody who's just chilling here. Please don't take this as an insult to you or your preferences. Again, I am happy people enjoy my work regardless of their taste in sexy fanworks.

It is worth noting that neither of the users who asked these questions follow me, and their blogs are empty, which I find pretty bizarre and don't know how to interpret. Perhaps it's just a couple people trying to circumvent my no-anon-asks policy. Who knows.

Anyway, please stop asking me about ᴅᴋʙᴋ.

[nyaagolor]

Bad Polls and the Art of Engagement Bait

So as anyone who follows this blog probably noticed, I posted a poll yesterday. Sorry ace attorney tumblr, it was bait. That was part of a little social experiment to test some theories I had about engagement bait and the tumblr "algorithm"-- and it was a resounding success!! I even made a replicate, that being a similar poll only hours later, which had basically the same result. Somehow. Now that the cat is officially out of the bag, I thought it would be fun to talk about it!

The entire point of this little social experiment was to combine some observations I had about what posts do well, the general attitude of tumblr users, and how to maximize engagement with minimal effort within fandom spaces. Thus, I'm combining all my thoughts into a little guide: how to make the lowest effort, highest engagement post possible:

Recognize that negative engagement on tumblr travels father than positive engagement Tumblr may not have an algorithm, but the system is still set up in a way where negative engagement rewards the poster more than positive engagement. A simple "like" is enough to show agreement or approval, but dissent or shock requires replies or reblogs (the latter of which are significantly more common). More reblogs = more people seeing the post, and thus posts that elicit a negative reaction tend to travel further than positive ones

Capitalize on the fact that people love to bitch about things when given the opportunity Generally speaking, going onto a random post you hate and exclaiming how much you hate it is a bit of a tumblr faux pas. Same thing with venting about how much you dislike something. While bringing up the topic yourself and being snippy to specific people are frowned upon, however, places like polls that provide an opportunity to bitch about things are a great outlet, and a LOT of people will take it

Take advantage of the poll's inherent anonymity This may seem counterintuitive-- the person posting the poll and everyone reblogging it aren't anonymous at all! This doesn't matter though, only the votes do. The anonymity of the votes on a tumblr poll turn the opinions of others, no matter their relative size, into a nebulous opinion of the indeterminate masses. THIS is the most important part of the engagement bait, because tumblr users love to complain but aren't likely to do so to someone directly for fear of hurting their feelings or getting called out for being rude. If you can take a dissenting opinion and remove the actual user from the equation, people are far more likely to share exactly what they think about it-- this is when the "no reading comprehension" and "you people seriously think (X)" and "ugh I hate fandom" takes come out en masse. Tumblr users may be mean, but more importantly we are also cowards. In the case of the poll I posted above, even extremely small minority opinions were being commented on in almost every single reblog, despite the fact that these opinions made up less than 10% of the votes for a majority of the poll's run.

More buzzwords, less nuance Buzzwords and a lack of nuance work together to make engagement more likely-- buzzwords are often both overused and misused, while a lack of nuance (typically in the form of a yes or no question) eggs people into explaining themselves. Combine these two and you add people justifying themselves, arguing with others, and complaining about the buzzword in general into your reblogs, boosting your numbers even more. In my case, I chose the lowest of the low when it comes to poll topics: "Is (recognizable character) (buzzword)?". How people fell for this twice I'm not sure, but it works!

If things are getting boring, stir the pot yourself You can use alt accounts or just make up tags yourself, but I was too lazy to do this. However, there's always the option of cherrypicking-- screenshot outlandish or dissenting tags, even if it's just one in a sea of hundreds, and post that in a reblog with an incredulous caption. Bringing tags to the attention of the majority invites new focus on those tags AND your poll, giving people another outlet to add their takes. Some people will likely even reblog it Again.

Now that the bait is set, watch people in your notes talk over themselves like a flock of seagulls

Congrats! You've now made a successful bait poll. Fortunately or unfortunately, mine worked so well that people fell for it twice, both of them got thousands of votes each within the day, my notifications are overflowing, and popular blogs have made posts referencing it. Point proven, hypothesis verified. As they say: easy website.

[crownmemes]

Scientist Sentences, Vol. 1

(Sentences for muses with a scientific background. Adjust phrasing where needed)

"Genetically, humans and cows are separated by only a couple of lines of DNA."

"I don't have enough information to form a hypothesis yet."

"There are simply some things that science is just too young to understand."

"Maths doesn't take sides. It doesn't judge."

"I will not trust you on something I can't verify!"

"Science and technology have reached a point where our means are finally catching up with our imagination, and the only thing preventing us from doing truly visionary work are these morally based restrictions that lawmakers put up in the name of public policy."

"My understanding was that you believed in rationality above all else."

"There is no god in this lab but me."

"My interest is purely academic. I do not like to get my hands dirty."

"Lab rule number one: do not borrow my equipment without asking!"

"I suspect someone has continued my research."

"Your lack of scientific interest is amazing."

"I must say, your brain would make an excellent specimen."

"Science has no price tag!"

"Things like this used to happen in the lab all the time!"

"Human memory is sensory-based. Vision alone is not the strongest trigger. Sound and smell actually work better."

"You're trying to create a wormhole into another universe?"

"Forgive me, I like to have an open mind, but I have a hard time accepting your theory."

"You're asking for an explanation for something that can't be explained rationally."

"I'm a man of science, but I can't find a rational explanation for this!"

"You put such faith in your science, but the things I've seen, science provides no place to start."

"I'm a scientist. This is my research, but you probably wouldn't understand."

"I want to put you in a little glass jar and then label your parts in Latin."

"In the end, it all comes down to one simple question - which is more important: having proof, or being alive?"

"No, I don't want to do that. In fact, I'd rather not! I'm just saying that I can."

"Our test subjects were less compliant than we anticipated."

"Who am I to play god with other people's lives?"

"Are you sure you want to do this? Submit yourself to these experiments?"

"That looks complicated! What is it?"

"People lie. Numbers don't."

"One of the inherent pitfalls of being a scientist is trying to maintain the distinction between God's domain and our own."

"You really aren't like other scientists."

"I need a corpse. Any corpse will do, but it shouldn't have been dead for more than two days."

"Why would anyone kill a scientist? What did we ever do?"

[crossovershipsandedits]

Please consider looking to see if characters have a canon orientation (like lesbian or gay man) before posting ships of them.

Hello! I hope you're having a wonderful day~

To address this ask, I first pose a question myself; Why?

The point of shipping, or really any fan creation, is to show your love and support for media/a character by expressing yourself, your thoughts and your theories/headcanon's through your work. The reason a lot of characters are loveable and popular is because they are fully capable of allowing fans to see themselves in them and see their versions without destroying the canon.

For example; If we look at Zoro from One Piece. As far as we're aware, bro has little to no romantic inclination. And yet his top ship is with another man on the crew, who happens to be woman loving Sanji. But it isn't something that feels wrong or out of place, because the ambiguity is there and their relationship is prebuilt, fans just need to figure out how it moves to romantic. The ability to see past the initial "Oh, Sanji loves women" and see the potential branches for this path. Yes, it's probably canon he legit loves women like that, but it could also be a trauma reaction based on his back story. Or it could ALSO be possible that he's bi/pan/etc

In short; Just because someone is shown a certain way, doesn't mean that's the only option. As fans we have the freedom to conjure up theories and beliefs based on the information presented to us.

Another good example would be Naruto. He's married to a woman, and yet it's still VERY much suggested that he loves Sasuke the same way. There is no "definite" answer. Assuming there is purely because of the canon relationships is a little closed minded in my opinion.

AND, even if it is stated, people change. We weren't born thinking "Oh heck yeah, dong". We develop our tastes as we grow and learn and experience new things. A great example would be Deadpool for this. He starts off in love with a woman (I'm speaking film wise by the way) and continues to love her, but very much over the course of their relationship begins to experiment and opens up that door for himself. Some people need to find the right person that makes them question themselves before they can confirm anything. Or, on the flip side, they need to see a lot of potential and not react lovingly/sexually to them in order to put the pieces together for aro/ace.

Life is a mystery bag of tags and labels that we as humans made to understand things better, and that's ok. Be who you are and love what/who you love. Be YOU

Anyway, I think I went a bit off tangent haha XD All I'm trying to say is, doors aren't entirely shut because of one thing or another. Fans can and will continue to express themselves and their thoughts through their loved characters, and that's ok. It's healthy even! I know people who use characters to test the waters for themselves because it can't hurt the people around them. It's harmless. A bit of fun, if you will.

I will always say this to these kinds of comments, ones where you should ask yourself "why am I bothering to send this?".

It is easier to keep scrolling past something you don't like, then drawing attention to it, and yourself, by commenting something that could hurt or upset an innocent person, and honestly makes you look like a silly grumpy guts :)

Keep sailing guys, gals and non-binary pals!!

[aspoonofsugar]

hey! Good day :) here to ask a question!! I was wondering about your process for analysis, character analysis, theme analysis- do you just write or are there specific things you look for? I suppose I’m curious if you have an idea/general gist of what you’re doing or steps you take to do your breakdowns. I’m trying to do something similar out of interest and your works are simply fascinating to read. I look up to your writing a lot!

hello!! Can I ask how you started analysing shows, how you went about it? I’m learning literary analysis and trying to do the same for hunter x hunter but I find it infinitely harder to analyse shows. Especially since I most notably consider diction in literary analysis lol

Hi!

Thank you for your nice words anon(s) and yay! I love meta-asks <3<3<3

So, it depends on the meta. In general, I try to focus on a specific topic, which can be:

a character (arc + foiling between characters)

a theme

the use of a specific motif, when it comes to a character or a theme

These are my three favourite kinds of analyses, but there are other types, as well. For example, some people are really into plot theories/predictions. Others prefer to focus on characters from a psychological viewpoint. Some other writers like to use philosophical lens or to compare different works. It really depends on your preference.

My preference is mostly for thematic analyses. This means that my character metas too tend to use a thematic lens. So...

WHAT IS THE THEME?

In short, the theme of a story is both:

the topic the story is exploring

the moral of the story, aka a phrase which summarizes its message

Stories explores topics through characters and plot, while the way the conflict is solved tells us the moral.

Some examples:

RWBY's main topic is humanity in both its weakness and strength and its moral is that victory is in a simple soul

Madoka's main topic is wishes and its moral is that it is worth to want things and to fight for them, even if it is painful

HXH is strange structurally, but its main topic is self-search, with its moral being that a person should not focus on the goal, but enjoy the journey

All of these messages and ideas aren't just things stated in dialogues (even if someone saying the theme helps). They emerge from the story itself.

RWBY's main conflict is about a destroyed world (remnant) surviving the anger of an evil witch (Salem). If humans let hate divide them, they lose. If they unite, they win. The main thematic question is then... can humans make the right choice? And the answer is that they can, as long as they remain simple souls (Ruby, but also Pyrrha at Beacon, Blake in Managerie, Yang in Mistral, Weiss with her family, JNR when they tag along and Penny in Atlas). The main message is that several people making the right choice leads to change. And that is humanity. This is why the characters keep being asked to give up their idealism and to embrace a more utilitarian way of doing things. And this is why every time they refuse and stick to their idealism. The conflict itself keeps testing their resolution.

Madoka's power system works through wishes, so the girls' powers and their backstories are all defined by their wishes and by how they relate to them. Madoka doesn't know what she wants. Homura's wish turns into an obsession. Mami makes a wish too early and thinks only about herself. Kyouko and Sayaka make a wish for someone else and have opposite reactions to their wishes ending poorly. Finally, it is revealed the girls' wishes are literally the force that keeps the world at balance. So, the plot, character arcs, conflict and worldbuilding are all about wishes.

HXH is made up of several arcs and each arc has its own theme. That said, the overall structure conveys the main theme. Gon's objective is to find Ging, but he keeps taking detours and getting engulfed in unrelated conflicts. However, the moment he meets Ging he realizes it is not his father who defines him, but rather it is all the people he met in his journey and his own experiences. Basically, HXH's strange structure conveys the main theme.

So, the theme (both topic and moral) should emerge by the characters, the worldbuilding, the conflict and sometimes even by the structure itself. In order to find it, one should start with the topic and ask themselves "What does the story really talk about?". The answer to this question will let you understand the theme as topic. The second step is to see how the story explores it.

DIFFERENT POINTS OF VIEW ON THE TOPIC

There are different ways a story can explore a topic. Still, the best stories have different perspectives clash with each other. Very often these different points of view are embodied by different characters.

Here are some examples, with some linked metas that explore the respective stories more in depth.

Madoka (topic= wishes):

Homura is determined to fulfill her wish no matter what

Kyubey is her opposite, as they are unable to wish since they lack feelings. This is why they need to recruit girls into creating energy through wishes

Madoka is in the middle, as she wants to wish for something, but doesn't know what

Mami, Kyouko and Sayaka all explore negative effects linked to wishes, which are connected to other secondary themes. Specifically, Mami explores the consequences of an immature wish, while Sayaka and Kyouko explore the selfishness/selflessness inherent in wishes

The conflict is solved through Madoka learning about the price of wishes, but still choosing to make a wish and to sacrifice her whole self for it. This ending conveys a specific moral: despite the pain and sacrifice that comes with them, wishes are still beautiful and worth it all. If Madoka had chosen to give up being a magical girl and had ended up the series without making a wish, the moral would have been the opposite: that a normal life is better than grandiose and dangerous dreams.

Monster (topic = the value of life)

Tenma believes that all lives are equal, which is why he chooses to save Johan as a child, despite being ordered to operate a far more influential patient.

Eva and Nina believe that not all lives are equal. In particular, Eva thinks that social status and importance in society influence the value of one's life. Nina instead believes that people who commit crime should be punished and lose their lives.

Johan believes no-life has value, including his own. In his words, the only thing all humans are equal in is death.

Here, the moral is conveyed through the Tenma/Nina vs Johan's conflict. Tenma is tested in his beliefs, but ultimately does not abandon them and ends the story by saving Johan. Nina instead is asked to change her mind, as she ends the story embracing Tenma's point of view.

RWBY - The Atlas Arc (topic = trust)

Ozpin lacks trust, as he is unable to trust others, no matter how loyal or dedicated to his cause they are

Ruby wants to "trust safely". She wants others, like Ironwood, to prove themselves to her before disclosing the truth to them

Ironwood is initially on Ruby's same page, but he spirals and comes to embody the "enemy of trust" aka control. He doesn't trust others, but wants to control them.

Oscar embodies trust, as he wants to trust Ironwood since the beginning. Even later on, he keeps on trusting people like Hazel and Emerald who are his enemies.

Cinder embodies another "enemy of trust", aka manipulation. She doesn't need to trust others to work with them, as she can use their feelings and wishes against them.

Penny embodies faith, which is a more extreme form of trust. She sacrifices herself and leaves the maiden power to Winter. She has no proof Winter will be able to save Weiss, Jaune or the relic, but she entrusts the future to her.

All these characters struggle with trust and its dangers. Some, like Ozpin, Ironwood and Cinder decide that trusting is too dangerous. Others, like Ruby, Penny and Oscar realize that to trust is the only way to move forward. Moreover, they learn there is not way to trust safely. As a matter of fact the moral of the arc is that "trust is a risk" and risks mean that things can end up badly. Still, not to take risk means to give up hope.

Hazbin Hotel - You didn't know song (topic= knowledge)

This song explores the idea of knowlege. The characters are after all in the middle of a questioning, which leads to several secrets coming out. Moreover, throughout it all the characters either admit or realize how ignorant they all are. The way they deal with this lack of knowledge establishes different thematic stances.

Charlie and Emily are both naive and ignore the darkest sides of their loved ones. Charlie doesn't know Vaggie used to be an exorcist and Emily has no idea Sera ordered the exterminations. Still, their answer to ignorance is to keep on questioning. They have no idea why only certain souls are admitted in heaven. Still, they think it is important to investigate the phenomenon and use it as evidence that there might be hope for the spirits in hell.

Lute and Adam don't know why some spirits end up in hell and others in heaven. Still, they do not bother to question it. So, Adam is caught by surprise by Charlie's question and has to improvise an answer. Not only that, but even later on the duo insist that Angel not being in Heaven proves he is unholy. And that's it.

Sera does know about the extermination, as she knows the system is unfair. Still, she refuses to question it and forbids others to do the same. She is the only one whose sin isn't ignornace, but knowledge.

There is no a clear thematic resolution to the question posed by the song. This is because the series is not over yet. However, the scene sets up the theme and the way characters will deal with it in later seasons will give us the moral.

As you can see, not only whole stories (like Madoka, or Monster) have themes, but also arcs (RWBY) and even episodes or scenes (Hazbin Hotel). That said, the way to go at it is always the same. Pintpoint the main topic and start investigate how the characters or the worldbuilding deal with it. You are gonna get several stances. The one which emeges victorious is the moral.

Let's highlight that the moral is not always embodied by the protagonist. For example, in the Madoka and RWBY's examples, Madoka and Ruby are initially at a loss and come to learn the moral by the end of the story (for Madoka) and arc (for Ruby). Similarly, Tenma initially does believe the moral, but doubts it throughout the story, only to be reminded and helped by other characters (like Nina).

In any case, the way the protagonist and characters in general relate to the main theme and to secondary themes is key for their arcs.

CHARACTERS AND THEME

When it comes to theme a character can either:

Believe the moral since the beginning

Not believe the moral since the beginning

In the first case, the character either stops believing the moral by the end (negative arc) or keeps believing the moral until the end (positive arc). In the second case, the character either learns the moral (positive arc) or doesn't learn the moral (negative arc).

In short, the story keeps challenging the character on their beliefs and they must either stick to their point of view or change it, depending if they believe in the moral since the beginning or not.

Exhibit A:

Charlie's belief that sinners can be redeemed is right. Still, in the beginning nobody else agrees with her, so she is challenged by the world around her. Her objective is not to lose faith in the Hazbin Hotel and to inspire others to change their mind too. Throughout her journey, she is bound to grow too. She starts as sheltered and naive with a simplistic idea of what redemption is. By the end, she will gain a deeper understanding of redempion and will grow as a result.

Exhibit B:

Eren's journey is about realizing what freedom (the main topic) is about. The problem is that he fixates himself on the idea that freedom means no boundaries, either natural nor humans. This leads him to embrace destruction and nihilism and to lose himself. In the end, the character who realizes what freedom truly is is Mikasa. She doesn't discard her bond with Eren, but is still able to make independent choices and to live as herself. In short, Eren doesn't learn the moral, hence why he spirals instead of growing.

Charlie is a protagonist who knows the moral and will grow with it in a positive arc. Eren is a protagonist who doesn't know the moral and never learns it. This is why he has a tragic negative arc.

These are just two examples, but there can be different combinations. By interrogating yourself on how characters relate to a theme, you get better a better understanding of their role in the story and of their overall arcs.

Still, how to find themes in a story? Luckily, each text is full of hints that are there for us to interpret them.

MOTIFS

Motifs are repetitive details within a story, which are used to communicate themes.

Anything can be a motif: a line, a musical tune, a specific imagery, an object. By repeating them in key moments throughout a narrative, they become symbols, which means they can lead to bigger metaphors and convey specific meanings.

In the song More Than Anything, dream is one of the main topics. We realize it because the characters keep mentioning it. At the same time, light keeps popping up. Lucifer summons light and throws it away, Charlie rememebrs a light show Lucifer imrpovised for her. Lucifer and Charlie start the song in the shadow and they end it in the light. This means that "light" is a motif throughout the song and by seeing how it is used we better understand the theme and the relationship between the two characters. We understand that light is a metaphor for dreams. Lucifer gives up on it, Charlie is inspired by it and eventually Lucifer summons it back as he has decided to believe in Charlie's dream. By looking at the way light is used, we can see that Charlie teaches Lucifer the moral that it is worth it to fight for dreams and not to give up on them.

In the CAA of HXH, gungi is a motif that comments both the topic of humanity and Meruem and Komugi's relationship. Their matches become a metaphor of monstrosity vs humanity, as humanity slowly conquers Meruem to the point he himself chooses to live and die as a human, rather than the King of the Ants. Similarly, Kokoriko symbolically becomes Komugi and Meruem's child, in the sense they give birth to this move and evolve the game.

Sometimes, their meaning is unique to the story. For example, gungi is a motif that makes sense within HxH and can't be brought outside of the series, as it is not a real world game. It only exists in that universe. Some other times, a motif can tie to bigger sets of symbols. For example, light and shadow are universal symbols that bring with them several additional meanings:

Good and Evil

The Jungian persona shadow

In the Hazbin Hotel song the first dychotomy doesn't fit, while the second one does. Initially both Lucifer and Charlie hide things from each other (shadow), whereas by the end they show who they are (light).

In short, to analyze a story, you should find its key motifs. They are hints to better understand the theme and the characters. Different stories will use different motifs and tie them to different wider sets of symbols. To find the right ones can help a lot in better understanding a story, as a whole.

Some examples:

RWBY uses fairy tales and alchemy as its main motif, so these two sets of symbols are the most useful to analyze the series

HxH is a shonen and uses its powers and fights to convey character arcs and themes, so to analyze one's nen abilities helps a lot

Hazbin Hotel is a musical series that takes inspiration from religion and mythology. So, it is probable that the best understanding of it will come from analyzing its songs and from looking into its religion inspiration

Of course this doesn't mean you should only use one motif to analyze a story. For example, you can use RWBY's semblances to look into the characters, as well. And there are some fairy tale allusions in Hazbin too. In the end, it is about using what best helps you understand a story as a whole.

What is more, there are general sets of symbols that can be useful in most stories, such as jungian archetypes. Finally, you might want to start from other aspects of the story itself, rather than theme or characters or plot. For example, you might be drawn to the world-building and realize it is used in a special way to explore the theme. Or you might be curious about character designs and see that they have their own symbolism (for example, I believe RWBY ones do and probably Hazbin Hotel ones, as well).

SOME PRACTICAL ADVICE

I have linked in the title of each paragraph, but this last one an article by @septembercfawkes. Her posts are great to better understand narrative structure and I found them enlightening.

I think the best thing you can do is to start with focused metas. Choose a scene, a character, a motif that intrigues you and start exploring it. It is better to start small and to narrow your focus, it would be easier to organize your article.

I usually outline the contents of the meta before starting to write it. Still, it sometimes changes as I keep writing.

It can be useful to write at the beginning of your analysis what you are gonna do. It will help you remember what the point of the meta is. For example, in my RWBY allusion meta or HxH nen meta, I always start with the motif I am analyzing. I summarize the fairy tale (even if many people know it already) and I explain what the character's ability is about. It helps organizing the flow and the contents.

The more you analyze the better you become at it, so it is just a matter of starting :)

Thank you for the asks, I hope this was helpful and not too much confusing!

Have a nice day!

[circuitfurscaleandvine]

Inspired by @princess-maid, who makes way great hdg posts and you should absolutely be following if you're into that.

Self Discovery Pipeline (post turning 16):

Pansexuality: Look, nobody is hot, so I guess we should try dating boys too. (tbh, still need more boys in my life) (And no, we didn't realize we were ace-spec for another 8 years)

Polyamory: Look, if you want to date someone else at the same time, I really won't mind. I want you to be happy, no matter what shape that takes. (5 years later) wait there's a word for that!?

Healthy Plurality: We heard randomly this phrase from across the room at a UU brunch and it changed our life. Just... oh, there's a healthy way to be us. Oh, MPD doesn't have to be a struggle. (NGL, tulpamancy techniques helped us selfcare more than books on DID that pathologized the whole thing)

Service Oriented: (honestly this wasn't a single realization, it was a dozen across years) Helping is the best. Clear instructions are the best. Praise is so good. Why can't we find that? Doesn't anyone need a servant? It hurts so much to not have a master. It's debilitating. It's a hole in our soul... (this colors all six of us even now, we all cope in different ways)

Demisexuality: When people say some celebrity is hot, they /actually get aroused/? wtf. No. (queue AVEN deepdives) (🦉Sensuality-gated Sexuality, to be more accurate. Until touches have been exchanged, you're not a sexual thing for us.)

Not Human: Sure, we've had a dog headmate since we were first plural, yeah she kinda bottles up a lot of painful unfulfilled needs so the rest of us don't have to handle them, but like, seriously nobody /wants/ to be human. fantasizes about replacing joints with servos

Gender - Nah, I'm not trans, I took E for two weeks and felt nothing. goes off. worst week of our life. OKAY Trans it is then. (we checked again 3 months later and it was /also/ the worst week of our life) (Also yes you can be cis on HRT, but we definitely aren't)

Autism: "No seriously, you're autistic, how did you not know? Wait, HOW DID YOUR PARENTS NOT KNOW??" - literally 10 people within a single week. (Relatedly, our parents trust the medical system enough to put us in therapy, but not enough to accept diagnosis. They never mentioned our therapist's suspicions to us. Found out later they're both medicating to stay functional, while telling our brother and us not to do the same.)

PDA Autism: Wait… that explains why we get full body lockdowns when a request hits us at the wrong angle… and why we need 24 hours advance notice to agree to anything… and why were so obsessed with social theory since like 10.

Sweet, I finally got it all figured out, with these tools I have achieved self-enlightenment. Only took 30 year-

ADHD

Therapist: "No seriously, your struggles to maintain habits aren't just Autism" Me: "I just have lots of memory gaps from Dissociation and Autism makes me need structure but not always know what sort I need." Therapist: "You explained very clearly what structure you need, and then gave a dozen reasons you were unable to follow through. You have executive dysfunction." Me: "Can't be, like, I work a job." Therapist: "You're only able to stay employed because you have two partners caring for you parttime, and most of what they do is assist you with self-care. Take some tests" Me: first test Fuck. second test Fuck. third test Fuck. Fine.

Final Note: 🦎we didn't put headmate tags on these because most these realizations happened via previous headmates. A big realization often causes one or more of us to shift heavily, and struggle to identify with who we were before the change.

[ccavill]

Thanks to the lovely @himelander for tagging me 💕

Do you make your bed? No, well sorta-kinda. I make it but not in the morning, once I'm done with work I'll make it.

Favourite number: 8.

If you could go back to school, would you? Eh, idk. I don't miss tasks like homework or examinations but I do miss some aspects of school and learning.

Can you parallel park? I have been able to do it in the past but it has been quite a while, so probably not.

Do you think aliens are real? I mean I guess it's naive to think we're the only examples of life in the world, so I guess I believe but I doubt we'll ever learn anything of them.

Can you drive a manual car? No, I was so close to being able to pass my test but unfortunately the pandemic postponed it and by the time I could again my provisional had run out as well as my theory test and it just felt too far from it so I haven't started again.

What’s your guilty pleasure? Hmmm, I quite like reality tv, especially reality tv show competitions that aren't singing. I've binged Love Island, Big Brother, Great British Bake Off, so much Drag Race, etc. It's just easy viewing. That and solo cinema trips.

Tattoos? Yes, one cartoon style alien face outline on my inner ankle, a matching tattoo with my friend and probably my only one 👽

Fave colour? Yellow 💛

Do you like puzzles? Yes, I like traditional puzzles as well as video games with emphasis on puzzles like the early Resident Evil series and most recently the Silent Hill 2 remake.

Any phobias? I don't like spiders, but can deal with them when they're small and not thick bodied. I don't like heights but not in the traditional way, more so seeing like people too close to railings high up. Also, helium balloons, I think I must've let go of one when young and just the feeling of despair/disappointment with them is too much it makes me feel sick whenever I'm involved with one like buying balloons for a party and transporting them.

Favourite childhood sport? I used to do swimming a lot and when I was much younger horse riding so I guess those.

Do you talk to yourself? Yes, like an internal monologue going through tasks to do, etc.

No pressure to do this, tagging @awormwithproblems @mechanicalhandsyaoi @cha-melodius and anyone who sees this and wants to do it too!

[almondmilktargaryen]

OC Tag Game

Thank you @mourning-sapphire for the tag 💘

Doing this for Viktoria Tyrell for my long fic, A Fire's Warmth

1. What is something that your OC would never purchase for themselves, but would be (secretly?) delighted to receive as a gift?

I'd probably have to say history books. She keeps an image of being a seductive kind of socialite, but enjoys reading history. Because of the image she has to maintain, she keeps her knowledge to herself for the most part so she wouldn't be seen reading in public.

2. Is your OC ticklish? Has anyone ever dared to find out?

Probably. I imagine her brothers tested this theory when she was little, but she keeps her distance with most others who aren't her family.

3. How easy does your OC find it to apologise?

She can be very stubborn, but it depends on who it is. If it's simply a person she has no reason to dislike, quick and easy to apologize. If it's someone she loves, it depends on whether or not she believes she did something wrong. But if she doesn't like them, she'd rather they stay mad.

4. When did your OC first see a dead body? If they have not seen one yet, how might they react to doing so?

She saw her father's body at his funeral, delivered after drowning on a hunting trip.

5. Does your OC have any recurring dreams? Have they ever told anyone else about them?

She dreams of her brothers often after their deaths. She's spoken about them with her cousins, but they occur often enough that she doesn't talk about them anymore.

6. Is your OC stingy with their money (or other resources)? Or are they something of a spendthrift?

She does love dressing nice and looking her best. Money also isn't a concern to her when it comes to working with the poor. Her father taught his children that working with the poor is worth the brief loss in money if it keeps them in a favorable position.

7. Does your OC have a sweet tooth? Or do they prefer to avoid sweets and sugary treats?

Not particularly. She prefers savory foods and pies. She'll eat them out of politeness if they're offered, but very little.

8. Is your OC easily provoked by insults or mockery?

Again, it depends on what about her is being insulted. She is very confident in herself, so insults toward her person doesn't shake her. But the Tyrell reputation is in jeoprady because of recent events in AFW, and her brother was Lord of Highgarden at the time. When it comes to insults toward her house, she can grin and bear it, but insults against her brother she does not take lightly.

9. Where is somewhere your OC has visited that they never want to visit again?

KING'S LANDING. She hated it the first time, and hates it all over again.

10. Is your OC ever somewhat flirtatious?

YES. She's gorgeous and she knows it. Flirtation and charm are two of her most familiar weapons and she uses it often to get her way with men. It's when it doesn't work that she's at a loss.

Very inspired by Margaery Tyrell, if that wasn't obvious

No pressure tags: @asumofwords @ladylokianna @yoursweetheartsrevenge

[subconwoods]

Snatistical Evaluation

I was really surprised to see Snatcher x Reader lose Round 1—when I seeded the bracket, I put it up against Conductor Divorce (which was a joke option I added to round out the poll) as a gimme. The round was designed this way because, as Conductor's Divorce isn't actually a pairing, it would just be giving me a ballpark for how many people actually liked x Reader.

Granted, the AHiT tag on Ao3 isn't that populated to begin with, but Snatcher x Reader is the only romantic pairing other than DiscoTrain to even appear in the Top 10 relationship tags.

It wasn't like the poll simply failed to reach people who like x Reader content, either; I recognized a few names in the notes from the tag reblogging it, and x Reader accounts tend to heavily interact with other x Reader accounts. It didn't make sense to me that so few people voted for it, but towards the end of the polling period, I had an idea for what might have been skewing the results.

So, I made a spreadsheet to test my theory.

I went through the entire Snatcher/Reader tag, noted down every single author's username, and added a counter every time I encountered another upload by them.

(Interestingly, while I went through the entire tag at least three times to double-check I hadn't missed any, the total only added up to 72. It only just occurred to me that the missing four might be hidden from users who don't have an account, which I forgot was a site feature. Oops. Anyway, they aren't taken into consideration for this analysis.)

Here are our results.

Of 72 total uploads:

Six (6) were from anonymous/orphan accounts. Although one or more of these could have been written by the same user, for our purposes, I'll consider them non-recurring.

Twenty-one (21) were from unique authors, "unique" meaning that the user only had a single upload in the tag on their account. Counting the anon/orphan uploads, that's 27 from non-recurring users.

Forty-five (45) were from recurring authors, "recurring" meaning that the user had two or more uploads in the tag on their account. There were eight (8) recurring authors in total, but of those eight, three of them had two and two of them had three, making for twelve (12) uploads from five (5) recurring users.

Then there were....a few names that cropped up again. And again. And again.

4. Thirty-three (33) uploads were from the same three accounts.

Here's the same data represented by percentage.

62.5% of individual fanworks in the tag are from accounts who have posted more than one, while 37.5% are anonymous or from accounts which have posted exactly one.

The top three posters make up the highest percent of any category. Not only do they outnumber the rest of the recurring authors, but three users have created 45.8% of the content in the tag, more than all of the unique uploaders combined.

I expected going in that the number of total works might be inflated by the same users uploading many, but I couldn't have guessed the results would be this extreme.

Verdict: Snatcher x Reader is not actually that popular of a pairing. The people who like it just really like it.

[hazellvsq]

frank/hazel/leo most popular pjo ot3? an analysis

okay so the love triangle poll had me thinking. i knew frank/hazel/leo had ship content on ao3, and i was curious to see if other love triangles or popular trios got the same treatment.

(this is very long and rambling)

this is the amount of ao3 content frank/hazel/leo has:

these are the other trios i was looking at:

last one is crazy lol. anyway, other potential trios like jason/reyna/piper or different combos of percy/annabeth/piper/jason all had less than 20 fics each. its possible i missed one but i'm pretty sure i tried of all of them.

for context, the general state of pjo character and ship content looks like this:

the vast majority of tagged fandom content with frank and hazel has them as background characters. finding content that centers them takes digging. aside from calypso/leo, they have the least popular canon ship, and the only other character that either has any substantial fan content with is leo. the pjo fandom has shipped leo with literally any character he was in proximity with, and hazel was a canon love interest of his. in addition, the pjo fandom has incredibly popular mlm ships and has gone through the time-honored tradition of finding ways to sideline, if not villainize, the canon female love interests. which makes these next stats so interesting to me:

a decent portion of works in both of these tags are frank/hazel/leo fics that got crosstagged. obviously, frank/hazel have more fics than frank/hazel/leo:

however, its impossible to figure out how many of these fics actually center frank/hazel, as opposed to them just being background characters. so i did a test and filtered out all of the more popular ships in their tag:

this isn't a perfect representation, because there are definitely frank/hazel centric-fics that had other ships in the background, and frank/hazel/leo aren't the main couple of every fic they get tagged in. still, though. that's less than the frank/hazel/leo fics.

the other thing about hazel and frank content is that they are the two characters who are most frequently headcanoned as straight. it's died down some in recent years but it used to be CONSTANT (it happened to leo too, but not as much). most fans thought they were the two most "traditional" characters, value-wise. so i was thinking, if frank and hazel got this much content for a poly ship, then the characters that this fandom actually thinks are gay have to have more:

and then i was like, hmmm well okay i'm very surprised there's not more for those three. but there's so many people who ship some combo of nico/percy/jason/will. i've seen so many big 3 edits that leave out the girls. there's no way frank/hazel/leo is beating out the white slash ship industrial complex.

frank/hazel/leo beat out the white slash ship industrial complex (big threesome is a very funny ship name tho).

my biggest guess would be that there was some sort of beef between the percy/nico and jason/nico crowds that has led to this lack of ot3 content. i wouldn't know. i'm wondering if they're going to catch up; its not far off right now. as far as i can tell will solace has no popular ot3's that broke more than 20 fics and is pretty much only shipped with nico.

other potential ot3's like jason/piper/leo...i have a theory that a lot of jason/piper shippers only really shipped it in conjunction with percy/annabeth because they were were a good secondary couple for percabeth-centric fics, and didn't care about leo as much (which could explain why there's more overall content for jason and piper than for leo). also, i think historically a lot of leo fans thought jason and piper were bad friends, although these days there's a lot more renewed appreciation for their trio. piper has also been commonly written as a ship obstacle since the inception of her character, when people thought she was homewrecking jason and reyna (the jason/nico crowd uses this trope too), which might be why she's not commonly put in ot3's despite having chemistry with most of the cast. on the other hand, the "ship wars" between hazel/frank and hazel/leo shippers in the mark of athena era were pretty mild, because most readers liked all three characters and didn't have strong enough feelings about either pairing to fight about it, whereas other ot3's don't get written because fans have a very strong preference for their other ships.

i know frank/hazel/leo has its origins on ff.net, but it was mostly one author and mostly just kink. there's a much bigger variety on ao3. i'm wondering why people liked it enough to make it a side pairing for other fics, and at what point the bulk of content for it was written. i'm wondering what people get out of combining the three of them that you don't get from just two. is it because all 3 dynamics are so clearly defined in canon? some of them also are based on kinks like mpreg that historically exclude women, so why do these authors include one? this is also interesting because the rest of the fanbase, including both fans who ship frank/hazel and fans who think that shipping hazel with anybody is problematic, refuse to write about hazel or frank having sex to the point where it was a fandom meme for a while. except in frank/hazel/leo fics, where a large percentage have explicit content. i'm wondering which of the nico/jason/percy or frank/hazel/leo tags has more mpreg, but i'm okay not knowing.

if you made it this far, there's not a real point to this post, except pointing out that for characters who barely get shipping content, frank/hazel/leo is unexpectedly popular considering how much content exists about them otherwise, and also goes against popular fandom perception of the characters in interesting ways.

[gamebunny-advance]

NSR Comic Ideas I'll Probably Never Get To

My brain worms often prevent me from doing the things I actually want to do, so here's a list of NSR comic ideas that live in my head that I just can't bring myself to actually draw. These aren't full scripts like I've written in the past, but more like general outlines.

Draw them yourself if you want, but tag/credit me if you do. It'd be fun to see other interpretations of these prompts.

Since they're mostly gag comics, I've split them into "Set-Up" and "Punchline" in-case you want to write your own punchline or don't want to spoil the joke with the misguided hope that I will someday bring these to life. Some also have "Extended" parts which I think functionally don't need to be there, but may add context or additional jokes at the risk of dragging it out.

Anyway, I hope y'all enjoy them, and hopefully someday I'll be able to make at least 1 or 2 of these real. If there's a particular one you really like, let me know and it might inspire me to actually do it~

Preview:

Game (Neon J. teaches 1010 a new game.)

Clothes (1010 discuss the concept of nudity.)

Simulation (Kliff plays a 1010 dating sim to gather intel.)

Shorts (Tatiana urges DJSS to reconsider wearing shorts to work.)

Singing (Kliff sings to himself in the hideout.)

Chill (Gigi reveals that he has ice powers.)

Wall (Kliff and Tatiana have an argument that turns violent.)

Magazine (Neon J. tries to find the culprit of a smuggling.)

Trade (Kliff makes a trade.)

"Game" (Warning: Violence)

Set-up: Neon J. offers to teach 1010 how to play a new game. They all agree.

Punchline: NJ throws a gun on the table and declares the game is "Russian Roulette."

Extended: The winner turns out to be Blue (as per the chess poll), but he is traumatized by the events. It turns out to be borderline pointless, as the losing 1010s are immediately restored by the factory. The 1010s attack Neon J. in retaliation.

"Clothes" (Warning: Suggestive)

Set-up: Green holds a meeting to discuss if the concept of "nakedness" applies to the 1010's considering that their "clothes" could also be considered "skin." White is annoyed at the prospect of such a pointless discussion, but the others make their cases. Two camps form: team naked (Red and Green), and team not-naked (Blue and Yellow). Team naked believe the skin theory, and team not-naked believe that functionally they can't be naked. Additionally, Blue believes that their clothes are technically made of skin since they're 80% recycled materials.

White refuses to participate to break the tie, so to settle this Green proposes the "underwear test," claiming that if they look more or less naked while wearing underwear will determine if they are functionally naked or not. If they look more naked with underwear, then they weren't naked before because the underwear would draw attention to their nudity. If they look less naked, then they are naked because now they're more covered up. He convinces White to model for them since he hasn't done anything to help move the conversation anywhere (the sooner they settle this, the sooner they can do something else). White agrees and models some underwear, but all the 1010s determine that he just looks stupid.

Punchline: Green bursts out laughing, revealing that this was just a drawn-out revenge plot. White destroys him and their "Days since White has Destroyed Green" board is reset to 0.

"Simulation"

Set-Up: Kliff hobbles into the sewer looking half-dead and is intercepted by Zam, asking what happened to him. Kliff explains that he was doing research for the upcoming 1010 battle. To meet that end, he discovered that they released a dating sim that was supposedly programmed with the 1010 A.I.'s input, so he figured that there might be something useful in it that he could use for a battle strategy.

"Ellie says: Please don't pirate games from independent developers!"

When asked why he didn't just use a guide or play through for his research, he claims that although each 1010 only has 2 routes (good and bad) plus an ultimate ending for playing all routes, the A.I. adapts to the player, so the information would only be useful if he played as though he was Mayday or Zuke.

Punchline: The content of the game was so expansive and the story so moving that he was burnt-out emotionally and mentally. When he recalls the final ending, he starts crying, mimicking Mayday at the end of the 1010 battle.

"Shorts"

Set-Up: DJSS was recently hired onto NSR and has been pulled into a meeting with Tatiana. Tatiana tries to convince DJSS that wearing shorts is inappropriate dress-code, stating that "There are children here." Offended, DJSS starts pointing out the obvious biases in her request, citing that Neon J. doesn't technically wear pants and Eve accidentally interrupts their meeting in her usual outfit. Tatiana acquiesces on this condition, "Don't come crying to me when you come to regret your choices."

Punchline: DJSS leaves the room in a huff, and begins muttering to himself. At that moment, Yinu and Mama are passing by as Yinu points out that DJSS often talks out loud to himself. DJSS and Mama stop to try and make small talk while Yinu zones out of the conversation. She starts looking at DJSS's leg hairs and grabs onto them. DJSS thinks that she's trying to get his attention, but she suddenly yanks them out, causing him to let out a physical scream which bursts out of NSR tower to be seen by the citizens miles away. When we return to NSR tower, DJSS has toppled over from the pain, and Mama lightly scolds Yinu as they walk away from the scene. DJSS manages to pull himself back into Tatiana's office, crying. To which she replies, "What did I just tell you about crying back to me?"

Extended: It is revealed that this is why DJSS wears platform shoes: to keep Yinu from reaching his leg hairs. He also switched to velcro shoes just to be safe.

"Singing"

Set-Up: Kliff is singing Vs. SAYU to himself in the meeting room. He's embarrassed, but can't help himself because the song is too catchy. He at least finds relief that no one can hear him in there but suddenly notices that someone is peeking in through a crack in the door. It's Zam who was secretly recording it on his phone.

"Ellie says: Don't record people without their permission!"

Zam apologizes and slowly closes the door and begins to talk away before Kliff bursts through the door and begins chase. Zam manages to get the phone to Ellie, who gets the phone to Mayday, who is confused about what's happening. Kliff managed to get back to the game room, but he's too late.

Punchline: Mayday plays the video and says, "Wow Kliff... you've got a really good voice." Zam (who is a little beat-up from the chase) agrees and says, "But he never comes out to karaoke with us." Kliff is confused because he thinks the fact that he was singing one of NSR's songs is embarrassing, but Mayday laments that it's a really catchy song, and she does the same thing sometimes.

"Chill"

Set-Up: It's a hot day in B2J's hideout. Mayday laments the heat when Gigi passes by and puts his hand on her forehead. To her surprise and delight, his hand is really cold. She asks him if he was just holding a cold drink, but he reveals that he's half-ice elemental, so he has a naturally low body temperature, explaining that's why he's always bundled up. Mayday asks if she can hug him, since she thinks a frosty hug would be amazing right now. He's a little hesitant but agrees. Mayday feels relieved from the heat, but Gigi starts sensing murderous intent from somewhere. He notices a darkness flowing out from the meeting room and sees Kliff peering out. He urges Mayday to stop, but before she can do anything, Kliff accidentally falls over into the room from leaning on the door.

Punchline: Mayday wonders why this happened and concludes that Kliff must have been jealous. As Kliff tries to say that "it's not what it looks like", Mayday says, "You're jealous that I'm hogging Gigi all to myself. You can have a turn too." Gigi and Kliff internally monologue about how dense she is, but hug each other anyway to keep up appearances.

Extended: As they hug, Kliff realizes that it actually does feel pretty good. And the next shot has Kliff apparently monopolizing Gigi from the others as the latter wonders how they got to this point.

"Wall"

Set-Up: Tatiana and Kliff are arguing about something when Tatiana suddenly slams her fist into the wall, narrowly missing Kliff's head. Flustered, he says, "You can't win by trying to seduce me!" She replies, "This isn't seduction you moron." Before they can do anything else, they both hear a "Ker-thunk!" as Neon J. has situated a table with a sign reading, "Get wall slammed by Tatiana! $5 [Or the rough equivalent in ringgits]" and a small line has already formed. Tatiana questions this as Kliff slips away from the scene. Neon J. declares that he takes any business opportunity he sees. She's about to tell him to stop when the crowd starts looking disappointed.

Punchline: Tatiana begins wall slamming various characters including:

Mayday, who squees about being wall slammed by Kul Fyra.

Eve, who Tataiana tells could just ask her to do this for her.

Kliff again, who wasn't done with their earlier argument and had to pay Neon J. double since he "got the first one free".

Extended: After all the wall slams, Tatiana is exhausted and Neon J. tallies their profits from the day and gives Tatiana her share. It is also revealed that the "table" was actually a 1010 with a board on his back covered by a tablecloth.

"Magazine" (Warning: Suggestive)

Neon J. has called a meeting for the other 1010s to discover which one of them brought a dirty magazine into the house. They ask where he found it, but he claims it doesn't matter and he just wants to know who it belongs to.

Punchline: The 1010s look to each other but remain silent. Neon J. expresses disappointment that they would disobey orders twice, but they claim that they can't determine who it belongs to without more information. Neon J. then correctly deduces that they all own copies of the exact same magazine, just hidden in different places. They are all grounded for 2 weeks.

Extended: In an attempt to make it easier to identify the culprit the next time this was to happen, Neon J. decides to give each 1010 a different fetish, so he can just match the content to the 1010. To his dismay, this just leads to them finding a magazine which miraculously contains all 5 fetishes.

"Trade"

Set-Up: Kliff sits on a bench in front of a fountain. An individual wearing a trench coat and hat obscuring their face sits next to him. Without looking at the individual, Kliff asks, "Do you have it?" They slide him an envelope. Kliff briefly examines the contents (seemingly a document) which can't be seen by the viewer. After tapping them back in, Kliff sets a USB drive on the bench. The individual takes it. "That should patch up most of your vulnerabilities." Kliff says. "Yeah. Most." The individual says with a square text bubble, revealing himself to be Neon J. As Kliff stands up he says, "I need a reason for you to keep coming back, don't I?" Neon J. is left alone holding the drive before squeezing it in frustration and curses under his breath. Kliff makes his way back to the hideout's meeting room where Mayday is waiting with a stern expression. She asks, "Did you get the goods?" Kliff tosses the envelope onto the desk and says, "I always come through, kid." Mayday examines the contents and smiles to herself.

Punchline: It is revealed that the document is a signed pin-up of Kul Fyra which Mayday excitedly hangs up in the room.

[seewetter]

How low can you go, discourse edition!

"Lawful evil" is a dungeons & dragons game mechanic, not a political analysis. You look silly.

"The person in the comic is correct" which person? They are both stick figures!

To have meaningful discussion about politics, including transfeminist politics, comics aren't suited as the main source of theory. Stick figure comics can cause you to have theoretical insights, they can communicate politics, but they mix entertainment and thought. They are easily digested, like a tv series that people binge watch instead of engaging with a text slowly and methodically.

Beth's* (*just the alias Talia gave her, I know) mistake, in my view, is to try and use the form of a frequently published (!) comic to try and discuss things that must be read "in the context of everything that came before it". In other words, complex theory made so bite-sized that an onlooker can easily misconstrue it as a stand-alone statement. Complex theory that sincere people can misconstrue and that bad faith actors can much more easily misrepresent than long-form communication.

The tags that Beth wrote and got screenshotted by the first commenter are not clear enough. "Comic" can mean comic strip (the individual page of the comic we see embedded in the first post of this thread) or it can mean comic as a totality (all green stickfigure comics Beth makes as a totality). And as a result, outsiders unfamiliar with the comics who don't read the backlog have to trust the comic author (a complete stranger) that these comics are sympathetic to transfeminism.

On the other hand, I think we can expect people to read a note like that and read a small sampling of previous comic pages to get a feel for how honest the author is being. It's not too much to expect people to actually sit down and make an informed decision about whether this comic advocates these ideas. An author would usually not leave a note like Beth did. People who "test the waters" to express their bigoted opinions do so wordlessly, leaving the audience to interpret. They want as many people as possible to read the bigotry with their guard down. "This comic is progressive, just check the backlog" is something bigots are only likely to say when they've been attacked and are defending their stuff. It's not something people say while publishing their work.

Personally, I think the comic page that is causing this strong reaction isn't very insightful. The message I'm taking away from it is "some people think the height of (trans) activism is to not have friends with privilege, to only assume the worst about the intentions of privileged people and to justify it with the veneer of liberation theory which does not support that reading". But here's the thing. It's a comic. It doesn't have to blow my min. It doesn't have to liberate. You and I and everybody else can be unimpressed by this page and we can move along with our day or read the backlog for better pages or ignore its existence. The strong reaction from user thegreenbisamurai is hyperbolic. But I think you, dear reader, now have sufficient context. I'm not assigning equal blame, I think blame firmly lies with people who make zero effort to engage with a post that explicitly asks them to engage with more. But I do think this discussion will always be absurd, will always have a sillyness to it, because

#you fuckers better not take this as a generally anti-transfeminist comic#this exists in the context of everything posted before it. you are fully equipped to understand this as a comic about a specific behavior

will never make sense as a request unless we really assume that people are expected to read an entire oeuvre before judging a stick figure comic.

The strong reactions (at least in this thread) appear to be "this comic f*cked up" or "the author is displaying a discriminatory idea to me". Basically various people who read the comic don't get the point the comic is making. Perhaps in part because "wow some people really are over-suspicious and separatist and then blame theory, huh" is not a message that particularly helps people unpack their own suspicions and separatist opinions.

"Privileged people always have bad intentions. It's only a matter of time till they strike and betray you. That's what we have learned from good theory books." is a much more common opinion than "Trans and cis people can't be friends. No more race mixing." Right? The comic aims very broadly at all these tendencies, likely even at tendencies not directly voiced by the stick figures! I mean just look at all the wild hills people try to die on because they have a doomer interpretation of some theory book. Uh, the list is endless! But I can see how the user thegreenbisamurai might feel that the comic lumps all these people together not because it is primarily critiqueing bad reads of theory (for an audience already accustomed to poking fun at both self-destructive hyper-suspicious mindsets and also used to poking fun at separatists) but because, if you don't know what the core critique is or what the audience of this comic believes, it can feel like its lumping every target of criticism together into a strawman group of bad people. Laughable bad people, easily mocked for their backwater beliefs, such as their hillbilly mistrust of cis and transmasc strangers, all of whom are quasi-racist redneck separatists who us civilized open-minded trans people do not take seriously.

That's why 4chan was mentioned, I think. Because 4chan comics represent that kind of "lumping together", strawmanning the Other without nuance. And in a way, Beth's comic does do that too! Like yes, it's written for people who poke fun at these tendencies, who've already agreed that they think all these ideas are bad. The comic doesn't feel the need to justify itself to parts of the trans community who feel these suspicions of cis people or transmasculine people. They are not the intended audience -- and yet the tags below the comic are sort of for them, aren't they. They are expected to have sufficient willingness to read the comic in good faith, to not attack a statement that is built on the unspoken assumption that they are wrong. And that their feelings are misguided, mistaken, and that some introspection is necessary to stop misusing theory to argue that suspicions of privileged people are justified. Which, to be honest, I wish that too! In a perfect world, I want people to just introspect about every opinion they hold, every emotional reaction they have. I want people to approach these comics in good faith and treat them with good humour and a grain of salt.

But for many people, this hyper-suspicion is dead serious. It's a defense mechanism. And their reading of theory is strongly shaped by the fact that these theory books gave them more information about worrisome things in society. That's one of their takeaways from transfeminist literature, because that's what they were looking for: things to watch out for, potential dangers.

I really don't think it makes sense to expect people to make that leap. I know there are trans people out there who have convinced themselves that no trans person has a happy relationship with their parents! That your parents can't love you and will always betray you. These are assumptions and sweeping assertions made from a raw emotional place. A place of stupidity. They can't be fixed by telling people to reconsider, because these ideas have some kind of "use" for people. I think it's important to remember how lonely some trans people are, how dependent some trans people are on the trans community -- how dependent some transfem people are on the transfem communities around them. How risky it can be (or feel) to reach out to a privileged person. Heck, I am hyper-cautious about it myself. Sometimes it's easier to delude oneself that these are iron laws of reality, that no one out there is happy among cis or transmasc friends or also comforting: being right, always, always being proven right eventually, and not having to bear the pain that reality is unpredictable and weird, preferring predictable patterns like that everyone will predictably betray you.

Bad takes? In my trans community? It's more likely than you...get it, it's a meme, I hate myself.

Anyway, I don't expect Beth to not make funny stick figure comics. I don't know if she has a financial incentive to post all the time, but she may have. And if there's a financial (or otherwise) incentive to post a lot, sometimes posters like that will express thoughts badly. That's the nature of how mass production works. If I make a comic every week, I may just not find the time to really make the message perfect. I know this. That's why I take Beth's comics with a grain of salt -- I smile at some when I come across them, I think others (like this one) are meaningless. There's even some I disagree with (I don't have examples for that, I'm not a regular reader).

But equally I don't expect people on Tumblr to be able to parse the meaning of a comic or to read a backlog of comics. Remember the Neil Gaiman revelations of the past few weeks? In the aftermath of that, there was a post going around that claims that Gaiman (on top of being a horrific serial abuser) ripped off a small author. But I've also come across a counter-claim, that some guy on the internet invented the similarities between Gaiman's Sandman story and the universe of this small author wholecloth. For clout! I say all this because I don't have the time "read the backlog". Maybe in a few years, I'll have the money and time to read the small author and compare her work to what I know of Sandman (which is from the tv series, never read the comics). But until then, I can only relate to it with ignorance. I don't know! The internet is full of green stick figure comics or posts making accusations. And we have to make ethical judgment calls. I think thegreenbisamurai's post is actually fairly subdued, the typical grumblings of someone who is unconvinced by an argument and finds it unfair (for pretty understandable reasons!). I also think Beth's comic is fine, nothing that needs to change about it. And I find Talia Bhatt's responses fine too! So in short, I don't really think there is much to talk about here.

But I do want to address summertimesadnessgirl's reaction.

"This is about Christianity, right?"

It is? How so? Ok, I've read the whole post and I guess I'll respond with more substance later...but, to employ a Christian rhetorical figure, what a hell of an opening statement!

"Look.

This isn't complicated.

It actually is possible for double think to exist which causes people to support ideology which ruins the lives of people they see every day and are "nice" to."

I think it is helpful to quote the people you respond to. When you don't quote them, you end up writing about niceness and doublethink and Christianity and talking about various things other people aren't explicitly talking about and it comes across like you are from another planet.

The thing summertimesadnessgirl is trying to say (I think) is that a person like Beth can be a transfeminist with hypocritical (transphobic, transmisogynistic) tendencies.

I take it that had summertimesadnessgirl clearly stated this, it would be far less confusing to read!

"They teach it to people who grow up in Christianity, for sure."

There are 2,000,000,000 people on this planet who grow up in a Christian tradition. Do you know how many German Catholics have committed themselves to continuous mass protests against a sexist, homophobic and transphobic church doctrine? Have you seen the uproar?

Ok, that's not the point though, is it. Chilean or German Catholics and Unitarian Universalists may be chill people, but current Catholic doctrine is monstrous yet "nice", and evangelicals like John MacArthur dare to say that we live on a "disposable" planet. Nietzsche had a point when he critiqued the Christian idea of love that masks hate. So I'll grant summertimesadnessgirl that you can convince good people to do evil things through something like a religion. You can convince people to define "nice" or "virtuous" in ways that are destructive and horrible.

"They teach it to people who grow up with white supremacy and bigotry."

I wouldn't be so sure. A lot of white supremacists know that they are evil. H.P. Lovecraft is the rare historical figure whose racism came from genuine ignorance about foreign cultures (his parents were mostly in mental institutions, he grew up alone next to a bookshelf full of books with racist propaganda about Africa and the Middle-East) -- and notably, Lovecraft came to regret much of his ideas and writings towards the end of his life. But like most racists know that they are just fantasizing the Other into existence. Putin's racist advisor Aleksandr Dugin knows that Russia doesn't really have "it's own reality", he just says that because it confuses people. The darling of the modern alt-right, Julius Evola argued for racial supremacy "on spiritual grounds" just because he knew nobody could argue with him on that terrain. Nazi Germany declared their neighbours, the French, to be subhuman and their culturally completely alien allies, the Japanese, to be "Yellow Aryans". Does that sound like a conclusion reached naively, through ignorance? Or does it sound like political calculation?

But okay, that's not the point either, is it. Yes, good people can internalize racial messaging. People can hate racism yet have difficulties interacting with racial minorities.

And yes, those observations do apply to this comic. A hypothetical version of the comic's author could promote hostility towards some important liberatory goals! It's possible.

I don't think so though, and I have reason to be wary of such accusations.

Separatism (Group A can't be friends with Group B) is historically associated exclusively with bigots. Even modern black supremacists like Gazi Kodzo, who argue black and white people can't befriend each other, are in bed with the alt right (Kodzo also believes that Hitler did nothing wrong, and his insistence that he's gay and a socialist don't really help convince me that his anti-white-black friendship stance offers any kind of helpful future to anyone)

Suspicions of ill intentions and betrayal are fine, but people who use these suspicions as preaching material and get mad when someone trusts other people are preventing our ability as a transgender movement to not remain isolated and politically removed from the gears that enable us to prevent our extermination.

The comics method that people should not read into theory and should instead be self-reflective is not some secretly bigoted opinion.

"It's part of lawful evil culture."

That's a 5. Oh, I'm so sorry. The wisdom check fails and you're going to have to roll for initiative. Look, I don't think these are drow you're attacking, I think they're just other trans people. Oh no! Your character won't be able to stop her attack. I'm so sorry.

"Lawful evil culture includes even people who engage in doing a behavior themselves on a regular and consistent basis and claim to love the behavior and then work to make the behavior illegal and punish people who make the behavior possible-"

Give me an example.

I hate to put people on the spot like this, but I think what happened here is this: summertimesadnessgirl had a (genuine, not joking!) epiphany and is articulating something worth articulating: that there are often people who seem to be on our side but then back legal efforts that go in the exact opposite direction. Example: Kyrsten Sinema, a bisexual activist whose radical ideas seem to have evaporated in her role as a politician in Washington. Example: overhyped New York mayor Cuomo, who spoke the language of progressive activism and intersectionality so well, that his sudden betrayal of Black Lives Matter activists was all the more horrific!

But without examples, people don't know what you're talking about.

Other examples may include Christian hate preachers like Jerry Falwell who are caught with male prostitutes (Falwell famously tried to excuse his behaviour and said something along the lines of "to understand evil, you have to explore evil").

But crucially, your examples need to work. Falwell is a bad analogy for this comic, because Falwell is a hate preacher who secretly betrays his hateful community. Cuomo and Sinema are bad analogies because neither are sincere, Sinema may have morphed into a monster over time, or perhaps both were always dishonest people just waiting to manipulate progressives for political gain. None of these examples, as much as they express the duality of speaking vs doing, are really examples of a well-meaning person passing a horror law!

Perhaps the closest analogy, in the legal realm, of genuinely well-meaning progressive people unleashing horror on minorities happened in Florida under Ron DeSantis, who passed some kind of anti-LGBT legislation that found a lot of support among liberals. But importantly, those liberals didn't realize what the legislation did in its entirety. It was framed as a support for parents, I believe, and quite a few liberals just didn't look at the proposal in detail.

Plenty of material for summertimesadnessgirl to pontificate about "lawful evil culture" and confirm that lawful evil culture works exactly as defined by using examples... but if these examples are unrelated to this comic, then...then why?

"Like homophobic and trans phobic people who vote to have rights taken away from queer people while crossdressing in their sex lives or having gay sex, or people who regularly use porn and vote to have porn censored and make the lives of people who are consenting adults legally producing porn difficult. Those things are a regular feature of the cognitive dissonance in lawful evil culture."

Some people want power. Bigots are quick to give power to those who support their bigotry.

The official biography of Jarosław Kaczynski (the right-wing former leader of Catholic supremacists in Poland) states that in university, Kaczynski went to gender consultation. So it's possible Kaczynski, someone who has done harm to queer and trans people at the highest level, is a closeted transfem. But what summertimesadnessgirl has to prove is that the Kaczynski's of the world aren't aware of what they are doing. That they go to gender consultation, get positive vibe about being trans and then join the leopards eating faces party through sheer cognitive dissonance.

That's what's so hard to believe about the argument.

Like I understand Kanye West watches porn and wants it banned. But I'm pretty sure Kanye West feels guilt at his porn consumption. He calls himself a porn addict. He thinks something bad is being done to him, he interprets the pleasure he feels through the frame of an evil industry that he blames for his feelings.

The Jerry Falwell's and Jarosław Kaczynski's of the world may crossdress in bed (I don't know) but they aren't simultaneously excited about promoting queer rights and also trying to get queer people killed. That's not how cognitive dissonance works.

"Lawful evil culture will argue that something the person does is fun and they like it, but it's a net negative for society, or that it's out of it's proper place, or some other thing."

Yes, but what does this have to do with this comic?

"There are a bunch of reasons they do this."

Yes, but how does this relate to this comic?

"But pretending that a group of people who follow all belief system that says "everyone in this group deserves this bad outcome" will not turn on you because they are nice doesn't work."

The comic differentiates between two types of groups: demographics (men, women, trans people, cis people, transmasculine people, transfeminine people) and agents of marginalization (transphobes, transmisogynists, etc.). You don't seem to? Should I believe that Kaczynski, a Christian nationalist, is safe to be around? Hell no, I'm not suicidal! Should I believe that my friend Xander, a trans guy who has never said or done anything cruel to me and whom I want to protect from his bigoted family, who does not follow a belief system that "everyone in this group deserves this bad outcome"... should I believe this friend of mine will betray me? That this is a law of nature? That I must be afraid of him, though he is a decade younger than me? Do I need to quiver in fear?

People are people. I've met transmasc genderfluid people who have treated me without the barest shred of consideration or kindness and projected their trauma onto me with zero consideration for what transfems go through and trans men who have been far kinder, who never hurt me in any way. There is no neat box that will quickly tell you who is safe, there are only (behavioural) red flags.

rationalize

[ID: Three panel comic with crudely drawn stick people

Panel 1: A leaf green person is talking to a grass green person with a hat and glasses.

Leaf: "And then Orange said that-"

Grass: "Orange"? Your friend is orange?"

Leaf: "Yeah?"

Grass: "Why do you have non-green friends? Don't you know about misoviridy??"

Leaf: "…I have plenty of non-green friends. I have grayscale friends, even."

Panel 2: Grass Green solemnly holds Leaf Green's shoulder.

Grass: "Look. I hate to be the one to tell you this, but every single misoviridy-exempt friend you have secretly hates you.

Leaf: "Uh. That is not true."

Grass: "It's basic viridist theory. Every single moment they're around you, they're thinking about it."

Panel 3: The grass green person tips their hat down.

Grass: "Look. I get it. You're naive and uninformed. You don't know better. But read "Pruning Greens." Then you will understand."

Leaf: "I already read that. It did not say the things you are saying."

Grass: "You will see. It is inevitable."

Leaf: "No I think you're just finding a new way to rationalize really unhealthy thought patterns here actually"

End ID.]

Start - Previous - Next

[lemonhemlock]

I don't get why any team green supporter would want the "Aemond is the father" theory to be true. It would only serve to undermine team green and shit on Alicent. I've seen many team black people that like this theory and their reasons are: "it's an good ironic twist since Alicent hated Rhaenyra's bastards", "it would highlight team green's hypocrisy, "see, the bastard argument doesn't matter, etc." Basically, they want to use it as "gotcha."

I think this theory only serves to prop up team black and will ruin team green's depiction even more. And no, I'm not a "Helaemond anti." I'm fine if they want to make it romantic instead of platonic, but I'd hate it if they make the kids Aemond's.

i don't know what to tell you anon since i already have a ton of posts in my backlog cataloging those very points so i'm going to redirect you to my helaemond tag. although some stuff might be found under the anon wars tag or inbox antagonism as i got besieged at one point

i'm just going to say that the greens being hypocritical in one regard isn't the end of the world. i don't know why people are so against this, they're not meant to be perfect angels. and they're getting much worse as the story progresses. also this changes nothing for the actual plot.

the bastardy argument absolutely does still matter, because it's a different thing entirely to have plausible bastards you can pass off as trueborn. we all know that if cersei had fathered those children with stannis (lol), we'd be having a different conversation. how would this amount to a gotcha moment for rhaenyra? she doesn't know shit and can't prove shit. meanwhile her children are looking like harwin strong's clones. aegon has got himself very properly targaryen-looking kids.

there's no DNA testing, but people aren't stupid either. those working in agriculture and animal husbandry have been manipulating genetics for thousands of years to get better crops and food without studying chromosomes under the microscope. sure, their understanding was limited, but it's reasonable to assume they would, at the very least, realise that a Rhaenyra-Laenor marriage could not produce Strong features and find it Pretty Sus

but, you know, what actually really bothers us is that no matter how often we explain these things, it gets ignored and unaddressed. so people just regurgitate the same talking points again and again. it's hard to believe people are not doing it in bad faith at this point. not saying that's your intention, anon, but go to any helaemond account and you'll see that we've been over this already. many times. it's really like talking to a wall. and we still get "i don't understand why some people like this idea" type of questions even though there's a lot of ink spilled on the topic already

and these different asks from different anons:

Anonymous asked: I think people get so riled up about Helaemond and for what 😭 it’s a shipper theory. There are minuscule hints in season one, but like you said, the show could very well never do anything with them. That’s it! Why is it always such a big thing lmao

bingo. this is what it amounts to. the show's framing is there, it's implied as a possibility, yes, it's subtext, for the millionth time, we get it. why would any green sympathizer be interested in this? because they'd find exploring those particular themes interesting in a fictional setting. whether it be angst or longing or star-crossed lovers or dreadful secrets that eat you alive and consume you from within.

there are a hundred of different flavours to any ship. you may not like every one but do you even have to? people who hate this theory talk about it more than people who actually like this theory. is that normal?

Anonymous asked: You don’t have to answer, I know you’re done with ship asks, it just confuses me how people on all ends of the spectrum cry about how others are self inserting or wildly changing a ship. F&B barely gives the main characters a ton of attention, ships even less so. Why argue over something that gets one-two pages? It doesn’t seem worthwhile to me. The show is liable to change plenty of things, as we’ve already seen. The rhaenicent dynamic is so different from the book. The idea of them changing other things is incomprehensible? And “making up characterization/personalities/etc”- doesn’t everyone do this? Isn’t this the purpose of fanfic? I feel like I’m in an alternate universe sometimes where the idea of someone developing a side character is not only normal, it’s encouraged. Fandoms do it all the time.

hey there, i'm not ~done with shipping asks, as this is my blog at the end of the day and i can be as annoying as i want. :)) i see both sides of this issue.

one the one hand, it's sometimes baffling how much of a difference there is between the actual presentation within a text / on screen and the fanon interpretations. i think like there is a conversation here and it is sometimes indicative of some other issues. it's not always just innocent, self-aware changes made for fun, sometimes it's also a question of media literacy or personal / societal prejudices at play here.

a personal example from my reading experiences was the fact that i used to encounter a lot of fics where alicent was depicted as this awful mother who hates her children and sees them as tools. i would get so tired of seeing this take (which i consider bullshit for a number of reasons) that it was kind of a frustrating situation, since it seemed that was the (undeserved) way she was being portrayed all over the fandom. it would bother me bc it's also something so prevailing in society today, to demonise women who are trying their best as bad mothers and place the burden of child-rearing on them. for example, people would look at the scene of a distressed alicent trying to calm a continuously crying helaena and would claim that the baby hates her because she is such a horrible mother to her. anyway. many such examples. you can look up my opinions on lucemond, for instance. :))

on the other hand, most fics imply some sort of changes somewhere, whether they're a fix-it, canon divergence, a freaking coffee shop AU, a crackship or characters acting OOC. it's completely normal AND harmless at the end of the day. so, as long as people mind their own business and are not being arseholes to each other, to each their own. the people who want to make these changes should be free to write without getting hate for it and the people who are frustrated by interpretations they dislike can rant about it in their own spaces and that should be that.

it truly becomes an issue when people don't mind others boundaries' anymore, become so hateful with others and resort to name-calling, morality high-horsing and other forms of online harassment and bullying. for example, there are many people who write fics i don't care for or have takes i strongly disagree with, but i've never in my life went to their inboxes to disparage them, send them hate, dictate what they should post, leave comments on their fics, deride their artwork, tell them to kys or any such things. at the end of the day it's about having some basic manners, you know? it's ok to not like stuff and feel frustrated about it, but do you have to make it everyone else's problem? can you not just convey your displeasure in a more considerate way?

Anonymous asked: putting aside that self inserts in fic are as old as time and will never stop being a thing so it’s silly to complain (aemond/ofc has more fic on ao3 than alysmond, helaemond, aegond and daemond combined) I think people throw around that insult the same way they used to make fun of people for even writing fic. like it’s so silly and fangirly and dumb. But what most people are doing with literally any aemond ship is finding a dynamic they enjoy/find interesting and running with it. they expand on the characters because they have to, f&b is so sparsely drawn and the show had to cram 2 decades into 10 episodes. there simply isn’t a lot of source material. so using that as a foundation and crafting more rounded characters isn’t a crime, it’s simply fandom? i don’t relate to having prophetic dreams and marrying my alcoholic brother any more than i relate to being a hot goth milf who can do blood magick. both can be expanded on and played with because that’s what you do when you enjoy media!

this was in reference to a caustic anon that was accusing me of self-inserting into helaena. :)) OP is making some fair points here, i don't have much to add but thought it interesting as a general commentary on fandom

Anonymous asked: Even if you were engaging in ship wars and stoking flames (which you really aren’t, I don’t think any of your personal discussions have been inflammatory) it’s your blog. People can block and unfollow if they dislike the content? I can’t imagine asking someone to confirm more to what I want to see on their blog, as a fan.

yes, thank you, this was sent to me because i sometimes get requests from people asking me not to post something in favour of something else. this particular instance was because i answered other helaemond asks at the time.

is it fair? idk! some of those requests are worded v politely, so i'm not upset by them or anything, but, at the same time, shouldn't this blog be something that caters to me first and foremost? not to toot my own horn, but i should be my first customer in this regard. why else would i post if i don't enjoy doing it? i don't get paid for doing this, it's my own free time involved. if i have a day where i want to post shipping asks instead of something else, why not? if i have a day when i don't want to or can't muster up a coherent answer, i feel like it should be equally fine?

another thing that people don't realise - some might not like a topic or me talking about shipping wars for the 234th time this week, but others do. otherwise i wouldn't be getting so many messages about this. so, by trying to please 1 or 2 people, i might end up displeasing others. is that a good trade-off? this is why i don't even want to start considering my blog in those terms. "pleasing" everyone is an impossible objective, so i might as well just write about things if i enjoy them and not if i don't want to.

similarly, you're never going to find an account that caters 100% to your tastes, so i feel like trying to make it so by putting pressure on other people to post what you specifically want is an endeavour doomed to failure from the start. your first reaction when seeing something you're not interested in should be to scroll past, not to feel the urge to make people aware that you experienced a minor inconvenience and should, therefore, be accommodated accordingly.

[evilluminati]

Gush about your OC

Ahm, I got tagged by my dear @shynrel-vp , thank you for this opportunity to talk a little bit more of my character. Even tho I have five of them I choosed the one I'm enjoying the most right now.

RULES:

Post 5 Facts about your OC.

Open the latest section of #cyberpunk 2077 tag and reblog 5 posts of people you don’t follow, giving them nice tags.  

Tag 5 People to spread the game.

So... I'll be talking about my nuthead assassin: Kayn.

Delivered to Arasaka when he was just a kid, he didn't have the tradicional childhood. Unfamiliar with simple plays like hide and seek, he spent most of that time studying what the corporation let him have acess like science chemistry and physics. His sense of humor is very dried and awkward, he doesn't understand jokes very much and his jokes aren't understandable either what makes him a lonely dude. (humor reference: sheldon cooper from the big bang theory)

At first Kayn was a project Arasaka wanted to start that was the implatantion of the personalities constructs on youngers to make their body a "second home" for the members of the council. The project was shout down but the constructs were never removed or used, it was an cyber empty space in their heads that the corporation could use for whatever reason they want in the future. The project name can be found in the source code of the construct and it is: MMLXXX (2088), the year they wanted to present this to the world.

One day he was sent to eliminate a man but it was an ambush to test him. So when Kayn got there it wasn't just the target, even tho Kayn gave them a hard time in the end they won by number, beaten up to almost death. He woke up one week later in the hospital. Kayn developed a second personality in that time, his name is Rakin. A curious thing is that he was responsable for making him wake up since the main persona was too weak that time. Rakin is irrelevant, vengeful, violent and stronger. When he left the hospital the second persona made Kayn blind for revenge and week by week he spent killing everyone that was on that day. His brain got affected by his other persona like a poison corrupting it, he was tested in Arakasa and they saw this persona was affecting the construct either what was an unique ocasion. Arasaka took advantage of that, turning Kayn into an assassin for them, all his files got classified and he suddenly turned into a shadow, what was the perfect deal.

One day in a test at Arasaka lost his mind in a crisis while was connected in the cyberspace to see how was the construct that made Rakin suddenly starts to took over it, filling in the empty space of the engram and actually putting an organic personality there. This event made a black mark in his face that was caused by a corruption that accidentally happened when it was taken, this also made Kayn develop heterochromia since his yellow eye is his natural one and the red one is actually from his alter ego. Arasaka once again didn't know what to do with that so they tried to turn Rakin into an personality construct but it would kill Kayn but with the several attempts he turned into a hybrid: now they have the human personality: Kayn & there's also Rakin the persona living in the cyberspace even tho he isn't an AI and can influence in Kayn's mind as an organic one.

In the recent days he still works for Arasaka and have what he call friends from work - they are not his friends and he doesn't like them. In a birthday party of one of his fella workers he was drag to a karaoke which he hated a lot, he met Lazuli (@wingdeer oc), little did he know he was talking to an AI. But since he doesn't have any sense of humor he didn't notice she wasn't human and found her very pleasent, that made something very rare happen: Kayn and Rakin now had an interest in commun. Fun fact: He will not care that she's an AI, he finds her more interesting than everyone that has been around him in his whole life. (I might write something for them soon).

Well, tagging time. Of course no pressure/obligation but I would like to know about your OC's and want people to know about them too. @mentorun @mhbcaps @neverfadesaway @fonfan121 @rebelcroftvp