#sooooooooooo mentally ill about him

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I am SOOOOOO normal about chip jrwi I'm so normal I'm so so so so normal about chip jrwi IM SOSOS FUCKIGJGNG NORMAL ABOTUT THSIS GUY IM NORMLA IM NORMAL IM NORMAL <- gnawing at the bars in its enclosure

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Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love 💗

Hey, hi anon!! Thanks a lot for this, I enjoy gushing as much as any fic writer :3

#1 and closests to my heart, is Fathers and Daughters

You can tell I was mentally ill about it, because I'm forever struggling to finish WIPs, the ADHD constantly going "Oooh shiny new idea? Just take a break, this will be a one shot" only to lie to me, or do it X times in a row. But not with F&D. I stayed glued on to that one.

Yeah I had a couple long hiatus, but I'm finally working on the last chapter and I can tell you I'm going to be taking myself out to dinner to congratulate lol

I passed 100k words!!! I never thought I'd manage. I don't think I'll ever manage again!

#2 Then the dreadful night shall break

A Dark!Obi-Wan fic. I had for a long time this back and forth with a friend, where we kept gifting each other more and more tortured Star Wars fics. So I originally made this a one shot focusing on the horrors of sleep deprivation (from first hand experience…) and how it might break even the kindest of Jedi.

Things snowballed and got out of hand, and it turned into what I think is my best Star Wars story. It's also titled after a line in Cradle Song by William Blake. I am weirdly obsessed with naming fics from his poems. Only him. IDK why.

#3 Never Too Late

Another SW story but on the other end of the spectrum, focusing on H/C. Set right after Episode 1, with Obi-Wan reaching out to Dooku, who hasn't turned to the dark yet. It's my second most kudoed fic ever after the 100k words one, so you know I was cooking and people liked the taste of it.

In general I love writing reluctant father figures, and Dooku - Obi - Anakin, at that time and place, are like the holy trifecta of reluctant daddies lol

#4 For Always

My Elden Ring masterpiece and foray into Monsterfucking. I was very sauced for "pubber" Maliketh the Black Blade, even before I played the game. I owe a lot to my friend Spiced for this one--without them there wouldn't be much fucking in this fic! I just like tragic hee-heem-whimper men and Maliketh is that but also with a broken mind, rags, a raspy voice, and paws large enough to make a doll out of us sooooooooooo…..

The irony is that this story has some of my most purple and stuffy prose, despite how horny I make it out to be. I really enjoyed this writing style.

Would you stay with him, henceforth? Would you cast away your humanity, sacrifice your mortality to give him companionship? Would you twine your fate to his? How you'd laughed, naive little thing, telling him that it was no sacrifice. You hadn't known better then, and he, a god, knew even less. He kissed you and licked at your throat. He felt you shiver and asked once more if you truly wanted this. You wanted him and immortality at his side seemed close enough. So you said yes, and he clamped his jaws down on your throat and killed you—one last time.

The sauce stings my eyes to this day. This is the good shit. I wish I could brainrot on characters like this at will.

#5....

This one is impossible to pin down. I have stories where I'm really proud of the writing. Stories where, like the one above, I still really taste the sauce, and the dynamic really appeals to me. Got plenty like that which would easily fit in 5th place. I could also mention the ones I still have very much on the fire, simmering even if they haven't updated in a while.

Fuck it. I'll go for Chosen.

A one shot I wrote while in Florence, often sitting out on a little balcony… It was such a nice place and such a sweet time… And I packed the story with these (bitter) sweet feelings and tried to explore what would happen with Anakin died killing Grievous, leaving Obi-Wan lost, and Ahsoka fearing nobody will chose to take her on again.

It also has some of my favourite prose ever, in the way I wrote (for the second and better time) the backstory of major blorbo Taron Malicos. Nobody ever cares about this bit but I think it's the best part of the fic LOL

Thanks again anon! I'm spreading the love now in my mooties' ask box.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

hello! I once heard the opinion that the zutara fandom (the loudest and most toxic part of it, of course, we are not talking about normal people who just enjoy their ship) has features of cultist, sectarian thinking and organization. I haven't thought about it much, but recently a friend of mine who understands quite a lot about cults and sects and to whom I showed the most popular zutara blogs and their meta tags here, tumblr (I didn't push him on this idea, we were just chatting about fandoms) said that according to the type of thinking zutara's fandom has features of a religious cult. this thought seemed interesting to me. what do you think about it?

I'd say it's true, but it does not apply solely to Zutara, or even to the ATLA fandom.

I lost count of how many times I've seen some legit insane news here in Brazil about angry fans of some soccer team violently beating, or straight up murdering, people that were wearing the "wrong" t-shirt after a game.

Harry Potter had the weird thing with the Snape wives, and now has the current cult-like TERF bullshit JK Rowlling encourages on a daily basis.

One of my cousins is VERY into K-pop and told me some WILD shit about some idols literally have to sign contracts that forbid them from dating (or at least publicly dating) anyone because half of the marketing around their persona is "You, regular person, could totally date them!" and faced some ABSURD backlash, including death threats towards them and their partners, when they were revealed to be in a relationship.

Anything, no matter how mundane, can be used by some disturbed people to excuse/encourage awful behavior. It's usually a result of desperate, lonely people needing to find ANYTHING that makes them feel like they belong, are part of a group, of a community, to the point that they shut off from anything else and become obsessed. That kind of thing has always existed, but BOY, has the internet made it sooooooooooo much worse.

I mean, seriously, just look at the things the "extreme" zutara fans do.

Creating whole conspiracies to justify why their was totally canon until some evil authority screwed it over, lying about anything and everything that happened both in canon and in the making of the show, even going as far as creating fake "evidence" of some huge power struggle between Bryke and other writers (mainly Ehasz).

Harrassing, bullying, doxxing and threatening anyone that has a different opinion, and justifying their actions with "Oh, but the people were doing this to ship Kataang/Maiko, which means they're all raging mysogynists, rape apologists, and 100% against interracial relationships."

The constant claims of "Bryke are creepy pedos because they only pushed Kataang because they are attracted to Katara, a cartoon character, and thus are attracted to real-life 14-year-olds! That's even the real reason why Aang is bald! To look like one of them!" that are not only ridiculous but could EASILY lead to a lawsuit, and ignores the fact that Zutara, like any popular ship, has tons of smut of it even though both characters are underage - make it make sense!

And, of course, the classic "This bad behavior people accused some of us of is completely false! I didn't see it, so it didn't happen! Nobody here would do that! Never one of us! Must have been one of them, the evil fans of kataang/maiko/(insert any ship for either Zuko or Katara here)!"

Some of the bad apples in the Zutara fandom are just entitled assholes, but I'm also pretty sure that some of these people legit need to see a mental health professional. There's being passionate about a ship and being upset that it didn't happen, and then there's being downright delusional.

And before anyone tries to pull the ableism card on me: I've been through this shit. Thankfully I've never reached the point of ever harming anyone in any way, but I was a mentally ill child/teenager that just latched onto the media I liked, and it made it my whole life.

I had full on panic attacks because the power went out and I couldn't watch my favorite TV show, and I'd cry for DAYS when something bad happened to my favorite characters. I legit started showing signs of depression because one of my favorite bands had broken up, to the point that my parents were really fucking scared. I got FURIOUS at an annoying classmate in school who talked shit about my favorite singer, to the point that I legit had to get away from them as fast as humanly possible because I was three seconds away from starting a physical fight - again, all because a random kid whose opinion on literally anything else wouldn't have meant a damn thing to me.

That is not being passionate. That is not being a loyal fan. That is a clear sign that something is VERY wrong and that you need some help FAST. See a therapist, deal with whatever it is that is pushing you to act like that, THEN engage in fandom stuff as much as you want. But don't ever make this your whole personality.

[amplifyme]

@randomfoggytiger

Beyond Words, Beyond Silence...

Nan ties these episodes together brilliantly. She also captures Cathy sooooooooooo well, building more on her self-doubt than the little bits of cursory examination we were given ("In telling her what he believed, he'd also been telling her what she desperately wanted to hear - that their relationship existed on a different plane from anything she'd ever known"-- I CALLED IT. Proud of myself.)

Yep, you called it! 😁

it makes me giddy to see the throughlines (including the children and swimming, the Other and the cave-- both wanting that undivided, appraising attention.) Vincent's poem tying to back to Cathy and his fervency in tearing apart his room, breaking into her place, and driving himself into a fever until she quoted the poem back was superb.

The need for that undivided attention is also a call back to Vincent's demand in A Ceremony of Innocence. "Look at me, Catherine. Look at me!" Look at all of me and see all of me. Love all of me, if you can. Because the Other is a part of me and loves you too.

"Now she wondered if she'd been right to discount the unfitting things. If refusing to acknowledge all the anomalies - the number and scope of them! - she'd been dismissing the forest to see only the one preferred tree.... But they weren't deformities: they were Vincent. Maybe even the most of Vincent."

Nan did not pull any punches. Cathy needed a good "Come to Jesus" moment or two, and Nan gave us those.

As a final note, when Vincent speaks with shame about parts of himself and Cathy assures him those parts aren't him, I wondered how that would sound if he were a normal man with a comparable struggle; and the quickest comparison that I could think of-- though clumsy-- was mental illness. I'm mostly ignorant on this topic, so pardon my thoughts if they're too off target; but I sat wondering how it would feel if he were in the midst of a mental health crisis with everyone treating him like he needs to be "fixed", with restraints or with their love. And the shame and closed-in aloneness of that experience seems comparable in a few degrees, though of course you can't factor in his primal nature. Cathy's grand gestures of sweeping dismissal in the name of "this" not being "him" hits pretty close, as it would be denying an aspect of who Vincent is by pretending it can be weathered and then ignored-- and more tragic, because it would be spoken through well-meaning ignorance.

This whole passage is brilliant and I couldn't agree more. And when you think about it, what Vincent struggled with was a mental illness of sorts. There are those who believe V suffered from Multiple Personality Disorder caused by the trauma of his birth and immediate abandonment. Certainly Nan based much of her Vincent/Buster split in AWTN on that belief. And it makes sense that MPD would manifest in Vincent differently simply because he's different.

That whole sweeping aside of his differences and his otherness by not only Cathy but everyone else who knew and loved him had to have had a deep impact on him. Likely causing his lifelong habit of never addressing his otherness with anyone. He was just supposed to act like everything was fine, that he wasn't feeling the things he was because they were somehow "wrong" or a burden on those he loved. It's absolutely the same struggle that some folks have with mental illness. Think back on Outlook in AWTN, where young Vincent is always censoring himself and his feelings and needs because others might find them unacceptable. Because he's been told they're unacceptable.

Vincent is an almost unsolvable puzzle, not only to himself but to those who love him - including the fans. He's someone I'll never get tired of exploring, just as with Mulder. Like I said, layers upon layers.

Okay, one final thought and we'll put this one to bed. You did get that it was Buster with Catherine in the cave, not Vincent, right? That's important moving into S3.

[kidcooper02]

ive been dwelling on this hc for a while but what if ed’s maternal side of the family was cattle ranchers out in the country. he and his parents would go and visit every summer when he was young and he learned how to ride really well and can do a bunch of roping tricks and whatnot. his abuelo gave him a little filly one year and he named her pimiento and helped train her. he misses her and has her picture in his room in taos (im white so i hope im not stereotyping with argentinian cattle rancher). also “horse girl ed” is a brainworm i currently can’t get rid of

I can't answer on the Argentinian front since I'm Mexican BUT I ADORE COWBOY AND VAQUERO CULTURE SO ED BEING SOME FORM OF THAT IS SOOOOOOOOOOO AAAAAAAA

I do wish we got to know more about Ed's family outside his father, and again using my own culture, the idea of owning lots of land and taking care of animals isn't a fair stretch of the imagination for me.

And horse girl ed....that's so funny. To bring up my other obsession, fire emblem, so many of those mentally ill bitches turn to horse girl phases to cope so Ed being like that just makes sense to me.

I also like when powers correspond to a person's personality/way of life, so Ed's teleportation could hypothetical have its roots in the maintenance of an animal caretaker. You have to really be in multiple places at once and jump around to keep everything in order, teleportation would help no?

AND ED KNOWING LASSO TRICKS?? THAT'D ACTUALLY BE COOL TO SEE HIM USE IN BATTLE, Wonder woman please train this boy he's got nothing but his bare fists cmon now

I just...love cowboys and Ed