#so weird that OP is getting these really defensive replies from a very reasonable point about the mirror test

[local-hellhound-steals-spaghetti]

OP is right, though! The mirror test is inherently flawed considering that we are using a research method we use for humans - a visual species - for animals that interact with the world in vastly different ways.

It's good to question science that is still evolving - animal cognition is definitely one of those fields where our data is limited and there is room for discussion. It's not anti intellectualism to bring up flaws in animal cognition science and the anthropocentric lens that limits it - it's a discussion we are having right now within the scientific community. That's how science is!

The mirror test was considered initially to be this revolutionary way to determine self awareness in animals and all these big implications of intelligence and ability to percieve and understand ideas of "the self". Yet just recently, ghost crabs and cleaner wrasse also passed the test. So are these species actually super intelligent and self aware even though they're not what we consider to be "intelligent" because they're not charimastic megafauna or socially intelligent mammals?

Is the test actually doing the things it was claiming to do or are we trying to draw conclusions from a shaky methodology that isn't actually acknowldging the subject species' umwelt (how they percieve the world)?

Dolphins are one of the species that people refer to as "self aware" because of the mirror test - but the study has never been consistently replicated in a large sample study of animals. And it doesn't make a lot of sense for an animal that heavily uses acoustic recognition to be as visually inclined as humans are.

The biggest flaw with a lot of animal cognition studies, particularly the "self awareness" research is that we study animals with humans as a baseline of the highest intelligence - which is exactly what OP is trying to say here.

the mirror test is crazy. "we tested a bunch of animals to see if they share the exact same senses, grooming habits, and love of mirrors as a 30 year old new yorker. this is the most objective standard of sentience possible"

[theflyindutchwoman]

I read your reply to an ask about Tim and Isabel laughing together about the meditation and I think there are quite a few strange things in that episode. I do not really understand what the writers were trying to do, because to me Tim and Lucy’s communication is all off this episode. And communication is what they are so good at and really their strong point. It starts with Tim inviting Isabel to Lucy’s place and forgetting to tell her (I can forgive him on that, he had a good reason to forget..). But Lucy thinks it is weird, but says it only to Tamara. Isabel’s presence affects both Tim and Lucy’s behavior in a space (Lucy’s apartment) they are usually so comfortable. It is such a contrast to how close and cosy they were just before she arrived. 

Later Tim expresses to Isabel that Lucy is different, but does he communicate this to Lucy really? When Lucy and Isabel are in the car waiting, Isabel suggests they should turn off their mic, so Tim cannot hear and they talk about what being undercover entails. When Tim asks later what that was about and Lucy makes a joke instead of being honest, it gave me an iffy feeling. Cause no wonder he is already a bit defensive when Lucy wants to be vulnerable and says she is worried he won’t be able to handle her being undercover. I think he might suspect that the conversation he was cut out from was about discussing undercover experiences. On the one hand I think it is great that Lucy brought up her worries about how going undercover will affect their relationship and that she cares how it affects him (which is kind of how I read what she said). On the other hand she is not involving him in how she feels about it and what worries she was for herself. 

Also a bit sad that an episode that involved a lot of them not communicating well with each other ends on that note too :(

Sorry, this was a a lot of thoughts  and I do not if it makes sense. I am very curious what your take on it is :)

The way I see it, Isabel was used as a catalyst to propel this part of the UC storyline : how this is going to impact their relationship. Up until this point, Lucy and Tim had avoided that topic like the plague. Even after Noah's remark that UC was a relationship killer or his question as to why she hadn't done any op since finishing UC school… Isabel's return is what forced them to finally start this conversation. So I get why their communication was a bit off : this is only the beginning, where they themselves are trying to figure out how they feel and are unsure on how to proceed.

In some ways, it is a parallel with 1.01, when Isabel crashed back into Tim's life, pushing him to open up to Lucy. This is how their bond started… And this is the same here : Isabel showed up (almost) unannounced and soon after, Lucy and Tim started to be more open about their feelings. You can see the progression between 5.20 where he shuts down and try to pretend that everything is alright and 5.21 where they actually start to hash this out.

But yes, like you said, there were a few strange things… And I'm not sure if that was on purpose or if something got lost in the execution. Let's start with Tim inviting his ex-wife to Lucy's apartment… I get the idea behind this. By having Isabel coming over, it sent a clear message : Tim is basically living with her and he didn't want to hide anything from her. 'A place of honesty'. Plus, it made the transition in the scene easier. Just like I can understand why he didn't tell her… It's not like there isn't a precedent of his brain going blank when he sees Lucy in the shower. Don't get me wrong, it would have been preferable to ask her if she was OK with this beforehand… But as it was a last minute thing, I can get over it. The problem is that all these points were negated right away. If this was supposed to show them as a united front, then having Lucy being weirded out a bit changes the narrative. Especially since, like you said, it goes unaddressed. And that's really where the scene goes downhill for me. She is not only relegated to prepare the coffee while Isabel and Tim go to the living-room to talk (they could have stayed in the kitchen), she also has to sit on the floor, practically at their feet… Let's just say that this image made me very uncomfortable. I doubt it was intentional but still. And even without all the implications behind this, having Tim and Isabel sitting together with Lucy on the side contradicted this idea of united front. It completely threw off their dynamic and as it directly followed that lovely scene at the very beginning, it made the contrast even more jarring.

And it didn't end there… I feel like the writers suffered from a tunnel vision problem. They were so focused on making Isabel friendly that it sometimes came at the detriment of Lucy and Tim, as individuals and as a couple. The thing is, I really appreciate that they wanted her to be friendly with the both of them. She wasn't used as a device to come between them (not in a love triangle way) and that is so refreshing. But the execution didn't fully come through. Her scene with Tim at the station, where she laughs with him about the meditation, felt too much like a joke at Lucy's expense. And her scene with Lucy in the car, when they turn off the mic just to mess with Tim, came across as almost callous in light of his insecurities regarding secrets. And I don't think that was the intention at all in both cases. The scene between Lucy and Isabel was great on paper : Lucy has always looked up to the other female agents (Capt. Andersen, Nyla, even Angela though we don't have as many scenes). And she was already curious of Isabel when she met her in 1.03. So it made sense that she would want her opinion. And I liked that she felt comfortable enough to joke with her or that there was no jealousy/rivalry. But the camaraderie went a little too far when Tim or Lucy became the butt of the joke - at least, for me. Although the 'keeping secrets' part was addressed a bit in 5.21�� So there's that. And it was clear during the episode that Isabel was overcompensating : I can't imagine how hard it must have been for her to go back to her old life, facing the people who saw her at her worst. It just needed a few tweaks here and there to make it more seamless.

As for that final scene in 5.20, I actually get where Lucy is coming from. She does open up first by sharing how much she loves undercover. She is being vulnerable here. She is aware that this is a sore subject with him and I believe a part of her might be afraid of his reaction as well. And that's why she wants to know how he feels. She knows his baggage here. Besides, that's her MO. They always focus on the other. Had she touched on how she felt, Tim would have jumped on that, instead of his own fears. There's also the fact that it is her choice to pursue UC, so she might consider her own worries to be her burdens, if you know what I mean. They are both learning how to be in this relationship, so they are bound to make some mistakes. Since 5.20 served as an introduction for the undercover mission in 5.21 and for that whole UC arc, I didn't mind that their communication was still off by the end of that episode (though I get it). I think the hesitation and the fear that were palpable helped a lot as well. So is the fact that they took a step in the right direction in 5.21 : they kept maintaining a line of communication and they both shared some of their fears. It's a work in progress in so many ways and there should be more to come. Maybe once we get to the bottom of this arc, everything will fall into places. I hope this helps a bit :)

[fbfh]

fangirl’s paradise - leo x reader

genre/vibe: romance, adventure, slice of life

word count: 2.8k

pronouns/perspective: first person present, no pronouns (I think), gn reader

au: soulmate kind of?? also traveling to other dimensions/multiverse

pairing: Leo x fic writer!reader

requested: nah

warnings: you think someone broke into your house for a minute, you feel like you’re going crazy for a minute, questionable pop culture/internet references, you get really embarrased about stuff you’ve written, you say fuck a lot, tiddy as an explative

summary: all you wanted to do was write some leo one shots for your blog, but finding out he’s your soulmate is good too

reccomended songs: havana - camila cabello, where do we go from here - amelie obc

a/n: got really meta and self indulgent with this bad boy, probs gonna do a part 2 at some point, cause this got really long and I started to get tired lol. For clarity, you’re from the riordanverse, but ended up in a world where it’s fictional. also some memories were erased. 

requests r open xo

All I wanted to do was dance embarrassingly and sing along to the same playlist I’d been listening to for the past three days in terrible accents while I wait for my ramen to finish cooking. That’s it. I really don’t think that’s too much to ask for. Plus, I’ve been home alone all day, so it’s really not too much to ask for. I flip over the waistband of my sweatpants while shimmying my way to the kitchen. 

“Half of my heart is in havana oh nana,” I sing along off key, in a pseudo growly voice that makes me giggle. I’m going to turn the corner, make myself some ramen, then finish the episode of love island I’ve been watching. Except that’s not what happens.

“He got tha-” I cut myself off with a scream, seeing a stranger in the hall way. He looks up. I scream more, way more, and choke out, “JFK’s left fucking tiddy!”, because this dude is either the best freaking cosplayer ever, or those tiktok reality shifting tutorials actually worked at some point. 

He looks too natural, too organic. The level of detail and strategic imperfection is beyond conscious choice. There’s no way he’s a cosplayer that broke into my house. Also, that would be a super weird crime. 

Either way, I’m standing in front of a dude who looks exactly like Leo Valdez. 

It feels… fake.

I didn’t really notice I’m covering my mouth with my hand to stop my hysterical scream laughs, but I’m able to get it under control after a second. 

He’s looking at me, eyes wide, examining me, probably wondering why I’m acting so erratically. Or why I just spat out such strange bullshit. In my defense, I’ve been watching chaotic tiktok compilations inbetween updating my blog for like, two days straight. Three other people round the corner. I don’t know what I expected, and it shouldn’t have been a surprise at this point, but I’m sure I’m looking no other than at Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase, and Piper Mclean. 

“Jesus fucking christ, fuck me with a chainsaw!” I spit, retreating into the kitchen, reminding myself that while they are my favorite characters - and again, somehow real and in front of me? - they’re still technically intruders. I grab the nearest kitchen implement, a pair of red kitchen scissors I’d used to hack open the ramen packet, and point it at them. 

“Woah,” Piper says, “it’s okay, we’re not going to hurt you.” I count to four and breathe in, setting the scissors back down within arms reach. Hold for seven, exhale for eight. I repeated the process again, watching Annabeth whispering to Leo.

I can feel the initial freak out subsiding. I’m starting to calm down a little.

“We’re not going to hurt you,” Piper repeats. Well duh, they’re the good guys. A spike of pure what the fuck shoots through me, as I realize I’m already adapting to the fact that fictional fucking characters are standing in my kitchen. Leo’s ignoring Annabeth, and still staring at me, searching my eyes for... something.

Piper’s brow furrows. I call past Piper to Annabeth.

“Yeah, hi op, what the fuck?” They all have a silent conversation for a minute, and I continue, “Anyone want to tell my why the fuck fic-”

“We can tell you what’s going on, but it’s going to sound crazy.” Piper starts.

“After the past five minutes, probably not.” I glance past her shoulder, Leo’s still examining me. I look away, overwhelmed almost immediately. About 30% of my brain is just an endless loop of ‘ohmygodohmygodohmygod he’s real??? Like,,,, r e a l real????? Aj;dlfkajskdla ohmygod he’s looking at me what the fuck richard’, 20% was still trying to calm down from freaking out so much earlier, so I was at about half brain power for the conversation ahead. 

“Okay, wait. Let me get this straight.” they stare at me in silence. We’re standing in the hallway outside the kitchen, and I feel like a complete disaster trying to process what they’re telling me and not look like a total idiot.

“So, Calypso went missing, and Leo got Aphrodite to activate his soulmate link so he can find her and it led you here?” I’m already smiling. There’s no chance, I can’t get my hopes up. 

Piper continues, “Which means it might not be Calypso.”

“Unless you’re wearing a really good disguise or something,” Leo says. I’m pretty sure that’s the first time he’s spoken to me. I let out a breathy laugh and look away from him. If I try to look at him my brain goes haywire. Scenes from stuff I’ve written about him on my tumblr flash in my mind, and it makes me feel like I’m about to explode. 

“Yeah, the reason we know is-”

“The gods are real, monsters are after you, et cetera et cetera. Yeah.” They seem a little surprised that I’m more concerned with the soulmate part than the mythology part, but I’ve been reading these books since middle school. We been knew.

Piper keeps looking between Leo and me with a weird look on her face. God, Piper, don’t get my hopes up. A knowing look passes over her face and she looks around the room again.

“Gods, where did he go…” She gets up and leaves the room. No one says anything. Between right then and when she gets back should have been in a ‘top ten most devastating anime uncomfortable silences’ compilation. She enters again a few seconds later, a tall hot guy behind her. He has red flowers in his hair and isn’t wearing a shirt for some reason. He looks between me and Leo.

“I see… interesting.” he turns to me and says, “Can you tell me anything… personal about him?” My face flushes. I turn to Piper.

“Sorry, but who the fuck?”

“I mean the only noncanon stuff I know is what I came up with for like, writing and stuff but that doesn’t count-” I sputter.

“Eros.” she replies, “My mom sent him along to help find the right person.”

“Normally I’d be able to tell instantly, but my powers don’t seem to work here very well.” his voice is like honey, and it seems like he’s heavily implying something no matter what he says. 

“Yeah, go on hermosa,” Leo says, smirking, “take a whack at it.” His voice sounds so much more… real than I could have imagined. If I could verbally keysmash, I would have then and there. 

“Hmm… why don’t you try anyway. What kind of lover is he?” the room erupts into protests. They don’t want to hear personal stuff about their friend, I don’t want to talk about cripplingly embarrassing smut headcanons in front of the character they’re about, and he probably doesn’t want me taking a wild guess at his bedroom habits. Eros turns to Percy, Annabeth, and Piper.

“You two, out. You, leave but stay close.” They leave the room hastily.

“Since I’m the god of sexual desire, I know what gets people going. I’ll be able to tell if you’re right or not. ” Eros says. I risk a glance at Leo, who I have a feeling has been staring at me a lot. He leans forward, playful intrigue all over him. How is he not dying inside?? 

“Ah ah,” Eros says to Leo, “you too.” Leo obliges, and heads up the stairs.

“H- okay, uh… he acts like a top, but he’s really kind of a bottom,” I choke out, trying to remember details from past posts, and Eros nods in approval, encouraging me to keep going, “he’s really-” my voice falters, and I hide my head in my hands, “he’s really vocal, like really vocal… uh…” 

“Oh yes, I can tell.” Eros says, and I laugh slightly. “What else?” 

“More? God okay… uh… he really likes hickeys, and-” I choke on my words, still unsure of how I got in this situation. 

“He holds hands a lot in… the bedroom? God…” I trail off.

“The next morning, he kind of… he just sort of stares at you while you get dressed and stuff. I don’t know anyone else who does that.”

Eros studies me for a second. My heart is beating so hard. How long does it take to say yes or no? I’m uncomfortably aware of the distracting adrenaline in my arms and chest and head. 

“Interesting,” he says, then stands up and leaves the room.

What the fuck, is he not going to tell me anything?

I’m listening as closely as I can, and I’m pretty sure I hear Eros say five out of five. I got everything right or everything wrong. Nailed it or failed it. 

Piper speeds past me a second later and races up the stairs. After a few seconds she comes back down. She nods toward the staircase.

“You should go talk to him.” a knowing smile is playing at the corner of her mouth, and I can’t stop one from starting on mine. I run up the stairs, and see him, kneeling on my bed, reading what’s on my laptop. 

Oh god, no. 

He stands up. He’s staring at me so intensely, I look away immediately. I start sputtering out a panicked apology and sit down on my bed, moving to shut the lid of my laptop.

“Uh… I just listen to a song or something that makes me think of you,” my voice gets really tiny at that last part, “and stuff starts to pop into my head. I just keep replaying it, and uncovering more details so I can wr- wait,” I start to look up at him, but can’t bring myself to meet his eyes. I stare intensely at the pattern on my quilt instead. “Did you say remember?” He lets out a breathy laugh, and I can hear the smile in his voice. 

“-of course I never thought you were going to read any of that, or…” His hand is on top of mine, my hand and voice freezing at the same time.

“How… did you remember all this?” my fears are being squashed. He doesn’t sound mad, or grossed out, or judgemental. He sounds… impressed.

“Yeah, I mean, I’m only starting to get back bits and pieces, but you remember… everything.” 

“Wait wait…” I mutter, completely dazed, “so it wasn’t… it was all real?” I feel him nodding behind me, and he makes a noise of agreement. 

“It was genius, really… as soon as I felt like I was remembering something, I’d forget it.” His other hand rests on my shoulder, palm flat against my back. “Only you would think to write it like that…” 

“So… it all happened?” I breathe, my face heating up as I think of the titles marked with a little asterisk. 

“Yeah,” I bite my lip, feeling his breath over my skin. It’s quiet for a second. The mattress shifts and I can feel him leaning closer to me, feel the heat coming off his body. His lips are dangerously close to my ear.

“Want something else to write about?”

Oh my fucking god.

I nod before I finish registering what he said. His free hand moves to my cheek, tilting my face towards him, and my skin explodes with sparks where he touches me. 

Our lips brush.

We both freeze.

Flood gates open. Countless vivid images and feelings and scenarios flash across my mind. It was like watching a movie connecting every fic I’ve written. I gasp-laugh a little, and he does the same. It seems like the visions or whatever that he’s seeing are a lot more intense than mine. His eyes flutter open and he looks at me stronger, more intensely, more passionately than he had before. He lets out a soft, breathy laugh, and presses his lips to mine. Everywhere he touches feels carbonated, and I’m trying not to smile too much. I don’t think I’ve ever been more in the moment than right this second. He pulls me closer, tilting his head and deepening the kiss. I didn’t know a kiss could be deeper than it had been a few seconds ago. His mouth moves feverishly against mine. My arms move up on instinct, one hand playing with his hair, the other tracing the collar of his shirt. He shifts his weight, and one hand on my waist, lowers me back onto my bed. His left hand intertwines with my right, and I smile, remembering what I had told Eros earlier. 

“Estrella,” He groans into my mouth, our teeth scraping as we smile in spite of ourselves, and I get the sense the nickname was an ‘as you wish’ type of thing, from the Princess Bride. It feels like he’s saying I love you. My heart speeds up as he nuzzles into my neck, pressing kisses and little bites into my skin. I think about the nickname I always thought would suit him, the one I kept writing down over and over. Now or never.

“Sparky…” I smile, hiding my face in his hair. He freezes for a second, then lets out that breathy laugh again, his face in my neck. His lips graze my collarbone, and he starts to say something, but the door opens suddenly, and we jump apart. It doesn’t help much though, because he’s still hovering over me on all fours and we both look very flushed. And I’m pretty sure the start of a hickey is forming on my neck. 

“Right,” she replies, “we gotta get going, the door is closing soon, so come down stairs as soon as you’re… free.” 

“Sorry!” Annabeth yells, averting her eyes. Leo and I stumble over each other’s flustered responses.

“-looks bad but nothing… happened… we d- we didn’t like, do anything...” I trail off. 

The door closes.

“I’m coming with you guys?” I breathe. He looks over at me, that unflappable sense of playfulness present as ever. 

Leo sits back, scratching the back of his neck.

“Yeah, we should get back soon. Everyone else will be worried once they remember.” My heart plummets. I didn’t know you could go from feeling so incredibly euphoric to beyond miserable in about five seconds. I open my mouth to choke out a response, but before I can, he stands up and stretches a little.

“Do you wanna change before we go?” The question has such a normal tone to it, it’s a little bizarre after all the unusual things that have happened today. The bad feeling and tears at the corners of my eyes start to recede. 

“Of course you are. If you think I’m losing you again this soon you’re crazier than I am.” I let out a relieved laugh, and stand up. I look down at my monster foot slippers and sweatpants. 

“You know where to find me,” he winks before closing the door on his way out.

“Yeah, I should probably change.” He pulls me close to him, one hand comes up to the back of my neck, the other on my hip. He starts swaying us back and forth, dancing around my room.

“Well, if you need any help…” I laugh, and shove him away playfully.

I take a second to catch my breath. Oh my god. Thoughts are still racing in the back of my mind, but I don’t pay attention. I don’t have time to worry about what’s real and what’s not, I need to find the perfect demigod adventure outfit. I throw open my closet, start shuffling through dresser drawers, digging through my shoes. I don’t remember having one or two of the pieces, but after a minute, I find exactly what I’m looking for. It’s the exact outfit I’d always imagined myself in if I ever went to camp half blood. I search through my accessories, grab a bag, and hastily fill it with anything I think I’ll probably need. I turn back to my laptop, and change my blog description to on hiatus. I check my hair, flattening out the back from before, and determine I’m ready to go. 

I walk down the stairs, and everyone’s watching me. I feel like it’s prom or something, which sounds silly since I’ve got on ripped jeans and a backpack instead of a dress and clutch. Leo’s watching me with that look, the one that makes his eyes all sparkly, and he meets me at the bottom of the stairs. He puts his arm around my shoulder.

“Ready to go home, Estrella?”

I have never been more ready for anything.

[thelightofthingshopedfor]

@kiwimeringue replied to your post “I know it’s generally rude and very unwise to reply to a fandom...”

ok I'm super curious now, feel free to message me if you want to talk about it all stealthy-like~

@veliseraptor replied to your post “I know it’s generally rude and very unwise to reply to a fandom...”

i'm so curious

apparently I did want to talk about it, because this got looooong (also please do not add more discourse to this post, it’s probably kind of shitty of me but I don’t super want to have a dialogue about it, I just want to barf out my thoughts and defend my own faves on my own post, so if you want to argue with me I would really rather you didn’t and just made your own post instead)

(I also only just realized that I only put “tony stark negative” and “tony stark critical” in the tags, not anywhere before the cut, so here’s your warning now if you didn’t see the tags that this is me being frustrated with a lot things about how Tony is written)

I can't find the actual post now to screenshot or link because I just came across it on my dash, got annoyed, scrolled past, and then made my post when I couldn't stop grumpily thinking about it (so at this point I also don't remember who the OP was or who reblogged it onto my dash, which is probably just as well), but the gist was that almost all MCU title characters have storylines establishing that they're wrong about something and they show growth by accepting that and working to improve...except Steve, who never acknowledges that he might ever be wrong about anything, with the implication that this makes him a bad, self-righteous character who is basically incapable of growth. several other characters--Tony, Thor, Dr. Strange, Peter Parker--were mentioned, but the state of fandom discourse makes me assume any Steve-negative post exists at least in part to show how much better Tony is, which...may not always be a fair assumption on my part, but I do think it's fair to say that's still a relevant context. and of course Steve is one of my favorite characters, so anything even mildly Steve-negative puts me at least somewhat on the defensive right away, which again is not necessarily fair. (the other post that’s already sitting in my notes is about Ragnarok, which is probably even less surprising.)

anyway the post made me grumpy to begin with and then doubly so because I couldn't think of a good way to refute it aside from "yeah well maybe Steve's just a better person than your faves and he doesn't need a whole character arc about realizing he's been an asshole and needs to change because he didn't start out as an asshole to begin with, bet you didn't think of that huh" which is of course VERY unhelpful. but then I started thinking about how I don't think OP is right about the changed characters to begin with, given that a) it's not really fair to compare a character who's only had one solo movie (Dr. Strange) with characters who've had more, b) Spider-Man is kind of an edge case because he's a teenager and a lot of the problems in his movies stem from a combination of him being a fucking teenager and Tony dumping him with tons of dangerous tech that he doesn't have the training or adult impulse control to use safely and then blaming him when disaster inevitably results, and c) the characters who have had multiple movies and arcs focused on realizing they were wrong about something (just Thor and Tony, really) are...maybe not actually great examples because like 75% of that character development seems to reset after each movie and, actually, the narrative still operates under the premise that these characters are basically right even if some other characters don't agree. like...I mean, the only lessons Thor really, consistently seems to learn are "humans are at least not totally worthless (but lbr they're mostly silly and cute)" and "Odin is extremely wise and probably right about almost everything despite mountains of evidence--that grow with every single film he's in--to the contrary". 

and Tony, well--yeah, that's his arc, in theory, and in theory I don't have a problem with flawed characters who keep making the same mistakes because let's face it, that's a very human thing to do. but with posts like this, it's like...you're effectively arguing that he doesn't really make mistakes overall, though, because it’s really just an opportunity for growth? and that when he does, the narrative shows he's wrong, he admits he's wrong, and he makes consistent efforts to change? which...again, obviously I have my own biases, but I have to see this as a weird interpretation because he's basically been the main character of the entire MCU thus far, which means he's likely to get sympathetic treatment and justification from the narrative even if he's ostensibly being called out for fucking up, and that's something I've definitely seen. his entire first movie is about him realizing how wrong he was and working to do better, definitely, but he ends up being his own worst enemy half the time and other people suffer for it. like...he wants to protect the world, okay, that's a reasonable goal. you can argue that the vision Wanda gave him made things worse, and that's possible, but I don't know how much that might be true given that I'm pretty sure he was working on Ultron before that too (and her mind-magic mostly seemed to work by emphasizing something that was already there, not planting new ideas). so he ends up creating a murderbot, with good intentions but he still does it and he keeps it secret from the other Avengers, and now-sentient murderbot immediately reaches the conclusion that humanity is awful and they won't need protecting if they're all gone, and everything breaks very bad, and then Tony...basically does the exact same thing again, without telling anybody else, in hopes that it'll work out better this time because JARVIS? and it does but that seems like mostly luck? and everybody manages to defeat the murderbot, barely, but a not-insignificant number of civilians die anyway because that tends to happen when a sentient murderbot goes on a rampage, and Tony feels really guilty about this when it's shoved in his face, so he deals with his guilt by kind of...spreading it around and allowing the possibility of other major problems down the line so they can hand over some of that responsibility and he can feel less guilty. (that’s not the most charitable interpretation, yeah, but I also don’t think it’s an unreasonable one, based on what’s there in the text.) and then of course things blow up and other problems get dragged in and it's a huge mess and half the Avengers are fugitives, and the general consensus sort of seems to be that nobody was completely right or completely wrong but Steve is the only one who actually apologizes for any of it (no wait, I guess Wanda and Vision apologized but just to each other) and Rhodey reinforces the idea that the Accords were a good idea with no major drawbacks...and then Thanos shows up and things get SO VERY MUCH worse.

and Tony is once again stricken with grief and guilt (not to mention half dead), so lashing out at Steve is understandable, but what he actually says is basically that this is all Steve's fault because he wasn't there (even though he immediately sent Tony that phone, which means Tony could have contacted him at any time but hesitated to do so even when monsters were basically falling from the sky), and he was right about the Accords and Ultron even if the latter didn't work out so well in ways that probably could have been predicted, and...that's what we're left with. nobody else has a meaningful opportunity to say "now hold on a second, you cannot possibly be arguing both for accountability and for your right to decide for the entire world that exchanging some freedom for some potential security is a good trade, and also how are you saying you were essentially right about Ultron when Ultron is what kicked off the desire for the Accords" or, like, anything. (does the world need a security blanket? going by the evidence...yeah, probably? but again. Tony. you tried that and you made a sentient murderbot instead so like, your track record is not great!!)

and then it all culminates with Tony sacrificing himself to save the universe, which I do at least think was a climactic, thematically resonant send-off for such a major character--for the final time, in the most final possible of ways, he reaches a point where there's no more clever tricks and he reacts by selflessly taking the entirety of the consequences onto himself. I can't say I'm happy with it, because I'm not a fan of character death in general even when it doesn't involve my top faves, and it absolutely would have been possible for the filmmakers to keep him alive if they hadn't gone into this with the specific intention of ending Tony's arc with his death. (ditto on all the other major character deaths, which is a big part about why they make me mad--none of them really, honestly had to happen, some even less than others.) but regardless of my feelings on whether it had to happen, it's inarguable that his entire arc from Iron Man to Endgame is that of a brilliant but selfish manchild who changes and grows until he doesn't hesitate to make the ultimate sacrifice for the sake of the entire universe.

BUT THEN THERE'S SPIDER-MAN AGAIN.

spoilers if you haven't seen Spider-Man: Far From Home but like, the entire conflict of that movie was based on two major things: a bunch of disgruntled Stark Industries employees, at least some of whom had to have legitimate, recent grievances (and frankly that whole mess demonstrates--among other things--that Stark Industries must have unforgivably lax security around its arsenal of world-ending weapons); and Tony's decision at some point to essentially REMAKE ULTRON AND THEN DUMP THAT RESPONSIBILITY ON A FUCKING TEENAGER WITH ABSOLUTELY NOTHING IN THE WAY OF WARNINGS, TRAINING, OVERSIGHT, OR EVEN BASIC FAILSAFES, like holy shit my computer spends more time making sure I definitely want to delete that file than EDITH does about confirming that yes this random teenager is a legitimate target for IMMEDIATE DEATH. all the other adults involved in this clusterfuck bear a good share of the responsibility for this too, given that not one of them ever seemed to think either "hey, maybe saddling a smart and very good but basically normal sixteen-year-old boy with the power and responsibility (but not the resources or experience) of a grown-ass adult with unlimited resources is not the smartest move here, and yelling at him when he inevitably fucks up this power and responsibility we dumped on him with no training whatsoever is not actually fair or reasonable" or even "maybe before giving a piece of massively powerful and dangerous tech to a sixteen-year-old boy, we should spend at least 15 minutes going over the device's major functions and how to not accidentally kill someone, even if we figure things like ethics and privacy rights and knowing when not to use this tech aren't that important".

but, but, Tony still made the decision to give it to him, and he did so without building in any precautions at all, which is the exact same thing he did in CW/Homecoming with Peter's new suit (yes, the Training Wheels protocol was a good step, but the fact that it could just be turned off that easily--and that Tony isn't shown even trying to tell Peter to use the training programs or safely practice with the suit--shows that it really, really wasn't good enough) except even worse because EDITH is about 100 times more invasive and destructive than the suit. and he pretty much scolded Peter in Homecoming for getting ahead of himself, but then the second Peter did well in a bad situation Tony was right back to making this teenager an official Avenger and giving him all this power and responsibility he'd just decided Peter hadn't really earned, and Peter turned him down because at that point he had a better idea of his own limits and need for growth than Tony did, and then!! in what must have been one of his last acts alive!! Tony dumped an even bigger, more dangerous power/responsibility combo on him!!! way way bigger than the one he'd already turned down and maturely decided he wasn't yet experienced enough to handle!!! without even giving him a chance to say no!!!! and did not take any of that (or the mess with Ultron and the lessons he theoretically learned there, or the mess with the Accords and the lessons he theoretically learned there, or for that matter the lessons he theoretically learned in his three solo movies about treating his employees well and making sure he knows exactly what his company is doing at all times) into account when designing it, handing it off to other adults who also should have been more responsible about it, and leaving it to a teenager against that teenager's stated wishes, thereby ensuring that this teenager will follow Tony's footsteps in being unable to have a normal life!!!!!

...................but, okay, the point of the original post was that Steve is generally deemed to be Always Right and therefore he never has to change, and that makes him unrelatable at best and also not a great character. which...well, that's part of the point, that's why he was picked for Project Rebirth in the first place because he's a good dude dedicated to doing what's right; even before the serum, he was literally willing to die to protect a few people he barely knew (the grenade scene, remember). he was already starting from a point of selflessness and an understanding of responsibility that the others lacked, so it would be tough to give him a similar character arc without undermining or ignoring the whole point of the character. sure, though, even a character like Steve is imperfect and human and bound to be wrong sometimes, and when that happens he should acknowledge he was wrong and take steps to make amends, and if he's never shown doing any of that, it's true that it's not great even if part of the issue is that he's never really put in a position to do so. 

except, except DID YOU ALL COMPLETELY FORGET THE ENDING OF CIVIL WAR

like, sure, if what you wanted was to hear Steve say "I was wrong about everything and Tony was right about everything, and I will humbly submit to whatever you think is best regardless of my own convictions, my very good reasons for having those convictions, and my personal concerns for my friends, or at the very least I will humbly ask for forgiveness and accept whatever you throw at me, because Tony Was Right About Everything," then...yeah, I'm sure it was a disappointment, especially if you figure Tony was right about the Accords and at least the intentions behind Ultron. it's true Steve doesn't really address any of that, which indicates he definitely still believes he’s right about those parts. but...look, the last time he saw Tony, he was fighting to save his lifelong friend from being murdered from a crime he didn't necessarily remember and really wasn't responsible for. once again I don't blame Tony for reacting emotionally and lashing out at the nearest targets instead of the people who were really at fault, but that doesn't change the facts of the situation, which are, Steve was fighting to save Bucky's life. and when he did that by incapacitating Tony, he didn't go any further; he took Bucky and left. and then he almost immediately sent Tony a letter of apology and a means of contacting him in return if an emergency comes up--and again, yes, his apology wasn't "I'm sorry for everything because I was wrong about everything," but it was a genuine, compassionate apology for the ways he'd hurt Tony even if his intentions were basically good. (this of course assumes that he really did know for a fact that Bucky killed the Starks and consciously chose to hide the knowledge from Tony, and frankly I'm not convinced that's true, but it's not really the issue here.) honestly, I thought his letter was kind of funny because it so closely followed the format of the apology-note meme--you know, "I was trying to do X, but I see now that I hurt you because Y" and everything. he didn't apologize for opposing the Accords or protecting Bucky or fighting in Germany so he could get to Siberia in time to stop what he had every reason to believe was a much bigger threat, because all those actions stemmed directly from his convictions and sense of morality and he wouldn't be Steve Rogers or Captain America if he was willing to compromise his most foundational convictions--but he absolutely did apologize for hurting Tony and recognized that he'd made at least one big mistake where Tony was concerned. 

Tony...didn't. even before doubling down on the Accords and Ultron, I don't think he ever really said, hey, at least some of this was my bad; most of what he said boiled down to "okay this situation isn't ideal but I'm sure if I throw more money at it things will work out fine, more or less". in the Raft and in Siberia he got close to saying that maybe he'd been wrong about a few things, but that all went out the window pretty quick, and I don't think there's ever a point where he--just for instance--at least apologizes for trying very very hard to kill Bucky. and by Endgame, apparently he’s pretty much walked back what little he did kinda sorta think he was maybe wrong about. so.

that's...basically what I've got, OP’s interpretation is wrong because their facts are actually wrong and I was apparently annoyed enough to barf out all these words when I could’ve been doing anything else, the end

[chaseagainstonision]

I just wanna cover this for a bit. The screenshots from the Discord server are as follows: post 1 post 2 post 3 post 4 Full disclosure that I am the user Broke: pls subscrib and that our mods are the users who's names are in red. Also, I know that I've talked about this so much in my gender tag, so most of you have prob'ly seen this argument before. For the first image: It's not about being strictly being anti-onision or anti-taylor. That's not exactly how the server works. We can talk about how shitty they are and the things about them. That's what the anti-onision and the anti-taylor channels are for. We can also criticize them an not have an intence dislike for one or the other (like be okay with Taylor and not okay with Gerg, for example). The whole reasons that you were muted was because you were being incredible ruse and were going to invalidate other people becuase of their gender by saying "if it is allowed to be, i will start analyzing everyone's gender in the server." I only said that it was fine by me because it seemed that you were going to do it regardless of any sort of consensus. And I figure, if you attack me, you're leaving the rest of the server alone. But we're not out here attackign your gender identity, so I have no idea why you got incredibly defensive. When I talk about Taylor's gender issues, I'm only referencing it in regard to them. That's it. Not you, not anyone else. I'm not out here toquestion the validity of your gender or anyone else's gender aside from Taylor's, and for good reason. It's not like I'm purposely misgendering them, either, as I go out of my way to use the proper pronouns, even if I doubt their gender identity. But the reasons I do question their gender is 1) it one of the only things that they talk about 2) they make it their whole personality where that's all they are is their gender and that's it 3) their stance on gender dysphoria and their attempt to backpeddle 4) the fact that they are so against being called feminine and what have you while doing traditionally feminine things and wearing traditionally feminine things (not that, in general, there's anything wrong with that, just their unwillingness to admit they like feminine things) 5) claim that they have basically cripling dysphoria, but run around in videos and what not half naked and showing off their body (then taking the time to edit said videos) 6) Gerg's influence over them and him pushing them into other situations that they initially didn't want to be in and then renaming them (which I have made very clear that A] he renames his partners a lot, regardless of gender and B] it's incredibly uncomfortable for me), which is possible he pushed them into this, too 7) They have and still do weaponize their pronouns when people use the wrong ones, especially if it's a detractor 8) their refusial to go to a doctor and start hormones, stating that they don't want male body hair (darker leg hair, facial hair, etc) or to look explicitly male via hormones and/or getting surgery and I really can just keep listing reasons at this point. It's not really that you were being sarcastic. People are sarcastic in the server all the time. But, the fact that you called all of us "sensitive" because one of the mod put you in a time out? All becuase you were being rude to the rest of us in the server? Nah, man, that's not how this works. It's more about the fact that, whenever the issue about Taylor's gender comes up, we all talk about it in a civil maner and eventually agree to disagree while you just kept stirring up conflict about it. We're not out here to invalidate anyone. I've let this be known countless times. A lot of us in the community are some stripe of LGBT+. I, myself, am genderfluid and bi/pan. Most, if not all of us know what it's like to be invalidated or misgendered or what have you. You trying to take this weird moral high ground isn't doing you any favors. We're all pretty accepting people in regard to sexuality and gender. It's just that there comes a time where someone does something that you start to think on and question and that's where the debate over Taylor's gender comes in at because there are a ton of red flags everywhere. And I know that I've talked about this before, too, but if you're trans (like, trans trans and not just nonbinary, because there are differences in transitioning/not transitioning), you should transition and have dysphoria. Taylor claims to be trans (transmasc as of recently) but has said in the past that they're only really bothered that they're chest got bigger and their hips got wider (that's all due to having two kids). A simple fix for that would to at least get a breast reduction. Them saying that alone makes me believe that they just have body dismophia and not gender dysphoria. Because when I'm going through dysphoria, I wanna just rip my tits off and hate that I have a vagina. Taylor seemingly doesn't have those feelings, just generally going through what most people go through when they hate parts of their body. So no, it's not that no one has the right to analyze someone else's gender. It's that, in certain cases, there's a cause for debating someone's gender for the very reasons that I have stated above. For the second image: I don't have all of the conversation for this (since op blocked whoever they were talking to), but I will answer what I can see. I feel that people can comment on any post that is posted to a public forum. This site is basically a public forum and allows other users to post/reply on whatever posts they want. To sit and say that peopel can't comment is ridiculous. But most of the people commenting know what transphobia is, so this elitism is stupid. I already stated this above. Any time that you have come in to comment, you've started something. It's not that we're sensitive, trust me. We can engage in civil discussion about "hot button" issues and not have a huge problem. We've done it before since Taylor's gender is, indeed, a hot button issue. But I'll just leave it here for this image For the third image: That's... kinda the point? To showcase someone who is bringing in drama, most people won't censor out that name. Plus, both on Discord and here, you have the same user icon. Most of us already have false usernames, anyway, so what does it matter? My actual username on Discord is ChaseArts, anyway, but it's not like someone is going out of their way to doxx you or something. Just exposing what had happened in the server. Why would Gerg shit talk himself, lmao. That's got to be the dumbest theory that I have ever heard. If it were Gerg, he wouldn't willingly let a bunch of his detractors into his server, let alone to shit talk him and his spouse. Anyway, who has compared you to Gerg? That's a dumb comparison, too, honestly. But it's not that you were right and we were wrong. It's not an objective sort of thing. It's people opinions and you got way to salty and took it personally, for some reason. You were put in time out because you were stirring the pot. The mods were doing their job. The same woud happen if you were on another server with several mods, though I'm not certain if they would just put you in time out of just boot you completely.

[spnrelatedurl]

Con-Blue’s - Chapter 1

A/N: Hey, I’ll put another A/N at the end of this chapter, but I wanted to say thank you to everyone who’s liked and commented on my stories so far. this is a Jensen!daughter fic, and the daughter’s gonna be a little different to everyone else. It plays a major role and it’s something I live with, and always will. People think Autism hinders you, but in reality it is you. I love my autism. I hope people will think I write mine with justice. Anyway, I really hope you enjoy this story and want more of it. Please like, comment, and talk to me. I love my followers! (and constructive criticism is always welcome to. I’m always looking to better myself.)

Trigger Warnings: Autism, Long Lost Family, Depression, Anxiety, Abandonment.

Summary: Veronica “Ronnie” Lockhart found something in her life that she never needed nor wanted. She never asked him for a damn thing. That is until her mother kicked her out. Now Ronnie needs the help of her father, Jensen Ackles. She’s a girl with autism, and she hates change. But maybe this one will be the change she’s always needed to feel at home with herself. With the help of the Supernatural cast and families, as well as her best friend Alex, will her life finally stabilize?

Word count: 3001

Tag List:  @winchesters-favorite-girl  @winchester-writes  @storyofawinchester  @rosie-winchester  @bea789 (Anyone can be added. Just ask!)

“Are you sure you want to do this, Ronnie?” My best friend, Alex asked for the trillionth time today. And to think, this all started a month ago at school.

Mrs Newbury was, as per usual, droning on and on about something scientific. I’ll be completely honest with you, I’m terrible at science. I keep failing it, and nothing even motivates me to try and pass my classes. I’m not all that academic. Besides English and Performing Arts, I don’t really do well at school. Not that it’s a massive problem for the school board. They blag it off as us being special needs students. Which we are, but I feel like that’s all the school thinks of us. But I’m starting to drone on about school, and let’s face it, nobody deserves to be that bored, so let me tell you the relevant points about that day.

We were told to do a family tree for homework, which didn’t initially scare me because I figured they’d give me just my mother’s side to do.

Mrs Newbury is very traditional, so I had to do my father’s side as well.

I had no clue who my father was at that point.

I dreaded going home to ask my mum about my dad’s side of the family.

Mrs Newbury has had it in for me ever since I burned her sheets on a Bunsen burner one lesson.

And that school day wasn’t even the worst I’d had in my life. It’s what happened once I came home.

You see, I’ve asked my mum about my dad about three times in my life. Once when I was really little and started learning that everyone has a dad. The second time was when I was a bit older and went to the doctors. They asked my mum if there was any history of hereditary illnesses, so I asked if dad had. And the third time, I did it to piss her off. She’s always hated the mention of the man, and whenever my grandma mentions my father, she doesn’t speak to her for a month. So asking her about it for school makes me feel like being sick.

I walked in through the front door and smiled nervously at her. I mentioned Mrs Newbury gave us a project and I needed my birth certificate. She froze in her place for about five seconds before going absolutely ballistic. “If you want your birth certificate so much, you should leave this house!” Were her exact words. I was so angry at that point. Why was she so defensive? Well, I found out as soon as she threw the crumpled piece of paper at me.

Turns out my dad is Jensen Ackles, star of my favourite TV show, Supernatural. So I’ve been looking up to this guy for ages, and been going on about him and his co-stars to her, and whatever happened, it ended badly. So after a week of meticulous planning, I got in touch with my American pen pal, Alex Gateley. He’s so funny and we’ve been speaking for years. Since we bonded over a band online. And then we came up with a plan.

“If only I had the money. Then I’d buy a plane ticket, find him at a convention in America, and then the rest will be history.” I said to him.

“Veronica, you do realise I can help you?” Alex replied.

His family isn’t wealthy, but they have enough money to burn it a bit. I shook my head and told him I couldn’t do that.

“My parents love you. They’ve always wanted to meet you. And as we’ve been speaking I’ve found out that they have a con in Los Angeles in three weeks. That’s a thirty-minute drive from where I live. So you can stay at our place. And then when it’s con time I can drive us there. Sound good?” He asked.

I kept saying it was too much for him to do, but he kept insisting and I eventually gave in. And skip ahead a few weeks, and we’re outside the con.

“It’s something I have to do, Alex. Whether I’m sure or not.” I told him. He didn’t know what to say to that, so he just scratched the back of his neck.

“Got the birth certificate?” He asked. I nodded my head.

I smoothed over it’s folds with my thumb. It was now the single most important possession of mine. I kept it zipped up in my pocket. We left and locked the car then made our way into the con. Even from outside you could feel the excitement in the atmosphere. I must’ve been the only person there who was tense as hell. Apart from maybe Alex, but he was tense for different reasons. He was stressed for me, and making sure everything ended up okay. I was tense to do it though. But I knew I had to. We went to the counter and got checked in.

“You guys don’t have any photo ops or autographs? I guess it’s fun just to be in the hall anyway.” One of the workers said for chatter. The hall is where it would have to happen, I guess.

“When’s the first Q+A for Jensen?” Alex asked with a smile on his face. He always was a bit of a charmer.

“That’s starting in…” She began, checking the timetable. “Five minutes. I guess you should go. Have fun!” She said with a kind smile on her face. Her bubbly attitude was kind of grating at the moment. But usually I’d be just as bubbly. Maybe even hyper. I don’t know. I guess I haven’t been myself since this whole thing started. I blame Mrs. Newbury.

We walked into the hall and took our seats – hoping and praying I’d get a chance to talk to him. I knew I wouldn’t get too many chances at this. He was only here for the weekend and doing two Q+A’s in total. Everyone in the room was buzzing for him to come on stage. Well, him and Jared – his co-star and best friend. When they finally did it was like the room exploded into cheers and applause of star struck delight.

“Hey guys!” Jared greeted with a wave. Jensen just waved with him with a huge grin on his face. You could tell how much they love doing this. And here I am, possibly about to ruin one of their lives. I sat down along with everyone else in the room.

“So, who has questions for us?” Jensen asked. We made a plan earlier to both raise both our hands so we get an even bigger chance, but right now I didn’t think I could. I guess my heart was ignoring my head as my arm raised gradually. And what am I even going to say to him if I get picked to speak? “Oh yeah, just wanted to say I think I’m your daughter. I mean, why would my mum lie, right?!” Nah, that’s way too casual. And it wouldn’t accurately express everything anyway. Besides, I’d probably get kicked out of the con and I’d never know.

“Well, we rarely get guys asking questions. How ‘bout you?” Jared asked, pointing at Alex. A microphone was passed to him, and it was then that I realised, I didn’t have a lot of time to figure out what I was going to say. I guess I’ll just have to improvise. But how could I improvise what was essentially a make or break moment of my life.

“Uh-“ Alex said, nervous as hell. I couldn’t blame him. He hates being centre of attention. If it were up to him he’d be a hermit crab. Besides, what he was about to start was the furthest thing from a hermit’s chosen lifestyle. “I actually came here with someone who has a really important question to ask you. Is it okay if I just pass you on to her?” He asked, gulping. Jensen smiled and nodded his head.

Suddenly the microphone was handed to me, and I felt everyone’s eyes on me. Alex sat down straight away, leaving me to stand up. I used my free hand to unzip my pocket and put my hand in it. The certificate was still there. I scrunched my eyes shut tight. Then I opened them.

“Hey. I’m Veronica Lockhart – daughter of Brynn Lockhart.” I added. Jensen’s eyes widened slightly as everyone else in the room seemed to giggle.

“Thank you for stating your ancestor’s name. Are all Brits like this?” Jared jested. Not out of nastiness. Just because he’s like that. At least from what I’ve gathered from interviews and stuff.

“My question is for Jensen.” I said, noticing Jensen already getting emotional. “Do you remember her? At all? Because if you don’t that’s fine. But if you do, I think you can gather who I might be.” I said. The whole room turned into a state of confusion. Apart from the three in the know. Me, Alex, and Jensen.

“Y…You mean…?” He asked, with a quavering voice.

“I don’t know for sure, but I have my birth certificate.” I said. I took the paper out of my pocket. It’s so weird. I wouldn’t expect to have a piece of paper become so significant in my life. “I would’ve spoken to you privately, but there was no money left from my flight. My mum kicked me out. There was no way mum would give me a clue about how to find you. And I couldn’t get a photo op or an autograph. My whole life my mum has been evading the whole discussion of my father. But I think you’re it.” I said, with tears in my eyes. Everyone around me seemed to be in shock, but I was hyper-focussed on trying to figure out what Jensen was thinking. I could barely see him. He was such a blurry figure through the tears. Even Alex stroking my hand with his thumb felt numb.

“J?” Jared said in the mic, trying to get Jensen’s attention. I was hysterically crying. I never wanted it, and now it’s here it’s like it’s not how I wanted it at all. There was no way this could make me happy.

“I’m sorry.” I said. I ran out of the convention with Alex hot on my tail.

I covered my mouth with my hand and let out these guttural sobs, then as they turned into hiccupping cries, my hand lowered to my stomach. Alex caught up with me and put his hand on my shoulder.

“It’ll be okay.” He said, pulling me into a hug. I sniffed.

“No. It won’t. I’ve basically just ruined his life.” I said through my choky moans. “Can we just drive somewhere?” I asked.

“I wouldn’t go anywhere if I were you.” A voice said from behind me, and I turned around to see the owner.

A large man with huge muscles came forward. He had a lot of tattoos, a bald head, a greying beard and sunglasses. He came closer.

“Leave her alone, man. She’s had a rough day.” Alex stood up for me. He kind of separated me from him. Sort of ironic considering Alex’s skinny stature and timid presentation.

“I know that, I promise I’m not here to hurt either of you. I’m here to help. I’m Jensen’s body guard.” He said.

“How can we be sure?” Alex asked. He had a point. I mean, apart from having all the right looks of a body guard, we had no definitive proof he was who he said he was.

“My name’s Clif Kosterman. One f. You can look me up online, I swear I’m here on his behalf.” He said. Even from that I could tell he was genuine, but Alex looked him up just to be sure. I looked at the screen as he typed. Pictures of him with the guys came up. It was true.

“Well, if you’re here to tell me to never see him again, you don’t have to worry. I’m sure he wouldn’t want me after I ruined his career and family anyway.” I said with finality in my voice.

“He wants to talk. He sent me to run after you. He doesn’t want the situation to escalate for your sake.” He said. I wiped my eyes with my sleeve. Alex let out a breath of laughter.

“Bit late for that, don’t ya think?” He said, getting angry on my behalf.

“It’s okay, Alex.” I said, not wanting him to get in any trouble. Besides, if we should get angry at anyone, it should be my mum.

“No. No it’s not okay. You deserve better.” Alex said. I shook my head.

“I don’t deserve anything. Okay? I expect nothing and I still get less. I don’t even get a family. I can guess how this conversation’s gonna go. Let’s just get it over with.” I said. Clif shifted awkwardly, then led us to the green room. Basically the room for the stars to unwind and take a break. We went through the back of the convention and entered the room. It was empty apart from one man. Jensen.

He looked how I always imagined him to look in person. Skinny, yet muscly. Tall, but not overwhelmingly so. He had sandy blonde hair, green eyes, a slightly different shade than mine, but the same shape. He had freckles, heavy stubble. Everything about him looked how I imagined him. Everything apart from the bags under his eyes. He must be taking this hard. Not that I’m exactly easy to handle.

“Wh- um… How long have you known?” He asked.

“About a month.” I answered. We all walked further into the room and Clif closed the door. Everyone was sitting down, but I stayed standing. I knew I wouldn’t be here for long. I just needed to handle it. To rip it off like a plaster. He smiled slightly.

“How old are you?” He asked.

“Eighteen… just.” I answered.

“Finishing school soon then?” He asked, attempting small talk.

“Jensen, I’m sorry. Okay? I’m sorry I dropped that bomb on you. It wasn’t fair. But I had no other way of finding out if it was true, and even now I have no way of knowing it is.” I said.

“What are you talking about? Of course…” He began rather quickly, then he cleared his throat, looked at the coffee he was swirling around in his paper cup, then looked back up at me with a slight smile. “Of course you’re mine.”

“What? So that’s all you’re gonna say? How do you know?” Alex pressed.

“Well, we can do a paternity test. I think we both need confirmation, but I think… No, I’m sure of what the results will be. It’s just – she lied. She completely lied to me. After everything…” He said, being vague about everything he was saying.

“Even if we do a paternity test, what then? What will your family say? I’m sure I’m not wanted by them, and I’ve ruined your life enough.”

“You think you’ve ruined my life?” He asked, sounding sad.

“You don’t exactly seem impressed by my presence.” I pointed out.

“I am. Believe me, I am. It’s just… I don’t know. A shock, I guess? I’m gonna do right by you. I promise. It’s a lot to get my head around.” He said to me. I calmed down a bit then. I walked slowly to the nearest chair and then sat down.

“What have your family said?” Alex asked.

“Well, I’ve just texted Danneel. She’s still writing back. It’s a lot to process for both of us.” He said. “How do you two know each other?”

“Oh, um. Online. We met on this website. Kind of a fan website of our favourite band at the time. They’re actually my favourite band still for that reason alone.” Alex said. I couldn’t help a slight smile from being plastered on my face.

“What band?” Jensen asked, trying to take an interest.

“Dust Biters.” I answered meekly.

“Cool. Um, when did you become boyfriend and girlfriend?” Jensen asked. My eyes widened and cheeks flushed a rose red.

“We’re not.” I said.

Not that I haven’t thought about it. Alex is, for a lack of better word, hot! He’s got messy, side swept brown hair, and he wears a bandana to keep it from falling over his face most of the time. He’s got dark brown eyes and an almost constant cheeky grin. His humour makes me adore him. But he’s my friend. I wouldn’t even think about becoming more than that. It’ll never happen. Alex looked as embarrassed as me.

“Oh. Sorry.” He said. For him the awkwardness was over. For me and Alex, we were still revelling in it.

Suddenly Jensen’s phone buzzed. Again and again. I guess Danneel decided to call him.

“I guess I’ll answer this.” He said, picking up his phone. Clif then tried to get my attention.

“This uncertainty will pass, kid. I promise ya.” He said. I smiled gratefully at him. Looks can be really deceiving. When I first saw him I thought he was gonna kill me. Turns out he might be about the most helpful human being in the world.

“Hey honey.” Jensen greeted over the phone. “Yeah, she’s with me… no, no… oh yeah. Of course we are. No, I totally agree. Did you tell the kids…? Right. No. No and I don’t think I should for a while. Yeah but not now. I know. Of course I love you… like five minutes. Yeah we’re getting it done as soon as possible. Okay. I’ll call you after. Love you too. Bye.” He said before switching off his phone.

“Is… is she okay with this?” I asked. Jensen turned to look at me. For the first time today, I couldn’t read him at all.

A/N: Hi everyone! I hope you liked this chapter! So, mainly I just wanted to say that Alex Gaskarth is who I envision to play Alex in the story, so if the gifs I add seem off because of different people playing different roles, just know that it’s because I see different people who have never met (to my knowledge) merging together and being the people in this fic. As well as this, I want to say about the tags: Of course everyone’s welcome to be on the list, whether it be for this story or every story I write. However, I also want to say that if your url changes could you please notify me? It’d help heaps. And if you don’t want to be in my tag list anymore, please don’t hesitate to tell me. You don’t have to say why, and I won’t judge. These fics are only for fun and to get to know you all better. But I digress. If there’s anything at all you want to talk to me about - be it about the fic or otherwise, my ask box is always open! See you around! :D

(This is not a Danneel hate fic. She’s a good’un in this fic, as I’m sure she is in real life. Any hate for ANY of the IRL actors portrayed in this fic will NOT be tolerated.)

[parchnposies-mod]

This is a companion post, the main post will be linked below

( ◞･౪･)click here to go to the main post [Link] Please do not reblog this WITHOUT reblogging the main post as well. 

This is all speculation on my part, but its important to note that you should always ask yourself why someone might have said or done something. Even if the answer is incorrect or you dont agree with it, you might find yourself disagreeing with your most impulsive reactions and taking a calmer approach to the situation.

1) “if you’re not jewish you dont get to say “jew” period“ As we know now, the original sentiment here was “referring to people as a demographic they fit can be offensive and reductive, so instead use their demographic as an adjective (jewish) instead of a noun (jew).” so with that in hand we can clearly see that this is really just someone who’s tired of being called “a jew” in the same way that I am offended when someone calls me “a queer” without knowing if I’m okay with it. Most of the discussion around jewish people is hurtful and 

2&3) “holocaust, hitler, and nazi jokes aren’t funny period“ and “seriously quit saying “grammar nazi”“ keeping in mind that this was a post made in 2014/2015 think about the climate back then. This was back when it wasnt socially acceptable to be an out and out nazi/white nationalist/identitarian/kekistan or whatever the fuck, and a lot of the ways people were saying something was bad or irritating was by calling it a nazi. Both groups actually contributed to making nazis seem less like the horrific thing that they were: a political party that advocated for the genocide of millions. This would be incredibly frustrating to watch, to have people invalidate and joke about the reason your people are less than 1% of the world’s population. 

4&5) “also when the subject of the holocaust or hitler happen to come up DONT TRY TO SAY THAT HITLER WAS DOING WHAT WAS BEST FOR HIS COUNTRY OR THAT HE WAS HUMAN” “SERIOUSLY HE WAS A MASS MURDERER AND DISGUSTING IN EVERY SENSE OF THE WORD” No controversy around this one, please see my original reply to get my full response to this. But its good to again note why this sort of thing would be prompted to be said at all. One of the common ways people try to make white nationalism/nazi ideology more tolerable is by trying to paint Adolf Hitler as a sympathetic figure. This of course doesnt excuse what he did, but imagine seeing people say “hitler wasnt that bad” “Hitler was only a human being” “hiter was just trying to do what was best for his people.” over and over again. It would be upsetting because of fuckin course it would be. Hell its STILL upsetting. 

6&7) “dont make jokes about us being penny pinchers or greedy or any of that its gross and racist“ and “if youre a goyim dont tell me that “_____ was a very jew thing for me to do”“ I feel like being upset with stereotypes and reacting aggressively is super understandable, especially as a kid in their mid teens. I dont think this really needs further elaboration. Its insensitive and shitty, and makes someone feel bad for doing a “jewish thing” because they feel like behaving like how they are you’re buying into stereotypes. I relate to this specifically when I perform a behavior associated with my stereotypes, such as liking pink (i’m dfab*). My example is really toned down, but i think its a good way to relate because all of us have some dumb stereotype that we can relate to just being like “fuck i cant do x because i might reinforce preconceived notions.

8) “dont use yiddish, goy always mispronounce it and tbh it sounds stupid when you try“ Okay, its really important that i stress here again that OP does NOT agree with this statement anymore. To quote them directly, “i realize now that yiddish should be shared with all. Its not just a Jewish thing anymore“. However its still important to think of why would someone say something like this in the first place. This is where I speculate the most. I personally believe OP said this because yiddish is a part of their culture that they treasured at the time (likely still do) and while they were upset at people speaking it poorly it wasnt just because people were speaking it poorly. They were upset because of everything else in this post. The erasure of their history and the lessening of the severity of what happened to the jewish people through nazi jokes. The cruelty of having your identity stripped away from you beyond just another “jew”. The people sympathizing with Adolf Fuckin Hitler and trying to make him less repulsive and more “understandable” (read: forgivable). People using stereotypes to define your actions as something that “a jew” would do. The mockery of traditions and holidays “because they’re different.” These things are cruel, and when you hold something close to your heart and its attacked, as a child you will usually either react with anger and lash out to defend it, or shrink away from it and be ashamed. I wouldnt even be surprised if OP had at one point been ashamed of their heritage, only to have this post be the result of deciding to be proud of it and shifting far over to the other end of the spectrum past “happy and proud” to “aggressive defense”. 

I feel like i covered points nine to eleven pretty well in #8, but here they are for posterity  

• dont call our traditions weird just cause theyre different • be aware that jewish holidays dont get the same respect from society as christian ones do • seriously our holidays are almost never seen as “a legit reason” to miss work/school

Then finally is 12) “Educate yourself.”  I hope all of you leave this post feeling a little more like you understand what happened here, and more so i hope you have the tools to take a step back from snap judgments and ask yourself whats really going on. What someone really meant. Its not always what it seems at face value!  d(･∀･ ´*)

[alluring-skull]

sweet requiem

So, like I closed out mentioning last time, I’m very interested in game stories which try to manipulate the player. And really, I’d have to say that a lot of people are, with titles like Bioshock and Spec Ops: The Line from the previous console generation drawing enormous amounts of attention from players and critics for their efforts in this regard. I’m not terribly fond of either one, personally, and in some ways I don’t know how to feel about the way audiences seem to treat highly self-referential narratives as more profound. But I suppose I’ve done this just as much as anyone, particularly when it comes to Christine Love’s visual novel duology, Analogue: A Hate Story and Hate Plus.

(Once again, there are spoilers.)

The main character of Analogue is a literal anime girl, who introduces herself to you as *Hyun-ae (the asterisk acting as shorthand denoting an AI). She and the game’s second most important character, *Mute, are diegetically 2-dimensional illustrations appearing on computer screens. (Specifically, the game uses a “remote terminal” conceit, similar to what I described last time.) The player is tasked with discovering the history of a ghost ship in space, and it’s by the end of the first act, *Hyun-ae reveals that that history is first and foremost her own backstory. Even as she acts cute and affectionate toward the player character (who it’s difficult not to treat as synonymous with the player themself, particularly in Hate Plus), it becomes clear that she unambiguously killed a whole lot of people. The final act of her route is essentially her defense, revealing her appalling abuse and mistreatment in the ship’s final years (and Hate Plus all but says outright that the society at that point was already well past Super Fucked). Ultimately, the player is given the choice as to whether or not to actually download the AI whose route they were on, which could be treated as an actual endorsement or rejection of each character’s faults, of which there are many. But obviously leaving them in grim solitude forever doesn’t leave much room for the sequel.

*Mute’s story is the anchor of Hate Plus, in much the same way that Analogue is about *Hyun-ae (likely even more so), and as a result, almost every “serious” interpretation of the game I’ve seen focuses on it. Personally, having expected that it was the “real” game, I played it first, and I was completely wrecked emotionally for a week after finishing it. (In a different way from the normal way that I’m wrecked all the time, of course.) It took me a lot longer to appreciate *Hyun-ae’s path, which, particularly because of the extremely unusual and meta sequence opening the third day, seems to be commonly viewed as something of a joke in comparison. (Though, if nothing else, the dialing back of her obsessive attachment to the player is greatly appreciated, as understandable as it perhaps was in Analogue.)

A lot of science fiction has a tendency to focus on questions of “what it means to be human”, generally by contrasting people with aliens, computers, or robots, who are written to be mostly like people, but not quite. The most famous examples may be from Star Trek, with characters like Data and Spock who struggle with being, essentially, “partly human.” And while this was a central premise of the AI characters even in Analogue’s predecessor Digital: A Love Story, the early revelation that *Hyun-ae was once a living human who now exists solely as a techromantic ghost skips Hate Plus right past all the weird philosophizing about humans being somehow extra special.

At the very beginning of the game, before getting into pretty much any of the actual story, there’s a message replying to an unseen inquiry, akin to how all of the conversations in Digital worked. (This is quite possibly the most interesting and loaded part of the entire story for me, to the point that I could probably write another entire essay on it alone. Definitely not promising that one, though.) It is, essentially, an ad, pitched toward a human seeking a mechanical body to house an AI. Despite a brief mention of the company’s promised “95% of Standard Human Resolution” sensory functions, it’s heavily centered on the qualitative benefits of having a body. In other words, it’s selling the idea of being able to share human joys with a companion previously restricted to incorporeal existence in a computer.

Through the game, *Hyun-ae’s occasional side dialogues imply in several ways that this is a concept that she holds very dear, especially because, long before even the backstory events in Analogue, she too was a human girl with a loving family. Both the second and third “days” of the game feature food-based rituals, and her 2D graphic mimes drinking soup and eating cake during these scenes.

Eventually, during the game’s ending sequence, *Hyun-ae asks if you’ll be able to get her a new body (she can’t read the message from earlier, since she’s nominally running on a virtual machine one layer lower). You can lie (ok, yes, there’s a very reasonable argument to be made that this is best for everyone’s safety, though during the course of the game another email message comes from an AI therapist offering to help), giving an ending where she’s displayed trapped in a cyberbirdcage. The other option, of course, is to agree to get her one, which then appears in both of the other endings. Throughout her dialogues, *Hyun-ae certainly seems most enthusiastic about being able to eat again, but that enthusiasm is inextricably tied to her memories of family. It’s less the food itself than the ways it’s symbolic of everything she’s lost.

*Hyun-ae isn’t looking for some elusive quality that makes her a human; she knows she already is one. What she wants, ultimately, is just to live again: to share old joys, have new experiences, and feel togetherness. After centuries having been denied all those things, it couldn’t be simpler. Perhaps it’s not the most profound statement about life, but it’s one I’ve felt is incredibly affirming on its own, and deeply appreciated as closure to what is overall a very heavy and overwhelmingly tragic narrative. And you get cake, too, while you’re at it. What a great game.